Memphis Rock

On Sunday morning we woke up in Little Rock, Arkansas. The KOA that we stayed at was, lets just say, rustic. In fact everything about Arkansas was rustic. Not too impressive of a place. Not much to do there than drive by the capitol, and that wasn't too impressive either. The states greatest claim to fame is that Clinton is from there, so what does that tell you? The most exciting thing that happened to us in Arkansas was when this huge hay truck rolled in next to us in the gas station. Those rolled bales were huge and the farmer in the truck got quite a kick out of us California folks getting a kick out of his truck.

The only thing we did in Arkansas was go to church. That was not rustic however. The ward was huge, actually and we really enjoyed their fast and testimony meeting, especially my teenage boys. You see, the girls in their ward had just returned from a week at girls camp and several of the prettiest and cutest girls you have ever seen got up to bear their testimonies. You can bet my boys paid good attention. It did my boys so good to see that there are some darling neat girls out there, even in Arkansas.

After sacrament meeting we came out to find that latecomers had parked in the spots directly adjacent to our RV. We were wedged in and it took Dennis quite some maneuvering to get us out, but he did it! Dennis is not only an expert driver, but is gifted with spacial things. That is what makes him such a good athlete and he can pack a trunk like you wouldn't believe, which is why he was such a great hotel doorman way back when. I would have smashed that thing up for sure. Bravo, Dennis!

Soon we were over the great Mississippi!

The next stop on our trip was Memphis, and what do you have to see when you come to Memphis? Graceland, of course.

Since Since it was Sunday, and since none of us are actually all that interested Elvis, we did not actually pay the whopping $35 a person to go inside, but we did have to take a picture in front of the gates and just get a feel for all the craziness and hubub surrounding this rock and roll icon. I could not believe ALL the Elvis merchandise they had for sale here. Holy cow. Everything from Elvis key blanks to pink Cadillac wallets. Derek's penny machines were even inside juke boxes. It was crazy!

It was SO incredibly hot and humid that day - the worst of the trip, and to make it worse the AC wasn't working too well in the RV. We were melting. We just wanted to snap our picture and leave already.

But the gates were not that impressive either. The walls looked an awfully lot like to walls of Mama E's, covered with graffiti from adoring and crazy fans over the years. It was kind of too much - they had even written on the sidewalk and light poles and the historical marker! Please, people.

That was it. We paid our homage to the King (mostly because Dennis' mom is a HUGE Elvis fan- I think she already owns half of that merchandise we saw there, and grandma V. would have probably disowned us if we went through Memphis without going to Graceland) and then we moved on.



A drive through downtown Memphis was interesting.

But the most famous street in Memphis, Beale St., where many of the rock and soul legends got their start, is a pedestrian zone, so we decided to stretch our legs and take a walk.

The FexEx sports arena.

The Hard Rock Cafe Memphis.

And the Gibson guitar factory, which my dad, who is fascinated by all instruments, was bummed to find offered tours, but was closed for the day.

Beal Street was a grimy, but cool place with great live soul music being played at every bar, and their own musical walk of fame under our feet.

There were some funky shops, and the boys were drawn to this window display of weapons and war helmets.

But when you are in Memphis on Beal Street, there is no more appropriate shop to step into than the music shop.

Beal street was gritty, colorful and fun - with a beat.

On our way our of town we stopped at the Sun recording studio - the "birthplace of rock n' roll" where many of the music legends including Elvis, Johnny Cash, and Jerry Lee Lewis, cut their first records here under the Sun label.

Nearly four days into our trip as we rode on that long ride through Tennessee. At least there is room in that RV for people to stretch out and sleep as we rolled along.

Oklahoma is OK!

We woke up Saturday morning to find ourselves in Amarillo, Texas.

We thought it would be fun to get a big US map, and mark our path along it as we go so that our kids could see our progress, and really appreciate how big this great country is and how far we have traveled. We will take more of these pictures through the whole trip (if I can remember to do it.)

We love Texas, but it sure is easier driving across the pan handle than the entire state like we did last summer. Dylan is our climber. If you ever lose Dylan, look up. He is probably up there somewhere hanging on something. I love this picture of Luke. See the cool Texas shadow?

We hit the road early, and made our way all the way to Oklahoma City. By then we were starving, so we found the perfect place - something we saw on the Food Network's "Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives." I think this place might have to fit in the "dive" category because it is a little nowhere place it what looks like a yellow double-wide trailer with an unpaved parking lot. But when we saw Guy Fieri eat their speciality, our mouths were watering, and we HAD to try it for ourselves. SO glad we did!

This place is everything soul food should be. They served masses of collard greens, candied yams, mac and cheese, black-eyed peas, macaroni salad, homemade yellow cake (don't you love how that cake is piled up on that table?), and banana pudding, of course. Oh yah, and fried chicken! - Which brings us to the name of the joint: Mama E's Wings and & Waffles.

Now, when we first heard the name, we figured it was because they specialized in two things: waffles for breakfast, and wings for lunch and dinner. Nope.

When they say wings and waffles, they mean just that, emphasis on the AND! They put three hot and huge fried chicken wings on top of a large homemade Belgium waffle, then topped it with powdered sugar, syrup, and, get this, Louisiana hot sauce!!!!

It was a little tough to navigate around the plate with the bones and everything, but, so dang good! Who ever thought topping waffles with fried chicken was a genius.

Yummy! Along side candied yams, mac and cheese, and finished off with banana pudding, it was some good eats!

Look at Dad. He is in soul food heaven!

So, you might have noticed there was a bit of graffiti on the walls of the joint. This is encouraged! After your meal they hand you a thick permanent marker and tell you to have at it. After a bit of hesitation (what kind of an example would I be setting for my children, after all?) I jumped up on top of a table (moving the table cloth aside, of course) and did it. Yep. That was me, mother of six and good citizen, in Oklahoma City, standing ON a table, in a restaurant, writing graffiti on a wall!

And of course, following their mother's example, all my kids had to follow suit.

We all left our mark on Oklahoma!

Now this is the stuff dream road trips are made of!

With full bellies, and sticky fingers, we decided to explore the city a bit.

Of course, the most important thing we wanted to see in Oklahoma City was the memorial for the bombing of the federal building in downtown on April 19,1995 where 168 people were killed. The first thing you see when you go there is this long chain link wall filled with mementos of love and support for all those who were killed and their families. There are stuffed animals, flags, and everything you can think of. After the disaster the entire grounds was surrounded by this fence and there are millions of such mementos that have been collected and put in archives. This was just a sample.

The memorial is flanked on both sides by these gigantic gates representing 9:01 am and 9:03am, on April 16. The bombing happened between those minutes. The gates are enormous and quite striking.

There is a beautiful large reflecting pool where the street was, and where the footprint of the building was, there are 168 chair sculptures, each engraved with the name of a victim. Sadly, there are several small chairs representing children. There had been a day care center in the building.

It was scorchingly hot the day we visited, so we couldn't spend more time there, but it was worth seeing.

It was such a lovely and well thought out memorial. We were touched.

Right across the street from on of the gates is this smaller memorial done by the church across the street. It is a huge statue of Christ with his back turned to the memorial, as if he could not bear to look at the violence. The inscription reads: And Jesus Wept. There are 168 niches in the wall were candles could be burned. It was touching.

While we were downtown we had to run over to the Oklahoma History center so Derek could get himself a pressed penny. Since Oklahoma City is built on oil, they had a large display of oil derricks. I could help but snap a picture of Derek with a derrick.

Oklahoma is OK!

Another long day on the road, wondering what the days ahead would hold.

The Ultimate All-American Road Trip Begins!

We did it! We are on our way! From sea to shining sea and back, we decided this was the summer to take the ultimate road trip!

This is something we have wanted to do for a long time - drive all the way across this great land of ours and see Washington DC, New York City, and all the church history sights. We decided that this was the perfect year for such an adventure, since Luke is now 5 and requires no stroller or anything and is old enough to really enjoy himself, and Alex is 15 and it will only be a few more years before he is gone, and then Nate and the twins right after! Really, the time that you have with all your kids is so short - there are only a limited number of summer vacations you get to all take together, so it is our philosophy to make them good and do the trips you dream about doing when there is still time.

That's why a whole year ago we bit the bullet and rented this monster RV. My boys are pretty good travelers, but the bigger they get, the smaller our Suburban gets, and since we were driving all the way across country, it had to be in an RV!

And this thing is quite the machine! Dennis went to pick it up from Orange County on Thursday morning. We hoped he'd hurry home with it and we'd have it packed up and be on the road by noon. We should have known better. Picking it up was a lot more complicated that picking up the keys and by the time he got home with it, it was late afternoon. Just turning it around in our cul-de-sac was a challenge. The boys were SO excited to see him pull up with that giant 38 footer in front of our house!

Though we had been all packed and ready, it still took us a long time to pack up the RV and get going. By the time we finally hit the road it was nearly 8pm - and we still had to drive to Flagstaff! Dennis booked it and drove until the early morning. We didn't quite make it to Flagstaff, though, and spent the night (what was left of it anyway) at a truck stop somewhere.

Meanwhile the boys had a good time exploring the RV. It is quite a marvel of engineering! It is amazing how much room we have! It sleeps everyone. We have our own room, there are bunk beds and the sofas and table all turn into beds. There is a bathroom and a shower, 3 TVs, including a big flat screen, a stove, micro & oven, and even a washer/dryer. And tons of storage! We even had room to bring all of our bikes (including mine!) This RV is pretty darn cool! But it is also rather complicated, and though we are into day 5, we are still figuring out all the knobs and switches. No worries. We'll be pros by the time the month is up.

The best thing about traveling in it, is that when there is more elbow room, everybody seems to get along much better. There has hardly been any fighting on this trip and nobody ever has to whine "He's touching me!" For that reason alone, this RV is worth its weight in gold! And it is fun to have my parents with us, and to watch my kids interact with them so much. We are all going to be stuck together for nearly a month, so we all better get along real good, right?

The boys had a great time running around at the rest stops.

On Saturday morning early, as soon as Dennis was rested enough, we hit the road again. We had a full day of driving ahead and some catching up to do, so we didn't have a lot of time to stop and see much. The way we planned this trip was to book it through the West because we have seen it before or can another time, and then slow down a bit and see more once we got across the Mississippi. So for the first 3 days all we did, pretty much is drive.

But we still got to see a few fun things.

The I-40 travels along much of the same route as the historic Route 66, so we decided to pull off the freeway and drive it a bit through the tiny town of Holbrook, AZ. The folks at Pixar used Holbrook as the inspiration for Radiator Springs in Cars, so it is fun to drive down the main drag and try to recognize parts of the movie. It even has the same red rock formations surrounding it. Of course, the most recognizable landmark in the town is the Wigwam Motel.

It is so kitchy and fun! Definitely worth a stop!

And what a great place to take some fun pictures! There was even a young couple there who were on there honeymoon. They had just spent a night in a wigwam, and wanted me to take their picture in front of their tee pee, him holding her over the threshold, of course, before they jumped in their car and hit the road.

Classic!

Not only are the rooms all tee pees, but they have a bunch of old vintage cars parked out in front of the tee pees! The boys had a ball running around in the desert heat looking for all their favorite Cars characters.

They found Mater!

This is why road tripping is fun! This is what memories are made of!

It was a short stop, but a super fun way to start the trip. Classic road-tripping at its best!

Quite a view from the gigantic windshield!

We drove all day and made it to Albuqurque by dinnertime. My Dad suggested a crazy fun place called Range Cafe. It is a nutzy local spot, just the kind of place you need to visit on a road trip through town. Obama ate here apparently. The place is funky, decorated all over with cows and vintage toy stoves (thus, the Range Cafe). Notice the flying cows over Mom and Nate.

The place was funky, but the food was fab! It was classic diner fare with a southwest twist. I had the spiced up mac n' cheese with white cheddar and green chilies. It was plenty spicy - just the way I like it!

Dinner was great, but we discovered that the truly amazing food at the Range Cafe was the desserts. We could not pass by the pastry display without taking a second look - and then ordering something. Everything was huge and yummy looking. We finally chose a pie for the road, and Dennis snuck a giant cannoli into the order that they two of us secretly shared together. It was absolutely amazing, amazing!

On the road, when we could stand it no longer we pulled out the pie! The one we had settled on was the chocolate banana cream pie with a chocolate dipped crust! Yes, I know, absolutely indulgent! Oh and it was! It was so, so good.

So we drove into the night with good company and happy mouths! A good start to a great trip!

We're Jammin'

And I was SO close to catching up on my blog posts too... Oh well.

Last week we had a Signs family reunion in San Diego, but happily, my sister Mindy who lives in Oregon was able to come down a week early with two of her kidlets to spend some time here with us! That was the same week that Dennis and my 4 older boys were gone at scout camp, so the 3 of us got to spend extra time with them. It was grand!

Of course, Mom, Lisa and I HAD TO whisk Mindy away to our favorite girlie getaway spot, Clementine patisserie, for some yummy Frenchy Frenchness! We took our time, chatted, and worked on the plans for the reunion. It would have been simply perfect if sister Natalee and SIL Elizabeth were with us too!

I LOVE this picture of my momma and sisters! Signs girls rock!

But it wasn't all play. We also stripped my parents' tree of all the ripe figs (a hot and sticky venture!) and made ourselves a batch of white fig jam.

Getting figgy with it!

I don't know what it is about making jam that I love so much, but it is always so satisfying to see all those pretty jars lined up on a dish towel. It is gonna be so yummy with some good brie on a slice of Dad's homemade Ciabatta!

While we were slaving over a hot stove in the kitchen, Dad was baking banana bread in his Sun Oven in the backyard. Bread bakes pretty darn fast out there this time of year, and dad does it to perfection!

(Did you know that many a Sunday, you can catch my dad in the parking lot at church checking his food that he has cooking in the Sun Oven in the bed of his truck? He runs out there between meetings and adjusts it, then, by the time church is over, dinner is ready! Weird? Yes. Smart? Yes. Delicious? Absolutely!)

While Mom and my sisters, and I were busy together, the cousins were also having a great time together. The girl cousins were having a blast! I was amazed to watch them. They were doing things like drawing fairies. Fairies are so much nicer than the ugly monsters and aliens that I am used to the boys drawing around here. Refreshing.

They also got into a little boys vs. girls battle, and the girls tried to escape the boys, etc. Caleb decided to make a sign and asked my mom how to spell "Girls stink!" so my mom said "G-I-R-L-S-space-R-U-L-E" and Caleb faithfully wrote it on his sign. It was so funny! I think Caleb asked the wrong person.

Luke had a ton of fun with his cousin Zack! Those two are so funny together.

They invented a new sport on Mom's stairs - stair surfing; sliding on their tummies head first down the stairs at top speeds. Never mind that there is hard tile and the bottom. They kept doing it over and over and over, racing each other to the bottom. It was so funny. This is what kids do when it is too hot to play outside in the summertime. I am happy to report that there were no injuries.

Another thing we do in the summertime is make popsicles. We got Dennis this Zoku popsicle maker from Brookstone for Father's Day. It is SO cool! You leave it in the freezer and when you want a popsicle you pull it out of the freezer and pour what ever you want inside and it freezes right there on the counter top, in minutes, while you watch! It only does 3 at a time, but stays cold long enough to do 3 batches, so our whole family can have popsicles. Of course, on this day, there were only three of us, so we made diagonal double pops with chocolate milk and drinkable strawberry yogurt. SO yummy and refreshing on a hot day! What a fun invention! The kids get a huge kick out of watching it freeze and coming up with stuff to make popsicles out of.

This morning before my other sister Natalee took off beck home to Texas, we had to drag (kicking and screaming) over to Clementine too. We made her friend, Janet, who drove from Texas with her join us. After all, fair is fair. If we brought Mindy, we need to bring Natalee too, right? Right.

Next post will be all about our family reunion, but I'll get to that when I can. Today we leave for our big cross-country RV trip, and that will require a lot of blogging. Stay tuned for posts on our adventures, and of course lots and lots of photos from sea to shining sea!

Here we go!