A '53 Ford - cuz I think my brother will like seeing it!

This motorhome and tow vehicle was "next door" at our first site at Lake Tawakoni, and it ended up that they were the next rig down from us this morning when we were leaving as well.

Dwayne went down and talked to the owner. He said it is a '53. He also said that his wife does all the driving of their motorhome!

What a difference a few days makes...

When we got to the Thousand Trails campground at Lake Tawakoni on Wednesday, we enjoyed driving and walking around and seeing the facilities.

After spending much of Thursday away from the campground, it has rained almost continuously, and, even more, it has rained "upstream" from us, causing the lake to rise quite a lot. We heard today that, even after the rain stops (predicted for tomorrow) the lake may continue to rise another couple of feet. We moved the bus from our "lake front" site to a site on the main road in the campground today, as we plan to leave tomorrow - we didn't really think there would be any issue with the site we were in, but the road we needed to take out from that site was getting close to having water flowing over it, so we thought the wise move was to get to a more secure location.

We also did laundry today at the activity center that we visited on Wednesday. A couple of pictures to see the difference from Wednesday to Sunday:

Wednesday: A view down from the activities center to the fishing pier - it came to land just by the tree on the right side of the picture. There was some kind of game court just past that yellow marker sign.

Sunday: A picture from the activity center. The horizontal railing of the fishing pier is just above the lake level and the water is covering that game court as well as some of the parking lot.

A more close-up view of the railings of the fishing pier just above lake level.

 Weather predictions are that the rain will be stopping, both here and in Gainesville, which is where we will be driving tomorrow, Lord willing!

"Honey, It's wet outside!"

We're having very wet weather in Texas - though they are probably having more rainfall in the Dallas area, we are getting our share of rain, and I guess we may be getting runoff, certainly from areas north of us. As a result, Lake Tawakoni is at capacity, and water is coming up in the campground.

We got up this morning to see that the sites on the loop across from us were under water.

Looking out the front windshield of the bus. It is hard to see, but right in the middle is a picnic table that is at what used to be a campsite.

Looking up the road, the water was coming up behind the motor home that was up from us.

Soon enough, the campground folks came by to let us know that the power in our section would be going out (I think the transformer was about to be flooded) and they encouraged us to leave. We thought about driving out toward Lake Texoma as we need to be in Gainesville by Tuesday morning, but we had some difficulty getting the power cord to stow, so we decided to try to find another site in this campground.

Unfortunately, many other rigs were also looking for higher ground, and since Miss Doozie is so long, we had some difficulty finding a spot that was large enough for us to not only park in, but also to get into... we almost had a disaster as the front driver-side tire went off the road as I was trying to back into a spot...

Ditch carved by our front wheel

Miss Doozie's front tire got deep into the mud!

Thankfully, we avoided hitting the tree *and* got back onto the hard surface.

We finally found a site that seems to be on reasonably higher ground (or we hope so!) and had sufficient road surface across from us to allow us to get into the spot.

We pretty much have a lake front site now. We're keeping an eye out on how much the lake comes up to those rigs across from us - we may need to move on out of here too!

Our first visit to Thousand Trails was at Lake Tawakoni

We figure it was about 20 years ago that we made our first visit to a Thousand Trails campground. Pop (Leo) and Peggy had purchased a membership, and they invited us (and other family members) to go. At that time, Thousand Trails had rental trailers that guests could stay in (now they more have cabins, though I think I saw rental trailers at Menifee Lakes in California).

As we drove around the campground when we arrived on Wednesday, it is painfully obvious that this campground was really gorgeous and set up so nicely when it was first built... but unfortunately, not much has been done to it since then other than just basic maintenance.

We really don't remember a lot about our stay back then - we remember playing miniature golf, and we remember a few key features about the rental trailer... specifically,
- there was no soap dish in the shower
- the shower was so small that to bend down to reach the floor, you had to step out of the shower
- if someone dropped the soap in the shower, the person in the bedroom could hear it, and would be prompted to laugh uncontrollably, and their laughter would shake the rig so much that the person showering would think that the trailer was being moved!

We also remember having a nice time with family!

Happy Thanksgiving, Y'all!!!

We were so blessed to spend today with Clif and Patti at their lake house - it was wonderful to be with friends and be accepted in their family as we give thanks.

Pat Pat's lake house

Traveling east (at least a little ways)

We had planned to go to a Thousand Trails campground at Texoma for the Thanksgiving holiday - we can stay at Thousand Trails for free, and we need to be in Gainesville on Tuesday, so that seemed like a reasonable plan. But, friends Patti and Clif invited us to join them for Thanksgiving at their place on Lake Fork, and we accepted! We were thinking we would just WalDock for a night or two, but when I looked at where Lake Fork was, I saw that there was a Thousand Trails at Lake Tawakoni, and changed our booking to stay there.

We drove around the campground after we got settled - it is really a large campground. The lake is quite high and they are predicting a lot of rain this weekend, so we selected a site that is further away from the shoreline!

The Gift of an Ordinary Day

I watched a video recently of an author reading from her book: The Gift of an Ordinary Day

I was reflecting on the past few days and thinking about how much I appreciate just "ordinary days" - days with nothing particular scheduled, just enjoying God and His glory and His love.

Yesterday we got to enjoy being with our church family - it was SO great to be able to worship together with our family! I especially appreciated getting to see the Primrose boys - just love those little ones! It was also parent-and-child dedication Sunday - what a joy to see the youngsters that God has blessed our fellowship with! I also got to visit with friends Charleyne and Clive - so good to see them again, and hear about when they lived in Arizona.

Today I got to visit with my friend Naina, enjoying a relaxing massage with her! I have been dealing with a painful right shoulder, and she was able to work on it and it feels tons better.

We also visited at the house on Meadowglen Circle on Saturday, and realized that we had some stuff that needed to be taken care of, so we went back over today to clear out some things from the garage and solarium. We still have some additional things to take care of, but were glad to accomplish quite a bit today.

Shoebox packing day!!!

Each year, we pack shoeboxes for distribution to children through Operation Christmas Child. All through the year, we collect items to put into the shoeboxes - small toys, crayons, socks, pens/pencils, soap, washcloths, toothbrushes, toothpaste. I used to do just a few shoeboxes, and then I asked other friends to join in. Because of our travel, I wasn't sure I was going to be able to be part of the packing party this year - so the responsibility fell on the capable shoulders of my friend, Janell. She kept a spreadsheet of everything that had been bought, and tracked what was still needed. At the packing party last year, we set a goal to pack 100 shoeboxes - and we accomplished that today!

There were about 15-20 folks who helped with the packing today. Janell had pre-sorted a lot of things so they were already in groupings of 100 items - which meant distributing into the shoeboxes could go easily. We had 3 tables of "group" work - splitting the candy and note cards into 100 packages, and packaging the soap and washcloths into their own baggies. Others distributed grouped items into the 100 shoeboxes that were positioned down two sides of long tables for easy distribution.

When we were all done, re-positioning of items was done to ensure that tops could close and rubber bands were put around to ensure that the tops and bottoms stayed together.

This year, since we were a little later with getting the packing done, the processing center in Dallas was already open, so we were able to distribute the boxes directly to the processing center.

It was great fun, and we pray that the children who receive these shoebox gifts will receive not only the gifts that we packed, but the greatest gift of all, salvation through Jesus!

We packed at St Catherine of Sienna in Carrollton. Father came by at the end, and we were able to get a picture of him with the kids who helped!

This is most of the folks who helped out! Sorry that it is a little blurry....

A couple of the ladies who participated!

The Dallas processing center - this year it is just off Crosby west of I-35E in Carrollton

Unlimited Internet has gone bye-bye -- hmmm... it's back!

We were able to sign up for a sweet deal to get unlimited data from Omnilynx back in the August/September timeframe. Unfortunately, we were notified at the beginning of November that they were having to shut down service. We thought we would have through the end of November, but have been reading online that others have been shutdown earlier this month. This evening when we tried to get our computers online, there was no internet via our MiFi device. :-(

On the positive side, Verizon is giving away 1G of free data for this billing period and the next!

Updated on Saturday, 11/21 - I tried booting the MiFi device, and it seems to be working again! I know it will be gone by the end of the month, but I appreciate it for as long as we have it!

Checking off those appointments

We were planning to be in the Dallas area for just a few days, so we tried to get all doctor appointments scheduled within about 5 business days. General practice doctors x2, specialists (pain management, dermatologist x2), dentist and periodontist, and a follow-up with the oncology surgeon that did my biopsy in July - plus doing laundry, packing Operation Christmas Child shoeboxes, visiting the house and doing some tradeoffs on things we brought versus things in the attic, and getting to visit with some family and friends - makes it a very busy few days!

But - once these 5 days are completed, we should be checked out for about 6 months! We need one of those stickers like they put on the car after an oil change: next service needed on 5/19 or 20000 miles, whichever comes first.

Shall we gather at The River?

On Wednesday nights, our church has a praise and prayer service called "The River". We got to participate in it tonight - what a joy it is to be back with our church family!

Psalm 122:1
I was glad when they said to me,
“Let us go into the house of the Lord.”

Looking forward to Yuma!

Lord willing, we hope to spend much of the winter in Arizona - as we did last year - visiting family in Tucson, meeting up with folks at Quartzsite, maybe a trip to the Cottonwood area, and we are hoping to spend the majority of time in Yuma.

Yuma is a small town right in the southwest corner of Arizona - a part of Arizona that sticks out further south than California. There is a lot of growing done in this area of the US - many of the greens that we eat in the winter come from the Yuma area. We were there for a week last March, and got to participate in some of the activities there. We hope to be back for the "Lettuce Days" celebration and have signed up for some of the other activities there -

• Field to Feast agriculture tour
• Behind the Big Guns tour of the Yuma Proving Ground
• Date Night Dinner in a date grove with Alex Trujillo

The tickets have gone on sale on different dates - I booked the last ones (Field to Feast tour) today. We're looking forward to Yuma!

I think we need a user tutorial

We had had service done on the bus at the National Indoor RV Center in Lewisville back in August/September. When we couldn't get the AquaHot to work to heat the bus as we were leaving Virginia, we decided to try to take it back there when we got back to Texas to see if they could determine what the problem was. They agreed to work us in, so we arrived at their lot just as they were closing last night (Monday). We were able to get fresh water on board, and we could have used their dump station if needed, and they had 50A hookups for us to "camp" in their storage area.

This morning, the service manager, Paul, came to our coach to check out the AquaHot. It turned out that the problem was probably "user error" - the need to have several components on the coach correctly set as well as sufficient battery capacity to run the 12V blowers. Paul showed us how to get the system working, and it worked great to heat the coach this morning. He also helped us with a propane issue and an ABS indicator issue. (He indicated that it is unfortunately rather common that the ABS indicator from the tag axle gives incorrect readings of failure on Blue Birds and that many coaches just disable that check of the ABS on the tag axle.)

We determined that there were some additional items that we would like for them to diagnose/correct (the biggest being a water leak in the bedroom floor area), so we went over to our service advisor, Carey, to see if we could bring it back after our driving test on 12/1. We were able to make an appointment to bring it back on 12/7, so we'll be staying in the north Texas area for a little longer. When we asked to "settle up" our bill for the services that Paul had done today, Carey let us know that Paul had comped the services!!! Oh my - we did not expect that!

We really appreciate all the help that both Paul and Carey have given us, and are really happy with the service that they have provided. Unfortunately, I think what we really need is a user tutorial on how to operate the systems on this bus!!!

Be Prepared

We've lived in the DFW area for a long time (Dwayne for his entire life, Patti since 1985) - but our first night "back" living in the bus, there is a tornado warning. We aren't in a regular campground that would have provided a gathering place, we aren't in a WalMart that would have a Tornado shelter; instead, we are parked at an RV service center, which is closed for the night, and there are dozens of other motorhomes around us, as well as an aluminum canopy over the motorhomes across from us. We knew that severe weather was predicted, but when WeatherBug sent an alert over our phones at 350ish this morning, followed shortly by the tornado warning sirens sounding nearby, we realized we didn't have a plan! All I could think about is that tornadoes always seem to target mobile home parks, and could the tornado tell the difference between a parking lot full of motorhomes and a mobile home park????

Dwayne was much more sane than I. I had packed up the cats in their carriers and was figuring we needed to evacuate to somewhere - where, I wasn't sure!

On the list: each camping location, decide together what you're going to do if severe weather occurs.

Excitement for the day

We were on our last leg in to Dallas from West Monroe, LA today, anticipating a pretty short day. Instead, we had a bit of excitement!

As we were driving through Bossier City / Shreveport, we experienced some of Louisiana's incredibly rough roads. We hit a place where the rig started porpoising pretty wildly (I think we were just past exit 22) - I was able to keep control of the coach... but... evidently the stress on the tow bar was too much and we must have popped the locks that we were using in place of the linch pins on the quick-connect bar on the Jeep. In my normal checking of the mirrors and rear-view camera, I noticed that the Jeep was not quite following along as normal - it was following, but was zigzagging back and forth on its own. Uh oh - let's look for a place to stop... there were no shoulders where we were, so I drove a bit further and pulled off at exit 20.

The wonderful thing was that the safety features of the Roadmaster tow bar system worked just as they should have. The Jeep was still attached to the bus by the blue safety cables, and the air braking system was still attached, as was the safety emergency brake (which would have engaged if the Jeep came totally loose to stop the Jeep immediately). The blue safety cables kept the Jeep pretty closely engaged to the bus, and the air braking system ensured that the Jeep braked when the bus was braking. When I pulled off on the exit, the Jeep followed me to the shoulder of the exit ramp, and as long as I was holding down on the brake pedal on the bus, the Jeep was stopped. Dwayne got out and went back to set the parking brake on the Jeep so I could set the parking brake on the bus and we could both get out to assess the damage.

I anticipated that there would have been contact between the front of the Jeep and the back of the bus, but there was no evidence. The tow bar had been dragged for a ways, so the curved receiver of the quick-connect base was scraped, and of course, the locks that we had been using instead of the linch pins were broken off.
See page 5 of this manual: http://roadmasterinc.com/pdf/85-3326-18.pdf

We decided to disconnect the Jeep, and then drive the vehicles separately to a safe place to assess further corrections. We were going to go to the Texas State Welcome area, but thought as we were driving that it would make more sense to go to a parking lot where we could purchase whatever we needed to complete repairs, so we found a Home Depot via the Garmin and headed there.

We got new locks, and also a bastard metal file to clean up the place where the tow bar attaches to the quick-disconnect base.

Some pictures:

My view of the Jeep - this was after we had disconnected and Dwayne was getting it out of neutral - but I can keep an eye on the Jeep as we are going down the road with the rear view camera.

The exit where we came to a stop.

This is the new lock in place - the previous locks sheared off.

You can see where this part of the quick-disconnect bar dragged - Dwayne had to file the inside (between the two rounded parts) as that is where the tow bar attaches, and it wouldn't attach due to the metal that had built up inside there.

The right side didn't have as much drag damage. You can see here the safety cable anchor that allows the safety cable to hook in under where the tow bar attaches.

This shows the quick-disconnect bar across the front of the Jeep.

 I'll try to get pictures with it all hooked up and the safety features at another time.

When is fuel too cheap?

We generally check prices for diesel fuel from one state to another. With a 270 gallon fuel tank - we have quite a travel range, so we can often avoid filling up in states that have a high fuel tax, or higher fuel rates in general.

I was checking rates as we were heading across Mississippi to Louisiana - I could see that the Pilot in Louisiana had higher rates (2.33/gal versus 2.11/gal at "car" fueling stations in Mississippi), but I wasn't finding a Pilot in Mississippi. So... using AllStays, I just looked for truck stops - and found one in Vicksburg - just 5 miles from the border. I looked on GasBuddy, and it didn't have a rate listed for diesel... but it was a truck stop (Kangaroo Express) -- surely they would have diesel?

We got off - the station is just north of I-20 at exit 5A. There is an entrance north of the station for trucks to use, and they have 4 diesel pumps behind the building and the price posted was $1.86. Yes, $1.86. That's almost 50 cents per gallon cheaper than the Pilot that is just a few miles into Louisiana.

Miss Doozie was thirsty - 134 gallons worth...

The only downside was that they didn't have "pay at the pump", but that wasn't too much of a hassle. There were other truckers filling up there; I asked one of them why it was so cheap, and he said, "I don't know, and I'm not askin'!"

We drove about 80 more miles and Miss Doozie seemed to run fine on this fuel - is there a point where the fuel is so cheap that you figure there is something wrong with it?

Our stopping spot of choice - WalMart!

As I have mentioned before, for us, it is hard to beat WalMarts for overnight stays when just trying to get from here to there. We are on our third straight night, and probably last for a few weeks as we will be at campgrounds in Carrollton, TX and at Lake Texoma.

In South Hill, VA - with another RVer for the night... the Tractor Trailers had left by this time of the morning.

At Greenville, SC - we got up very early this morning!

Pulling a relay out of the box in the engine compartment requires taking the 8' ladder off the back of the rig.

Parked at West Monroe, LA for tonight

The variances of rest areas

We bypassed the rest area on I-85 as we were leaving South Carolina this morning, thinking that there would be a welcome center as we entered Georgia... well, there was, but it was closed, and I think we passed another closed one either on the way in to Atlanta on I-85 or on I-20 heading west from Atlanta. I guess I could have used various tools at my disposal (e.g. google) to discover this, but we didn't know. So, we drove on through to the welcome center on I-20 in Alabama, and stopped there for breakfast and rest after about 3 hours of driving.

I checked AllStays and found that the rest area between Birmingham and Tuscaloosa indicated that it had an RV dump station - so we decided to stop there also, and sure enough, it was open, it did have a working dump station, and we were able to empty our tanks.

RV Dump in Cottondale, AL Rest Area, nearest exit, 86 on I-20

It has been two weeks since our previous dump - but we "cheated" a little by taking showers in Jimmy and Regina's house while we were at the farm, so we can't really claim to be able to make it 2 weeks between dumps. Maybe we'll test that in Quartzsite in January.

After we dumped, we drove around into the truck rest area - wow - so much parking. AllStays says no overnight parking, though - that surprises me. I didn't notice any signs, but I didn't think to look either.

I am not sure why the Georgia rest areas were closed - whether it is a cost cutting measure or they are just doing maintenance. It makes it challenging when you're trying to make good time and your rig is rather large for pulling into gas stations or fast food places!

An unscheduled stop

While Dwayne was driving this afternoon, the inverters started giving an error message - one indicated "Hi Bat" and the other "Lo Bat" (or, that is what I thought I read). I got them both turned off, and Dwayne found an exit ramp. We also saw that the voltage on the engine and coach batteries was higher than it should be.

Blurry picture taken while still traveling (Dwayne was driving!) - shows DC Volts for Coach and Engine to be quite high. The Alternator Amps had been at about 100 (1/3 of the way from the center 0 to the 300 on the right) the whole day - it looks like it was still at about that value in this picture.

We found a nice place to stop (a business that was closed for the weekend but had a nice gravel parking area), called Jimmy, did some debugging, and decided on a way forward. Dwayne and I tried adjusting the charging output of the regulator but could not determine that we were having success (it kept on giving the same reading when we measured the voltage from the alternator post to the negative post on the battery), so we decided to remove the regulator relay.

A nice place to stop if you have to work on the bus on a Saturday afternoon! The only thing that would have made it nicer is if we had pulled in from the other side so we would have been working in sunshine.

We have essentially been traveling without a working alternator since we got the bus, using the coach batteries to start if the engine batteries weren't charged enough, so we're proceeding in that way.

The blessing I am seeing in this so far: there is SUCH an array of gauges and switches on the dash of the bus - from the beginning, I have been overwhelmed with knowing what to look at and what values are ok and which ones are a concern. The problems we had with the air pressure a few weeks ago have made me cognizant of that gauge and its meaning and what values are ok and not. Now I am better aware of the "Alternator Amps", "DC Volts Coach", and "DC Volts Engine". I'm thankful to have the opportunity to learn about each along the way - though I have to admit I would be happy to learn without there being problems associated!!! Experience is a great teacher, though!

What was that picture of???

Remember this picture from a few days ago?

Any last guesses?

Scroll down....






Keep on scrolling....







Are you having fun scrolling yet????








This was Tyson's Corner in the 1950s. Route 7 and route 123 were both dirt roads. Can you believe it?

Wow - what an amazing amount of things got done!

We arrived at the farm in Virginia late on November 1 with a long wish list of things to get done. Amazingly, we got almost all of them done! In fact, I think we got EVERYTHING done that required Jimmy's expertise. Ricky also helped. We still have a few things that we need to work on, but that will always be the case...

A list of what was planned / completed - I am amazed!!!!

• Purchase / install Parker Racor air filter - completed
• Install Cole Hersee switch - completed
• Determine why alternator not charging engine batteries when driving - completed
• Also installed 3 new engine batteries - we don't know for sure that the old batteries would not eventually have charged up, but decided that it was more prudent to replace at this time.
• Purchase / install or rebuild Gast aux air compressor - rebuilt the Gast aux air compressor (also have spare air compressor (purchased at auction) if needed in future) - completed
• Install tire minders - as part of this activity, installed Cross-Fires on duals and turned the valve stems on tags to be more accessible. - completed
• Wet carpet by the bed - not yet debugged - may be issue with awning attachment
• Reglue chrome panels - completed one; know process and can do others as needed.
• Check all lights. Make sure all working.  Also anything that DPS inspector would fail us on when going to take driving test. Note that one of the rectangular glass sealed back up lights on passenger side does not illuminate when backing. - completed - required correction on ground on the landing lights  
• Purchase and install 3 lever mechanism to drain water from air supply reservoir. - completed
• Check/replace air dryer cartridge - completed
• Check bushing? driver side steer tire.- determined not to be a problem
• Check oil? leak under battery compartment.  May be hydraulic fluid - determined to be a "nuisance" leak
• Hook up central vacuum - not yet done
• Install  passenger side front porch light.  - completed
• Check passenger side tag wheel, rock-able - did not find issue
• Look into toll tag - think we should get E-Z Pass for traveling on toll roads in Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern states
• Drill out and replace lock on safe - completed
• Finish step well.  Dwayne to do
• Figure out why we cannot hear radio/CDs - Ricky corrected - there was a device behind the dash that was not working
• Front TV mount replace with one that allows access to wiring. - Ricky determined that front TV did not work correctly, so we moved the back TV to the front and may eventually replace the back TV.
• Test CO detector, test Propane leak detector. - Still to be done
• A/C drains from top of bus need cleaning. - think we have a plan to help with the draining
• Door wind noise.  Replace seal. - still to be done
• Air bags adjustment for ride height  - completed, also corrected the shock absorbers to help dampen the "porpoising"
• Check fittings for air leaks - completed
• Light switch (slider) near passenger chair.  - completed
• Fuel gauge fix - still to be done
• Verify that other gauges are correctly registering - still to be done

I suspect that there were other things corrected that we don't have documented - but I find it amazing how much got accomplished!!!

Uncle Jim's tree and Henry

It was a beautiful day on Thursday, so I did some cleaning and then took some pictures outside.

Henry in his lot and Uncle Jim's tree just beyond near the pond

Henry may look menacing, but he really is just wondering why in the world I was in his lot without putting grain in his feed bucket!

Uncle Jim's tree

Another view of Uncle Jim's tree

Grinding feed

I got busy this week and didn't get posting done - so I'm catching up!!!


On Wednesday, Jimmy found that he was close to the bottom of the store of ground feed for the cattle, so he acquired the parts to make a new "batch" - corn from Edward, soybean meal from Southern States (I think), and alfalfa hay from the barn. On Thursday morning, Dwayne and Jimmy started with the grinder to grind and mix it all up - I got there in time to help with putting some of the alfalfa into the grinder. Then Jimmy backed the grinder into the barn and transferred the ground feed into the holding tank.

Examining the ground meal to see if the individual parts were distinguishable

Making sure that none was getting caught up on the sides as the feed was being transferred

Transferring into the storage tank

Pushing the ground meal to fill more evenly in the storage tank

Dwayne at the end of the barn

Historic Virginia Land Conservancy

On Thursday, November 5, we went to Williamsburg to the annual meeting of the Historic Virginia Land Conservancy, previously known as the Williamsburg Land Conservancy.
Historic Virginia Land Conservancy
The land of Poplar Springs and Oak Grove Farms are part of this Conservancy.
Protected Property: Poplar Springs Farm

One of the folks who were honored at this event was the attorney who works with the landowners as they are placing property into the Conservancy. 

He shared an interesting photograph - any guesses as to where these two pictures were taken? The car in front of the store is a 1955 (according to my brother) - so the picture on the left was mid-to-late 50s. Answer to come in a later blog entry!

A few weeks ago, a filmmaker came to the farm and interviewed Jimmy about his participation in the conservancy - and the unveiling of the video occurred at the annual meeting. It was really great to share with the directors and officers of the organization in seeing this for the first time. I have only found the video on Facebook - so I don't know whether folks can access it who aren't on Facebook...
Historic Virginia Land Conservancy video
Jimmy's part starts just after the 2 minute mark, and scenes from around the farm are sprinkled throughout.

I am so proud of Jimmy expressing the heritage of our family in this way!!!

"Barn cat"

There is a sweet, sometimes shy, kitty that stays nearby the dairy barn - so we see her from the bus at times.

Wanting attention

"Aren't I loverly?"

"Sure am glad that they remembered to put cat food in the dish!"

"Yum, yum, yum..."