Duke Family Vacation 2010...Day One

Well today was the first day of our vacation and I am lucky enough to have access to a laptop and the internet so I figured I would go ahead and update...Our first day was a trip to the beach.  Weve been here before so you'd think we would be a little more prepared...Well...atleast we had our bathing suits!  Chairs...nope.  Umberella...nope.  Sand toys...nope.  Frisbee...nope.  Oh well.  Lane and Layla still had a blast.  This was Layla's first time BTW.  We started out at the pay to park Stewart beach because they had SHOWERS!  We then left there and went to free beaches and got all dirty AGAIN...without showers.  It was OK with me but Jackie didn't really dig the 2 hour ride home while she slowly marinated in fresh Galveston sea water.  Anyway...we had fun.  Here are the pictures:

Heres our "sand castle"...the kids liked it.

They liked being buried in sand.

lane had a lot of fun jumping in the waves.

Layla was still trying to get used to the waves...they usually bowled here right over.

Lane wanted to catch a sea gull...he called them seagles.

And a little History...It looked like Galveston is coming back nicely from Ike.  There are still numerous signs that a major storm has devistated the area but if your not really looking you may not even notice.  The only pics I got were of the old Balinese Ballroom that was next to Murdochs (which they've rebuilt).

How it looked pre Ike...

This is the Balinese room in 2006

 Now it's just a 4 X 8 pergola with the folowing sign...

Hold The Phone! Stop the Presses! I found more pics on the camera!

Aunt Courtney's birthday dinner was fun for everyone...



Lane got to ride a horse with Uncle Jay...Layla was scared to death of the horse...

Didn't take him long to lose the clothes and find the water...

Casen probably thought these two were crazy kids!

Here are a few pictures from the park:

UPDATE! IT'S HOT OUTSIDE!

Just thought I'd share the fact that it's hotter than a stolen tamale out there...weve been trying to keep cool around here.  Lot's of playing in the sprinkler...lot's of popsicles...lot's of suckin up the AC.  We haven't been too busy outside of work and Jackie playing kickball on wednesday night's we haven't done much in the way of fun.  We went to the Texas Reds Festival again this year...I think it was hotter than last year!  We've done some more fishing...I took a few canoe trips...we've been to a few birthday parties.  Somehow the camera just hasn't really made it out of the bag much this summer, but I have managed to snap a few pictures here and there.  We have a little trip planned in a couple of weeks.  Not sure where...somewhere with water...I'll be sure to take the camera, and I promise I'll use it.  Anyway...here are a few pics from the last few months.

I'm still trying to figure out this editor!  If i post X-Large pics it cuts half of the picture off!  As always if you click on the picture you get the full size picture.  

Waiting for the Rock-a-Fellas to start.  They both had a blast.

Add caption

Yep...that's a tomato!

NOM,NOM,NOM

She ate the WHOLE thing!  She eat's them like apples.

Lane spotted a rocket one day at Hobby Lobby so we told him if he was a good boy and got 10 smiley faces on his chore board that we would buy a rocket.  He did and the following pictures are from the rockets first flight.

What are we doing?  It's kinda warm out here!

BLAST OFF!!!

I'll get it!

That's it?  I'm thoroughly unimpressed!