Back to Utah - Day 1, Kansas

As we planned our trip home, we were super excited to drive through Kansas and visit a little place called Humboldt, where David's grandpa grew up.  One of my favorite things about visiting with Grandpa is hearing about growing up on the farm, but I never imagined I would be able to visit Kansas and see it for myself.

On the way up to Kansas, we went through Norman. Oklahoma and stopped for a few minutes at the Oklahoma Sooners Football Stadium, of all places.  As we pulled in, David joked that maybe we would run into Landry Jones (I had no idea who this was, but assumed correctly that it was a Sooners football player).  Well, we got out of the car to walk around a bit, and lo and behold, the football team filed down the sidewalk into the stadium, right before our eyes.  That was a treat for my football-loving husband.

 A few hours later, we rolled into Hometown Country, Kansas.  David joked that it must be called that because the only reason people ever go there is because it's their home town.  The more we got acquainted with Chanute and Humboldt, the more I agreed with him.  I loved it!

We had no idea how to get a hold of Grandpa's family who still lived in Humboldt, as no one had any contact information.  So, we pulled into a gas station, found their name in the local phone directory (yes, those still exist), and rolled down the country dirt roads to the farm.  Google maps led us to a small bridge rather than a house, so we had to call the house to get directions.  The directions they gave were things like "Pass the cemetery on the left, cross the blacktop, and pass two telephone poles and there we are".  Well, apparently telephone poles are different from regular electric poles, and we ended up driving around for about half an hour before the got in their truck and came to meet us.  

It was great to see Uncle Willy, Grandpa's brother, and his niece and nephew who own his brother's old farm.  Paisley especially loved the farm.  She had so much fun there that by the end I felt like a terrible mother taking her  away from it, like I was taking her out of her true element to a bland and barren city.  She marveled at the real cows and horses, hugged and kissed the dogs, chased the cats, oinked at the pigs, lifted the feed buckets (or tried to), collected the rocks, climbed the tractors, explored the little playground, and ran from one wonder to the next taking in everything she could.  She screamed when we had to get back in the car again.  

Paisley had fun playing with Uncle Willy.

  

When David was small, he and his cousins took pictures on this very same tractor.  

Watch out, Paisley will mow you over! 

Uncle Willy, Christy, Rick, Paisley, and my lesson to stand up straight for pictures.

This is the farm where Grandpa lived while he went to high school.  Unfortunately this one has since been sold, so we could only get pictures from afar.  

After eating at the Benchwarmer's Bar & Grill, we headed to Wichita, where we spent the night.

Back to Utah - First Stop, Dallas

Much to David's devastation, August 9th marked the day we left our Austin home and embarked on our trip back to Utah.  But we had one big, important stop to make first: Becca's house in Dallas.

After a whole summer of no Becca, I was in serious need of some good quality Becca time.  So we planned to take the long route home, stopping for a day in Dallas, and then continuing up through Oklahoma City, Kansas, and finally Colorado before hitting Utah.  It was so much fun to see Becca and meet her amazing family.  They totally spoiled us!  We hit the water park for Paisley, then enjoyed amazing ribs smoked in the back yard by Becca's brother Chris, and Becca even gave me an amazing pedicure and foot massage.  Let me tell you, fewer things are more enjoyed by a pregnant woman!  Paisley had a blast playing with Becca and her family.  I think if she could she would adopt Becca's dad as a grandpa.  They got along great!

Paisley playing with Auntie Becca at the water park.

I'm just realizing now that we had such a good time there that we forgot to take a lot of pictures.  On the way out, though, we did stop by the Allen High School football stadium.  Becca and her sister told us about this $60 million high school stadium, so naturally we had to stop there on our way out at sunrise and grab a picture.  It holds 18,000 people and somehow, it is only the 5th largest high school stadium in Texas.  Nonetheless, Here she is.

Florida, San Antonio & The Offer

As mentioned in a previous post, David went to Florida for a convention to wrap up his internship.  For these 4 days, he was forced to stay in the Disney World Resort, eat their delicious food, and play on their rides.  Here are some pictures of him, hard at work.

The view from his hotel.

Oh yah, they did have to attend some meetings as well.  These were actually what David couldn't stop talking about when he came home, because the speakers were really interesting and inspiring.  The chairman and CEO of Ernst & Young, Jim Turley the owner and CEO of Skull Candy, Rick Alden, and some performers including M.C. Supernatural, The poor guy, he had a rough week.

Meanwhile, while David was in Florida, I was back home taking care of our newly broken car window and other results of our car break-in.  We got it all cleaned up just in time to go back to San Antonio for a day and meet up with my friend Breanne.  I love spending time with her.  We spent the morning visiting the different missions in San Antonio, including the Alamo.  It was really fascinating to see what these Catholic friars and missionaries built, how it affected the native Americans and others in the area, and they part it played in making Texas what it is today.

A lot of the Catholic churches built in the missions have been restored and are still used today.

The Offer

The Monday after his return from Florida was David's final day of interning.  He went in in the morning as usual, met with the partners, and received a full-time offer to return to Austin and work with the company next fall.  So, that's what we're doing!!  David is excited to start his career with EY, but I think he's even more excited to live in Austin.  In fact, he was not very happy about having to leave Austin for the next year to finish up school.  Here we go, nonetheless, back to Utah for another year of adventures.

Austin Eats: The Finale

I really have to give more credit to David for this blog.  Not only does he brighten up and make fancy our pictures and write once in a while, he also motivates me to write when my motivation is lacking.  This is no small task.  So, thanks to him, here I am after a few weeks with some things to catch up on.

Hey Cupcake.  This is yet another one of Austin's little gems.  It started out as a shiny silver trailer on the side of the road, selling delicious cupcakes.  It continues as a silver trailer, and has expanded to other locations around Austin as well.  Of course, we chose to visit the original trailer location.  The cupcakes did not disappoint.

The week before we left, there were still many places to check off on David's list of places to eat.  We chose the very best ones and David would be very disappointed if I left any of them out, so let me breeze through our last few Austin restaurant reviews.

Matt's El Rancho was sort of an upscale Mexican restaurant compared to some of the trailers we've eaten at.  Their big claim is that they make everything absolutely fresh from scratch, right there in the restaurant, including the chips they serve in abundance before your meal comes.  The freshness was evident and the food was good.

Franklin's Barbecue.  If you're ever in Austin with a craving for BBQ, and have a few hours to wait in a line for food, Franklin's Barbecue is absolutely the best.  It opens every day at 11 a.m. and stays open until they sell out of food, usually around 1:30 p.m.  If you go on a Saturday, be prepared to arrive early in the morning and wait in line until it opens.  On a weekday, you can arrive slightly later, which is why we waited till David's internship ended, so we could go on a Tuesday.  We got in line at 9 a.m. and there were two people in front of us.  By 9:30, quite a line was forming, and by 10:15, the line looked like this, wrapping around the building.

 They started taking pre-orders around 10:45 to get an idea of how many people they would be able to serve, and for those unfortunate souls who were too far down the line, they would have to come back another day.  You might be thinking, 'What food is really good enough to stand in line for 2 hours in the Texas heat with an antsy toddler for?'  And here is your answer: Franklin's Barbecue.  It certainly won't be a place we visit regularly, but we're definitely glad we stopped there while we had the chance.

The smokehouse out back.   It may not look like much, but magic happens here.

You may notice a small family in line with a little boy, sitting on chairs.  Paisley discovered this little boy in her wanderings and played with him for a few minutes.  Then, worn out from all the walking around and waiting, she climbed up on the boy's father's lap, snuggled herself into a comfortable position against his chest, and threw her arms back in a 'woe is me' manner.  I might have been very uncomfortable if it wasn't so funny.  Needless to say, Paisley's not shy.  

Franklin himself.  

And the food.  WAAAAAYYYYY too much.  It ended up serving the three of us for two days, including when we had our friends over for dinner the next day.  

Austin Cake Ball.  The day before we left, we remembered David's co-worker mentioning a place called Austin Cake Ball, and thought if we were going to try it, now was the time.  They were amazing.  Way too expensive, but amazing nonetheless.

The Break-In

Preface
As much as David hates to think about it, his internship has finally (almost) come to a close.  This week EY shipped him off to Florida, where he and all the other EY interns from this year have "training".  This means good food, Disneyworld, and apparently some meetings.  I think it will be a rough week for him.  Anyhow, he comes back on Saturday, Monday is his last day of work, and then we're off to Utah soon after!

Some of you may remember how rough it was for me when we first got here and David had to leave for Dallas for a week.  Well, I didn't feel as bad about him leaving this time, now that I know the city fairly well  and don't feel so cooped up in the house all day.  We have a pretty good routine now, plus I have some things to get done in preparation for leaving, so that should make the time pass quickly.  I was (and still am) feeling pretty optimistic, really.

The Break-In
So this morning we got ready to drop David off at the airport.  Just before it was time to leave, I went out to bring the car around from the covered garage where we park it, to the side of the apartment complex.  Imagine my surprise when I go to open the driver's door only to find this:

Shattered window, obviously.  You can even see a little patch below the
window where the cop lifted fingerprints.

That's right, our car was broken into.  The window was smashed, a whole dollar's worth of change strewn across the seat, and everything from our glove box stolen, which was basically our owner's manual, registration and phone chargers.  Whoever chose our car of all the cars in the garage must have been pretty disappointed!

The Lesson
Well, I tell this story not so much to complain - I did plenty of the the last time David left - as to tell what happened in spite of our little stroke of bad luck.  Admittedly, for a moment there I started to think things like 'Of course this would happen to us right now'.  I even found myself cursing all the homeless people and ruffians in Austin, thinking it must have been someone like that.  I know, I'm horrible.  HOWEVER over the course of the day, the following happenings helped me change my attitude:

• The maintenance workers at our apartment complex offered to take David to the airport, saving us from having to drive there with a missing window and shattered glass everywhere, and allowing me to be able to call the police and take care of things properly.  Throughout the day they continued to ask how things were going and if I needed anything.
• I never got to feel sorry for myself that I was having to do this without David, because I had family members calling all morning, offering help and keeping me company.
• The police officer who came to check for fingerprints was kind and happy, and even lifted Paisley's hand print from the car and gave it to us as a little souvenir.
• When I found out Mini of Austin wouldn't have our window in until the next day, I was concerned about parking it in the garage overnight again with a window missing for fear of any further vandalizing.    In the afternoon, I dropped off the car at Mini, and prepared to make the 1.5 hour bus trip home, plus 30 minute walk to the bus stop.  To my eternal gratitude, the man helping me offered to have a Mini employee drive us all the way home! This also saves me from having to wait there for hours tomorrow, with a sleepy toddler, while they fix the window.
• Everyone we came in contact with, whether in person or over the phone, was just extra helpful and warm.  

These things may not seem like much, but as a result what could have been a tiresome and unpleasant day turned into something quite different.  Instead, it was a reminder to me that while bad things happen sometimes, life is still good.  And while there are people out there who do bad things, I should never fall into the mindset that people are bad.  I like the way Anne Frank said it: "In spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart".  I suppose if she could believe it I certainly should!    

So, at the end of this long and unusual day, I just have to say I'm grateful.  For family, for good people, for life's strange lessons, and just for the gift of life in general.  It sure is an adventure.