Life at 65!

Spoonbill John photographed

It’s been a while since my last posting.  We’ve obviously settled into life in Rockport and I find myself busy with lots of things.  The big event this week was my 65^th birthday – yep, I’m now on Medicare and hope it lasts.  I’ve been attending the weekly activity meetings and, as usual, finding it hard to keep quiet.  My mind is constantly ticking trying to come up with resolutions to problems the groups encounters and wham, up goes my hand!  I’ve been approached numerous times to run for Chair/President of the group but I’ve been very good at saying NO.  In the meantime, John and I did agree to oversee the setting up of tables and chairs for various events.  Although there are several, I think once we’ve done a few, we will find this a great way to serve and hopefully keep the stress level down.  The first event was a bit bumpy as it was a learning experience and we caught some flack but that’s okay.  Round two is Saturday and I’m feeling good that it will go smoothly.  What concerns me the most is setting up for Christmas dinner next year.  They had well over 100 people this year and the folks must go through a food line in a room that was packed. 

One of the things that I have found fantastic is that before any food related event, the group prays.  How awesome is that.  Before we start the activity meeting we pledge to the American flag!  This group is very God and country oriented. 

Pelicans waiting for food at a cleaning station

From the time John retired he assured me that I didn’t need to worry about him finding something to keep himself busy but that’s hard for me to do.  He can entertain himself all day on a computer and in front of the TV.  He eventually went and visited with the man that heads up the group that gets together and carves wood but just couldn’t seem to get excited about that.  Then he gave a lot of thought to doing something with photography and although that excites him, he didn’t want to just take pictures and not do anything with them.  This past month he finally decided to try working with stained glass again.  This is something he dabbled in before I knew him and what he wants to learn to make is stained glass figures with metal windchimes. So, the packages started arriving after he ordered all the items he needed online and then we made a trip to Hobby Lobby to select stained glass and to Lowes to get tension shower rods to make the chimes with.  He has done a lot of research on the chimes and is now getting started.  I’m excited for him. 

The photography hasn’t gone by the wayside though.  We both love to take pictures to share on Facebook and currently we are interested in getting pics of all the beautiful large birds here in the Rockport area.  Of course, our biggest desire is to find and photograph the ‘whoopers’ (Whooping Cranes).  We’ve been given a lot of info on where to find them during the day so it means a few trips to that location and just waiting them out.  We did finally order a very large telephoto lens that requires a tripod to hold it steady since it’s so long hoping that will help us when trying to photograph wildlife from long distances.  We’re still working on how to use the lens so I’m thankful John has had lots of classes in photography.

I’ve also been helping a neighbor learn to blog and organize photos on her computer, which is something I really enjoy doing.  She and I seem to have clicked as friends and it turns out that she doesn’t live far from my hometown in Minnesota.  We did have to enlist some help from John as she works on a Mac, which I have no experience with, so we could figure out how to organize her photos.  The file management system on a Mac is definitely different from a PC.  She seemed very pleased with her computer lessons.

Stock photo of whoopers

This week we finally made a day trip to north Houston to visit with my sister and her husband.  They are always so gracious about allowing us to bring our fur babies with us who are usually much better behaved than many children.  While we visited, they had a blast running through the house for a bit.  Bailey loves to run fast and doesn’t bet to do it very often since they both must be on leashes every place we go.  When I take her to a dog park she just smells and smells and smells but no running.  At least she will run when we are at our place at Cedar Blue.  We also played cards and then had a nice dinner out before heading back to Rockport. 

I hope to be able to post some pics of whoopers that we take soon so more to come.