Happy Birthday RV! Happy Birthday David!

German Chocolate Cake... 

Exactly one year ago this weekend our new RV arrived from Canada and we picked it up in Ft. Worth and drove it back home to San Antonio.  We camped the first night in the parking lot at the RV dealer.  Not exactly a beautiful location for our first night, but very practical.  We were able to try everything mechanical making sure we knew how it all worked and then we had a list of questions in the morning for the guys in the shop.  The next night we stayed in a commercial campground nearby in Arlington just in case we had more questions and then we felt good enough to take off. 

Our brand new RV last year at Dinosaur Valley State Park

 
I’ll never forget our first ‘real’ camping night at Dinosaur Valley State Park.  We were so happy and excited to be camping in our new RV.  Everything went smoothly including cooking our first ‘real’ meal of grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup.  The bluebonnets were just fantastic and their fragrance was incredible.  I tend to think of wildflowers as a visual experience, but camping in the middle of fields of bluebonnets is also quite a fragrant experience.  And David celebrated his birthday with a new RV in bluebonnets.  It doesn’t get much better!

Maya came with us on our 'maiden voyage.'
She didn't really want to pose for a cheesy bluebonnet 
photo but I made her, just like moms do.

 

Only a few short weeks after picking up the RV last year, the house sold unbelievably fast and we were packing like crazy getting ready to take off on the adventure of a lifetime.  And here we are one year later (still married, I might add) so the closeness of RV life has worked out for us.  The bluebonnets aren’t quite as magnificent as last year, but we’ve seen some nice fields of wildflowers this spring.  I baked David his favorite German Chocolate Cake in my mom’s kitchen in Odessa.  Our RV has a combination microwave and convection oven which is a little small to bake a cake in (although it does pretty well on cookies and brownies).
 
David’s birthday present this year was a really nice GPS unit.  He wasn’t very satisfied with the GPS ‘app’ on my phone and besides it depends on cell service and often on our hikes we have not had cell service.  Satellite service should be more dependable.  David is practicing using the GPS right now so look forward on this season's adventure to ‘Stats by David.'  We will be leaving Texas in just a few days and appreciate all your suggestions of places to visit along the east coast and Appalachian Mountains.  There is still plenty of time to send us a suggestion...  

Searching for a satellite

 

Maya knows where she is...