Swiss Family Robinson

We took advantage of the reasonably warm weather for an outdoor camp out in the new tree house. Too bad it only fits 3.

In Memoriam of Oso

We all miss you dear friend

Death is not the end
Death can never be the end.

Death is the road.
Life is the traveller.
The Soul is the Guide

...

Our mind thinks of death.
Our heart thinks of life
Our soul thinks of Immortality.

- Sri Chinmoy

We all love our pets, and all of our dogs get out accidentally,
please slow down on area roads for dogs and deer at night.

Sign of the times

preferred hiking shoes

we've gotten over our fear of coyotes and have started to venture back into the wilds of Onion Creek.....behind the new Stagecoach Park




There's lots of old signs of Buda around town, here's a few before they're lost.

Boooooooo da

Downtown Buda has trick or treating at the library each year in a festival they call BOOda. All of the downtown business set up tables for the kids to walk by and trick or treat and promote their businesses. The fire department also comes down with their trucks and let the kids climb through them and our new police force directs traffic!
We started going when our kids were really little and have seen how much the city has grown with all the new families.
Thanks City of BOOda and Martha & the Library for this cool family event!

"The Lightning Thief"

Athena & Aphrodite

Buda Kids were were honored to have a special guest, the author Rick Riordan of "The Lightning Thief".

I first remember hearing about this book last year when they read and voted on it for the Texas Bluebonnet book award. Then they all dressed up as Greek Goddess' for Halloween, and wore them for his new book signing at Book People.
(we've heard there's also a Camp Half Blood put on by Book People in Austin".

Mr Riordan read to the kids from "The Sea of Monsters" and told them how the series of books came to be...an influence of reading to his son every night and when he ran out of greek myths to read, was told by his son to make new ones up!

He also said this about Buda on his blog "My uncle lived there back in the 70s, and it was a real trip to see how much it has changed since I was last there. The old school(Buda Elementary) is still the same, though -- lots of character, a very laid back atmosphere, and friendly people" Yeah for staying good & funky!

Each generation of kids has a favorite book that was a turning point in their love for reading and this ones it!
Thanks for inspiring kids to run out and read the next book versus see the next movie.

For more info on his visit, see his site and his blog.

http://www.rickriordan.com/
http://rickriordan.blogspot.com/

Viva Chavelos!

Here's another downtown Buda restaurant plug.

If you want to have fun with your friends, take them to Chavelo's for their birthday dinner.
Then secretly tell Chavelo it's their birthday.

At the end of the meal, Chavelo and his whole staff come out with pots and pans banging and sing Feliz Cumpleanos! The kids love it!

Chavelos is BYOB so you can bring a few beers or a jug of margaritas like we did!

Plus they also have great grilled tilapia and tacos al pastor.

Viva Chavelos!

Feelin like a "fattie"

Helen's Casa Alde in downtown Buda is know for their breakfast tacos, so if you've never had a "fattie" drop in, they serve them until 1:00.
It's over filled with bacon, eggs, sausage, cheese and potatoes on a freshly made flour tortilla.
The salsa is nice and spicy too!
This place is the good kind of funky!

Home Improvements

After all the rain this summer we decided we might need some gutters on this old house.
We found some cool galvanized gutters to match the house and painted the under side of the porch with sky blue paint. You see it on a lot of Victoria houses. It's supposed to make the wasps think it's the sky so they won't nest on the ceiling.
So far it seems to be working. We need rain barrels next......

Rainy Summer

Last year we had a drought and this summer a flood! Seems like it's been raining everyday all summer.
Onion Creek is full of water ( and snakes, bugs and other things), but at least the gardens are doing great!

We'll hope for more hot and humid days for swimming before school starts.

Down trees :(

We came back from our vacation to a yard full of downed trees from last Sundays storm.
They said it was a storm with 70 mile an hour straight winds, but it looked like a small tornado came through Buda. Special Thanks go out to ALL our GREAT neighbors who looked out for us. They helped PEC get in and repair the fallen electrical lines, turned off the power and helped us clean up the mess. Here are the photos before we cleaned up. And Thanks to the City of Buda for providing free dumpsters for all the tree limbs! At least our yard has more light, we may even be able to grown some grass now.