We Had A Blast With Karin & Carol!

Today has been really fun. At 9:00 this morning Karin arrived on schedule to help us with our morning chores and then it started raining lightly, so we put on raincoats and then we jumped into Kermit and went to the pump house, so Tony could feed the deer and the pigs.

Then we took off to go feed the deer, wild turkeys and Wilbur, the wild hog, outside the rescue ranch near our white board fence and on T.'s cue he and Karin poured out their buckets of feed, as we made a wide circle up by the trees and the deer came running to eat, but Wilbur was a no-show, which always worries me, because I fear that someone might have shot him.

When Karin and I started cleaning the pens, the rubber boots that we had loaned her to wear started hurting her ankles, so we drove up to the trailer, so she could wear her shoes and that is when I took this picture of her ready to go back to work.

But, before going back to scooping poop, we drove outside the ranch, to see if Wilbur had shown up for his morning feeding and we were thrilled to see him eating with the white-tailed deer. So, I took this picture of him and his deer friends. Then we went back to work.

When we finished our chores we came to the trailer to put on clean clothes, because Tone and I were treating Karin to lunch at the famous, O.S.T restaurant, in Bandera, the Cowboy Capitol of the World. When Karin came out of our bedroom she was dressed up like a real Texas cowgirl and we loved seeing her pants nicely tucked inside her new Justin Gypsy cowboy boots. Then we grabbed our cameras and took off in Trigger.

As usual, the O.S.T. (Old Spanish Trail) was packed with locals and tourists and we were so lucky to have gotten the last unoccupied table in their famous John Wayne room. After I had sat down on the long bench, I thought Karin, who was standing behind me grabbed my shoulders, but I was wrong, because it was our dear friend Maribeth Couch, from Utopia, so we had a fun, but short visit with her, because our friendly waitress showed up to take our drink order and to give us menus. 

After we had told Karin that the the O.S.T. was famous for their delicious Chicken Fried Steaks and a must-do in Bandera—the three of us ordered it. As Karin, who is camera shy, tried to eat her giant chicken fried steak, Tony shot her and then when we finished eating our lunch he shot her again, standing next to her cowboy hero—a life-sized John Wayne cardboard cut-out.

Then we went to several shops for her to buy postcards and a few gifts. 

On our way back to the ranch, we decided to stop at the famous Old Timer, in Medina, so she could see where T. sits every morning, when he drinks coffee with his many friends. I took this picture of Karin and him sitting at the table, where he always sits and drinks his coffee.

Between Medina and our rescue ranch Karin thought it would be funny to do a funny photo-shoot of her sitting in a chair with her boots propped up on a table with Mama by her side and a rifle in her lap, like they did in the old western movies, so when we got home we accommodated her wishes and it was hilarious.

After Tony had made sure and showed us that his shotgun had no bullets in it, because we are uncomfortable around guns, we went into Outer Space with Mama, so Tony could shoot Karin and Mama with his camera. Our dear German friend had wanted to look like a mean, tough, rugged cowgirl in her photo shoot, but that never happened, because we were all laughing so much. 

After T. had shot Karin and my beautiful dog with his camera he took this picture of us showing off our Justin Gypsy boots. 

Then  I challenged Karin to a Rope-Off. "Karin, roping looks real easy to do, but it is not. I'm not very good at it, but Tony can rope anything that he wants. He is so good at it." Then I took off to get  my ropes, which took me awhile to find, because I had misplaced them.

Before our official "Germany vs. Texas Rope-Off" Tony went inside the trailer, so he could call Carol, to invite her to come over. When he came back outside he told us, "Carol is coming over after she finishes baking her last bath of cookies." Then Karin and I picked up our ropes and we went to where my roping post is—next to my Space Ship, which is still under construction. 

After T. had shown Karin how to hold the rope correctly and throw it—the fun contest began. As she and I took turns throwing our ropes, in hopes that we would win the "first to rope the post three times" there was non-stop laughter, because Karin was as bad as me and it took us forever to rope the post. Tony took these pictures of Karin's roping skills and her joy of finally roping the post.

I ended up winning the 3-2 roping contest, right before Carol drove up in her to-die-for Ford F-250 pickup, that I drool over every time that I see it and then we went back into Outer Space and our fun visit began. 

We laughed a lot about our thick Texas accents and not being able to properly pronounce Karin and Jurgen's names correctly or Karin's maiden name and a few other German words that she had used, as we munched on Carol's delicious, homemade oatmeal-raisin cookies, that she had brought over to us.

Around 5:30, after a great time in Outer Space, Carol went home to her ranch and we went over to Echo Hill's barn to feed Shalom and the three donkeys, Roy, Gabby and Little Jewford and when we got back home we made tomorrow's plans with Karin and then we adios-ed each other. And that is about it for tonight.

Y'all have a great evening and please keep praying for us to get some rain, because it is working, because last night we got 1.5 inches of rain! Come on RAIN!