It was an up and down week… Dominic achieved a huge milestone in Boy Scouts (more about that next week) but then had a rough moment in PE at school and got in trouble. We see the kids’ psychiatrist tomorrow in Austin and I’m expecting some changes in meds. Today was Anna’s transition ARD for high school, gulp. I LOVED the teacher I met and I think we have a good plan in place. Anna is so much happier and stable than she was in the beginning of the school year, I’m incredibly grateful for the great team she has at Church Hill. I hope high school goes as well!
Day One Hundred-Six ~ Kids’ Choice
It was Friday night and Curtis was not home yet from his work week in Minneapolis, so I let the kids pick where to eat. They chose Bosses Pizza in New Braunfels. It’s a great family-owned restaurant that has delicious pizza (but always order easy cheese or you’ll be engulfed with gooeyness) and burgers.
Nikon D750 | 35mm | f/5 | 1/400 | ISO 250
Day One Hundred-Six ~ Bosses
Like a boss at Bosses, ha. Dominic loves the French fries here and always orders them even if we are getting pizza. They coat the fries with a sugar salt, so they are sweet and salty.
Nikon D750 | 35mm | f/1.8 | 1/400 | ISO 1600
Day One Hundred-Seven ~ Ready to Orienteer
The very last requirement Dominic needed to achieve his First Class rank in Boy Scouts was orienteering (using a compass and map). His troop leader was supposed to do this with the boys at the last campout but something happened and they didn’t do it. So Curtis searched for two weeks for a permanent orienteering course in Central Texas with no luck. A permanent course has markers to denote specific compass points, latitude and longitude. After looking a little more, we found one at the Stephen F. Austin State Park outside of Houston. Road trip! Guess what? It wasn’t there anymore.
Nikon D750 | 35mm | f/3.5 | 1/400 | ISO 200
Day One Hundred-Seven ~ Wildlife Viewing Area
Even though Stephen F. Austin State Park didn’t have a permanent orienteering course, we decided to create our own since we’d driven 2.5 hours to get there. We picked a point on the map as a starting place and got started. Shortly on this trail, we found a Wildlife Viewing Area… alas, no wildlife was showing off at the time.
Nikon D750 | 35mm | f/3.2 | 1/400 | ISO 200
Day One Hundred-Seven ~ My Boys
My boys, Curtis and Dominic. Curtis is such a good father. He gets involved, he teaches, leads by example, and cares. I couldn’t ask for a better daddy for my son. Here we are about halfway through our adventure. Aren’t they the cutest???
Nikon D750 | 38mm | f/5 | 1/200 | ISO 400
Day One Hundred-Seven ~ Copperhead Trail
I love love love this photo… the light is soft and amorphous. The trail is named Copperhead and it even looks like a snake curving away into the distance. Then you’ve got the green branches curving into the trail with a tree trunk off in the distance also curving in the same direction. Did I mention that I love this photo?!? So proud of this!
Nikon D750 | 46mm | f/5 | 1/200 | ISO 400
Day One Hundred-Eight ~ Red Admiral
Sunday it was rainy (actually it’s been raining ever since). We got a short break with a minute of sunshine and I found a red admiral butterfly visiting our rose bush. Hello!
Nikon D750 | 105mm | f/6.3 | 1/500 | ISO 200
Day One Hundred-Nine ~ After the Rain
Monday it rained so hard and was so gloomy I thought they might cancel school (it was pouring buckets when the buses came!). There was flooding all around, especially in Houston. After the kids got home, I went out back with my camera to capture some of the gloominess.
Nikon D750 | 35mm | f/2.8 | 1/400 | ISO 200
Day One Hundred-Nine ~ Full Filter
Our pool ended up overflowing due to the torrential downpour. Curtis was nice enough to go out in the thick of the storm and start backwashing the pool. After it stopped raining, I noticed the waterfall was anemic which usually means the filters are full. Geez, full doesn’t quite cut it. I’ve never seen it that bad before! It doesn’t help that the live oak right over the pool is blooming and dropping pollen everywhere.
Nikon D750 | 35mm | f/2.2 | 1/320 | ISO 200
Day One Hundred-Nine ~ Very Pregnant
We’ve had construction in the lot that borders the back of our empty lot next to us. So we haven’t seen the deer in several months. I was so happy to see our resident momma doe back and obviously very pregnant. We had a fresh bag of deer nutrition which I loaded up in her trough. She was quite happy to have the snack. I wonder when she’ll have her baby?
Nikon D750 | 35mm | f/3.2 | 1/500 | ISO 400
Day One Hundred-Ten ~ Beauty Behind the Barbed Wire
I had to run to Brookshire Brothers in Canyon Lake the other day and on the way I found this incredible field of beautiful tiny yellow wildflowers. I love that they appeared behind a barbed wire fence… something about the beauty and softness of them juxtaposed against the barbed wire caught my fancy.
Nikon D750 | 105mm | f/4 | 1/500 | ISO 200
Day One Hundred-Eleven ~ Checking Her Pulse
Yesterday was Anna’s last day of PT. Here she is warming up on the recumbent bike for 10 minutes. She’s supposed to get her pulse between 120-125 and keep it there… I let her borrow my FitBit to check it. I’d like to get her one of her own.
Nikon D750 | 35mm | f/1.8 | 1/160 | ISO 200
Day One Hundred-Eleven ~ Graduation Gong
Since it was Anna’s last day at PT, she got to ring the graduation gong right before leaving. She was pretty darn excited and proud! Now we have a home program to keep her motivated. We need to work on strengthening her core and improving her posture. Anna’s kyphoscoliosis, lordosis, and balance are all worse. 🙁
Nikon D750 | 35mm | f/1.8 | 1/160 | ISO 400
Day One Hundred-Twelve ~ Trio
This morning was supposed to be the most fun outing I’ve had planned in ages… there is a beautiful goat farm (yes seriously!) down the road on 306 that has an acre of purple verbenas blooming. I’ve been itching to photograph those goats at sunrise in the flowers so I dropped a note in the mail to a non-address (gotta love a small town) to the owners and she called me! Alas, it was raining, AGAIN, so we had to postpone. The verbenas are almost gone, so I hope the rain lets up soon. In the meantime, I stuck my camera through the netting around our Monarch Way Station at the neighborhood clubhouse to get this shot. I thought it would probably rain all day so I better get something. Ha!
Thanks so much for looking! My last Paris post will be this Saturday. No one really commented on my Notre Dame photos, so I’m guessing most of you are pretty bored of my Paris pictures by now. Almost done, I promise! Smooches!!! Have a great week!
