Texas trip

I know that I've been slacking, I mean my gosh we've been back for 5 days and I still haven't blog. So let me take you through a day by day experience of our return home...

DAY 1

It started with the plane ride of hell, and not due to the boys they were actually really great and drum roll please, QUITE! The problem was that I truly believe we got a pilot straight out of flight school. It was like a kid driving a car, just turning the wheel side to side thinking that is how you drive. When we took off we rocked side to side for a good 5 minutes! And then the landing he did it again trying to line up to land it was crazy! But enough of that for now...Where do you think I went straight to after the airport?



And it was as delicious as I remembered. Wait a minute I have to go wipe the drool off my mouth! Okay I'm back, now we're off to check into the hotel and to get Amya. Even with the GPS I still made the wrong turn, but in all fairness the exit it told me to take was closed due to construction. After picking up Amya we go eat dinner with the in-laws. Oh how sweet it is to have true Mexican food. I know, y'all are thinking I live 10 minutes to the boarder wouldn't I be able to find some authentic Mexican food? Well here's your answer on one side of me is Taco Bell and the other Del Taco! But Texas now has not only Mexican recipes, but Mexican chef's, Mexican waiters, they even speak Spanish (which isn't a problem here in San Diego) but you get my point. So we leave there with our tongues slightly burnt from homemade salsa, there goes the drool again!

We head over to the hotel for the night. It took forever to get the monkeys calm and into bed, but here is how they ended up...



Knowing they were all snuggled into bed, lights out for me.

DAY 2
We wake up early to drive out to Auntie Alli's house for Ethan's birthday party. Plus it was a great excuse to have the family come together, so we wouldn't have to drive to each of their houses, problem was that only GG (great-grandma Darlene) drove out. Oh FYI when I say we woke up early we woke up at 7:30"ish" I believe, but that is Texas time, so it was 5:30"ish" to us! We wouldn't fall asleep till west coast time, but wake up central time! Here are some pictures from the party...





This wasn't just Ethan's birthday party, it was the first time the boys met Aunt Alli, Uncle Jimmy, cousins Alyssa & Aidan, GG, and Sweetie.









After being run out of the house by the real estate agent we head over to the park. Of course as soon as we get there we have to make a potty run, and we ended up hiking down the road to a restaurant because everything else was closed.









Once it's time to leave this is where the drama starts. Who is riding with who and who is staying where. Mom and me have to head out to Austin straight from there and the boys are going to a football game with Papa and Grandma Kathe the next night, so to allow my mom to spend more time with her Dad in Austin we decide the boys would stay with Papa at his house. Well the cousins wanted to stay with eachother and Amya didn't know what she wanted. During all this Gavin decide that he changed his mind and wants to go with me. After packing, unpacking, and re-packing a bag for the kids they all go with Auntie Alli and Papa Tom had to drive back down to pick up the boys to go to the game. I get a call 25 miles into going to Austin from Gavin crying that he wants me to come get him. I feels so bad becasue I realize that I haven't really left him with anyone and only once overnight with my mom and sister (they think Auntie Hannah as their "fun" second mommy) And then my mom lays the guilt on me by saying way to go Sara, you leave your kids with strangers! :) She was just playing of course, but it was right. They had just met them that morning! Alli says she can handle it and we continue to drive to Austin.

Day 3
Mom and I wake up without getting any phone calls during the night that the kids didn't make it, so we head off to Grandpa Curt and Kathy's house. This is the first time I can remember meeting him and it had been YEARS since my mom saw him. It was actually really nice and he is extremely funny. It was nice to see some traits that my mom has in him. He always had a quick come back that made me laugh. And the best part was that he aged so gracefully. My God women would die to have his porcelain skin! I can only pray that I have skin like that when I get older. So here it is God, if I'm only to get one trait from the Crandall side PLEASE let it be the skin!






After spending as much time as we could with Grandpa Curt and Kathe in Austin we had to drive back to Corsicana to pick up Amya. Once we get to Alli's house to get Amya, Alyssa looked sad becasue the boys were already gone and now I was taking Amya. So we had her pack a bag and come stay with us in the hotel in Dallas. We entered the hotel address in the GPS and started off, only to be passing buildings that we passed coming into town from Austin. Knowing that we should be headed north to Dallas something wasn't right. It took a quick minute but we figured it out, we had put in the Austin hotel and not the Dallas hotel. We could have drove 2 1/2 hours south before we finally realized that we would have to turn around and drive 4 hours north to Dallas! By the time we get back it's late and we headed off to dinner with just us girls since the boys were staying the night at Papa Tom's house due to coming home late from the football game. The girls wanted to go swimming and hoping after a long day of driving that it would make them tired, I take them.





Day 4
We wake up early to pick up the boys to having mother nature pouring her eyes out casuing flash floods, so we call it an lazy day and stay indoors. We take the kids swimming and order in for dinner. After all the driving and time change, a day to relax was what I needed, so thank you rain! BUT kids do not agree that indoor days should be quite days! There is only so much swimming you can do with the kids before they start turning into prunes, so I ran to Target to buy stuff to keep them busy. You may never see me run as fast as I did that day trying to get out of the rain. :)










(If your reading this, I have to go tend to the boys I'll be back in a few to finish)