Leaving Santa Fe

.............after leaving Meow Wolf, we headed back down south on the freeway.

Next stop on the adventure was going to be an old trading post, practically out in the middle of nowhere.  I had first seen this place because it's one of the train stops on the way to and from Santa Fe.  Unfortunately, the day we came by it was closed......but look at the history of this wonderful place. 

This was the day we visited

 

It was first opened in the 1880's. 

And this was the way it looked when I first saw it.

It was destroyed in a fire in 2001.

I'm hoping the next time I visit NM that it's open.  I just really, really love old historic buildings

 

A little further down the road was our destination......Tent Rocks

 

We hiked along for about an hour (1.5 miles) and just enjoyed the

gorgeous weather and the beautiful scenery around us. 

Shay took a picture of Aaron, I borrowed it from her FB page

because I can never get him to pose for pictures. 

 

Our 2nd group selfie for the day!

We got the Ranger to take a group picture of. 

(if you are wondering why I look like a prancing pony.....it's because my foot is up on a stump. 

I was trying to pose myself in a relaxing and interesting position -- and I failed!)

 

Just hiking along......what great exercise

 

We started walking back to the car about dusk and found a pile of fresh Coyote poopy right in the middle of the trail.  Looks like we may have just missed someone doing their business. 

It was definitely time to go.

We snapped this picture on the way back with the wind blowing in

our hair in the back seat of a car speeding down the freeway

 

The day ended with us picking up pizza and salad and headed home to have a couple of cold beers and playing card games again.

 

It was another fantastic day!

On our way to Santa Fe!

It's Monday and we had plans.  We got a slow start, but hey......we were all on vacation.

We loaded up the car and headed north to Santa Fe (about 1 hour drive).  We had fun plans for the day.

First stop:  New York Deli in Santa Fe.  They have the most amazing sandwiches and food.  Most of the items contain green chiles too.  We sat outside in the beautiful sunshine and enjoyed our lunch.  Some had French Toast, 1 had Rueben, and the last one had a Philly Cheesesteak Sub (which was one of the best I've ever enjoyed).

After lunch, we were headed to Meow Wolf.  What is Meow Wolf you might ask.  Well it's an old bowling alley and strip center that's been converted to this place that you can't even describe.  You are supposed to try and solve a mystery in a house and then you can walk through closets and fireplaces and it takes you into another dimension.  Here's a link if you are interested in seeing what this place is MEOW WOLF.  It's described as the house that art, fantasy, and mystery built.  It's definitely different.

 We sure do love this girlie!

 A nice lady offered to take a picture of us in the neon under the sea

 These bones make musical sounds when you hit them with the mallets. 

Shay and Paul had a good time in there......as you can see!

 Some creepy thing that Paul took a picture of

 Just resting in a pod

 How cool is this......walking out of a refrigerator?  There's a hallway behind me that goes into the other dimension.  It was funny watching people's faces when all of a sudden you come walking out of a refrigerator.  This was my favorite part in the whole house!

 Paul standing at the doorway of a very tall rabbit (and kinda creepy)

 Another nice lady offered to take a group picture of us in front of the creepy rabbit

 See what a gorgeous beautiful New Mexico day it was!

Our first selfie shot of the day (and certainly not our last!)

 

Well since this posting has gone on too long with so many awesome pictures, I will continue the rest of the day on the next one.........................

Sometimes you just need a lazy day

It was Sunday in Albuquerque.  We had no real agenda today.....so we just made it up as we went along.

Aaron's priority was seeing the Texans game and that meant going to a place that was showing it.  We chose Bubba's.  We went and had lunch and at half time, Paul and I decided to head to a casino.  Well actually, Paul didn't decide on it -- he was just being nice and letting me have a little casino action while we had an opportunity.

We drove 1/2 hour to get to one of my favorite's in Albuquerque (the Route 66 Casino) and maybe spent an hour there losing money before we decided to head back.

We met back at Aaron's and Shays and this time we all headed to Old Town Albuquerque.  This is an amazing place to shop.  Similar to the Plaza in Santa Fe, but we think it has better shops and much less expensive. 

We had a little thunderstorm hit us, so we all decided that a cup of hot chocolate was the first thing we needed before we stormed the shops.

But first we needed a group selfie......because our motto is "a group selfie every day"

 

Shay needs a new phone camera.....

And of course she had to have a selfie with her favorite buddy. 

He thinks she's just the greatest too!

 

We wandered around and purchased some New Mexico souvenirs and then it was time to head to dinner.  We were meeting up with Shay's father, brother, and father's girlfriend.  It was going to be the first time for Paul to meet her family.

 

We had dinner at Claim Jumper and had a wonderful time.  For some dumb reason we forgot to get a picture.  I can't believe we did that.......duh

 

Shay's brother was going to spend the night at the house with us so we stopped and bought Cards Against Humanity game and we stayed up for 3 hours laughing our butts off playing that game.

 

What a fun and chill day it was.

 

We will once again have to thank Shay for ALL the photographs today. 

For some reason, I never pulled my phone out and snapped anything.

We're back!

Got back last week from visiting the kids in the Land of Enchantment......New Mexico.

I have to honestly say that I really love visiting there.  I guess I never saw the beauty of that place, but everytime I visit.....it's amazing.  Of course, visiting the kids is our highlight.

We started off the morning with a selfie on the plane.  This is probably our last vacation this year (* insert sad face here * )  Sorry for the blurriness.....it was a little early for us!

 Yay!  We're going to New Mexico!

 

We landed, got our rental car and headed over to the kid's house.

After a quick tour of their home (it was for Paul since he'd never been there), we all were HUNGRY and we couldn't wait to start eating that awesome New Mexican cuisine.

 

The kids picked out a restaurant and we feasted on Mexican food topped with lots of green and red chiles.  I love New Mexican flat enchiladas.  There is something about that enchilada being flat and not rolled up that tastes so amazing.

 

Next stop was Central Ave.  Lots of shopping to do and fun to be had.

 

Paul found this one shop that he didn't want to leave.

I believe he really wanted to spend some money in there, but never got that opportunity.

 

We had to wait so long for him to get done shopping, that Shay wanted to take selfies.  I was told that we were going to act scared.....I played my part well.

 

This is the shot where I wanted to get out of the store, but Paul just kept shopping, and shopping, and shopping

 

After a HOT afternoon of shopping, we stopped off at Walmart and stocked up on a few things and headed back to the house.  Paul and I really needed a nap.

 

After a little refreshing sleep.......we headed off to the horse track and played a little at the casino there.  Didn't win anything off the ponies and didn't win off any of the slot machines either.  Boo!

 

It was a beautiful night to be at the horse track.  It was also a beautiful night to take a group selfie!

and another group selfie....................

The decision for dinner was to get a pizza.  Yum......we LOVE pizza!

We took the pizza home because we had games to play.  Paul and Shay picked out some crazy game where you wear these headbands and put cards on them and try to make your partner guess things.  This is what my crazy partner looked like with his headband on.

We sure did enjoy this first day in Albuquerque.  It was a great day! 

 

Have to give a shout-out credit to Miss Shaylene for most of the pictures in this blog episode. 

She was the one taking the most pictures on this first day.

There's a post coming......I promise

It's been crazy busy around this house and business lately.

I have a new post started about our adventures in New Mexico, but unfortunately some of the pictures Paul took did not download.

So......tomorrow is my day to get this task done.

Come back!

Well here's what we did the last week or so

Here ya go.......look at what we've been doing:

Remember when I posted about those delicious potatoes we had in New Orleans?  Well after some research......this is what they had been boiled in:

So I bought a small bottle and gathered some red potatoes and corn to boil up.

The zucchini was going to be prepared differently.

Paul likes this stuff so much.......that he found us bulk sizes of crab boil. 

WAY TOO MUCH for us!

However, I really love it when he sends me random pictures when he's out and about!

 

OMG......this is so yummy!  We cooked the zucchinni up with some onions and garlic. 

This crab boil stuff is so freaking delicious!

Of course, while I was working this week, my staff was sleeping close by.  If you look closely, you can see the kitty sleeping in the dog's bed.  The dog is so nice and polite and just finds  her own little space to lay down.

Paul snapped a picture of the new sign they just got at the strip center we are thinking about moving to.  They are reserving that second spot for us.  Seriously.....I'm not joking.  However, my husband would prefer having the top spot.

Cleaning out the room for our exercise room......we have stumbled across some sentimental items.
Like this valentine from Aaron.  Sure wish I had put a date on it......but I think it was when he was a freshman.....(just kidding!)

It is so much fun to stumble across these old pictures.......

 A soccer tournament to California which had an extended vacation with the Gordon's.....those were such fun times.

Our first time to Medieval Times in California.  I think Aaron is a little scared of the Queen.

My husband brought us home pizza the other night because we've been so busy doing things.

He seriously can come up with the best combinations!

Apparently no one wants FREE monitors. 

If they don't get picked up today.....we'll have to dispose of them.

 

The husband went to a yard sale down the street and came back with this.  New Mexico Mexican food is so delicious......probably one of my favorites.  Of course, every recipe in here calls for either red or green chile.  Can't wait for our trip there next week.

Things are moving forwards to our moving PZ.  The new landlord has made us an awesome offer towards relocating.....and we are seriously considering it.  Of course, there is still lots of discussion that we'll need to do, but that's what our hot tub is for.

Our last steamy hot day in New Orleans....Day 3

No definite plans for today, except we did have a couple of souvenirs to pick up.  We really took our time getting up this morning and headed out of the apartment around 10:30.  In our quest for souvenir shops, we first had to stop at an art gallery featuring Dr. Seuss art.  We had seen stuff like this in Lake Tahoe years ago and Paul spotted this shop and needed to check it out.  He's a Dr. Seuss nut.

We spent some time looking around and then headed off to find an adventure.  We walked towards the river with the intent of going to the aquarium.....although that didn't really excite us too much.

We did spend some time snapping pictures of the Mississippi and the boats that went by and of course....had to take some pictures of ourselves.

 I love this guy so much!

 It was so freaking hot.....my face is red.  At least there was a coolish breeze blowing off of the water

 This ship was HUGE.  The hugest ship I have ever seen and it was stacked with train cars headed to ??? 

Well after being out in the heat for awhile, we headed to the outlet mall that is along the river.  We spent some time in the AIR CONDITIONING just walking around and coming up with a plan.

The plan ended up being going to the IMAX theater next to the Aquarium and there we watched an IMAX movie about the Hurricane Katrina and the impact of the storm to their wetlands.  Interesting.

Now we were hungry and we had one place in mind.  Café Maspero......the place we had eaten at 2 years ago and had the BEST muffaletta we had ever had.

 Usually there's a line at the place, but when you eat lunch at 3pm.....not a problem.

We have eaten lots of Muffaletta's in our life and have declared that this is absolutely the best we've ever ever had.  Love these sandwiches.  We also had Red Beans and Rice as our side dish.

Next plan was to hit the casino for awhile.  Would be the last time for awhile before I could play in a casino and didn't want to miss my chance.

Passed a Sherwin Williams along the way........

 We spent a couple of hours in the casinos and then it was time to head back to the apartment to get our little break.  Of course, we had to snap our picture with Ignatius Riley......just like we do everytime we visit this city.

It was raining when we got up and out to Bourbon St., but that didn't matter to us.  We pretty much stuck to a couple of bars and moved when the rain let up.

Dinner was once again at 11pm and it was the same pizza place we had the night before.  Their pizza is really delicious, but probably one of the greasiest Pepperoni pizzas I'd ever had......but oh so delicious.

Lucky for us, we had a 1pm flight the next day so we didn't have to get up too early.  We called an Uber and headed for the airport about 11am.  Storms were in the area all the way from New Orleans to Houston so instead of our normal 45 minute flight, we had to divert south into the Gulf to avoid the storms and took us about 1.5 hours to get back.  No worries.

Great to get away.  Great to have fun, but 3 nights of New Orleans partying was enough for this old lady!