Prairie Knoll Tree Cutting After the tree that is on my side of the duplex broke, I felt the remaining and very unstable branch desperately needed to be cut down. I'm not entirely sure if this is my brother's tree to work on or not, but seeing on how the previous collapse had damaged one of the neighbor's cars, I didn't figure anyone would raise a fuss over it.

Graham Sunday Brunch Sunni and Preston wanted to have a little get-together at their house before the little one finally arrived. I think this was the first party that they've had at their house since major construction on the back garage had started several months prior. It was a pretty large crowd and the Mowads and Grimaldis brought their new ones as well.

Visiting Baby Graham Tracy and I stopped by the hospital when Genevieve was just two days old. I was a little nervous about it, but did get to hold her. Tracy took her like a natural pro. Sunni was still recovering in bed, and though it's pretty rare that I work with this directive, she did politely ask for no photos of her. As such, Sunni is the only one missing from this gallery.

Babysitting Woody Bush One of Tracy's teacher friends asked her if she could babysit their infant son, Woody. She asked if I could come along for the evening and so it was.

Trip to Sea World I went on a trip to Sea World in San Antonio with most of Tracy's family including her niece. The day started off a little slow with the crowds, long lines, and of course Texas summer heat, but saving grace was just around the corner. Sometime just around us having lunch (and by no surprise a pretty terrible one) the sky opened up and a huge thunder storm had rolled in. Though the park wound up being 'closed' (the attractions were shut down for about an hour or so), it cleared most people out of the park virtually eliminating the lines and consequently allowing us ride the roller coasters over and over again. ...not to mention that it cooled the place down pretty nicely.

Boating and Jet Skiing The family and Tracy and I took the boat and the jet ski over to the cove just off of the inter coastal. We managed to secure one of the little islands and dock the boat on it. As always, the underwater house on the Casio proved to be a great purchase.

Accident Pics Tracy's friend, Heather Bucklin, was working with the Bastrop medical team (as a mobile paramedic ambulence worker) and somehow was able to take Tracy out and about on her route one evening. Unfortunately there wasn't but a single call, the pics which are contained within.

Yard Critters I snapped a few pictures of the birds using the elongated bird feeder that I set up under the pergola of Prairie Knoll. They made a complete mess of the thing. I also found this interesting bug, as yet unidentified identified as an Assassin Bug Nymph by Daniel Marlos at whatsthatbug.com, crawling on one of my palm trees.

Siena & Tuscany From Tracy and Katie's blog: Today we made our way to Siena, leaving the busy streets of Rome behind. We enjoyed the change of pace when we arrived. We met a tour group that went to the Chianti vineyard, saw two villages from the Middle Ages and tasted some good grapes. Now, we are headed to see the Duomo, eat some dinner, and head out for Florence early in the morning. Everyone wants to know where we are from, and we proudly say either Texas or Austin. I guess Texas pride knows no boundaries. We have met a lot of interesting people. One friend that we made from Australia always comments on our "good energy." Hope that we can keep that energy flowing through our next stops.

Cinque Terre From Tracy and Katie's blog: We are winding down a wonderful day in the Cinque Terre, five tiny towns, connected by a local train on the coast. The towns are picturesque, and with Tracy sitting on the beach, they look like a postcard. But seriously, this is the Italy that I have dreamed about and we saw a lot of beautiful countryside and interesting locals today. I have really enjoyed the smaller towns, and yesterday on my bike in Lucca I may have pretended that I was one of the Van Trapp family, while riding through town. (You know the scene, where the kids are dressed in the drapes from Maria's bedroom.) Anyway, I was pretty impressed with the Leaning Tower of Pisa, because even though I know it has been leaning since construction, it was affirmining to see it for myself. I will let Tracy post about today's hike across the Cinque Terre. All I can say about it was that it was long and hot, and that I am not a mountain climber. I guess that my travelling talents are limited to drinking wine, trying to speak Italian, buying scarves,and eating almond biscuits. All very honorable skills indeed. Tomorrow we head to Venice and then begin the last leg of our journey.