Christmas in August

Well MJ and I got the opportunity to go on a Christmas vacation in August. Marilyn, MJ's mother, decided a while ago to take a vacation for Christmas this year. So we went to The Sandals Royal Carribean in Jamaica the first week of August. My parents, Ed and Arlene, went along with MJ's brother and sister in law, Jammie and Britain Brewer, and her parents J.E. and Marilyn Benham. We had a great time in the sun with great weather. Highlights included, great food, a trip to Dunn's River Falls, some magic, a plantation tour, and two rounds of golf. Overall we had a great time and here are a few pictures of the trip.

MJ and Joe one night before Dinner


One of the Holes on the Half Moon Golf Course, an awesome view.

Ed and Arlene Waldron, Joe's Parents



Joe and MJ, then J.E. Benham and Britain Brewer


Ed Waldron teeing off at White Witch Golf Course.


All of us on the plane going to Jamaica.


All of us once we arrived at Sandals on Sat August 1st.

We have a WInner

I just wanted to show everyone the growth we have had at JMJ Vineyards. As you know in the end of May we had some damage to all our plants from Thrip bugs that looked like this:



In June the Vineyard looked like this:





Today it looks like this:



The Winner is one particular plant that has grown so well that it has reached the 51" wire and is now growing along it to its right. I know this sounds confusing, but each plant needs to get to the 51" wire for optimum fruit growth and this plant has already done this in just under 3 months, and I am as proud as a new born baby's daddy. Well not really, but you understand.

Hope you enjoy these.

Chicago Update

Wow what a difference 990 miles makes.... Low 60's at night, and highs in the low 80's. No air conditioning and fun by Mom and Dad's pool. Marijon arrived on July 10th and we have had a great time visiting our Illinois friends. We have had a great time visiting with the Janeks, Swaffords including baby Eli who is awesome, LaMores, and visiting our old Church River Valley Christian Fellowship. Life has been good. Mike Janek and I have had a great time riding bikes until he was forced into a crash last Saturday and here is a picture of that result.


He actually was very lucky for someone who crashed a road bike at 20 miles an hour because the guy in front of him got caught up in a set of railroad tracks they were crossing. He gets his stitches out Tuesday and we are going to ride again before I leave to come home to Texas.
We have had some fun in the pool. Shown here...

The dogs wanted in the pool really bad, but my mom was very against that.

Then my dad secretly made a plan to get them in the pool and we were successful, and my mom was very upset. This is Zoey swimming. Both our labs love to swim.





And here are a few vineyard pictures from late June when my parents, Ed and Arlene, were in Childress. I put them to work in the vineyard and they did great.



Me and my Momma in JMJ Vineyards getting rid of weeds, fun right?

In Chicago

Well after a very long drive I made it to Chicago, my parents house, yesterday at around 1:30 in the afternoon. The 4th was great. My sister and her entire neighborhood was busted by the cops for illegal fireworks last year so they moved the celebration to my parents house this year. They live in an area that would ensure no police interruption. It rained most of the day but around 6:30 pm it stopped and we had a great fireworks show after dark. Immediately after the show I got a very good nights sleep. Today was very nice, a day by the pool, and hanging two ceiling fans for my momma.

MJ has been in Santa Fe all weekend and seen a spectacle called the Wine Festival. MJ and her mom, Marilyn traveled to Santa Fe, New Mexico and have been going non-stop all weekend. They have seen some great art, a lot of different Wine Tastings and good food. MJ tells me she had the best guacamole ever, they made it right in front of her at the restaurant.

Well I will be in Chicago for a while with the rents, I miss my wife and Childress already, but I am looking forward to visiting with old friends and time with mom and dad. Until next time.....Have fun in the heat, in Chicago I can sit outside and not sweat, who would have thunk?

Update

Well here is a little update without any pictures. MJ and I are back in the same town. For the past two weeks we have been in Austin, and then this past week I have stayed in Amarillo for a leadership training. Here is a run down of things happening in our lives:

• Marriage is great, our four day trip to Austin two weeks ago was so fun
• House is great, showers will be finished on Tuesday, plumbing done Monday, we move in at some point Tuesday or Wed.
• Vineyard is growing, despite the damage noted below, they are growing and some are growing fast!!
• Work is uncertain. Toby Tucker our Assist. Sup is leaving us and that may mean a change for the administration of CISD. I have no idea if this will trickle down to me or not, but one thing is for sure, change is often not welcome, but is often good. We shall see.
• Parents, My, Joe's, parents are coming on Thursday, and I cannot wait. It should be fun to hang out with my parents in Childress, TX considering they spend most of their time in the small town of Chicago. Should be interesting.

That's all for now, I will post some pictures of our vines growing soon.

How are your summers going?

Pictures of Damage

Here are photos of the damage in the vineyard after one week of recovery. Looks as if some will be fine. In the photos there are some new leaves that look healthy. But as you can see there are many plants in the vineyard that are very damaged. At the bottom I included some of the star vines that are actually putting out little fruit clusters.

Stress

This is something I have never experienced before, crop damage caused by a crop duster. In our vineyard on Sunday I was casually walking through doing weed control and began to notice plants with leaf damage. Some plants were entirely torched while others were just a leaf or two. It is the opinion of the experts that the vineyard was hit by a vapor cloud of 24d, a nasty chemical, that was not concentrated very high so the damage is not as bad as it could have been. Either way I have a hard time with some farmer spraying their field and it damaging mine. If you cannot keep your stuff in your field, wait for a better time to spray and leave my stuff alone. Some people will say, "That's just farming," but this is not cotton, these plants are planted once and will grow for 30 years, so this stuff effects growth for years. Frustrating.

My hope is that these very tough plants pull through and continue to grow. It will take about two weeks to really see if any need to be dug up and replaced, so we shall wait and keep our fingers crossed.

Here is the damage.......

This picture shows damage on the leaves to the left and healthy leaves on the right.


This one shows the damage on the top of the plant where the newest buds have come out.


And this picture shows a plant that is almost completely damaged