TX skyline

I worked in Texas for about a week recently and found a lot of color in the evenings! It was like this pretty much every day. 

#OptOutside 2015

We decided to participate in #OptOutside for Black Friday this year so we went to Ledges State Park. Having never been there before, we were pleasantly surprised at how big the bluffs and "canyon" were. It was really cold and windy but we managed to make a big loop out of one of the higher trails.

The road through the park passes through a number of stream crossings but we weren't allowed to drive through due to "winter conditions/high-water". It's a big area worth checking out again sometime.

First snow!

The first snowflake spotted at our house this season!

...and it was accompanied by quite a few others.  

Typically we don't have much snow this time of year so we had to make sure and go to the Jolly Holiday Lights pre-opening walk. Temps were around 20° and it was a little windy but still worth it.

Hard to get a picture of it with my cellphone but there is fog rolling off the lakes in Waterworks Park since the water temp. has not caught up with the sudden cold air. It was pretty eerie and made the walk even better. 

Into Fall

So....went ahead and skipped Summer there. We'll just go straight to fall. 

A hawk ate a bird on top of a pole in our backyard. 

I did not edit this photo - I was getting ready to mow the flower meadow down and noticed that there were two cone-flowers still holding on. It's frozen pretty good a few times now so I guess it's a right-place right-time sort of deal.

Short days mean good sunset views.