Day 27

Woke up to this again today.

The girls wanted their favorite for breakfast; biscuits and gravy. The baking pan in the resort was smaller than our pan at home so the biscuits all met together while they baked.

But there were no complaints from the customers.

I had to decide if I wanted to act like a North Carolinian and let 2 inches of snow keep us inside for another day.

I decided no.

So off exploring we went.

The desert is so cool in the snow. I think it’s beautiful.

Still trying to figure out the difference between a Mesa, a plateau, and a butte.

We drove to the Petrified Forest National Park.

If this isn’t an incredible archeological site nothing is!

Trees turned into stone

Giant trees!

Beautiful intricate detail of the deposited minerals.

Glittering crystals

Dinosaurs buried and fossilized with the wood.

This is such a cool place to see evidence of a world wide flood.

Even the “rivers” are now dry.

And the topography created as the waters rushed and receded is amazing!

We know that wood rots slowly over time and eventually turns back into dirt, so if this forest were millions of years old these trees would not have been preserved in this manner, by petrification.

They had to have been buried quickly and under immense pressure to enactivate this process. And with the dinosaurs being buried here and fossilized in the same layers, it’s pretty compelling evidence they drowned.

The rock formations and sand mounds are incredible.

I can’t get over the beautiful colors and stripes in the sand.

“Mom, it’s white sand underneath!”

The Painted Desert is phenomenal.

It is huge too! This Park is a 28 mile drive through. Just massive! And so worth the trip.

We returned following the historic Route 66 a bit.

Interesting how all of these places close by have petrified wood when you are not supposed to take it out of the National Park.

The girls loving on eachother warms my heart so much.

It’s no surprise they wanted Mexican. This place makes everything from scratch. Casa Ramos in Overguard, Az is Awesome. The plates are ginormous.

I had a great afternoon nap.

The girls did martial arts and acrobatics in the room and I didn’t even hear them.

We spent a nice, relaxed evening playing games and sitting by the warm fire.

I got to work on my knitting project and FaceTimed with my older girls.

The girls cooked Ramen for dinner since they have been wanting it for a month, and well, you read about our last attempt at it a few nights ago at an Asian restaurant.🤪

Another day over and time to settle in. The whole country , except for us here in Arizona lose an hour of sleep tonight. Don’t forget to move those clocks forward! Yikes, I am really glad I am on vacation and don’t need to know what time it is.

Nite y’all