Arizona Tourists

Brian had to work all of October Break this year, so we couldn't make any big trip plans.  Which was really fine with me.  I was so craving a real break.  Meaning at home with no schedule.  Not going from crazy schedule to family vacation, then right back into the crazy schedule, except now you're even more behind on everything & buried in laundry.  So we hung out at home & truly chilled out.

But I wanted to do something to remember this October Break by.........

So I figured this was the perfect time to be

Arizona  Tourists!

I've wanted to do this for a long time.

Here we live in The Grand Canyon State and not one of our kids have ever even seen it!  Shameful. 

So this is our goal this school year.  To visit as many Arizona sights as we can through a series of daytrips.  Whenever we can fit them in.  All of those places I remember (or don't remember) learning about in Arizona History class long ago.

Destination #1......

Meteor Crater!

It's the best-preserved meteor crater on Earth!

OK.  So it's a big hole in the ground.

In the middle of nowhere.

But the light was beautiful out there.

And there was a gift shop full of rocks & fake gems that we could hardly get the boys out of.

And now we're the proud owners of several smashed pennies with a picture of meteor crater on them.

Who needs Disneyland, I ask you!

This is when Gus was proudly singing his Planets song at the top of his lungs.

I love how Max & Jake are so embarrassed & Zane's laughing his head off.

Because there were a bunch of people around. 

As it turns out, we aren't the only ones who thought it was a great idea to spend the day driving out to BFE to see a big hole in the ground.

It was pretty windy out there.

And with that light & the wind & Marlee's hair.......I just had to take some pictures!

I normally don't do much to my pictures in Photoshop.  Mostly just optimize them for the web.  But with all these pictures of Mars, I thought I'd try some different things.  Experiment a little.

Then we headed to  Destination #2.......

.....with Gus hanging his head out the window like a little puppy dog......

....and takin' it easy on  Route 66...

to

Winslow!!!

Where we  stood on a corner.

I'm telling you, the excitement was never-ending.

We even made some new friends there in Winslow.

Here are the boys just takin' it easy before our drive home.

And that sums up Daytrip #1.

Watch for more exciting memories of our Daytrip #2 when I get around to editing them.