Sometimes I hate you, Blogger

There! I said it. And yes, I do feel better.
WHY must you give me all sorts of trouble? All I want is for you to publish for everyone else the way you look for me as I'm composing you. Is that too difficult?? Okay everyone, I have had it with this tonight and I'm just posting the way it is so you'll just have to scroll down a lot. Sorry about the annoyance. It wasn't me.
Okay, we've been back but who has time to post for like 3 days after they get back from vacation? Seriously, it takes me that long just to get all the clothes and crud put away.
As you may have read from a previous post we were vacationing in my hometown of Houston for a while. It is a major (unspecified) birthday for my Mom soon and we had a sweet family reunion in honor of her big day. We had an awesome time and did a ton of stuff. One of the first days I was there we went on a walk on a golf course by my brother's house and there was this cute little bird sitting on eggs right in the middle of the course. The kids loved it but were getting too close for comfort so the stupid bird was screaming at us and had absolutely the most annoying shriek ever.



































We hung out around my mom and dad's for a few more days and then all headed up to Artesian Lakes in Cleveland, Tx. We had two cabins right on the lakes and got to watch, feed, and annoy the animals below all from the convenience of the deck of our cabins.


































We saw birds, squirrels, turtles, an armadillo and most of all, these guys....


































And they were great entertainment for these guys....























And after a while we got bored with just looking at them so we fed the hotdogs, marshmallows, and perch (a small fish), strung and dangled on a vine. Then we saw some real action. This guy rocketed out of the water. It was awesome.
































The next morning we got picked up by a horse-drawn carraige to take us to a delicious buffet breakfast.



































And we saw a prehistoric turtle. Seriously, this thing was humongous (Texas-sized). Can you make out it's head? (It's grabbing the pole under us and it's nostrils are toward the top of the water.)
























Then we took some family pics.























And had a surprise b-day party for Gma.


































Next we were off to my parent's lake house in Longview, Tx. We went on boat rides, hung out at "the island", and sunk a few lures. Spencer caught a nice "rock bass" (i.e. an unidentified fish) with red eyes.


































And then back in the safety of Gma's house, Carter finally got to explore his curiosity of what it would be like to dress up like a fairy. And yet one more blackmail picture to add to the collection for future teenage Carter. (I'm RAKIN them in)