West Texas Fam

While I was in Texas, the girls and babies headed out to West Texas for a quick trip to see my aunt, uncle, cousins and their babies. It had been almost 2 years since I'd seen my cousins and their kids and it was important to me to fit them in this trip! Let me tell you, I will not be doing 3 days of babysitting and 3 days of West Texas all in one trip again -- too exhausting for a vacation!! It was fun, though.

Mom, Beth and I drove up there on Thursday afternoon, arriving just a little before dinner time. We stayed until Saturday morning after breakfast. The 6 hour car rides to and from were not bad although Beau and Ryder ATE both my headphones and my mom's headphones they were using to listen to the movies they were watching. Ryder chewed up the cord to mine until it no longer worked and Beau bit the ear part to pieces on my mom's. This was my first car ride with kids where I got to experience the whole "Are we there yet" phenomenon. Although it was shortened to "We there"?  Luckily, it's only Ryder who's picked up on that so far, but it started 45 minutes into the ride. The highlight of the ride for me was when Beth warned Beau that she would have to buy some pepper spray to spray in his mouth if he kept saying potty words. I have never in my life seen a boy so terrified...tears, screaming, and holding his hands tightly over his mouth.  It was as if she had actually sprayed his mouth already.  That is one dramatic kid...hilarious.

It was a quick stay in Canyon, but just enough time to hang out at my aunt and uncle's new house. It seems like they live on a ranch now - don't know if that's what you'd call it, but that's what it feels like with all the land and animals nearby (not their animals, just neighboring animals). They do have guinea's though and I only knew what those were because I'd just seen some when I was on the Charlottesville farm. They're kind of like a chicken. Anyway, I digress. Here's what the trip consisted of:

-- good meals planned by my aunt. Great salads on the first night followed by delicious brownies (she even made a batch of PB brownies for all of us choc/PB fans in the family). Hamburgers the second night. Awesome bread and tea bought from specialty stores right there in their town.
-- watching the kids play with each other

Ryder, Canon and Megan on the bench

JB peeking through the window!

Beau was hanging out under the bench

-- sitting by the pool while the kids swam. I was only out there an hour or less and somehow got a crazy sunburn. I had weird white splotches all over and we couldn't figure it out. Later realized I had put a sunscreen lathered Jaxon on my lap and apparently some of it rubbed off in odd places here and there...lovely.
-- Granny cart rides around the property

-- Visiting the neighbors new baby horse...3 weeks old!

-- West Texas sunset

-- Late night Wii, adults only. My mom even got into it (surprise, surprise...we all know she's super competitive and will never forget the huge chalkboard in our Columbia basement that documented each of our personal high scores for Frogger back in the day)
-- Shopping the town square...only my mom, aunt and I went on this excursion. We're the ones who are not used to getting up at 7:30 to the sound of loud kids (9 of 'em to be exact)...we needed a breather (not really...just wanted to shop!) No good finds this trip.
-- Shopping at Dillard's at the Amarillo mall. They were having a sale, but we didn't find too much.

That pretty much sums up the trip to WT. Look forward to the next time we get to hang out with the fam!