1st Trip to Grandma Daisy's

Get ready folks, this is kind of a long one....

This past weekend, Steven had to go on a cross-country trip to Florida with a student, so I decided to brave the 4 1/2 hour drive to Turpin with Caroline AND Jack and Fred. Yes, I am crazy, certifiably. I was really nervous about the drive, but it actually went much better than I expected. I had to stop half way to let the dogs pee and to feed Caroline. That took almost an hour, which totally shot my time. But, we made it there in one piece, which is all that really matters.

This was Caroline's first visit to Grandma Daisy's house. (Backstory: Yes, my mom's name is Linda, but I have called her Daisy or Miss Daisy for about 7 years now... You know the movie "Driving Miss Daisy"??? Well, let's just say that there is a lot of similarities between the real Miss Daisy and my mother.... So, since I pretty much only refer to my mom as "Daisy", it was only natural that she would be Grandma Daisy to Caroline....) And let me just say, it was a weekend to remember!

When we got there Friday, I was too tired to think, much less take pictures. But Saturday morning, we got up and caught up with Grandma Daisy and Bump (Bump is our name for Jim... Long story short, several years ago, my mom got a sign for her birthday that said "I enjoy life in the fast lane, but I married a speed bump" If you know Jim, you know that this couldn't be more true. Steven came up with "Bump" for Jim and it works). Since Bump has been so busy with his cattle, it makes it really hard for him to get away, so this was the first time for him to meet Caroline. I think he was just in shock that I have a baby :)

Caroline and Bump

Enjoying Saturday morning with Grandma Daisy

Caroline also got to meet my younger cousin, Torrie. Caroline loved her!

And Caroline spent some time with Aunt Jean too.

So, after Saturday morning coffee, Grandma Daisy, Caroline, and I got ready and went into "town" (Liberal for all of you that don't know). We did a little shopping and returned home to prepare for our family BBQ later that night.... Little did we know that things were about to get reallllllyyyy interesting.

It is no secret that the panhandle, along with many other areas of the country, desperately needs rain. However, it would be far too easy for it to just rain nicely. Oh no, there must be wind, tornadoes, and hail involved. We kind of watched the storm move in for the better part of the afternoon, but didn't think it would be too bad. We were wrong! Pretty much the entire family had arrived at my mom and Jim's house when all hell broke loose. There was a tornado spotted about 9 miles away. So, we started scrambling to get all the cars and my mom's potted plants inside. In the midst of that, the wind was blowing about 30-40 mph, but all of a sudden, it went totally still.... The creepiest feeling ever. We had been watching the other tornado in the distance, but when the wind died, we looked up above us to see those clouds starting to rotate. Growing up in Oklahoma, I don't usually get nervous about storms like this, but when I saw those clouds rotating right above my parents' house, I got a little scared. My parents have a basement, so we had a place to go. Sure enough, when we got inside, the radio was saying that there was a tornado in Baker, which is a mile from my parents' house. I was shoved to the back of the closet underneath the stairs with Caroline. While waiting out the storm, I said pointed out that this was Caroline's first tornado.... And Grandma Daisy just couldn't pass up the opportunity to document this monumental first in my little girl's life.

Caroline and I sitting in the basement closet... She fell alseep :)

This was after the storm was pretty much over and we had all crawled out of the scaredy-hole. Thankfully, everyone was ok. My parents had several limbs down and it took some shingles off of their roof, but the damage was pretty minimal.

After all of that excitement, we finally ate the food that had been waiting for us throughout the entire storm. It was well worth the wait :)

Sunday morning we woke up and went out to the front porch to enjoy the beautiful morning with Grandma Daisy and to go through "the trunk". When I was little, my mom started saving special things in this big gold steamer trunk. Ever since I can remember, we have always just referred to it as "the trunk". My mom put special clothes that I wore as a baby and then different things that I became really attached to as I grew older. It was so funny to see the things that I deemed trunk worthy. I mean, not that a polyester princess style nightgown isn't special...

THE trunk :)

Any way, my mom had a picture taken of me in this little blue dress when I was about as old as Caroline is right now. She wanted to see if the dress would fit Caroline... It did not. No surprise there, since I was a huge baby from the start. It took Caroline awhile to pass my birth weight :) However, the little patent leather mary janes I wore in the same picture did fit Caroline. I haven't put shoes on Caroline yet (I mean come on, it's not like she walks anywhere), so it was funny to see her reaction to having something other than a sock on her foot.

Grandma Daisy putting the shoe on

She was trying so hard to grab the shoe... We probably just started her shoe addiction.

Jack and Fred enjoyed hanging out on the porch too

Later that day, my older brother Hunter or Nun-No as I call him stopped by to meet Miss Caroline. (I couldn't say Hunter when I was little, so I called him Nun-No... What can I say, it stuck).

Caroline and Uncle Nun-No

We love our Nun-No!

I packed up and headed back to Wichita Falls shortly after Nun-No left. We had a great time visiting Grandma Daisy and Bump, but we might have to get Caroline a pair of ruby slippers next time we go :)