My holidays

After an amazing holiday, today is the day that I must return to work. I've done a lot over the past 2.5 weeks. The first week I basically did "nothing": caught up on sleep, had a lock-in with my youth small group, visited grandparents, played with my nieces and nephew, and all that jazz. Then my parents and sister and I flew to Texas to visit my aunt and uncle, and my cousins and their kids. It was fun!

We arrived in Dallas late Tuesday night, then drove out to where my family lives (just outside of Paris). Wednesday and Thursday we hung out with my aunt. We went shopping and bowling in Paris and also visited with my cousins and their kids. On Friday we headed in to Dallas to do some site-seeing. We went to the Dallas aquarium, which was pretty spectacular! I love seeing different animals from all over the world. Then we walked around the downtown, saw different buildings. We took the trolley through the downtown area, that was pretty neat! We stayed overnight in Dallas and on Saturday we went to a heritage museum which had different buildings from the early settlers. There were different homes, a general store, a saloon, a bank, a printing shop, a doctor's office, a hotel, and a blacksmith shop (with a guy who was teaching blacksmith lessons). We also went to this aviation museum and I decided that when I hit my midlife crisis I will become a pilot! Then in the evening we went to a Dallas Stars game (they were playing Phoenix). Dallas won 4-0. Then we headed back to our Texas "home". Sunday morning we went to church with my aunt and uncle. Then we went to my cousin's house to see their yard. They live out in the country and have a whole bunch of animals. Then my sister and I watched the Superbowl with Norma, a new friend we met from my aunt and uncles church. On Monday we hung out with my aunt and uncle, then headed back to Dallas for night cuz our flight was early the next morning. We flew out of Dallas to Chicago on Tuesday. Our flight out of Chicago was cancelled, so we were booked onto the next flight which was supposed to leave 4 hours later than our original flight. So I explored the airport and such. Meanwhile it was snowing like crazy! When we finally boarded our plane they said they needed to de-ice the plane before we could fly out. First we had to wait for the de-icer people to come, then when they did come they got the stuff somewhere where they weren't supposed to...so they couldn't fly the plane. so we got off the plane and the airline provided us with a hotel room for the night and we flew out the next morning. Meanwhile, during our night in Chicago, there was apparently an earthquake. First of all they said on the news it was a 4.3, then later they reported that it was more like a 3.8. I was asleep and didn't notice a thing. But the guy that was working at the hotel the next morning was telling us that he woke up from it. Crazy! So that's another thing I can add to my list of things that I sleep through: earthquakes, smoke detectors, multiple alarm clocks, telephones, exams...oh my list goes on and on.