May, Where did you Go?

Where did May go? I can't believe this is my only post for May; talk about slacking! Here is a brief pictorial of where the month has gone for us:

Our annual family reunion at the coast. This is probably the last reunion for awhile for my husband's nephew as he will be joining the Airforce in August. He is the cool one with the sunglasses. We are standing in front of his brand new car and kayak that he won on The Price is Right! He was the showcase winner that day!

A sweet 17th birthday for my beautiful niece.

A surprise 25th Wedding Anniversary celebration for her parents. Can you believe these two have been married for 25 years? They do not look anything like the pictures of the couples on 25th anniversary cards. Their oldest daughter will be getting married in July. It is so hard to believe.

Two confirmations; the first was my niece. Her sponsor is my oldest sister.

The second is my nephew. He is my oldest sister's son and my brother in law is his sponsor.

We had a graduation of my sweet little girl. It is only preschool, but to her it might as well have been college! She was so excited about all the songs she was going to sing to us.

We had a Spring Fling on the hottest day of the year so far! It started at 5:45pm and it was outside. My son did a wonderful job doing a traditional Filipino dance. We were all melting by the time it was over so we went and had an SOS. It made it all worth it.

We made a quick trip to Papa's cabin to open it for the season. We did get to stay 3 days and 2 nights, which were not enough! I could have stayed for a month.

The kids had so much fun playing in the creek and finding sticks and rocks!

We finished the month with an airshow. Here are two cute kids that had fun for most of the day but after several hours of sun, they were ready to go home.

Don't they all look cute in their sunglasses and hats?

This was the kids favorite plane. It was flown by a woman who got out of the plane dressed as Wonder Woman. She had red, white and blue smoke as well as fireworks! It is amazing what they can do in the aerobatic planes.

My daughter is out of school but my son has to go until Thursday. Oh how I can't wait for Thursday. It will be so nice to have a relaxed schedule for a few months. Summer here we come!

The View from Above

When my husband and brother went flying, my husband took my camera to take pictures of the landscape from above. They took pictures up in the mountains and where we live. They also flew over my Father's ranch. This is where both my sister and my brother live. It is also where my grandmother and my mother were raised.

This is a view of the houses that are on the property. My brother's house, on the left, was where my grandmother was raised. Her family owned that side of the road. My grandmother then married the man across the street, and she raised my mother there. It is the little house on the bottom right. My sister and her husband built their house in the upper right hand side in the early nineties.

This is a close up of the house where my mother was raised. It is hard to see the house because it is in the middle of the trees. But you can see the little garage and all the little chicken coops and the corral for my dad's cows. This is also where the tractors and the supplies are kept for farming the land.

This is where my brother lives, in my great grandmother's house. It is a cute little adobe house that has a lot of charm. I love the palm tree lined drive. It looks like a little island out in the middle of the farm land.

This is my sister's house. You can see my dad's cows in the bottom left corner. I like the little semi circles that the tractor made when it was making its turns.

I love the way the land looks from above. It looks like a patchwork quilt. The rows in the soil look so straight and neat. My grandmother would have loved looking at these pictures. I doubt that she ever saw her property from above. When she was alive, she raised cattle so the land would have looked completely different. She was an original Pioneer Woman.

FIrst Flight

On Sunday night, my brother asked my husband if he wanted go flying with him. If the day was clear he was planning on flying over my Dad's cabin to check it out. That was all he had to say and my husband was ready to go. He loves to fly and will go any chance that he gets.

He was so happy when Monday morning was crystal clear. When he was getting ready to leave, the kids wanted to go with him. He told them he would ask if they could have a ride when they got back; since my brother's plane is not big enough for all of them to go together.

A few hours later, hubby calls and says they are back and the kids can go for a ride. The only problem is they will each have to ride by themselves. When I asked the kids, they both enthusiastically said they wanted to go. So off we went to the airport.

My brother had to make some adjustments to the seat for the kids. First was trying to see if their car seat would fit, but that didn't work. So he got a file box and a pad to boost them up, and they were ready to go.

My daughter, the brave one, was ready to go! She wanted to be first and my son gladly let her go. She loved putting on the headsets so she could talk during the flight.

She gave us a big thumbs up and they were ready to take off. The only part she didn't like at this point was that it was windy from the prop and the windows were still down!

It was at this point, them taxing out to the runway, that I thought, "Oh Lord, take care of my baby!" It was that mother's internal panic button that started to go off as I saw her leaving without either of her parents.

But they took off gracefully and my brother radioed us from the plane and said that she was doing great. She was looking out the window and having a good time.

If it wasn't for the glare on the window, you can see her little head looking down at us.

When they got back, she gave us another thumbs up, and wanted to go again. She loved it.

Then it was her brother's turn. Before they landed, he had decided that he was not going. I told him that I had an opportunity when I was his age to go up in a hot air balloon and that I didn't go because I was too scared. It is one of my biggest regrets. When he saw his sister get out with the big grin on her face, he decided that he would go.

The big grin on his face was for the camera only! He was a little nervous, but he thought the headset was pretty cool. He was cautiously ready to go.

In this picture you can see my brother waving and my son looking down at us.

Here they are ready to land. I had not been nervous when he went up, but I was happy when they were landing.

He had a big thumbs up when he landed. Both the kids had fun and were telling me that they felt like they were giants. They talked about the things they saw, how the cars looked like ants, the land patchwork and how fun it was to be up there. Next time they want to go longer!

My brother is an excellent pilot and very cautious. I knew that I had nothing to worry about with him taking my children for a ride. I would have said the same prayers if they were getting on a commercial airline. So THANK YOU, UNCLE BOB, for making my kids day, and my husbands. They will never forget their first flight!