Oktoberfest

Last year I found out about this great little Texas town called Fredericksburg, a friendly German town with some great B & Bs.  We've never made it over there and when Neal found out they had an Oktoberfest celebration this month, we couldn't think of a more perfect place to celebrate the German holiday than in a German town.  After doing some online research, Neal also discovered that there are some ideal drives for the motorcycle enthusiast (ideal meaning scenic, 2-lane road with few cars) just outside of town.  Mike and Lisa were up for an adventure, so we put the guys' bikes on the trailer, hooked it up to Mike's Hummer, and made the four-hour drive to Fredericksburg for the weekend.

Since we decided to go only a few days before the festival

started, every B&B in town was sold out, with the exception

of this Bed & Brew, a bar/B&B with some character.  Mike

and Lisa stayed in the "Bordello" room while Neal and I

took the "Admiral's" room.

Ever wonder what it's like to ride on a motorcycle?

Here's a small sample (though not a very good one)

WARNING:  THIS VIDEO IS VERY

"BLAIR WITCH PROJECT" -LIKE  AND

MAY CAUSE DISCOMFORT!

This was our first bike ride of the trip - 

an 80-mile journey on some country 

roads through the hills.  The cars in this video

were two of about ten we saw on the entire

80-mile ride.  It was SO much fun and

such a pretty drive.

Fredericksburg is a charming little town with 

antique shops and restaurants up the main drag.

Here we are about to have our first dinner, some

good German food and Oktoberfest beer.

Riding back from church on Sunday morning. 

Mike and Lisa were waiting for us by the truck and

snapped this photo as we rode up.

The power of Photoshop....

Mike created this new version of the photo and

titled it, "Don't Mess With Texas."

After breakfast we took our last ride of the trip, about

30 miles up to a national park called "Enchanted Rock."

Little did we know that it would be quite a climb up there

so we hiked the four miles up and back in our motorcycle

boots!  It was beautiful, however, and well worth while.

The 360 degree view from the top.

It was SO windy up there - it sounds like we

were on the bike only we were standing still!

We saw more Hawks on this trip than I've ever seen

in my life.  They were an awesome sight.

Oktoberfest is underway!

Cheers....to a great weekend!

Heading home we saw a beautiful sunset - 

a great way to end our trip

Good-Bye Sarah and Gi

Tonight we said "Good-bye" to our next door neighbors, Sarah and Gibron (whom we affectionately know as "Gi").  They leave tomorrow for Atlanta, where they will both move on to better career opportunities.  While we are so happy for them, we'll miss them dearly.  It's not often these days that you talk to your neighbors, let alone become good friends with them.  We've shared a lot of good times together, and we will always remember them fondly.

The last time "the gang" will all be together

Neal with his "Ike beard" (the beard he's been growing

since the hurricane two weeks ago.  :-)

Chinch-y

Neither of us had ever heard of this, but Texas has this nasty thing called a Chinch bug.  They're worse than a fungus and when you get them in your yard they eat your grass, completely killing and practically uprooting it.  Unfortunately, our neighbor across the street had caught the chinch bugs and kindly passed them on to us.  Before we realized what the brown patches in our yard were, it was too late.  We now have to re-sod the entire front and back yard.  

Over the weekend Neal rented a sod cutter so that we could

do the dirty job of cleaning up our own  dead grass before

having new sod laid.  He and Mike worked all morning cutting

up our poor grass, and I worked with Neal the rest of the

afternoon bagging up the grass and raking the yard.

After we had completed the job.

Manual labor sure is exhausting!

We Survived Ike!

Experiencing our first hurricane was pretty scary. Although it wasn't expected to be anything higher than a cat 3, we knew the damage could still be substantial and that hurricanes can also spawn tornados, causing even further devastation. We were not asked to evacuate and decided to ride out the storm at home, where we knew we had two sets of good neighbors to rely on should an emergency arise during or after the storm. A few of the people on our street boarded up their windows while we mainly removed any small items away from the windows and shut the blinds. All we could do after that was wait to see how bad it would get.

Our neighbor's "Take a hike Ike" sign. This became the

talk of the neighborhood and people from nearby streets

came throughout the evening to take photos of it.

With the nice sunset tonight, you'd never know a hurricane

was about to hit. We had a dinner party at our house with

Mike, Lisa, Sarah, and Gi. There's nothing like a party to calm

nerves and welcome a hurricane!

Although we had lost power earlier in the evening, Mike

set up his generator so that we could play Rock Band

until the storm was bad enough that we had to return

to our own homes. When we got home, we lit a candle

and retired to our temporary bed in my closet, one of

the safest places in the house. We were pretty sheltered

from the noise there, though I had a hard time sleeping

while Neal enjoyed a few hours of z's. More than the

hurricane, I was scared of a possible tornado ripping

through our home. Luckily, we didn't have one in our

neighborhood, though just a couple of miles up the road

a tornado virtually destroyed an older neighborhood.

In the morning we awoke to find minimal damage - a minor

leak in our master bedroom and a blown over fence that

opened up our yard to our two neighbors. 

Some of the damage within our neighborhood

Trees knocked down like dominos

This is one of our lakes. The wrought iron fence

under the water is supposed to separate the land around

the lake from a soccer field. It was completely flooded.

The fences around the tennis courts got a bit blown around

Dozens of trees were completely uprooted

Just outside of our neighborhood....

power lines were knocked over

Street lights were dangling in the middle of intersections

Shopping centers were mangled

Trees blocked roads

Nothing really appeared normal. There was definitely evidence of a hurricane and after seeing the damage that a category 2 can cause (a high 2), I can't imagine what it was like to be in New Orleans after Katrina, a cat 5. Overall, we are blessed to have come through the storm with a blown down fence, a minor roof leak, and a 4-day power outage. Other cities were completely demolished (Galveston, Crystal Beach, etc.), and still others will not have power as late as an estimated October 6th. Ike was certainly a scary experience but if anything good came out of it, it was the quality time we've spent with our neighbors over the last few days. None of us fully returned to work until today, so we had a five day "vacation" thanks to Mother Nature.

We are so grateful for all of your prayers and support. Thanks for checking in on us, for calling, e-mailing, and texting to make sure we were okay. I have no doubt that all of the prayers that went up from around the country on 9/12 were heard.

Hurricane Ike

Dear friends and family,

We've been receiving phone calls and e-mails from some of you making sure that we're okay with the upcoming storm.  So far, we're one of only two cities in our county that has not had to evacuate, luckily.  We're not in a flood zone, though we do have man-made lakes throughout our neighborhood.  Hopefully they'll hold up okay with all of the rain they're predicting.  We've got the buddy system going with two of our neighbors, so we're going to stick it out together, which will help with safety and sanity.  

We'll keep everyone posted as the storm progresses, to let you know that we're okay.  In the meantime, any prayers that you could send this way, for us and all Houstonians enduring the storm, would be greatly appreciated.  Thanks for all of your support and concern.

Love to all, the Baileys

JP Mc Nasty's

On Saturday we went out for a big bike ride with Mike and Lisa down to Sugarland.  We ate at Neal and Lisa's favorite, Lupe Tortillas.  

On the way home, we stopped at this bar that we've passed a hundred times riding the country roads near our house.  The one thing that stopped us from going in there until now was it's name: JP Mc Nasty's.  And the name seemed to speak for the place - it looked like a run down little hole in the wall that drew a rough crowd.  BUT, it IS a biker's hangout.  In fact, the only cars in the parking lot are usually either bikes or trucks.  

Since we're big bikers now (well, minus the tattoos and the beer belly), we thought we had to give it a try.  Luckily, the inside turned out to be a bit nicer than the outside and the staff was super friendly.  They had a huge backyard with lights and tables, where we sat and had a beer (workin' on that belly).  It was actually a pretty fun time.

Another Beautiful Sunset

Last-Minute Trip to Cali

Neal is currently doing some work in Long Beach, California and we were hoping to get the chance to spend Labor Day weekend together.  We didn't find out until Friday afternoon that I was going to be able to join him and luckily, I was able to catch an evening flight.  We didn't tell my parents that I was coming out and surprised them on Saturday morning.  They were certainly surprised and thrilled to have us both there!

Breakfast at our favorite place - Country Harvest

Hanging out at the beach in Ventura

Serra Cross Park

It was a hazy day in Ventura but you could

still make out the coastline

Dinner at the Taj Cafe with Mom, Dad, Reva, & Dave

Of course, we had to hit the local gelato shop after dinner!

Kelly and Reva

Back to Country Harvest on Sunday, this time with

Andrey and Stacey

Over at Stacey and Dave's for a Labor Day BBQ

Little monkey's growing so fast!!

California sunset

Uh-oh, someone discovered the chocolate 

cupcakes!

A farewell lunch at Duke's before my flight on Monday

This seagull had a good spot at the window by our table

since Mom wanted to make sure it had enough food.  :-)

Hula pie - the perfect way to end a great weekend