sea world

We took a quick trip to San Antonio this weekend. One great advantage of being military is they let you in free at Sea World. We didn't spend a dime, except for parking and gas. And our hotel was free because of Jared's Marriott points he earned in May when he was back east. Now, THAT'S what I call a vacation...when you don't have to pay for anything. ;)

fountains in the hotel pool

one last dip before winter

images from Sea World:

Carly wanted to ride the scariest roller coaster, but she was four inches too short. She had to settle for this ride and a kiddie roller coaster. She LOVED it! I SO look forward to riding the Mamba with her! :)

shows from the day:

AMAZING show!

After we watched this show the second time, we saw a couple who had chosen to sit in the splash zone with their two kids. The kids were wailing because they were drenched. We just laughed and laughed because we knew that's exactly what would've happened to us, had we not run out when they started splashing. The couple was laughing too, wiping their poor kids down.

back again

So here we are again. Back to the Texas grind.

This trip south wasn't quite as hard as the first one; familiarity played a big part. We knew where we were headed and how long we'd stay. The further we drove, the higher the temperatures became. The dirt changed colors. South of Abilene, TX, we once again appreciated the kindness of fellow drivers. Did you know that on the 70-mph two-lanes, it's common courtesy (maybe the law) to pull off to the paved shoulder so faster traffic can pass? If only they could make that rule on the stretch from Sabetha to Holton.

I mustn't rub it in, but it was quite nice to wear shorts again today. Our temperatures reached a comfortable 85, while we pitied you Kansans with your cloudy 46-degree forecast. Oh, we'd love to freeze with you. Seriously. :)

What a blessed time it was at home. Isaac showed me a new trick here. In the up-side-down position, he stated, "I love to be at home!"

We are happy to be back in our beds, but we do so look forward to Thanksgiving.

weekend wandering, pt1

We woke up Saturday on a mission: to experience no boredom. We decided to take a road trip. We packed a sack lunch and started out around 10:00 a.m. As we started driving down the road, I asked Jared, "Okay, what direction are we going?" He said, "Oh, I don't know. How about south?" I said, "Okay." It was a pleasant day for driving. A few miles down the road, we heard a song request from the backseat. The kids wanted to hear "Man of Constant Sorrow." Miles later, you could hear yodeling from our car as we all sang the chorus of "In the Jailhouse Now" together while driving past skinny goats grazing on stubbles of grass in a Mesquite-filled "pasture."

After we passed the town of Christoval, I asked Jared, "Where are we going?" We looked at the atlas and realized that our road was leading to nowhere, so we turned around and went another way. I suggested we go to Mexico; it was only 2.5 hours away. An hour later, the kids told us, "We wanna go back to our apartment." We wondered where their sense of adventure was. We were exploring!!

We finally settled for the Caverns of Sonora 90 miles south of San Angelo. A quiet, hilly place it was, and we were excited to see some real caverns. At the visitor's center, Jared discovered that it cost $20/adult and $16/kid (age 4+) to see the caverns. Instead of paying $56 for a tour of these beautiful caverns, we decided to walk on a short trail and return home. What an excursion it was.

Back at the apartment the clock read 2:30 p.m. We sat on the couch and asked each other, "Now what are we going to do?" It was all in good humor.

big.texas.

We noticed it when we crossed the border into Texas. There was a vibe of ego bouncing off the big Ford (or whatever) trucks passing us on the highway. I'm sure we saw a sign bragging about the size of Texas. Even Wikipedia states: "The physical size of the state and the bigger-than-life attitude of some of its inhabitants has led to the saying that 'Everything is bigger in Texas.'" Some of the trucks passing us.... No, hold on. I'm going to call them pick-ups. Where did that term go, anyway?! I'm assuming that term just wasn't tough enough. Back to what I was saying.... Some of the pick-ups passing us had a Texas flag sticker with the word "SECEDE" on it. Okay, I know. Maybe it's half joke. But the other half of it is not.

Yesterday afternoon we drove out of San Angelo city limits for the first time since we got here. Our church was having a picnic at Spring Creek. (The pastor and his dad owned a few acres around the crick.) The scenery on the 15-mile drive west was pretty in its own way with little buttes sticking out of the ground in the middle of nowhere. Most of the ground was "timber" if you want to call it that. Mostly small mesquite trees, cactus, and lots of brush from dead trees. Every now and then you'd see cows grazing on orange dirt, probably. No, I'm not sure what they ate, because there wasn't much grass. What seemed amazing to us were the fields and the fact that farmers try to farm it. We saw fields of shriveled up cotton and milo. The milo was mature at two feet tall. Jared said, "I'm not sure why they say that everything is bigger in Texas, because it's not. Milo would be six feet tall in Kansas."

Yes, we are biased, but we cannot come up with any reason for why Texas is any better than Kansas. No, we probably wouldn't drive around with a Kansas flag sticker boasting "SECEDE" on our little Mazda pick-up that has a dented bed and a drooping bumper. But we're thinking that Kansas is about the best place to be. ;) So to anyone who thinks that everything is bigger in Texas, I say, "Oh, hogwash."

a train fanatic's dream field trip

We took a field trip to the KCM&O Depot museum on Saturday. There was a lot of history, and there were a lot of trains. The kids were pretty excited to see three different rooms with model trains. After we went through the museum, we climbed into an old engine and caboose. Here are some of the things we saw:

different

One good thing about being in a new place is the opportunity for learning flexibility. For lack of a better thing to write, I'm providing you a list of differences we've found in Texas:

• Having neighbors. This apartment complex is satisfactory, but apartment living in a city is somewhat different from living on a farm. We share walls with neighbors to our west and south. The south neighbors must be gone or very quiet. But we danced to the west neighbor's music at suppertime tonight, then sang a rock 'n' roll version of "1, 2, 3, Jesus Loves Me" to their beat. They must've really loved that song, because it repeated several times.


• Fireants. These cute little critters build HUGE mounds. Their bites burn and sting. Carly still has two bumps on her big toe from getting bit two weeks ago. We do not currently have any bait to get rid of these ants by our front porch, so I have been temporarily conquering them with bleach and vinegar.


• Unknown by all (well, almost all). One advantage of grocery shopping in a big city is the fact that no one knows you. You can go out in public and be unknown. I have fixed my hair maybe three times in the past three weeks. And no one notices. Yesterday, I took the kids to Wal-Mart, wearing ratty clothes, greasy hair, and a ball cap. I thought to myself, Should I look more presentable? I quickly answered myself, No one will know me anyway. We know, like, 10 people in San Angelo. There's not a chance we'll meet someone we know. We were greeted in the checkout line by a Mesquite Ridge Church elder's family!! It was good to see them, but how it would've been nice to be presentable. ;)


• Wal-Mart....is practically in our backyard. Nice!


• Laundromat. We didn't bring our washer and dryer. I now understand why High Rise tenants stuff as much laundry as they can into each load. Except washing loads here are $1.00 each, not $.50.


• Temperature and humidity. It may be hot here, but laundry hanging outside sure dries fast. I wonder if San Angelo's 95 at 36% humidity right now feels better than Sabetha's 83 at 72% humidity. Somehow, I doubt it, but the lower humidity is good.


• Drinking water. The tap water here is not good. We've been buying jugs of water and refilling them at Wal-Mart. When I'm carrying a strong, canvas bag filled with 3 gallons of water, I think about those poor women years ago who had to lug jugs on their heads because they didn't have any running water at all. We've got it good, really.

The best thing about a different place with unfamiliar surroundings is the ever-present fact that God is constant. He is forever with us. That VBS song rings loud in my head: "Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the LORD.your God.will.be.with.you.wherever you go" (Joshua 1:9) (periods added where you're supposed to point your finger in the air). ;)

A favorite picture of mine that doesn't have anything to do with anything I wrote here. :)

sight-seeing

San Angelo: "The place to come for good times" they say.

Three hotspots we hit today:

1. Kids Kingdom. Ever been to the Bern park? This was pretty similar, except three times bigger. Wow. The kids were overwhelmingly excited, running around not knowing what to do first. It's a beautiful park with a picnic shelter. There were knights and princesses dressed up outside the playground. The knights were sword-fighting, and the princesses were sitting, watching. Well, one princess was talking on her cell phone. That didn't really fit. ;)

2. San Angelo Visitor Center alongside the Concho River. Beautiful. We've never seen so many turtles in a river! We walked across bridges and along the riverwalk. The vegetation was beautiful, especially for being in the middle of a desert climate.

Oh yeah, there's something about sheep in this city...23 different sheep statues around town.


3. The Old Chicken Farm Art Center. This was interesting. Sitting in the middle of a run-down neighborhood, this "center" was actually an outdoor art gallery. Different artsy vendors set up booths and activities for people stopping by. Today they had a big table for kids to make free clay creations. About three different groups of pickers were singing and playing old songs. One booth had welding, where you could weld any metal piece of junk to this metal "creation" that looked like a couple kids on bikes. What an interesting atmosphere.

It was quite a fun morning.

first impressions

Day 1

Moving company shows up at 8:30 a.m. Packers ease into the job by looking around, whistling, and calling, "Here, kitty kitty!" to Patches who probably has ringworm on her neck. Stuff is packed and loaded by 2:30. We pick up the kids and leave for Wichita. Isaac starts saying, "I wanna go home..." The Marriott discount was quite a blessing. And the Marriott restaurant was quite convenient, but who would pay $4.75 for a peanut butter and jelly sandwich kids meal?! Do you know what kind of a PB&J sandwich I could make with $4.75?

Day 2

We travel to Dallas. Praise God for safe travel and cool temperatures. Our car A/C usually works in mild temperatures but not in hot ones. Isaac keeps saying, "I wanna go home..." We arrive at sister Carrie's house by suppertime. They feed us and we all head to the lake to swim and watch fireworks. Carly had her first encounter with two fireant bites on her big toe.

Day 3

Saturday. Day of relaxation. Carrie and Kyle took us to a park with nature trails and a huge playground. There were lots of families there, only one who spoke English as their first language. The multi-cultural experience was quite interesting, and I found it much easier to strike up a conversation with a Hebrew woman than it would've been to speak with an "Americanized" white woman. Why are white people so stiff, anyway, afraid to look dumb?! (I guess I don't want to look dumb either, but I often do anyway.) :) We topped off the night with frozen yogurt cones and shakes. It was unfortunate that Carly's cone fell up-side-down as soon as the lady handed it to her. No harm, though; 5-second rule. She ate it anyway.

Day 4

Sunday. We headed to Ft. Worth. The kids were sad to leave their cousin, and we were sad to leave Carrie & Kyle, but we needed to head west. After going to Aunt Phy and Uncle Harold's church, we stuffed ourselves at Ryan's steakhouse. The hot rolls with honey-butter are hard to beat. Travelling on...going west...we found ourselves on a 70 mph 2-lane. Surprisingly hilly. We pass the World's Largest Wind-Powered farm. We pull into San Angelo around 7:30 p.m. and manage to book a suite on base fit for a chief.

Day 5

Monday. 6:00 a.m.

A bugle-boy-recording has the audacity to wake us up with Reveille. Jared rolls over and mumbles, "You've gotta be kiddin' me!" We move to Goodfellow AFB's temporary housing. Homesickness sets in.

Day 6

Carly normally wakes up cranky, but today she woke up with a revelation shining in her eyes. She said in a sleepy but cheerful voice, "I think Isaac would stop saying 'I wanna go home' if you gave him a rub." We'll try that--not that we haven't already. Tuesday. Commissary, here we come! All I can say is: Garrett's Country Mart is over-priced and Sara Lee bagels rock! We sign a lease with Encino Apartments and plan to move in as soon as the moving truck gets here Friday. We're excited to get settled.

We miss you all!