Many things have contributed to our family never really taking a family vacation before this summer. For one thing we never really had that much money and add that to the fact that Josh didn't have very many days off and we lived 12 hours from our family. I know when it was just the two of us we didn't feel the need to go on a real vacation because we did little fun things together all the time but even, well especially after Gavin was born, all of our vacation time and money was spent on getting back to texas to see our family. So, now that we make a little more money and we see our family all the time being so close, we decided this summer would be a good one to go on our first official just our family vacation. It started because we were thinking about meeting Joshua's roommates in Utah, about 25 hours from Katy, but considering that I was around 25 weeks pregnant and we would be driving all that way to camp out on the ground and go on lots of hiking trips we decided to stop and stay at what was supposed to be our half way mark on the trip to the camp grounds. Which just happened to be Farwell, Tx/ Clovis, NM where both sets of Joshua's grandparents live as well as some of his family. It was really fun spending a few days with them all.
We stayed here with Joshua's Maternal grandparents. GG and Papa Bill Pennington.
This is Joshua's paternal grandma. His grandpa has already passed away and Grandma Betty is in a nursing home, she has recently had a stroke and they thought she wasn't going to make it there for a little while but she was doing really great while we were there and knew who Joshua was even though she hasn't seen him in a few years.
We drove the ten hours straight there but we took a more leisurely way home. I spent one summer as a little girl in big lake texas and my parents mention it frequently so we decided to drive through on our way home.
This is the church we attended that summer and my parents made lots of friends in that little time although I couldn't find any one who really remembered. Of course that was something like 27 years ago!
We made sure and ate at the local dairy queen where I apparently ate many meals that summer. It's just about the only thing in the whole town.
We drove around that night when we first got to town and actually caught some deer out eating the grass from the baseball outfield. Which if you remember they have a problem with in the movie The Rookie, which was filmed in Big Lake. Caught this picture as the deer jumped back over the fence.
The next day we drove around a little bit and went by the baseball field we think was in the movie where they played their high school baseball games.
Gavin sitting in the dugout. I was sure "His" little boy spent time in this thing.
This is outside the what used to be the general store where all the old men used to hang out and talk. My family spent lots of time there as well that summer.
After Big Lake we drove on to San Antonio and went down to the river walk. It was SO HOT!!! I mean I really thought I was going to die! It was so humid down there and with all the buildings etc there was NO breeze! I was pretty miserable that evening but glad we went down there.
Gavin loved trying to feed the ducks that swam in the river and they loved eating his chips and french fries!
The next day we went to Sea World. It was still really hot but things were a lot more open and there were a few places that had ac where we stayed for a little while. Plus we spent the hottest part of the day in the lazy river and that helped a lot!! Gavin was really the perfect age to enjoy absolutely everything!
You can't see him sitting beside Joshua but he got to ride his first roller coaster and he LOVED it!
Gavin loves the show Free Willy and so all day long he talked about wanting to see the "Willy" show so we saw it during the day and then we saw a slightly different version later that night and Gavin cheered and yelled and was totally into every second.
He was being so funny all day and everything was so silly and fun you could tell he was having the time of his life, even during lunch!
He even got to feed the dolphins and he really enjoyed that even though it was a little scary at first. :)
This was at the end of the day getting ready to see the "willy" show for the last time before getting back in the car and heading home. We had so much fun spending a couple days enjoying each other's company and laughing and sleeping in hotels, etc. It was like an exciting adventure that we were all going on together. We didn't know what hotel we would find in each place which added a little excitement and a lot of roll with the punches, go with the flow attitude. I think that made it more fun because it was an adventure and we didn't have all these preconceived ideas about was going to happen. Anyway it was a wonderful way to spend some time together after not having a lot of time to ourselves over the past few years and before this new little addition arrives any day now!
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