Travelog for: Schnattchen

We played with a bunch of Steampunk stuff and we had fun! They have a more western style steampunk here in Oklahoma. They like pistols, flintlocks, and the worn "old" look... poker cards... that sort of thing. It's pretty neat!

I got to have some dinner at Buffalo Wild Wings. I ate some mini chili dogs and fries. It wasn't too bad!

Hello!

I had fun celebrating Saint Patrick's Day in Bricktown (down town) Oklahoma City. My host says it's an Irish Holiday that they celebrate with getting drunk, listening to Irish music, and lots of green things and Irish flags.

We ate at Jazmo's, a cajun restaraunt - Black Magic Catfish! Oooo weee! It's blackened catfish topped with etouffee on top of dirty rice, and a side of fried ocra. It is SO GOOD! As a treat, we stopped into the Candy Factory. It's not really a factory, but they have a ton of candy there.

Then, we went for a long walk around the different lots where there was live music and green beer. We also enjoyed the wind blowing off the river. The white stuff in the water are petals from the peach trees. The peach trees smell awful, but they are so pretty!

We went to a Steampunk event called Nightmare Machine. It was held in Jefferson Texas, which they say is the most haunted town in Texas. We were sitting in the vistors center with a frame photo on the wall fell and broke, and then a bunch of people walked in saying that the Steam Train derailed and they all had to walk back. Thankfully no one was hurt... unfortunately we didn't get to ride the train.

Still we had a lot of fun. We went camping out by a swamp lake at the Cypress Bayou RV Camp Grounds. It was so pretty out there! We even visited some of the stores. The town itself was pretty neat because it is one of the oldest towns in Texas.

And it was moth season, because there were a lot of moth caterpillars crawling around. We brought two of them home only to find a third stow away in a bag. One of them already made himself into a cocoon (we named him Jefferson). I can't wait to see what kind of moth he ends up being!

I wanted to let you know that I'm okay!

I just wanted to show you the storm that we had. We're in "Tornado Alley" and it's Tornado season right now. There was a very dangerous "super cell" storm that passed through Oklahoma this weekend. It's been all over the news. There were several dangerous tornadoes that killed 5 people (3 were children) and injured 29 others. As exciting and beautiful tornadoes are, they are deadly and very scarey!

Don't worry, we are okay in our area of Oklahoma. The winds got really strong out, but luckily the majority of the storm went Northwest of us. 

Stormy Weather!

I had a fun time at Aetherfest - a Steampunk Convention. The St. Anthony hotel was so beautiful! It was built in the 1880's in San Antonio, TX. We even walked down to the Alamo! This was were Texas fought the Mexican Rebels and won, despite impossible odds. Such brave and strong soldiers! You can read more about it here: http://thealamo.org/battle/battle.php

The other TV's in the photos are Toki (my hosts' bunny), Myka (panda from Kansas), and Mr. Shawn (sheep from Germany). Mr. Shawn may end up adopted by my host. His mentor has been missing for a long time and several toys have been lost with her, including my hosts' toy kitty, Bo. Mr. Shawn misses his mentor and maybe one day she'll come back - but he's very well loved with his host. I think Mr. Shawn will be just fine.

Yesterday's Annular (ring) Solar Eclipse had a Ring Of Fire! This doesn't always happen and the next one won't happen again for another decade or more. The Ring Of Fire is when the moon is directly infront of the sun creating a black hole with a thin ring of light (fire) peeking around the edges of the moon. There are also crescent shaped shadows under trees too!

We got to see the very beginning, but that was it. The clouds covered the sun. We had a lot of storms that day. But we still had a lot of fun outside and taking photos. Then when we got back inside, we watched a live stream of the eclipse.

The other TV's and I helped our host write an article about taking photos for toyvoyagers.com and it turned out pretty good! She's hoping this will be useful to other hosts. More than anything, it was just good fun. As part of the project, we had lunch at a diner called Freddy's and then stopped to smell the flowers. Here are the photos we took while getting photos prepared for the article... but only the really good ones. You can see the article here: Article

We took the bus down to Bricktown (downtown Oklahoma city). First we had lunch at La Luna's mexican restaurant. I had yummy Chile Relleno and some chips with queso and salsa. There was a lot of neat decore on the walls, and the staff was really nice. Then we went to the Myriad Botanical Gardens. It was wet and hot and a lot of walking... but it was so pretty there! They had waterfalls, exotic flowers, and some cactus.

I am not in every single photo from the Gardens, because I really wanted you to get a good look at some of the plants and scenery. It was SO BEAUTIFUL in there!

The next US Holiday is Independence Day (4th of July). Everyone wears the colors of the American Flag - red, white, and blue. There's fireworks and general festivities. We made me a white band with a red, white, and blue stars on it.

How do you like it?

We tried to view the Transit of Venus but it was too cloudy outside.

I went to Soonercon, which is a local scifi and comic convention here in Oklahoma. I was busy helping my host sell toys at their vending table, but I did take time away to meet Peter Beagle, the author of The Last Unicorn!

There's a Vietnamese restaurant across the street from where my host lives. They have a lot of noodle soups and seafoods. It was very tasty.