March 21, 2012 On The Road Again......Just can't To Get On The Road Again......

Bye Y'all.......this morning it was time to say goodbye to our friends, the Dahlinger family....at breakfast, Gracie asked me if we would be back to San Antonio to visit them again....oh she got a sad lip when I said probably not.  She really had fun getting to play with Timothy and Paul, the boys asked the kids when we could come and play again....and, of course, we had such gracious hosts that you couldn't not want to come back!!  The best meal the kids ever had was pizza for breakfast this morning!!!  Mrs. Dahlinger rocks!!!  God has blessed her with such a servant's heart for her family and others. She is so sweet and we have enjoyed visiting with her and John.  They have decided to homeschool the boys so it was fun to share some of the things that we have done over our many years of doing the same. 

I have been a weather watching crazy for the whole trip but especially since the lightning storm that we survived the other night on our way to San Antonio.  So this morning, I go on and am checking the forecast for our route....well it didn't look so good.....light rain in parts of Texas but severe weather (flash flood warnings included) in most of our path into Louisiana for the next two days......be calm, God will work it out.....


One billboard passed and it said:

"Jesus is the Savior of All:  Are you married to him or just dating him on the weekend??"  That would be awesome to see such things in good ol California.......Texas is BIG on lots of things, houses, jewelry, hair, bumperstickers (I saw one that was, no joke, 6' h x 18" l), trucks, malls, churches but the thing that is the coolest big item is....GOD!  I can see why it is called the bible belt.....I love that!!

So, once we got back on the road, it was gas up, and drive for hours again.......the Texas countryside that we drove through today was beautiful, if not a little flat. But hey, here they had trees! Unlike the area near New Mexico, the area from San Antonio to the border of Louisiana appeared to be ranch country and we saw many horses, cows, a chicken ranch and meadows of lupines and other wildflowers. I wish I knew all of the names of the flowers. Tim's Grandma Whitehead would have known all there is know about each one of these flowers. She was so knowledgable about nature and wildflowers. It was nice to remember her and think how she would have loved to see this area, if for no other reason but the flowers......Gracie and Brookie laid up in the top bunk and drew pictures of them in their Nature Journals. We were blessed to be able to see the pretty wildflowers that Texas is famous for.....
 Wow, there are a lot of churches in Texas and they are big buildings, even the ones in the country look large, and they are mostly Baptist....





We stopped for gas in Flatonia, TX ($3.79 a gallon) and, oh yes, we remembered that Dave had said something about checking the oil every once in awhile.  So, I know how to do that from watching Tim do it enough times right??  Weeeeellll,maybe not.  Pam released the hood latch and we all jumped out to "teach" the kids how to check and add oil if need be. 

Challenge #1 (picture it if you can)......the hood released about 1 inch and we couldn't see or feel where to unlatch the rest of the way.....Pam and I looked like we were doing acrobatic moves all discontorted trying to see through the small opening.  Christian, being the reliable boyscout that he is, felt confident that he could do it but the latch proved illusive to even our young man (poor buddy, he was trying so hard to show us that he was strong and could be a great helper).....pulling into the parking lot came our rescuer in the form of a true Texas Gentleman......As this 40 something modern day cowboy got out of his truck, he said "you ladies need a little help there?".......of course, we are not ashamed to ask for assistance so we answered "sure!!!".....He got the hood released and we were so relieved (we were doing it right to begin with, the latch was just really tight).....that at least made us feel better........we assured him we could do the rest.  I have checked the oil in my old van in the past and Christian knows how to do it also.  So we check the oil (Christian pulled the stick out and wiped it down.....I was proud of him for really stepping up), ascertain it is a little low and get all prepared to fill it up......

1. oil-check
2. funnel-check
3. oil tank-hmmmm....where is that?

Challenge #2.....ok, I know what it looks like....can't look that different than in my van....ok there's the radiator, window washer fluid, brake fluid......so now we look like real blondes.....Now, out of the store comes our Texas Gentleman and he has a friend with him.  He must have told his friend about the damsels in distress out at the gas tanks because they came prepared to help.  They told us that the friend used to be a Ford mechanic....he walked right over and said "here it is" and unscrewed a piece that really didn't look like where the oil would go.  Darn, how come we didn't see that?  Oh well, learn something new everyday, I say.....quite hysterical......our new friends were nice, helpful and wished us well on our trip.  Thank God for nice, neighborly folks in Texas!!





I took the wheel for the second shift. On through the rest of Texas and into the lush state of Louisiana.....about an hour from the border it starts to look a little different, more water, taller trees, larger stands of trees some standing in water in bayous and they stretch out as far as you can see.  The billboards start to advertise gators and gumbo....., more churches and more churches....everyone must go to church here, that is Awesome! 

We stopped quickly at the border to take our state sign pic and upon opening the back door, two adult and a baby wild pig jumped out of the bushes and ran off.....we must have startled them but I was a little startled to see them, too......the kids and Pam jumped out to quickly take the pic and weren't gone long when they all ran screaming back to the RV.....they had been attacked by a rogue swarm of mosquitos!!!!!  They were all itching and when they opened the door to come in a few mosquitos flew in with them.  Gracie ran around the RV smashing her hand on them trying to kill them all....guess what we will be buying.....bug spray!!

As we continued towards Baton Rouge, there was the most spectacularly beautiful sunset that reminds me of the ones that I saw in Mauii when Tim and I were there on our honeymoon, 24 years ago.  this pic doesn't really do it justice but Gracie took it out the back....Colors were much brighter in real life, you just had to be there.  Made me think that God wanted me to remember how pretty Texas was.........

 Light rain the rest of the way, our campground called about an 1 1/2 hours before we arrived to tell us about the power outage that they were experiencing and to report that we had missed the big storm that had been ravaging them all day.....we can see God's hand each way of our travels and how he is protecting us from major weather conditions.....oooops missed our branch off right before the campground so we had to get off the freeway and back track a little but not too bad....having that Trip Tik on my iphone sure helps, invaluable!!  We pulled into our KOA campground a little after 8 p.m. and sent the kids off to the showers immediatley.....we survived our first campground hookups!  We got to cook in the RV for the first time on the trip and that was fun, sloppy joes...yum!

One more stop for gas... $3.69 now....we keep seeing it for $3.65 but always right after we fill up.....stopped for bug spray at the walgreens right near our campground and the girl there was asking us where we were from.  We told her about our "CROSS COUNTRY" trip and she asked if we were going to go to Africa.....looks like the public schools in Louisiana are no better off than ours in California.....

From Christian: 

 Hi I helped changed the oil.  Tomorrow we are going to go to a boat ride in a swamp.

 We are going to see alligators and we are going in a fan boat in the bayou it will be awesome!!