Keeping busy at our winter home

Time does sure fly when having fun and that's what we're doing now that we've been back in AZ after our visit with family and friends in IL. I can't believe it's been over a month since we left AZ to watch our grandson, Aiden and just under a month that we've been back. I've neglected the blog but for good reason. We've been keeping busy.

One of the first things we did was have Thanksgiving dinner with our son, Chris and his girlfriend, Audrey. They cooked a wonderful ham, green bean casserole and mashed potatoes. We brought some veggies and dip, cheese and crackers, marshmallow fluff, sweet potatoes and of course, pumpkin pie. What a thankful, delicious dinner and time we had. And what goes better with Thanksgiving than Football? We definitely watched that too. :-)

What a spread

Happy faces after dinner

The amenities here in the RV park are so many there just isn't time to do everything so Glenda and I tend to concentrate on what we like best. For Glenda that's line dancing. She goes to classes twice a week and learns new dances. This is probably the most popular activity at the park.

 And for me, it's Pickleball. I try to play 3-4 times each week and get into a round robin tournament on Saturday mornings. Great exercise and good for the reflexes.

Photo from the web

However both of us enjoy hiking with our friends Ron and Patsy.

Picketpost in the background

Picketpost Mountain

Saguaro cactus and the mountain

Once or twice and week we try to get out for some hiking with our friends. Picketpost Mtn is about 25 miles further east of our park near Superior, AZ. Going to the top of Picketpost is a very challenging hike but none of us were ready for something like that right now so we did out hike about half way up the mountain to get some great views of the surrounding desert.

This was our first hike after coming back to the SW. We had a great hike and had some lunch in Superior after. We recently did another hike on the Coffee Flats trail near Peralta trailhead. It's a nice up and down trail with mild elevation changes but great landscape.

Trail leading to Coffee Flats

Miner's Needle

Grasses growing in a wash

The magnificent Saguaro cactus

Looking out over Coffee Flats

Lush color

Follow the leader?

We never get tired of the desert and the beauty that we find. Some may look at it as just rocks and sand but if you look really close you'll find life in every fashion. Can't get enough.

Continuing on with our activities, our friends Ron and Patsy had company come for a few days and they invited us to go with them to Organ Stop Pizza. This was a first for their company but we've been before and jumped at the chance to go back. If you CLICK ON THIS LINK I did a full write up of our first visit there in 2014. The history is certainly something to learn about, the pizza is very tasty and the music is something you should not miss. If you're ever in Mesa, AZ you need to go.

 Last weekend we had the opportunity to see Chris in a Holiday parade. His class in lineman school had a float(truck) in the Chandler-Gilbert Holiday Parade and Festival. Chris dressed in a Coyote costume and was on top of the float waving to the crowd of people.

Coyote Chris

Every parade has horses

And dogs?

It was a festive parade and tons of people lined the streets. After Chris's float got to the end of the route he headed back to where were watching the parade pass by and we decided to see what they had for food at the festival.

Nothing like a festival with Deep Fried Klondike Bars and Bacon Lemonade

Chris and Audrey

After we taste tested some OTHER foods, we parted ways and headed home. It's so nice to be able to spend time with Chris leading into the Christmas season. I noted in my last post, we won't be going back to IL and IN this year. We'll certainly miss everyone back there but not the weather they're getting right now.

We love the activities here at the RV park and have made so many great friends. We love the weather here and are so happy we tried AZ after we retired. Such a beautiful state. Tomorrow we plan to go on another hike with our friends. Keeping busy in AZ. Thanks for following along.