Sorry, Part 2

Alright I'm finally blogging again. It's been a long time and I'm sorry about that. We had vacation and we're working on our house trying to make it better and I've been going to bed late and just not having time to blog. So please forgive me.

I suppose I should start with our vacation. We had a great time. The driving wasn't a big deal at all. Grace was good throughout the whole trip and honestly I don't think she minded being in the car for hours on end. I can say for sure that she really liked the Leapster as she played with it basically the entire way from here to Omaha. The first time she took a break from it was three hours after we got in the car. Big hit!

As you can see from some of my cell phone posts, the Verizon network doesn't follow you everywhere like their commercials say. I took the picture 60 miles out of Des Moines and the picture didn't post to the blog until we were in Des Moines. Nice. Getting the picture to begin with was crazy. We were flying by these signs at 85 miles an hour and with the sun in our face trying to take pictures of these signs several feet off the road with a little cell phone camera - doesn't work so well. Even if the picture looked alright, I couldn't see it on my cell phone. The dialog went something like: "I can't see the sign" (in the picture), "Oh I got part of the sign here", or "I can't even see what this picture is." So we abandoned that idea and decided to stop on the side of the interstate and take a picture - effectively lengthening our trip to Omaha. Well, keep in mind that the sun is still in my face, I still have a tiny little camera phone and the sign is still like 20 feet off the highway. Not to mention the vehicles flying by at 85 miles an hour like we just were. I couldn't see the screen on my phone to see what I was looking at through the camera's lens. Heck, I couldn't even see what I had taken a picture of after I took the picture. I was just holding the camera in the general direction of the sign and hoping for the best. So the picture didn't turn out so well, but it was a picture and we started back on our way. Then I sent the picture, but the phone kept saying "Network unavailable." Nice. And I thought that Verizon network followed you EVERYWHERE. Isn't that what YOU get from the commercials? Can you hear ME now? NO!

Anyway, it took about an hour and the reaching of a major city for the message to finally go through. We stopped in Davenport for lunch and they have free wireless internet at the rest stops in Iowa so I brought my new laptop to the picnic table to test it out.



It worked just fine. Julie made some great sandwiches and we had a good lunch. But Grace didn't want to leave. Not sure why, but we got back on the road and we made it to Omaha in about 8 hours including stops. So we did good on that portion of our trip, just wish we would have left earlier...

We stayed in Omaha that night, all day Sunday and left on Monday morning for Denver with our Aunt. Julie's two Aunts live together and the one that didn't come with us still works but we got to see her Saturday evening and Sunday. I already mentioned that we went to the Omaha Zoo on Sunday. That place is incredible! It's huge! A little pricey, especially considering that you have to pay for everything inside as well. If you want to take the train it costs extra, the carousel for the kids; extra, and even the tram ride, you guessed it; extra. I believe it's 130 acres, so even one day probably isn't enough, especially if you only get around by foot. However, I highly recommend the aquarium. If you've been to the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago, then you know that it will take something pretty exciting to top that. I'm not saying this tops the Shedd Aquarium, but for what it is and how you get to experience it, this is great and you really should see it!

Pictures at the Omaha Zoo
Hailey and Grace:


Grace, Hailey and Hannah (and a Goat):


The three of us at the Zoo:


A gorilla "smiling" for the camera:


We went to visit a cousin and they weren't home, so we took this picture of all of us on their back deck (we're planning to send it in our Christmas card to them):


Unfortunately we got in too late on Saturday to go to Warren Buffet's favorite restaurant in Omaha and they are closed on Sundays. And when we came back from Denver, it was a Sunday so we never got to go. Maybe the next time we visit. We are actually planning to visit again just to see our Aunts. Not sure when, but we need to visit them more often and the ride isn't all THAT long.

The trip to Denver was pretty much the same as our trip to Omaha. It took about eight hours with stops as well. We got to our condo around 4 pm MT and got settled in before heading out for dinner.

Here's a picture we took at a restaurant we stopped to eat lunch at on the way. It was really good!


I'll have to pick this up tomorrow as it's late and I have to get Grace to gymnastics early tomorrow morning.