Day #6: Good-bye Bandera ~ hello Austin

The very wild wild west of Bandera, TX
includes occasional deer bones
faithfully brought up to the house by Speedy (pet dog)

This is the outside of Nick and Rachel's house
Bandera, TX

We had a really full day today and are presently in Austin. Grandpa Jones is too exhausted to get the laptop set up and upload pictures, so I'm going to do a post without photographs to just briefly share our day. I'm doing this mostly for Nana because she checks the blog to see how all of us are doing.

This morning as we drove from Kerrville (where our hotel was) over to Bandera, we took the alternate route. On all of our previous trips, we took the fastest route ... but today, we took the rollercoaster ride that winds you around the back of the steep hills and valleys of Bandera County. The ride was an adventure. I don't think I've been on a steeper, curvier, crazier road since we were in Israel in 2004! Very beautiful to see the hill country from this perspective. We drove past numerous creeks and rivers ... that actually had water in them this year ... the drought is official over here in mid-Texas.

The day we played at the Toy Store in San Antonio,
the store clerk GAVE Nathan this funny green rubber
hat thing because she said she'd never
seen a child have so much fun with this ...

Lottie thought the green rubber "hat"
was pretty cool too.
Nathan wore it for awhile, but seemed to
prefer it on other people ...

We spent the morning just hanging out with Nick, Rachel and the kiddos at their house. What sweet and beautiful grandchildren. I'll have to post more pictures of them at a later date. I was sad to begin with this morning, because it's always difficult to say good-bye to one family as you are moving onto the next family. And Nick and Rachel are considering some very big changes in their lives in the near future ... PLUS ... Liam Calvin is due at the end of April but is threatening to arrive much much sooner than that. We hadn't seen Nick since September, and it was so good to see him again and share a few days with his family.
This is the train layout that
Grandpa Jones and Nathan built ...
they looked up different train layouts on the internet
and then built it together!
It was difficult for me to get a last picture
of Nia ... she really really enjoyed
her donuts throughout the morning ...
so this is Nia, with her donuts!

It was about noon when we pulled out from Nick's house, drove down to the Medina River so that I could snap a few pictures, and then headed on over to Austin.

This is the Medina River ...



A very pretty place ~ don't you think?

We arrived in Austin at 3:00, hoping to be in time to meet Jackson at the bus stop. As it turns out, Jackson has been sick the past few days and has missed three days of school this week. We were enthusiastically greeted by both Jackson and Karis and had a fun afternoon with them. Jackson seems to be on the mend, but has a bad cough. He is still hoping to play in his T-ball game tomorrow morning ... and Grandpa Jones and I are looking forward to watching him do that very thing.

Grandpa and Karis

Olivia came home from school at about 5:00 and later in the evening, we met Andrew and had dinner out. Everyone has just been tucked into bed and now it is time for us to ... crash and get some rest. We'll try to post some pictures with

tomorrow's post ... for now, good night!

Jackson Drew showing us how to do the computer ...

P.S. Photographs were added Saturday, March 6