Texas Trip: Hanging Out and Little Things

Since this blog is serving double duty as our family photo album (our real ones are about 8 years behind), you'll have to excuse me for posting so many pictures in this post.

I think I took this picture of all the shoes by the front door on the day of the blessing. There were even more people in the house than this. Fully ELEVEN of us were actually sleeping there! (While I'm on that topic, Eric and Ann were excellent hosts!!)

The first couple of nights the boys slept in sleeping bags up in the loft.

Our second day there, I was trying to get Chris to take a nap because he was getting a bit cranky. Sometimes all I have to do is get him to close his eyes and he'll be out. So I told him to close his eyes and pretend to sleep so I could take his picture:

I took the picture then sat there real quietly, hoping he'd conk out. No such luck. He opened up those eyes and said we needed a picture together. (Drats!) So here it is:

I lost that battle and let him get up to play. About 30 minutes later he started crying over nothing and I finally managed to get him to sleep. This little munchkin just does not know when he's tired!

One night I was trying to get him to lay down, and he insisted he wasn't sleepy at all. So I took a picture of him for proof:

Now was I right, or was I right? LOL.

The last two nights, the boys got to sleep in a tent set up in the dining room. Pretty fun!

See Chris in there taking a nap? This was on Sunday. He fell asleep at 4:30 pm or so, in the car. I put him in the tent and he slept straight through till the next morning!! Uh-huh. That's what I thought.

Anyway, in between the bigger events, we did a lot of hanging around.

Even though I'm pretty used to it by now, I STILL don't get why boys think it's so fun to play fight.

Uncle Eric, the Great Human Elevator:

It's very cute to see Grandpa doting on his granddaughters:

Course, who doesn't want to dote on these cute, little girls?

We also played games:

Just Grandpa and the boys. :)

This is a game called Settlers of Catan and is soooooo fun! Does anyone have this?

We let John bring his Waveboard since it didn't take up that much room in the car.

One night he demonstrated for his Uncle Eric, who hadn't seen one before. John loves teaching his older uncles how to do this. It makes him feel so grown up!

We all went to Chuck E. Cheese one night.

This is one of those rides where the seat goes up and around as the little kid sits on it...

Or the big kid...

Or both. You know, whatever. :)

And we swam...









Ben doesn't always like water in his face:



But he's getting over it:

The pool had a neat zero-entry area for little kids, with water fountain spouts. Brian discovered that if you stand on two, it makes the other ones shoot higher.

He wanted me to stand on one too to see how high we could get the last one to go. Thus, the picture of my foot in Texas was born:


Strangely, I now have a picture of my foot in three states. If we go to San Diego with Kimmy and Daniel this summer I'll take a picture there and that will make four states. It makes me want to make a goal to get a picture of my foot in all 50 states. But the only way that's going to happen is if I sell my book and become a huge, bestselling author. If anyone thinks that's easy or likely, please see my post on the dismal realities of publishing. LOL.

Recipe: Mexican Love

This is a creation of Eric and Ann's which they made for us in Texas. Everyone loved this and we (me) ate way more of it than we should have. Even though they named it Mexican love, and even though it's all wrapped up burrito style, the flavor isn't what I'd think of as Mexican. It's more... um... okay I don't know what. American? Is that a flavor? I don't know, but trust me, it's good. And for something that's so easy to make, you can't go wrong. Without further ado, I give you...



Mexican Love

1 lb ground beef
1 large can Bush's Homestyle Baked Beans (did I get this brand right Ann?)
around 1 cup or so hickory-flavored BBQ sauce (they use a brand I've never heard of, I don't think you can get it here)

Ground the beef and mix in remaining ingredients. Heat through.

On large, soft, warmed flour tortillas, assemble the burrito. Shredded cheese first, then the meat mixture, sour cream, salsa, and a tiny bit of lemon juice (trust me on this, it's good). Roll up burrito style. (Eric demonstrated the correct way to do this a la Taco Bell, but I can't really describe it.)

Eat, enjoy, and prepare yourself for seconds.

Recipe: Oreo cookie balls

The Texas trip was the first time I had the opportunity to meet Ann's family. I thought her mom was really neat and I enjoyed talking to her. She's in a very well-established book club (going on 20 years now or something) and so she's sending me some of their book lists. (Yay!) PLUS she made these incredible treats for everyone to enjoy. They're so good that I was happy to hear how easy they are to make. You should definitely give these a go.

Oreo Cookie Balls

1 package Oreo cookies, crushed in a blender
1 package (8 oz) cream cheese

Mix ingredients together with a mixer. Roll into balls. Dip in melted chocolate if desired and sprinkle with leftover Oreo crumbs.

I actually had them without being dipped in the chocolate and thought they were perfect, but Caroline insists it's better with chocolate. Yum, yum, yum.

The Newest Arrival

We interrupt this tale of Texas to announce the newest member of our household. This is John's new pet, whom he has dubbed "Cinnamon Cookie Brownie Cook." (The guinea pig's eyes are actually brown, but they didn't photograph that way.)

Welcome Cinnamon!

Read-Aloud Book: Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing

Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing, by Judy Blume is the first in the famous series of Fudge books. You guys remember those, right? This is the book we finished on the way to Texas. It's pretty funny. Our favorite part was "Eat it or wear it!"

Texas Trip: The frogs

Just half a dozen houses or so away from Eric and Ann's house is this pond.

It's loaded with frogs, and every night this is what you hear:

Did you hear Chris say "What is that sound?" :) This was the first time we went down to the pond, and Brian was determined to get a picture of one. They kept jumping away before we could even see them, but finally Brian got this shot:

Little did we know just how much of the frogs we'd be seeing. This was the next night, I think, and not close to the pond at all. We were walking home from the pool:

I did pet this one once it stopped trying to jump out of Brian's hands. I thought it'd be slimy, but it wasn't at all. His skin was very dry and bumpy. (I guess this is not a frog, but a toad. Is that right?)

The next day Ann and Leeanne took the kids to the playground next to the pond (thanks for sharing your pics ladies!)

And even this involved, you guessed it....

Yep. That's an itty, bitty, teeny, weeny frog. So cute!

Chris was content to just scout out frogs for others to catch, but John, Ben and Logan all came home with their own frog. Logan's was dead within minutes. He's still learning not to squeeze them too hard when he picks them up. He didn't seem too upset though, cuz he knows there's about a thousand more just a few houses away. John and Ben put theirs in a cup, wanting to take them home to AZ.

We warned them their frogs probably wouldn't live that long, and we were right. But it was pretty cool seeing all these frogs anyway.

Texas Trip: The Blessing

The whole reason so many of us made the big ol' trip to big ol' Texas, was so we could be there for the blessing of this little sweet pea:





I guess you can't see it, but her binky says "sweet pea" on it. :) Isn't she adorable?? Eric and Ann held the blessing in their home, which I really loved. There was a sweet spirit there and it was nice to have it be so small and intimate. It made it feel like a truly special occasion.

There were so many pictures taken afterward that I think little Sweet Pea must think she's a Hollywood star. (She's cute enough to be one, no?)

Look at that clan! (Anyone notice that Ben still thinks it's funny to ruin a picture?????)

Anyway, afterward there was plenty of visiting and good food (which reminds me... I brought home some recipes from Texas which I'll be posting later).

The blessing was the central activity of the trip and I'm so grateful we were able to be there for it. We love you, little Taylor.

McDonalds Madness

This part of our drive to and from Dallas deserves it's own entry.

The plan for meals, both there and back, was this: donuts in the car while driving, a quick stop for sandwiches for lunch, then a longer stop at McDonalds for dinner. We started our trip at 4 am and wouldn't get to our destination till 11 pm. After all that driving, we figured the kids would need a good, long break to stretch their legs and get some exercise.

So all day, the kids were looking forward to their McDonalds stop. For about 100-200 miles, we had been seeing the town of Abilene, TX on the highway signs, listing how many miles to that town. We figured it'd be a big town, and seeing that we'd get there about 7 pm AZ time, it'd be the perfect place to stop for dinner. (The longer days of summer tend to push our dinners later.)

About 5 miles before hitting Abilene proper, we see along the highway a big, shiny McDonalds with a play area outside. "McDonalds! McDonalds!" the kids all shout.

"Once we're in Abilene," we say. "Almost there."

A few minutes later, we enter Abilene. We start watching for a McDonalds.

And watching.

The town (which wasn't that big, it turns out) quickly slips by. Soon it becomes apparent we're starting to leave town, and we haven't seen any McDonalds. Brian and I look at each other with a look that says Uh-oh.

We pull over at a gas station to find out where the nearest McDonald's is. "Fifteen minutes back that a'way," the lady says, pointing toward the direction we'd just come (and presumably the McDonald's we had passed), "or forty-five minutes that a'way," now pointing in the direction we're heading.

By now it's 7:15 AZ time, so the kids are ready to eat. But no way are we doubling back. We decide they can wait a few minutes more. We go on.

Ten minutes later we realize we're really on Texas time now, which makes it well after 9 pm. Now we're worried the play area will close before we get there. Brian pulls up the phone number on his GPS and calls to see when the play area closes.

They don't have a play area, the manager says. It's a franchise and he took it out for liability reasons.

Say WHAT???

We ask the guy if there's another McDonalds with a play area nearby, and he says no. A check on the GPS and a few phone calls confirms this. Oh man.

The kids were so disappointed. But they handled it well, and when we got to this McDonalds we let them run around in the outdoor dining area (home of the former play area) all they wanted.

That was the drive there.

This is the drive back:

Same plan for food, only this time, we made SURE there was going to be a McDonald's wherever we'd be around dinner time. We find one on the GPS, and I think it was only 6 o'clock or so when we'd make town (Thatcher, I believe).

We pull up and this is what we see:

Oh glory be!! A play area! "Yay! Yay! Yay!" The kids all shout. I think I may have been shouting too. We go inside. Brian heads to the counter to order and the kids and I head to the door leading to the play area, where we see this:

"You've got to be kidding!" I say right outloud. A couple people looked at me like I'm some sort of impatient you-know-what, but I didn't care. These poor kids!

Well, we got their food, except for Ben who was still feeling sick. We learned there was another McDonalds in Globe so we decided to let the kids eat in the car and then we'd stop at the McDonald's there for them to play. We also told Ben we'd get him a Happy Meal there, even if he didn't feel like eating it, so he could at least have it the next day (McDonalds is such a rare treat for us, and we felt bad he was missing it).

We get to Globe. The play area is there and it's open and so the kids finally get to play. Seeing we were so close to home, I could only handle a short 30 minute stop. I was really ready to just be home. But we let the kids play. Ben laid down on the hard, marble bench and put his head in my lap and barely moved a muscle the entire time.

Right before we left, Brian asked Ben which of the Speedracer happy meal toys he already had. Brian said he'd try to get him a different kind if they were available.

As it turns out, they did not have a different kind. In fact, they didn't even have the boy kind. They were all out until their truck got in the next morning. Can you believe that? So Ben walked out of there with a pink, girl toy and the promise that we'd trade it in for a different one at a McDonalds the next day.

I tell you, it was madness. Pure madness.

Texas Trip: The Drive

Without question, the thing I dreaded most about our Texas trip was the drive. Our kids travel pretty well, but we'd never gone so far with them before. Plus, it's not like driving along the coast of California or through the mountains of Arizona, with beautiful views to enjoy. We've driven through parts of Texas before we had kids, and I remember it as the most mind-numbing experience of my life! Flat roads and flat desert all the way. I was not looking forward to that.

Little did I know that the worst part of the drive would be what led up to it.

The Sunday before we left, Tiffany offered us her DVD player for the ride. I automatically said no without thinking. Then I realized, this wasn't like putting a movie in for my kids to get from my house to the store (which I frankly think is asinine, sorry). This was over 1000 friggin miles to Texas. Just as I decided to find her and tell her I'd come to my senses, Julie offered us hers. Halleluiah! And she has two screens so we could set it up so all three kids could see a screen at once. Oh yeah.

So I pick that up from her and she kindly sets it up in the van for me. Meanwhile I'm wondering what Brian and I are going to do to save us from dying of boredom along the way. That's when Genny offered us her DVD player. It's one that sits in your lap and I thought it would be perfect for whichever of us was in the passenger seat.

Awesomeness.

Well, the evening before we left, I discovered Julie's player wasn't working. I tried this and that before calling her to see if I was doing something wrong. We figured out the cord that plugs into the cigarette lighter wasn't working, so I go to her house to get a different one. To make a long story short, probably an hour later, we'd gone through an adapter and a different kind of cord I don't even know the name of before we finally got it to work.

Did I say "we"? I meant "her." I had no idea what to do. But it was working and we were so excited! I was impressed with Julie's knowledge of all these technical things.

She unplugged it to rethread the cord and when she plugged it back in, it didn't work anymore. Oy vey.

We figured out it blew a fuse.

Okay. Well, so I gathered everything up and took it home to Brian to sort the rest out. He replaced the fuse, tried it again, and it blew a fuse again. He tried it in his car, out of curiosity I guess, and it blew that fuse too. Determined, Brian tried it one more time and this time it not only blew the fuse but even after replacing the fuse our radio no longer worked. True, we did still have Genny's, but I didn't want to use it because I was afraid the kids might drop it, and I know my kids well enough to know that they would just fight over who got to hold the screen anyway. As far as I'm concerned, boredom is better than fighting.

So now I was looking at a trip through the desert with no movies and now no radio. Add to that we found out the kids had been telling everyone in the neighborhood we'd be gone for five days so now we were worried we'd be robbed while we were gone. Plus when I ran to Target to get something (I can't even remember what now), Brian called me on the way and told me his shoe just ripped and I'd have to get another pair. It was pretty late due to all these delays and we still needed to finish packing so we could leave at 3 o'clock in the morning. I was tired and stressed and I just let all this weigh down on me.

I was starting to feel like this trip was doomed. I had a terrible feeling about everything, so much so that I didn't even want to go. But Brian suggested we say a prayer and that really helped. After that I knew we'd be fine, the house would be fine, and it'd be a great trip. And it was.

In spite of having no movies, and having to make do with a portable radio/CD player that liked to skip on the bumps, the drive was not that bad at all. The kids slept a lot...




... except Ben, but he was cheerful so I didn't mind...





In between their naps (and ours) I finished reading a book to them which was fun. Plus the scenery through the southern part of Texas (while still peppered with plenty of long, boring stretches) had some interesting parts too. We saw plenty of what makes Texas famous: trains, cattle and oilfields.

(We love trains, so it was fun counting the cars as we drove by. The longest train we saw had 4 engines and 115 cars!!)

I like the oil pumps because I think they look like great iron birds. Which is funny, because at the rest stop in Las Cruces, NM where we stopped for sandwiches, we saw this great iron bird:




The sculpture was made from all kinds of random items. This is a shot of its underbelly - you can see all the graffiti on it too. I spy a keyboard and lots and lots of shoes.

I think we just chanced upon the coolest rest stop ever. I loved this sculpture. The view was pretty too.





Of course, my foot was there as well...




Deeper into Texas, we saw windmills like they have on the drive to California. The kids think these are so cool (so do we).


And on the way back, we saw half a dozen semis carrying bits and pieces of one of these windmills. This has two arms of the windmill:



Speaking of the drive home (which was made easier because we got our radio fixed in Dallas - it was a different fuse that had blown and not the one marked "radio" which is bizarre - but seeing that it only took 10 minutes and $1.46 to get my radio back, I was not complaining!)... anyway, as I was saying, poor Ben was sick the whole way home. He was either throwing up or sleeping, poor little guy.

But when we pulled over once, and Brian and the boys entertained themselves by making the truckers pull their horns:

Ben had to drag himself out of the car and try it too:

It was the most activity we saw from him all day.

All told, we traveled over 2100 miles there and back, and over 200 miles right there in Dallas, so it was a ton of driving. But the boys did well and it wasn't nearly as bad as I'd feared. In fact, I'm hoping we have a reason to do it again someday. :)

We're Back from Texas!

I feel like I have a lot of catching up to do! I've been tagged (thanks Jodi - it actually looks like fun) and a few questions to answer, and I have to blog about our Texas trip. (The short version of that is: it rocked!) I guess I'll be a busy blogger for awhile. First I should probably finish my laundry. Do you think I need to feed the kids dinner? I mean, I just fed them lunch five hours ago. Kids are so demanding sometimes! ;)