Today, Bill and I were invited to my cousin’s wife’s birthday party in Lockhart, Texas.  Lockhart reminds me a bit of Sanford, North Carolina, the city where we lived before we moved to Texas.  It’s actually cuter than Sanford, though… with a nice row of mansions in town and some very interesting old buildings.  I was glad to see them, since we now live in the land of box stores and chain restaurants.

This particular cousin and I hadn’t spent much time together because he and his wife have always lived in Texas and had five kids, now all grown and thoroughly awesome people.  Texas is not close to Virginia, which is where I spent most of my life.  So I didn’t get to see them much as I was growing up and they were raising their family.  In fact, I think I saw them all for the first time in 2000… and it was the first time in many years since I’d seen my cousin Andy.  Since then, I’ve seen them sporadically, but now that we live in Texas, we could become closer.

Lockhart is on the way to Austin, about an hour from San Antonio…  It’s a really cute town.

On the way into downtown Lockhart…

Very cool old building…

Another shot as we passed…

Castle?

It was my cousin’s wife’s 50th… This is their son holding up the pinata.  No, he didn’t hold it as the birthday girl swung at it.

We have been invited back for a baby shower in a couple of weeks, so I’ll get a few more shots next time.  We had a great time visiting with my family, though… and their very nice friends and all the sweet dogs in attendance, too.  Next time, we will have to bring Zane and Arran.

Probably the funniest part of the evening was when my cousin’s daughter, Sandra, introduced me as her dad’s cousin.  I laughed and said, “I’m YOUR cousin too, you know!”

I wish I had gotten more photos.  It was quite the blast.