Is it fall yet?

Well today is the last official day of summer, and I must say we are ready for the fall. Summer is great, but it just doesn't have the same effect as it did when we were in school. Sitting behind a desk all day is easier to do when it's rainy and cold outside!

In the spirit of fall, our church group held a back-to-school party Sunday night. Seeing as close to none of us are still in school, it was more of a back-to-football season party. Each person had to sport their team's colors, so you will see in our pictures that we were in the minority vs. Baylor. We grilled some burgers, watched the Cowboys game, and spent quality time with friends. To donate to the cause, Katie baked over 3 dozen brownie/blondie/cake/cookie bars all day Saturday. The German chocolate cake "brownies" are tried and true, but although the marshmallow chocolate chip "blondies" were pretty good, I don't think they are a keeper. Sometimes our kitchen feels like a test lab - Chris sampling for quality control and Katie making the necessary adjustments.

Chris' brother Brian came to visit this weekend also, so he helped Chris taste test a bit. He was in town to watch a couple soccer games Friday, but spent Saturday with us watching football and doing a bit of shopping. We always love to have friends and family visit. Hopefully one day soon we will have a guest bedroom or at least a little more square footage to accomodate.

Other than that, we are still waiting...waiting on letters, emails, any sort of information that would help us figure out what is in store for our next year and beyond...

"In the land of sand & sun, we don't flush for number one."

I need to print a retraction and say that Katie doesn't really hate snorkeling for more than 10 minutes. Apparently when you hit enter after a title it sends the post. Sorry for the confusion.


Now to explain the title of this post - We saw this sign in one of the Cruz Bay shops. On the island, rainwater is collected for household use. Water for drinking is more important than flushing...Need I say more?

Katie and I enjoyed island life last week on the wonderful island of St. John in the U.S. Virgin Islands. The trip involved ups and downs that are associated with traveling places including being welcomed to Ft. Lauderdale by our flight attendant when we should have landed in Miami. We did get to travel by land, sea, and air to reach our destination in Coral Bay on the east end of the island of St. John.

Our trip began in Houston where we dropped our dog, Dixie, off with the puppy grandparents. Chris' parents were kind enough to dog sit for us while we were gone. We had layovers in Miami and Puerto Rico before arriving in St. Thomas, taking free shots of rum, and then catching a ferry to St. John. The shot was a little rough on Chris and made his face tingle but he is a not a drinker. We were greeted at the dock by the innkeeper for the House of Open Arms. She took us to the grocery store in Cruz Bay before driving us to the other side of the island where we would be staying. St. John is quite mountainous and for us flat landers, it was an eye opening experience to be riding down those roads at night.

We awoke to a beautiful sunrise and banaquits chirping. Perfect way to start our first day in paradise. We went into Cruz Bay and picked up our Jeep and checked out the little shops before heading back to the cottage and an evening snorkel in Haulover Bay.

On the following days, Chris would fly fish for bonefish while Katie read on the beach in the mornings and then we would snorkel in the afternoon. We snorkeled at Hawksnest Bay, Jumbee Bay, Cinnamon Bay, Brown Bay, Lameshur Bay and Princess Bay. At Lameshur, Katie and I went on a 4 mile hike to see ancient pre-Columbian Indian petroglyphs carved in the rocks around a spring-fed pool near the island interior. We climbed from sea-level up and across a ridge that was over 400ft then back down to sea level and up another 100ft to the spring. It was a hot hike that took 2 hours to complete but was totally worth it. It really is amazing how one side of a ridge can be so arid and then the other so tropical.

St. John really is a lovely little island with much to offer. There is a variety of different animals, fish, plants, etc and we loved crossing paths with them each day. Between snorkel trips there are many roadside stands selling food and drinks. We stopped at one of these stands to get smoothies made with local fruits. There are also many ruins all over the island dating back to the 1700s when the island was part of the Dutch colonies and there were many sugar plantations and even a few forts to protect the main town. In fact, the mountain our cottage was on was named Fortsburg. The ruins of the fort were above us, and the old coastal gun battery for the fort was below us. As all vacations must come to an end, we came back a week later to the hustle and bustle of the city.