Musings on life, parenting, Jesus, and more...

We flew into Denver last Saturday and now Thursday night we are back again, this time with the RV. We planned to crash in a Walmart parking lot overnight but Walmart’s in Denver are not friendly. Rob drove until late while the rest of us slept and tried at least 3 Walmart’s going through Denver before finally giving up and resorting to a Target parking lot north of the city. He said one parking lot even had some sort of police surveillance van in the middle of it. 🤷🏻‍♀️ Here’s the circle we’ve made around the mid-west over the last 5 days 👆🏼and my handsome co-polite who loves to come chat my ear off when he gets bored in the back with the girls 👇🏼 A stop along the way at a random playground that happened to have an amazing swing! The kids played while I cooked up steaks, mashed potatoes and gravy, and Caesar salad.  And that’s it for Colorado pics folks. We were just passing through this time. Yellowstone bound!

We didn’t see much of Texas, but it was probably one of the funnest stops of the trip so far for the kids. The night before, we made a Walmart run and picked out some fun colors of spray paint. Then first thing the next morning we drove out to the Cadillac Ranch, a field right outside Amarillo where 10 Cadillac’s have been buried nose down since the 1970’s. Kenton had fun finding the cans that still had some left in them, and then finding a matching cap. He also did lots of painting and helped me cover up some negativity left by others.  Jenica and Tenley had fun painting too. When we were leaving, there was a guy set up outside the gate selling souvenirs made from the paint chips that have fallen off the cars. We bought a keychain from him for our keepsake jar back home. I also decided when we got there that it would be the perfect place for my second #cleanupchallenge  🎨  I read in the Google reviews that there were spray paint cans left behind, so I brought a couple ...

We just cut through the very top corner of New Mexico on our way from Texas into Colorado, but thanks to google maps, we were able to see that there was a national monument along the route where the kids could earn another junior ranger badge. Capulin Volcano is an extinct cinder cone volcano that last erupted between 55,000 and 62,000 years ago. Unfortunately we couldn’t drive the RV up the road to the rim of the volcano but we were able to do a short hike at the base and see some pretty views. I had Tenley take this picture for me so I can remember these moments. One of Kentons favorite things to do when we are out exploring as a family is to hold Mommy AND Daddy’s hand at the same time. Kids need to know that both their parents love them, and I’m so glad that we can give our kids these experiences even though we are divorced.

We rolled into Oklahoma City Monday evening and decided to stop and see the Memorial for the 1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building. I was living about 5 hours away near Branson, Missouri when it happened and remember seeing it all over the news. 168 people were killed and many more injured. The suspects were aprehended and authorities learned that they were acting in retaliation to the governments actions at Ruby Ridge and Waco in 1992 and 1993. One was sentenced to death and was executed in 2001. The other received life in prison. A friendly security guard offered to take our picture and told us it was a tradition for kids to dip their hands in the water and leave their handprints on the wall, so that’s what we did. We spent the night in the Bass Pro parking lot, which was right next to the Bricktown area of downtown OKC.  The Bass Pro shop itself was a fun way to kill an hour or so the next morning while Rob worked.  The kids loved trying out all the trackers...