Texas 2

Coop and Mary and I rode this cute little train around the park in downtown Fort Worth:

Family style Mexican food with Grant, Mary, Trent, and Breccia:

Dessert (at a deli, not the Mexican place, but a picture of Coop's hot dog didn't seem exciting enough to include here):

Texas 1

First stop:  family style fried chicken with Aunt Mary and Grant!

We spent a couple of hours at the historic Fort Worth Stockyards:

We picked up a fancy $10 cowboy hat for Coop, which he wore for the entire week:

Long horn cattle!!!

A cowboy is never far from his hat...

En Route to Texas!!

As soon as Coop got out of school and I finished my grades, we headed out on a road trip to visit my Aunt Mary in Texas.  We took our time driving down there, stopping for lunch at PF Changs in Wichita:

Then on to Oklahoma City, where we visited the bombing memorial.  This is the survivors tree that was very very close to the federal building, but survived the bombing and is thriving today:

I hadn't planned to take Coop inside to the museum part, but he was interested in going.  It was spectacular.   They had just recently undergone a $10 million renovation, and it was worth it.  Amazingly high-tech museum with tons of information and absolutely intense exhibits of artifacts from the bombing:

After the bombing memorial, we went to dinner at The Melting Pot in the Bricktown part of OKC.

Cheese fondue!  And then chocolate fondue!  And a salad thrown in the middle for something "healthy."

At our OKC hotel, Coop wanted to work out a bit:

And the next morning, we hit the Science Museum of Oklahoma.  It was pretty crowded, with tons of school groups visiting that day, but we had fun:

After a quick lunch and a stop for gas, we hit the road and were in Texas before we knew it:

Mother's Day and misc

One afternoon, Coop and I played Mastermind.  He's actually quite good at it!  I was impressed!

For Mother's Day, I booked massages for Coop and I.  I was a little worried how that would go with a squirrelly 8-year-old, but it was lovely.  As Cooper said, "that felt aMAZing!"  Indeed.

For my Mother's Day gift, Coop picked a giant "You Rule" clothes pin.  It fits in perfectly with the giant pen, pencil, and post-in notes at my office!

Bedtime.  Man, I love this kid:

Selfie with Cooper:

All of the "treasures" Coop cleaned out of his jacket pocket before I washed it.  (About half went back in after the jacket was clean.)

Coop and his friend Henry at the KU Lied Center to see the Wild Kratts!

Coop and his friend Molly wrote a story called The Adventures of Jenny and Anakin (featuring Coop's snake Jenny and Molly's pet turtle Anakin).  They won the classroom book contest with it!!

During the last serious week of school, the students all presented reports for the parents.  This was the project (a giant drawing!) that accompanied Coop's shark report:

Board Break-a-thon!

Cooper's karate studio hosted a board break-a-thon to raise money for St. Jude's Childrens Hospital.  Coop raised a bit of money for the cause (enough to get a t-shirt!), and on the day in question, each kiddo got to break five boards:

All of the board-breakers with their stacks of broken boards:

Lyons and Easter

Coop and I drove back to Lyons for the Friday - Saturday of Easter weekend.  Kelly and her daughter Zoey were there, so it was fun to spend time with them.  The weekend kicked off with a rousing game of Monopoly.  Grandpa Cecil and Aunt Kelly are ruthless!

Gator ride (with Grandma Joan's crutches following her foot surgery this week):

We walked around the new library in Lyons and picked out a couple of books:

And I conned mom and Kelly into helping me stuff easter eggs for the egg hunt Cooper was having at our house on Easter Sunday:

 Some of the easter egg hunt crew (Coop's friends from school):

Crafts:

Eleanor finding an egg:

Sorting through the loot:

And admiring Jenny the snake:

Magic

Coop and I attended a magic show at Theater Lawrence:  Korso the Curious.  It was a small crowd in the lobby of the theater, and Coop volunteered to help demonstrate a trick:

Karate

Coop has been enjoying karate, especially the black belt training portion, which takes place after regular classes for 15 minutes.  In these pictures, he was working on a jump front kick:

He passed belt test last month and now has his yellow belt.  And he's going to move up to the 8-12-year-old class.

At the belt graduation ceremony, the Demo Team performed.  Pretty impressive kids:

Friends!

We spent one lovely spring day with our friends Gus and Eleanor, to whom we donated Cooper's "Own Car."  He was convinced he could still fit in it.  Barely.

The kids riding bikes / scooters:

Eleanor and I on a walk:

At the start of spring break, Coop and I headed down to visit Henry and Caroline.  We spend one afternoon at Crystal Bridges museum.  The boys making a Jackson Pollack painting:

Enjoying the sculpture art:

Alan's birthday

We went to a Mexican restaurant for lunch on Alan's birthday.  Cue sombrero and fried ice cream!!

For dinner, Cooper took Alan to the Mad Greek restaurant in Lawrence.  I bought a pre-paid VISA card for Coop so he could pay for the meal.  He was thrilled!

Ball python report

This week at school, Cooper gave a report he prepared about ball pythons:

Naturally, we had to take Jenny as a prop.  Coop was thrilled with the opportunity to show off his pet snake!!