Friday Fun Day: Aquarium

I love having 3 day weekends!  We're calling the Fridays Brad has off, Friday Fun Days.  A day to just have fun as a family and not have to worry about errands and chores that can some times take away the weekends.

So this last Friday Fun Day we used up another one of our Houston City Pass (we bought this pass when we went to NASA and has some of the top 5 Houston attractions on it) and we went to the Aquarium.

The Aquarium was alright.  Lots of fishes in fish tanks.  They had all sorts of aquatic life from the crocodiles, electric eel, to octopus's, local gulf of mexico life, to exotic coral reefs. The boys really liked it.

haha Tanners face!

At the end of the Aquarium for their grand finale they had a female white Tiger.  Not sure what a white tiger has to do with aquatic life, but she was there anyway and the boys thought she was so cool.

We also got to pet the stingrays.

Outside the Aquarium was where they had some rides.  We were able to go on a train ride that takes you through the center of the shark tank.  They also had a carousel and a Farris wheel.  Unfortunately we were only able to ride the carousel once before we got rained out.  Carson was really disappointed he didn't get to ride the  Farris wheel.

I'm loving these fridays.

4th of July

And I'm proud to be an American,where at least I know I'm free.And I won't forget the men who died,who gave that right to me.~Lee Greenwood

It was a wonderful 4 day weekend, and we took full advantage.  

This was our first year that we've been able to by fireworks.  They were illegal in Arizona up until a two years ago, but even then they were always banned because of fire dangers.  So we took advantage and went to a fireworks stand to get our supply.

To celebrate the 4th of July we had a BBQ/pool party with our new friends in the ward, the Millers.  They moved in the same day we did so we had that instant "were both new and don't know anyone" bond.  We thought the pool was going to be packed, but we actually had it all to ourselves.  It was quite nice.

We later watched the fireworks just up the street from us.  It was nice having them so close.  We had a great spot by the lake, and the fireworks didn't disappoint!  Carson loves fireworks, always has, so he was in heaven.  Tanner did great last year, but this year he was scared to death!!  The fireworks were close to us so they were extra big and loud.  When the first firework went off Tanner about had a heart attack and let out a "I'm going to die" scream.  During the entire show he had the tightest death grip on me and just buried his head in my chest so he didn't have to watch the horror that apparently was the fireworks.  Brad and I thought it was hilarious how sacred he was.

The next day we went to one of our community pools.  Carson loved the frog slide.  After the pool Brad took Carson on a fathers son date to see Despicable Me 2.

Then on Saturday we went to Galveston beach for the first time.  We live about an hour to an hour and a half (depending on traffic) away from the beach so we need to take advantage!  Everyone we talked to however, told us we would be disappointed about the beach.  "They're not California Beaches" they told us. So I thought it would be a rocky beach.  One that we couldn't even play at, but it was not like that at all.  The water is a little murky from sediment from the Mississippi River, and the sandy beach has a lot of seaweed, but thats it.  It was a lot of fun!  Carson loved the waves and building sandcastles, and Tanner loved to destroy said sandcastles.

Carson makes friends wherever we go!

We're going to have lots of fun times at the beach! 

Such a fun filled/exciting weekend!

NASA

We went to NASA.  As in the "Houston, we have a problem" NASA.  It was at the top of my list as places to see when we first moved here.

Brad gets one day off a month (of his choosing) so in June, Brad took a Friday off and we decided to take a break from house projects and we went to NASA.  

They have a kids area of Angry Bird space that encourage and excite kids about science.  Carson loves playing Angry Bird space on the ipad and loved playing in the gigantic playground. 

 Brad and I liked looking at the history of NASA.  We both have a little fascination for NASA.  My sisters and I loved the movie Apollo 13 growing up and watched it all the time.  We even went to space camp one year and got to pretend to be astronauts or in mission control.  Katherine got to be a pilot where I was the person who did the countdown and pressed the "go" button for liftoff.  Brad has actually met the mission control director for a lot of the Apollo Missions (in the movie Apollo 13 he was played by actor Ed Harris).  

the Astronaut Gallery (pictures of all the astronaut teams)

 We went on a tram ride to see the Space Training Facility as well as the Saturn V.

The Saturn V is the rocket that launched all the Apollo missions to the moon. It was fascinating to see how huge it was, but at the same time how little of it was for the Astronauts.  As exciting it would be to go into space I don't think I could live in that cramped of living quarters.

We even got to touch the moon!

When we went to the Pima Air and Space museum they had a moon "rock" it was more like a pebble, but it was worth millions.  Here they had actual moon rocks that were a decent size.  I wonder what the price tag is on these...

It really was a fun day, and I can't wait until August when Brads work schedule changes and he will get every other Friday off so we can do more fun things like this on his day off.