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State Fair Time!

It's that time of year again! Fair time!!

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Unlike last year, it was not terribly sunny and warm... Honestly, this whole summer wasn't terribly sunny or warm. Hopefully that means we will have a nice winter to make up for summer being a little lame?

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Matt and I actually went to the fair last night as well for a concert! I heard Third Eye Blind was coming and knew we *had* to go! We have spent sooo much time jamming their first album that I wanted to see them live. I was worried they would only play newer stuff, but they played so many old ones - including our absolute favorite: Motorcycle Drive By!

Thanks so much to Nonni for watching the kids so we could have a date night! (And it only rained on us a teensy bit...)

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And since I was already on the state fair website booking special events, I decided to buy tickets for the Monster Truck show. I absolutely love monster trucks and haven't seen them since we left Texas. I figured it would probably be a little lame compared to MONSTER JAM!!!, but the boys would probably still think lame trucks were cool!

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I got *so* excited when I saw this guy from a distance. "No way that Grave Digger is here!!!" And he wasn't, but when I saw this guy was named Identity Theft, I decided that was worth loving him too. :) He even got some good jumps in!

Which brings us to the fence situation. We always sit fairly high at the Monster Jam because we have read too many horror stories about tire flying off of the trucks and into the crowd. And then I buy tickets that literally have us at tire level. So while it was fun, I doubt we will be doing this again...!

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The bikes were equally as exciting to the boys and not nearly as scary to the parents. Well maybe a little scary to the person still nursing a broken collarbone...?

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I would just like to include this photo because Henry is so adorable. And he even was willing to wear his ear muffs - which is a miracle sometimes. ;)

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Actually, they requested the ear muffs back for the lumberjack show! We don't usually have them and they end up covering their ears, so they were pretty happy this time. We made it through the show and a few more snacks before these guys decided it was too cold and they wanted to go home. So not our longest visit to the fair, but given that I got fair food last night, I was ok with calling it a day.

Here's hoping for more sun next year! :)

Kindergarten! :) :(

I can't believe that Thomas is actually old enough to be starting Kindergarten! I have been in a little bit of denial about the whole thing. We went and met the teacher last week, then he had a practice kindergarten for a few hours. He seemed fine with the concept, but I was still worried about his first day...

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Which was ridiculous apparently. He walked into school and to his class like he was a seasoned pro! Put all his stuff away in his bin and was ready for the day. I know that is a good thing, but he looked like such a little boy. My baby is officially a Kindergartener... :( 

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So proud of him though! :)

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Nonni didn't want to miss out on the fun either! Not only did she get to be part of such a momentous day, it really helped ease our minds about the after school Tae Kwon Do program. We were nervous about him figuring out the bus ride over there and she was able to take him the first few days. After a day or two of being escorted, he was ready to try out the van with Nonni following and finally didn't need any sort of help. Such a big guy!

Weekend in Talkeetna

Since Matt was supposed to be gone for a few weekends, I had made plans to go to Talkeetna with the kids and just hang out. I figured we would miss Matt less if we weren't just hanging out at the house. But since he was back home early, he came with us!

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We hadn't stayed in the cabin for a few years, so I was pretty excited about going back. Plus you can have dogs in the cabin, so the girls got to join in on the family trip. Not for the photo though... Matt can't exactly hold a dog leash right now, so they were stuck inside for photo time.

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After breakfast, we wandered down to the river to see if Denali was out (though you can tell there really wasn't much of a chance of that based on the weather...). I was going to let them throw rocks in the river, but it was much higher than usual and I didn't want them getting close to the bank at all!

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Luckily there was a nice beachy area just to the left!

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Much less scary to let them throw rocks in where the water is gentle. Unfortunately, the girls were not at all impressed by the fact I wouldn't let them in the water. Sorry girls - you have not proven yourself very competent with currents, so it's not happening!

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We randomly picked the weekend of Denali's 100th anniversary to be in Talkeetna - which happens to have the ranger station that is the home base for all mountaineering adventures to Denali. A park ranger found us throwing rocks in the river and told us to stop by since they had all kinds of activities for kids. 

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The boys had a blast with several of the activities, including these rad "100" glasses! But the best park where the park badges they were handing out. We've collected several of these and they are always plastic, but not today! Since it was such a momentous occasion, they had badges laser engraved out of birch. They were only for the celebration and the kids thought they were the coolest thing.

Happy Birthday Denali! :)

Matt's Motorcycle

Matt has a tradition of every few years of going on an epic motorcycle trip with a few friends. This trip was planned to start in El Paso, with a quick jaunt down to the Mexico border, then up the Continental Divide trail all the way back to Alaska.

The Alaskan contingent shipped their bikes down to a shop in El Paso and then flew down a before the trip start to get them put back together and buy any last minute items. Several friends were coming from both Dallas and California to join in the fun. 

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Unfortunately, this section of sand had other plans. Deep sand is apparently a bit tricky on motorcycles and it made the bike take a hard left, while Matt continued going straight...

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It was immediately apparent that something was broken and Matt was not going to be finishing the ride. The other guys called for an ambulance, but were concerned that the ambulance would not be able to make it down the dirt road. Luckily a rancher was driving by and offered to take Matt to the road to meet the ambulance. Which is where we lose exact details of what happened from there.

The best we can tell, the rancher got Matt to the ambulance. The ambulance crew was worried that he had injured his head because he was very confused and mentioned having head pain. They called in a helicopter, closed down the highway for it to land, then Matt got a ride to the nearest trauma hospital back in El Paso. He got there and got all kinds of scans and tests. 

Amazingly, I was still in Texas on my trip when I got the initial news and then the update that he had gotten a helicopter ride. So guess who got a side trip to El Paso to go check on their husband?

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Luckily it was only a broken collarbone. The doctor said that in cases of trauma like this, the brain tends to check out a bit and that was the explanation for the fact that Matt doesn't remember hardly anything from the wreck to when he was at the hospital in El Paso. The ortho team there decided that a sling was all that this break needed.

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So I got him the fanciest sling I could find at Walgreens and treated him to a few Texas delicacies before heading home. (In the midst of all this, my sister flew to Texas and took the boys home. Talk about a life saver!) I got him safely home and then found an ortho up here to make sure things were healing up ok.

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Except the angle of the x-rays they took in El Paso didn't quite give the whole story. They took new ones and realized the break was much worse than it initially looked. So in addition to all of the "fun" of being helicoptered, he also got a fancy schmancy new nail put in his shoulder. 

And his poor bike got left behind in Texas. Luckily, one of his friends took it back with him to Dallas and it will just have to hang out there Matt can go retrieve it.

Continental Divide trip, take 2 - coming summer of 2018? 

Galveston Fun

The beach house was just north of Galveston in Crystal Beach. It was nice to be away from the hub-bub that is Galveston Island in summer, but we still made several trips back there for fun!

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It may not look like it here, but the boys loved the Ferry rides! There were a few crossings when they fell asleep and I tried to let them nap, but without letting the engine run, the car got pretty toasty even with the windows open - so that never lasted long. It was much nicer to get out of the car and watch the ships going by!

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The kid fell down sooo many times on this trip. We met my parents at Starbucks one morning to retrieve Nonni (dad came down for a few days to spend with mom) and I happened to notice how bruised and scraped up his leg had gotten. This poor kid!

He even managed to add a few more after this photo...

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I wanted to take them to Seawolf Park because I figured they would like the giant submarine and warship. I don't think they quite understood what the giant torpedo behind them was, but they acted suitably impressed! 

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They loved climbing through the submarine doors though! They were the perfect size for kids - us adults had a harder time at it than they did. Especially poor Josh, he is much to tall to ever serve on a sub!

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The best part of the submarine was the air conditioning honestly. It was pretty hot outside (in case I haven't mentioned that before), but the sub was nice and cool. So nice!

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The battleship, on the other hand, was roastingly hot if you weren't in a breezy and shady part of the ship. My kids didn't seem to mind all that much, but the kids that live in this heat year round were pretty done. We were all a bit confused about that turn of events. ;)

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See this guy? Red as could be, but having a blast!

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Luckily for all of us, a storm was rolling in! The temperature dropped to reasonable levels as soon as the clouds covered up the sun. So we wandered over to the park to play for a bit and then down to the dock at Seawolf Park to watch people fishing. The kids were super excited when this guy in the corner caught one and ran over to check out his catch.

But one kid was much too concerned with the lighting off in the distance...

He wanted us to leave as soon as possible! To be fair, it did start raining shortly after we got to the car, so he wasn't that far off.

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We found this spot on the ferry after a few rides - there was a sitting area that was above the car deck, but not as high as the enclosed deck. It was shady, breezy and we could see all the ships going by. Definitely the best spot!

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To my surprise, there was a Children's Museum in Galveston! It was part of the Bishop's House Museum and looked promising. So one of the days when the other kids all wanted to use the water slide again, mine kids opted to go check out the museum instead. 

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I wasn't sure to expect since it was in an old mansion, but it was pretty awesome! There were different themed rooms and everything from a play PIzzeria, fishing boat, art, building blocks and a health area. 

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Thomas was super excited that they had real tools to use and made his own little creation out of scrap wood, beads and some tiny nails. Then he used a hand auger to drill some holes in it. Not sure what it would be to most people, but to this guy it is a treasure!

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I kept losing track of Henry and Nonni because it was a bit of a maze, but I managed to find him finishing up some art work. Also, not sure what this was supposed to be, but art is subjective anyhow. ;)

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If you go to Galveston, it would be a shame to not get ice cream on the Strand! It took me forever to find a parking spot and I wanted to just write it off, but I had promised these two guys ice cream and they weren't willing to give up on it. Luckily we finally found a spot and finally got our tasty, tasty ice cream! Clearly the younger two were more interested in ice cream or people watching than taking photos - at least Nonni pays attention to me. :)

Beach House with the Larsons

Our whirlwind week across Texas was deliberately planned to be before the second week of staying in one spot - a beach house on the Gulf Coast with Theresa and family. A week of relaxation with my bestie and both of our moms to help some with the kids? Perfect!

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I was so stressed about the heat for this trip that I may have gone a little overboard preparing for it... As in I sent myself a snow cone maker to the in-laws house so we could cool down with snow cones. The kids didn't seem to think I was crazy at all and loved snow cone time! 

Also if you look at the reflection in the window, you can see how close we were to the beach. Plus the house had this super awesome deck all around the second floor that was mostly shaded - perfect again!

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You have to catch a ferry from Galveston to get over to Crystal Beach, so I also sent myself this Lego set for Thomas to build after our ferry ride. He, of course, found it last week and has been so excited about building it. As soon as we got there, I conceeded and he set to work constructing it!

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Henry found this Bop-It game at Allie's house and loved playing with it. So, of course, she gave it to him. He loves playing with it while dancing around. He's gotten more points on it than I would have guessed, but he mostly just likes the music. 

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We even managed to go the beach! I know that sounds silly since we are at a beach house, but the cloudy days were our favorite days to venture over there. Otherwise we waited until super late in the day when it was slightly cooler.

The boys weren't super impressed with the waves on the first visit, so Thomas didn't even want to wear his swimsuit the second time. He pointedly said he wasn't going in the water, so why couldn't he go to the beach in his pajamas? Can't argue with that fine logic...

Also, Henry is totally pretending to be a bear and Thomas luckily realized that a bear was about to smash his sand castles and stopped the bear just in time. Ha!

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Henry then wandered over to check out the hermit crabs the other kids had collected in the pirate buckets. And by that I mean it was mostly Theresa finding the hermit crabs. I managed to find one and got squeals of joy from Anna when I put it in her bucket! :)

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This guy was just happy as he could be drawing in the sand and trying to build castles. And I bought him these super big Superman sunglasses because the transitions just weren't cutting it. 

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Don't they both just look like they are having such a good time? Henry did try a few rides on the knee board the first day, but he was pretty happy to just splash around in the surf and play in the sand today. Water babies, they are not...

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Meredith was also all about playing in the sand. Theresa and I kept building her little castles with rocks and shells hidden inside because her favorite thing to do was destroy anything built out of sand. And it was way more fun for her when there were "treasures" to find!

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The other kids had been talking up this awesome water slide down the road. Even though my kids aren't water babies, it certainly looked like fun and not that scary. So we went for it - I bought a ticket too, even though no other adults did. First ride down, Thomas and I rode together!

And he hated it and refused to go again... :(

Henry rode down with Anna while I waited at the bottom to make sure he didn't freak out when they got into the pool at the bottom. And he pretty much loved it. The two of us went down several times! I managed to get Thomas to give me one more try since I had figured out how to make it a little less splashy and twisty after a few rides. I promised an ice cream cone and he did exactly one more ride before quitting again... Oh well. 

At least they look excited in the photo! 

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We brought our own mini-water sliding contraption with us and thought the kids would have more fun with that. Theresa's kids were ready to hit the ground running when we set it up, but my two had never seen such a thing before. Thomas was more interested in the mechanics of the slide than sliding at first...

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Wallace was by far the one to get the most air, but I'm not sure he really liked the landing... "/

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Henry kinda figured out the sliding on his knees at the end. Meredith and Henry would mostly run down it and fall dramatically at the end.

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Thomas managed to get a few decent slides in. But he's totally posing at the end for me. :)

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Then the kids pretty much gave up after a bit and just hung out cooling off on the slide. Henry didn't realize the girls had given up and was yelling at them to move. Good luck, Henry!

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Popsicle time! We tried for awhile to get a group photo and this was the best we could do. They were close to all looking at the camera. 

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I was a total sucker for this frog hats when we went to the Rainforest Cafe. And Henry loved wearing his around. Pajama bottoms and a frog hat - he is one stylish kid! ;)

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I didn't get very many photos with Nonni in them, but I swear she was with us and having fun! :)

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The last day at the beach house, we pulled out the tons of water balloons that Allie had given us. They are the ones that have a cluster of 30 balloons and one connector for a water hose. It is soooo much easier than filling up tons of balloons! Even the adults got in on the action as you can clearly see the water balloon flying through the air that Josh launched at me...

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Henry was most excited when the seal on the balloon wasn't that great and he could spray water out of the end.

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This kid was risking serious payback throwing water balloons at mommy while she had her camera out. He is not yet aware that mommy thrown water balloons are a bit more accurate than the ones he was chunking...

Obviously, we had a blast at the beach house and thanks to the bestie and family for letting us crash the family trip to hang out with all of them for a week. Though I think we are basically family at this point, so maybe the better question is why this is the first year we got invited?? :)

Houston!

After all the fun in North Texas, we headed south to Houston! I may or may not have planned the route to Houston to go through West just to get kolaches. It seemed like a nice detour around the madness of downtown Houston and I got my favorite Texas pastry. Win-win!

We were doing so much running around visiting all of our friends that the camera once again got forgotten until almost the end of our time there. (Like always...)

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But I did manage to get a few photos of pool time at the Thurmond's house! We had pool time at one of my former mentor's house and he suggested these pool "wings" that worked great for his grandkids. They did a much better job of keeping the kids from going face first in the water. These two still weren't convinced and mostly preferred to stand on the side of the hot tub. (It was definitely not being heated!)

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As usual, Allie went a little crazy buying all kinds of toys for them for both indoor and outdoor use. We managed to convince her to keep the pool floats since we don't have a pool, but she insisted on sending the water squirters along with us. The kids (mine and hers!) had such a blast attacking each other with them, that I couldn't resist taking a few along with us. 

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Also, as usual, John had a fun project going that the kids were super interested in watching. Last time was 3D printing and this time was a new CNC router he was tinkering with building. The boys kept trying to peek into the garage through the cat door. We finally let them out there to watch with the proper hearing protection.

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After saying goodbye to the Thurmond's, we decided to hit one more museum before hitting the road south again. We hadn't made it to the Children's Museum of Houston yet (we did get the one in the Woodlands again on this trip), so we decided to go check it out. Our museum membership in Alaska covers so many museums around the country and this was one of them - it even included immediate entry into Kidtropolis. I think you usually have to reserve a time, so it was nice to just walk in. 

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The boys had a blast in Kidtropolis! They got little bank cards at the beginning, then got to try out various jobs - collecting paychecks along the way. 

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Of course, they wanted to hang out in the grocery store and this one was even a HEB. I wanted to hang out there too (maybe more at the real one, but it was close!)

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Henry was more interested in shopping than checking out. I spent most of my time restocking behind them. They had the cutest little aisles! And there were even kids manning a meat & seafood counter. So adorable!

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I finally got them to wave goodbye to Kidtropolis and check out all of the fun water activities outside. Henry must have been watching his brother the other day, he was using two water guns from the get-go!

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Thomas was much more excited about making the biggest waves he could in this wave tank. I was mostly trying to avoid the sun and stressing over not having their hats! Only one of them got soaked enough in the water play to need an outfit change once we got back to the car, but for such an exciting morning, it was a small price to pay! 

On the road again and off to the next Texas adventure!

Hanging out in Weatherford

After two action packed days, I thought it would be good to stay closer to home for a day. All this excitement will wear a mom out!

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The boys were pretty excited to get plenty of water time in on this trip since it was so toasty outside. I made them wait until late enough in the day that the sun wasn't roasting them in the pool, so they got the splash park and pool time yesterday!

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These two kids are not at all water kids. I can plan out some activities for them back home, but I never seem to make the deadlines for swim lessons. So I brought along their life jackets and they never get to go in the water without an adult each. Good thing, since we discovered these life jackets actually tend to tip them into the water face first. Yikes...

Luckily the life jacket an pool noodle combination let them float pretty well, though no one was willing to let them go at any point anyhow... 

Today we opted to check out one of the parks in town that I had found on google. It said they had a splash park and the boys kept asking to go back to Legoland just for the splash park. Instead of paying those high ticket prices again, I convinced them to try out this awesome free splash park in town! And for the record, I really wish this had been here when I was a kid - it was super fun!

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After slathering them with a super high sunscreen, they were off and playing in the water jets! We were the only kids (and adults) wearing rashguards, but we Alaskans aren't really used to the hot sun...

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Nonni even joined in on the fun - she will pretty much follow these kids anywhere. Even when she knows Thomas is covering a water vent just to try and spray her with it when he calls her over to see "something"... :)

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The boys had ben begging their grandpa for a tractor ride since we got to the house and dad pulled it out for them today. They were super pumped! Also, those boat seats used to be where my sister and I sat in the back of my dad's pick-up truck. He did have a camper shell on it, but I can't imagine that would fly with road safety these days...;)

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I was going to follow along and take photos of them having fun until my mom nicely reminded me that there were chiggers out in the field. I decided to hop in and ride along after that. I hate chiggers! I distinctly remember my grandmom putting sulphur on her legs to keep them away and I did not have any sulphur on hand...

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Plus it was much more fun to see the boy's reactions to their nature ride. Thomas was not impressed by a few parts of it.

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But they both thought the goat was awesome. She followed us for quite a while, probably thinking we had Fritos - her favorite snack from my dad. The boys threw her some of the leaves I had been tickling them with, but she wasn't interested in plants. Oh well!

Overall, a relaxing day in the home town before heading off on the next part of our Texas adventure!

Legoland!

I have to be honest, I have a lot of fun on these trips trying to think of fun activities that the boys will love. I wanted to take them to Legoland last time we were in town, but I wasn't sure Henry would be old enough to enjoy it, but this year, I figured I would offer them the option and see what they thought...

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Ha - they didn't even think about it before they got super excited! Just like the Perot, it was pretty crowded, but they didn't seem to mind! The first building table we got to inside the door, they were ready to start constructing and destructing!

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They had one exhibit hall with scenes from around the city - Thomas was entranced by the airport display. The windows in the terminal had a scrolling scene of passengers so it looked like people walking by - he thought it was too neat. 

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Amongst the city-scapes were random scenes to find. I think my favorite was the skateboard accident one. I sent Matt and photo about how wearing your helmet is always important (the Lego guy didn't have one!). Also, I loved the miniature Lego American and Texas flags!

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There were even a few Lego themed rides. The boys were super pumped about this wizard themed one. It would go in a circle and to get it to go up in the air, you had to pedal. So I basically had to pedal for the both of us because Henry's feet couldn't even reach the pedals... Thomas helped Nonni out a teensy bit, but we both got a workout in!

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Then there were race cars to build and race against other people!

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And a big Star Wars exhibit with a very huggable R2-D2!

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But the part they had been most excited about? The splash park! Ever since we tried it out at the zoo last year, they had been talking about how fun splash parks are. We don't have many (any?) in Alaska, so this was their first chance to enjoy one again. And they had a blast! It took forever to pry them away from the jets of water and giant foam Lego blocks, but their hunger finally won out once I mentioned the magic words: "Chick-fil-A" :)

Fort Worth Museum

Our first day over in Weatherford, I let the boys pick what fun activity they wanted to do. Unsurprisinly, they picked their other favorite museum!

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Both of my parents decided to join us on our museum outing, though Dad opted for the boring sidewalk into the museum instead of racing though the insect tunnel. 

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We don't usually pay attention to most of the museum, but Nonni had heard from some coworkers that there was a special exhibit going on that were aimed at kids. So we wandered around looking for the Clifford the Big Red Dog exhibit, but ended up finding Dora the Explorer instead. The boys were happy as could be with that!

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Henry's favorite part was definitely the animal hospital! The animals all had tags that the machines would read and tell you how to help the animals feel better. His favorite "treatment" had to be the pretend bath and real blow dryer.

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Nonni tried to keep up with Thomas, who was all over the place. Anything that required moving things around was his favorite, so the big plastic coins on this pirate ship definitely fit the bill!

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Henry tried out some rock climbing, but wasn't quite sure how to traverse the wall. Yet...

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We finally found the Clifford exhibit and Thomas had a blast being the postman. He was delivering mail in his postal uniform and made sure that all the letters went to the right house. But then he got confused - they mail he had *just* delivered was missing...!

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Can't imagine how that happened...?

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We finally made our way down to the usual kid's exhibit and the boys went nuts for all of their old favorites. Henry was shopping up a storm and then diligently checking out. Not quite as good at restocking, but that's not the most exciting part, is it?

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Thomas wanted to get the big wheel in the center to spin, but one stream of water wasn't quite enough. He was about to give up when I pointed out that he could do two if he used both hands - the little guy was so proud of himself when it started moving!

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Two worn out little guys and one worn out momma! It was as fun as always though! :)