Celebrating Christmas in an RV park

Wherever we go in RV parks we see Christmas decorations. Lights can be hung on trees and on RVs. Mirrors on motorhomes sport Santa hats. This year we have been traveling and enjoying how others decorate. We have a small tree inside our trailer, a few gifts, a nativity set and Santa.

We saw the first outdoor decorations in Canyon Vistas before we left on this trip.

Santa was parked in the Junction, Texas, park we stayed in.

At Peach County RV in Stonewall the rocking chairs all sported Santa hats.

Here in Blazing Star in San Antonio there are lots of decorations. The snowman is shivering.

Santa has moved here and shares his trailer with a penguin.

An elf is sitting on this mirror.

The Holy Family is on a patio.

Only in Texas would you find Santa trying to ride a bull!

We even saw Santa in person, riding in a golf cart here in San Antonio.  He gave me a handful of small Hershey candy bars.

Another Happy Meeting

In May, while staying in a Corps of Engineers campground in Texas, we discovered that the couple next to us owned a funeral home, just like we did 30+ years ago. We had a good visit with them.

This week, we talked to the couple next to us here in the Apostle Islands Area Campground in Bayfield, WI. After learning they were retired, enjoyed RVing so much they had talked about going on the road full-time, and they loved hiking and biking, we gave them our card with our blog address. A little later, they brought their card over so we could see their blog. We already had a lot in common and from the blog, we learned the wife, Trish, is a retired Presbyterian minister. Since John is a retired Episcopal priest, we had a lot more to talk about.

If you look carefully at the words on their hats/visors, you will see Trish and Jack have a ministry to children being Santa and Mrs. Claus. Who would have guessed that Santas get together to share ideas on ways to relate better to children? Did you know that in Georgia (and, perhaps, other places) Santas are on call to visit ill children anytime during the year? We didn't, but were impressed with how much this might mean to a sick or dying child.

Santa's Visit

Santa came to our house on Monday. I guess people over the age of 60 are practical folks. We didn't get a toilet like Barbara and Ron or an ipad like Jim and Gayle. We had planned to get a new mattress for Christmas. That is until our neighbor Vern volunteered to build some drawers for our kitchen. If you remember, we moved into this new Mobile Suites in October and discovered there were no drawers in the kitchen. Since Santa's visit, that has been corrected.

We began with this empty space where there would have been a dishwasher if we hadn't eliminated that from our order. At the factory, they had replaced the dishwasher with a slide-out wastebasket. We quickly moved the wastebasket and were left with empty storage space. (There was a cabinet door there.)



A week or so ago, Vern brought these drawers and frame.



And Monday, he arrived to install them.



Here are the drawer slides, waiting for the drawers.



And here are the drawers in place, just waiting for me to fill them.



It didn't take me any time to do just that. Finally, the knives, forks and spoons, as well as other cooking tools and some pans were sitting the drawers, within easy reach when I cook or put away the clean dishes. Yea!



In the next week or so, Vern will return with drawer fronts that match our other cabinets. That will be nice. But we're both happy campers, now. We feel like our new home is finally complete.

What a Treat!

Saturday, we went to the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl parade in downtown Phoenix. Kansas State will play Oregon in the bowl game Jan. 3. The festivities begin with the parade on Saturday and marching band competition on Sunday. Since downtown Phoenix is 32 miles from our resort and we didn't know where to park there, we drove to the Mesa light rail station and took the train downtown.

The parade we saw was very interesting. But all that happened, beginning when we got off the train, was the real treat. It was almost like a late Christmas gift from a Secret Santa. We got off and were trying to decide which way to go (we have never been in downtown Phoenix) when a woman who had also been on the train asked, "Are you going to the parade?" We answered yes and she asked if we would like tickets to sit in the bleachers. We had read about those seats and chose not to spend $25 a person to watch a free parade. But Trisha had extra tickets and offered them to us. We learned that her family had planned to use the tickets to watch one daughter march with the Basha High School band from Chandler. However, her son and husband got tickets to the Fight Hunger Bowl game in San Francisco, where Arizona State University was playing.

Wow! Free seats within a block of the parade starting point, within sight of the reviewing stand! So, we walked with her toward the seats. We came to a large area blocked off and Trish asked one of the Fiesta Bowl officials on a golf cart how we could get around the blockage. He said to hop on the golf cart. Here was our view of the parade route as he drove us to our seats.



Here I am, seated with Trish. Since the parade lasted 2 1/2 hours, we were really glad we were able to sit down.



In case you are more interested in the parade than our good fortune, let me show you some of the things we saw. There were a number of large balloons. I had never seen a parade with balloons before.



There were some really interesting bicycles.



Both high school and college marching bands were there. Participation is by invitation only. This college band was huge.



Trisha's daughter Emily is (I think) the third flute player in on this row.



These biplanes flew over just as the parade began.



One float had blooming saguaros.



Here are some of the Wild Women of the West.



Sheriff Joe Arpaio and his wife rode on the department's tank.



And these young people were singing about "Standing on the Corner in Winslow, Arizona."



We had a great time at the parade and want to thank Trisha for being our Secret Santa. We bought ourselves another late gift, as well.



We have finally moved into the 21st century with our iPhone 5 smart phone. Let me tell you, the learning curve is a little steep, but it does take good pictures.