Katherine at 30

I am especially fond of this photo of Katherine, as she turned thirty this year, and wanted to share it with you.

thinking of you all today,

Love,

Dad

My garden

Hey, Mom here,

I want to share my beautiful irises, gardenia, Easter lilies and black-eye susans from the backyard. Had an acquaintance who came two weeks ago to photograph our backyard as she wants to do hers in a similar way. We also gave her some of our bounty. Gave some to the neighbor last weekend also. I had forgotten how fast plants grow in Houston.

Hey, I will (read this as may) be on TV tomorrow. A few months ago, I joined a group of women who knit scarves for breast cancers patients, blankets for babies in Ben Taub (charity hospital) hospital, and blankets for premies and for the parents of still born babies. This group is also involved in making heart shaped pillows for all surgery patients in the city of Houston. In their fiscal year 2008-09 ending in May, the group donated 5300 items, which means that a person every two hours around the clock is the recipient of an item in the hospitals from Katy to the Medical center. I knit while I watch tv some I feel useful even when I watch tv.

Keep posted as I will send you pictures of my latest lace pieces.

Love to you all. Mom/Mance

First toe in the water....

Greetings from the dual bloggers, Tom here,

Maybe this can replace all the Emails I've been sending. I give you the Rangoon Creeper, extraordinary vine entwined around our front wrought-iron fence, that opens in bunches of 8-11 buds, that are anywhere from 2-3 white ones and the rest pink, for the first day. The second day all the white ones have turned pink and the pink ones are deeper rose. By the third day all are rose.

Has your bank screwed you lately? For years, Mance and I have forced all our credit charges onto our Smith-Barney credit card, which offers air miles at a dollar-on-the-airfare per-point, with exchange to any airline, not just, say, Continental.

When Mance called them today to book our flights to Spokane for Mollie's wedding using points, she was told the owners of Smith-Barney, Citibank, had "restructured" the air miles program, and without notice on March 1, reduced all air mile programs to one point equals one penny toward airfare cost. Instead of getting our Portland trip with miles, too, we barely had enough to get to Spokane.

Thinking revenge? Some counter-punch to such underhanded tactics to grab my wallet? Me, too, especially since they've enjoyed all our charges for so many years, and, are recipients of the big billions of bucks from our tax dollars in the bailout.

Oops, sorry, Citibank, to get some quick cash, sold Smith-Barney to Morgan-Stanley's Bank, and I imagine they were quite happy to only be saddled with one-cent on the dollar of Smith-Barney's air mileage club debts. So, they got us. But good.

I've spent the day painting, a tango theme I started fourteen months ago and left standing. It was fun! But made the day fly by....

Love,

Dad

Memorial Day Weekend Recap - Tristan

aahmiigaad, the pictures loaded the wrong order. whateba, you get the point. I edit laytr. Bbq, snowman on a hike, strawberries in the yard, hottie kickin' it in style. I left out the pic of me mooning the town from the top of the mountain, thought you would appreciate not seeing my hairy bootay. =) enjoy.





words to follow but thie pics must come from the home computer. it's late.

Memorial Day Weekend - Tristan

Since no one seems to be putting time into this, I thought I would shame you all and just start posting like mad until you were all jealous that you didn't have a fair amount of stuff on this blog. I changed my picture, it didn't seem difficult, all you have to do is click Save afterwards.

There is a full weekend of sun approaching the Northwest this weekend, and the 75 degree sunshine means hosting a late springtime bbq for me tomorrow afternoon and then Brie and I might head somewhere to camp for the rest of the weekend. Surf is blown out on the coast, 20-25 knot winds, which means 25-30 mph - unpleasant even for a lazy day at the beach, and I'm not that into kites - plus it's colder at the beach. The mountains still have snow at 5000 feet or so, which means a hike to the top of a small mountain around here means some spring snow. That might be fun. If I build a snowman I'll post a photo. Right now a sunny, dusty hike in shorts and a t-shirt on a river trail up to a waterfall sounds nice. Break out a watermelon at the waterfall and get wet in the icy snowmelt. We'll see.

Hope you all enjoy the R&R. I don't usually have trouble enjoying my weekends, so you can believe I'm up to something fun!

Love to all,
~Tristan

Yeah - really

I will have to do some reading as I have not a clue on how this blog is going to even post this writing. I have to arrive into the 21st century.

Got to my annual check up with my general practitioner today. Blood check, ecg, regular questions, measurements, weight, ah the fun of aging - it still beats the alternative.

12 cases of swine flue in one elementary school in Houston - in the Heights. School closed till further notice. Keep taking your vitamins, wash your hands and don't go close to anyone who is coughing.

Love to all. Mom

New Blog

Hello Peerys,

Just start posting things online here and then we can all view them! Whee!

Me confused

who are you? Who sent this- Princess Katherine