Cool and rainy here in Palacios.  And a cool rainy Saturday means no excuses for getting caught up over here at RV There Yet! So – let’s get started!
First of all – Gary.
He doing pretty darn good. He’s still stiff (and achy) when he goes from sitting to standing, and he can’t actually sit for too long (but that’s not really new, is it?), but he’s been back to work all week, and is well on the way to full back health. (Whatever that looks like for old folks like us!). Thank you all for your continued prayers for this guy!

And just what has he (and the rest of the team) been working on? Well, there has been a fair share of electrical fixes and other odds and ends, but the biggest project they’ve been working on is that Ga-Ga Court. You know, the one he fell from. (For those who are still wondering just what is this Ga-Ga thing, here is a little better description.)  Yes, this was a classic “get yourself back in the saddle after you fall” kind of project.

So here is the stage of construction the court was in when we got here –

And as it progressed through the project –

Yes, that is Gary up on the scaffolding. Remember that saddle thing…..

It still needs a little trim work, but it’s almost done!

Since I was working in the yellow building closest to the Ga-Ga court, I didn’t get any shots of the what the other guys were doing. But I did manage to snag a couple of pictures from one of the other fellows –
A little tractor play goes a long way….

And I’m REALLY glad I wasn’t around to watch what was going on here (and neither was Gary, thankfully!)

So the guys were quite busy, and so were we ladies!
It was an interesting and fun month for us that involved lots of paint and many brushes, but it was quite different than any other painting assignment I’ve had!

For you see, most of us ladies spent the entire three weeks painting surfboards!
Ok. So we weren’t painting actual surfboards, but we were helping to paint the 86 decorative surfboards that are lining the walls of the main meeting room.
Here are a couple of shots of when we first got here –



At first we were just giving some of the boards a coat of “color”, since not all of the designs had been determined

but eventually we were given a bit of the detail painting.

Talk about using a lot of different paint brushes!
Here’s the one I did – with a little help from the overhead!

(the one with the turtle, not the Endless Summer one!)
Along with the surf boards there was also lots of staining and varnishing and even some furniture refinishing.



And at the very end of the project, when everything had to be cleaned up and out of the room, we managed to find one last thing to paint – the “sandwich” sign of a local thrift shop!

Nothing like 4 SOWER ladies crowded around a 3’x4′ sign!
So, here are the surfboards after the room had been set up for this weekend’s guests, all ready to be worked on by next month’s group!





Lots more to paint, but I think we made a pretty good dent in the job at hand!

Enough for today.  Rainy Saturdays are also good for catching up on the laundry, working on some sewing, and even a marathon day of Downton Abbey watching (thanks to a SOWER friend who owns the DVDs!).  But now it seems that it might just be time to think about what’s for supper!

More to come, I promise!

Pssst – if the sun comes out tomorrow, we might even get to the beach after church.  🙂