I was so excited to have our first visitors in Texas. I'm not sure how often people will come here and I love hosting, so I was glad they were able to come so soon. PLUS, we got to see my sister who we have been missing so much for the past 18 months as she was serving a mission in Ukraine (and recently transferred to California when it got dangerous).
This was great motivation to get the house clean, boxes un packed and a few decorations up. It was fun to plan meals and live a 'normal' life for a few days while they were here
Melinda is awesome. She is a great, interactive and attentive Aunt.
First, I took them to Fort Worth to explore. We saw the stockyards and sweated like crazy there. We ate a picnic lunch, explored in a candy store while my kids picked their favorites and walked the strip. We saw the long horn cattle walk down the street (Jackson was so disappointed that they were not running). We topped it off with drinks from Sonic and relaxed at home. We played games that night.
The next day we spent hanging around home. We went to see a movie "Heaven is for Real" I really liked it and it was super clean, but Jackson was terrified of the little boy almost dying. He sat on my lap and I talked him through the whole movie. That night he couldn't get to sleep until 10:45 and he was really scared. I felt so bad I scarred him. I shouldn't have taken him, but to me it is so spiritual and uplifting I didn't think it would affect him so much. Jackson is really sensitive soul.
When flights weren't looking good I was looking for more options of things to do. We went to Dallas for the day on Thursday. We saw a large model train display, ate lunch at a gorgeous and peaceful fountain plaza and rode the trolley to uptown Dallas. The kids loved the splash pad we found on the way back. Such a great way to cool off.
By Friday flights were still filling up with Stand-bys stacking up, so we were getting really worried. Dave decided to take the day off and we drove a FULL 8 people in our van to Austin (3 1/2 hours away) to get them on a flight from there. We spent the afternoon at Barton Natural Springs pool. It was cool and pretty and so big! We had a great time cooling off there.
We checked flights as we were leaving and there were more seats on the earlier flight so we rushed out and took them to the airport. Melinda didn't even have time to change out of her suit (and of course, that means that she got the pat down at security!). They had a 4 hour delay, deplaning, cancelled flights that affected theirs and then another delay in Phoenix until they gave up at 1 am and went to Tylers. They got out fine the next day. We were so relieved and happy to have them home (although so sad to see them go). Hopefully, they are brave enough to try standby again.
Our little family spent the evening in Austin at the capitol building and grounds. We also waited and watched millions of bat leave the Congress Street bridge.
The next day we went to the military museum, hiked Mount Bonnell for a great view of Austin and walked around a sculpture garden.
We headed home and stopped at Inner Space Cavern to check it out and eat lunch. The kids fell asleep almost the whole ride home. Successful trip. We really fell in love with all that Austin has to offer and hope to be back to check out more natural springs, caverns and other sights.
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