We have had a great first week here in our new city for the
summer. Both of us have felt like we were on vacation with all of the
running around and eating out we have
done. Wednesday we took things slow
sleeping in and heading to the bike store to pick up my new bike that CJ had called
to order the week before. I love it, it is the perfect city bike for doing
errands and running around. As soon as
we got home CJ put the panniers(bags you put on your bike to carry stuff)on my bike that
I had purchased a year ago. I am so excited to finally have a bike they will fit on, they are perfect for errands. With the
bikes all set to go we headed off to go grocery shopping! We rode our bikes to
the store and filled up our bags and backpacks with groceries for the week and
rode home. It was pretty cool. It is one of my goals while we are here to ride
our bikes as much as possible for errands close to home. I felt very
self-sufficient toting my groceries home with my own woman power(also some of
CJ’s man power since he carried a backpack).
Later in the afternoon we
decided to go for another ride and try to find our way to the city’s network
for bike trails along the Akansas river. We finally found them and enjoyed
riding unhindered by traffic for an hour or so before deciding to head back
home. CJ was excited to see some guys bow fishing for gat from a pedestrian bridge along the trail and intends to try it himself soon. On the way back we got caught in a rainstorm and rode about 1.5 miles
soaking wet, but it was a good adventure.
Thursday Annie invited us out to the
ranch where she boards her horse to meet her farrier since her horse, Ibby a
white Arabian, was getting reshod that day. CJ spent a good hour talking with
the farrier asking questions and watching him shoe the horse while Annie and I
sat back and watched and chatted and got to know each other a little bit. CJ plans to attend a two week course at a school while we are here to learn to shoe horses. After
Ibby had on his new shoes Annie showed us some of his tricks. He is such a well
behave horse, very calm and responsive to what Annie asks him to do. Ibby will follow commands to back up and come
forward without a halter or a lead, just with Annie on the ground in front of
him giving commands. He also gives a high-five , can do the grapevine and even
jumps when asked to. It was a lot of fun playing with him and getting him to
perform for treats. He loves peppermints!
After we left we went over to CJ’s new workplace to meet
him boss and see the land he will be working on. The ranch he is working on is called
Bonnesboro after the family The Boones who live there and now employ CJ, yes they are related to Daniel Boone. Compared to the busyness of Tulsa the
morning and afternoon out in the country was a little slice of home we were
missing. CJ says he gets to “work out in the Boonies” haha, since he works for
the Boones. Anyway when we arrived CJ’s new boss, Bill, welcomed us right into
his home and offered us something to drink and asked us about ourselves and we
all got to know each other a little bit. Their house is beautiful and they are
very eclectic collectors, it kind of reminded me of that movie Jumanji. Bill showed us around each room in the house
and was especially excited to share his “man room” with CJ. It was full of guns
and mounts and other man periphinalia. They had a great time talking about all
of the things Bill has collected. After the house tour we loaded up the Mule and
the 4 wheeler to tour the ranch. CJ rode the 4 wheeler and I rode with Bill in
the Mule. I was the designated gate opener and managed to step in a huge pile
of what I thought was cow poop at my
first gate, it turned out to be just mud. Bill has about 10
cows that he has always kept just as a hobby.
He says they never eat them, but he did say one was named Chill because
she was born on a chilly morning and she would be Chili one day. The cows
are of varying breeds, some are long horns and some are a shaggier looking
medium horned breed that Bill said they fell in love with when they visited
Scotland. Bill showed us around and shared with CJ some of the jobs he had for
him to do. The whole time we were riding around I was asking Bill about the
wildlife, the flowers , the trees, the little cacti that were growing in the
tall grass but he said I would have to ask his wife since she is the Okie and
he grew up north of Chicago. I will have CJ take some pictures out at the ranch
of the land and the cattle and we will post them later on.
Friday morning CJ
went out to ride his mountain bike at a group of trails called Turkey Mountain
and in the afternoon we headed downtown Tulsa to an art fair they were having
and had dinner at the Spaghetti Warehouse. These are some Art Cars that were driving around town this weekend.
In the evening we took a walk
through our neighborhood and found a nice route to the grocery store. The state
fairgrounds are about a block over and they are sparsely populated for most of
the year but have nice sidewalks and paved parking lots that we will be able to
ride our bikes on. In the evening we wandered over to Bass Pro to get CJ a fishing license and ran across The Robertsons.
Saturday CJ took a ride on his road bike to the river parks
and I went to the local farmers market to look around. I came home with a whole
bunch of good stuff.
In the afternoon CJ
and I rode to the fairgrounds again to the weekly flea market. We browsed
around and then continued on down the road to Whataburger for lunch. It was
delicious and new and we enjoyed it. After that we went the the grocery store and
bought some food for us to pack in our lunches. I can fit all of this into the bags on my bike!
That evening we went and made use of CJ's fishing license at a city park. He only caught one small fish but got the low down from the locals about how to catch more. I enjoyed just sitting in the shade and reading my book.
Sunday we went to church at an EFCA church
in north Tulsa. Everyone was very welcoming but we definitely missed the
familiar faces at Trinity! On the way home from church we stopped at another
local farmer’s market and looked around. When we got home the weather was
supposed to be getting bad so we sat out on our porch and read books and CJ
worked on his bike a little. Sunday evening we spent watching the news closely
as the first set of bad storms came through Oklahoma. Annie popped in to say
that she was also watching the weather and she would let us know if we all
needed to head down the block to the neighbors basement. CJ and I sat glued to
the television trying to learn a little Oklahoma geography so we would know
what was going on. All of the storms passed around Tulsa and we didn’t even get
a drop of rain! We now have a much better perspective on the weather and the layout of the state so when Monday's storms came through we were much more relaxed. I will try to post a bit on the severe weather later. Thanks for all of the concern and checking in with us since Oklahoma weather has been big news across the country all week.
That was our first week here. We feel settled in and
comfortable at our house and we are looking forward to a great summer here and
looking back and missing all of our friends and family at home.
Love,
CJ and Adrian
Here is a teaser for my post about our first week of work, can anyone say tarantula?
