Trip to Texas

Last week we went to Texas! Both of Adam's sisters and all of his nieces and nephews are there so we've been meaning to go for awhile. Thanks to a nice tax return and finding super cheap plane tickets we decided to finally go!

Day 1: Monday started off a little crazy because we were supposed to leave in the morning but our flight got cancelled and rebooked. We were originally going to have a layover in Houston but with the crazy weather there, we instead had a layover in Denver and left in the afternoon. This turned out to be a silver lining because the now 5 hour layover allowed us to visit Adam's parents. So when we got to Denver, we headed over to their house in Broomfield.

It was nice to have that time with them and Eli enjoyed playing with their toys. Adam's aunt Joanne who lives with them and hadn't met Eli as well. It was instant love :) We ate an early dinner with them from a place called Infinitus Pie, a really yummy pizza place. We hung out for awhile before they drove us back to the airport. Eli enjoyed high-pitched squealing on this flight which was not fun but we made it and finished off the evening heading to Adam's sister Ruth's house in Fort Worth.

Day 2: We had a low-key morning with Ruth and her two youngest kids (ages 2 and 3). We surprised her middle son (3rd grade) at lunch and decided to take him out of school to spend time with us. We met up with Adam's other sister Sharon and her youngest boy who is only 6 months older than Eli and we all went to the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. Fort Worth is one of only two places in the country that print paper money. It was cool to see all that went into the process. There were some areas that the windows were covered because they were printing new money, which we later figured out that it was probably the new Harriet Tubman $20 bill. After this we went to a local Thai restaurant for lunch. I was pleasantly surprised at finding good Asian food in Texas haha. That evening we had a big hamburger and hot dog dinner with both families and had Family Home Evening together. It was so fun to be around all the kids and Eli loved all his cousins. It brought back memories of getting together with all of my cousins when I was little (except multiply the number of kids about 3 times haha). We gave the lesson and a couple of our nieces made yummy treats. A thoroughly enjoyable evening.

Day 3: Adam was still finishing up his last project for the semester in the morning. After that, we went into downtown Fort Worth to see the Water Gardens. The Water Gardens are different kinds of elaborate fountains and waterfalls in this big city square. I really liked the one you could walk down into so you were surrounded by waterfalls.

For lunch, we went to a yummy Mexican restaurant that had a beautiful outdoor sitting area. We went back to the house so the littles could nap and I ended up napping too while Adam finished his project. Once they all woke up, they played together until dinner. After a tasty family dinner, Sharon picked us up to take us over to her house, where we were staying for the rest of our trip. Eli went to bed as soon as we got there and the adults stayed up late talking which was nice :)

Day 4: On Thursday we went into Dallas for the first time. I always enjoy seeing new downtown areas with their new places and people. We went up the Reunion Tower which has an observation deck with a great view of the city.
After this we wanted to go explore Dallas more but then I started to not feel good. So we headed back to Justin where Sharon lives. On the way, we stopped at this cute French cafe called La Madeleine which had french language audio instruction playing in the bathroom. The food and pastries were delicious. Later, we went to our niece's gymnastics place to see a bit of her practice. She was so good! It was fun to see our nieces and nephews enjoy all their various passions. We took her out of practice a little early and went home to eat dinner and chill for the rest of the evening.

Day 5: Friday, we had plans to go to Mckinney to see a friend but I woke up feeling awful, so we mostly just hung out at the house. In the afternoon, we went to a park with the kids and in the evening, we all went out for dinner with Ruth and her family. We went to a BBQ place which was very Texan haha. It was fun to have all of the family together again and the kids loved playing with Eli.

Day 6: I was still feeling crummy so we called off our meet-up with a cousin of mine and I spent most of the morning resting and packing. Adam and Eli were able to go to our nephew's basketball game which was fun. Eli loved seeing his Auntie Ruth again and watching the boys play. Before we left for the airport, I did Sharon's girls' nails which turned out way cute.
It made me feel good how excited they were about it especially since I hadn't spent too much time with them since getting sick. We then went to the airport and took our first leg to Houston. Eli has done pretty good on the flights we've taken this far but this one he high-pitch squealed the whole time. Luckily it was a short flight but it did make me worried about our 3 hour flight to SLC which would end just before midnight. We were blessed however because he fell asleep during take-off and woke up when we landed with no complaints!

Overall, I loved this trip but it did leave me wanting more. There were so many things that I we didn't get to do because I was sick but we will definitely keep our eye out for cheap flights to Dallas/Fort Worth in the future ;)