Winter here in Mission, Rio Grande Valley, is not as nice and warm as the past two years we have been here. We have been having some cold and rain and everyone around is hoping it will warm up soon. I am sure it will as winter can't last too long around here. I just keep telling myself that it is not as cold as it is in the North and we can live with this. We did have some very cold nights, below freezing and a warning was put out for the fruit corp. Since we have two ruby red grapefruit trees and 4 orange trees, we had to do something. We were told at the park meeting that if it gets below 28 degree for more then 6 hours it would ruin the fruit and it would be best to pick the fruit. We did just that and then got out our juicer and made orange juice and froze it. We were lucky that the place we are buying has a very large freezer in the shed and that is where the juice ended up.

From 2010 - January

All the parks are filling up and all park and valley activities are in full swing. I am still doing computer club on Monday mornings. Over the Christmas break, we offered informal computer help instead of the class like setting we do. That format went over very well. The skill level of seniors are so different and it is hard in class to make sure everyone is understanding what is going on and what to do. Then too, we have new people arriving new each week and if they are new to computers, it is a catch up to what we have covered already in class. Thanks to one of the instructors, he has offered to open up the meeting room and have that informal one on one help for 3 days a week and some of us go up to help with that. My other big activity is line dancing and if I get a chance, it meets four times a week. Due to my having a cold or sinus problems the past week or two, I have not been attending line dancing but hope to get back to it this week.

On Friday the 8th we had an appointment with our lawyer and cosed on our new place. We are now the proud owners of our next home. I still do not have photos to share with you of the inside, as the couple we bought it from are still there. We will be getting it on March 1st. We have spent a lot of time with them and feel like old friends. They are from Canada and we have agreed on March 1st as they want to spend more “warm time” here. We have started to move some things over to the new place. We had some things at our place in Bentsen Grove that we wanted to take with us and since we are selling it furnished, we needed to change out a recliner. We took Roger's new lazy boy over to new place and brought one of their recliners over here. We also had an area rug we had bought last spring and we wanted to take it with us. When we show the place at Bentsen Grove we felt we should have the things in it we are going to be leaving, not have to tell them “ and we are going to take this, replace it with this, we are going to take that, etc. Also, it doesn't hurt to declutter. Now Roger is wondering what he is going to do with all the things he kept when we sold our place in Stanwood. We have a storage garage rented and I must say, it is full. When we get back to Iowa this spring/summer we will have to go through things and do some more sorting and thinning out. When you buy a furnished place, you just don't need all the things you thought you needed.

After waking up Christmas morning and opening our gifts to each other, Roger decided to take the trash to the dumpster and drop our plates off at the hall so we could get our place for dinner. After going outside to get his bike, he came back inside and informed me someone stole his 21 speed bike. We ended up calling the Sheriff after dinner and making a report, but it seems there have been many, many bikes stolen from this park and others in the area. Who ever it is, crawls under the fence, finds the bikes and throws them over the fence where they are loaded into a truck and then they are back under fence and gone. We did do some looking at pawn shops to see if it showed up, but that didn't do any good. Spent a day checking out new bikes, but decided to wait. Our friends (Larry and MaryAnn) from the park next to our, called us and said they had friends in their park who wanted to sell a 7 speed bike. That is what Roger had decided he wanted. He never did use all the gears on the 21 speed. He ended up buying it and is now back to riding his bike.

From 2010 - January

We are keeping busy despite the cool weather and the time seems to be flying by. Still have our place at Bentsen Grove up for sale and seem to show it a couple times a week. With all the people arriving in the valley, we are just waiting for that right person to come look at it.

Merry Christmas

Boy, have we been busy. We put our place here at Bentsen Grove Resort up for sale and have had a few lookers, but nothing serious yet. It takes a little extra time each morning to make sure it is all clean and ready to show, just in case some one stops in or calls to see it. The park has a notebook in the office with a listing of units for sale. I made up a page to add for our place. We also have a sign up on the unit so and then it is word of mouth. We will put it in the "Winter Texan Paper" after the first of the year. Hopefully we will get someone that is interested in it.

On the 14th we made a trip to Hidalgo for their Christmas light display. Hidalgo is South of McAllen. We went with Larry and MaryAnn from the park next to ours. Of course we went out to eat first then went for the light show. This is our 3rd winter here and the first time we made it down to see the lights. What a great time we had and the lights were wonderful, so much to take in and it seemed like I was sitting on the wrong side of the trolley to get the pictures I want. Now if I can remember next time to site on same side as driver, I will get pictures of other side. LOL Most of the pictures we taken from moving trolley, so not as good as I would of liked. Also, I haven't learned how to use all the features on the new camera, so that would improve them also. Be sure to click on picture to take you to rest of photo's in "My Photo Album".

From Hidalgo lights and Green Gate parade

Roger has signed us up for Christmas dinner here at the park, it will be at noon, then we will pack up and head to Valley View (were our new place is) and have pot luck with them at 5pm. Boy are we going to be stuffed. I just don't know why we need to have two big meals that day, but as the saying goes...............whatever.

Yesterday morning, I received a phone call from my sister, Linda. She drives truck and was headed this way with a load and wanted to know if we could meet up with her. We had made planes to meet with the couple we are buying our new place with, to go see a lawyer. So I told Linda we could meet her before that. We then took off to check at our old park to see if our packages had been delivered there, then on to meet Linda. She wasn't here yet, but would be around 10:45am, so we headed for Weslaco where she was to unload. We waited till she got there, which was around 11:30 and then went for lunch. Left there and met with Jack and Sharon and lawyer and waited for Linda to call after she got unloaded and knew what her next load would be. She hadn't called, so I called her and she said she was just finished unloading and didn't know about another load yet, so she was going to head to Flying J and park there and get back to me when she found out. After leaving Jack and Sharon, we started for home, on way got a call from Linda, she didn't have a new load and would find out in morning if she got one then. I dropped Roger off at home (we were almost there) and I took off for the Flying J in Edinburg to pick her up. She was going to spend the night at our place, and I would take her back to her rig in the morning or when she found out about a load. Low and behold, we weren't even back home yet and she got a call, she had a load to pick up in Huston by 11am the next morning so she couldn't spend the night and would need to go back to Flying J. Roger was at park next to ours watching a gulf cart Christmas parade so we went there to get him, so he could ride back with me. Buy this time I had not had any supper and hadn't eaten since the Subway sandwich we had for lunch. It was back to Flying J and home again. I felt like I had been driving all day. Regardless, it was good to see Linda and spend a little time with her.

Like I said before, Roger went to Green Gate park to see the gulf cart parade there. We have some friends there (the ones we went to Hidalgo with) and he had is gulf cart in parade. Roger took pictures, so be sue to check them out.

From Hidalgo lights and Green Gate parade

I seems we are ready for Christmas, both of us have finished our shopping and have our cards and packages mailed. We have received packages from three of our five kids and know of one more on it's way so everything is a go. Then we have our plans for 2 dinners and the day spent with friends, Dick and Darlene. All that is left is to wish:

Merry Christmas to all our family and friends from Mission, Texas

Our New Place

We made it back over and took some pictures of our new place. Now please remember we are still at Bentsen Grove and won't be moving into new place till March. We did take the motor home over and have it parked on the pad there and hooked up to electric. The couple we are buying from are so nice, we seem to stay and have a good chat with them each time we go over. It helps to have our good friends, Dick and Darlene across the alley, so we stop and chat with them also. Here are the pictures, be sure to click on the first one and it will take you to My Photo Albums. Then you can view all of the pictures of the place.

From Our new place

The computer club went to lunch yesterday and we had a good time. Class seemed to go pretty good. I did a hands on class with everyone making a file, saving it, then going to documents and making a folder to put it in. We then dragged and dropped it into the folder.

While we were out to eat, the subject came up of our moving (some of them read my blog) and one of the couples wanted to come over and look at our place here. We haven't put it up for sale yet, but they seamed interested. Have to wait and see, we have a lot of time.

Hope you enjoy the photo's, till later..................Happy Trails

Happy Thanksgiving

We have been in Mission for over a month now and getting back into the swing of things. Computer Club here at the park is meeting every Monday morning and they have asked me to teach the beginners class. I was a little worried about this as I am no pro at computers but said OK anyway. Thanks to some DVD's I bought from Geeks On Tour, I have used them in class and they seem to have saved the day. Now mind you, I do some of the class on my own as well, but the videos have helped a lot. The first weeks lesson was on using the mouse, and basics such as WordPad, the desktop, etc. The second week was learning about getting on the Internet and a little about how to navigate around. This past week, we went into email. We have everyone open a Gmail account from Google and that way everyone is following along on the same screen. Most of them bring their laptops and we have tables set up and it looks and feels like a real classroom. The club also has and advance class which follows the beginners and I feel if I learn just one thing each week, I have learned.

I have also started back with line dancing. They are meeting about 4 days a week, so far I have not made all 4 days in one week. Just seems I have something else going on. They also have a beginners and an advance class. I was going to the beginners (and I still do quite a bit), but I really get a little bored, as every time a new person shows up, it is like stating all over again. With my dancing background, I think I catch on pretty well, so I have decided to attend more of the advance classes. I may go to some beginners classes also.

The park will be having their big Thanksgiving dinner at the hall on Thursday. We have signed up to bring a desert so I will be making pumpkin pie. They have different colored pages to sign up on and that is the group you will sit with during dinner. We are with the orange group. Each color group has serving tables with their food so the lines aren't too long. We have been in some parks, that if you are one of the last tables to be called to get your food, everything is picked over and some of it is gone and by the time you sit down to eat, the people who were first are getting up and heading home. Real get together time there, don't you think?

The park had it's first craft sale and I had my table, but November is not a good month. First of all there are a lot of people who do not come down till after Thanksgiving. Also, people have spent money traveling here, have expenses when they get here, food to buy, etc. so they are not spending there money at craft sales. I made a whopping $13.50 and then had to pay out $3 for the table. Wasn't hardly enough to buy lunch, so went home to eat. I am hoping Dec. will be better. I am making some poinsettia pot holders for the Christmas sale. Hope they are different enough that they will sale.

We have been spending time visiting other parks where you can own your own land and looking at other units. One of the things on our wish list was to have a space to park the RV on the same lot and most of the parks you can't do that. We even went and looked into new mobile homes. Saw some really nice ones, but with the price and then having to buy a lot, and the set up fees and putting on a Texas room, it would be way over our budget. We kept going back to one unit we spotted and even made two showings of it. The owners live in Canada and were not down here yet, Roger talked to them on phone, but we decided to wait till they got here. We went to see them on Sunday and after talking to them for a long time, we decided to buy it. We have put money down on it and will work out all the details later. They want to stay down here till March so we will not be moving till then. It does have a pad for RV with sewer, water and we will put in the elec. hook up for RV. It is 2 bedroom, 2 bath, living, kitchen, laundry and yes, a Texas room. It also has a large covered deck and one small shed and one large shed that is set up as a work shop with over head storage. It is at Valley View park and our friends live right behind this place so it will be handy. We are excited about it, but it will be a long wait till March.

May you all have a very Happy Thanksgiving and enjoy your family and friends.

In Mission - Bentsen Grove

We arrived here in Monday (19th) around 4:30pm. It is good to get here and get settled in. We are still working on the settling in thing. Have to take RV to the storage area today. We parked RV across the street and unloaded it after cleaning our trailer. I can't believe we had so much stuff to unload. with my crafts and Roger's tools he brought, it took awhile. Roger got my 3 wheel bike out of shed and filled the tires with air. I am ready for a bike ride now. We were going to take one last night, Roger got the front tire on his bike put on and went to fill it with air, and blew the inner tube. Now he has to get a new tube. We took a walk instead.

There really isn't much to write about as not much happening in park right now and our friends aren't here either. I want to make it to the pool today and I want to check out the exercise room and show Roger how to use some of the equipment. We did take our pop cans to the recycle area and crushed them, then to the hall and read the bulletin boards. Seems they are having garage sales here this Sat. and a Halloween party on the 31st. We also signed up for flu shots for next Tuesday. Wow...........isn't that all exciting??? Not really, but like I said before, not much to write about.

The weather has been nice, in the 80's. Slept with the air on last night, haven't done that for awhile. We were sleeping with heater running all the way down here. The fruit trees in our yard are full of grapefruit and oranges, but they are still green so it will be awhile before we get some of that great fruit.

We did venture out yesterday and did some driving round and looking at other parks for mobile homes for sale. I can see this is going to take awhile to find the right price and everything we want. I like the park we are in, but we lease the spot and own our trailer. The activities in this park are great and I have made many friends. Roger wants to own the land as well as the mobile home and many parks are set up that way. It is the activities in those parks that sometimes are not up to par with what I want. Roger doesn't do activities, so it really doesn't mean anything to him. Also, we have a wish list of what we want this time around, so finding everything is the challenge.

"How beautiful a day can be when kindness touches it"

Too Cold.......Left Iowa

Wow, the title says it all. It was cold and they turned off the water at the campground we were staying at, we checked into another one, but they were going to turn off water too. Roger called both the Dr's and they got him in on Monday (12th) so Tuesday morning we took off for the south.

When we left our place in Stanwood, the satellite box was one of the last things we took out, and wouldn't you know, I pulled all the wires off the box, went to back of TV and gathered up wires and then missed the power cord for satellite box. Called the new owner and she found it and dropped it off at our son's house who lives a half a block away.

Monday while Roger was running around doing his DR appointments I spent the day at daughter, Sandy's house doing laundry. Took my lap top with me and the cord with my Verizon USB card and when I left, I left the cord. Didn't get lap top out of bag till last night and had to call Sandy to see if it was there. Now they have to mail it to me. They are going to overnight it and we will pick it up at a post office close by. I just can't go without my Internet. I must have a block for cords.

We are at Mark Twain Landing campground outside of Monroe City, MO right now. Will go into Monroe City and check at post office tomorrow, if the cord is there, we can move on, if not it will be another night here. I must say this is a very nice campground, but it is still cold here. Don't know how much further we will have to go South before it gets warmer. I went to office today and she gave me the code to use the Wifi here, so I am now almost a happy camper. We have cable TV here, but no ABC. I watch alot of ABC, so having some withdrawal with that.

Tuesday morning before we left, Roger had to drive back to Stanwood and stop at post office as we needed to pick up mail (they were closed on Monday, Columbus Day). He also had to go back to Dr for blood test. Besides picking up mail, I asked him to get me 100.........forever stamps. He gave me the check book when he got home, the check was for $80.80, then he gave me the stamps. He had a total of 20 stamps....................WHAT..........20 stamps for $80, WOW. I guess he and the gal at the post office did not understand each other. I called her this morning and she said she changed to check. I guess my lost cords aren't that big a deal now.

Not much more news, we are glad to be on our way, just wish it was warmer. Checked weather in Mission and still in 90's there with some 80's. Sure sounds good to me right now.

Paper's signed.....we are now homeless

We closed on our home yesterday and are now moved out and sitting in a campground in Cedar Rapids. I must say it was a lot of work those last 4 days. I am soooo tired, getting to old for this. We have some mixed emotions about it, will not miss the town of Stanwood, never really made any friends there but we will miss the mobile home. We really liked that place, just hope we can find a good place in Texas that is as great. There is no hurry to find one, we want to be certain so we don't have to do this moving again.

Roger has Dr. appointments on the 19th and 20th and we will be leaving here after that. We are going to take this time to try to see all our friends and family and get a few things done we have been putting off. Who know, we might even take in a movie. While living in Stanwood, it was always a long drive to Cedar Rapids, so didn't get to do some of those things. It is getting quite cold here, and our old bones are not use to this, we are looking forward to heading south.

Till later