Houston!

We made our annual trip to Houston this weekend. Aunt Amy and I took Ava to visit our dear friends/old college roomie. We've had this tradition since college for about 10 years now! We always have a good time although with our little ones our fun look way different than it use to. We use to wander around the city, not having set plans, staying out late, sleeping in. These days we have to have some more plans to our adventures, they revolve around nap times and kid friendly locals, earlier bed times. We still have fun even though it looks different and we now have the added blessing of watching our kid's friendships grow with each of these visits! 

(One of my most cherished friendships is of my dad's college roommate's daughter. We visited each other each year when we were growing up and formed a life long friendship ourselves. I love the idea of Ava also having deep rooted friendships that she is already developing!)

Ava did great on the road trip portions, we only had one incident of uncontrollable crying for no reason  Amy or I could find other than that it was smooth sailing. I did some reading online on tips for road trips with toddlers before we went. One of the best things we did was go pick out a bunch of library books, that way on the trip when we pulled them out they were new and novel to her and she spent lots of time looking through them.

Friday we went and fed ducks and played at a park before. Ava loved the ducks, she got her finger nipped by one toward the end which she did not enjoy but overall she loved it. 

We then went to Cafe express for lunch which I always enjoy eating at when we're in town. Then we walked over to a splash pad near there.

Post ducks, playground, and splash pad morning, the girls crashed on the drive back.

 That night we had Mexican (another Houston must when we are in town). Ava wanted to try the salsa, she ate some small bites and seemed to like it, So I got out my camera to video this for Ryan as she rarely tries new foods on her own and seemed to be enjoying the salsa, then right as I am videoing she takes a big bite and started to cry, we couldn't get her to take a drink so she started coughing uncontrollably and threw up right there in the restaurant. She finally took a drink and calmed down. It was funny and sad all at the same time. After that ordeal, she asked for more salsa again but I wouldn't let her have anymore, crazy girl!

Bath Time!

Saturday we went swimming at their neighborhood pool and went downtown in the evening to a little out door festival they had. We ate at a great place called Barnaby's and got to meet up with our friends the Meredith's who use to live in OKC and recently moved to Houston. They had a live band downtown and the girls had a great time dancing. Us big girls did some shopping, several us bought dresses at a great booth that had tons of vintage dresses for sale.

Sunday we enjoyed worshiping at their church. I always enjoy the singing there, Ava did too, she kept asking a different times if we could sing more when they were in between songs. 

Our traditional post church girl picture. 

We stopped by Willies for lunch on our way out of town. Genius idea, they had a large sand area for kids to play on their patio. We got visit pretty uninterrupted and had a great last meal. 

Today we are getting back in the swing. Ava went to MDO for the morning while I ran some errands and did some work. Now she's napping and its time to get us organized for the rest of our week before we head to Texas again on Friday. Happy Monday!