Park n' Drive: Texas State RailRoad Campground

 Know before you go - a park drive thru video.

Texas State RailRoad Campground

We've stayed here multiple times before in the full hook-ups loop.

Believe, Valentine's Camping, A Gift: Long Weekend, Long Post, Easter Weekend, and Blessed. 

Believe

 

RDB and I were super excited for this weekend - because we're finally getting a chance to camp with KD & the Vowels!  We were so grateful that everything lined up just right for us to be able to camp at one of our favorite campgrounds (the Texas State Campground in Rusk) AND get to share the magic of the Polar Express with them!  K joked at one point: perhaps RDB and I are living vicariously thru them? (Spoiler alert: why yes, yes we are!)

We checked into the campground before sunset on Thursday; for dinner, we took a short trip north into Jacksonville and had dinner at The Jalapeno Tree.  When we checked in, chatting with the office host, she informed us we couldn't' save a spot - the entire park would be full with several 'groups' of camper.  We've never seen this park full, but can certainly understand why: everyone's excited about taking a ride on the Polar Express!!  

To jump straight to my review of our magical experience, go here.

But we purposefully kept it a secret from the Vowels (to explain: the girls' names all start with a vowel: A, E, I, and O!) so that Sunday night, our last night camping, we could truly surprise them with the Christmas trip of a lifetime. (And if you've followed my blog long enough, you'll know how much of a railfan I am, too, so this was the perfect excuse for me to give my inner child the gift of a Polar Express train ride, too!) 

Friday afternoon KD & the Vowels (and their trusty - er well, rusty - steed, Howie) rolled into camp and settled into a spot beside us.  We started up a fire in the fire pit for roasting hotdogs and marshmallows, and heating up the cast iron pans to sear the steaks we were sous-viding for the adults for dinner.

With four Girl Scouts, one troop mother, and the daughter of an Eagle Scout in attendance, we got the fire started in no time (and I had the fire hose ready to go, you know, just in case!) 

It was a delicious evening of steaks, s'mores, and hanging out by the campfire, and enjoying the time outside, knowing that most of Saturday it was going to rain, rain, rain.

Perhaps the sweetest moment that evening was when "I" came over and said: "Miss Sarah, you know what I haven't done today?" "What's that," I answered.  "Hug you!"  and then proceeded to give me the sweetest little hug.  My heart melted like a roasted marshmallow at that!

Sure enough on Saturday morning we woke to rain.  

A slow, laid back day ensued.

RDB and I went into town for lunch (back to The Jalapeno Tree again - yes, it was that good!) and then into Rusk to see the Cherokee County courthouse. With the cold front that the rain brought in, we didn't dawdle, just grabbing a few photos and then heading back over to the campground.  Reading the historical placards just now, I realized that I'm drawn to the art-deco styling of this building (and others like it, too).

Back at the campground, I was ready for KD and the Vowels to come over and decorate cookies! I had purchased a few of Color My Cookie's Christmas kits and was incredibly impressed with what arrived: everything we needed to watercolor cookies, including paintbrushes, a cookie "palate" of icing paint, extra liquid icing, sprinkles, even edible silver paint! K warned me not to put out the sprinkles and extra icing unless I wanted to find sprinkles in my camper for months to come... even without those additions, the girls had an absolute blast coloring cookies!

They were such a success! Little to no mess and we LOVED the way they all turned out!

I couldn't help but laugh that both "E" and I had our serious crafting faces on while we were painting our cookies.

Of course, after the girls left, I did break out the extra goodies to put a little more pizazz on mine. ;-)

I would 100% recommend Color My Cookie Decorating Kits because not only were they packaged in a way that you could send it straight from the vendor as a gift to someone, but the cookies themselves were as delicious as they were fun!  "O" totally approves!

Done with our craft for the day, we all grabbed a cookie (or two!) and settled in to watch a movie in the camper - The Polar Express of course!  

By this point,  the oldest of the girls, "A," had figured out that the 'adventure' of this weekend was likely more than just camping ("K" did a great job of throwing the Littles off the trail when they pulled into the campground Friday and immediately saw the "Polar Express" advertisement by saying 'maybe it's just their theme for Christmas?').  "E" cracked us up at the scene where the elf with a very raspy voice tries to reassure the little boy to "just trust me" with his Christmas present when she commented: "I'm not trusting an elf with that kind of voice!" Regardless, we enjoyed one of the themes of the movie:

Saturday evening, with the rain finally behind us, we lit up another fire and enjoyed some true winter weather - it was dropping quickly down to 49*! "I" brought over her game Disney Color Brain and we played a few round in the camper - during which she throughly kicked my butt! Looks like I need to catch up on my Disney shows before our trip to Walt Disney World in March next year! 

Sunday morning we all slept in; well, we slept in,  I have a feeling the Vowels had K and D up at the crack of dawn again - when you're all sleeping in 20 feet of space, when one kid is up, all the kids are up!  All the girls went for a walk, eventually meeting D over at the lake - he had brought along two new RC toys - a couple of small boats.  When I asked him, why two?, he said: "Why get just one when you can have twice the fun for twice the price?"  That - and having four kids means it's easier to share two than just one.  

But the fun didn't stop with just the boats, as RDB had purchased another DJI drone  - the DJI FPV (First Person View).  It's a totally different way to play with remote controlled flight and RDB, D, "A," and me all had a turn flying it.  It was surprisingly easy to operate and lots of fun!

"Please don't break it. Please don't break it."

Not to be outdone, D brought out the mini-drones their family had purchased (this time, four of them, well, because four kids!) These were so cool that I couldn't help but buy two for RDB and me (Merry Christmas, hun!) Getting these two guys together always results in some kind of electronic fun!

RDB and I drove into Palestine for lunch and to 'chase the train' during a one of its other Polar Express runs that afternoon.  Lunch at Giovani's didn't disappoint, but we were a little bummed when we realized that the motive power for the day was one of the TSRR's diesel engines, not the steam engine as we had hoped.  We also took the opportunity to go over to the Anderson County courthouse and snag a few pictures and a geocache. 

Sunday night the big event was finally here!  The Littles still hadn't figured out that we were going on the train ride (we told them I knew a great place to go see Christmas lights and they all piled into the Jeep).

To see the excitement in their faces when we finally told them (standing in the parking lot next to the big steam train!) and their hugs and 'thank yous' all throughout the evening are 100% the reason for the season to me.

I've dedicated an entire post to the experience, because there was so much good and fun and joy (and this post is already so long!). You can read about the Texas State Railroad Polar Express here.

This post, as the whole weekend, was long and stretched out. Its as if time stood still for us to enjoy the magic of everything this trip had in store - from good friends to fun activities, to awesome experiences and great memories. This one was a long time in the making; I think we first wanted to camp with KD and the Vowels over a year ago and it was definitely worth the wait!

We were at the Texas State RailRoad Campground, site, um 12? (it's first come first served, and the sites aren't numbered very clearly, except on the map). We truly love this park - the only downside is the road noise during the day.  First time here with the 5th wheel, and we had no problem finding a large enough site - in fact, there were probably 3-4 other 5'ers in the park this weekend; however, with it being first-come-first-served for sites, you may want to plan to come in on a Thursday (especially in the holiday season) so you can grab one of the larger sites. 

We've been here several times before: Valentine's Camping, A Gift: Long Weekend, Long Post, Easter Weekend, and Blessed. 

For more camping photos, go here.

And for a drive thru of the campground, go here. 

Park n' Drive: Cedar Hill State Park

 Know before you go - a park drive thru video

Cedar Hill State Park

We were in Site #112, Full Hook Ups

We've been here several times: 

Into the Holiday Spirit

Fine Art, Food, Family, and Friends

Wow, What a Weekend!

Thanksgiving (Part 1)

Turkey Trip #5: Into the Holiday Spirit

We left out from Palo Duro Canyon State Park late in the evening on Thursday and made our way down to the Abilene KOA Journey, with two thoughts: 1) cut the 6 hour drive to Dallas into tow days (to make it easier on RDB, who's driven over 1000 miles on this week long adventure) and 2) to see D&V or maybe visit the Abilene Zoo.  I think Diesel has had about enough of being in the truck for these long hauls!

We did make it in to the KOA (love that they are so easy to find, right along the highway, and pull thru full hook-ups sites makes them perfect for the stop over) but we didn't have a chance to have dinner with D&V or make it to the zoo (we came in long after the dinner hour and realized the KOA had a 11am check out). No worries either way, we accomplished goal #1 - to break the travel in to two easier days and arrived at Cedar Hill State Park at the perfect time to check in. 

Boy, oh boy, were we happy to have this site! We've been to Cedar Hill SP several times before, the first time with the 5th wheel being a monster of a site to park in, but this one (site 112) is just heaven - easy to park, and look. At. That. View!!  It's definitely going to be one that I keep my eyes on when we book here in the future, as well.

And continue to book, we will, because this campground is such a great place to stay when we're up in the DFW are to visit family.  Friday night Mom and G came over and picked us up and we went out to dinner, then we drove thru Grand Prairie's annual light show.  It was an absolutely PERFECT way to kick off the holiday season!

Saturday we went over to Dad and Bunny's to celebrate a late Thanksgiving and Dad's 70th birthday this past week.  It's always fun to be there as Dad is carving the turkey (yes, in the laundry room!).  I kid you not, he gets his fill while carving the bird and then his plate for the real meal is only side dishes!  This year I was pleasantly surprised to find a sweet little lady in there with him....

That's my 94 year-young Grandma G in there helping out!  I'm so grateful that she's right next door to Dad's and that we get to see her as often as we can when we come up (with a 6-pack of "Grandma Beer" (11 Below's 7-Iron pale ale) in tow).  She giggled with happiness as I placed them in her fridge.  Y'all, find the little things that make your family happy and you'll have joy all season long. 

We had smallish gathering this year - us, Dad and Bunny, D&A, Sis & TJ and Aunt Sissy and Uncle Roy.  After dinner we got down the Christmas tree and decorations and started to get the house ready for the holiday season.  It was sweet to be around family and my siblings.  

Cute then and handsome now. 

Telling the story of Grandpa G and the bread bag wicket invention. 

We called it a night and went back down to our camper; Sunday morning we woke up slowly and enjoyed our coffee and tea and the incredible view out the window of our rollin' home.  A quick text to Mom and G and we coordinated a late lunch - we're kind of stalling the drive back home (for two reasons: 1) it's windy out right now and it's easier to drive when the wind has died down and 2) I don't want this trip to be over!)

But, all good things must come to an end, and so after lunch we packed up and started the trek back home.  It was a wonderful, long, much needed break to have these past dozen days of camping, and we're already looking forward to our next adventure with KD and the Kids for Christmas!

We were at Cedar Hill State Park, Eagle Ford camping loop Site #112 with full hook ups. This site is perhaps one of the best we've been in - great view of the lake (slightly blocked by trees - with the leaves on in spring/summer it might have as good of a view), wide concrete pad to park on, nestled back a ways in the park. Cedar Hill is set between two major roads (I-20 and FM 1382) so there is quite a bit of road noise, but as I mentioned earlier, with it's close proximity to family, the good well outweighs the bad.

For more camping photos, go here (once I'm back on hi speed wifi)

Park n' Drive: Palo Duro State Park

 Know before you go - a park drive thru video

Palo Duro Canyon State Park

We were here - Juniper loop, Site #105, 30a/W

Canyons, Cravings, Courthouses, and Cars