Cheyney and Ryan's Blog: April 2022

Sam is a lot like me with sleeping. He is a night owl and then can sleep all day.

David Smith and Jude came out to San Antonio for Fiesta. Mom and Dad were still here and so we took them to San Jose Mission and the Pearl. Becky and Alex joined us.

Tessa had to make a "float" for Fiesta. She chose a dinosaur theme.

Luke wants to have 100 stuffies. I think he currently has in the 70's

(which includes little tiny ones received in Happy Meals)

We went to Houston to tour the NASA station.

It was really cool. I loved seeing the astronaut training station.

From there we went to Huntsville to visit Lynn and Judy.

She was so sweet as she wrapped towels into animals like cruise ships do.

We toured Sam Houston village.

And then we went to College Station to tour President George H. W. Bush's Presidential Library.

I really enjoyed this library. It was so personable and showed President Bush Sr.'s humanity, self-deprecation, and good character. It made me teary to think that even if I may not agree with his policies, I truly respect him as a person and leader. His quotes were inspiring. I worry that politics will never be like this again.

Tessa practicing being President

We had a nice time with Lynn and Judy.

The pool is open, trip to Chuck E. Cheese, and

enjoying the trail near our home

Sam looks so handsome for his orchestra concert. He is a natural with this violin and his teacher is amazed at how quickly he has picked it up and advanced.

Easter

We celebrated a week early because I would be in Portugal during actual Easter.

Our backyard isn't big enough for a real egg hunt so we went down the trail near our house

to find the eggs and prezzies.

And then I was off to Portugal!

Brooklynne was having her wedding here and I really didn't want to miss it. I asked April to join me. Luckily she is up for an adventure and was up for it. Unfortunately, Lane had a stroke right before she left. She wasn't sure how severe it was at the time and came anyway. It was so difficult to hear about everything decline with no brain activity and then to hospice. She was able to say goodbye to him over the phone and got the call that he had died while we were walking the streets in Madeira. We ate a steak that night in his honor.

Here we are in Lisbon for 2 days.

I left one evening to take part in the wedding activities. It was beautiful and very much like a fairy tale. Brooklynne wanted a destination wedding and this site came open and magically was one year to the date from their first date. Dustin has a 12 year old daughter, Sophia.

We were off to Madeira which was absolutely breathtaking and so different from anywhere I have ever been. We rented a car and set out to see the sigts.

We went to one of the most beautiful hikes called the 25 Fontes Levada

The Levadas are channels where the water runs year-round along an unobstructed surface, in a gentle flow, carried by gravity along channels with a slight incline.

Then we drove along the coast and found this tunnel and decided to explore it.

The continued to Porto Moniz with natural complex of lava pools

We stopped at a black sand beach with waterfall

We stopped at Santana, known for the traditional homes constructed with sloping triangular rooftops, and protected with straw. These were mainly rural homes, used by local farmers, during the settlement of the island, with white-painted walls, red doors and windows with blue trim. Most of the surviving buildings are tourist attractions.

The next day we walked around Funchal

Rua de Santa Maria, in old town, has colorful painted doors, narrow streets and umbrella covered restaurants

We then went to a cable car that takes you up to top of the city

Here we toured the Monte Place. The Monte Palace Madeira occupies an area of 70.000 square meters and houses an huge exotic plant’s collection, coming from all over the world, together with swans and duck’s, that populates the central lake, peacocks and chickens, that walk free in the main areas of the property.

We went down Tobaggan sledges. They are powered by two drivers called "Carreiros", dressed in white and wearing the typical hats known as "straw boaters". they also stop the sledge when necessary by making use of their boots as brakes. I loved the ride but April was not a fan as she thought we were tip over or slam into cars or walls along the way.

We took a taxi to the hotel. By the time we made it to the room, April realized that she left her phone in the taxi. We were frantic in trying to contact her family to get access on my phone to their shared phone locator. It took a little while and we went to a taxi spot trying to see if they knew what would happen if the driver found it. We didn't know what the driver looked like and we didn't get the taxi number. It was like finding a needle in a haystack. We finally saw the location of the phone and it seemed that the car was parked. We got a new taxi to take us there. We found the locked car with the phone in the back seat. We knocked on the houses near the car. Only one person answered the door for April. I went back down an alley and rang a doorbell. An elderly man came to the gate and I could not really communicate what we were looking for. Obviously he wasn't the taxi driver. Our current taxi driver tried to communicate for us. I saw a gentleman working in his garden. I tried yelling, "Pardon" but he could not hear me. A lady came out to talk to our driver and we found out that the man working the fields was our driver. He came and unlocked the door and April miraculously got her phone. I kept praying, "Not today God. Any day but today. Please help us get it!" Lane had died that day and April desperately needed her phone to communicate with her family.

We really ate yummy food for dinner and went to one restaurant two nights in a row.

Our last day we went to the colorful fishing village, Camara de Lobos.

On my return, I took Luke on a date to Austin. We got some food for a picnic at a park and then went to watch the Lion King. He was a great audience. It reminded us of when he was in the Lion King production in 1st grade at the Grund Schule.