Wow, What A Week!

I have been very busy this past week. On Tuesday evening we left to attend our church's Annual Conference. In the United Methodist Church (UMC), areas of the world are divided into jurisdictions and converences. We are members of the Southwest Texas Conference and our meeting is always held in Corpus Christi. There's never enough time to go to the beach during the day because meetings last all day and it was especially true this year. We had to vote on representatives from our conference to the General Conference in 2008. Anyone who is a member of the UMC in the conference is eligible for election. Voting started on Thursday morning, first item, and continued through the sessions. Since there was a break for the awards banquet at 5:30 Friday and the last delegate had not yet been elected, we were called back into a late session that ran from 8:30-11:15 pM. We didn't stay for the whole thing because we had to be up in Kingsland by 10:30 Saturday morning, so we left at 5:30.

Right outside the conference center and across the bay bridge is the USS Lexington. The Lady Lex, as she's known, was also known by the Japanese as the Ghost Ship because she was reported sunk three times. The conference center was cold and the weather outside was balmy, warm and humid, so my lenses were fogged up on the camera. This is what I got from the waterfront. Looks kind of ghostly, huh?



And in keeping with my new tradition of taking shots of birds by the ocean, here's a guy that was hanging out at the barge dock. I took this with the telephoto lense. I have a whole series of pictures taken at different distances from the bird. He stayed put for a long time. Perhaps he thought I might have some bait to fish with that he could go after?


It turns out that DH's great-great-grandfather was a member of the Texas Rangers during the Civil War, which makes him eligible for a Texas Ranger Grave Marker, which was dedicated and unveiled in the city cemetery on Saturday morning. William Merritt Weeaks was the father of 15 children, one of whom died at age 5. All the rest survived until adulthood. So after the dedication, there was a family reunion in Llano. This was all fine and good, but the only people I knew there were my immediate family. BIL and SIL came down from Pittsburgh for the event bringing their son along.

My BIL has done a lot of genealogy research on his family, so when this recognition came along, there was no way he was going to miss the presentation of the marker. He's so into genealogy that his son carries five names, three of which are from ancestors.



I really wanted a picture of Christian with the marker because that would have been his great-great-great grandfather's resting place he stood at. Oh well. Sometimes poopy diapers are more important than pictures. Here he is exploring the city park in Llano when we first got there.


I'm so proud to be his aunt and godmother. He's such a cutie. Not unlike his cousins, IYKWIM.

Have a great week!