The road goes on forever and the party never ends...: NYE 2011 on Crystal Beach

Well here we are startin another year! Time just flies by... so I went to my brothers ExWifes place to visit with her and the kids, Jake, Sofie & Brandon and her boyfriend Fred. Beautiful house on the beach on Crystal Beach. Friday night was pretty cold, we were all layered up. When I arrived Fred had Gumbo for us all, was yummy. Then we bundled up and went outside to start with the fireworks...

While we're waitin on midnight Jake made me watch the Star Wars episode of Family Guy on his iPhone.

Then I had to listen to Jack Black sing about the Sax Guy

Brandon seemed to really get into tied 'em together and seein how loud they can pop.

and Champagne at midnite... Brandon really liked the stuff and drank 3 glasses, and the rest of the night he was giggling and sayin "my tummy hurts" was too funny. He's 11 yrs old. He passed out when all the fireworks were done and we got back up in the house. His hangover wasn't too bad after he had breakfest the next morning.

Then it was off to fireworks on the beach...

Now we get into 1/1/11

This painting was in the hall of the house, I just love it! Thats me on the deck with the gulf behind me, and then theres Jake on the couch while we were watchin my first movie of 2011 "Superbad".

Jake loved drivin the buggy up and down the beach while we were shell huntin... he was doin all kinds of donuts in the sand... its a wide open sparsly populated beach, lots of room to play. And great for shell hunting, they are much bigger & more of them over here compared to Galveston where they are picked clean by the tourist daily I'm guessin.

bbrrrr is was cold early in the day, real windy...

We had a mornin then an afternoon run on the beach... between we snacked and invented "Jigglyball" with a fishin wieght on the kitchen table...

During this game I told them a story about their dad, my lil brother David, he was somewhere around 10 years old, and we spent our summers at Bug Beach on Possum Kingdom Lake with our many cousins, the Laymans, the Teagues, the Fryers, and so many more. Well Granddad (Bill Pilkington) drank a bottle of Maylox daily for as long as I can remember. Grandmother (Louise Pilkington) bought it by the case. So anyway, one mornin Granddad was complaining that someone drank one of his bottles of Maylox and left the empty up there with the full ones. He figured one of the kids did but didn't know which one. He complained just as much about leavin the empty as he did about one being drank and went on about it most of the morning. Well it must have been a weekend cause Dad (Ed Pilkington), Uncle Elbert Pilkington, Daryl Teague, Squeaky Fryer & Granddad as well as a few others were sittin out in front of the camper drinker beer and all us kids were playin in the water. Then David bolts from the water holding his rear cheeks together with both hands, runnin as fast as his legs would carry him towards the outhouse... well of course he had to run right past the camper & all them men couldn't have missed him... they knew immediately... needless to say, David did not make it to the outhouse... was a stinky mess... we laughed for weeks over that one. Dad, Elbert and Daryl of course were/are the best at comin up with nicknames and for the life of me I cannot remember a one. But I'm sure they were great and they stuck with David for a long long time.

Also during our break we went off with Fred to check out the progress of his other 2 beach houses... looks like they just painted the walls in both and got the cabinets in... now the light fixtures appliances and flooring then maybe some landscaping. Then Fred will furnish them and rent them out for vacation rentals. They both are lookin real nice already...

Then its back to the beach for some more shell hunting... we were huntin for the bigger shells, we found a few medium ones and lots of small ones...

The black thing there on the beach... is that black tarp type stuff you put under siding on a house. When hurricane Ike hit 2 years ago... literally every house and building was demolished, there are big pieces of that and carpet all along the beach. While much of the place has been cleaned up theres alot to go. I'd like to think someone comes around every so often and dig that stuff up and dispose of it. I know there was much distruction there and I know it'll take time to get it all cleaned up, with more of it washin up after storms come thru. I picked up some trash here n there, did what I could. And will pick up some every time I go enjoy the beach. Hope others do too. Lead by example they say.

Me huntin shells, I was wearin Jakes mudd boots, and they are a bit heavier than my flip flops and my legs are sure sore now. Was a good work out, walkin in those things all day.