Vacations, part 2

Our second vacation was to Platoro and Bayfield, Colorado.

Lunch at Spanky's in Lubbock on the way up. Yummy food, especially the fried cheese!

Across the street from our hotel in Santa Rosa, New Mexico was a playground. We took full advantage of it!

Emily's traveling companions

The first night we got to Platoro, we fished (just outside the back of our cabin!). It's a good thing we did because they started letting water out of the dam and the river rose about 3 feet (maybe more) so we couldn't fish in the river the rest of the time we were there!

This bridge has been there at least 30 years (probably more!). We have pictures of Jenni and my dad on it from their trip 30 years ago.

Emily had her first big bathtub baths on the trip. The first one (in Santa Rosa) was terrible, but once I got in the tub with her in Platoro, she was fine.

The front of our cabin at Conejos Cabins. It's a good thing Daddy doesn't mind driving a trailer!

Emily got lots of Aunt Jenni time!
A family photo

Papa became a jungle gym!

A beautiful view of Mix Lake, where we fished quite a bit

Emily napped while the rest of us fished.

That big white "thing" behind us? Snow!

Behind me and Emily is the outlet for the dam. They had to release water from the lake because they had gotten so much rain recently. That's why we couldn't fish in the river. We've been there before where you could almost walk into the pipes (if you could get to them) because so little water was being let out.

This was actually our second entrance into Colorado. On our first entrance either Emily was asleep or there wasn't a sign (I can't remember). When we left Platoro to go to Bayfield, we went through New Mexico and re-entered Colorado.

Mom's cousin, Stephanie, and her husband Lee live in Bayfield and have several horses. Emily got to pet and "ride" Filene. Emily even stuck her hand up Filene's nose. Gross!

Emily's (and my) first ATV ride. I held on so tight!

Emily's never really been in grass before. What we have here doesn't exactly qualify as grass, it's more weeds. So, to see her in lush, green grass was fun. She just played with it and tried to figure out what it was.

Fortunately, Jessica is an old dog who doesn't mind kids! Emily just loved on her for a long time!

At our cabin in Bayfield, Emily became fascinated with zippers and got to play with all the zippers on Grandpa & Pearlie's suitcase.

Emily did not sleep well on the trip (any night of the trip). One morning in Bayfield, she woke up especially early and I brought her back to bed with me (something I never do). She fell hard asleep and when I got up to get ready, she was still asleep. I put pillows around her so she wouldn't roll off and she continued to sleep!

One day, we rode the Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Rail Road from Durango to Silverton. Lots of fun. Emily slept the first hour of the trip, then was happy for an hour then got fussy for the rest of the time (about an hour). The train ride was beautiful though and the weather in Silverton was great!

Our brakeman-in-training

Pearlie, Stephanie, me, Phillip & Emily

Our lunch stop in Silverton...yummy!

Our dinner stop in Durango. A little pricey, but Emily took care of that. She managed to "steal" a spoon without us knowing!

Back in Abilene, we went to Belle's Chicken Dinner House for our last vacation meal. Emily got to do the Hokey Pokey with our waitress.

It was a great vacation and I can't wait to see where next year takes us.

Vacations, part 1

Back here, I told you we'd been on vacation and that the post would come later. Well, it's later. Mostly because we took our final vacation.

In May, we were sponsors on the Panther Creek senior trip to San Antonio. We stopped at Schlitterbahn on the way and had a few hours there. Emily enjoyed it for a while, then was tired of it.

We had dinner the first night at Mi Tierra, just across the street from our hotel. It was good Mexican food!

The next day, we went through the Buckhorn Saloon.

Phillip had a good talking to with this elk!

We went to Dick's Last Resort for lunch. They give you hats they've written on. Emily's was so cute and she wore it all day long! Phillip and I left ours at Dick's.

For dinner, we went to Hard Rock Cafe. Good food, but expensive. Good thing it wasn't our money paying for it!

We enjoyed San Antonio and may even visit again later.

New Washer

Don't you just hate it when an appliance dies? Last week, my washer stopped mid-cycle (full of water, of course!). We tried repairing it ourselves, but that didn't work. So, last Saturday, we headed to Home Depot to see what we could find. We debated between a top loading washer and a front loading washer. The salesman gave me the pros for each. While the top loading one was only $549 and was 4.0CF, it uses 40 gallons of water per load. The front loading one was $599 and 3.5CF, but it only uses 14 gallons of water per load! I was shocked!! So, want to guess which one we went with?

Click here to see!

Fun pictures

Wednesday, Emily was playing in the living room while I was in the office for a few minutes. I decided I needed to go find her and this is what I found. (This week, she'd also found the toilet paper in the bathroom and pulled it off. We now keep the bathroom door closed!)

Then, Thursday morning, she'd fought her nap and had finally settled down. I went in to check on her and found this.

Finally, happy 13 months!!

New car seat

Emily enjoyed her new car seat yesterday. On the way to Brownwood, we really thought she would sleep, but I think there was just too much new to look at and play with. However, she did sleep well in it on the way home. We did discover, though, that she needs some kind of pillow. There is just so much room around her head that when she fell asleep, her head fell forward and rested on the seat belt. Any suggestions?

4th of July

For the weekend, we headed east to Jenni's house. We had lots of fun shopping and spent way more money that we planned to spend this weekend (though most of it was planned spending anyway).

We bought Emily's new car seat, an Evenflo Triumph, I think. (I'd post a picture, but I can't remember exactly which one it was.) We got a convertible car seat for a couple reasons...I want her to stay facing backward longer and Emily will outgrow her current car seat in height before she's 20 pounds.

We also bought a new diaper bag. I love it so far. Several things I love about it:

1. it matches our car seat & stroller
2. it's super lightweight (6.5 pounds filled!)
3. it will attach to any stroller (even an umbrella stroller!)
4. the strap is long enough that it could be carried across your body like a messenger bag
5. it has a removable changing pad that can hold a diaper or two and travel wipes and can be carried alone

We headed to The Container Store to buy a couple boxes. We ended up watching a travel packing demo and I won a $25 gift card! Since we were there, we looked at the suitcase that was shown in the demo. We've been needing to replace a couple suitcases anyway, so we bought one! It was on sale and we had the gift card so it was a great deal on a piece of luggage that has a lifetime warranty! I can't wait to use it in September when I go to Nashville.

Last night, Phillip and I headed to The Melting Pot to celebrate our anniversary (yes, a month late). We've been there every year for our anniversary and look forward to it every time we can go. They were having a special last night called the Freedom Feast which only cost $59 per couple. It was wonderful. Started off with Wisconsin trio cheese fondue; then salads; then filet mignon, white shrimp, teriyaki-marinated sirloin and chicken breast with a vegetable broth; and finally the original chocolate fondue (chocolate & peanut butter). It was so YUMMY!

Needless to say, we had a great weekend with Jenni. Emily slept well and started the dishwasher and washer all by herself. (The washer is in her room--the laundry room--and the buttons are just at her height.)

Thanks for reading. I know it was a long post, but maybe I'll get pictures up one of these days.