headin' to the mountains of new mexico

as soon as school was out we headed out to cloudcroft, n.m. my parents took their camper and camped out and we stayed up in town in a really fun bed and breakfast run by a texas school teacher. the weather was great, about 65-75 in the day and down to the low 50's at night. it was wonderful. it was too bad that they are so dry so we could not burn any fires :( we slept every night with our balcony door open under our down comforter.....listening to all the critters and enjoying the cool breeze. took a day and went over to ruidosa and almagorda - stopped at a pistachio farm and winery - that was really cool. hoping they get enough rain in july to return at the end and have a fire. nice thing -- it was only about 4-5 hrs. away!

georgia.....georgia......

on may 14th, i GLADLY took three days off work and went on a great "road trip" with tyler to ATHENS, GA. he was moving there for the summer to do internship with a business and to live in the same town as kathryn for about 13 weeks for the first time. the trip was a hoot.......and i LOVED every minute of it. it will be a road trip that i will not soon forget.......first of all - the really special time i got to spend with tyler was just amazing and probably one of our last times to do that. the weather was NOT our friend on this 1250 mile trip. we had to stop about 100 miles out of midland, find a walmart on I20 and get some new wiper blades so that we could see, then about 50 miles from dallas, the "check engine" light came on and so we had to find a toyota dealership in dallas to get that checked out. 3 hrs later (and they were awesome, treated us so well and pushed us to the front of the line) and $400 later, we were back on the road right during rush hour traffic. thank you beless's for taking care of us while we waited!! our goal for our first day was jackson, ms - but we were falling way behind schedule. we finally caught up with the BAD storms when we hit monroe, la and boy was it a tough 35 miles to vicksburg - it was pretty scary, but when we got to vicksburg, the storms had cleared (there were no hotel rooms anyway) and we went on the next 40 miles to jackson and got the last room at the hotel at about 12:30 am. 7:00am -12:30 for the first day -- pretty long day.....we were tired. woke up to torrential storms the next morning, i think God knew we needed to sleep in, so i let tyler sleep until the storms stopped and we finally got on the road about 11:30 am -- behind once again, but again, had another great day of travelling together. talking, talking, talking, catching up, listening to matt chandler and mark driscoll and the whole book of 1 cor. sermons -- it was awesome. saw the talladega speedway, mecedes benz plant, stopped off in tuscaloosa and went throught the U of Alabama campus (gorgeous) and then met an old friend of mine from my coaching days in sugar land and she and her oldest daughter took us to a very late lunch in the coolest part of Birmingham - we coached together 22 years ago....it was great seeing her and meeting her daughter (who btw was a cheerleader at UofAL) -- then we finally got on the road to Athens - what a BEAUTIFUL drive to ATHENS-reminded me so much of East TExas - we hit the storms again for about our last 100 miles, so it slowed us down, especially around Atlanta - boy were we glad to pull into Kathryn's house about 10:00 and crash!! ATHENS is beautiful and the campus of UGA is just amazing - I had a great time walking around it all and the downtown area by the campus was so much fun. i can't wait to go back. now i know why tyler has so much fun when he goes to GA and why kathryn loves uga. not sure who is going to ride back with tyler in august -- i know it won't be bruce, i will either fly and ride back with him or send one of his roommates or try to talk kathryn into riding out to midland with him. but, if it's me -- i look forward to it once again...............

mother's day 2008

my "baby" sis, mom and me
tyler - almost 22
the best thing about being a mom

the first shared with my mom and sister in i don't know how many years. i can't even remember "celebrating" mother's day with my mom, it's been so long. so, this year was very special to be with the whole family and to have tyler home too!

SAM I AM.......the king of the house now

sam's the man
even hannah came over from tech and went with us
four very happy girls.....

in january we had to find a new home for SADIE, our beloved 2 yr. old border collie. she did not make the move to midland very well - actually worse than sherry, if you can believe that! we found an amazing home for her with a family with 3 kids and two horses on 5 acreas. we went out to visit her for the first time when tyler came home this spring. she is doing GREAT! sam, our 1st cat, is ruling the roost around here now.

ZTA Formal in Athens

Kathryn's formal in January 2008
ZTA House
University of Georgia

WicKeD WeST tExAs SuNsEtS

You never know when you are going to walk out the front door and there is going to be a gorgeous orange glow in the sky. tonight was one of those nights - this is about 30 minutes after the sun went down and stayed around for about an hour.

NEW YEARS 2008

carlsbad caverns - new mexico

down under.........in new mexico

from the top of the sand dunes of monahans to a chilly 800 ft. below ground level to the caverns of carlsbad, n.m -- today we took tyler and kathryn to another west texas(nm) wonder. funny, how all my life, living out here and actually visiting carlsbad many times to see my grandmother, we never went out to the caverns. what an amazing trip it was, unbelievable sight. we all had an incredible time, "hiking" down the caves and seeing and learning about the spectacular sights and ecosystems. we even had lunch and a break at the cafe -- along with a bathroom, gift shop, and elevators at the 750' mark. none of us could figure out how they came in and made this place underground so "modern." ..... all the walkways and ammenities and electricity. we weren't able to see the bats, as they are all migrated south to mexico for the winter months -- i think i was glad about that......over 400,000 of them fly out every day (when they are there) at dusk to eat insects for thier meals and return every morning at dawn -- must be an amazing sight to sit and observe that. anyway......would highly recommend it to you if you are ever in the area----it's a pretty good workout though--thank goodness it was all DOWNhill and you had to take the elevator to get back up to the street level!

it's NOT snow..... white sands of WEST TEXAS

this gives a whole new meaning to "playing in the sand." what fun we had taking the kids to Monahans. this is a place i spent many of my young years at -- birthday parties, dune-buggy rides, waxing and surfing my own personal "surf board," eating gritty, sandy hotdogs (only the best), and grinding the sand between my teeth and emptying pockets full of sand out. I loved it when we got in the car yesterday and kathryn was like - "i have sand all in my teeth." welcome to west texas! :)

beaches of west texas.............

better known as the Monahans Sandhills State Park. Fun time there today with Tyler and Kathryn. Not quiet the same as the Florida beaches and much more of a workout!

this sand is sooooooo cold!!

prepping the disc with a little wax

READY........

SET..........

GO - TYLER - GO.....

the big hunt....they really do have deer out here!!

tyler finally made it to midland for the holidays (via a 5 day stop over in coppell with his roommate, brooks - to visit his family and to camp out overnight to shop at the REI garage sale) just in time for the big west texas hunt with the mccrary men. it was a very successful hunt with all the guys getting a buck and a few doe too. unfortunately, bruce's father was not able to come this year due to a bout with strep throat. however, we have plenty of venison for a while........ tyler and his 8 point........

bruce and his 6 point

the mccrary men --- brothers/cousins/uncles/nephews --bruce/tyler and jeffrey/guy--could jeff and tyler pass for brothers or what!!

LET IT SNOW, LET IT SNOW, LET IT SNOW.....

we woke up to a beautiful snow on Thanksgiving morning. Snowed ALL day, flakes as big as feathers. it was so beautiful. snowed thursday, played football playoff game on friday NIGHT -- and yes it was COLD-- freezing - and yes we got beat after sitting out in the mist and below freezing temps for 4 hours!!
- then the snow returned on sat and then again on sunday -- sunday morning going to church out here in the wide open fields - nobody on the roads -- was an amazing site. wish i would have had my camera then..........

rOaD TRiP 2007 -- NAC to MidLaNd

what a GREAT weekend -- the girls come to midland from Nac!! who-hoo!! Julie, Jill, Cynthia, Kim and then Hannah came up from TECH to spend the weekend with us. Friday Night Lights was the main agenda - and the REBELS were REBEL STRONG "trashing" those crosstown rival dawgs from Midland high to a crowd of about 20,000. It was so much fun. Also on the weekend was plenty of shopping, food, church, laughs, hugs, talking and a little bit of blood, (sorry jill), sweat and tears -- plenty of those came sunday. thank you so much for coming to see us.... i LoVe you dearest friends and miss you!!!!

it's been a long time...............

OK...now I have a new camera for Christmas, so maybe I will update our blog. It's been way too long. We have been in Midland now 6 months!!! Can not believe it. Still an adjustment for me. Bruce is loving it. Still giving it time and one day at a time. Tyler is home for the holidays and that is good. Dreading the holidays coming to an end............Tyler back to College Station and me -- back to my dreaded job............. Keep the prayers coming.

YEAH!!!..........tyler is on his way HOME.........

Tyler's time in London is UP..........after almost 9 weeks he is returning home today, home to Midland for the very first time. He will have a very long day -- starting before 2:00 am this morning to catch a train to Gatwick and probably not getting back to the house until 11:30 pm tonight. If you are reading this today (7/25) please send some prayers up for him -- safe flights (2 connections), that he might get some rest on the plane/s, and that he makes all of his connections -- especially the one from Houston to Midland at 9:15 tonight -- it's a tight squeeze and it's the last flight out to Midland tonight. ANXIOUSLY awaiting tyler's arrival!!! :)