Mid July musings

This week we enjoyed visiting the newest location of our favorite Tex-Mex Cajun fusion restaurant, Tia Juanita's. The service and food were both pretty good, but I can see a bit of room for improvement as their kitchen staff settles into things.

We tried a new-to-us Mexican restaurant a couple weeks ago. As you can see below, the basket of chips was quite colorful. My flautas were fine, but I don't see it added to our restaurant rotation. You win some, you pass on some.

Last week I decided to whip up an old favorite of my granny's. So off I went to the grocery store to pick up the things I needed to make Swiss steak, whipped potatoes, green beans and yeast rolls. After cooking the Swiss steak on low in the crockpot for almost 8 hours, we sat down to a nice meal we enjoyed with the husband's parents. 

A kind neighbor two doors down from our house in Boerne kindly went over to check our property on Wednesday after about 13 inches of rain fell in two days. She sent me the video below that our neighbor on the other side took while standing on her porch looking across towards our property. The fence you see in the background runs down our property line. Bad news is that our septic alarm went off after over a foot of rushing water ran over the top of it at the height of the flooding. The good news is that it didn't do any damage to the septic system. She found a bit of water pooled at the entry to the garage, but the house was high and dry, praise God.

On a final note, we've been working on the front elevation for our new lake house as well as a few more tweaks for the architect to try and get the floor plan set so we can move to next steps. We're opting to lean into what I've dubbed lakeside cottage. Something that blends into its natural surroundings. Warm and timeless, yet full of character. That's how I hope it turns out once it's finished. I'm looking forward to this next week since I've got our designer coming up here to accompany me to the nine vendors where I've scheduled appointments. It's time to start looking at interior and exterior selects to make this build our dream retirement home.

New build planning proces

Last week our house dimensions were staked out on the lot, thanks to our survey company, so we can see where the house will sit. But this week we went all-in on technology regarding our dream retirement home build. We had seen literature for "Walk Your Plans" at a couple of the local parade homes last month. So we gave it a try today for a couple hours. And y'all, it was the coolest thing. We got to check out how our plans will really work in terms of space and usability. Thanks to this immersive technology that projected our floor plan at a 1:1, life size scale on the floor, we were able to get a real feel for the details. And of course we ended up making several changes to the interior spaces.

As luck would have it, we asked her to project the pool size we're considering, as well as placement of it, beyond our 33x18' screened back porch. This gave us a good idea about how our outdoor entertaining space will best function on the property, as well as ways to maximize our views down to the boathouse. If you're building a home, remodeling, or adding a pool, I highly recommend Walk Your Plans because it's money well spent.

Speaking of the boat house, on Friday we drove a little over an hour north to the lake where our boat house builder lives. We were able to tour a couple different boat houses he designed to get a feel for the quality and details seen on our plans that will go to the river authority soon for approval. Plus we got to consider composite decking options because I'm absolutely NOT having any walkways made from boards that will bake in the Texas sun and get warped after a few years. Plus splinters, y'all... I loathe them!

Lately I've been busy setting up appointments with many of the vendors our custom home builder uses so the decorator and I can start getting a feel for what's out there and how we want our space to look. As you can see in the latest version of our front elevation below, I am going for a legacy lake house feel. One where generations of kids have spent summers learning to ski and eating watermelon in the backyard. I didn't want to lean too far into the rustic. So I feel like I'm headed for more of a lakeside cottage feel lately. Think Granny and Pappy's old house that has been updated and modernized so the next generation of family can continue creating great memories at the lake.

July 4th recap

We had a lovely holiday weekend here at the lake. Our Dallas daughter and her boyfriend arrived on Friday, along with our nephew. Then Saturday our niece arrived. We had eleven for lunch on Saturday, and it was a wonderful time. Late that afternoon, I took out the younger set for a cruise on the lake. The older crowd  - my husband's parents and aunt - opted to stay in the AC instead of sweating in the Texas heat.

It was fun to watch the fireworks displays in our community on Friday and Saturday nights. The one out on the point, reflecting off the water, was especially impressive.

I didn't take any pics of our meals, but I did snap one of the pan full of onions I spent 45 min caramelizing for homemade onion dip that the kids enjoy. The husband did an excellent job smoking brisket and ribs, as well as grilling a couple spatchcock chickens. The younger daughter and I whipped up several sides, as well as homemade banana pudding. But the cookie cake covered in icing was also well received. 

With our Austin daughter and her husband in Colorado visiting his family for July 4th, we volunteered to keep our grand doggy. I've gotta say, Chorkie is mellowing out some as he continues to age. Oh sure, he hiked his leg on my ottoman as well as silk plant in the house. And probably a few other things got sprinkled that I haven't discovered yet. But he's generally easy to keep if you discount his need to mark things in our home. As luck would have it, our niece drove Chorkie back to her place in Round Rock, and thus saved me and my daughter a couple hours of driving to get him back home to Austin.

It's hard to believe this is our country's 250th birthday. I remember celebrating the 200th birthday (bicentennial) back in 1976 when I was in 3rd grade. We dressed up in colonial costumes for celebratory activities at school. I recall feeling really proud of this cute revolutionary era mob cap my mother made me to wear. Where does the time go, y'all? As the song says, "God shed His grace on thee"... and I praise Him for it. May the Lord bless and guide our country as believers continue to be both salt and light in a world that desperately needs to hear His Good News.

Independence Day Eve

I love July 4 on the lake. It's all about grilling, boat riding and enjoying time with family. If it was about 20 degrees cooler, then I'd call it a perfect holiday. The one thing you can count on at this time of year in Texas is sweating and the need to wear sunscreen. Plus mosquito repellent. And to reapply both after some more sweating.

Last weekend, the family across the bay from us hosted their annual Texas Adaptive Aquafest. A year ago, I was back at the hill country house and missed it. They set it all up a couple days before, and it looked like a good time was had by everyone who attended. In true nosey neighbor fashion, we broke out the binoculars to get a good look at all of the fun going on across the water from us. 

I had heard from our neighbors about this now annual event last year, as well as the fireworks show they put on at the end of the evening to cap off a wonderful day of water sports. This year the fireworks lasted for a solid twenty minutes, and we had ringside seats from our back porch. It's such a blessing to see folks in our community pulling together to be the hands and feet of Jesus, providing a fun day on the water for folks who might not normally have the opportunity to enjoy time at the lake with their families. God be praised!

Landed a fishing boat

The husband has been talking about getting a fishing boat for months now. He finally made his selection of a zippy 20 ft center console, and picked it up a few days ago. Safely in our second boathouse lift, the husband has been busy figuring out all of the technology. Things like a fancy trolling motor plus Garmin and Hummingbird sonar/live scope. We took it out on its maiden voyage a couple days ago so he could fluctuate speed and RPMs to get it "broken in". And I gotta say it's a pretty sweet ride.

Begone, house

And just like that, our tear down is torn down. They got started last Wednesday, and had everything above the slab demolished and hauled away by the weekend. Today they're working to finish pulling up the rest of the slab. Then they'll move to tearing out the old sidewalk to the water. The dilapidated dock is next on the demo hit list to wrap up the week's work before the holiday weekend.

We're meeting with the pool builder tomorrow to design our splash pool. Then we need to get the next (and hopefully final) round of tweaks to our architect in the next couple days so he can wrap up the floorpan. That will allow us to move forward with elevations and full construction documents, so we can get it all priced out for contracts with our builder. It's a lot to wrangle, but we're motivated to keep the custom home train moving down the tracks to kick off our build in the next couple months, Lord willin' and the creek don't rise. 

Hit and miss cooking

We recently enjoyed a community-wide fish fry our church hosted. As a member of the activities committee, I pitched in to help with rolling flatware, setting up tables/chairs, serving drinks, and clean up. We all agreed it was a really good turn out for a Saturday evening. 

I had originally thought I'd whip up some potato salad since salad, sides and desserts are the standard "covered dish" options for this sort of gathering. But then I figured potato salad would be a popular side, so I made a big batch of pasta salad instead. Unfortunately, that seemed to be the mindset of several other ladies who also brought pasta salad. And thus there was an alarming lack of potato salad options to accompany our fish, which was a bummer. So that resulted in me and the husband eating leftover pasta salad for several days afterwards. Note to self: make potato salad for the annual fish fry going forward.

Unlike my pasta salad, the cake I made was quickly devoured. It's called better than sex cake. However, since this was a church gathering here in the evangelical belt of Texas, I dubbed it chocolate candy bar cake since it included crushed up toffee bars. 

In other cooking news, the husband has been experimenting with his pellet smoker and meat thermometer since he retired. After twelve long hours in the smoker, this brisket pictured above was both tender and tasty. He'll be firing up the smoker again for the July 4 holiday weekend, when we'll be feeding a dozen folks for a couple days. I don't know about you, but I'm a firm believer that meat always tastes better when it has been cooked outside on a smoker or grill.