March 13, 2013

Cousins Road Trip: Brenham and Houston

 My sister and I decided a few months ago that we would take a little road trip with all three kids for Spring Break. We planned a tour of Blue Bell's factory and then the Houston Zoo. We left Monday morning and came home last night. It was lots of fun and I know the kids will remember it for a long time!

We had to wait about 20 minutes for the Blue Bell tour, but they had such a cute and educational waiting area. Spring Break is their busiest time of year. For a 45 minute tour and a scoop of ice cream, it is well worth the $6 I paid.


These old ads were on display...


They even had cute little hats for the kids :)


You can't take pictures on the actual tour to protect the privacy of their employees, but we saw them mixing ice cream, big vats of milk, and the bakery where they make the baked goods that go inside the ice cream, like brownies! They use milk from 60,000 cows each day. Wow!


We also learned the top five flavors are: Homemade Vanilla, Dutch Chocolate, Cookies and Cream, The Great Divide, and Neapolitan. We also learned although they don't sell to all 50 states, they are the #3 ice cream company in America.



We left Brenham and drove to Houston. We checked into the hotel and walked around the Galleria Mall. Everybody did a little shopping and we had a really late lunch in the food court. The older kids then decided they wanted to go swimming despite the fact that the pool was not heated and it was 60 degrees outside.


It didn't last long and they were taking hot showers to warm back up!


We woke up Tuesday morning, grabbed a quick breakfast in the food court and popped in Old Navy before heading to the zoo. It was packed which made it not nearly as fun as last time, but we did get to see all that we wanted to see.


One of my favorite zoo moments.... Tiffany, Kyleigh, Cohen and I noticed an odd looking animal like a horse with zebra stripes on his hind area and a longer neck. We went to read the sign having no clue what this hybrid animal was. Abby then notices it from her stroller and proceeds to say, "Look an okapi. I love okapi with their long purple tongues." Stunned and impressed! Thank you Diego for sharing animals with Abby!


The elephants were fun. They were throwing hay on their backs to cool off (it was mid 70s) and we saw two small baby elephants, about 3 years old.



Silly kids!




We left the zoo about 2:45 and thanks to light traffic and the HOV lane, we were home about 6 last night. 

I hope we take a road trip with the kids annually- it is what childhood should include!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sounds like ya'll had fun !! Your Dad talks about the road trip you n Tiff made out to California....
(golfers1)

~kristi said...

The okapi is LE's fave animal. I wonder if she first discovered it from Diego too. We saw one at Disneyworld, had never seen one before then

Marissa said...

Emmie's favorite animal is the Okapi too! They have two at the San Antonio Zoo. It has been her favorite since she was two, but most people think she is making up an animal since they have never heard of it!

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