Spring Break 2011 - Lubbock

On Tuesday, March 15, we were able to head up to Lubbock for a little bit of Red Raider time.  We had lunch at Spanky's, well we had fried cheese.  Spanky's was a standard for us in college although I did get burned out on the fried cheese back then.  Now it's a great treat when we get to visit.

Brady's first fried cheese at Spanky's.  He ate the whole thing.

We headed over to campus to let the guys go to a baseball game.  Anything to keep Cameron excited about baseball.

We stopped by the Alumni center to get a pick in front of the Masked Rider.  We have a family pic in front of the same statue from about 2 years ago.  I need to post that one for comparison on the kids.

They were drinking blue Powerade and barking like dogs to "Who let the dogs out."  

Go Red Raiders!

Will Rogers & Soap Suds

After the game, the Chris & Erik took Cameron & Brady for a walk around campus.  They went past Sneed, their old dorm, through Memorial Circle, and over to the Student Union.

Dogwood's framing the bell tower.

The girls went shopping instead of hanging out on campus.  First we hit a scrapbook store and I had way too much fun spending money.  I found Texas Tech paper, tooth fairy paper & brads, and all sorts of other cute stuff that I'll put to good use.
Next door was a resale shop and I found a few new (well to me) outfits for Maggie.  Cindy scored on a great jacket for Brady for next season - only $1.50!
Finally we went out to a metal works shop with some fun finds.  Since I had to think plane ride and not car, I had to limit my shopping, but I found something I think Chris will really like.

Jailed Maggie

So tired she fell asleep eating.  When Brady got in the car he demanded the apple to finish off.

We headed back to pick up the guys and swing by Raider Alley to pick up a new shirt for Chris.  We tried to grab a snow cone from Bahama Bucks, but the location we went to had a fire the previous day and so they were closed.  Cameron was highly disappointed by this turn of events. 

Spring Break 2011 - Go Fly a Kite!

On Monday, March 14, we headed out to the mall to get Erik's birthday present - a new Rangers hat.  He tried to slip in a Boston Red Sox hat, but Chris said not on his dime!

Erik, Brady & Cameron.  Texas Rangers fans.

Looking out the window at Lids

Then we went to Murray's to eat lunch.  They had all sorts of yummy things to eat, but what the kids liked best was Aunt Cindy playing "I Spy" with them.  Cameron thinks he's so good at this game, however when it's his turn, he's bad about looking at the item he's "spying" so we could guess fairly easily.  After our good lunch, we walked down a few shops to a cupcake place called Gigi's.  Who doesn't love a good cupcake.

Take a look at Cam's mouth, he lost his 2nd tooth on Sunday.

The selection at Gigi's was so good looking.  Maggie picked the princess cupcake, of course!

Afterwards, we decided to go fly kites in the park.  Our kiddos have been begging to fly a kite really high and we thought for sure we'd have really good winds in the plains.

Brady trying his hand at kite flying.

We only brought 2 kites, I guess thinking Brady wouldn't be interested.  Silly us, of course he was interested in what Cam & Maggie are doing.  Everyone shared pretty well though.

Chris was sitting here telling me this is such a relaxing activity and we should do it more often.  I think both the kites fell right after that.

You can always find a monkey in a tree.

They were playing hide and seek.

Brady loves to throw balls and I think we could recruit him for a little league team soon.

Chris also brought along a Junk Ball set (?), so he and Erik could act like they can hit a ball really far.  I did hit a few as well and it was pretty fun.  Somewhere in there I started playing catch with Chris & he was impressed that I could throw and catch the ball.  I did post on Facebook that it's kind of nice to know that I can still impress him with "secrets" about myself after knowing each other for 13 years.

We did get a bit warm at the park and needed down time to cool off so back to the house we went.

Even the big kids needed a break.

Chris offered to make his fantastic pasta for dinner so we ran and grabbed all the yummy ingredients while everyone was having a rest.  After we settled in for the evening, we watched Despicable Me.  Our kiddos love this movie and can quote quite a few scenes, so they were glad to share it with Brady.

Spring Break 2011 - Church, Birthday & Children's Museum

So we started out Sunday morning by going to church.  My kids did good for only one part, where the pastor called them up on stage to tell them about the Bible story.  After that Maggie was a wiggly child so I spent the rest of service out in the hall.  The people at Cindy & Erik's church were so friendly and stopped by to visit with all of us and introduce themselves.  I'm so glad that they have been blessed with such a good church family that takes care of them.

Chris was a popular man this morning.

Who could resist that cute face!

 Following church we went out to lunch at Dickie's, Erik's pick since it was his birthday.  This is a shot of him opening his card from Jeanne & David - a funny Simpson's one.  I pulled a card out of my stash of Thirty One cards, not even realizing the irony since it was his thirty first birthday.  Don't you just love how things like that work out!

Then off we went to the Children's Museum in Midland, which the kids loved.  The museum was fantastic because it's got all these really good interactive areas for the kids, but then had some interesting art pieces on the walls that were for the adults.   Chris & Maggie did a puppet show.  Erik & Cameron made masks.  I think all the kids played with a mini-golf game.  There was a vet clinic, a grocery store, magic shop, pizza shop & I think the favorite - a TV station!

Our trio on a turtle (statue).

 The train table was just a bit too tall, so Brady decided to crawl on top and Maggie followed suit.  What a bad example he is, teehee!

Engineer Brady

 Outside, under some canopies, is an area to dig for dinosaur bones.  So you can dig in this sandy dirt and find all sorts of cool treasures hidden away.  Cameron was gathering pieces to try to complete an entire dino, however we couldn't find the poor guys arms.  Neither Maggie nor Brady so much cared about the bones, they were more interested in the digging part.

Margaret Olivia!

The weather was so nice and the kids played so hard, it's a wonder they had any energy left for the next day.

Spring Break 2011

This year we decided to spend Spring Break taking a road trip to see friends and family.  Well, part of it was a road trip and part of it was a flying adventure.  So Saturday, March 12, we hop on a plane to Midland.  Cameron is a great flyer and can totally entertain himself.  Maggie was okay for the first part of the flight, but we had a layover in Dallas and she was not happy that we did not get off the plane at that point.  I don't like layovers either, so I understood her disappointment as well.

Getting our shoes back on after going through the airport scanners.

So our first stop was in Midland to see Erik, Cindy & Brady.  It was Erik's 31st birthday on Sunday, March 13, and since it's been a while since we've been able to celebrate his birthday together we just had to visit.  And it's been almost a year since they've moved out to Midland and this was the first opportunity we had to get out and see them in their new home.

Testing out Brady's doctor kit.

Brady has grown so much in the last year.  He's a super fun little boy.  It did take a day or two to warm up to us (totally understandable) and then he was calling us by name in no time.  I think the only thing that sort of freaked him out was that we tried to put all 3 of them in the bathtub together and with my 2 being so rowdy it was a bit much for the little man.  He was so easy going and happy to share his fun toys with Cam & Maggie.  He also introduced them to a new character and tv show - Chuggington.  

Oh boy do our kids have Chugger fever now!  Maggie kept saying the girl train was 'her Koko', so I'm thinking we might have to get her a train for her birthday.

Brady, Erik & Cam winding down for bed with iPods.

Brady & Maggie racing!

So that was just the first night, wait til you see what we did the rest of the week!