5 Days of fun and a little business thrown in

Hope everyone had a great 4th of July. Houston got a big surprise. Some areas received up to 8" of rain. WOW! Our big Freedom over Texas celebration with music and food vendors had to be cancelled. The bayou came out of it's banks. Porta-potties were floating away and some vendor merchandise was lost in the waters. The fireworks still went off but the only we could see was on TV because the area flooded.Our day started off slow and easy. We weren't in any big hurry. We finally got the car packed and headed to Bryan to stay the night with Pamela and drop off Lilley while we went to Austin and other areas for the rest of the week and weekend.
We got to her house and asked if she wanted to ride up to the farm to see the progress of the house. She's only seen pictures lately so she was happy to ride up. I think she was impressed since she was able to see and visualize the rooms. LOL she even picked out which room she wanted to stay in when she came to stay the night.
So the week before this was how the house looked. Pretty much framed in.


And when we walked up to the house we saw the firebox was already installed. Wow. Sure won't be needing that too soon with this heat Texas has been experiencing.
And this is how the outside has progressed.  They had complete the framing on the roof and the porches plus they put up the paper barrier all around.
Slowly it's starting to look like a real house. Our forever home.

Exciting.


So after looking though the house and walking though the walls it was time to go back to Pamela's and feed the pup's so we could go eat.
Well when we left to go eat we walked out the door and I asked David if he had the keys. Of course he thought I meant the car keys but unfortunately I meant my keys that I had handed him when we got to Pamela's earlier. uh oh. And Pamela rarely brings her purse or keys because she's riding with us as was the case this time. In fact most times she don't even bring her phone..What a fine pickle we were in. We had already locked the knob and pulled it shut when we realized my keys were on her entry table. Oh Lordy! Pamela had her phone and was able to find a locksmith quickly. We had to wait almost 30 minutes for a locksmith. It took that guy all of 2 minutes to pop the lock....are ready for this.... he did it with a credit card. A CREDIT CARD!. Be sure to lock that dead bolt folks. That was too easy. I don't even remember where we went to eat now. We didn't even watch any fireworks.
Next morning Pamela went to work and David and I headed to Austin. But first we stopped off at the Farm to do some measuring. Back on the road we headed to Austin. We were trying to get there in time to have lunch with our friends Kevin and Pam. Well we ran late but we stopped for a visit and made plans for dinner. Pam J. had back surgery just about 2 weeks prior and had developed vertigo so she didn't think going out for dinner was a good idea and offer to fix us dinner so if she got to feeling bad she could just go sit down in her recliner. Fine by us if that's what she feels most comfortable doing. We left their home and headed to our appointment with TRS (teacher retirement system).
Yep we're meeting with a TRS rep to talk about me possibly retiring one in the future. I had my notebook of questions and little sticky notes on the forms in the packet. The meeting lasted about an hour and I got all my questions answered which will help with decisions regarding insurance and retirement itself. It's exciting, scary and in a way almost insurmountable if that makes sense. Now to go check into our hotel.
Wow the hotel was pretty cool and old. We stayed at the Driskill Hotel in downtown Austin. it opened in
December 1896. Just a few days ago. Now I was all fine and dandy staying at this grand hotel until our friend Kevin goes "I hope you aren't staying in the most haunted room" Whoa What did he say? Haunted! Really? Awesome.
While laying in bed I was relieve to see the most haunted room was 525. Which is in the old part of the old original part of the hotel. We stayed on the 10th floor which was added in 1934. Either way we saw no ghost or got strange chills while there. We did have breakfast at the 1886 Cafe and Bakery in the hotel at the suggestion of our friend Pam J. It was awesome. I forgot to take a picture of our pretty plated food. We both ordered eggs Benedict. They were so good. The eggs were cooked perfect, the English muffins had a great flavor, the Canadian bacon had a smokey flavor and the hollandaise sauce had just the right amount of lemon. As we stood outside waiting for our car Friday morning I looked up and saw the light fixture and the emblem around it.  Made me think of my sorority emblem. David noticed the doors and the hardware. The hardware has star at the top and bottom of the handle plate.

This hotel is where Lyndon B. Johnson met Lady Bird. There's a lot of history and interesting stories.
They say it's haunted by Col. Driskill himself and maybe the 2 brides that killed themselves while on their honeymoon and you might hear what sounds like a ball bouncing down the stairs and giggles of the little girl who chase the ball and fell down the stairs.

From here we went to Johnson City to do some antique shopping. Found a few things we might want to get. Like this shelf the shop owner was using as a display but he needed to ask the owner of the shelf if she wanted to sell it. It's like the one David found on the Internet somewhere. But dang it he hasn't called us with an answer yet. Hope he calls soon. We also found this light fixture for the front hall at the Rock'n K we both liked but we needed to measure to make sure it wasn't too big. Looks pretty cool.
It was getting late in the afternoon after we shopped at two-3 more shops and we needed to get to Brenham by no later than 7pm to be able to check in to our hotel there.
We stayed at the Ant Street Hotel. Another historic hotel. It's one block off the square where the music plays.With our stay we get breakfast each morning at the Brenham Grill located there in the hotel. And again the food was outstanding. On the 2nd floor where the 18 rooms are in the late afternoon they set out wine with cheese and crackers. They call it the social hour. We were the only ones out there that day.

 After we finished out glass of wine and appetizer we decided to go for a stroll and find somewhere to eat dinner. Brenham is a small town and there's not that many places in the actual downtown area but we decided on Ninety Six West. It was a bar and grill.  They had some very tasty looking food being served but we both decided on a stuffed chicken with asparagus. Wow a healthy meal. What's wrong with us.
It was cooked and seasoned just right. The chicken wasn't dry and the asparagus was mmmm.
 Now it was time to find live music and a beer or wine. Whatever. We ended up at Home Sweet Farm. It's right across from the hotel so that made it easy when we were ready to go to bed.

The band was called "Law by the Gun"  Great band. The lead singer got comfy and played the evening away in his stocking feet. Those boots just rested in front of the drummer.
 Got up Saturday the 7th and went antique shopping. We had a healthy lunch at Los Americana's a Cuban restaurant. We kept ordering the same thing. We both got a salad with grilled chicken with a cilantro lime dressing.  Pretty tasty.    After lunch I just wasn't feeling quite right and I said I wanted to go back and rest at the hotel for a while. It was really hot. Well my little while turned into a four hour nap. And David let me sleep and while a slept there came a big rain. Later that evening we strolled on the square to see if the concert was still gonna happen and it was. So I let our friends know to come on out. In the month of July Brenham has Hot Nights and Cool Tunes. Free concert. All you have to do is bring your lawn chairs and set them up in the street around the square.
Before Mark and Kathy got there we went and had a burger and onion rings from BT Longhorn Saloon. I misunderstood and thought they were eating at home but they had planned on eating in town. I'm bad. Very Bad but we still had a good time.





And here we are at the end of our Mini Vacation leaving Ant Street Inn until another time.

From Brenham we decided to run by the Rock'n K just to see what they might have gotten done in the past couple of days. Wow were we surprised. They had decked and put the tar paper up on the front of the house readying it for shingles. This framing crew is moving right along.  Well I'll end this long post with a I can't wait to see what it looks like this weekend. I've been told there is more progress.. Yippee

Until next blog.... Be Happy