Keeping Up With The Corcorans

(Sort of) Remembering the Alamo and Other Things

On our last day in San Antonio, Curtis' cousins took us downtown to see the Alamo and the Riverwalk. The Alamo was pretty cool. Although I don't think the kids really cared about it too much. There were lots of groans when I told them they would be writing up a field trip report on the Alamo. :) Afterward, we went over to the Riverwalk and had lunch.

141 year old tree

This was Curtis' "oops, I didn't know I couldn't take pictures inside" picture. And Josh , as usual, won't look at the camera.

Bella is tooting into the cannon. Downside to having so many boys training my daughters. :)

Lily and me with our sweet cousin Laura.

Lunch on the Riverwalk

We went to a fun gourmet ice cream place. Silas is sure happy that he has outgrown his milk issues!

The Beach

On the second day of our vacation, we drove down to Corpus Christi to take the kids to the beach. It was kind of cool, misty weather and really windy. So it wasn't exactly "lounging on the beach and soaking up the sun" kind of weather. We drove to Mustang Island state park which is on the barrier island of Padre Island.

The surf was pretty rough and the tide was coming in so we were pretty nervous about our weak swimmer/non swimmer kids getting too far in the water. But they are adventurous and went for it! Thankfully nothing dramatic happened. :)

And....we're still cleaning sand out of everything. I washed a load of the clothes that we wore to the beach. And my dryer was full of sand. :( Eventhough it wasn't quite a beautiful, warm beach (more like the English channel!!) it was still fun to watch the kids' reaction to seeing endless water for the first time.

And here's the pictures. :)

San Antonio Vacation, Part 1

Well, we made it home from our little vacation to San Antonio. The kids are napping right now. I tried getting back into full swing with school today. Uh uh. That didn't happen. The kids are so tired and cranky from the trip. So I am letting them rest while I catch up on vacation laundry.

Planning the trip was a source of stress for us and we weren't really sure what to expect from the trip, to be honest. We are the kind of people that like to have everything planned well in advance, but because of our schedules, that just didn't happen. So we started to plan the trip two days before we left and made a mad dash to get everyone packed and out the door on time. Other than buying Sea World tickets in advance, we really had no clue what we would be doing when we got there.

However, once we got to San Antonio, things turned around. We stayed with Curtis' cousins, and they gave us a wonderful time and showed us such gracious hospitality eventhough our family completely overran their house! They tagged along with us and showed us around and told us about places we would never have found on our own. It ended up being a wonderful trip and now we are itching to get back there soon! :)

On the first full day in San Antonio, we went to Sea World. It was a fun time, especially for the kids. This year we have been studying aquatic animals in depth for school, so we thought Sea World would be a good way to end the curriculum and reward the kids for a job well done. Plus, Bella is kind of obsessed with dolphins.

While we were at Sea World, we participated in a special education program/behind the scenes tour of the beluga whales and Pacific White side dolphins. The educator gave the kids a tour and showed us the animals when they were working with their trainers preparing for a show. I think this was the highlight of the entire trip, not because of the beluga whales but because of how well the kids participated.

As the educator asked questions, our kids were able to answer everything because they remembered it from science this year. From echolocation to counter shading, to fusiform bodies, they knew it all. I was so proud of them. The educator was really impressed, too! This is a big deal for me, because we have struggled through school for several years and our kids haven't really been motivated. But this time they showed that they, indeed, had learned in school. Very happy time for me!! And the kids had fun as well! At the end of the tour, we all got to get a kiss from a baby beluga whale. :)

Since I am running on such limited time, I'm just going to post a whole bunch of pictures right now, and I will add captions only if necessary.