Oklahoma day 3

On the last day we drove up to the top of Mount Scott to check out the view and do some more rock climbing. Then we went to the parallel forest. The kids had a blast running around in the forest, playing hide and seek. At one point, Eric hid behind Dan. Apparently, it was the best hiding place ever. Hannah and Emily looked right at him like, 10 times before realizing he was there. Clara, on the other hand, found him right away and stood there trying to figure out what was wrong with the other two. We got to see some longhorns close up. I got within about thirty feet of them before turning back. The only thing between us was some underbrush. After that, we had a picnic lunch and headed home. Some other things we did over the weekend that I didn't get pictures of were seeing prairie dogs, seeing all of the bison and longhorns as we drove around the reserve, and this weird church called the Holy City, where they have recreated scenes from the life of Christ and put on a big pageant every Easter.

The intrepid explorer

Emily taking off to "hide." Really, she just wanted to run as far as she could.

finding Eric with no problem

She had NO clue that he was right behind her when I took this. Lol.

Oklahoma day 2

The next day we went into the Wichita Mountains Wildlife refuge. We started at the visitor's center which had lots of taxidermied animals to show the local wildlife, and then we headed into the mountains for a hike. The mountains there are really cool looking. They look like a giant came along and made a big pile of rocks. I don't think I've ever seen anything like it before. Because the path was so rocky, we made Clara stay in the backpack, which she was NOT happy about. She liked it at first, but when she realized she was missing out on climbing rocks, she got mad. But since the older girls were having trouble navigating the terrain, we just put up with the tantrums. We stopped for a snack in the bottom of a ravine. It was really beautiful. I don't think the pictures fully do it justice.

This is one of my favorite pictures of Hannah, EVER.

Oklahoma vacation day 1

My mom's Christmas present was a family vacation. We decided to go to Oklahoma, to a place that is just north of Fort Sill, which just happens to be where I was born. We moved away when I was still a few months old, so this was the first time I've really seen the place where I was born. The base actually sits up against the highway, so we drove by it several times. The first day of our trip we left around lunch time and got there around 3. We got there about an hour ahead of my brother, so we headed into the little boom town to walk around while we waited. I'm glad we did, since we didn't get a chance to go back and the kids had such a great time. These were also the best pictures I got of the girls during the trip. They loved walking over the water on the bridges, and Clara spent the whole time giving me heart palpitations by trying to fall in the water.