Familia Farias: January 2010

The worlds greatest invention...the portable dvd player!! Ryan was awesome on this very long trip. The only complaint is that out of all the movies we brought for him to watch, he only wanted to watch the same one over and over and over!!! Small price to pay though!! Jaina did okay, she didn't like being in the car seat for the long haul though, luckily Lupe was sitting with her so she was entertained for the most part. I wasn't expecting to be stopped and asked if we were United States citizens though....that was interesting!! I guess since we were traveling so close to Mexico, it makes sense, but they didn't even check ID's, not sure what the point was. Our first outing was to a little town called Cloudcroft, about 8000 ft above sea level and 20 degrees colder than Ernie's house!! Ryan was not a fan of the cold weather, and that is a huge understatement. It was a cute little town, but a little hard to enjoy when you're frozen! Then we went to a space history museum, a little version of JSC, but still pretty cool. One of Ernie's friends took us to a hanger on the base to get up close and personal with a F-22 fighter plane...a once in a life time, very cool experience! Then the guys went and bought some fireworks to celebrate the new year. We did sparklers and poppers in the garage....Ryan even held the sparklers...then we went out to an open field and did the big ones!! I stayed in the car with the kiddos, it was way too cold to have them out there, but we got a front row (warm) seat to the show!! the last thing we did was went to go explore White Sands. A desert full of HUGE dunes that I would have totally gotten lost in if it wasn't for the guys!! Ryan loved it, he was running up and down and all around....it was like a big sand box!! Then we were on the road again....back to San Antonio for a quick break, and sleep, and back home! It was very eventful, but now I understand what it means when people say that they need a vacation from their vacation!!