Happy Birthday, America!

 


We hope you and your family enjoyed your 4th of July! God Bless America!

Johnson Space Center- Houston

 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 

Today we took our City Passes and found ourselves at the Johnson Space Center. We've been to Kennedy so it was interesting to see the differences and similarities. We took the tram tour and saw where the astronauts train, drove past Mission Control, played all sorts of simulations, and watched a show. It was a very kid oriented place, but ours were still just a bit too young to really appreciate it. I'd say it'd be ideal for a 8 to 12 year old. But we enjoyed seeing the grounds and were glad that we had the opportunity.

 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 

Misc.

 
 
 
 


I just had to add these first two photos. Outside the aquarium is a mini carnival type setting. There was live music this evening and the boys started dancing as soon as they walked outside! TOO CUTE!

And the last 2 photos are our room service desserts which we had when we got back. (I also ought to mention that we have had tremendous luck with our Hilton reservations on this trip. They have upgraded our rooms to suites for the entire trip. Last night was Jr suite with a king bed, a fold out couch, and it had 4 overstuffed chairs a desk and 2 flat screen tvs. NICE! Tonight and tomorrow night it's a 2 room suite with a true bedroom/bathroom and a separate living area with a large sofa, 2 chairs a desk a mini bar and another 1/2 bath! AWESOME!)

Houston's Downtown Aquarium

 
So after going to check into our hotel and resting, we went to our third and final venue of the day: The Downtown Aquarium. It's a rather small aquarium, but Ian really enjoyed it. They have a few touch tanks and several sea life exhibits and we walked through rather quickly since we had plans to eat upstairs at their restaurant. They also house a couple white tigers which seems odd to me, but I guess whatever floats your boat! We enjoyed our time and then went upstairs to enjoy some seafood and atmosphere and while we were finishing up I heard my name. And when I looked up, there was my friend from Pregnancy Weekly days and her husband. It was a glowing, pregnant Annette! I'm glad she noticed us and came over to say hello! It was a pleasant surprise!

 

Museum of Natural Science

 


After a quick lunch we walked over to our second stop of the day: The Houston Natural Science Museum. It had a great dinosaur/fossil exhibit that we really enjoyed. We also enjoyed the chemistry exhibit. Ian enjoyed pushing all the touch screen buttons and Aaron rode fairly patiently in his stroller. We skipped anything that cost extra money, but we wouldn't mind going back to check out just the butterfly gardens. We just couldn't justify it on this trip since we have so many places to visit with our City Passes.

Houston Children's Museum

 


Today we started off our day at the Children's Museum here in Houston. I had used a website to purchase our tickets from Citypass.com. I had used City Pass in other cities (San Francisco, NYC, and Toronto) in the past and had great luck and thought that Houston's venue choices were good. So off to the museum we went today! It was a lot of fun and the kids really enjoyed it. Ian LOVED Kidtropolis! It's a town where you work and earn money and spend money all with credit/debit cards and earning paychecks to deposit/cash at the bank or atm. Ian especially enjoyed it when Bill drove the police car and then saw Ian and grabbed him and stuffed him in the back of the police cruiser. Ian hasn't stopped laughing about that all day! The top floor houses a Tot Area for kids 35 months and younger. Aaron enjoyed the freedom to run around up there without getting run over by the big kids.

Southside Meat Market

 
 
 
 


So we're BBQ fanatics in our house! We haven't met a BBQ here in TX that we weren't willing to try. We've been to a couple out of the way places, but had heard that this little place in Elgin (which is right on the highway we were traveling) is really good and has a name for making some really tasty sausages. That's all it took to convince Bill that we should stop in Elgin on our way to Houston! We weren't disappointed. The sausage was great! And Ian enjoyed the icecream afterwards!