Midland means food, family and fun!

We left Austin at about early a.m. on Wednesday morning. The drive from Austin to Midland is usually about 5.5 hours or so, but it took us a little longer. We stopped in San Angelo to eat lunch at Schlotzsky's, which is family tradition. We stop there to eat everytime we drive to Midland, and everytime my dad wins a free cookie because he answers the trivia question correctly. :) Since Madeline just recently became officially potty-trained, we had to stop somewhat often for her to go potty, but noone ever minded.

We got to Granny's and had dinner then went over to the Chuck and Sarah's to see all their remodels and visit with the cousins. The house looks great! Here is Gian and David goofing around.

Zac and Braegan having some serious "coach talk" or something like that, haha.

Fab Five and Ariel...I love how our family keeps growing! We had 29 people at our Thanksgiving meal!

Yay! My cousin Amy (from my mom's side of the fam) that is in TIP at McMurry came to Midland to have thanksgiving with all of us and my dad's family. IT was great to have her there! This was taken at the duckpond that is like half a mile from my Granny's house.

Madeline and Claire fed the ducks some bread.


Brad and Heather looking picture-perfect! :) We had SO much fun staying at their house. I hope Megan looks up to me as much as I look up to Heather! :)

The Fab Five!!! (and my new blog banner)

In between Granny's house and the Duck Pond is the A Street Park. I spent hours and hours and hours of my childhood there, and now we go to watch Madeline play! There is a humongous slide, so Madeline went alot and then we all took a turn, haha!

Thursday evening we all went over to Brad and Heather's to watch the game. Obvs UT won, so it was lots of fun and cheering!

Granny and I on Friday morning. Friday afternoon, 10 of us girls (cousins and aunts) went to see Twilight! (Yes, it was my second time to see it, and yes, I still loved it, haha.)

Madeline loved her hair in braids. She had never had it like that, but suggested it the next day too. :)

Friday night after dinner was my favorite part of the whole trip. The kids were just playing and we all sat around and watched them enjoy each other. In this picture, Madeline was taking Nati's nose and pretending to eat it. He was either reaching for it back, or trying to grab hers...it was funny.

David found an old slingshot and Granny showed us how to use it. Isn't she cute? She will be 90 in April!!!

The kids wrestled alot and it was a riot...so hilarious! Nati was so gentle with both Claire and Madeline, and always let them tackle him.

Madeline had some mad wrestling skills and she would grab him by the ankle and wrap him up. It was quite a hoot!

Friday night after we left Granny we went back to Brad and Heather's and picked them up and went to Buffalo Wild Wings for some drinks and hilarious stories. We laughed hard and long. We planned on just staying for one drink or about an hour, but ended up staying much longer than that. When we got home, Liz and Robin and I felt like we needed to be good big-cousins to Megan (Heather's daughter). We had not done anything to corrupt her yet, so we took her toilet papering (although it seems the kids these days call it "wrapping?"). It was fun. I have not done that since I was like 10, and that was with my kickball team, to our coach's house, haha. :)

On the way home, we were actually in the middle of nowhere (welcome to the sprawling wild west Texas, haha) when she had to go, so we had to pull over and Mommy and Madeline both got their first pee-on-the-side-of-the-road experience. :)

The last hour of the trip (from Burnet to Austin) we changed up cars, and Papa, Zac, Madeline and I, and all three dogs were in the Prius. It was quite a sight, haha. Poor Rusty thinks he is a cat. Just look at him!

To see a cute video of Madeline singing and bossing Zac around, click HERE! :)