What a great weekend it was! Sad that it wasn't the warmth I was craving for due to those crazy cold winds, but it was so wonderful to spend time with family and friends. I have never really been to Oklahoma City. It's surprisingly cool! I'd put it on a list of potentials to live in even. Never thought I'd say anywhere in the state of Oklahoma would be a potential! I must admit though, Bricktown makes that city. My brother lives downtown in a really sweet industrial looking loft, the perfect bachelor pad. It was walking distance to Bricktown, the newer development (only 10 years old I'm learning!) of refurbished old brick warehouses into shops, restaurants, bars, and hangouts. This area had it all, complete with a man made river canal, outdoor parks and sitting areas, and of course the very popular basketball arena where the playoffs were held on Sunday! Right on the other side of the highway was the newly developed rowing facility and park area, a training facility for olympic and paraolympic athletes on the river. It was gorgeous and an outdoor lovers dream. The river had places to rent canoes and kayaks, biking trails that ran along it, and lots of fun sitting and walking areas. Grant and I will have to hit that up again sometime!
Jon took us to all the hotspots and gave us a full tour. We went to the Oklahoma City Bombing Memorial on Saturday - a gorgeous and breathtaking display in remembrance of the victims of the bombing. It was an architect's dream so my dad didn't mind going back an admiring it although they had been many times before. It was constructed in such a cool way - a statue of Jesus with the verse "Jesus wept" out in front, the two big walls saying 9:01 (when all was right in the world of OKC) and 9:03 (when their world would never be the same) with a shallow water feature aligning the two. And in the grass where the building used to stand, hundreds of chairs, each with a victims name on it. They are aligned by floors and the smaller chairs were the children. These light up at night so you can see their names from far away. So cool. They also had a wall of tiles that children (from Texas!!) had painted in elementary schools and sent right after the bombing, and a little sitting area full of inspirational quotes around the 100 year old tree that survived the bombing and stands alone. If you ever go to OKC - you must go see the memorial! It will seriously impact you.
We also hit up Jon's favorite restaurant and bar - Bolero (where he is quite the popular guy with all the ladies I must say!) and later, G headed to the wedding and the Martin's headed to a OKC Redhawks (the AAA baseball team) game. Sunday, my parents drove back to the Big D and Grant, Jon, his friend Chance, and I hit up a sports bar down the street from the stadium to watch the final playoff game between OKC and Memphis. I was so glad the Thunder won - it sure did make downtown on Sunday a fun place to be! We enjoyed the live bands up and down Bricktown and the massive amount of blue shirts cheering and running all over the place after the game! On a side note - I'm interested to see what this upcoming series between Dallas and OKC does to my family's moral! My younger brother Jay is a die hard Mavs fan - biggest fan you'll ever meet. He and Jon (the baby bro) are going to game 4 together. I hope they come back from the game still speaking to each other!
We are so blessed to have found those cheap last minute tickets for the weekend. Grant got to spend much needed time with his buddies Austin, Blake, and Zach at Chad's wedding (which was lots of fun I hear!) and we got to spend much needed time with my fam as well! Thank you Frontier airlines!! Thank you Chad for the wedding invite!! And thank you mom and dad for driving up!!
Here's some pics from the time in OKC:
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