our mini vacation to austin and back

thanks to our sweet friends the funderburks, we headed out of town for some much needed r&r this past weekend.  they live just outside of austin and austin is one of our most favorite places to visit (or i should really say, eat!) so it's a perfect combination.

since i am on this huge rutherford summer school kick, i couldn't help but indulge myself by making some of our visits like a field trip.  with a little research under my belt, my plan of attack was ready.  i knew that i wanted to take the boys to the bob bullock texas history museum and also to inner space cavern in georgetown.  with those two destinations in mind, the boys and i headed to the library before our trip to check out a few books about texas history and caves.  i think it was just as educational for me as it was for them!  most know that the state flower of texas is the bluebonnet, but did you know that the texas state plant is the prickly pear cactus?  i love random facts like that!  we had fun quizzing john one afternoon to see how many state symbols he could get right.  and the boys were most excited about visiting the cave after reading about stalagmites and stalactites and bats!

so first up was the bob bullock texas history museum.

we really thought we would spend a few hours here but we quickly realized that we might possibly make the fastest visit ever recorded.  the boys bounced from one exhibit to another like a pinball.  we did manage to talk about texas' fight for independence, the alamo, drilling for oil and the space program in houston. 

we had a good time learning about our state and will definitely do this again on another austin visit.  and a trip to austin would not be complete without going to our most favorite place to eat:

magnolia cafe!

we love this place and if you're from dallas this place is equivalent to cafe brazil.  delicious food with an exhorbitant amount of menu choices.  the boys love eating pancakes here. 

then we were off to hit our favorite bookstores and vintage shops.  we really appreciate austin's uniqueness and plethora of crazy shops!  after our fill of shopping we headed to the funderburk's for a sleepover with this cute curly-headed guy!

it was so fun to watch our boys play together all weekend.  i just loved it!  there was lots of sand digging, rock collecting, and bubble blowing.

on saturday we headed to the quaint little town of gruene, tx.  apparently, so did the rest of central texas (think memorial day weekend and a river).  nonetheless, we ate some good food at the grist mill and headed down to check out the guadalupe river.

i love little towns like this with sweet little general stores and antique shops.  when the boys get a bit older, tubing down the river will definitely be on the agenda.

sunday morning we headed to church and saw this crazy plant growing in front of this house down the street (i couldn't resist taking a picture!).

do you see how it's taller than the house!?!?  you never know what you'll see when in austin, ha!

finally, with much little boy anticipation, we headed to inner space caverns.  the boys were so excited!  inner space caverns was discovered in 1963 when the texas highway department was drilling to check if the ground was strong enough to support a highway bridge.  when the drill hit an air pocket, a crazy highway department guy volunteered to be tied to the drill and lowered down the hole to see what was below.  he was the first human being to see the caves.

and we quickly realized the magnitude of precociousness our two boys possess.  we were at the front of our guided tour the entire time and they would not stop talking to our (very patient) tour guide. 

we saw a bat, several interesting cave formations, and what it would be like to be in total darkness.  our tour guide had us sit down in this one cave room and he flipped off the lights.  and here's another random fact:  did you know that if you were to live in total darkness for 6 months, your retinas would die and you would be blind?  it was really fun.  i love making these kinds of memories as a family.

we headed back home that night to enjoy memorial day at home.  we grilled up some salmon, stuffed with crab, corn on the cob, and baked potatoes.  yummy!

so that was our mini vacation to austin.  thanks funderburks for hosting us again.  since we started summer vacation with this trip, maybe we'll have to end it with another trip to austin!