Fall Break in Texas

We just got home from a wonderful fall break in Texas. We got to visit the Drake cousins and see some of my cousins- Zach and Trevor Bogart. We left Monday afternoon after Chris fixed my van's timing belts. It took him about 18 hours and he worked so hard. When we finally got to leave, we drove straight to Fort Worth to meet everyone for dinner. We drove to the Fort Worth Stockyards and explored there for a little bit. 

 

Benson loved all these little horses. 

 

 

The kids really loved petting the horses. I think they would have loved to have gone for a trail ride, but when Dad saw the trail ride was basically a ride on pavement, we decided it wasn't the authentic experience we were looking for. 

 

 

Eventually we all met at "Risky's BBQ" for dinner. We got to meet the Bogart cousins too. It was so fun to be all together. 

 

These cuties loved having their own table.

We had to get a group picture of the 2nd generation cousins. 
Bailey was obsessed with McKenzie and Caroline (Trevor's little girls) and Zach's little guy, Luke, fit right in with the group of boys. It was so fun!

After dinner we went back to Uncle Joseph's house to sleep. The kids had so much fun staying up late, playing their tablets and the switch together. They were up way too late but it was too much cousin cuteness to stop. 

The next day we slept in and had a delicious breakfast made by Uncle Joseph. Then we went back to the stockyards to see the Cattle Drive. They only do it twice a day and we had missed it the previous night.  I sure love these handsome boys of mine!

We waited for just a little bit while the cattle were gathered and then we were surprised to realize that we were at the very beginning of the cattle drive. 

We couldn't believe how long the horns were. 

 

After the cattle drive we got a group picture and then we toured the Texas stock exchange. It was said that during the height of the Texas cattle drive more money changed hands there then at the NY stock exchanged. 

We also did a little window shopping. I had to get a pressed penny so we found one and the kids found all sorts of souvenirs that they "had to have".  

 

After leaving the stockyards we all went to lunch at a local pizza place that Uncle Joseph recommended. Again, the cousins had their own table and they ate their weight in pizza from the buffet. 

After lunch we went to a trampoline park and played for a couple hours. 

The Dads played hard too!

The kids had a blast playing together and bounced their little hearts out. 

We are so grateful for cousins who are also best friends. 

We eventually had to say goodbye to the cousins and we drove to Grapevine, Texas. We had a reservation at "Great Wolf Lodge" and we surprised the kids with it. 

We arrived and got checked in and the kids were so excited. 
Because it was October, they were doing the "Howl-O-Ween" special so we got to trick-or-treat around the hotel. 

I had bought the kids matching pajamas and we all got wolf ears from the hotel. The kids looked so cute together. 

The kids had a great time trick-or-treating around the hotel. They got bags full of candy.

Benson took the "Howl" part of "Howl-o-Ween" very seriously. 

The kids loved this picture of wolves. 
Each kid also got a stuffed wolf and they were in love with them. 

After trick-or-treating, we went back to our room to change and go play at the water park until it closed.

I didn't get a ton of pictures because I was busy riding slides and swimming with my kiddos. It was so fun. After playing at  the water park, we went to the restaurant to get some dinner.
We were so tired at this point that we drug our paws back to our room and immediately fell asleep. 

The next morning we slept in, except Dad. He couldn't sleep so he left to go get breakfast for all of us. 
He came back with delicious breakfast burritos and we loved it. 
Then we went to play again at the water park. We played all day until we had to leave to drive home around 3 pm. 

I love these pictures of the kids in their yellow swimsuits. We had a great time playing together. 

Benson was cracking me up as he tried to stick his face in the fountains. 

He's such a cute buster. Bailey and Tucker really enjoyed the wave pool. 

Benson loved the hot tub and he really loved it when Tanner would play in there with him. 

We rode all the slides more than once and the kids loved it. Even Benson was big enough for the big slides. He rode the biggest one with us but decided it was to scary and stuck to the tube slides. 

He didn't even cry when him and Dad tipped over coming out of the tube slide. He's a brave little guy. 

Dad and I enjoyed watching our kids play independent of us. The kids are really getting to a fun age!

We had to get a picture in front of the fireplace before leaving. 

We had a great time at Great Wolf Lodge. I don't think we will go back unless I can get a great "groupon" deal again. But we really enjoyed our first visit to GWL and would love to go again sometime if possible. 

After checking out at GWL, we grabbed some dinner on the road and then drove the rest of the way home. 
It was such a great fall break. We miss having the Drakes live 3 minutes away, but we are grateful they love to have visitors. We will definitely be going back. 
Happy fall everyone!

Fall Fun!

 I absolutely love getting to go on kindergarten field trips. They are my favorite age to chaperone and I felt so lucky to get to go with Benson on his pumpkin patch. We had so much fun. I sure love my kindergarten buddy. 

We played and played. The corn pits were a huge hit with my little man. 

And then played on the playground. 

 

We also had a picnic lunch before playing some more. 

I think Benson loved the corn maze the most. He was pretty adorable the whole time. 
Surprisingly, his class didn't get lost once and we all made it out pretty quickly. 

 

 

The bounce pad thing was crazy with so many little kindergartners running around. It was giving me a little anxiety as I waited for someone to crash head first into each other. 

 

 

But I would definitely say that Benson loved riding the bus to the pumpkin patch more than anything else. 

Before leaving the pumpkin patch, each kid got to pick out their own pie pumpkin and Benson was so excited about his perfectly round, orange pumpkin. 

 

Of course, we had to get a class picture before leaving. So we got one with only the kids and then one with Ms. Goodell.

It was a wonderfully beautiful day at the pumpkin patch and we all had a great time.

Not soon after, it was "Hog Wild Spirit day" and the kids got to wear the hog-wear to school. I also got to go to "Rise and Shine" because Benson was being announced as student of the week. So I got to go watch that and surprise Benson. That was so fun. 

Later that day I got a text with this cute picture from Benson's teacher. I love seeing Benson in his element in Kinder. It's so cute. 

On Oct 7th, Tanner got to go to a Bentonville West High school football game and play with the HS band. He loved it so much. I got to watch for a little while and I could just see him beaming the whole time. 
He can't wait to join the HS marching band and he really enjoys band. I love that he's found his thing. It makes my mommy heart so happy to see him so happy. 

Tucker had been begging me to have lunch with him since school started and I was finally able to make that happen. He was so thrilled to see me. I brought him a boba smoothie to go with his lunch and he was so happy. This boy really thrives on one-on-one time. 

We enjoyed another amazing General Conference and to help us stayed energized I made this charcuterie board. It was a huge hit. 

Oh and to help us get into the Halloween vibes, we had a little movie party and watched the new "Hocus Pocus 2". It was lots of fun!

 

And I couldn't miss out on the chance to put together a little party. We had popcorn, cauldron cakes witch's hats and "book" brownies. 

 

Here are our cauldron cakes, and witch's brew drink. 

These are our "book" brownies and our witch's hats. 

I also styled this fun movie night for my girlfriends. We watched "Warm Bodies" this year and it was so funny. I love the tradition of a Girl's Night Halloween Movie Night. It always has a great turnout. This year we had it at my friend Brooke's house and about 20 girls came. It was awesome. 

It think that gets us all caught up for now. We have lots of fun coming though so stay tuned.