BIG: The 'Big'inning

Every story needs a beginning.  This is more of a 'big'inning.

In January Denyse at To Bee or Not To Bee introduced me to NaBloPoMo, or National Blog Posting Month. Everyday I would eagerly venture over to her blog and read her month-long daily postings centered on the theme "best." Although it sounded like a neat idea, I came on board too late to participate. February and March had themes that I wasn't sure that I could write about every single day for entire month.

However, this month's BIG theme lends itself more readily to a daily entry. Well, I say that before I start. We'll see how that's going on day sixteen or twenty-seven!

According to the NaBloPoMo website, "people who want to set the habit of blogging by doing it every day for a month, including weekends, can come here for moral support, inspiration, and the camaraderie that only marathon blogging can provide." Doesn't that sound like fun?

I might need some support, but I am looking forward to attempting a month of blogging daily. Things have gotten a little dusty around here lately. After all, there have only been fourteen posts in all of 2010! Let's see if we can bump that number up a little. I am already getting ideas for this BIG topic. Best of all, this project may just help me keep my mind off of a BIG event happening at the end of the month.

What an Animal

Spring Break Adventure: Drive-In Theatre

We have discussed going to a drive-in theater for some time. This week during Spring Break we did just that. mrs. mil10 did the research on the Galaxy Drive-In Theatre in Ennis. Two movies for only six dollars seemed like a good deal. Also, there is miniature golf available if we arrived early enough. Since we were expecting good weather, why not make this a spring break adventure?

Finding the drive-in was not difficult. Actually we arrived early enough for a dinner and ice cream at Braum's. We don't make a habit of frequenting hometown's Braum's location, so we thought we would give this location shot. It was pretty good. As always, miniature golf was a must. Not really for the challenging course or for the elaborate scenery, but for the fun family competition that ensues. This time there was only a nine point difference between the highest score and the lowest score! EK has really picked up his game.

There was nothing fancy here.

First we saw Alice in Wonderland. Although we had seen Alice in 3D on opening weekend, this was a new dimension seeing it at the drive-in. EK, mrs. mil10 and mr. mil10 sat outside in front of the car. Modie and Grams were inside listening over the car radio. I enjoyed seeing Alice the second time because I felt like I could take time to laugh out loud without missing portions of the dialogue.

After an intermission we saw When in Rome. It was a silly movie about finding love. It had gotten much colder so we were all inside for this movie.

Two movies and a long drive make for a late evening! We finally made it home about 1:30 a.m. Guess who slept in the next day?

Spring Break Adventure: Backyard Campout

Sunday night was the first of one of the mil10 Spring Break adventures. It was a surprise to EK, but we were planning a backyard camp out. Now, remember that us mil10s are not exactly people of the wilderness. The closest that we ever get to nature is a trip to Atwoods or watching the sunrise on the way to work.

We found an inexpensive tent online at Walmart, but none of the three closest Walmart locations had one in stock. This was a tent that would have held three and allowed all of us to be in the backyard overnight. (EK was actually disappointed to hear that his parents were going to join him. He thought he should do it alone! We told him that was against the law for a child his age to be alone outside all night. He seemed to believe us.) Since no store had a tent that could hold all three of us, and we didn't see the point of buying an $80 tent that would sleep six, we settled for a tent that would hold two. The family event became a guys event. Before the sun went down we went out to set up the tent.

Before going out for the night, EK packed his Nintendo DS and several comic books. mr. mil10 had a cell phone and planned to surf the Internet. Amazingly there was a WiFi signal in the backyard! We were really roughing it!

No camp out would be complete without s'mores. We dropped in the local Brookshire's to buy the necessary items. While checking out two people said, "You must be making s'mores." I guess it was that obvious. Remember, we are not people of the wilderness and since it is probably not safe to build a campfire in the backyard, we cooked our s'mores in the microwave. Who knew marshmallows grew so quickly when subjected to microwave rays? After a few s'mores, we were ready to go out into the great outdoors!

Don't ask me to explain the crazy faces we were making while we were eating our s'mores. I couldn't if I had to. After the snack we were ready to head outdoors. We loaded the tent with sleeping bags, pillows and blankets earlier, so we were ready to go inside. Remember our tent was made to hold two people. I don't know how it would have held two adults, because we nearly had it filled to capacity. Also, anyone taller than mr. mil10 would have had difficulty fitting inside comfortably.

We had a great time and it was definitely better to camp out on a cool night than in the heat! EK is ready to do it again.

The Cookie Monster

Sometimes our eyes are bigger than our stomachs. It wasn't long after EK started eating his "double trouble" cookie that he admitted that it would have been better if he had ordered the mini, bite-sized version.