Spring Break

How time flies! It's been a month and a half since our spontaneous trip to Corpus Christi, Texas for Spring Break. We had a fabulous time.

The first day we went to an aquarium. It was kind of like a mini Sea World. We saw sea turtles, otters, sharks, sea horses, lots of fish (big and small), sting rays, an alligator, a bald eagle, dolphins, and some other neat things. We saw a fun dolphin show while we were there. James loved running back and forth chasing the otters around their exhibit. He also enjoyed touching the little sting rays, but he did NOT want to hold the hermit crabs. One of his favorite parts of the aquarium was the entrance which included statues of parts of whales (see below). He enjoyed climbing on them. When you got close enough the whale would spray water out of his blow hole. After such an occurrence, James decided to run up the whale, but slipped on the water and ended up with a nice mouth full of blood. Poor kid. It was thankfully only a minor wound, from which he quickly recovered. Even after that sad event, all he wanted to do was play on/around the statues.

After the aquarium, we headed over to the USS Lexington aircraft carrier that was docked next door. It was fun to explore. James' favorite part of the aircraft carrier was not the airplanes, but rather the construction equipment. He's really into construction things right now. He got to ride on a forklift and tractor-like thing, which he loved. Kate thoroughly enjoyed the day away in the carrier on daddy's back. She smiled there, laughed there, admired there, and slept there. A family that looked to be from India rather admired Kate's nifty backpack. In fact they admired it so much that they asked us if they could take a picture of it. So Jordan and Kate posed for a picture for some nice strangers we briefly met on board the ship. Next we went to walk briefly along the beach before dinner. I LOVE the beach. My family frequently went to California for family vacations, so the beach just feels like the place for a vacation. We got a little something for dinner and then headed back to our hotel to find that they had freshly baked chocolate chip cookies waiting. (I think I could live in a hotel...house keeping, complimentary breakfast, and freshly baked chocolate chip cookies each evening! Love it!) Anyway, James was rather excited...and I'm sure Jordan would want me to add that I was also rather excited. :)

Jordan and James enjoying a precious moment of father-son bonding via an airplane simulator (Isn't Jordan cute?):

On day 2 we drove about 30 minutes to get to the Padre Island National Sea Shore. It was wonderful. The weather was great (the day before had been rather chilly). The beach was nice and clean. We had to step through about a foot or two of kelp before getting to the water, which was interesting. James and Kate briefly enjoyed the water. We had to be holding them. The waves frightened them a bit. They preferred playing all day in the sand. They were both covered head to foot in sand. Kate found it rather enjoyable to purposely face plant in the sand. So even her sweet little eyelashes were caked in sand for parts of the day. She also enjoyed eating the sand. Yummy. Since we went on the trip on a whim, Kate didn't yet have her own swimming suit, so you see her below sporting James' old suit. It's a good thing she had a rather girly hat. When the time came to reapply sunscreen James was so covered in sand that he needed to be washed off first. Jordan took him to the nearby showers. However, they happened to be freezing. It took James a while to recover. He sat cuddled on my lap in a towel for about 30 minutes until he was ready to play again. At which point he joined a family in building (and occasionally destroying) a sand castle. It was a great day! When we returned to the hotel we again found delicious, freshly baked chocolate chip cookies. So wonderful. Then we went to a local BBQ place for dinner. I got a jalapeno with my dinner. James normally steers clear of all spicy things. However, on this particular occasion, for some unknown reason, he decided to grab my partially eaten jalapeno, stick it in his mouth and suck! Poor, poor boy. We didn't really have anything at our disposal to help him. So he just ate some roll and waited it out. He handled it rather well. When we got back to our hotel to our delight we found a new batch of freshly baked delicious chocolate chip cookies. It was a perfect day. :)












The next day we drove home and enjoyed the last of the hills and greenery before Lubbock. We also enjoyed the windmill farms along the way.