O'Rourke

Updated: with pictures. And click on the picture to the right to check out the rest of the pics.

For the weekend before Thanksgiving, we took off to Garner State Park, out in central Texas. It's about 5-6 hours drive and Cheryl was working Friday, so we left Saturday morning and arrived in plenty of time to set up camp and have a look around. It was pretty overcast and damp enough that it felt like it was going to rain, but we never got anything more than some drizzle on the windshield and no rain once we got there. We brought the bikes on the bike rack, so we took a spin around our section of the park. They have some really nice cabins there. A good option if we try to bring along some of our less out-doorsey friends next time. The first night was a little cold. I think it may have gotten down to the low 40's.We had the girls in 2 layers of PJs and 2 sleeping bags each, complete with hats and socks. Some of those little bodies don't hold heat too well. Cheryl & I stayed up and played cards by the lantern. Sunday, we did some hiking in the morning and drove around the rest of the camp on our way south to Uvalde. The kids & Cheryl got a decent nap on the ride, and we stopped at Wal-Mart to pick up a few things we forgot and headed back to camp. Not much to do in Uvalde.

Sunday night was warmer, but the card-playing was interrupted by a very persistent family of skunks. I guess they either know the end-of-weekend routine,

or sensed a big dropoff in camp activity level and decided the left-over feast was on. The girls were in the tent and we were playing cards at the picnick table and heard something behind us. I shined a flashlight over at the water faucet about 10 feet away and there were 2 skunks digging the the rock basin scrounging for post-dishwashing scraps.

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Well, everyone had fun at the pool. The girls spent some time talking to some army guys, telling them how their Uncle Dan was an army guy. Allison & Meghan got a good night's sleep, but Cheryl wasn't so lucky between a fire alarm with a battery that decided to die at 1:00 am and Mackenzie tossing & kicking her the rest of the evening. Fortunately she was with it enough to put the fire alarm, and not Mackenzie, in the bushes outside the hotel door.

Took off around 9am, stopped for lunch at McD's but it was raining, so they couldn't get in any leg-stretching time or a zoo trip so everyon elected to press on to Dallas, Ga to visit an old college friend. Yes, Maren I called you old.

Pulled into Maren's around 3:30 or 4:30 depending on if you're on central or easter time. The kids got to spend some time jumping on trampoline and running off the willies. Yay!

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The girls x 4 made it all the way to Hattiesburg, Mississipi. They were only planning on getting as far as Baton Rouge, LA and then stopping to go to the zoo. But when they got there mid-afternoon, the M&Ms (Meghan & Mackenzie) were asleep in the way-back, and it was raining. So Allison & Mom decided to press on through and see how far they could get. They made it to Hattiesburg by dinner time, and found a hotel with a pool and something to eat. Hopefully a dip in the pool will burn off some energy from being pent up in the car all day. The dual-screen DVD player was a big hit.

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