Boilermaker Friends

We went to the downtown Palm springs Street Fair Thur night. There were all the usual Vendors of jewelery, paintings, everything you can imagine, food, veggies and thousands of people. It was wall to wall people. Quite interesting for Viki and Pete as this is their first year down here. Here's a huge double decker bus which is going to be used for tours downtown.
We ran into Rob, who the guys used to work with, so off to Healing Waters where they are for Happy Hour on Friday. These 3 retired guys can't wait to send this picture to the Union Hall for the men still working to support them. Had a great time with 14 people.

Model T

Had Happy Hour with Frank and Denise, ( we graduated from Nursing together) and other friends and of course we love the 1940 Ford Model T car kit that Frank built. It certainly is a centerpiece and gets lots of attention. They even put a decal of a bullet hole on the side door in keeping with the 1920's .

Cabazon and Morongo

We went west on I 10 to Cabazon which is where you find Hadleys Fruit and Date Store, whose orchards were established in 1931. They have an amazing offering of every fruit, nuts, candy and lentils you can imagine. Next we drove over to the Outlet Factory Store complex and looked around. Needless to say, an amazing amount of merchandise at discount prices. By then, we'd worked up an appetite so off to the Morongo Casino for their buffet lunch. Ron had a free coupon so that was our motivation. My goodness, they must have had 200 items in this buffet and everything we tried were absolutely delicious so we certainly enjoyed. We were blown away by the orange flowers behind the Outlet Stores. I just assumed that it was California Poppies but when we drove closer for a picture, it turned out to be thousands of yellow and orange daisies blowing in the wind. Absolutely beautiful.

Sun and Bocci

Thank heavens the winds are gone and we have beautiful sunshine again. Pete and Vicki are back for 2 weeks, they joined Catalina and Ron and they are playing bocci each Tue and Thur. I still can't watch the balls go back and forth. Makes me dizzy so I swim instead.
Here's Vicki throwing and Edie on another team. Ron was keeping score with Big Bear Mountain in the background.

Louder Than Words

I've just finished reading Jenny McCarthy's book about A Mother's Journey to Healing Autism. It is just amazing. There used to be 1 in 10,000 while today there are 1 in 150 children diagnosed with this condition. She has had great success although very difficult to achieve, with diet changes, speech therapy and much more that helped her son. If you know anyone with autism, this will help you understand better. I saw this car sticker in Laughlin.

Champion golfers

We had a great Happy Hour yesterday with 9 friends, including Liz and Allan from home. The wind was blowing and it was cool so we were indoors, not what we like best but had a lovely visit.
Today Hoffers and Ron and I went in the Mini Golf Tournament and Ron and Alyson were first and Daryl and I were second with 35 and 38 as scores so 2 more hamburgers for Sunday dinner.

Ladies Shopping Day

Joanie, Vicki and I went off to Joanne’s for fabric today. We all got some, the special kinds that you don’t see anywhere else, just beautiful. Next stop, Trader Joes for some specialties and of course, their premium wine, 2 buck chuck, that’s right, very palatable wine for $1.99 a bottle. Off to a golf shop where Joanie picked up some very different items for gifts.
We hunted out some bargains at consignment stores – blue jean Capri’s for me, a beautiful decorative bowl for Vicki and Joanie scored with 5 new golf shirts with the tags still on. Had a fun day and here’s the girls with a metal art Saguaro Cactus.

Vicki and Pete arrive

Boy, have we been busy having fun. Sunday, Pete and Vicki arrived for 5 days. The guys have worked together in Boilermaking and Vicki has taught me a lot about quilting while we were on jobs in Port Alberni in 2006 and Kitimat last year. We’re giving them some clues about RV life down here so we started with the ice cream social Sunday and then had free Sirloin BBQ Burgers for dinner thanks to all the crib, bocci and pool games Ron and I have won.
Monday we went down to the Pak Inn for a Chinese food buffet lunch which has 105 items. Eat your heart out Mel. Needless to say, we enjoyed.
We stopped at the Coachella Preserve on the way home, a nature park, the home of palms, desert, oasis and the three toed Lizard. There is a palm log cabin that Paul Wilhelm, a naturalist built when he settled there in 1932. The 'logs' used were dead palm tree trunks and because they were too heavy to lift, he dug a trench and stood them upright so his log cabin is vertical rather than horizontal like we are familiar with. We walked through the thick fan palm groves where the Indians used to live and get water at the 6 oasis nearby. Twenty feet away, there is only hot dry sand so it seems amazing.

Valentine's Day

Lots of pretty decorations around the park and clubhouses for Valentine's Day. We celebrated with a great steak dinner - delicious. Roger and Carol dropped in for a visit. We went to Desert Pools today for a visit with Frank and Denise, whom I went through Nursing School with at St. Paul's in Vancouver. Here's one of our beautiful sunsets.

Canada Day

Each month a party is held for people from different states so today it was Canada Day. The Clubhouse was decorated in red for Valentines Day and Canadian motif was all around. We had 107 Canadians for a social and potluck. Met loads of people and had a great time.

Our Hamburger Chef

We came back to Catalina in DHSprings Sunday. We've had a busy week with a haircut, shopping, a lesson on making a crystal night light and all the visiting with friends. Wednesday Ann beat Ron in the first pool game and then won the tournament. Today Ron knocked Ann out the first game and then came 1st for another BBQ Sirloin Hamburger on Sunday night. Here's Mel cooking with his hamburger hat. It has layers of tomato, pickles, lettuce, mayonnaise, ketchup and beef patty in the yellow bun. I took this picture about a month ago so you see it was dark by 5:30 p.m. It's much lighter now.
We celebrated Ron's birthday today with friends and a great steak dinner and enjoyed about 10 phone calls from family and friends from home.

Old and New Friends

We played in the pool tournament with Carol and Robert, whom we met in Indian Waters. Later Beulah from our Yucatan RV Tour last winter came by walking her dog, so we had them all over for a visit and had a great time, sitting in the sunshine comparing notes.