Oklahoma is OK!!-- Bar Induction Ceremony

It’s not very often that we are able to take off mid-week for an adventure but we recently had an opportunity to travel to Oklahoma City for a Bar Induction Ceremony. We were gone just a little over twenty four hours but we squeezed a lot in that very short amount of time.

We started the night with the best pizza from "The Wedge" if you are ever in Oklahoma City you must try it.

They have a nice area called Bricktown to walk around

Congratulations Daddy!!

It was a challenge to keep little man still during this part - but he did great thanks to lots of animal crackers and pretzals.

What a cute little man!!

If you have ever traveled with Jill then you know that she researches and is able to find some great things to do. On this trip she may have reached an all-time high as she found a museum on homing pigeons. At first, I was very hesitant and was thinking of about a hundred other things that we could have been doing instead --- but then as we started learning more and more about the birds it quickly became an experience that we will never forget. By no means is this a comprehensive list of what we learned but we will provide some highlights:

· People buy pigeons and pay to have them trained so that they may race against one another – the typical cost for this training can be several thousand dollars.

· Pigeons can sell for as much as $75,000 or even more depending on their ancestry. The highest priced Homing Pigeon was sold for $225,000.

· Racing Homing Pigeons have been clocked flying 92.5 mph average speed on a 400 mile race.

· Pigeons are the only bird in the world that do not have to lift their head to swallow water.

Kellen loved all the birds!

Arn't they so clean looking?-- for a bird

3rd Annual Branson Getaway

It’s always nice to get away with friends. Recently we were able to take advantage of an open weekend at my aunt and uncle’s rental in Branson for our 3rd annual getaway. So we loaded up four families, with all of their baby/toddler items and took over the place. Thankfully it is large enough for everyone to have their own space and for the kids to run as wild as they would like to. However, we had five kids, all under the age of two, so even with all of the space it is understandable why the place was a madhouse at times but overall the weekend was a great success.

2011 Crew -- Amazing to see how this group will grow in the future!!

Flashback to 2009

Flashback to 2010

Home sweet Home

We are very blessed as we live relatively close to our parents/families. Thankfully, we don’t have to suffer through six hour car rides to visit and we are not limited to seeing them only on major holidays like Thanksgiving or Christmas but no matter how often we see them, there is always a sense that we could use more time with them. It seems like every time we see them we never have enough time to squeeze in everything we want to do and we always leave on Sunday afternoon wishing we could just have a few more hours together.

As K is getting older and appreciating his grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins even more, it seems like he is beginning to feel the same way. It is great to see him acknowledge who they are and even though he doesn’t get to see his cousins as often as we would like, it is evident that they love to spend time together as they all quickly warm up to one another and almost immediately team-up to destroy anything in their path.

Playing in the farm equipment

Jumping with daddy- Mommy a little nervous!

So we will continue to try and make it home as often as possible and even though we know that our return trips will never be frequent enough to satisfy our parents, they should know that we would like to make them more often as well. Clean and snuggling before bed

3 boys in a tub! Being carted around by Grammie!!!

Rock and Roll Number 2

This past weekend was spent in Dallas completing the second leg of a six (or maybe) seven leg journey. For the past couple of years Davin and I have discussed completing multiple marathons and half marathons in the Rock-and Roll series. We love to do the runs and after several years of running in local or regional runs we thought that it would be cool to make this year’s runs more of a destination run or enjoy some places that we haven’t been before. Not that Dallas really fits into those categories but in order to get in six races we needed to have some that we were within driving distance to help keep some of the cost down. So we loaded up the families and headed to The Big D for the weekend. The majority of Saturday was spent enjoying various spots around Uptown. Although we have been to Dallas a couple of times before we never took the time to visit this area but it was pretty cool. We enjoyed riding the trolley around, visiting a few of the shops, and then found a little local place where we had a great lunch. We also found a great yogurt shop that was so good that we had to visit it twice. We then met up with the Hicks family and enjoyed the rest of the evening with them.

As you can see we love Red Mango!!!

"I am fully hydrated but I want some FOOD!"

Having fun on the trolley!!

Kellen's tent/he slept great under it!!

On the road ready to cheer on our Da da's (can you see litte P in the mirror)

Hanging out near the finish line

Lake Tahoe We Love You

While we are not ones who think of ourselves to be drawn to extravagant or costly things, as a couple our one indulgence is definitely vacations. It is all too common for us to say, “So where do we want to go on our next vacation.” Honestly, that may not even be truthful as we usually have about three or four trips booked and in the works when we start talking about getting ready for the fifth. We certainly love us some travel. All that buildup to explain that we just returned from Lake Tahoe and a wonderful ski vacation that has to rank up there with some of the finest vacations we have been on. It was our first post-child trip and so that certainly played into the enjoyment, and not because we didn’t think or miss the little guy every second, but it was great for us to be able to get away and just enjoy each other and some of the most beautiful surroundings that are out there.

The views were spectacular!!!

We had a couple of great days of skiing.

Missing Kellen at 10,000 feet.

First views going up the gondala

Goodbye Tahoe!!!

Thank goodness for great grandparents! While we probably don’t say it enough, Jill and I both are blessed with wonderful parents. They do so much for us and support us in so many ways, but they also care so deeply about Kellen that it is ridiculous. This was again evident as they both stepped up and volunteered to watch K for a few days and he loved every minute of it. A big THANK YOU to the grandparents.