Lake Brownwood State Park - August 14-17, 2014

We made a kind of last minute decision to take a camping trip this weekend!!!  :-)  Daniel had a job he had to be at in San Angelo on Friday.  His Thursday was pretty clear and ours was able to be cleared so we decided it would be fun to find somewhere towards that direction to go camp out.  This way he wouldn't have to get up so early Friday morning to get to his job, and we could have a fun camping weekend!

So we decided on Lake Brownwood State Park.  This was a really neat park!  They still have a LOT of CCC structures all around the park.  There were hiking trails that ran along bluffs around the perimeter of the lake.  The lake was down about 15 feet (so we heard) but thankfully it is a huge lake and there was still water in the lake (last year we went to San Angelo state park only to discover that it's lake is completely dried up)!  It was kind of sad though to drive by and see lake front properties with boat docks that cannot be used due to the low levels.  That area of the state really really needs rain!

The kids did road school on the way on Thursday!  And then Friday morning when Daddy left we went on a fun hiking trip.  We came back to the camper for lunch and finish up what school we didn't get finished on the road Thursday (mainly due to the fact they found it hard to concentrate in the car), rested with a movie, and then we went swimming (in the lake of course).  Daddy got back right at supper time!  We enjoyed the rest of the time with him.  We went hiking some more, hung out at the camper, watched movies, and even went for a trip to town to get ice cream!  It was a nice weekend!

Here are some picture highlights of the trip!

 Hiking our trail on Friday morning

 Good spot to stop for a photo!

We stopped at one spot of our hike on Friday that was nice and shady and sat down and drew some prickly pear cactus (they were ALL OVER the park) in our nature journals.

 Alyssa's cactus

 Seth's drawing

 My drawing

 Aaron's drawing

 kids swimming in the lake

Our camping spot had a nice view of the lake - and it faced west so we got to see a beautiful sunset every night!

On Saturday we went around and checked out some of the neat CCC structures around the park.

 Seth was tired!

 This was the top of a huge stair case that led down to the lake (and of course we forgot to get pictures of the stair case as we went down)

On Saturday evening we took a hike and enjoyed the sunset as we walked along!

 And of course Seth HAD to find a tree to climb!

 The kids enjoyed riding their bikes!  I think Alyssa has plum worn out her tire on her bike!!  In fact the whole bike is in bad shape!  I think she is ready for a new one!

The boys decided to put their bikes on "display". 

I am glad we made the decision to go!  We had a really fun time!

Until next time,
Kellie

2014 Summer Vacation

We just recently got back from a 10 day, 2,000 mile RV trip to Arkansas and Tennessee.  We had an AWESOME time made many new memories.

Here are some picture highlights from our trip :-)

Our first stop was Crater of Diamonds State Park in Arkansas.  The kids were so excited about going here to dig for diamonds!  What we found out really quick was that it was very hot work to dig for diamonds.  And it wasn't too rewarding either :-(  But they still had fun!

This has to be my favorite picture of the entire trip!  Seth was serious about digging for some diamonds!

The cool thing about Crater of Diamonds that we discovered was the awesome little water park they had!  We spent an entire afternoon there!  The deepest part was only 3 feet so the kids were able to run and play and go down water slides!  They had a ball!!

From there we went to Mt Magazine State Park!  It was BEAUTIFUL!!!  We had a ball there!  In fact on one day we hiked 4 1/2 miles there and then went over to Mt Nebo and hiked probably another 4 miles there!  It was a fun day!

On our last morning there I made up a new recipe - smores pancakes!!!  I added mini marshmallows and chocolate chips to the pancake batter!  They were super yummy!!  In fact everyone requested them again on our very last morning!

From Mt Magazine we went to Tennessee to Natchez Trace State Park.  We had a family reunion with some of my father-in-law's family.  We stayed there for three nights.  We fished, the kids swam in the lake, and we ate lots of super yummy food!  But low and behold!  Can you believe that we did not get ONE picture of our time there?!?!  OMG!  I guess we were just having too much fun!  (There could be some pictures on hubby's phone....)

After TN we came back to AR and went to Blanchard Springs Cavern!  Oh how the kids loved this cave!!  They had an awesome time!  We actually took two tours of the cave.  The first tour went deep into the cave and had 700 steps!  (and I really didn't get any good pics from that tour).  The 2nd tour stayed more along the top...not as many steps but many more formations!  There was also a cool spring there as well.

 Did we find the Titanic??? 

We actually stayed at Buffalo Pointe National Park, which sits on the Buffalo River.  It kind of reminded me of the New Braunfels of Arkansas.  There were all kinds of people tubing and canoing down the river.  We did go to one spot and let the kids play in the water.  Even though the water was COLD they still had a ball.

Well that is the highlights of our fun fun vacation!!!

Until next time,
Kellie