A TOUR OF THE SHIP

I decided that the best way to show you the ship tour was to put in a slide show form as well. Enjoy. We certainly did! (If you mouse over the photos you can read the titles of the ones I have labeled)

ICE SHOW AT SEA

FAMILY BIRTHDAY FUN AND SAILING THE BRIGHT BLUE SEAS

Sometimes it's difficult to know where to begin. The last part of February was very cold, very busy and went by very fast. After all of our cold weather, we decided to take a short break and go to the sunny Caribbean for a week.

Several days before we left, we celebrated February birthdays with the family. Both February and October are very busy months for birthdays in our family. We had everyone over to celebrate Dayna, Rachel and Ethan's birthdays.

Boompa grilled wonderful steaks for all of us and we all made pigs of ourselves. He's become a marvelous chef (must take after our son)

After dinner, the birthday trio went to the little red monkey who was hanging from the ceiling fan in the den and got to pick their own $50 bill from the "monkey tree". Money always seems like a pretty safe gift since everyone can then get what they want for themselves. There's no exchanging for the wrong size or color as the color of green always works well.

It's hard for me to realize that Ethan is now 15 years old! Seems like yesterday that he was just taking his first steps. They grow up much too quickly!

The next day we packed and early Sunday morning we headed for Galveston and our cruise ship. The drive was easy and we were there by noon. I couldn't believe that we were able to get everything in these two bags (guess my teenie-weenie polka dot bikini didn't really take up too much space after all ;-)

Our ship was the Voyager of The Seas which was a Royal Caribbean International ship. We will be gone for 7 days and will stop in Cozumel in Mexico, Georgetown in the Grand Caymans and finally Montego Bay in Jamaica.
Since neither of us are water babies anymore, we are really going just to enjoy the ship. And a beautiful ship she was indeed!

The 138,000-ton, 3,114-guest Voyager of the Seas became the world's largest cruise ship when it entered service in November 1999.
She has an ice skating rink, rock climbing wall, a 9 hole miniature golf course, spa, casino, heaven knows how many pools and Jacuzzis and a full sized basketball court, just to name a few of the amenities.

She was the largest ship that we'd ever seen, let alone been on, and she was truly wonderful. I must also add that our accommodations were very nice. We were able to get into our suite as soon as we boarded and the luggage arrived to our quarters within 20 minutes. I couldn't believe how very efficient they were. Here's a quick look at our suite.

As you can see, we had an abundance of drawer space and we didn't need it this time. I would have killed for this much space on our last cruise that lasted a month! It was like having all the comforts of home at sea.

The bath was a little small but we survived. We somehow managed to stay out of each other's way. We had two sinks plus a tub and a shower on the last cruise and that was great.This time we only had a tub with a shower in it, but the water pressure was great. If we'd only had a tub, that would be an entirely different story. We would have had to call for help to get out!

We even had a walk in closet. It was so nice to have enough room to really spread out!

We had a lovely dinner and were blessed to have delightful table mates, Melinda and Jim, from Houston.

Our table was on the third floor of the dining room and we had great waiters as well. We had requested a table of 6 but there was only the two of us which worked out very well.

Since tomorrow will be a sea day, I'll take you on a tour of this beautiful vessel and tell you a few funny things that have happened along the way, so stay tuned.
XOXO, Pcasso

WINTERTIME IN ARLINGTON

When we looked out the kitchen windows this morning we were greeted by this glorious sight. The snow continues to fall as the day progresses.

They have just announced heaviest snowfall since DFW airport opened 32 years ago. It's the perfect day for sitting by a roaring fire, sipping a cup of cappuccino and enjoying a good book.

I have a pot of Chili on the stove for dinner and we plan to chill out (literally) the rest of the day. The newscasters say that we have already had 6 inches of snow on the ground and we should expect another 6 inches by midnight. This is VERY unusual for our part of the country. Our Grandboys will love it and I'm sure they are hoping school will be canceled tomorrow so they can make a snowman. Enjoy the slide show as there will probably not be another like it for many years to come. And they talk about global warming ... I don't think so, at least not here in Texas!
XOXO, Pcasso

HOCKEY, OPOSSUMS AND BONFIRE CAKES

It's been such a long time since I've posted anything here. Autumn, my favorite time of year, has come and gone,

and the Cowboys have done the same.

I'm sorry to say and winter time is in full swing here in Texas and we're freezing to death. Frank did everything that he could possibly do to help the Cowboys out, from wearing this silly "helmet hat" to wearing his lucky Cowboy blue A&M T-shirt, but neither of those could get us to the Super Bowl.

We went to Arkansas for New Years and spent some time with our dear friends, the Firmins.

Charles surprised us all and helped with the dishes while we were at the cabin. That's not generally in his job description.

We spend most of our time when we're with them at their Lake house playing cards and he's officially in charge of the card shuffler! That's his main job on these outings.

From the time we get up in the morning until we go to bed, he is shuffling the cards as a signal that it's time to start the fun.
Right after we returned from the lake, we had a visitor in our back yard. This ugly little critter was thirsty and thought our pool was his own personal drinking fountain.

Actually he was quite large and very unfriendly. Take a look at those teeth!

I was more than glad to see him leave.

On Monday of each week I meet with my Group Reunion. This consists of me, two good friends, Kay and Diane, and we report on our spiritual journey the previous week with one another.

We talk about our Piety, Christian study and our Apostolic Action from the previous week so we can become better Christians. Group Reunion is part of the Cursillo movement which we have all been involved with for years. Meeting on a regular basis keeps us accountable to one another on our spiritual journey. When I don't meet I tend to slack off.
Speaking of slacking off, I've joined Weight Watchers again (for the umpteenth time) and am doing pretty well.

It's a wonderful program and holds me accountable for my food intake, exercise and good eating habits as well. Frank loves it when we're on the WW eating plan because I cook all the time and we eat much better than we do without a goal in mind. You have to plan ahead and that makes it much easier.
At the meetings you get a pebble for each pound you lose, so I'm keeping mine in this little decanter so I can actually see the pounds that I'm losing. It's a good motivator for me as I am a very visual person.
I've only been at this for 4 weeks so I'm doing pretty well. I hope to fill this up 2-3 times at least.

Our good friend, Bob Williamson celebrated his 80th birthday last week.

His darling wife, Cleo, gave him a dinner party and dance at Royal Oaks Country Club in Dallas. There was a big crowd and it was a wonderful affair.

Bob is an Aggie, so his birthday cake was a replica of the Bonfire that they hold each year in College Station.

They had a combo playing wonderful music and had also flown Doug Montgomery in from Santa Fe here to entertain us. In fact, there were quite a few people from Santa Fe in attendance. Here is Bob with Doug making his Birthday speech.

We had another surprise that evening. Clayton West, a jazz singer from Santa Fe was there also and he entertained us as well. We absolutely love his voice and love to hear him sing.

It was a wonderful evening and a good time was had by all.
When you have Doug Montgomery and Clayton West entertaining you plus good food, good friends and dancing, how can you possibly go wrong! It was great to have a little Santa Fe here in the Metroplex. Many thanks, Bob and Cleo!

A good friend of ours came over for dinner last week. He brought us this lovely orchid which is now gracing our kitchen table. Hope I can keep it alive.

Franklin's eldest son, Ian, has decided to play hockey again. He's always loved the sport, so he's taking lessons and will start in a league in the late spring. He's wearing his uncle's jersey in this shot.

He used to play roller hockey when he was a little guy and was very good, but now he's going for the real thing!

He also made the newspaper today. The Optimist Club of Arlington held their annual Orartorical Scholarship Contest where students from the Arlington School District participated. The subject of this year's debate was "Cyber Communication - Progress of Program".

He's the handsome one on the right in the back row. We're so proud of him.

Our great grandson, Ethan, is in a play at his school this weekend. It's an original play written by the students. I'm sure that he'll do well. I told him to break a leg. (Now let's hope that he doesn't literally do that!) He's a Cowboy fan along with his Grandfather.

I was in the mood to paint one day last week. We had a break in the cold weather and the back yard was full of dove and cardinals.

Since I had already painted a cardinal last year and there were too many dove, I decided on chickadees. Here is the results. It's a watercolor that I saw on line and liked. I've almost forgotten how to use this medium since I've been painting in acrylic for so long.

My computer monitor died, so I had to invest in a new one. It's much larger than the old one and I really love it. The images are much sharper and brighter so it really wasn't such a bad thing to lose the old one.

Guess I'd better go and get dinner started. We'll be leaving on a short cruise in a couple of weeks. It's so cold here that we have decided to take a little jaunt to the Caribbean for a week. I'll report back on our return.
Lent starts next week so have a Holy Lenten Season. It will be a good time for reflection for me. I need that to keep my priorities straight.
XOXO, Pcasso