Memorial Day 2005: We had the opportunity again this year to visit the Rivas family in San Antonio and at Julie Rivas' family ranch near Lampasas. This year we were joined by the Littles. I took my kayak to run the Guadalupe and did a little fishing out of it on one of the ranch stock ponds. Karl Rivas and John Little took more fish out of the pond than I did, but I caught the biggest bass. More on the "secret" blog.

That wasn't the only time I got the kayak out. I also took a camping trip the last weekend in April with a client on the Mountain Fork river in Oklahoma. It was my first time taking a trip where we had to pack everything we needed into the kayaks, and while neither of us had ever been on that river before and didn't know exactly where we were or where we were going, it was a lot of fun.

I also took a trip to Las Vegas (my first time in that lovely city) in May. It was Mothers' Day weekend, but it was also the weekend of my birthday, as well the weekend of the 80th birthday of my mother's last surviving sister, Dolores Pennington. My mother was one of 4 girls, and the only one still alive is Aunt Dolores. I had caught back up with her and several of her daughters at the funeral of another of my mom's and Dolores' sisters, Audrey, who died in August of 2003, and my sister Leanne has stayed in contact with some of Dolores' kids. They had emailed Leanne that Dolores' kids were planning an 80th birthday party for her in Las Vegas, where her oldest son lives, and since Leanne was going to be in Dallas around then anyway, Leanne and I planned to heading to Vegas for the party. It was a fun trip, and a big surprise for Aunt Dolores.