So as I mentioned in my last post, Jake and I took a little kiddo free vacation to Dallas for our anniversary at the end of November. We headed down the Friday before Thanksgiving and got back the day before turkey day. We had a great time, and I am so thankful that we had the opportunity to go and parents that were willing to watch our little munchkin while we were gone.
Disclaimer: all the pictures in this post will unfortunately be from my phone as I have yet to unpack the cord that connects the real camera to the computer.
We got to Dallas late on Friday night so our first real day in the city was Saturday. It was a rainy and cool day, but we still had a good time. It also happened to be the 50th anniversary weekend of the Kennedy assassination. We went to the 6th Floor Museum where Lee Harvey Oswald *supposedly* took the shots that hit President Kennedy and the Texas governor. I don't know what the wait is usually like, and it was probably really busy being the day after the anniversary of the assassination, but we had to wait for about an hour and a half to get up to the museum. Here is the line waiting to go up, and it curved around the building on up ahead too.
It was a really interesting museum, however, I don't have any pictures from inside it because they don't allow photography in the actual museum. Here is a picture of us with the window that Oswald shot from in the background though.
Even though you couldn't take pictures in the 6th Floor Museum, we did get an opportunity to go up to the 7th floor of the building, so this picture is exactly one floor above the corner window on the 6th floor looking down at the street below.
This is a shot looking up from the sidewalk (because I wasn't going to just walk out into a busy street to get a picture) to the window from where the shots were fired.
The memorial in Dealy Plaza was really nice, and even though it was a little rainy we enjoyed walking around to look at things.
And what would a visit to the place where Kennedy was shot be without a picture of the grassy knoll?
That night we went to a restaurant that we had both been wanting to try for a long time. The closest one to us is about an hour away, and we had heard great things about it, so we decided to give it a try.
It's true, we had never been to P. F. Chang's before this trip. We got a special where two people got an appetizer, main course and dessert for I think $50, which was a little pricey, but we were expecting it, and we took leftovers back to the hotel, so it wasn't too bad. And also since they heard it was our first time they gave us a $10 gift card incentive to come back again which we are really looking forward to using.
I also noticed that night that our second little bun was really starting to make an appearance, so here is an obligatory selfie.
The next day we headed somewhere that I had been looking forward to going for literally years. IKEA! Dallas is the closest IKEA to us, so we had never been to one before. We didn't plan anything else for our Sunday since we had heard it can take a while to get through it.
We were a little at a loss for what to do when we first walked in, so we just kind of followed the crowd up the elevator and started looking around. They also had some helpful signs along the way that helped us figure out how things worked. We really enjoyed looking at all the show rooms, as well as checking out a few things that we had been contemplating getting from there for a while, and overall we both really enjoyed the day, although by the time we were done looking through everything and getting our loot we had both hit our shopping limit I think. We liked the look of this island (as well as several other ones) to potentially put in our kitchen at the new house some day.
The new house also has soffit over the cabinets that we would like to tear out and possibly put up some cabinetry that goes to the ceiling, kind of like this, although I'm not sure our kitchen will ever be that beautiful. So anyway, we checked out a few basic glass front cabinets while we were there too.
We also checked out the area rugs and sofas since we would like to set up a tv area in the basement of the new house at some point (after we save enough up to do it well). I forgot to get a picture of the sofa that we like, but here are a few rug options we looked at.
We want something soft and cozy down there, so we were looking at more shag-like rugs than I would probably usually check out. And even though it's blurry, I think this picture of Jake checking out the coziness factor of this rug makes it worth it.
We didn't end up just looking at stuff either. I forgot to snap a picture of it all before it went into use, but we grabbed a nice picture frame to put up a family picture we had taken in September, as well as a little car for Will's Christmas stocking and an abacus for him too. We also snagged some sheet sets, one for the guest twin size bed and one for the futon, and some cute glass bottles to use in the kitchen. We may have picked up a couple of other things too, but I don't recall what they were at the moment.
Monday we had a pretty relaxed day, we went to a record store (Good Records was the name in case anyone is interested), where we came away several dollars poorer but several records richer, and checked out a cute little old historic soda shop where we had lunch.
It was very cute inside, and looked like it hadn't hardly been changed since it opened in 1912. If anyone is taking a trip to Dallas or some locals want to check it out, here is there website.
Then we decided to hit up the Dallas Farmer's Market for lunch.
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I had read great things about the market and so we had high hopes for it, but apparently Tuesday is not really a busy day at the market, so there was a definite lack of vendors and food places open. Despite that fact we still had a great sandwich (the picture of which is unfortunately stuck on the camera) and were able to check out some amazing looking produce.
Later that day we headed back to the theater that we had watched Doctor Who at to go see the new Thor movie (got to take advantage of the baby free times to go to the movies). We then headed back to the hotel to pack up for our trip home the next day.
Our hotel had a really nice view, and when it finally got sunny on Tuesday and Wednesday I was able to capture a little of it.
On our way out of town we stopped off for some breakfast and then got on the road somewhere around 10:30-11:00. When we hit traffic heading out of Dallas we were a little concerned what the drive home would be like (since the day before Thanksgiving is one of the biggest travel days of the year) but after about 30 minutes of really congested traffic we got clear of it and had great weather for the drive home. We stopped off at the Texas welcome center to have a bathroom break and take a picture in front of the giant Lone Star.
We made it home around 5:30-6:00, and were so excited to see our little stinker again. We had really missed him while we were gone. He stopped walking and looked at us for just a second when we walked in before heading over to give us big hugs and kisses. We were all very happy to see each other again, and Will thought we were much funnier than usual, so I think he must have missed us.
So that pretty much sums up our anniversary trip to Dallas. It turned out to be pretty much exactly what we wanted, slow and relaxing for the most part, without a ton of stuff to do every day. I'm sure there are tons of things to do in Dallas that we missed, but we had a great time regardless, and would definitely recommend it if you are considering a vacation.
Disclaimer: all the pictures in this post will unfortunately be from my phone as I have yet to unpack the cord that connects the real camera to the computer.
We got to Dallas late on Friday night so our first real day in the city was Saturday. It was a rainy and cool day, but we still had a good time. It also happened to be the 50th anniversary weekend of the Kennedy assassination. We went to the 6th Floor Museum where Lee Harvey Oswald *supposedly* took the shots that hit President Kennedy and the Texas governor. I don't know what the wait is usually like, and it was probably really busy being the day after the anniversary of the assassination, but we had to wait for about an hour and a half to get up to the museum. Here is the line waiting to go up, and it curved around the building on up ahead too.
It was a really interesting museum, however, I don't have any pictures from inside it because they don't allow photography in the actual museum. Here is a picture of us with the window that Oswald shot from in the background though.
Even though you couldn't take pictures in the 6th Floor Museum, we did get an opportunity to go up to the 7th floor of the building, so this picture is exactly one floor above the corner window on the 6th floor looking down at the street below.
This is a shot looking up from the sidewalk (because I wasn't going to just walk out into a busy street to get a picture) to the window from where the shots were fired.
The memorial in Dealy Plaza was really nice, and even though it was a little rainy we enjoyed walking around to look at things.
And what would a visit to the place where Kennedy was shot be without a picture of the grassy knoll?
That night we went to a restaurant that we had both been wanting to try for a long time. The closest one to us is about an hour away, and we had heard great things about it, so we decided to give it a try.
It's true, we had never been to P. F. Chang's before this trip. We got a special where two people got an appetizer, main course and dessert for I think $50, which was a little pricey, but we were expecting it, and we took leftovers back to the hotel, so it wasn't too bad. And also since they heard it was our first time they gave us a $10 gift card incentive to come back again which we are really looking forward to using.
I also noticed that night that our second little bun was really starting to make an appearance, so here is an obligatory selfie.
The next day we headed somewhere that I had been looking forward to going for literally years. IKEA! Dallas is the closest IKEA to us, so we had never been to one before. We didn't plan anything else for our Sunday since we had heard it can take a while to get through it.
We were a little at a loss for what to do when we first walked in, so we just kind of followed the crowd up the elevator and started looking around. They also had some helpful signs along the way that helped us figure out how things worked. We really enjoyed looking at all the show rooms, as well as checking out a few things that we had been contemplating getting from there for a while, and overall we both really enjoyed the day, although by the time we were done looking through everything and getting our loot we had both hit our shopping limit I think. We liked the look of this island (as well as several other ones) to potentially put in our kitchen at the new house some day.
The new house also has soffit over the cabinets that we would like to tear out and possibly put up some cabinetry that goes to the ceiling, kind of like this, although I'm not sure our kitchen will ever be that beautiful. So anyway, we checked out a few basic glass front cabinets while we were there too.
We also checked out the area rugs and sofas since we would like to set up a tv area in the basement of the new house at some point (after we save enough up to do it well). I forgot to get a picture of the sofa that we like, but here are a few rug options we looked at.
We want something soft and cozy down there, so we were looking at more shag-like rugs than I would probably usually check out. And even though it's blurry, I think this picture of Jake checking out the coziness factor of this rug makes it worth it.
We didn't end up just looking at stuff either. I forgot to snap a picture of it all before it went into use, but we grabbed a nice picture frame to put up a family picture we had taken in September, as well as a little car for Will's Christmas stocking and an abacus for him too. We also snagged some sheet sets, one for the guest twin size bed and one for the futon, and some cute glass bottles to use in the kitchen. We may have picked up a couple of other things too, but I don't recall what they were at the moment.
Monday we had a pretty relaxed day, we went to a record store (Good Records was the name in case anyone is interested), where we came away several dollars poorer but several records richer, and checked out a cute little old historic soda shop where we had lunch.
It was very cute inside, and looked like it hadn't hardly been changed since it opened in 1912. If anyone is taking a trip to Dallas or some locals want to check it out, here is there website.
That night we went to the Doctor Who 50th Anniversary special in theaters (yes we are nerds). Jake even decided to dress like the 11th Doctor for the occasion, and he was definitely not the only one in the theater who did.
Tuesday was our last day in the city, and it was the first really nice day weather wise since we had been there. It was finally sunny and fairly warm and we took advantage by exploring the city a little more. Whenever we go on trips we like to just drive around and get a feel for the place we are in. We don't use a GPS or map really, we just go wherever looks interesting, and thankfully we both have a good enough sense of direction that we pretty much never get lost.
We had seen an interesting looking bridge on Saturday from the 6th Floor Museum, and since it was finally a cloudless day we decided to go looking for it. We discovered that it is called the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge, and it was super cool. I think we drove across it three times each way just so that I could get enough pictures and we could take it in.
I had read great things about the market and so we had high hopes for it, but apparently Tuesday is not really a busy day at the market, so there was a definite lack of vendors and food places open. Despite that fact we still had a great sandwich (the picture of which is unfortunately stuck on the camera) and were able to check out some amazing looking produce.
Later that day we headed back to the theater that we had watched Doctor Who at to go see the new Thor movie (got to take advantage of the baby free times to go to the movies). We then headed back to the hotel to pack up for our trip home the next day.
Our hotel had a really nice view, and when it finally got sunny on Tuesday and Wednesday I was able to capture a little of it.
On our way out of town we stopped off for some breakfast and then got on the road somewhere around 10:30-11:00. When we hit traffic heading out of Dallas we were a little concerned what the drive home would be like (since the day before Thanksgiving is one of the biggest travel days of the year) but after about 30 minutes of really congested traffic we got clear of it and had great weather for the drive home. We stopped off at the Texas welcome center to have a bathroom break and take a picture in front of the giant Lone Star.
We made it home around 5:30-6:00, and were so excited to see our little stinker again. We had really missed him while we were gone. He stopped walking and looked at us for just a second when we walked in before heading over to give us big hugs and kisses. We were all very happy to see each other again, and Will thought we were much funnier than usual, so I think he must have missed us.
So that pretty much sums up our anniversary trip to Dallas. It turned out to be pretty much exactly what we wanted, slow and relaxing for the most part, without a ton of stuff to do every day. I'm sure there are tons of things to do in Dallas that we missed, but we had a great time regardless, and would definitely recommend it if you are considering a vacation.
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