Fun in Abilene

Abilene was a very cool town. The architecture of downtown was amazing, but sadly most businesses had relocated to the newer parts of town so it was mainly empty buildings. I hate that! Why not use those cool buildings for stores? Anyway we checked out the local Air Force Base BX (because that's what military people do), and then decided to visit the local zoo.
The Abilene Zoo was a really nice zoo, and it has one amazing feature that makes is stand out...the "Giraffe Bridge"! There is a bridge that spans the Giraffe enclosure, and it allows visitors to walk up and see the giraffes eye to eye. The zoo also sells Giraffe Cookies, and visitors are allowed to feed the giraffes! This was SUPER cool!! The giraffes have long black tongues that have amazing dexterity! The kids had a blast feeding them crackers, especially Lucy who thought that the giraffe tongues were hilarious!

There was one small breeze, and this ostrich was feeling it!

Next we visited a museum outside of Abilene, that was a collection of buildings from the early part of the century. All the buildings & artifacts had been collected from around Abilene and put in one location. The museum provided handsets that provides visitors with historical information. I have to mention that this museum was a little out of the way, and we were expecting something different...it kind of gave off a little bit of a creepy vibe. But we plunged ahead, and boy we were glad that we did. It was a really neat place to explore!

This old merry-go-round was definitely their favorite thing!

Enjoying some cold ones!

After that we meandered back into San Antonio. It was a great trip, and we all had fun! It was especially fun to share the trip with Oma. Maybe we will actually make it to Mt. Rushmore next year!! :)

Kelley & Deborah take the kids on a Grand Adventure, Part 1

In August, with summer vacation quickly waning, Mom & I decided to take a road trip. Originally we were going to take the kids to Mt. Rushmore, but with the escalation of gas prices we set our sights on sites in Texas (hehe, couldn't resist). Now the thing to know about me & Mom is that we travel well together, and we love road trips. We don't really care about the destination, because we can find something to do nearly anywhere, it is more the trip that we look forward to. So with this in mind, we decided to take the kids out West, West Texas that is. Our itinerary was roughly Monaghans, Midland, and then loop back around through Abilene, and then down the back way into San Antonio. Not the most exciting tour, but you would not believe the things we saw!
Firstly in Monaghans we saw sand. Yup, that sums up Monaghans. Oma bought the kids a sled (for our Northern friends, we Texans prefer to sled down sand), but alas the gift store no longer carried wax. This made getting down the dunes a bit difficult, but the kids gave it a good college try before giving up.

Next we headed to Midland. We used to live in Midland in the early 80's, and it was fun to visit our old haunts. It was a nice community, and we had a great dinner downtown! In the morning we took the kids to a park that my parents used to take me & mel when we were little, and it was just as fun as I remembered it being. Unfortunately the park attractions are made out of metal, so you have to get there early! We let the kids burn off some energy at the park before we headed to Odessa.


In Odessa, we visited the American Airpower Heritage Museum dedicated to WWII pilots. The museum housed original plane nose art, WWII artifacts, and lots of restored planes. We spent a lot of time at this museum, and it was well worth the stop.

Next we went on to visit some rather surprising attractions in Odessa. Did you know that there is a Stone Henge replica made out of limestone in Odessa? Or how about that Odessa is home to a replica of the Globe Theater? I didn't know either!!! But it was really neat to visit these spots out in the middle of nowhere. Just goes to show that there is nothing that oil money can't buy! Well now I can check that off of my "Things to See with the Kids", and I didn't even have to take them to England!
I don't want to give all the fun things away on one post, so stay tuned for "Fun in Abilene"!

Declaration of War

As a parent, hell as humans, you get stuck in a rut & you start to think of it as status quo. You forget that you don't have to put up with certain behaviors, and you have tools that can help break bad habits. Now these tools don't always work & all kids respond to different pressures, but at least they are a place to start. I am sure all of you without children have lots of great ideas on how to discipline children, and I would love to hear those ideas...when you have kids. As for us parents, you can identify the glossed over look of a parent that is just trying to make it to bedtime without hurting a little person (and all of you non parents can shake your head & wonder how any parent could do that to their own child).
All of this to say that Ms. Lucy has some bad habits that are about to come to an end. I am pulling up my big girl pants, and girding myself for battle. For bettet or worse, I am going to win. Now I just have to convince Lucy of that!

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Creaky Knees

I come from a long line of "bad knees" people. My knee first dislocated in 7th grade. I didn't understand what had happened, so I told the teacher I had sprung my ankle. Which was a weird enough conclusion to come up with, I mean my knee cap's unusual location should have been a clue. Thankfully it popped back on it's own! From then on out I had to be extra careful of table corners, twisting too fast, and wiping out on the slope.
But the most annoying side effect of having bad knees is when they creak & pop. Now this might not seem problematic to most, but when you have spent 30 minutes or more (ethan!) getting a baby to sleep, creaky knees are killer!! Nothing like ONE knee pop to alert the child that they were dangerously close to sleep, and that their MOM, of all people, was abandoning them. Insert REALLY big sigh.
I was reminded of how annoying these knees could be as I kept trying to sneak out of Lu's room last night. With each betrayal of my knees, she popped up, and with her little hand waved me back to the place by her bed (I have of course given up sitting at this point, whats the use?) By my third escape attempt I was backing out of there as stiff legged as Frankenstein!! I had done it! A feeling of relief overcame me (the rest of the night was mine!) as I slowly released her door knob...Only to have the dog bark start barking at the invisible person at our front door. Drat! Some nights you can't win!

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Happy Birthday Jacob!!!

WE LOVE YOU SOOO MUCH! You are a GREAT Dad, and an awesome husband!! Can't believe how old we are getting, but that is better than the alternative!! Here is to making each year count! Love you my friend!

Pissed

My anger & disgust with our government is at a record high. I read an article today about a 10 year old boy who lost his Dad in the Chinook crash ( he was the pilot). It really drove home the point that average American families are working hard & making sacrifices (sometimes the ultimate sacrifice), and our elected officials (ALL of them) are too caught up in pissing contests to care about our welfare. They have lost sight of why they are there, and who they are working for. More importantly they have forgotten that even though we have two parties we expect them to compromise and do what is best for Americans & not their own party agenda. I guess it is easy to forget these things when you have enough food to eat, you get to go home to your family every night, and the American people provide you with a pretty good retirement plan.

Yum! Gelato!!!

105 deserves a frosty treat!!

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