We're Home-For Now

Since the Mexico trip I was home for 1 day and then the kids and I went to my parent's house to spend some days with one of my aunts and one of my cousins and her baby. It was a fun time to relax and hang out with the kids. We also celebrated my mom's birthday while we were there.

After we got home our Montana friends came over to swim before their long drive home. The kids had a great time in the pool ALL afternoon.

Too snotty to swim.

"Couch Potatoes"

Some reason the scooter ended up in the pool that afternoon. Who knows, but it was fun!

10 Years of Marriage & A Perfect 10 Vacation!!!

Last Thursday Clay and I celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary. We have had 10 great years together. I couldn't ask for more in a husband. He provides for our family, is a great father, and I love him so much! Thanks for 10 great years, Clay. I can't wait for the next 10.

We celebrated our anniversary with a trip to Playa del Carmen, Mexico with our friends Brady and Vicki. One word to sum up the trip is unbelievable!!!! We left DFW at 7 am Thursday and arrived at our hotel a little before noon. We were a little nervous because check-in time wasn't until 3, but we went ahead and started the check-in process. We are standing there and the girl is helping Clay and I while we see Brady and Vicki walking across the lobby to sit down at a desk. We didn't know what was going on, but just about that time the girl helping us says we need to have a private check-in. We didn't know what that meant and really thought that our vacation was about to go really wrong. Boy were we wrong! So we walk across the lobby to the desk across from our friends, where our new best friend, Christian, proceeds to tell us that our rooms were overbooked. Yes, this sounds really BAD. He follows that sentence up with, "So we have upgraded you to the Presidential Suite." We were totally floored. We were concerned about our friends, but he says they have been upgraded, too. To the other Presidential Suite. There are only 2! The room was fabulous. Absolutely beyond anything we had ever imagined it would be. We even had our own pools on each of our balconies!!! So we didn't even go to the hotel pool until the 3rd day of our trip. All I can say is thank you, God. We asked ourselves several times throughout the 4 days we were gone how this happened, and the only answer is God. God's hands were all over our trip. We had safe travel, fun times, good memories, good friends, good food, and so much more. I have to also say a huge thank you to our families that kept all the kids. What a blessing to not worry about your babies when you are away.

Here are some of the highlights!

Anniversary Dinner!

We actually arrived on our anniversary. So Clay and I enjoyed a great dinner that night after a fun first day at the resort. It was delicious and a great start to the trip.

Hotel Lobby

View from our rooms!

View from our rooms at night.

Day at the Beach. What could be better!!!

Lunch on Friday at Asiana. It was a great restaurant. Probably our favorite. Sushi for those who are into that. I am not. They had a yummy steak, chicken, and shrimp teriyaki that I loved! We at lunch there 2 days.

This is view of the resort. Our rooms were the ones right there in the middle with the awnings. Ours was the one on the right.

Our Balconies!!!

Dinner at Maria Marie.

Snorkeling trip on Saturday morning!!!

Fun times by the pool!!

Shopping Sunday afternoon before we caught the van back to Cancun.

Houston Trip!

The kids and I got back Wednesday from our trip to Houston to visit my sister, Marcia. We had a great time! I have the best sister in the world. She cleaned for us, cooked for us, took vacation days for us, and entertained us while we were there. We swam, shopped, ate, visited old friends, played in the sprinkler, and relaxed. So fun! Here's some of the highlights.

Here we are at the end of the day Tuesday night. We were tired, but we needed to document Marcia's first day of wearing maternity clothes. We didn't plan to match, but it turned out great for this pic.

Swimming at the YMCA pool in Marcia's neighborhood.

The pool there was great. Both of the kids were able to play independently in various areas of the pool. So it was really nice. It was also nice to have an extra set of hands there with me to keep up with them both. Abby had so much fun playing in the little splashpad area during adult's swim time. Nathan, however, pouted during adult's swim until he could get back in the pool. What can I say, the boy LOVES to swim.

Here Nathan and Abby are having a little concert for us. This is the piano that Marcia and I spent so many hours practicing on over the years when we were growing up. It is so fun for the kids and we have a really hard time keeping them off of the piano everytime we go there to visit. All I can say is, "Good Luck, Marcia and Matthew when your little one starts exploring the piano!"

Doesn't Abby look cool after one of our Target runs?

We had to visit the play area at the mall before we could come home. The kids had fun even though they don't really look like it here. It's so hard to take a picture of 2 little ones.

Sprinkler fun in Parsh's backyard. We bought this fun hose thing so Nathan could play and we could lay out!

The kids were so good the whole time! They were good while we were there, good on the way, and good on the way back. Here we are celebrating at Dairy Queen on the way home.

Check out Marcia's blog to see some other pictures and more funny stories from our trip.

Fun Pics from our Week!

This whole 4th of July in the middle of the week thing has really got me messed up on what day of the week it actually was this past week, but we've had alot of fun. The majority of the week was spent inside watching it rain. No swimming. No waterpark. Just rain. Friday we got to spend some time with our friends Jennifer, Ansley, and Charlotte who moved to Atlanta in May. Nathan and Ansley had a great time together. Just picked up right where they left off 6 weeks ago. Like not a day had passed.

We've had a great week celebrating and ended it last night with a quick trip out to Possum Kingdom Lake for dinner and fireworks. Nathan had a fun time swimming and watching fireworks. They had bumper boats in the pool and I think those were his favorite. He loved spraying everyone. Abby was impressed by the fireworks, but really just had a great time being busy and exploring everything at someone else's house.

Wish I had taken some more pictures of these fun times, but here are some that I did take. The kids and I are headed to Houston in a little bit for a few days of fun with my sister and brother-in-law. Matthew, my brother-in-law, is a police officer and his days off are actually Mon, Tues, and Wed. So we are excited that he will be off to get to play with the kids. Nathan loves his Uncle Maf. I am also excited to see what my sister looks like. She says she's starting to get a little baby pooch!

Abby colored all over herself with green marker one morning. I was unloading the dishwasher and she kept saying the same thing over and over again. When I got over to her I realized she had been saying green. Guess I should have gotten over there sooner.

Nathan playing hockey with his golf club and the wheel off of one of Abby's strollers. He is wearing his winter Spider Man pajama pants. He loves to wear these pants and refuses to wear any of his summer pj's because these are SO comfy.

Abby has fallen in love with berries. Blueberries, strawberries, and black berries. Here she is enjoying some big blackberries. I would put a few on her tray and as soon as I would turn around all I would hear is more, more! I believe this was after our second trip to the farmer's market this week. The kids and I have been going alot and getting all kinds of fresh fruit and veggies.

Our sweet girl!

Friday evening the kids and I went to the mall to do some shopping for my vacation and to eat dinner. I don't know why Clay didn't want to go to the mall on Friday evening!?! As far as Nathan is concerned no trip to the mall is not complete without a cookie and a trip to the play area. Both of these requirements were met on Friday night. Whoever thought of putting these play areas in malls was a genius. Sure does make a much more pleasant shopping experience for all involved.

Happy 4th of July

We celebrated the 4th by going to a birthday party for Clay's Pa-paw. He turned 84 on July 5th. So we had a family gathering on the 4th. Here is Abby getting cozy with cousin Brady. she started out on the couch way on the other side and then slowly worked her way over to sit right next to him.

After the birthday party we came home and took naps. Then we went over to the Shake's house. We cooked out and the kids had a great time playing out in the backyard trying to avoid mud puddles.














































Abby LOVES playing with all the boys and is always one step behind them. She's not going to miss out on anything!