Father's Day, Surprise Visitors, Motel Hell

For Father's Day we packed up the family truckster and headed to Fort Worth. Unknown to Dad, Kim & Tony flew in on Friday from New York as a surprise.  TE saw this as a golden opportunity to add new members to his fan club.  TR & I saw this as an opportunity to give other, sweet, loving people the 'opportunity' to hold the baby.  

Aunt Kim & Uncle Michael are racing to see who can complete their Sudoku puzzles first.  I'm not quite sure who won or even if anyone won.  We did a lot of eating, so there wasn't much time for Sudoku folly.

Here's O'ma in her usual mode - cooking.

Uncle Tony & Aunt Kim - one of the many pictures of us sitting at a table full of food.  

Uncle Tony & O'pa even found a little time to cuddle after breakfast.  


Let them eat cake...or icing...you make the call.  All I have to say is that when pieces of cake were handed out, any piece that had an icing rose on it managed to make a full circle & ended up sitting by the cake.  Fortunately, the cake part was delicious, and I sure didn't mind scraping off those 4lb. roses to get to it.

I would like to say that this picture must have been taken at breakfast, seeing at Great O'ma is in her PJ's, but it could just as well been lunch or dinner.  Ferguson's are strong believers in staying in your jimjams as long as possible.  Who knows when you might be suddenly overtaken by a rogue nap?  

I'm really impressed that both Thomas and Tony are feigning the EXACT same look of interest.  I get this same look from TR when I talk about work.

Is there anything more special about Father's Day than getting to grill everyone's dinner...with several Chefs blabbing to you about how to properly cook their steaks?  

This picture was taken just before we left. TE is just heartbroken that he's leaving everyone. He always has a lot of fun with the family.  Then again, he could be crying because he just remembered where he spent the night. 

Some call it Motel 6, I call it Motel Hell.  TR thought that since the Schierloh B&B was going to be pretty full (O'ma, O'pa, Great O'ma, Uncle Tony & Aunt Kim) that we should stay at a motel. 

Now, this is where the commitment part of marriage comes into play.  Because I wasn't feeling much love when we drove to our doom.

I don't even know where to begin with this one.  It's hard to decide which part of our stay was the worst.  Was it the large, uninterested desk attendant who did me the favor of checking us in? Was it the part where I was given a TV remote control along with the credit-card style room key, and told to turn in both when we checked out?  

Was it the vending machine full of toiletries, lighters, cards and yes, generic condoms (bottom left, in discreet box) for $1.05?

Was it that our room was #242? (Unfortunately, we found it in spite of the bad signage).

Was it the fancy carpet - that also doubled as a baseboard?

Was it when my son tried to run away for the first time?

By the next morning I was tired.  I was hungry.  I was sick of being kicked all night long by TE.  (He had to sleep in the bed with us since the room was almost as warm as a meat locker, and I stupidly forgot to bring his snow pants - which we so often need in Texas, in JUNE).  But most importantly, I was ready to turn in my remote control and leave some tread in the parking lot.  

Ugh.  Never, EVER again!!  Ugh.