Spring Break Fun 2016 - Shooting

We decided to end our Spring Break with a BANG! After we got back home from Hannah's orthodontic appointment, we headed up to the shooting range to have a little fun.

We took along empty soda cans and a few shaving cream cans. As well as some equipment to shoot them with. ;)

 

Everyone went out onto the range to set up targets...

 

…those poor little cans were so scared they kept tipping themselves over trying to hide…

Oh, wait! That was just the gusty, ever present wind!

it was hard for a few of the little people to wait for Dad to get everything set up...

James got impatient and then a bit miffed and went and sat in the car and didn't participate. Silly boy!

Soren, Cambria, Hannah, Sadie

Charlie wanted to shoot something besides a BB gun, but it was too heavy for him to hold up straight, so Dad had to help out...

looks like James finally got out of the car.

Dad got out the big, loud gun….Cover your ears!!

I wasn't going to shoot, I like taking pictures of everyone else better, but decided that I need to be part of the action instead of just documenting it. So I took my turn on the big gun. HOLY COW! That thing kicks and is so loud.  I had a hard time shooting into the sunlight, my vision is not what it used to be. (not that it was ever very good.) But I participated. (Patting myself on the back) 

It's kind of silly that we don't do this more often, since the range is literally 1-2 minutes from our house. I guess the cost of the ammo is a factor…8 people shooting guns can go through a lot of bullets pretty fast. But Dad said that it's something he'd like to do more often since it's such a quick and easy thing our family can do on the spur of the moment.

The rest of our vacation...

We finally got on our flight to Denver on Wed and then on to Atlanta. Since we didn't have enough time to drive to Savannah to visit Brandee, she brought her kids up to see us in Atlanta. It was so nice to see them again, they are getting BIG! and to meet Isaac for the first time. Brandee has always been a sweet girl and she is a sweet, lovely woman and mother. Wish we didn't live so darn far apart...
We left Georgia on Friday and drove to Mississippi that day. We did a bit of shopping there and stayed the night. On Saturday we drove to Oklahoma City and decided to stop there since there was a big storm brewing to the west. It came through in the night and it was a bit strange to be warned about what to do in the case of a tornado. In fact, as we watched TV that night in our 3rd floor hotel room, we watched a show on the weather channel that highlighted a tornado that had gone through a town just SW of OK City a couple of years before. Yikes! On Sunday we drove from OK City to home. It was our longest driving day but we needed to just get home.
It was interesting to watch the change in the land and trees as we drove west. It is so green and wet in the east. I love the look of it, but I think I'd go nuts living there, never being able to see very far. Being a Western girl, I like to SEE distances. I think my favorite place was Western Arkansas and Eastern OK. It was still very green, but not so many trees so close together. Lots of cows in lush green fields and there was usually an oil pump or two in the field as well!
New Mexico was my least favorite part of the drive. So much sand and rock. So desolate, particularly once we got past Albuquerque. We stayed on the interstate until Gallup. I hadn't ever been to Gallup before so I can check that off my bucket list. Haha!
As we drove north from Gallup to Shiprock, we got to drive through a small sandstorm. It was very strange to be swallowed up in a swirl of sand, but it made me realize you could easily be lost in one. It was hard to see if anyone was in front of us and I was glad no one hit us from behind if we slowed down.
I was never so happy as to see the Abajo Mts. in the distance as we drove from Cortez toward home. I love to travel and see new places but I love where we live and was happy to be home.

finally in the air...flying over the Rockies to Denver

Brandee and Curtis having a deep discussion

Alabama...rain and green trees

Piggly Wiggly- what a name for a grocery store!

my chauffeur...driving in the comfort of our new (to us) car

the console-check it out! seat heaters!!!! Oh, happy day!

Mississippi...more green trees

an outside shot of the new wheels. Pretty sporty for us!

crossing the Mississippi River and heading into Arkansas...

Such a HUGE river...

Tornado damage in Arkansas. It was amazing to see trees that looked like matchsticks. All their peripheral branches were ripped off. Buildings were just piles of rubble...I was really glad we weren't driving through when it hit!

More damaged trees and buildings...

How do people recover from this? It happens so often there...

Had to stop and eat at Popeye's for Ford. He liked eating there while he was in Basic at Fort Jackson in SC

Nicest hotel we stayed in in Oklahoma City. 

It had a separate sitting/TV area. We felt right uptown there. Curtis even ordered Room Service food...

We thought it was pretty cool to stay here, since it shares a name with our oldest daughter...

I forgot to get Oklahoma, but here's Texas....

New Mexico's sign was the most impressive....notice the lack of green trees....

stopped at a truck stop for a stretch and drink..
watched these swallows flying around, in and out of their mud nests in the corner...

Lots of sand blowing across the road

I mean, lots of sand...

we wondered what our paint would look like when we got home...

I've never been in a sand-storm before...

Ah, there are the Blues! Home sweet home!

Good Things:

generous parents who gave us their car

nice roads to drive on

air-conditioning

awesome kids who took good care of each other and the house 

Durango-an unplanned vacation

I have had a couple of National Lampoon type vacations in my life. Someday I will document the worst one. I need to record it for posterity, so they can laugh about it. We didn't laugh at the time, but have a lot in all the years since. We realize it was the craziness of it all that made it memorable.

But our most recent vacation wasn't supposed to be one of these crazy types. It had been a quickly planned and anxiously awaited trip. Curtis's parents had called us in the first part of May and told us that they would like to let us have their Honda Accord as they were purchasing a newer, taller car. They wanted to know how they could get it to us and Curtis and I jumped at the chance to fly to Georgia for a visit and then take a cross-country drive home, just the two of us. It was going to be like an unforeseen 2nd Honeymoon. At least that's what we thought....

We were scheduled to fly out of Durango on June 2, the morning after we got back from Provo. I had arranged for my mom to drive us to Durango and drop us off since we wouldn't be flying back to pick up a vehicle. That part went smoothly. Then we got in the line to check in and get our boarding passes. The lines weren't moving very quickly, but we thought we were fine. All of a sudden, a guy behind the counter said, "Counter's closed. If you're in line to fly on Flight---, you're late. If you do not have your boarding passes by 45 minutes before flight time, you will not be allowed to fly." 

There was quite an uproar. We stood there stunned. We had been in line on time, but now we were not going to make our flight. Curtis was very calm, when I wanted to be very angry. I thought it was unfair of them to not tell people of these rules when they book a flight. We don't fly often and had no idea that this was the rule. But you know what they say about ignorance of the law.....it didn't matter, we were not getting on that flight. 

Then the bombshell, their next flight out was on Wed. What? What were we supposed to do? We had no car, no way to go home, no way to get to town. nothing. It was a very strange feeling. We spent several hours in the airport trying to decide what the best thing to do was. Should we call my mom? No, she was already on her way to Bluff...Should we call Cambria and have her come get us and then we'd try again on Wed? No. We'd already gotten things all set up of them and they were off and running. I didn't really want to stop and have to start that all over again...Should we try to fly on another airline? No. They wanted about $1000-1200 for last minute tickets...that was not in our budget. 

We ended up rescheduling for the Wed. flight (another $100) and renting a car (more $) and getting a hotel for 2 nights in Durango. Our plan had been to take 4 days driving home, but we decided to split up those days and use 2 of them before we ever flew to GA. We would just have to reroute our trip home and do it faster than planned. It would be fine, just not according to plan. Which is very typical of our lives!

Curtis at the ticket counters trying to get things figured out. The guys were more than happy to help because
Curtis was so nice and was not exhibiting anger at the situation. 

How I spent several hours. With my feet on my suitcase, watching stuff on Netflix or wasting time on FB...

watching river-rafters come down the Animas River. There were  a lot of them...
it sure was running high.

They're all lining up to hit the rapids. Woohoo!

This was a nice, restful quiet spot to spend an afternoon. The river was high and moving fast.
Love that man!!

I hate selfies, but I need to document that I was actually there too!

Lunch at the Animas Cafe, a patio restaurant on the bank of the Animas, at the DoubleTree Hotel.

The food was lovely AND yummy!!

Our dessert, Fried Cheesecake. It was fantastic...MMMmmmm!

Curtis found this shirt at Walmart. It was made for him!!
D.A.D.D.--Dads against daughters dating...

Although this was not a planned part of our trip, I'm actually glad we got this time to spend together, exploring a town we've never really been to. 

Good Things:

discovered a terrific eating place

watched a good movie (Belle)

had a nice, relaxing time with no schedule

 

Mesa Verde-spring break '14

Our spring comes really early...mid march is not really spring in my book. Usually there is snow and it feels more like Christmas break!

This year the weather was unseasonably fair so we decided to take a day trip to Mesa Verde. Most of the kids have not been there before.

Visitor Center

We stopped at the visitor center located just as you leave the highway. It's a nice building with lots of displays and a gift store. We looked around and used restrooms then paid our fee and drove into the park.

Charles, Sadie, James, Curtis, Cambria, Hannah and Soren

Watching the lights light up when the buttons are pushed

Our traditional souvenir...a smashed penny :)

Sadie

Hannah

Charles

Soren

Cambria

Sadie couldn't make up her mind which picture she liked more...

James

Kassie

Curtis

Then we drove on into the park and went to the visitor center at Spruce Tree House. We also stopped at several other sites, some pit houses, some towers, the Sun Temple and looked across at Cliff Palace. It wasn't open to be hiked into yet. Those people really knew how to build their villages in the right places. Lots of sun and warmth in the winter and shade in the summer. While we drove around we did the activities in the Jr. Ranger booklet and ran back into the visitor center at Spruce Tree House to get it stamped and get badges. Then we headed home, having checked one more thing off our bucket list.

Looking at the very cool dioramas
I loved these as a kid. I always imagined what it would be like to live inside one of them.
Sort of "Night at the Museum"ish....

hiking down to Spruce Tree House
Easy hike, cool Anasazi ruins

Our two Jr. Rangers: Charles and James

Good Things:

sunshiny day for our adventures

getting to go down into a kiva

a week of from school!