Texas In Review

We met Merrill & Laura at church when Laura & I were pregnant with our first babies... who are now 14!  Our dear Kansas friends were waiting for us in Texas, and we were stuck waiting for our Jeep to be repaired in Oklahoma City.  We could wait no longer, so decided to drive the 3 1/2 hours Jeepless, rent a car & return later for our repaired vehicle.
Our odd, new neighborhood was in Sunnyvale, just east of Dallas, TX.  Odd because at the entrance of the campground was a huge, beautiful plantation home (which of course was the photo on the website) yet behind it, just a flat, open field with cell towers & gravel RV sites.  Where, oh where have the luxury resorts gone?!?
Once settled, we rented a car and met with our friends, who were staying with Merrill's sister & brother-in-law, Judy & Mike.  So, so nice just relaxing in their lovely home spending time with friends.  For dinner, I'd done some research to find a "Triple-D" (Diners, Drive-ins, & Dives) restaurant for our "foodie" friends and found a treasure!  Avila's in Dallas is a family-run, tex-mex joint inside a cozy, colorful 2-bedroom house.  Our party of 15 practically filled one of the two small dining rooms.

The hit of the night was the Tripple D Platter... a gordita (fresh, hand-made corn tortillas filled with tender brisket), a melt-in-your-mouth pork tamale (which even Laura- who "hates" tamales- loved, and the most amazing cup of pozole (an intensely flavorful pork & hominy stew).

This meal put Avila's on our top-10-of-the-year restaurants, for sure!

Oh, how the girls loved time playing with friends!  It's been just the two of them for over 8 months now!

Jim & Merrill took care of our 2nd night's meal... Merrill's famous (at least famous to us) home-made pizza.  Jim was a great student, taking meticulous mental notes of his recipe & technique!  And we topped it off with our favorite pizza trick... honey on the crust!  Mmmmmmm... 

We ended the night with a few rounds of Dutch Blitz... a fun card game (similar to our favorite Nertz game) our Mennonite friends grew up playing.  Notice how the card's amish symbols (a pump, buggy, plow & bucket) replace the typical club, hearts, spades & diamonds:)

Jeanne & Laura

Of course time with our friends flew by way too fast and after our sad goodbyes, Jim piled in with them and hitched a ride back to the OK dealership for our Jeep.

He made it back just in time for us to run out to the American Airlines Center to catch a Dallas Mavericks vs. Los Angeles Clippers game.  Arriving right at game time, we found that tickets were sold out and decided to join others in a stand-by line... hoping for tickets to open up after the start of the game.  Security called out available seats and their price, and those at the front of the line would get first choice.  Many of the seats were high-dollar, and we weren't willing to pay $500+ for a partial game... so Jim decided to sneak past the security & make a "deal" with the guy at the box office.  The two of them struck up conversation (imagine that!) and he told Jim he'd see what he could do for us.  We seemed to wait forever but just as we decided to leave, security called after us, letting us know the box office had found us 4 cheap tickets!  By the time we grabbed our hot dog dinner and made it WAY up to our seats, we were just in time for half-time:)  

Jason Terry & Dirk Nowitszki with their final winning score

We love our Sunday tradition of listening to Pastor Dan's message (when we have enough coverage) at our kitchen table along with a pancake breakfast.  Alayna's a pancake pro!

...And Natalie can't wait to be a driving-pro!  Not much practice yet, but we know it's right around the corner:(

A must-see in Dallas was the Sixth Floor Museum which chronicles the life, death and legacy of President John F. Kennedy.  It was of course here, in Dealey Plaza, that J.F.K. was shot on November 22, 1963.  We took an audio tour that led us through the 6th floor to the window where Lee Harvey Oswald's rifle was found after the assassination.

The X's on the street in the heart of Dealey Plaza mark the spots where the 1st & 2nd shots hit J.F.K. 

View of the window in which the sniper's rifle was found.

The museum was filled with facts from the day's events, but as we walked a couple blocks toward the memorial, we were hounded with vendors trying to sell papers telling the "true" story about the conspiracy:)

The roofless concrete memorial resembling an open tomb, was simple -though quite beautiful.

My food research brought us next to the highly-rated, Triple D-approved Twisted Root Burger in Dallas.  Great service, funky atmosphere, delish burgers with unique combinations & crazy-good shakes...

The manager offered the girls shakes on the house... as long as he could top one of them with roasted marshmallows... no twisting Natalie's arm, she gave a quick "YES!!!"  :)

Instead of giving your name with your order, you draw from a bucket- of all characters, we were Harry Potter for the day

The "Frito Bandito" was topped with Texas chili, guac, cheese & Fritos and served on a pretzle bun.  Only after we ordered did we realize we could've ordered the burger made with venison, elk, boar, kangaroo or ostrich!  A great excuse to have to go back:) 

We took the opportunity to visit another college... TCU.  Unfortunately, tours of the campus weren't offered as they were at our previously visited schools, so we printed out some info & walked the campus on our own.  We were most curious by what made the college "Christian".  The only distiguishable difference we could find is that one religion class (any religion) is required.  We were disheartened when we visited the school's meteorite gallery which was filled with teaching such as, "After the big bang...  About 4.5 billion years ago nine planets in our solar system started to take shape from a cloud of gas and dust spinning around the sun...  The asteroid belt is very disorderly...  The collisions are all critical to the formation of our planets & solar system..."  We were shocked that in this "Christian" school, there was not one mention of a Creator. 

N & A with the school's mascot, the Horned Toad

On our way to visit friends, we "happened" upon this cool horse sculpture in I-have-no-idea-where:)  Don't even remember the significance behind it, but it sure was pretty!

We met with friends Shawn & Jennie and their boys Logan & Hudson in Grand Prairie.  Jim met Shawn in college, but when he came home telling me his new friend's name, I realized Shawn was actually my neighbor from childhood!  Since college, they've moved to TX, but we manage to visit each other from time to time.  We were able to see Shawn's mom too and all visited over dinner in Dallas.  So great catching up, but never enough time!

Jim & Shawn

Jennie & the kiddos

Moving our home from the Dallas area, we stopped along our route toward San Antonio at the Dinosaur Valley State Park in Glen Rose, TX.  We were so excited to see the dinosaur tracks found in the streambed... some prints up to 3 feet in length!  I called ahead to get directions, hours, where-to-park-a-40ft-motorhome instructions... never did I think to ask if we'd actually be able to SEE the fossils, but sadly, as we arrived the staff informed us that due to recent rains, tracks were not visible.   Thankfully, we had a 2nd stop planned on this detour... The Creation Evidence Museum.

This tiny little out-in-the-middle-of-nowhere building was full of items giving evidence to creation as well as to a young earth... one that is thousands of years old as shown in Scripture rather than the billions of years theory being taught with evolution today.  

"For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities- His eternal power and divine nature- have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse."  Romans 1:20 

Among the evidence was pictures of human tracks crossing dinosaur tracks found nearby- both in Cretaceous limestone,  footprints found in sedimentary rock assumed by evolutionist to be 225 million years old, man-made iron tools found in early cretaceous rock, pictures of prehistoric Indian petroglyphs on rock displaying etchings of dinosaurs and so much more.  All so fascinating... we'll certainly be expanding on this for a science unit!

Actual sauropod dinosaur eggs

Piece of wood plank from Mt. Ararat saturated with pitch... thought to be from the ark 

Fossilized human footprint with dinosaur print found in cretaceous rock  

Iron hammer in cretaceous rock

Moving on to our next destination, we found our new "Texas ranch" home in Kerrville, about an hour west of San Antonio.  We especially loved the drive as we left the flats of Texas and entered the hill country. 

We had to take part in the RV Ranch's Saturday morning home-cooked breakfast held in the big red barn on site.  We'd hired a company to wash & wax our home and watched from the barn while enjoying our meal:)

An absolute treasure we found in Kerrville was a restaurant I found rated #1 on TripAdvisor... Rails: A Cafe at the Depot.  Inside of a charming, old railroad depot, the service was impeccable, the food was fresh, creative & scrumptuous, and the live classical guitarist set a most perfect ambiance in this charming place.  Pasta, filet & quail, chocolate-caramel torte... another top 10 restaurant!  

The best part was after the meal, when the girls went over to chat with the classical guitarist.  They've been learning the basics of playing guitar this year while on the road and wanted to ask for some pointers.  He was super sweet (could tell he has daughters of his own!) and after chatting with the girls, gave them his card and offered a skype lesson if they ever needed extra help... Natalie was quick to email him the next morning!  

We grabbed cupcakes to go at "The Sweeter Side" next door... Boston Cream Pie, Smore, Caramel Apple & (the winner) Coconut Cloud.  We're loving the cupcake trend!

We absolutely loved our next stop to Natural Bridge Wildlife Ranch in San Antonio.  We drove our Jeep alongside an array of animals from Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, South America, and North America.  We laughed & squealed as animals stuck their heads right into our windows looking for food!  Went a bit crazy with the photos too... these are only about 1/10th of them:)

African Aoudad... called sheep, but more closely related to the goat

Indian Axis... whose antler development is determined by their birth date, not by seasons.

Gemsbok from Africa... in ancient Egypt they were kept in large numbers for sacrificial purposes

African Watusi... the largest horned animal in the world!  Tip to tip, their spread can be over 6 feet.

Jim was the only one daring enough to feed the ostrich from his hands!

The zebras especially cracked us up... they'd catch the food we'd toss at them, mid-air!

Llamas!  These stubborn-natured, spit-when-irritated creatures are used as pack animals in the Andes Mountains 

A small walk-through area of the park had lemurs, macaws & gibbons on display as well as a petting area with goats.  Super fun park!

Next up was a 30 minute jaunt to an audio-led tour of the Alamo.  

Several years back, Jim & I took a weekend getaway to San Antonio.  We read a mouthwatering review in a travel magazine about a barbeque pit 90 miles north in Llano.  No kids, no schedule, and a rented convertable... why not drive nearly 2 hours for bbq?!?  And along the way, we found another treasure- Enchanted Rock State Natural Area.  Both were so wonderful, they were worth revisiting with the girls on this trip.  On our way to the "rock" (this time), we stopped for lunch and browsing in the most darling town of Fredericksburg.  We decided we'd need to return one day for unique furniture & accessory shopping for our future home...

Alayna loved these rings!

Truly a Texas-style candy store... only in this state would you find chocolate-dipped jalapenos!  (Nope, we weren't daring enough to try them)

Here at Enchanted rock is a ginormous peachy-pink granite dome, rising 425 feet above ground.  So fun to climb & beautiful views from the top. 

(Went a little crazy taking pics again...)

The granite "dome" in the background

Ahhh... and finally the reason for the 2 hour drive... Cooper's Pit Barbque!  Part of why we loved it so much was that we'd never seen anything like it.  The delicious aroma leads you right to the huge outdoor pits which hold all of the meat.  We picked our selection (basically a little of everything) from the nearest pit, carried our full tray inside to pay-by-weight and sat in the no-frills dining room lined with picnic tables topped with paper towel rolls (essential while eating bbque), condiments, loaves of white bread & mayo jars of peppers.  We helped ourselves to delicious soupy pinto beans & sauce (nothing like KC sauce... more like vinegar) & devoured our heavenly feast. 

We of course spent time along the charming Riverwalk, eating dinner at Casa Rio- the first San Antonio business to open its doors to the River (1946).

So the classical guitarist we met at Rails happened to have an opening for a lesson just before we'd planned to leave the San Antonio area.  We jumped at the chance and couldn't believe how much info he fit into our short time together.  The girls left inspired and again with the offer for a skype lesson if they ever needed extra help.  How grateful we were to have met him! 

Somehow with all this crazy traveling & sightseeing, we do manage to fit in schoolwork and do our best to make subjects like science fun.  Below are a couple of random photos of the girls presenting science experiments in front of the class:)

It was time to move on, and our final TX location was Houston.  It was here that we would settle in to pack & prepare for our annual 2 week visit to Mexico, and then drop off our home at an RV repair facility for a new inverter (YAY!).

Two nights before leaving for Mexico were spent in a hotel by the airport.  We have no idea what Houston is like as we spent all of our time catching up on the business & schoolwork before being out of contact for 2 weeks.  The girls found the hotel to be a perfect, spacious classroom...  

Our only outing in the area was to visit long-time friends Sean & Dawn and their kids Katelyn & Blaine.  Sean was one of Jim's first drivers nearly 20 years ago and they've remained friends ever since.  Their home near Beaumont had the most beautiful, peaceful backyard, which backed right up to a swamp-like area (actually a "slew").  They took Jim and I on a ride in this little boat, and other than feeling like we were going to sink at any given moment, it was just lovely... especially as the sun set during our return.

We had missed the crawfish "season" while in New Orleans, so they brought us for a crawfish boil at a restaurant in Beaumont.  We loved our time with them and loved the crawfish!

Of course months could be spent in this huge state, but our small taste of it was all time would allow.  On to Mexico for a couple weeks break from the planning as well as a Spring Break for the girls.  We are all loving this trip of a lifetime, but also feeling a bit worn out... time to chill:)