wednesday

Today is going home day! Yea! We had a nice time in New Mexico but I am very ready to go home now. We can't leave till after 5 because Jeff is busy until then. Unfortunately Check out for the hotel is much earlier than that. We got everything packed up last night and loaded up this morning. Then I had to leave the hotel at 11 and keep the girls busy all day. We went to that store to get me an Ok Go Cd. I got one, but not the one I wanted. Then we went to lunch at McDonald's (of course) to let the girls play on the playland. They could have stayed there all day, but it's outside and I got very hot! Then we went to the space science center. It was neat but I didn't have a stroller and it was kinda expensive, so we looked at the gift shop and all the exhibts outside. Then we left. We went to Kmart because they have cheap clohes and by this time the girls outfits were gross! I had already changed them into the outfits fromt he diaper bag and i didn't feel like unloading the car. Kmart had tops/shorts for $2. So it was cheap. Then we went to Dollar tree because we still needed to kill time. After that I took them back to the toy train depot and we had another train ride. Then it started torain so we went tot he free (and boring) Alamogordo history museum. After that I decided I might as well get the oil changed. So we went to walmart for that. We shopped and enjoyed the airconditioning until the car was ready. After a stop at Sonic for happy hour I drove back to the hotel to wait for JEff. I still have an hour to wait, but I'm done driving around. We are currently sitting in the parking lot (running the air conditioner). They have wifi so I'm writing this and the girls are watching Einsteins on the Dvd players in the backseat. I'm telling you if you have young kids and travel much it's the best investment EVER!
I'm so ready to be home and we still have the 12 hour drive ahead of us!

Tuesday

Yesterday we had a dull day. I was planning on taking the girls to a national park and walking down the nature trails. However when I got up in the morning I decided I needed to know what was going on in the world (it happens every now and then) and I turned on Good Morning America. the very first story I saw was about a family walking down the path in a national park in New Mexico when their son was brutally attacked by a mountain lion. ON THE PATH!
Needless to say I changed our plans.
They are filming the next transformers movie here. All the hotels are packed with set designers and location scouts. The actors and stuff aren't coming till next week when they start filming so I decided to go hunting for the set. If you've ever been here before you know how impossible that really is. It's miles and miles of desert. The really could be anywhere out there.
I heard a rumor that they were building a small set in Cloudcroff, a tiny town on the mountain. So we drove up there looking for it. We didn't find it.
So that was yesterday.
Today we went to the Pistachio Tree Farm. IT was fun. Lots of trees.
We had a short nap (mostly because they rebelled against nap at all). And now they are running around our hotel room waiting for Dad to get back. I did get all our stuff packed up and ready to be loaded in the car for tomorrow. We will start the drive home and finish on Thursday.
The first picture is the pistachio tree ranch. The second is Lola being silly in our room.

Sunday

Yesterday Jeff had a free day so we drove over to El Paso. We have reciprocal rights with their zoo too, so off we went. It was a lot of fun. Not as big as OKC's zoo, but much bigger than Alamogordo's zoo. Sophy really liked the monkeys and the sun bears. Jeff though the sun bears looked like a mix between a pug and a black bear!
On the way back we drove through Los Cruces. By going that way we got to drive across all of White Sands to on the way. Sophy did great today so I guess she had a passing bug on friday!

Saturday

Yesterday evening we went out to white sands. It was cloudy and cool, the prefect weather! Lola LOVED the sand and threw a huge fit when we had to leave. I didn't get too many pictures though. Sophy got sick shortly after we got there so we had to leave. I guess I'll just have to take them back when she's feeling better.

Friday

Yesterday we didn't really do anything. We tried to go do something, but it just didn't work out too well.
Today we loaded up and drove down to the Toy Train Depot. It's a really cute muesuem about toy trains and they have a working train the runs around the very large park they have there. Luckily for me the girls got to ride for free so I bought one ticket and we were off! It was a lot of fun. The girls waved at the children in the park as we went by. About half way through the ride Sophy said "I can not believe it!". It was really funny. Even the train conductor laughed.

Later wednesday....

Here's what we got to do this morning. I guess we'll go to the toy train depot tomorrow.... Poor Lola. She has an ear infection alright and a nasty rash that the doctor thinks is allergy related so she is currently sleeping off the mass drugs that she has been given.

Wednesday

Yesterday I had just put the girls down for their nap (about 10 minutes after my last post) when the housekeeping came to clean our room. She noticed out tight quarters. We had four people, two large beds, a crib, and all our stuff crammed into our room. Several other hotel workers had commented on our room and suggested that we move to a larger room, but we were too lazy to move....that is until we saw this room (see pictures)! They gave us a GREAT deal so we could afford it and move we did! It has a full kitchen and a separate area for the kids. We swiped one of the wooden highchairs from the lobby an now we can eat in here instead of the lobby! It's so much easier to corral both kiddos alone in here. They are both enjoying all the space to play and I'm enjoying having a real kitchen sink to wash sippycups in!
On a sadder note: Lola is sick. I think it's just an ear infection but our pediatrian is refusing to send a prescription without seeing her. There's not really a emergency room here because it's a military town so we need to figure out if we can get on base for help, and if not where the closest town with a hospital is. I just don't want to have to drive over those mountains is her ear is hurting! Poor baby!

Tuesday

Last night we went to a pistachio tree farm and vineyad. It was neat to see allt he different kinds of pistachios they made. So Many flavors! Jeff liked the chilli ones and I liked the pumpkin pie ones. We grabbed a cheap dinner and at it in the hotel lobby. I sure wish we had brought out travel high chair with us, but since we didn't we'll be eating down at the lobby a lot while we are here.
Today we went to the Alamogordo Zoo. It is supposed to be the oldest Zoo west of the Mississippi river. It was small but nice. We walked around looking at all the animals and Sophy played on the playground for a LONG time! I wish we brought our lunch with us! It was such a beautiful place for a picnic. We might have to go back for a picnic sometime this week. The Alamogordo Zoo is on the reciprical listfo the OKC Zoo so I was able to get into the zoo for free! That's always nice.
We came back to our hotel for lunch and nap, I wonder what tonight will hold.

Today was a fun "settling in day". We took a trip to walmart, not so exciting, but the views around here are amazing! Then we went searching for Kid's kingdom. It's a playground nearbyt hat was a lot of fun. We didn't let the girls play long because it rained last night and everything was wet.
After that Jeff was excited to drive up to Cloudcroff. It's a tiny little town on top of one of the mountains. It's about 15 minutes away and you climb crazy high crazy fast. We stopped to take a lot of pictures on the way back. In the last pictre you see here if you look from bottom to top you see: The mountain we are on, Alamogordo, desert, white sands, the mountains, and the sky! We kept thinking we saw clouds at the foot of the mountians, but that's White Sands! We were amazed by how far away we could see it across the horizon. I am now looking forward to driving out there to check it out, but Jeff doesn't seem to intrested. We'll see who wins!

Hello Alamogordo

Today Jeff and I drove the lovely long drive from OKC to Alamogordo New Mexico. We had many stops and we even got to go to the Roswell UFO museum! I loved it. The sunset was beautiful. We were just driving over the creast of the mountians when there it was in all it's glory. Jeff laughed at me when I would yell "Stop! I gotta get a picture of that!" I hope to take many more on the way home! We planned to stay the night at Roswell but the kids were being SO good and the short break fromt he car seemed to give us courage so on we drove! Having a DVD player int he car for the girls sure did help keep them happy. We were able to make the whole trip in one day. Including stops it took us 13 hours! Can you believe that in all that time Lola only fussed for a total of maybe 45 minutes! The last 20 minute drive was the worst!
I hope to update often this week as we go adventuring around here, but you know how plans go when you're on "vactaion", so well just see what happens!

Happy Birthday Nicki!

Tomorrow is my friend Nicki's Birthday. Being that she's a Yankee baby we usually have very patriotic parties for her. This year she opted for something different, so we are having a luau for her birthday. I got the fun of making the cake. It turned out good even though I didn't get to do all I want. I am hoping to send the cake away for the night so that nothing happens to it...again. About 5 minutes after I finished cleaning up and taking pictures Sophy wandered into the kitchen (I was on the phone....sorry about screaming in your ear Courtney) and took handfuls of icing off the side of the cake. I think I fixed it ok, but boy was I mad! Sophy is now in her bed serving off her time.