#Houston Day 9: Trophies, Fish Nets, Walter Mitty

Today was a chill day. 

Callie showed off her creative side by making an M&M and jelly and ?? concoction.

Sam had seen a trophy store on the way home from the space center and wanted to check it out. I am standing in front of my ...

World's Best Parker award!

The trophy Sam wanted me to get him at NASA One Trophies (and don't pay attention to Google Maps when you try to find it because they put them on the entire wrong corner ... crazy-making!).

The trophy Sam actually got. It was for being World's Best 5th Kid.

Then we went to Sports Authority, but apparently fishing is not a sport, so we went to Starbuck's for coffee and cookies and then Academy for big fish nets for our next trip to Galveston. Oh, and sand toys. Later we did pool time, had grilled cheese and soup for dinner in the room and ended up watching The Secret Life of Walter Mitty all snuggled up in bed and staying up way too late. Such a great day!

Click here to see Day 10.

#Houston Day 8: Mass, Galveston Island and Gaido's

Sunday was gorgeous so we went to church, went back to the hotel for lunch, then drove down to Galveston Island, and it took less than half an hour to get there! The day can only be described as MAGICAL.

My parents have taught me an appreciation for cool old houses that started in Manitou Springs, CO.

Daddy and the kids did a lot of wave-jumping but it was WAY too cold for me!

They even gave Joel rock-hard abs made out of sand!

Michael smokes a BBQ veggie stick.

Joel's legs are buried! See Pleasure Pier behind him in the distance?

Gaido's! My parents ate here and also my husband many years ago. Now it's our turn!

Right on the beach!

Thank goodness they are okay with people going to the restaurant to spend so much money with beach hair!

They have different preparations or toppings for meals and Michael's was truly named Michael!

The Overland Park Hillbillies at a fancy place. Yep, it really happened.

Don't ask. There is another blog post to come about this topic.

Another cool house on the way back to the hotel. I texted back and forth with my dad for a while, and it was really nice to be able to do so!

Click here for Day 9.

Why Do We Need a Space Program???

As usual, I am talking out of my butt here, so bear with me. I just think things up like a normal society member and said things come out of my mouth. Then you tell me I'm wrong and point me to some great sites with great information to prove me wrong and there we go. On this space program thing, I feel both ways, though and am flip-floppy about it so help me out here!

Okay, so we spend bazillions of dollars on this Going to Space thing. We have hungry people and uninsured people in our country. We are a nation in debt, have been for a long time and yet WE KEEP SPENDING MONEY. So, like, what I'm saying is that if the United States of America was my HOUSEHOLD, the good ole USA would have been foreclosed on and we all would have been kicked out a long time ago. And had our car repossessed. We would all (not just some of us) be living in a homeless shelter and on the streets.

My kidlets in front of some massively cool rocketship.

And yet ... space. Wow. The going there and the space station building there and the whole NASA complex ... It's like when I know we don't have any money but I whip out the CREDIT CARD and get something like a $107 trip to the Johnson Space Center ANYWAY. I know I shouldn't do it but it's just so COOL.

Eva McLoughlin goes to the moon

Mr. Kerrie and I were discussing this. I said I hate that we spend all that money, yes, and he also hates it and doesn't see the point. But when you see this junk up close it's like ... are you kidding me? A bunch of HUMANS did this? They made something with all the wires and situations so people can live in space? Pee in space? Eat in space? They had to think of EVERYTHING. The second we get home I am making my kids watch The Right Stuff, that's for sure.

Anyway, you know how when you work with someone at a job and they eff up everything and you are surprised they can even live a normal life because they can barely work their job without blowing up the place accidentally? Okay, so now think of all the engineers, etc. it takes to NOT MESS IT UP with the going to space. The MAGIC that happens to make it all come together. Yes, we have blown up some humans in space, but statistically speaking we have done an amazing job of getting them there and keeping them alive.

International Space Station mock-up and practice facility. I do love that we are working together with other countries on this project but how much does it cost?

And I also think about the future. My friend Christine Shuck is working on a book and I'm going to mess it all up here but basically it's like we have gotten a virus or something on Earth and we have to get the heck off of here. Where can we go? Another planet? Space in general? Living in space in a space vehicle like in Star Wars?

So back to those people we know who eff up everything, kinda like Spongebob Squarepants. Do you think it's possible that someday we might need off of here? Is it worth it to spend zillions of bucks to explore Mars on this Orion mission? Should we just stay here on Earth and take better care of it and spend our bucks on that instead?

Opinions welcome!

#Houston Day 7: Chillin' Out in the Rain and the Spongebob Movie

Saturday was for sure just a hanging out day, which everyone needs from time to time!

Joel and Callie doing some morning hot tub chillin' followed by the kids swimming in the rain with hotel friends

I supervised from my perch under a poolside patio.

Checking out my potential office in my current outdoor office in Houston ;-) This is a house in Paola we fell in love with but it's too expensive, sadly. But otherwise PERFECT for us! We shall see if it is still available when we get back and if the price has come down any!

Rain rain rain. Chillin' kids. Lots of TV.

Laying in bed with Sam watching Spongebob while Daddy napped. This was after Joel and I ran to the HEB for groceries for dinner (burritos) in the pouring rain and got soaked.

We tried to head down to Galveston because we were bored but it was rain rain rain so I hopped on the handy iPhone and got us Spongebob 3D movie tickets, which the kids were dying to see. I have to admit I am a huge Spongebob fan myself. I think you have to be kinda juvenile to appreciate that show, and I certainly am that.

All of these photos were taken with the iPhone using its filters or Instagram's filters. If I look young or skinny, it is only to the credit of the iPhone 6. I should get a kickback for this.

Click here for Day 8.

#TheKerrieShow in #Houston Day 6: Johnson Space Center, Annie & Rude People

We started the day by ... doing a lot of hanging out. Some homeschooling and then I did the final proofing of my ebook to turn it into a print book and off it went.

We hit the Taco Cabana on the way for some lunch!

Then it was time for .... DUN DUN DUN ... drumroll, please .... The Johnson Space Center
(see post there by clicking on the words). I balked at spending $107 for the 6 of us to go but my mom said we had to go because it's a once-in-a-lifetime thing and it's RIGHT DOWN THE ROAD! They have long hours and it turns out it was the BEST THING EVER. We were there about 3-7 p.m.

There was a big play area for kids with a slide. We watched a cool short movie montage thing about our space program from the beginning and I freaking teared up when the Challenger blew up. I geeked out over a 3D magnet and a keychain with little charms of Texas, Houston, a rocketship an astronaut and the NASA sign and we got a T-shirt for Aron/Daddy/Mr. Kerrie. And what is it with kids always wanting to buy ROCKS at gift shops? Yeah, I was the same when I was a kid!

I'm going to have you go over HERE for all the pictures because there are a lot.

Also, please see yourself HERE for my piece asking if we even need a space program. Opinions needed and welcome.

The rest of the evening was spent with me trying to track down the movie Annie at a Redbox that DID NOT EXIST (it was a field!), getting dinner at Subway and then tracking down another Redbox down the road, driving through traffic slow as molasses anytime of day or night. Post on traffic to come. Found a Redbox at a CVS, thanks to the iPhone, and turned too soon, so I went in the WRONG WAY to a bagel place (closed, thank you) and parked in the outgoing drive-thru spot to run over and get my danged Redbox.

So check this out.

I get back to the hotel to feed my peeps after hunting dinner. On the way to the pool I see the movie room is occupado and I ask if they want to watch Annie with us, could we come in in a bit and do so? And I knew they could say no because it's first come first served. Got it. But they said OKAY.

So we got back later to watch Annie and it's like 8:45 and we are going to watch the movie and go to bed at our normal, traveling-with-Daddy EARLYish time.

That little family sat there watching something on ABCFamily that they could have watched snuggled up in their bed all comfy. They sat there until 10 p.m., knowing we had Annie and saying they wanted to finish MATILDA.

Rude. Don't tell me YES then do what you want anyway. I'd rather hear NO honestly and then watch Annie another time.

We tried to watch the movie in our room but the living rooms here are too small and we could not all even fit. So at 10 p.m., when we normally are going to bed, we went down to the movie room as the Rudes were leaving and so we got to bed at like midnight.

See ya back here for Day 7 ... Saturday ... Daddy will be off work so we'll see what we are up to!