Wednesday, April 19, 2017

Around OakMeadows

This is a Question Mark butterfly. It was the first one that I have ever seen. 

Around OakMeadows 

We took a weekend trip to the National Butterfly Center in Mission, TX last weekend. It is about a 5 1/2 hour drive so we always leave about 5 am.  I wanted to stop in Edinburgh on the way to go to the World Birding Center, but when we got there, it was closed for Good Friday. I was disappointed because it is a wonderful wetlands park. Next trip.  Fortunately, the Butterfly Center was open and we spent about 2 hours meandering through it.  I will post photos next week. Saturday morning we drove down to South Padre Island Nature Center and had a wonderful time meandering around there too. Then it was time to come home. 

I needed to stop at the grocery store before going home. All I can say is Do not EVER go to the grocery on Saturday afternoon before Easter.  It was packed!! We are spoiled by being able to do our shopping early or during the week and were totally put off by the crowd. Anyway, we got our groceries and finally arrived home. As always, nice to go, nice to come home. 

We went to see Beauty and the Beast. It was pretty good, sweet romance. I love Emma Watson and didn't know she could sing. 

I am so pleased with the way my Scrap Quilt top is coming along. I may be able to get it together next week. 

I'm reading two really good books. By Its Cover by Donna Leon is one of the Commissario Brunetti mysteries set in Venice. I think it is about #20 in the series and they never get old.  The other is The Serengeti Rules by Sean Carroll. It is about how Nature limits growth from the microbiological level to the ecological level. Very interesting.  

We have had more Monarchs this year than we have ever had. One day this week there were at least 20 on the property. Lots of caterpillars on the milkweed too. I counted 5 chrysalis on the back porch. Lots of Queens too mostly on the blue mist flowers.  I am so fortunate to have this beautiful property and all the beautiful creatures on it, birds and raccoons, butterflies and caterpillars and the beautiful trees.  

I had planned for 2017 to be a Year of the Salad where I learn to make one new salad each month. I did this one year for Soup and made 12 new soups and one year was the year of Muffins. It is a simple way to make sure to try new things. But this year, I just haven't been doing the salad as planned. So I bought a cookbook, Mighty Salads and next week I will pick out a salad for May. We shall see. 

Friday is our monthly lunch with P&W&C&B. We have to steer carefully around topics of religion, politics, or climate change. But if those are avoided, it is a very pleasant lunch.  

That's all the news from OakMeadows where the cats think we are their concierges and mostly we are. 

1 comment:

Sallie (FullTime-Life) said...

I enjoyed this post so much. It's great to know that the Monarchs are doing well somewhere at least and that it is in your backyard makes me even happier.

Practically all of our friends here at the RV Resort fit into the category of people like your luncheon group. quite lovely people as long as you stay away from those very topics. This has been hard for me to accept. I want those who disagree with me to be more easy to identify ;>)... I am learning (seriously).