Special Events: Our Horses • House Addition • Mustangs 2008/09 • Mustangs 2007/08 • Mustangs 2006/07 • Summer Vacation 2011 • Family Traditions

Test Flight 7 occurred today for Starship and had mixed results. This was the first launch with an upgraded starship and was planned to pattern after the previous flight for test flight 6. Launch and assent went fine, and the booster was able to return to the launch pad and was captured with the tongs. The starship though experience issues in orbit and they lost control contact with it over the indian ocean. It ended up burning up in the atmosphere with an uncontrolled re-entry. Made for some interesting videos of the burn up over the Turks islands. SpaceX has some things to fix it looks like with this new model.

So we went on an adventure today over to Laffeyette. LA with Haley and Jalen. Laffeyette is in the heart of Cajun country and we targeted the children's museum over there to check it out. The museum was really neat, with a lot of cool things for kids to explore and engage with. It was a little overwhelming for Jalen but he did good and found things to touch and feel and play with. We spent a good 2 hours walking around this place, and afterwards we went across the Lafeyette Park and had lunch at a place called, Agave Mexican Grill. Neat little resteraunt and the food was good. Jalen seemed to really like his lunch :-). For dinner we stopped in at McAlister's in Lake Charles to finish off the evening. A good day all around!

Rick continues to tinker with his fish tank and is battling a snail infestation. I think he added a bala shark and some other fish this month as well. He has a pretty large tank (75 gallons) so he has a lot more space to have different fish. Hope he can get the snails under control....

The dogs are up to their usual stuff and with winter now in season, Lily tends to enjoy it outside more - she's built for it. They spent some time at the pet resort this month while we were out of town. They always have fun there playing with the other dogs. Wondering if we'll get a good snow here this year that Lily can really play in? Time will tell...

Ok - so now the snow arrives. From talking with Violet, they got a good snow up in Colorado and it made it all the way down to Texas as well. There was enough snow on the ground in Fort Worth that Mia and Jack got to go out and play. Violet got to try out her new duck sled she got for Christmas on the burms around her house it looks like. We got a light dusting of snow at our house, but not enough to stick for very long, most of it hit west of us. Winter is in full swing now!

OK, so I spoke too soon. Old Man Winter has arrived and with vengance. Wind chill factor got down to single digits for a couple days, and the plants took a beating. It was going to happen sooner or later. We didn't get any snow with this cold spell,but plenty of freezing. Winter is here....

So its been a pretty mild winter so far (fingers crossed) and some things are still holding on and producing blooms. The pink honeysuckle bush still has some blooms and the hanging pansies I bought are still blooming. I'm wating for a cold snap to hit and likely wipe this all out but we'll enjoy it as long as we can. Old Man Winter is sure to pay us a visit, he always does :-).

So we've made some changes to the fish tank at home, added some new fish (red taiger barb, bala shark,golden nugget molly, and cleaner fish) to kinda ratchet up the activitity in the tank for viewing pleasure. The live plant I kept seems to be doing quite well and is growing new bigger leaves which are spreading across the tank. I like the LED feature on the tank so I can turn the tank color to the seasonal shade needed - for now its red for Valentines Day :-).

Rick and Kelly have already planned out their next building project for Legos - looks like a medevil village is on the horizon. This should be good!

As in previous years, we spent a quiet New Years Day at home watching the Rose parade and some football. Nothing too special. It was nice to see the Budweiser Clydesdales in the Parade this year! The College Football Playoffs included Texas so we had a horse in the race to follow agaun this year. They've changed the playoff format and added more teams so the process og getting to the final two takes more rounds. Its a 12 team pook so its 3 rounds of playoff games and one championship. So this year, the national Championship will be mid-late January. Texas took on Arizona State this year in the Peach Bowl down in Atlanta. The Long Horns pulled out the victory, but there were contraversies about some of the calls and such. This win gets them to the final four in Football and they'll play Ohio State next week in the Cotton Bowl.