Parker

Wed. night is family night for dinner. We all meet at Culver's for burgers and ice cream. Jack and I go into St. Charles early in the afternoon to pick up our mail, go to the bank etc., so we usually pick up Mr. Parker at school early to save mom and dad the stop and gives us time with the sweet boy.

He loves his jumper.

Big Springs - Van Buren

We spent the month of September parked on the Current River. That has to be one of the prettiest, clearest rivers I have ever seen. We also had to make our way down to Big Springs, if you haven't seen it you really should. Sandy and Carl met us there for one week and we also met up with Herb and Mary Joplin while we were in the area.

25th Anniversary

Here are some pics from our Family Photos taken for our anniversary. We had such a great time.

time to catch up

Parker
Kaili Eva


Cody and Parker

Well we love our new Motor home, it has so much room. We have been in Warrenton most of the summer and have been loving the time with everyone. The babies are getting so big I can't imagine how fast they will grow when we hit the road this winter. Jack and I celebrated our 25th wedding anniversary and the kids gave us a surprise party. What a shock, we had no idea. Cathy and Jackson were in town for 10 days and we enjoyed having Jackson out at the campground with us for several days. Cody and Scott came in on the weekend of the party and it was so much fun to have all of our kids together. Life is good and we still love the travel.

Where does time go to

Parker snoozing with his Paw Paw
2000 Fleetwood Discovery 37' 2 slides, diesel I sure hope it works out

I can't believe how fast time flies. We are staying really busy trying to get the camping lot fixed up, just had a new shed built, and of course spending time with Parker and Andrea. He is growing really fast and they change so quickly. I was in Kansas City MO over the weekend for the wedding of Daniel and Anna Blew, my cousins son. It was a really great wedding and definitely reflected the personalities of the bride and groom. Then I went to Linwood Kansas to look and a motor home we have been watching on Craig's list for a while. Keep your fingers crossed we might be getting a newer and nicer rig!!! We still have to get back up to Mark Twain to pack up our personal things so we can put the condo on the rental plan again. So much to do, but I don't dare mention that to Andrea she just rolls her eyes and asked what else would we be doing and that we now have all the time in the world. ( we really do stay busy)

Welcome Baby Nelson

hospital pic
opening day

Well we got back to St. Charles in time for our new baby. We went to Warrenton to the campground to find no water yet. We stayed in town and dry camped (no water or sewer) for 2 days and then went to Mark Twain to the condo. We were going to start packing our personal things so we can put the condo back on the rental plan. Good thing we have until Memorial Day, we didn't' get anything done. We relaxed caught up on rest and then received a call on Monday morning March 24th that Andrea was in labor and headed to the hospital. We packed the car and started the two hour trip in. We stopped by their house to drop off Sophi and then headed to St. Lukes (the same hospital Andrea was born in). Andrea had a long labor and a tough time at the end but at 12:42 am Tues. March 25th we welcomed Parker David Nelson into the world. 7lb 9oz at 19 1/2 inches. He is such a cutie and are very proud of our new little guy.

Carlsbad New Mexico

Jack at the opening of Carlsbad Caverns

Lions tail

On our way home we stopped at Carlsbad Caverns and were really glad we did.
We walked down into the cavern instead of riding the elevator, but we were glad to ride them back. It was 750 ft. down to the Big Room where we took the self guided tour. If you ever get the chance to go it is worth the trip. But I will warn you there is absolutely nothing else around the area.

Yuma, AZ

Castle Dome
Castle Dome
Oh Yeah, check out the Corvette
His and Her Thunderbirds

After coming back to Yuma we went to Castle Dome. Castle Dome is an old mining town that has been rebuilt and it is full of period stuff. I have not seen a collection like this before. It was really interesting.

We were also in town for the Midnight and the Oasis. There were over 900 classic cars in town.

We spent over 2 hours looking at cars and enjoying the beautiful cars.

Andrea's Baby Shower

Mary's daughter makes these and had one sent for the shower, it is made of baby diapers
How many squares of toilet paper does it take to go around moms baby belly

The last day of Feb. I took a shuttle from Yuma to Phoenix to catch a flight home for the weekend. I went home for Andrea's baby shower. Mom and Stacey gave her a really nice shower and I was glad I got to go home and check on her. She is doing really great and we are getting excited for the baby to come.

Yuma, AZ

My tattoo! Herb and Mary Joplin
Jack and I at Texas

Roadhouse for his birthday

The RV park in Yuma, the caretakers had a few animals and the turkeys were so cool.
There were ducks, geese turkeys, roosters and chickens.

We had a really hard time finding a place to stay in Yuma. We later heard that the valley RV parks where 98% full. We did finally find a place, not one I ever would have stopped at if I was just driving by, but it turned out just fine. Someone knew someone staying there and said it was a good place. We ended up staying for a month and met some really nice people. We met up with Herb and Mary Joplin. They were staying at the Yuma Army Proving Ground RV camp. They were there for a week while we were there and we had a really good time with them. Mary and I went shopping, we hit old ladies day (Monday morning) at Bealls Outlet. What a hoot. We got some really good buys and had a blast. We went over to Mexico and out to eat. They went out to dinner with us to celebrate Jack's 60th birthday. After they left we went back to Mexico and got our new eye glasses at 50% the U.S. cost and they were ready in 2 hours. We also picked up some of our meds and a huge discount.

Oh and I got a tattoo! There was a place in town and I saw some the work and I really liked the detail. It is on my ankle and the pic is the day after I got it so it was a little swollen.

Jack's brother Eddie and Sue came for a weekend. They brought their camper and we spent the weekend playing. Sue and I went to Mexico and the flea market. We went out to eat, Eddie likes to try and find authentic Mexican restaurants.

Benson, AZ

Cochise Stronghold
Fort Bowie

San Pedro River

We did get in some hiking and saw several beautiful sunsets. We also met up with my cousin Don again. We went out to his place and really enjoyed seeing his place and hearing about the tranformation he put it through. It is really a great place. We stayed here for about a week then moved on to Yuma AZ

Benson, AZ

On to Benson AZ where we always love to hike. Our car broke down right before we were to leave TX and we were afraid to take it to the shop and not have it ready to go when we were. We ran into problems finding places to stay this year. All the RV parks have been full, due to the

Canadian dollar being strong there are a lot of visitors here from Canada. We pulled our sick car all the way to Benson and dropped it off at the garage. It was still 4 more days until we had the car back. We walked to the Donut Shop in the morning, 3 miles round trip. Sometimes we would then walk 3 miles to lunch. Once we got the car back we went to check out the Lazy J., Jack's 30 acres of desert. Here are a couple of pics I took from the property. You can see snow on the Mtns.

Harlingen TX

We headed back to Harlingen. TX in Jan. and again we had a really good time. We only stayed 3 weeks since we are cutting our winter short this year to get home in time for babies. These are our friends Earl and LaNiece and Dale and Judy. We play pegs and jokers with them and have a blast. We also enjoyed a few great meals at Chiquita's with them.