Sometimes it's good to be late for work. This morning as I was crawling through traffic I looked up and saw a space shuttle flying across the highway a few miles ahead of me.
I didn't have time to take a picture with my phone, plus I didn't want to crash the car and my phone takes horrible pictures, so imagine this, but a bit farther away, with what appeared to be a smaller plane as wingman.
I was pretty excited, because I went to work too early yesterday to catch it coming into town*, Amber wasn't able to find it from our house, and I didn't want to drive all the way to Ellington last night. Hurray for serendipity!
*Someone apparently felt bad that Houston got shafted out of the space shuttle lottery, so Endeavor's one day visit was a consolation prize of sorts (since we're on the way to LA anyway).
On Saturday we started the day at the pyramids of Moody Gardens.
They weren't open yet when we got there, so we actually went to one of the gardens and enjoyed some trees and flowers.
We went to the aquarium pyramid, which is full of good exhibits. I had a lot of fun taking pictures.
Olivia and Carmen had fun collecting shark stamps from tables stationed around the aquarium to fill out their "passports".
Damon had fun trying to get into as much trouble as possible.
After the aquarium, it was back to the beach.
Nobody wanted to leave this time...
...except Damon (but only to explore).
We went to church in Galveston on Sunday, then stuck around for one more stroll on the beach before heading home. Thankfully, the trip ended well, and it was well worth it to see happy faces like this.
We did our third annual Galveston trip this weekend (2010, 2011). I think three times in a row means it's officially a tradition! Our trip started with an inauspicious start as we drove through torrential rain on our way there. It was raining a little when we first arrived, but eventually cleared up enough to get our feet wet before we checked into our rental condo. Damon was very excited.
Unfortunately, the rain was not the worst part of the trip. Damon had been sick the day before we left, and Olivia picked it up the next day. By the time we got our stuff moved in, none of the kids were interested in venturing back out to the beach.
The girls watched My Little Pony on iPads, and I enjoyed the view from our balcony. Not too bad so far.
Olivia took a puke bowl to bed, because she felt like she was going to throw up, then promptly went to sleep and threw up all over herself in her sleep. Yay. So we got to wipe up puke, shower her off, put a towel down for her that night, then buy laundry detergent, find quarters, do laundry, buy air fresheners, etc. the next day.
Thankfully, everyone felt well enough to go the beach again, at least. We all had fun splashing in the waves and digging in the sand (except Amber, who was doing laundry).
After lunch we rode the ferry to Bolivar peninsula and back. The girls had fun looking from inside (where they could see by standing on the bench), but I eventually ended up holding Carmen on the deck while Olivia stood on tiptoes to see over the rail.
It's a pretty short trip, but you can see industrial ships and lots of wildlife like seagulls, pelicans, and porpoises. Olivia and Carmen also liked that there were cars and even a school bus on the ferry. Damon's favorite part was chasing the seagulls.
Afterwards, I traded beach duty with Amber, and she headed back to the beach with the kids while I went back to the condo to get dinner ready.
We were at a friend's house last night when Damon the mountain climber decided to climb up one of their metal stools. Before we knew he had even started his expedition, he was on his back and the stool fell on his face.
He only cried for a minute and we didn't think too much of it until we noticed the huge goose egg forming under his eye.
These pictures are all from today, when he just looks like a tough guy.
I think he also chipped his right front tooth, but I'm not sure if it was the stool that did it, or when he smacked his face into the piano a few days ago after climbing up on the piano bench.
In any case, he hasn't let it bother him too much and most of the time he is his usual cheerful self.
I had the day off work on Monday, and Olivia had the day off of school, so we decided to go on a hike in the woods. We went to Jesse Jones park and walked several trails, where we got to see swampy areas, turtles, butterflies, a river, and lots of trees. We found a good log along one of the trails where we stopped to eat a snack. One of the highlights was finding a big pile of sand that the girls and I ran up and down several times. Unfortunately, I didn't bring my camera, so here are some after shots.
