Category Archives: Travel

Is November Over Already?!

I’m having a hard time facing the fact that this is the last day in November. I’m not really sure where the last week went let alone the rest of the month! I think we may all agree Thanksgiving is a hectic time of year. First comes Thanksgiving Day which we spend with friends and family and then comes the hassle with Black Friday. Black Friday is like a cloud over Thanksgiving to me. You have that feeling in the back of your mind that you have to “prepare” for all of these sales and hopefully you don’t miss out. Oh the pressure! Our minds should only be concerned with our friends and family and when it’s a good time to dig in for those Thanksgiving leftovers! I need to give a recap on my most recent week. This may be a long post!

This year for Thanksgiving, I spent the day with some friends and their families. It was relaxing with great food and conversation. It was nice just to be able to sit back comfortably and enjoy the day! Plus it was pretty amusing to see two one year old babies running around and having a good time. Who doesn’t like babies?! I’m really thankful that I was able to spend the day with such great people. Thank you!

I actually had to work on Black Friday, the over commericalized day that seems to take everything about Thanksgiving away but I did do a bit of online shopping. It’s a lot easier and I don’t have to hassle with the crazy folks in the stores.

Friday evening was spent out on the town in the Fort Worth Stockyards. I’m pretty sure this is one of my favorite places around here. It’s very, oh, “old wild west”. A group of us went out for dinner at Joe T. Garcia’s. This is a family style Mexican restaurant only serving fajitas or enchiladas. I’m going to admit that I had no idea what enchiladas were when I first moved here. We don’t exactly have a ton of Mexican restaurants in the small towns of Vermont but man, I love them! The atmosphere is great, food delicious and the margarita’s are the strongest around! If you plan on going – remember, they only accept cash and to get there early, it’s a popular place around here. (I forgot.)

After filling up at Joe T’s, we headed just down the street to Billy Bob’s, the “World’s Largest Honky Tonk”. I’m not kidding, it really is and it’s wicked awesome. Get ready for some bull riding, two steppin’ and some good ole country music in this venue. It’s also one of my favorites. On this particular evening, Kevin Fowler, a Texas native, was playing. The concert was good however I was having such a good time watching people two step and line dance, I even got out there at one point (here’s to good dancing partners!). The two step is pretty easy if you take away my need for attempting to lead, but once you get spinning around its pretty fun. I realized I haven’t forgotten how to two step – that’s right, I still got it! I learned a new move and before I realized what what going on I was being flipped upside down right out there on the dance floor. A little out of control dance partner I tell ya! It was a great time and I can’t wait to do it again. Now I just need to learn this line dance and I’m ready to go!

I actually had so much fun, why not do it again?! Saturday evening was spent at another honky tonk – Cowboys in Arlington. Another good show by another Texas native (see the recurring theme, great musicians come from Texas), the Bart Crow Band. Cowboys is a little different than Billy Bob’s, there is only one big stage and a much bigger dance floor. One thing is still the same, it still makes you want to get out there and two step your way across Texas.

Sunday was a day for relaxation and to take it easy until I decided it was time to get a Christmas tree! I’ll catch you up on that on December 1st! Enjoy the last day of November everyone! It was a great one!

Macy’s Day Parade

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One of the most iconic events around the holidays would be the Macy’s Day Parade, am I right? I think at one point or another we have all got up and sat in front of the TV to see the parade. Like New Years Eve in NYC, the Macy’s Day Parade on a list of things we’d like to do someday.

Now, going to stand in Times Square for NYC has never really been on any list of mine. I mean, standing in Times Square for hours on end – the real question is “Where do you pee?!”. I’m not fighting with the crowd, nor getting peed on. The Macy’s Day Parade on the other hand, well that is doable.

In 2005, I had a childhood friend that was going to school in the NYC area and I few down to see her, spend some time in the big city and to check out the parade! I think we were both pretty excited. The night before the parade, we stayed with a friend of hers in the Bronx. This wasn’t my first trip to NYC, it was my first trip to this borough.

Thanksgiving morning, we woke up early and headed down to Manhattan to grab our spot, via the subway of course. We arrived early, it wasn’t packed but there were people there. We ended up right around the corner from the front of the Macy’s building, two rows back from the gate on the side of the street, next to a man who was blocking small children from seeing the parade. Karma will come back to get ya buddy. If you had access to a building – those were the prime viewing spots!

The parade, awesome. The floats, the hot air balloons, just like you see on TV. The only quirk, they wouldn’t perform when they were in front of us. I’m not sure if it was because we were relatively close (within 3 blocks) from Macy’s or if they just didn’t perform during the parade until they were on stage? A few did, most didn’t. Ah well – I still got to see Garfield and some celebrities. Here are some pictures.

Celebrities:

Rhianna, Natasha Bedingfield and Carrie Underwood.

Hot Air Balloons!

Bands, floats and more!

AH Giant heads!

LOVE the turkey! Gobble, Gobble!

YeeHaw!

Loved this jungle float! Look at all the details!

NYPD

Even though Ronald McDonald has always kind of freaked me out – who wouldn’t want to drive one of these two cars?!

After the parade, we walked around the city and tried to take it all in. That will have to be in another post.

May we all be thankful for the people in our lives, what we have been blessed to have over the past year and what is to come.
Happy Thanksgiving Ya’ll!

Heritage Syrup Festival, 2010

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Every year on the second Sunday in November, you can head on over to Henderson, TX for the annual Heritage Syrup Festival. Being from Vermont, I grew up with Maple Syrup all around me for my entire life. Heck, I still need to have at least a half gallon in my fridge at all times. When I moved to Texas I had heard they had their own type of “syrup” down here but I wanted to know more. I had to know more. So I did what I do best, I went to explore.

I set out to the trip to East Texas last fall, for the 2010 Heritage Syrup Festival. I really didn’t know what to expect but I knew I had to check out as much as I could. The drive out to Henderson was great. First, for me to get out of the “city” is perfect. I can’t wait to get into that crisp fall air. Less is more folks! The even takes place in two areas of town, in Downtown Henderson and the Depot Museum Grounds. First up for me was Downtown.

Downtown you will find a ton of food. Pretty much any food imaginable, mexican, turkey legs, BBQ (we’re in Texas of course they have BBQ) and of course the fair food. I stuck with the corn dog and it was delicious. There was also craft tents, live bands (there’s more than one stage), square dancing, the Humane Society was there showing their available dogs (they were there to tempt me) and my favorite the antique car show. I love them! Thanks to my dad and my entire dad’s side of the family, I have grown to love the antique cars and down here I can’t seem to find a good show. BUT I sure did in Henderson. Here are a few of my favorites.

I LOVE this truck!

This is a 1927 Model T Ford. I know this because my dad drove me to Prom in one. Check out the crank in the front and the top comes down so its a convertible. Pretty awesome!

I took this one because frankly it looked expensive. I know its a Jaguar. It is expensive.

If I ever drive the Scenic California coast route – I want to do it in one of these.

Below is a painting off one of the buildings in downtown Henderson. Beautiful!

Now let’s not forget, I was here for a sugar festival. The sugar in Texas is derived from sugarcane. If you want to see what it looks like, see below. It’s much different than my maple syrup and there are different variations. There were a few samples but the best way to describe it is that it’s like corn syrup (the lighter versions) and molasses (the dark versions). Now, I’m a fan of molasses so I find nothing wrong with it but when I asked what it’s used for, I was mostly told for cooking (like pecan pies) and the lighter, the sweeter, you can put on pancakes.

Now, when you head over the the Depot, it’s where the fun really begins.

Keep in mind, all of the following showed demonstrations throughout the day.

It was really, really interesting.

First off, Sons of the Confederates. Yes, they are still kicking it down here.

I was going to remind him the Union won, but he had this long gun so I just walked away. It was pretty interesting though. They had their uniforms, cannons and muskets. I have a friend from home who probably would’ve loved this who does reenactments for the Union army.

Next up was the hunter / trader. They had set up an area where they showed what his living area would be like, with his skins, makeshift tent and how he took care of himself.

The following is how they make the sugarcane syrup.

First, you can see them feeding the sugarcane thru this machine.

The machine is actually being “operated” by the mule. The mule moves in slow circles, as he moves the grinder inside this machine is pulling thru the sugarcane and pretty much pulling all the “liquid” out of the branches. I’m not sure the technical terms for all of this so bare with me here. The liquid is then drained into the blue jug.

Once they have enough of this base liquid from the sugarcane they boil it down, much like maple syrup. I tried to ask someone how many gallons of the liquid needed to make a gallon of the syrup, they didn’t know. Nor when I mentioned Vermont, they didn’t really seem to care about maple syrup. Just for the record, 40 gallons of sap makes one gallon of the sweet stuff. Alrighty folks, moving along.

I found a few other folks who were doing demonstrations.

This man is a woodcarver and he made beautiful pieces. Here he was making a cane. He also had some children’s toys – I bought a whistle.

His neighbor was spinning wool into yarn. For some reason this always looked fun to me.

This man was making rope. I’ve never seen this so I found it pretty interesting. What he did was he took 3-5 pieces of twine / thin rope and locked them into place on each side of the machine. You can kind of see this below. On the farther end, the three ropes are brought together, On the closer end, they are farther apart on the piece with the handle. He then had this kid in the maroon hat, turn the handle which wove the three pieces of twine together to form a stronger piece of rope. Who knew.