The Lewis Family: Finally....The Big New Mexico Trip!

I added a lot of pictures. I don't have a site yet with all the pictures to look at, hopefully soon I will have that to look at. Time has been flying by and I wanted to at least get these on here. I have quite a few more from the past few weeks that I have been waiting on, so I decided that I would put a whole bunch up and be done with it! :) Amelia's birthday is tomorrow, so I will be needing to get up to date with all of my pictures.
Our road trip was incredible! It sure is amazing how much you see that you don't expect. We were able to see 10 different states on our journey. We all had such a great time, we are excited to plan for our next adventure!

Ready to go! A good traveling tip with kids that I found very useful...lunch boxes! You could put snacks or a little meal in there and they could balance it on their lap and eat. They really liked them. Cups were also very useful. You could put carrot sticks, strawberries, cheese or crackers in them, and it was easy for them to handle.

We like to be informative on our site :) Just so if you were wondering...the worlds largest truck stop is located in northern Iowa.

Not at that truck stop, but at another, we were able to run around a bit to get our legs some exercise. There was a crop duster that was flying on a field just next to the stop and the kids were buzzed a couple time...that was exciting, and the plane was bright yellow, he flew as low as the top of the building behind Harry.

Just so you know..."Do not drive into smoke"

On the way down we stopped at an aquarium in Tulsa, OK. It was great! We were pretty much the only ones there. Kids were in school, and we stopped by in the middle of the day, so it was a quite break and Harry & Amelia could take their time looking around. Those are jellyfish.

Ah...Nina's otter. This cute little guy was playing with Amelia. The more she reacted the more he would do in front of her. We went home with a purse that looks like an otter that day, it is her favorite accessory. :)

Harry and Andy here, petting a sting ray and shark. I too got to pet both, it was amazing! I have a love for sharks, so this was especially exciting for me. Funny enough, a sharks skin feels dry under water. Andy video taped my turn.

This is the reason we stopped. The picture does not do justice to the area. There is a hallway that you walk through and you are walking under the sharks. There were about 20-30 sharks in there about 4 different species. It was hypnotic watching them. The glass was about 8 inches thick. What a site. They swam so fast it was hard to get a good picture.

Pops! This was a neat place on route 66 in Oklahoma. They have 3-400 different sodas all in bottles. That is a soda bottle behind Harry & Amelia, it lights up at night.

An unexpected stop. We were running behind in getting into Santa Fe, but we stopped really quick here to see if the dinosaur museum (in a little town just south of Santa Fe) was worth going in. Boy was it! It was perfect size us...and again, everyone was in school or working, so we pretty much had the place to ourselves. Harry was beyond excited.

His favorite dinosaurs' bone, a "long neck".

Cousin of T-Rex. They had a T-Rex head that they were working on.

Ah...coming into Santa Fe!

For my dads birthday my brother put together a cooking class for all of us. Like I said before we were running late getting into town, so we pulled right up to the class from being on the road all day. Surprisingly, by the kids, you would have never known...they really did do well on the trip.

Peeling shrimp.

I liked these picture from the tux shop. My brother looks so innocent behind my dad. Looking at him in this picture, I flash back to when we were kids...he has the same looks. :)

Harry...who would have known that he liked wearing a tux as much as he did. He did not want to take it off.

Friday night, rehearsal.

Aunt Edna, & Aunt Margie (Uncle Joe not pictured).

Uncle David and Aunt Georgie.

Andy & Papa talking to Harry & Amelia before their walk down the isle.

Who is that boy?!

Amelia liked all the fuss. With the dress, flowers, her new bracelet that daddy got her. ( her first piece of "real" jewelry. Daddy was excited to get it for her)

Jeff and Annie. Beautiful.

Just before this picture he kissed Amelia...here he is wiping it off and Amelia trying for another.

Amelia....

Leaving the church.

Changed, and ready to go the reception. We stopped before at Jackalope. They have all sorts of things to purchase there, watch glass being blown, music being played, and in the middle were these prairie dogs. They were cute. We actually had some just outside our hotel room, but here they could really watch them in action, going in their tunnels. They really just look like squirels minus the tails.

Every building in Santa Fe must be adobe and of a cetain color pallet. It is so interesting seeing certian businesses so different, Target, McDonalds, ect... It's pretty cool.

At the reception.

Feeding a goat.

Harry being sweet.

Aunt Edna with the kids...and a goat wanting to be in the picture. Apparently they can't get enough. The location of the reception was featured on the food networks show, dinner impossible, he made an appearance on film then as well.

Mema & Nina.

My moms side of the family picture.

My uncle greg took this picture of the reception...just a great shot! In saying that, a few of the pictures on here are from Uncle Greg and Aunt Georgie...Thank you!

They loved dancing! It was so funny, we are not sure where Harry has gotten his moves from, but he was really feeling the music!

This was precious. Amelia really had had enough. Santa Fe is two hours behind us and the kids did a good job with the late nights, but that night...she was hitting the wall. She was spinning on the dance floor, getting herself dizzy and would fall down. The floor was concrete and we didn't want her to get hurt. Papa said to her, "Amelia, don't spin there, you could get hurt". Oh she was devistated. Crying and crying. She wouldn't let it go. I said Amelia calm down, go dance. She said, "Papa said I can't dance!!" She thought he was telling her not to dance at all. Made me think of "No one puts baby in the corner!" :)
Even the next morning first thing out of her mouth was "Papa said I can't dance" They patched things up later that morning. :)

The band was top notch! Jeff got to play with them too.

I tried to take Harry and show him what Uncle Jeffy was doing and it back fired. Referring back to the late nights...he had had enough too, and he was so upset that he couldn't play with him. He was all about anything that Unlce Jeffy was doing the whole trip.

Mrs. Koss and Grandma Ann. Bless Mrs. Koss's heart! The airline lost her luggage and all her information about the wedding. My Aunt Georgie ran into her at their hotel and had her borrow something to wear. She finally recieved her bag the day she left.

A big moment. Thier first polka together as husband and wife! :)

Our trip home. Can't go around it. Can't go over it. Must go through it. Strange.

We woke up in Colorado Springs (Gorgeous!!) and this is what we saw. Hot air balloons all around. We counted 15 of them that we could see.

We realized that our hood was not latched in Denver, we pulled off at the first stop to fix it and it ended up being a nice pit stop. Got some stawberries out, and the kids had their first Starbucks drink (strawberry smoothie).