For the 4Th of July Valerie was brave enough to load the children into the car and haul them here to glorious Wichita Falls, TX. Not the most exciting of places to spend the 4Th of July but I was very excited to see her and the kids. It is a long trip to complete in general but with a 4 and 2 year old it probably felt like the miles would never end. I thank Valerie for being so strong and coming to see me.
If you haven't been to Wichita Falls you are not missing much. With a four day weekend and two children to entertain we exhausted all this little town has to offer. Valerie arrived on Thursday evening and we went to dinner and the mall to kill some time. Friday was spent at Cast Away Cove, a small water park here in town. With temperatures in the 100's it was a nice way to spend time together as a family. Heidi and Ryan enjoyed the children's play area with fountains and slides that they could go on by themselves. That also allowed mom and dad to just sit and relax in the sun. Heidi was a bit to quick in the water for Ryan and that would frustrate him but both of our kids love the water. We enjoyed floating the lazy river and paddling through the wave pool. Staying wet was the only way to stay out in the sun and not burn up.
We also went swimming at the pool at the hotel a few times to get the kids out of the room and not spend any money, Mom and Dad did plenty of that over the weekend. We tried to have lazy mornings and just enjoy our time together with out feeling rushed to go somewhere or get something done. I think the earliest we left the room was 11 AM.
For the 4Th of July we ate dinner and started our adventure of finding the Multi-Purpose Events Center or MPEC. At the MPEC they had a sort of expo with booths and 4 or 5 huge bouncy slides and obstacle courses. Of course each one cost money so we let Heidi choose one and watched her navigate the obstacles and slide down this enormous slide at the end. Ryan felt left out and was letting us know all about it. Kids are so fun. We still had a few hours to kill before the fireworks were to start so we wandered around and found a few other things to let the kids have fun. Heidi and Ryan rode on a train made out of plastic 55 gallon drums pulled by a small tractor. Ryan looked as if he was going to fall asleep the entire ride. At this point the wind started to blow and we began to see lighting and hear thunder. In Texas storms come quick so you find cover as soon as you can. Heidi wanted to stay and watch the fireworks so we bought the kids swords that lit up and made sounds to settle them down and began walking to the car to leave. We noticed people sitting on the grass median around the parking lot and decided to spread our blanket and see if the rain would come. The kids had a blast swinging the swords around to get them to make noise. The rain finally came but we were close to our car and ran for cover as soon as we felt rain drops.

We let the kids roam the car listened to the thunder and watched the lightning and rain. It was fun to see others scurrying about trying to get out of the rain. The kids behaved very good for being in the car and doing nothing but listen to the radio and wait for the fireworks. Finally we were rewarded with a fireworks show that the kids enjoyed. It was definitely an adventure Saturday evening.

The rest of the weekend was filled with spending time together as a family, going to church on base Sunday and hoping Monday would not come when I had to be back at my Squadron. It was a very enjoyable visit and I look forward to seeing Valerie and the kids when I graduate in late September.

Ice Skating!

Last Saturday I took Kristen, Heidi and Ryan and met up with my MIL at the ice skating rink. She was taking one of the guys she works with skating and we decided to go too. It was Heidi & Ryan's first time, and I probably hadn't skated since I was about 10. I was nervous to get out on the ice. Luckily I was mostly going slowly holding on to one of the kids. Barbara took Heidi out there and showed her how to hold onto her knees to keep from falling backwards. Heidi did really well and only fell really hard once. She would get right back up and try again. By the end she was almost skating by herself. We put the skates on Ryan towards the end and took turns pulling him along. He didn't want to come off the ice! Heidi sat on the side a little bit while Ryan was using her skates until we got another pair. She took some pretty decent pictures. The top one of me with Barbara in the background is courtesy of Heidi. We were glad to put our pants and sweatshirts on and get out of the heat in the ice cold rink! We leave next week to go see Kevin again so I probably won't post again until I have pictures from that.

Fun in the Sun

Okay so I know it looks like we haven't been doing much since I have been in Arizona. The truth is I have just either forgotten my camera or been too lazy to post. These pictures are from a trip to one of the local splash pads. These parks are really cool and they are free too. My kids and I went with my sis-in-law Stacy. I didn't get very many good pics, but it gives you an idea.

Bowling on base

Well I downloaded the pictures from our trip and realized that the only pictures I took were of us bowling. We tried to find activities that would entertain/ wear out the kids. We spent an afternoon at the park, dinner at Chuck-E-Cheese and a little bit of bowling. I wish I would have gotten a better picture of the whole family together, but I hate asking strangers to take pictures. We really enjoyed our long weekend with Kevin and were very sad to leave. Hopefully July will come soon and we can make the long drive to visit him again. September just can't come soon enough!

On the way to Texas

Well Texas is a long way away so I decided to split the trip up into a few days. The first day we left in the afternoon and drove up to Kevin's Grandmother's house. The kids had a lot of fun with Grandmother. They enjoyed climbing the trees in her front yard and picking flowers from the bushes in the front yard. I couldn't get the pictures the way I wanted, but we enjoyed stopping off at her house before our long trip out to visit Kevin. Thanks so much Grandmother!

Where are we going?

Kevin called me today to let us know where we will be stationed. Looks like we will go to Nellis AFB right outside of Las Vegas. I am excited because we will be close to family. He will be working on F-16 airplanes. Luckily the kids and I will be used to the heat since we will spend the whole summer in Chandler. At least we know where we will be for the next year or so! I have been such a slacker of a blogger. I leave to go and see Kevin tomorrow and will be gone for about a week, but after that I should have some pictures to post about!

Finally an Airman!

Okay I know this is a little bit old. Kevin graduated at the end of February and I am just posting pictures. I have been a real slacker. I enjoy looking at everyone else's blog, but I just am not motivated to do my own. Kevin was an honor grad along with about 8% of the rest of the graduates. There were about 800 that graduated that week with him. He ended up with four ribbons, where most only had 2. We are very proud of his accomplishments. He was an element leader also and achieved War Hawk on his physical training test, which is the highest you can get. He is currently in Biloxi, MS at Keesler AFB doing 8 1/2 weeks of training, and then he will ship to Shepard AFB in Wichita Falls, TX for 18 1/2 weeks. Hopefully we will find out soon where we will be stationed for the next few years. I am still in Utah with the kids. A big thank you to Mad & Brent for letting us stay with them. We will be going down to Chandler, AZ to stay with Jeff & Barbara until September when Kevin will be done with his training. As you can see in the picture, Jeff & Barbara came to Texas with me to help. They knew their way around the base because they had gone in January for Scott's graduation. A big thanks to them for all of their help. I am really blessed to have such great in-laws!