South Padre Island

We headed down to South Padre Island for our annual beach trip the end of March with the Barlows and the Jensons.  It was soooooooooooooooooo nice to relax in the sun and listen to the surf for the weekend.  Sitting on the beach, watching the kids play in the sand and in the waves with their friends is one of my favorite things to do.  If we were closer to the beach, I could spend every weekend there.  In fact, I am ready to go back Right Now!!!

Our Motley Crew

Luke and his best buddy, Jack, had fun playing together this trip. 

Although, they could be deemed polar opposites:

1 hater of all things sand = 1 clean baby

1 lover of playing in and eating all the sand = 1 dirty,

but very happy baby  : )

This picture captures the two boys' version of playing in the sand.

Luke had to keep his shoes on so he wouldn't touch the sand and

sat in one spot while Jack dived right into the sandy, muddy mess

of the mote and played and played. 

We finally figured out where Luke was the happiest:

sitting on a boogie board playing with buckets of water.

His favorite thing was pouring out his sprinkler bucket over

and over again.

The big kids had a blast playing in the waves.  Even Savannah

got the hang of catching some good waves.

Do you think these two are brothers or what??

When they got tired of playing in the water, the kids spent hours

playing in the sand and building their ginormous sand castle

(with a little help from the daddies and their BIG shovels. : )

Best Buds!

"Hat" Mamas!

And of course we had to make a trip back to The

Big Donkey for dinner!  (Yummy Mexican for those

of us that don't love fishy items for dinner.) Next time . . .

Before we could go home, we had to walk the beach and

gather shells.

I'm ready to go again!

Escape from Reality . . .

I've decided that I can do one of three things during nap time to regain my sanity.

1. Read a fun new book
2. Catch up on Blogging
3. Clean my messy house

Can you guess which one I've been doing these past couple of weeks??
I'll give you a hint:  my house is still a mess!

Luck 'O the Irish to You

Road Trippin' to Fredericksburg

Road Trip!  Mike took Friday off for Spring Break and we hit the road for Fredericksburg.  We spent the afternoon exploring all the quaint little shops, sampling all the goodies for sale, and deciding on ice cream and pastries for lunch. Yum!  We toured the botanical gardens and the WW11 memorial.  Then, we let the kids play at the Market Square park in the center of town where there is a water wheel built by Mormon pioneers and several monuments remembering our pioneer heritage. 

It was so nice to take a day to be together having fun with our family and not running to sports or dance like most weekends.  We ended the day meeting up with the MBJ's (Manwarings, Barlows and Jensons) for dinner at Longhorn, one of our all time favorite greasy good hamburger joints where the kids can play outside and we can sit and talk.  It was a good day.

Ice Cream for lunch!

National Museum of the Pacific War

We had to make a stop at this amazing candy

shop with every candy imaginable, including

chocolate covered pickles, jalapenos, and ants!

After careful deliberation, we decided on fresh

saltwater taffy and 6 different flavors of homemade

fudge.

On the way home, we drove through Comfort and came across

this billboard.  Only in the south!  (well . . . and maybe in Utah. : )

Salado Creek for Spring Break!



One of my favorite days during our Spring Break was the day we packed up a picnic lunch, grabbed our bikes, scooters, and the stroller and headed out on a 4 mile walk round trip to Hardberger Park walking along the Salado Creek Greenway.  It was perfect weather for our walk, and everything was in bloom.  We walked past fields of gold wildflowers with butterflies flitting throughout.  There was a little water in the creek that we stopped to play in to catch our breath, and then we continued on our hike to the park for lunch.







We were so happy when we finally made it to the park for lunch!

We don't make it to this park very often, so we had fun exploring

all the playscapes.  The kids played and played, we got a good

break, and then we headed back along the path for home. 



It was a good day!  Luke played so hard he wiped

himself right out for the walk home.