Merry Christmas and Happy New Year (a little late)!

We know that we are a couple months late, but we just had to share a few pictures from our Christmas and New Year's celebrations. We made great memories with family and friends again this year!

Since our oldest son married into a wonderful family that lives in the Oklahoma City area, we have been invited to spend Christmas day together with them. That way we get to share the day with our grandchildren, instead of them having to spend their day traveling between the two sets of grandparents. It's a joint effort to raise these two grandchildren, just like it's a joint effort to build a gingerbread tree house. Extra hands are always helpful!

So we got to spend the entire Christmas day with all our children and and both of our grandchildren!

Just like the gingerbread tree house, we think the day was a great success for everyone!

In the days around the holidays, we played tourist with our youngest son who lives in Oklahoma City. The second half of Scissortail Park in downtown was completed while we were traveling in 2022. So we took a tour. From the top of the hill we can look down over the park and see the skyscrapers in the distance.

It was a chilly day when we walked around Scissortail Park, checking out the new art. This piece features brightly-colored plastic trash.

It's hard to see it all from a distance, but thousands of pieces of plastic toys and junk are screwed in place on this colorful sculpture.

This hub cap Christmas tree is a reminder that most of the car dealerships in Oklahoma City started here near this re-purposed location in downtown Oklahoma City.

It was a chilly walk down to the Oklahoma River that forms the edge of the new park.

On a warmer day we would have gotten out the bicycles and took advantage of the bike/hike trails that start here and circle parts of Oklahoma City.

Just this week, the newest downtown art was unveiled--"Taking Flight: Light as a Feather." This 31-foot tall, 14,000 pound sculpture is of a feather that looks like it just floated to the ground. It also includes 276 fiber optic LEDs that will illuminate it at night. At a price tag of almost $700,000, it is an interesting new part of this interesting new park.

On a warmer day we could have taken a ride on the downtown street car to explore more locations in the city. 

But instead, we ran back to the warm pickup and drove to our next indoor tourist stop. This building was once the location of the largest bank in Oklahoma City. Built in 1930, at that time it was the fourth largest structure west of the Mississippi River. It also contained more aluminum than any building in the world. But during the oil bust of the 1980s, First National Bank went bankrupt. Since 1986 it has been largely vacant.

Following one of the largest asbestos abatement projects in the United States, this 33-story building has now been re-purposed. The upper floors have become luxurious apartments and a boutique hotel. The main floor and atrium offers a choice of two eating experiences. One is the appropriately named, "Tellers" because this is where a long line of bank tellers once worked. The Great Hall was decked out in over-sized Christmas decorations for the holidays.

Since we visited after Christmas, Santa was gone. But these two elves were enjoying his throne and child-like Christmas decorations. We also heard that the basement vault has been repurposed into a popular cocktail lounge, but it wasn't open this morning.

We would have normally walked around this historic district of Oklahoma City, but on this brisk day we were content to drive the pickup to explore. We stopped in at one of the city's finest old houses. The beautiful blue December skies made a nice background for the Overholser Mansion.

After finishing up a nice Christmas holiday in Oklahoma City, we made another trip to the Oklahoma panhandle. At the end of the week we headed to the southwest corner of Oklahoma to celebrate New Year's with our friends, Connie and Steven. The city of Altus, Oklahoma, just finished a brand new sign. We drove out to take a look and then take a picture. 

The larger-than-life Altus sign is right beside the Great Western Cattle Trail. In the 1800s, this was the trail where cowboys herded millions of cattle 1,000 miles from southern Texas to markets in Dodge City, Kansas and beyond.

We can almost visualize those huge herds of cattle making their way across this land. A few miles away we took a hike through the pasture, with the Quartz Mountains in the background.

Some of our pasture hiking was through the brush, but it felt good to be back on the trail again.

This is deer-hunting territory, and an old deer blind also makes a good look-out tower in the middle of the pasture.

The only deer to be seen across the prairie today was dear Denisa.

After staying up past midnight on New Year's Eve, the four of us went hiking at Quartz Mountain State Park the next day.

Just a few miles from their house, it's a great place to climb the rocks. We took off on a short hike up to the ridge, so we didn't need to carry water to drink.

Some of the trails are more formal, but social trails meander through the cactus all over these southwest Oklahoma "mountains."

We headed towards the top of the ridge . . .

and finally got a view of Lake Lugert on the other side. The lake seems so close, surely we could continue this little hike to the water?!? We decided to give it a try. Our hosts hiked back to their pickup, and agreed to meet us at the lake.

But we found it was much more difficult than we thought it would be. The ravines between us and the lake were filled with a wall of brambles. Mark tried going through the prickly bushes . . .

but he soon found that they would tear clothes and skin.

So we tried going the long way around on the tops of the Wichita mountains that ring the lake. Doesn't it seem like we are getting further away from the lake instead of closer? Was this a good idea?

We were tired by the time we finally made the trek up and down the mountains and got to the water's edge. This "short hike" turned into a longer-than-planned journey that was a fun way to start the new year. However, Denisa was thinking that her New Year's resolutions should probably include some clause about not following Mark on some of his unplanned hiking trips.

The week between Christmas and New Year's was a happy mix of friends and family and making memories. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you (a little late)!