Field Trip to the Missions

In January our park took a "field trip" to two missions south of Tucson.  San Xavier is one of my favorite places in Tucson - it is an active Catholic mission/church.  It is a beautiful place which was built in the 1800's and has had restorative work several times over the years.  We took a guided tour which we have never done before even though we have been to the mission several times over the years.  It was super interesting and informative.

 

 

After going to the first mission, we went to Wisdom Cafe which is known for their fruit chimichanga's.  We did not have one because our meal was so big that there was no room for dessert.  In the courtyard there was a bottle tree - I am trying to convince dad to build me one for our yard.  I'm having a hard time convincing him lately - either of you interested in letting me put one in your new yards????????

 This was the second mission we went to - Tumacocori Nat'l Monument.  This mission has not been restored at all but is really neat.

We went on the field trip with at least 50 other friends and neighbors from the park, including Uncle Rich and Aunt Henrietta.  It was a fun day!!!!

Have a super week!!!!  Amy and Kurt and Chase, we're praying that your house-buying process goes smoothly for you all.

Love to you all,
Gramma and MOM

Uncle Rich's Birthday

Uncle Rich said he wanted to go to the House of Miniatures for his birthday, in addition to going out for dinner, of course.  The House of Miniatures is just that - all miniatures that were collected by one lady.  She added onto her house twice to hold all of them and finally created a museum for them.  It was very interesting and we all enjoyed it.  She is still adding collections to her museum and they said she can often be found in the museum cleaning her miniatures.  We took a little tour which gave us much more information.  There were several small houses with miniatures plus other displays.  The oldest house with miniatures in it was around 200 years old.

 

 

This violin had all small violins hanging on a line along with tools to make them.  They were all in a violin of normal size.  We were told that all of these tiny, little violins could be played and the small tools were all working tools.  I took this picture for my favorite violinist.

 

 

 In one of the rooms, they had a glass insert on the floor and a Christmas village under the glass.  I would love this in my house - what a unique, fun way of displaying a village.

 Small silver Dutch windmills....

 The small bottles of liquor in this display case had the actual liquor in them or so they told us.

 The collector lady bought this miniature gold house with all the tiny furniture, etc from an auction house on the east coast.  It was too large to ship in one piece so it had to be taken apart.  It was quite impressive.

When you all come to visit the next time, I'll take you here.  It was a fun way to spend a morning.

We went to Culver's on the way home for a treat and then went to Sweet Tomatoes for dinner with Rick, Shakayla and Jaylynn.  I think Uncle Rich had a good birthday.

Love to all,
Gramma and MOM

Arizona

I am still having major problems trying to post pictures to my blog.  Hoping to get some help soon.  Here are a couple of pictures I took when we first arrived.  The one is looking across the street from our house.  It was a beautiful morning and the clouds were gorgeous.

 

 

 

I took this picture from my van window when I was on my way home from lunch with Linda DeBoer.  I have never seen a rainbow with such vibrant color - this picture does not show the colors as they were at all.  It was so beautiful it took my breath away!!

Dad is back to playing shuffleboard with his team again this year.  He has been winning at least one of his games every week.

 Well, I guess this wasn't one of the good ones but he just barely lost it.

 

 

Tomorrow I'm going to work on trying to figure out why I can't load my pictures easier.  Until then, have a great day.

 

Love to you all,

 

Gramma and MOM