More of our Texas Adventures!
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| On our way to meet Ryan and meet some of his coworkers of course Riley had a blowout. And of course it was the LAST diaper we had. Thanks to Amazon Prime Now we got some delivered straight to the hotel. Amazon is a modern day miracle. |
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| Meeting up with Daddy and meeting some of his coworkers. Notice Riley's wardrobe change due to blowout :) |
Since Matt and Ryan were working, Mandi and I took the girls for some fun! We went to the Dallas zoo. It was the best zoo day I have ever had! Usually whenever I go to the zoo the animals are kinda hiding and you walk past an exhibit and think, "Well apparently there is a cheetah in there somewhere...maybe someone will see it one of these days..." Well not this zoo day! We literally saw EVERY single animal! It was crazy! I have no idea how we got so incredibly lucky! Mandi kept saying how we must be good luck charms because the animals never come out this often. The weather was perfect, nice and cool so maybe that is why the animals were so willing to come out and show off. It made for such a fun day seeing all of the animals up close!
My favorite part was feeding a giraffe!!! It was so much fun! I loved it!! And also, my other favorite part was the lion. He came right up to the glass and we got to stare right at him and take a selfie with him! It was breathtaking being so close to such a magnificent, strong animal. Seeing him so close up made me realize why they call the lion the king of the jungle.
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| The polar bears are made out of Legos! They had a bunch of big animal Lego statues. It was pretty cool! |
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| A fake Santa Claus! How exciting! haha Harley was so happy to see him and wanted to hold his hand. |
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| Group picture! |
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| I know this is the worst picture but these parrots talked! It was so fun! They said hello and goodbye and we all thought it was the coolest thing! Harley said, "When I used to be a little parrot I said hello and goodbye too!" haha :) I'm sure you did Harley. I'm sure you loved being a baby parrot. Oh the things little kids say. |
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| Petting the goats. |
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| Riley and I decided to sit out on the whole goat petting thing. |
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| Maybe I'll let Riley pet the goat next year :) For now she was very content to just watch. |
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| Harley has no fear! Petting a snake? No problem! She is so brave. |
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| Maybe this is where Harley gets her bravery? I thought Mandi was so brave to let all those birds land on her! I love animals but I am so NOT a bird person! They freak me out! I was joking that she was a Disney princess like Snow White or something because the birds just loved her and came and landed on her. So cool to see! |
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| They had an albino alligator! Basically an alligator version of me! So cool! I have never seen one of these before! |
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| Kangaroos! I'm telling you all of the animals were so active that day. We even got to see the Kangaroos walloping or whatever you call their hops. It was pretty cute! |
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| Call me immature but doesn't this gecko thing look like he/she is trying to pose all sexy? I thought it was pretty funny. This lizard has modeling aspirations. |
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| I don't think I have ever seen an anteater. It was so fun seeing him digging through the dirt. It was like he was a vacuum sucking stuff up! Pretty neat. |
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| Rise and shout the cougars are out! Awesome to see my alma mater's mascot! |
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| Riley did so well in the stroller for so long! I was really proud of her! She then had a blow out of course (again) but hey. whatevs. I'm used to it. She was done in the stroller and I hitched her up in the baby carrier--pooey blowout pants and all. What can I say, when you don't gots a back up outfit you do what you gotta do. |
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| Again, I restate that Harley has no fear. |
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| OK ready for the coolest part?! This lion was all over the place! It was so fun to see him so active. |
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| Posing for us! |
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| We had this brilliant idea to take a selfie with the lion. How's it working out for us? haha I'm not good at selfies! I cut the lions head out of this one and we are both so dang stoked that the lion is right behind us that we just look like dorks! |
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| Riley checking out the king. Notice that Mandi is now in charge of taking the pictures after the last photo fail. |
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| Seriously. Can you believe how close he is? Thank goodness for that thick glass between us...Also, what is on my tongue? |
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| One more lion selfie. Because he was the highlight! |
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| Oh wait, here is the other highlight! I got to FEED A GIRAFFE!!!! |
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| Again, so cool to see all of these animals and be so close up to all of them! |
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| Mandi and Emery feeding the giraffe. |
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| Harley just chillin with the cheetahs! |
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| When I said we saw ALLLL of the animals I wasn't kidding. They were all out! It was the best zoo day for real. |
After the zoo we headed back to our hotel to go swimming! AKA get in the jacuzzi because hello--it's December. Even in Texas December is not swimming weather. Our hotel had a rooftop pool/spa so it was outdoors and had pretty views! Harley and Emery were so brave and decided to get in the POOL! AH! Way too cold for the adults! haha It's amazing how kids have no internal thermometer for the cold. They just want to splash and swim and have fun, no matter the temperature. Most of us sane people tried to stick to the jacuzzi. :)
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| Ryan was done working so he got to come swimming with us too! This was right when we got back to the hotel and Harley asked Ryan if he wanted to cuddle! haha she is the cutest/funniest thing. |
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| Rooftop pool! So beautiful! |
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| We hung out in the jacuzzi and watched the sunset. So pretty! |
After the pool Matt met us at our room and we all got ready to go out to eat. Harley and Emery drove with us. About 10 minutes into the drive they all dozed off. Riley, Harely, and Emery all sound asleep in the back seat. It was pretty cute.
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| Leaving the hotel. Harley kept saying how we were all her "best friends." It was the sweetest/cutest thing. |
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| You can't tell in this pic but Riley is in the middle. You can't see her because she is in a rear-facing car seat. It was pretty sweet seeing all of them asleep back there at the same time. :) |
Of course being in Texas we had to get a crap ton of good ol' Texas BBQ. Holy moly is it fantastic! Texas knows how to do it guys. The first night out we went to the best burger place. The burger was delicious, but even better--the shake! It was a smores shake where they actually torch marshmallows and put them in your shake! Mmmmm. I want one right now.
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| This place was called Twisted Root Burger. And it was mmm mmmm good. |
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| After dinner we drove around and looked at Christmas lights. It was amazing how many homes put lights up. Like every single house was decked in lights. It was so fun to drive. And of course Ryan and I coming from the SF Bay...we were drooling over how big and beautiful all of these Texas homes were! |
Once Ryan's business trip was over, we checked out of the hotel and stayed the rest of our trip with Matt and Mandi. We decided to go out with a bang and get some room service. I think this was the first time we have ever gotten room service. It was soooooo good. I want to go back, even just for this room service haha, We got a belgian waffle and a fantastic breakfast burrito with breakfast potatoes. Mmmmmm. It was so fun to once again feel so fancy. Who knew it would take coming to Texas to put on our fancy pants.
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| I take a lot of pictures of my food. Because I love food. |
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Can you see the tiny glass bottle of ketchup in the background? And the little tiny S&P shakers? Too cute.
Everything is cuter in miniature size. Also, check out all that fatty, delicious cheese in that burrito right there. Also, that stuff on the waffle is fresh whipped cream! Not butta. |
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| One of my favorite parts of the trip was getting our girls together. Even though Riley is still pretty little and doesn't know how to "play" with other kids as much right now, it was so fun to just have them together. I hope we don't have to go too long in the future without these gals seeing each other! |
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| It was so cute seeing them set up their little tea party. They did this all by themselves and Riley just crawled right over to join them. This was not a prompted photo at all. We thought it was so adorable! |
OK back to food because that is what half of going to Texas should be about! Am I right? Matt and Mandi took us to their favorite BBQ joint called Hutchin's BBQ. Holy cow. The brisket was incredible. Wow. Ryan took one bite and said, "Yeah. We're definitely coming back to Texas to visit!" haha
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| Check out that brisket yo. |
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| Family selfie! Riley and Emery are there somewhere! |
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| Our BBQ food. Brisket, mashed potatoes, coleslaw, broccoli salad, delicious rolls, and cornbread. |
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| Ryan got pretty much the same thing except for a bunch more meat and mac and cheese and BBQ beans. OK nevermind. Guess that's not "pretty much the exact same thing." |
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| Harley always wanted to sit by Ryan and be with Ryan. |
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| Enjoying our yummy food. |
Another fun thing we did in Texas was go to the Stockyards. It is the epitome of Texas culture. They had a cowboy "shoot out," a Texan Santa Claus, live country music, lots of fun Texas shops with cowboy hats, belt buckles, jerky etc. and the best part was this--they had all the people line up on the streets and guess what came down the middle of the street?! Dozens of Texas longhorns! And let me tell you, they sure don't call them longhorns for nothing! Talk about loooooonnnnng horns! Those things are huge! It was so cool to see them!
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| Hanging out at the stockyards, |
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| Harley and the Texan Santa! |
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| Harley and Emery and Santa Claus |
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| Live band playing some good ol' country music. |
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| Trying on some cowboy hats! |
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| Pretty great signs. |
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| Riley didn't like her cowboy hat. Guess it wasn't her style. |
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| So many fun shops! |
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| The cowboys getting everyone to line up the streets and make way for a surprise! |
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| At first all we saw were the cowboys on horses... |
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| And then out came them longhorns! SO cool! |
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| I mean look at those horns! |
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