March 4 - Music and Friends

Carol, Betty, Pat, and Galen at Chuy's.  We all got together to play music in the afternoon and then went to dinner.  Today would have been Betty and Ken's 45th anniversary and we were celebrating Ken's life and wishing he were with us.

The chips and salsa at Chuy's are served out of the trunk of a car.

Feb 20 - Riverwalk

We had some extra time today so parked at the Brewery and walked along the new section of the Riverwalk to SAMA.  We walked under the glow in the dark fish and under another bridge that sounded like walking through a wild animal park.

We walked past this grotto.

It is February but felt much more like March or April today.

Feb 17 - San Antonio Museum of Art

Our friend, Mary Hogan, is training to be a docent at SAMA and took us on a great tour today.  Since it was just the three of us, we got to hear some very interesting stories not shared with the regular tours.  The eyes above are from an Egyptian anthropoid coffin.

The iridescence on this small vase came from many, many years of being buried underground.

This is a drinking bowl and the eyes are meant to startle other drinkers into not drinking too much.

Greek children probably learned the Greek alphabet with the help of figures like this female phi and female alpha.

This is one of my favorite rooms in the museum.  It is both eerie and beautiful.

The Romans must have had tiny appetites.  The plates in this photo are only about three inches in diameter.

I took our granddaughter Alex to SAMA when she was four or five and after we'd toured the entire museum, I asked her what she liked best.  She liked the elevator!  It is impressive - all glass and nearly completely silent.  Alex wanted to be an artist from a very early age and did enjoy the art, too.

This bowl may not look like much in this photo but if you could see it up close, you would see that all the marks in the background of the bowl are actually tiny little butterflies.

One small room was devoted to a Chinese cricket exhibit.  One thousand years ago the affluent Chinese kept crickets for fighting and for music and built elaborate homes for them as well as coffins, beds, arenas, duplexes, and special cages so the singing crickets could be taken on strolls.  Singing crickets were called "Golden Bell" crickets.  Fighting crickets were not allowed to fight so long that they would be hurt.

This cricket house is made of a gourd that was wrapped as it grew.

Cricket-sized food and water bowls.

This intricate and impressive mandala is one of only four in museums in the United States.  Mandala's are normally destroyed after a few days but permission was given by the Dalai Lama #14 to preserve this one.  A vaporized glue, settled over the sand and pigment of this 5x5' mandala, made it possible to move the mandala without destroying it.

Jan 27 - Riverwalk

There hasn't been much winter in San Antonio so far this year.  Galen and I like taking the park and ride downtown and walking out to the library and back.  It was so beautiful today we stopped at Rivercenter Mall for lunch on the way back and ate outside so we could listen to the live music and take photos of the tourists.

Jan 8 and 29 - Wurzbach Parkway

January 8, 2012

January 29, 2012

It has been a month since I've posted anything partly because we are still in San Antonio and there are lots of things to do besides take photos.  We are normally only here for two months but this year we'll be here a total of four months.  We had planned to be in Florida by now, but you know how plans can be sometimes.  Anyway, I started shooting photos of the newest section of the Wurzbach Parkway on our way to church on Sunday mornings.  When completed the parkway will run from the west side of the city to the east side.  The eastern end runs along side the RV park where we stay.  This section is in the middle and will run right past our church, Coker UMC, that has been hidden away between Blanco and West Avenue for the last 125+ years.

Nov 30 - Mission San Jose

Mission San Jose

A closer view

I love photographing this area.

Last year they worked on the upper half of the door.  This year - the lower half.

The mortar was crumbling so it was removed and is in the process of being replaced.

There is some interesting hardware in the mission.

The famous Rose Window

This is the first time I've seen the updated altar area, which is a bit much for my taste, but it sure makes for an interesting photo.  The San Jose church is a working church that fills up every Sunday.

Nov 30 - Mission Concepcion

Some don't know that there are four other missions besides the Alamo in San Antonio and my friend, Andrea, and I visited two of them on a lovely day.  This is Mission Concepcion - not as fancy as the much larger Mission San Jose, but I like it better.

A close up of the door

This is on the ceiling in one of the rooms.

The inside of the church looking toward the back of the church.

This light hangs at the front of the church.