Texas Forever

Last post of Texas!  We drove from College Station to Ft. Worth and spent a few days with Brian's cousin Katie and her sweet family.  Dallas/Ft Worth was much more exciting and worth visiting beyond the airport (where we've spent a lot of time in all our cross country travels).

Old stores and cool signage in the middle of nowhere.

One of our favorite things we did in Ft Worth was going to the Stockyards where they still herd a few longhorns down main street everyday.  Just for show, but we enjoyed the show.  The longhorns are really amazing.

 And we ate some more awesome barbecue.

One evening we drove to Dallas to visit some NYC friends who moved there recently.

And took a fun little train ride around a beautiful park in Ft. Worth.

And that wraps up our Texas travels.  Next up... Louisiana!

Deep in the Heart of Texas

We spent a few weeks in Texas.  (And I have one more Texas post after this one.)  After San Antonio we headed to Austin.  We enjoyed Austin, but wished the weather would have cooperated and not rained most of the time.  We were only there 2.5 days and it rained for 2 of those.  We spent most of the beautiful day on Congress Street which was full of food carts, funky shops, and lots of old hot rods cruising around.

After Austin we went back to Houston and spent several days there for recuperation.  The hotel there was nice, had breakfast included, and a kitchen in the room.  The kids and I went to the Children's Museum of Houston one day, but other than that we just played at playgrounds, and basically did nothing.  Which is what we needed at the time.

Isabella wants me to write, "Our hotel room had a ghost in it!"

We then headed to College Station to play some more with my brother Sean and his cute family.

Picking Texas wildflowers on the way.

Sean gave us a tour of the Bush School at Texas A&M where he will be getting his graduate degree in the Fall.

Awesome Texas barbecue in College Station.

We also picked up a new kid along the way...  Oliver got an extreme haircut.  I'm still not sure which one I like best (the bowl cut or the buzz), but I do love how his cowlick shows with the buzz cut.

The Stars at Night...

After New Orleans we finally made it to Texas!  First stop was Houston; the city with the most intricate, confusing, unnecessarily high highway system I have ever seen.

Our first encounter with Houston.

Catching up with an old roommate and her wonderful family.

We stayed only briefly in Houston before heading to San Antonio to see the Alamo.  My younger brother, Sean, and his family live in College Station (about 3 hours from San Antonio), so they came to meet us so we could all play together.  AND my mom, from California  was visiting my brother in College Station at the time, so we got to see her too.  It was a wonderful treat!  Grandma and cousins!

After two days in San Antonio we all went to visit a family friend who lives in Comfort, TX, about an hour outside San Antonio.  There we got to hang out with my family some more, do an Easter egg hunt, catch up with a childhood friend (unexpectedly), and fire some real guns for the first time in my life.  (Real as in: not a squirt or nerf gun.)

Fiona was my neighbor when we were kids (5-12 years old).  When I posted a photo of myself shooting a gun, in "Comfort, TX" onto facebook she wrote and said she lived in a neighboring town.  She drove 20 minutes Easter morning to see me.  It was so much fun to catch up.

Here's an unedited (meaning: a tad too long) video of me firing a shotgun for the first time (and my reaction).

More Texas to come...