2016 Summer Road Trip - Kentucky

We had a great couple of days in Kentucky. We were all careful to wear blue (and especially not red) while were there.

The best part of the trip was Whispering Woods Riding Stable, where we all went horse back riding.  Turner and Hazel hopped on Huckleberry and King and were led by the awesome stable hands. Mom and Dad were surprised when they put me on Apache, showed me how to control the horse using the reins, and just let me go with no one holding the horse. But I did really great, and really liked it. Dad's horse was Papi and was a pretty good horse. Mom got a rambunctious horse; Dad was surprised to find out it was Mom's first time riding a horse. Once all of us were on our horses, we rode them on a trail. It was really fun.

After the horseback ride, we played on a fun playscape they had there and went back to the house for lunch. Later that day, we went to the old James Pepper Distillery that Dad's friend is renovating. We got a tour of the building, which is still being finished out, and grabbed a flight of ice cream while we were there. Dad got a growler of sour brown ale to take with him too.

We started our second day in Kentucky at the Kentucky Arboretum where we walked along the really pretty flowers, trees, and vegetables. Everything smelled very pretty and we found lots of vegetable gardens and spices. There were also some really, really old tree trunks we could climb on. Dad and I counted the rings on one of them and it was over 100 years old!

After the arboretum, we went on a tour of the Old Kentucky Chocolates factory. It was neat seeing how they mixed the chocolate. Mom got especially nervous when Turner and I got really close to one delicious looking chocolate mixer. They were making all kinds of delicious treats like chocolate covered cherries, and chocolate shaped pictures. After the tour, we got to try samples of chocolate covered potato chips and pulled cream. Then we each got to pick out a treat from the store. Dad and I got chocolate covered bananas, while Mom picked out some chocolate pecans. Hazel got chocolate mints and Turner got chocolate candies. We saw an awesome chocolate tooth that we thought Bubbe would love, but didn't think we could get it to Atlanta without it melting.


After a fun two days, we left Kentucky and drove to Pennsylvania through West Virginia. We were all very impressed with how pretty West Virginia was; Dad even liked driving on the road there.  We stopped in Morgantown for lunch at the Core Arboretum, and got into Pennsylvania in time for dinner.

2016 Summer Road Trip - On the Road

As much fun as we've been having this summer, it started to get pretty hot in Austin. So we decided to pack up the car and head out on a summer road trip.

Our first days' drive was through Dallas up to Arkansas. Mom and Dad had a special treat for the car - we listed to a Harry Potter audiobook. Dad was careful to stop after each chapter to ask us what happened and make sure we were able to follow it. Hazel was really into it right away. I took a while to warm up to it, but really started enjoying it in the later chapters. It was harder for Turner to follow the audiobooks, though he really likes the storylines.

Our first stop (except for fairly frequent bathroom breaks) was at Buc-ee's. Mom and Dad got some breakfast burritos while we picked out a few treats from the famous Wall of Candy. Turner and I each picked out chocolate covered pretzels while Hazel went with her old standby of saltwater taffy.

After another couple of hours, we stopped at the Perot Museum in Dallas for lunch and a quick run of the awesome science museum. My favorite part was racing a tyrannosaurus rex; the T-rex was on a screen next to a track and we raced to a finish line. The T-rex beat me every time.

After getting to run off some energy, we hopped back in the car and drove to Arkansas. The hotel we stayed at had an indoor pool, and mom brought pool toys for us to play with. We swam until we were all very tired, had a nice dinner, and went to bed excited about our next day.

We got up early the next morning and drove to Memphis. The Memphis JCC has an unbelievable outdoor water park that we got to swim in thanks to Mom's connections at the Austin JCC. Dad, Mom, and Hazel went down the giant water slide, and we all rode on the lazy river. Turner and I played on the various water playscapes. We had a nice lunch, showered and hit the road again.

Our next stop was dinner in Nashville at the intersection that has a White Castle and a Krystal. We picked up food from both and did a taste test of burgers, fries, and milk shakes. The decision was unanimous that Krystal is better, and Mom declared that we can skip this stop in the future and just go to a more convenient Krystal.

We arrived in Lexington Kentucky pretty late at night, staying in an absolutely wonderful apartment that Dad's friend owns. She was super nice to let us stay there. After unpacking the car, we took a well deserved nights' sleep.

Cub Scout Camp

Hazel had her annual well visit today. She is 46 inches and 46 pounds, both in the 25th percentile. She was happy not to have to get any shots. You can see my latest growth chart on the right side of the blog or here.

We had a super fun time at Cub Scout camp this week. Turner, Hazel, and Mom got to come along too. We got to do archery, b.b. shooting, slingshots, water slides, swimming, and all kinds of crafts. I even got to do forensics, put up a tent, and touch a python! It was a really fun week.

On the way home, I told mom I know what the "S word" is. Then Hazel told mom she knows what the "D word" is. Mom was pretty freaked out and asked where we learn these things. Hazel said, "Kids! Inappropriate kids!" Mom asked which kids, and Hazel said they say these words a lot on Charlie Brown. So Mom asked Hazel what the D word is, and Hazel spelled, "D-U-M-B." Then mom asked me what the S word is, and I spelled, "S-T-U-P-I-D."  Mom cracked up laughing and said she is glad we don't use words like that.

Turner graduated!

We've been having so many great adventures this spring, like camping, hiking, partying, I made it to the top of the rock wall in my rock climbing class, we've forgotten about our blog. We'll try to improve this summer.

Today, Turner graduated from preschool! He'll still go a little bit this summer, but we're proud of him and he's excited to start kindergarten this fall. He had fun at his graduation. He wore a fun hat, walked in a procession, sang "Down by the Bay," and ate cake and ice cream.

There were two things he didn't like though. He said Mom took too many pictures, and he didn't like the outfit he wore. He told Mom, "I look like an old man!"

Congratulations, Turner!

Turner is 5

Turner has finally turned five years old. He thought this would never come.

He went to the doctor today. He has really grown. He is up to the 50th percentile in height now (42.5 inches) and 50th percentile in weight (41 lbs). Guess all those veggies are paying off.

You can his growth chart here or on the right side of the blog.

A week full of excitement

This has been an exciting week. Some of the excitement has been good. Some has not been so great. 

Tuesday, Mom's friend picked us up from school. We were expecting Mom, but she was at the emergency room with Turner. He was outside trying to make a car out of his scooter and a chair when they were getting ready to come pick us up. He stood on the chair to put his shoes on, and fell backwards. When he fell, he knocked his noggin on the cement/stone wall around our patio. Blood was dripping from his head, and he really screamed. Mom was scared and called our doctor, who told her to take him to the ER. By the time they got there, Turner was calm. They took great care of him, and he was brave. He didn't even mind when they stapled his wound shut! At the end of his visit, they let him keep the squirter they used to clean out his wound, and gave him a popsicle. Turner told mom he liked it there.

The good exciting news this week was Hazel and I won our school science fair! Hazel's project involved putting dirty, dull pennies in lemon juice and salt. She took some out after a few minutes and left the rest in for eight hours, then took them out and rinsed them. Every few hours she recorded what they looked like. Some turned green and the ones that were in the whole time that were rinsed turned shiny.

My experiment measured how quickly temperature changed when we put a 1/2 cup of sand and 1/2 cup of water (they were contained in measuring cups) in hot water. I had a good attitude about doing the work. Dad showed me how to make graphs with the results, which I really liked.

When they announced our names this morning on the school news, we were really happy! Mom, Dad and Turner came to watch us get our medals from the school principal. We are all really proud of our double win! Turner asked Mom if he can do one next year so he can get a medal too. So next year, we're going to see if we can bring home three medals! Hopefully we won't give Turner a complex by setting the bar so high.

One other good exciting thing that happened this week was a very cool Cub Scout overnight that Dad and I did. We drove to Dallas and got to spend the night in the Perot Museum of Nature and Science.

Our pack had rented out the entire museum, so right after dinner, we all had the museum to ourselves. First, we watched a really cool 3D movie about Sea Dinosaurs. We all kept reaching out in front of us trying to grab the things that came out of the screen! Then we watched a live science show. I was called up to be a volunteer and got to demonstrate how objects contract under heat. I held a rod with a metal ball over a butane torch and showed how the ball could fit inside a ring that it was bigger than just moments before. Dad was nervous seeing me so close to fire, but I did great. The show had lots of other neat things too, like freezing things in liquid nitrogen and then smashing them. Dad got mad when the woman running the show put her hand in the liquid nitrogen and then pulled it out quickly - he thought she was going to freeze her hand!

The room that Dad and I slept in

After the show, we had three whole hours to just explore the entire museum - all to ourselves! All of the exhibits that were usually full of people (10,000 visitors a day) were open to just us 130 scouts and parents. It was really cool.

My favorite things were controlling robots, riding an earthquake, racing a dinosaur, watching myself shoot a basketball in slow motion, challenging dad to a Predator vs Prey game, and looking at all of the dinosaurs. Finally, at 11:30pm, it was time to go to sleep. We got to sleep in the room with all of the dinosaurs. We were so tired from all that exploring that everyone went right to sleep.

In the morning, we had some snacks and headed back to Austin. It was a really exciting overnight.

Sufganiyot

Chanukah is coming up tomorrow night, so we thought we'd get in the spirit by making decorations and cooking some traditional Chanukah foods.

Turner and Dad made a chain about out of construction paper that was so long it stretched almost the entire length of the house.

Then we made Sufganiyot - which are basically jelly doughnuts. While they didn't come out looking exactly like the pictures I've seen, but they were delicious. Here are some pictures from today.