Oklahoma is OK!!!

Hello friends!!! I am currently downstairs in our hotel in Oklahoma City while Jeff is upstairs napping with the kiddos. I'm actually doing laundry right now...we tried to be smart when packing and only brought enough stuff for like 6 days each - and knew that would mean we would have to do laundry in Oklahoma City and in St. Louis right before the wedding (on either Thursday or Friday morning). Anyway...I figured as I am having to wait for my clothes to dry...I could post a quick update on our trip. No pictures this time (there is no way to be able to download the pictures from the hotel's computer - oh yeah - we can't get our laptop to connect to their network...). Anyway...

We were on the road by 8:30am on Thursday morning (about 30 minutes later than I wanted...and about 30 minute earlier than Jeff expected...so it worked out well). The kids did GREAT!!! We had hoped to make it to Birmingham, AL...and we actually made it all the way to Tupelo, MS (which is about 2 hours farther). Now...it was 9pm (our time) before we actually finally stopped for the night...and close to 9:30pm before we all were going to sleep...but considering how long the kids were in their car seats they did fabulous!!! So...the next day...we decided to see if we could push the kids again and actually get to Oklahoma City on Friday night (rather than Saturday afternoon as we had originally planned). And we did!!! And we got here about the same time...maybe 30 minutes earlier... So after we got the kid's beds made and stuff kind of arranged - Jeff went over to his brother, Jerry's, house for a few hours while the kids and I slept.

Then Saturday morning, Jeff and the kids and I ran around for a few hours - visiting some of Jeff's old haunts and eating at a restaurant that he loves, Johnnie's hamburgers. However...before we even left for the morning...Kendall was playing in the room and fell over backwards off of a chair and almost split her upper lip (it was swollen rather large for a while and there was a trace of blood on the underside of it) and skinned up the area just between her nose and upper lip. Then...at lunch...I was bringing her into the bathroom to change a poopy diaper...when she got two fingers on her right hand smashed in the door...bad...she screamed and cried for a long time...but she could still bend her fingers so we didn't feel like we needed to bring her to a doctor. Rough day all in all for the little one...

That afternoon, we picked up Jerry's wife, Angela, and their daughter, Cheyenne, and they played tour guides and we went to the Oklahoma City Memorial. Let me tell you...it was so incredibly moving. I've seen pictures of it, of course, but it really is something to actually be standing there...and there are park rangers that will answer questions, etc...and to really try to picture where the Murrow building once stood...very humbling. Not to mention the empty chairs...one for each person that was murdered that day...including small ones for all the children that were murdered as well...

Then we met Jerry in Bricktown (kind of like the Landing in St. Louis, or Ybor City in Tampa) and had dinner. This is my first time meeting my brother-in-law...and let me tell you...there is DEFINITELY family resemblance!!! It is really kind of weird in a way...seeing so many of my husband's features on his brother's face...

Sunday morning we drove with Jerry and Cheyenne to Guthrie, OK, which is where Jeff was born. In fact...we even drove past the hospital he was born in...which is now closed...and boarded up...and looks like a building you would find in a horror movie!!! haha

Today, since Jerry and Angela had to work, we took the kids and Cheyenne (who is 14) to the Omniplex - which is a "hands on" science museum. It was so much fun and the kids (specifically Kendall) really enjoyed themselves.

Kendall and Carson have both really been little troopers...they've been such good little kids too...not too whiny or fussy...especially considering Kendall's day on Saturday...

Tomorrow we leave to go to Springfield, MO and we will (hopefully) meet up with a girlfriend I went to college with, Renee, and her family. If nothing else - we plan on driving around the campus and see if I have any memory left at all...it has been 12 years since I was last there...I honestly right now can't remember a thing!!! Then Wednesday we will head up to St. Louis and see a few more friends that night and on Thursday, before we head to the wedding on Friday. Hopefully I'll have an opportunity to update my blog once again later this week...but no promises...