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Exploring Mission Tejas State Park Part III
The final post for Mission Tejas State Park! A few little morsels between photos but a write-up at the end! Indigo Milk Cap, Lactarius indigo: I was so excited to see this! The state park had shared a photo on social media a few days prior to our hike of this cool mushroom and I had seen someone else share their find in Ohio, so I put it on my bucket list to see one of these. We kept our eyes peeled for them but it was Chris who found them in an early morning hike before Forest and I got out of the tent. We went back later to…
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Surprise Pipevine Swallowtail!
Imagine my surprise when I got home at lunch today to find a pipevine swallowtail had eclosed in the butterfly cage! The pipevine chrysalides I have in the cage have been in there since September and I fully expected them to continue over wintering until spring. I still have two monarchs that have been darkening the last few days and figured I would see them out soon so when I saw a butterfly on the bottom of the cage I assumed it was one of them. But no, I was completely surprised! When I checked underneath the rock that the chrysalis had eclosed from I noticed it was the one…
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Exploring Mission Tejas State Park Part II
Hidden away on the Olen Matchett Trail near a remote corner at the front of Mission Tejas State Park are a set of old CCC tubs. Constructed when the CCC workers had set up camp to construct the state park, the tubs are a few feet downhill from a spring. Before our dinner the night we stayed at the state park we made one last hike to see what this interestingly labeled point on the state park map meant. At a slope behind the top of a hill we found the set of tubs. The spring was at the top, the clean rinsing tub in the middle, and the bathing…
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Christmas Cookies
We were supposed to be camping this weekend. And then the weather forecast last week stated temperatures in the 40s and rain starting Friday afternoon into early Saturday morning, tapering off around breakfast. The rain started later than anticipated on Friday so the rain became heavy by nightfall. The problem pipe draining our front yard still hadn’t been solved; Chris had been unable to pinpoint the actual issue. Friday night I started packing up my clothes and Forest’s clothes and a few other items, with Chris to bring in the storage bins for packing the rest of the gear later in the evening. However, the rain never let up. Secretly…
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On Sunday I got on our NextDoor group and saw that several people were posting about President Bush’s funeral train supposedly traversing a track that runs through a town very nearby. I can hear the train horns from inside our house, that’s how near this track is. Sure enough, I looked up the route and it was set to go through Magnolia sometime around lunch or just after. I told Chris about it and thought it would be neat to go. Honestly, when I thought about going I didn’t imagine that a ton of people would be going considering it was the middle of a work day. Little did I…
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Hanging Around Camp at Mission Tejas State Park | Wordless Wednesday
(Ok, so nearly wordless, but you can’t quite tell here but the piece of wood to the right of the fire pit, there’s a pipe coming out of it. yes, that’s the water source. It’s usually near the electrical outlet, typically near the parking. Let me say, getting water when smoke is blowing your direction isn’t fun. Poor planning on whoever did this!)
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Exploring Mission Tejas State Park Part I
Salvia azurea Liatris elegans Passiflora lutea Oak mistletoe, Phoradendron leucarpum, I think! American Pokeweed, Phytolacca americana Texas Bull Nettle, Cnidoscolus texanus Black walnut, Juglans nigra Before we arrived at the state park that last weekend in October, Chris had noted that there was some kind of trail run going on in the park. I was a little surprised considering the park isn’t huge, but after looking at the park map and seeing that it was adjacent to a Davy Crockett National Forest tract I knew that there was much more here to be explored. The park was very busy when we checked in and we were unable to get to…
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Christmas Tree Time!
Yesterday was one of those typical Texas December days that had you thinking it was early March. It was shorts weather and if you didn’t know any better, you would be loading up on plants at the nursery to get going for spring. A cool front came through last night which chilled the air just a bit but the temperature is back up today, though not nearly as high as yesterday’s. We had intended to get out and get our Christmas tree last weekend after we got back from Thanksgiving but the goal of cleaning up our upstairs living/play area was thwarted when Chris realized the pipe running under our…
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Life Lately | November 2018
Thinking: I didn’t write about it earlier this month but I went on my first overnight trip away from Forest in early November. I’ve been ready for a weekend away for several years now but I knew Forest wasn’t. Finally this summer I knew that it would be a lot easier to get away for the weekend and so two of my friends and I made plans to spend a night away. We’ve been friends since the summer of 1998 and were living aboard the TS Texas Clipper II. Ideally we would have liked some quaint cabin in the Hill Country but with last minute planning and driving distance we…
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We Got Bees! | Wayback Wednesday
No, we didn’t get new bees, but I was on my podcast’s YouTube channel the other day, something I’ve kind of abandoned but am thinking of resurrecting, and found some adorable videos of Forest. One was the time we went to pick up a new package of bees and the second is him planting green beans. Man, it’s been so long since he talked toddler/baby-like I forgot what it was like! Also, I’m going to reach through and pinch his cheeks! Feel free to skip around on the bee video, it is a bit long. Anyway, I’m thinking of doing more videos again and just keeping them simple. All the…