4th of July Weekend

Gotta love holiday weekends!

This weekend was totally great...

On Thursday afternoon Curt went riding with Danny, and while we were waiting on him to get home, Kendyl and I went to Luby's - one of our faves! Then we got Curt and proceeded over to a local park to help build our Village float! It was fun and got me excited for the parade the following morning... when we finished float building we went to our house for a second to pick up some FIREWORKS! Since we can't set them off anywhere near where we live, we went over to Kendyl's area to set off fireworks that we have had since the wedding (Kendyl had bought them for us to drive off to but it was a dry time of year so we couldn't back then). We made it into like a spy mission with our night vision headlamps, etc. We found a lake to shoot them over away from any civilization and had a great time enjoying shooting them off and me yelling at the 2 of them to be safe every 30 seconds. LOL! It was GREAT, and now Curt and I have extra space in the bottom of our pantry!

Friday we woke up early to go and meet some folks from work to enjoy the July 4th parade - it was a lot of fun... I love parades! I also learned that Curt isn't really a fan, which I thought was interesting, but he humored me and we had a good time.

Our village float was great, there were lots of high school bands and little kids, some pretty professional looking floats, a ton of classic cars, some horses, scouts, etc. It lasted a couple of hours and then we went to the grocery store to pick up Mam's Tinkerbell cake (as it was her birthday and we were celebrating later) and do some shopping as Danny, Heather, and Sonora were coming over for hot dogs at our house a little later.

When they came over we all jumped in the pool and had a great time swimming around and carrying Sonora around the pool. She was hysterical as she would fuss to get out, and then squat and pee on the concrete, repeatedly saying "Uh-Oh" - it was hilarious. Maverick was also outside so he was lying on the concrete watching us swim and she would go over and sit right in the middle of his two front paws like it was nothing. They have a lab and maltese at home, but Maverick is still twice the size of their lab, and still Sonora had no fear (and she's so small - she's maybe 20-25ish pounds and is almost a year and a half old). We had a ton of fun until it was time for dinner which is when we had to run to meet the family for Mam's birthday celebration.

When we got to the house we met Gerald, who is Mam's beau, and he seems to be polite, and she enjoys his company. We gave her her presents (a gift card bouquet and a small flat screen TV to mount in her bedroom), sang "Happy Birthday" to her, had some cake, and then we got on our way to head to the park for a concert and fireworks.

When we got to the park we set up our lawn chairs, played some frisbee and enjoyed the music (and the lovely weather and being outside) and waited for it to get dark. It was perfectly relaxing and so nice - we had fun taking some sunset pictures and laughed a lot, and then at 9:30 p.m. we saw an *amazing* firework show set to music over the lake! It was FANTASTIC!!

Yesterday I slept in and Curt and I piddled around the house all day - watching movies, catching up on shows, etc. Then we got ready late in the afternoon and headed over to Mam's for a turkey dinner. Gerald was there, too, so we got to know him a little better, and had a nice family dinner complete with Mam's GREAT mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, etc. It's been great hanging out with the family this weekend as it's been awhile as Dad was out of the country for the last 4-5 weeks, and Mom joined him a couple weeks ago... So after dinner, we all watched a Netflix that I had brought, chilled out, and came home, and then Curt and I watched another movie, and now it's Sunday!

Today we're going for a bike ride and getting ready for the pressure washers/window cleaners who will come tomorrow. Other than that, we're just hanging out which I'm loving - we're doing great at the "summer slow life" that we always try to implement as I run us ragged during the year. I may choose a book from my "to read" pile, and go lay out after our bike ride if it doesn't rain!

Hope everyone else is having as fun of a weekend as we are!

Love,

Tasha xx

See how great I'm doing already??

So last night I went in for a haircut… I LOVE my stylist – he’s wonderful and does such a great job, but I was a little annoyed! I had made Curt and I’s appointments back to back for 6 and 7 p.m. – mine for later as I don’t get home until later from work/driving, etc. So I was pushing it to get home on time, quickly changed clothes and as I was headed out the door Curt called to see where I was because our stylist was going to cut another guy’s hair in between us. I told him I was 5 minutes away, and whatever, as long as it was quick that would be fine. So I got to the haircut place at like 6:45 p.m. before my appointment and the stylist was cutting this guy’s hair so I chatted with Ash while I was waiting. So 7 p.m. comes, and he’s chatting away with his “friend” in the next chair, while cutting the other guy’s hair, and he didn’t finish until like 7:15 p.m. – ugh! I was trying really hard to not be visibly annoyed but geez – I had things to do still for the evening! And what’s the point of making back to back appointments?! THEN as he was cutting my hair he was still chatting with his “friend” in the next chair and I was so worried that in his obviously non-focused state that he would chop too much off or something! I wanted to shake him and point out that if he could just focus on my head that he could be done in like 10 minutes and free to chat up his friend after, versus my 40 minute hair cut/trim! It didn’t help at all that I was completely starving (read grumpy) with no dinner in sight as I was going to Kendyl’s after for a workout video session and only THEN were we eating dinner. It was actually more of an inconvenience for Kendyl to wait for me though, b/c she goes to bed at like 9 p.m. (because she wakes up in the 4’s – she’s nuts!), so by the time I got to her place, we did the workout, and then ate dinner it was totally 9 p.m. – sigh!

The workout video was GREAT though – we were totally panting but had a good time. I like doing workout videos at her house b/c when I do them at mine Maverick is all over me. He loves that I’m on the floor and thinks it’s cuddle time, but goes CRAZY when I’m jumping around so barks b/c he thinks it’s some sort of game or something! When I do my pilates video I have a hard time not laughing b/c I’ll make him go lay down on his bed and he does his inching scoot forward until he’s right next to me and I’m rolling all over him, or a leg hits him in the head or something – cracks me up, but probably not an efficient break in the workout…

Anyway, so got home around 9:25 p.m. and Curt told me I had just missed the coolest thing – ugh! Apparently 2 minutes before I pulled in the driveway, he looked outside and near our pool is what he thought was a cat (background info, Curt installed landscape lighting and blue pool lights that look GREAT in the backyard, so we have them on a timer and the backyard is kind of lit up til around 10 p.m.) by the edge of the pool. Well as we do not like cats in our backyard (we are not cat *haters* but for every blue jay I find dead in my yard I go a little more crazy) he was about to go back and shoo it away. At a closer look, it was a *RACCOON* who had come into our backyard and was pawing at the pool water to make the june bugs come closer through the ripples and eat them! How adorable is that? Curt said the raccoon was a pretty big one – Maverick saw it as soon as Curt had started to process what was going on and quickly sounded the alarm. Instead of running away Curt said the june bug bandit turned to look (oh so nonchalantly) and just trotted away, with a last look over the shoulder before he disappeared in the night. I can’t believe I missed it, but you can bet I will be watching for the clever raccoon!

After that excitement decided to watch Part I of the Bachelorette – WOW what a great episode – 2 great ones in a row! I have no idea who she’ll pick as both have laid it out on the line, so next week will be GREAT!!! Then, as Curt was still working on his laptop next to me I decided to watch John and Kate + 8 (my other fave show) which is *usually* 30 minutes but I realized only halfway through it was an hour show, so ended up staying up much later than I wanted…

Tonight was pretty low key and fun - came home and changed and went back out again to meet Pam for dinner at Market Street. Was really fun to catch up and just sit outside (it was so nice out today!) and talk shop... we don't do that often enough which is silly as we live so close, so will hopefully be doing that more often! We chatted about everything really, but I especially loved sharing Wilderness experiences with her (as she went as well on my trip in high school) from a few weeks ago! What is so funny is how well we both remember that trip, but how we remember different things from it! We both brought up a ton of stuff that the other had forgotten about until tonight again... so fun!

Oh and random thought - to make up for me missing the raccoon last night, TODAY I saw deer (pretty common but always love it nonetheless!), a bunny (NOT as common) and a SKUNK (*rarely* ever see!) so I felt like Discovery Channel girl again - whew!

I’m really looking forward to this weekend, too, by the way! Curt and I are going to decorate a float Thursday night for the Friday parade, we’re going to celebrate Mam’s birthday on Friday, then on Saturday she’s making a turkey dinner where we’ll get to meet her beau, Gerald (should be interesting, but from what she’s said he’s a nice guy so stay tuned there!), and then just try and relax and start getting things prepped for the following week’s birthday celebrations! We’re doing my stuff on Friday/Saturday, and mom’s on Sunday as we have a wedding the following weekend so it will be all our birthdays together! YEA!

Hope everyone has had a great day! Off to spend time with the hubby and go to bed - and laugh at Maverick... As it's July 1st I just gave him his heart worm pills with peanut butter, which he *loves* but always does this adorable head rubbing thing afterwards as if rubbing the outside of his ears/face with his paws will affect the amount of peanut butter stuck on the roof of his mouth! He cracks me up!

Love,

Tasha xx

No excuses!

Ok - I know how lame I am for trying to do better with the blog and failing miserably - sorry!

We have a lot to catch up on...

A week or so after I left off Maverick got sick - we have no idea what is was which is a little scary, but basically he would cry inconsolably when he tried to get up - lose his bladder sometimes, and just cry like mad. It was AWFUL to watch so we got him into the vet asap. They did a hip dysplasia test which was clear, it's not wobbler's (which is GREAT and what I was worried about), not arthritis or anything age related, so they gave us some meds (anti-inflammatory, antibiotic, pain med) for him to be on for the next 2 weeks, and graduatlly it cleared up and got better, until there was nothing? And there hasn't been any sign since - so crazy??

Maverick catching some rays by the pool

So we switched his food back to what he was on when he was younger (higher protein) and have worked on getting some weight off of him to relieve any stress his back/legs may have had, and all has been well! Hallelujah! I can't tell you how worried we were... A couple weeks later, we decided Maverick was up for going to the Spring Bark which is a yearly event - this year it was at the lake and we all had a great time watching Maverick make lots of new doggie friends!

Maverick and a bull mastiff - new giant best buddies!

As summer has begun we have also enjoyed the boat again this year - still enjoying wakeskating, etc. and our days out on the lake have been a blast! This makes summer so wonderful! We also got some great new patio furniture which has made summer evenings (and mornings) so nice - we just chill out there and eat or talk, and enjoy the R&R!

We also were very fortunate to attend an Astros game in AMAZING seats thanks to some good friends through YL who have some connections - whoop! It was such a great game - we won, the fireworks show was out of this world, and it was such a great night overall... sigh!

Then came Memorial Day which was the perfect combination of activities and relaxing! Me, Ma'am, Mom, and Kendyl had a girls day at the zoo one day, and on Monday we took the boat out and invited some friends to hang out with us as well... it was so fun! Heather and Danny have a little girl, Sonora, who just turned 1, and she was out there with us the whole time - she was perfect and we all had fun wakeskating!

Then of course, as it was late May, we had many high school graduations/parties to attend which was really fun, too. Kind of sad b/c we have a lot of great YL seniors that will be leaving us, and Greg (Curt's stepbrother) has also graduated, so we know quite a crowd of special young adults who will be setting out to make a mark on the world! Congrats to everyone and best wishes!

And THEN came Wilderness - Curt and I took 6 YL kids on a trip into the Wilderness, into the Rocky Mountains in Colorado for a 6 day backpacking trip... and yes, it was hard! We knew it would be as this was the same trip I did in high school (with Pam!) when we graduated high school and it changed my life, so Curt and I were so excited to have the opportunity to lead on this trip. And by lead I do not mean guide - we had 2 guides assigned to us that work at the base camp over the summer so we didn't have to worry about the survival/trail stuff, so that was nice. But our friends were so fun, the scenery was gorgeous, and once again it was such a life changing, once in a lifetime (and lucky enough to be twice for me!) experience. Of course on Wilderness there is always that one day that you think you're going to die, and for this trail it was on Day 4. Day 3 was really tough, don't get me wrong, but Day 4 we had to wake up at 3:30 a.m. to try to ensure we would be able to pass over the Divide (yes, the Continental Divide at 13,500 feet altitude - try breathing up there with a 60 pound pack on your back, falling through the snow), and we hiked that day from 4 a.m. until 5:30 p.m. We had to scale a mountain in snow and loose rock, and it was just crazy. But wonderful - by the time we hiked to our pick up point on Day 6, and had to get on the bus to go home, everyone was devastated to leave... we had a picture party though with our new YL friends a couple Fridays ago, though, to have fun and relive the memories, and it was fun! We had them over to our house, fed them dinner, watched a movie in the media room, and spent some time in the hot tub after - too cool.

Right as we got back was Father's Day, so as my Dad was out of the country, we went up to College Station to meet CP for dinner and margaritas, and it was great! Courtney came up as well, so it was a fun family get together...

And this weekend was pretty laid back - we had Greg's Graduation party today so we went down and had a nice, late lunch and fun in their pool.

Anyway, that's a very high level past couple months in a nutshell. In the next couple of months we have a maybe trip to China (well Curt will go for sure, but I will hopefully be attending with him for a couple of weeks vacation)!

Otherwise all is great, and I will make a harder effort to post more often so I can stop giving the nutshell versions of what's going on!

Love,

Tasha xx

Doing better...

Well the weekend is winding down, but it was a great one!

Friday, Carrie came over for dinner, Saturday we hit to get Curt some hiking boots at REI to shop, then enjoyed watching little Dylan later in the evening for our friends Rachel and Mike – it’s their wedding anniversary so we offered to babysit so they could go on a date! So we had fun and went to the park, fed him dinner, and just entertained him in general. He's pretty laid back so it was a lot of fun! Helps to that Dylan loves Curt (and he likes me too, but it’s ridiculous how much he LOVES Curt!)… we went on a picnic with them a couple weekends ago and he had such a great time just walking circles around us as he ate! At one point, he had a string cheese in his hand (he’s 1.5 years old, by the way) and he tripped over a stick and fell, so the cheese got really dirty, but it was like he wanted to “save” the cheese because as soon as he fell, the cheese (and dirt) went in the mouth! It was hysterical… Rachel had to fish it out. I mean a little dirt is ok but it was *covered* - I was laughing for like 5 minutes from his facial expressions… haha!

So anyway, that’s Saturday, and then today I went to a flower arranging class at Pottery Barn with Heather, learned some great stuff, and and then we did some things around the house! Curt did a TON on the garage, so I am happy, and then had the rest of the day free so we went to see "Made of Honor" which was too cute – I LOVE having free time!! Very unused to the whole idea in general, but man it's great!

Monday will also be a great time as we have our YL Crawfish Boil which is always a very big bash! And speaking of, I’m also really excited because earlier this week I found out that Curt and I are taking some YL kids to Wilderness! Yes, Wilderness – the very same trip I took 9 years ago as a Young Lifer in school… I’m SO excited to share this experience with Curt and to be on the other side this time… it’s going to be AMAZING!! And insanely hard, as well… I keep thinking to myself that back in high school I was the epitome of in shape, and even then it was ridiculously hard, so Curt and I will need to get our rears in gear and hit the gym to start preparing! And that’s why we went to REI – so Curt could start breaking some boots in!

Our garden is coming along so far now that we’re in the heart of spring… I *love* our backyard! We also got new patio furniture that we picked out last weekend… very excited, it's great and we spent this evening with my whole family enjoying it outside with a lovely dinner and dessert! I think this set will be more conducive to us using it more so we’ll be able to spend more time outside. I already sold our old patio furniture – on Craigs List – and got a great price for it (in fact, got the same amount that we paid for it 1.5 years ago, but of course it was in better condition than what we got it in as we painted it, reinforced legs, etc.) so I was very happy!

AND this next week is going to continue to be great b/c Ashley is coming into town! I get to see the boys AGAIN and I’m thrilled to see how her belly is growing!! We’re also going to see Chandler in High School Musical so that should be so fun!

Anyway, that’s the latest and just trying to update more regularly!

Hope everyone is doing well!

Tasha xx

Slacker, I know!

Yes, I’m way behind and I’m aware of this… sigh!

Things have been busy (as always) but particularly so as I was commuting extra far for work for awhile – apologies as this directly cut into home blogging time!

Overall things have been great, especially since I got a NEW CAR!

Here is a picture of her… and I love her! She’s a gorgeous Lexus RX400 hybrid, and so far I’m able to get 28 to 29 mpg on her so I’m very excited about this… and for those of you who know to ask, she does already have a name, and it is Aurora (think Princess Aurora from Sleeping Beauty, and still sticking with the “sky” theme, and it just fit)! I bought her used from Florida on the internet, and I have to say that it was a surprisingly easy transaction that although made me nervous, ended up being a great internet purchasing experience… who would have thought that you could really buy a car off the internet?! Crazy days, people…

In late February, I cashed in some miles to go see Ashley, TJ and the Dortch family – it was a blast! I timed it to coincide with the boys’ birthdays (very convenient that they’re only 2 days apart on the calendar) so we celebrated Cody’s 3rd birthday and Cade’s 1st – (I was just typing that out and thinking how weird it is that they are already that old), and with another boy on the way in the household (Ashley’s, not mine) I can’t wait to see what #3 will be like and how fast he will grow up, too! For Cody’s birthday we went to a Japanese hibachi place and had a pirate themed party (Cody’s obsessed, and it was so cute) and for Cade we did a family dinner, so we got to see a lot of cake, presents, and fun! It was a great trip and I’m always so happy to spend time with them!

Late in February, Cottonwood took a worse turn so Kendyl made the very hard choice of putting her down. It was VERY hard on her, and hard for us as CW had been a part of our family for almost 10 years in her 11 year life... she had been sick with a slow cancer for over a year, so it was her time, so we all miss her... LOVE YOU COTTONWOOD!

Then in early March, Jo from London came into town! We had a jam-packed trip that included dinners, the Rodeo (Faith Hill – so great), sightseeing hometowns, and a weekend at CP & Judy’s ranch in Giddings as a stopover to San Marcos and Gruene Hall/Gristmill for some hill country fun! Between me, Jo, Vicki, our families, and all of the activities, we had such a great time and it was so good to host Jo yet again in Texas! I think it’s a very nice tradition to switch off seeing your friends that don’t live close to you, as you always have something to look forward to in the future vacation vault!

Then came Easter later in March, which the Dortches came in for to spend time with Ash’s family, so we got to see them AGAIN! The Easter holiday was so lovely – had great family time, saw the boys (this time with my whole family – Cade and Cody sent Kendyl and I into fits of giggles), and just enjoyed having time off from work to chill and hang out.

Then came Kendyl’s birthday – woohoo! We had a great Crawfish Boil at her house to celebrate and just had it “open house” style so people could come and go since those generally last all day anyway (including this one) so it was a blast… I love boils b/c you can eat some for lunch, rest, socialize, and then eat more a few hours later, rest, socialize, and then do it again for dinner! They are the best (except for the part when you finish and your fingers are a little numb from the cuts/spices/rubbed off skin from peeling, but who cares about that when you’ve eaten crawfish all day)?

And lastly, we just completed our 2nd MS150 last weekend. This year, the weather LOOKED good to those who weren’t on their bikes, but it just so happened that this weekend had particularly freakish winds which resulted in a *constant* 20-25 mph HEADWIND. It was pretty miserable, actually… I mean still overall a good experience, but this year I had worked so hard to train more, and it was so discouraging to know our average pace (we got up to about 16-18 mph for long rides which was so exciting) and to be working hard, not even necessarily going up a hill, look down at your computer and you’re going maybe 11 mph – it was ridiculous, and beyond exhausting. But it was fun this year having Kendyl and her friends there, and we’ll continue to do them as it’s a great cause and just something really cool to do, I think!

So I think this catches me up, even if at a nutshell level… these days still doing YL though we'll be stopping for summer - we're supposed to be going to camp so this will either be June or July so that should be fun! We'll probably start taking the boat out soon (yea), and in the meantime I'm so happy that all of my shows are coming back on, and that The Bachelor is back (gosh I love that show) and that life will start slowing down some (at least for now, anyway)!! Curt's very busy with his work - he just got back from China and had a better trip this time around, so things are very exciting for him there and we're just so happy as he just got a PROMOTION! YEA! Maverick is also doing well - he currently loves carrying CW's Fat Cat everywhere, and I wonder if he knows that it was hers...

I’ll write more soon (sooner than last time, I promise)!

Tasha xx

Whoosh!

Well things have been busy as always, but they’re about to get busier!

Young Life is starting up again, Curt is going to China, and I’m starting a new project tomorrow!

Yikes!

So to update as to what’s been going on lately, we had a really busy weekend this past weekend that was primarily focused on *trees!* Meaning that Saturday we went to the Arbor Day celebration where we obtained probably around 20 trees (whoa!) and then spent all day Sunday planting them and clearing out room in our backyard and such… wow, we were pooped! Other than that we've just been hanging out with friends!

Last week we also CLOSED ON OUR HOUSE! OMG this was so long overdue and what a *relief!* It was such an arduous process with our buyers, and closing, and everything and such a nightmare… I’m convinced that Curt and I just aren’t overly lucky in the area of real estate, but we are just happy to unload the house in this down market and are able to move on with our lives without having to constantly remember in the back of our minds that we have two houses… so many praises here…

Curt leaves for China soon, and he won’t be gone long but I’m so jealous! He showed me the hotel where he’s staying for a couple of nights and it is so gorgeous… sigh… the next time he goes back you can count on me being with him!

Other than that, we’re just having fun and all is well overall, though currently a little sad because my great great aunt died on Monday. Lovely Aunt Grace (sister of Granny) who was just so funny – literally would send Ken and I into fits of laughter. Mom went up as Dad can’t get away from work, but Granny is doing ok… Aunt Grace had been really sick since before Thanksgiving and just been hanging on like a fighter, but she lived a really long life (in her mid 90s!) so it’s nice that she’s not suffering anymore.

Well, hope everyone has a good one and I’ll write again soon!

Tasha xx

Weekend update!

Well it was a nice week and weekend…

Stayed relatively busy all week for being on the bench, so that helped to pass the time, and then this weekend we got a lot of fun, rest & relaxation and friend time in!

Friday night we hung out and watched Live Free or Die Hard which I *loved* so so so much!! We had a nice dinner, enjoyed the movie, and had a great night and hit the hay early as Saturday was a big day! It started at 6:30 a.m. and we got the bikes together, and headed out for our first major ride for training for the MS150! We rode 36 miles in Kingwood with some coworkers who are also on our team, and overall Curt and I did pretty great considering we haven’t really started training yet! We finished just before lunch so packed up, went home, and decided to go to Potbelly for lunch – yum! Then we got tired afterwards so spent a couple of hours out in the hammock relaxing – it was cooler outside so we lit the chiminea and had a nice fire going and enjoyed the sounds of the windchime… too cool. We later spent the evening with Bill, Heidi, and Chelsea – made brownies, enjoyed English tea, and just had fun hanging out!

Sunday we went to church which was great, and then I headed to Courtney’s for a SLAH party and got some great stuff and saw her new place in the process! Got home around 3:30 p.m., did some chores, then headed over to Danny & Heather’s to enjoy a waffle bar, football, and hot tub fun! There were about 8 other people there, so we had more friend time, and I even got to feed and put Sonora to bed in the evening – sigh – too precious for words!! I didn’t take any pics all weekend, so sorry, but next time I’ll try to remember the camera!!

We'll either close on the house this week (cross your fingers) or in a couple, so we'll see! Hope it's this week, though!

Love,
Tasha xx

Pictures, Pictures, Pictures!

Ugh – I know, it’s been ridiculously too long since I wrote, so my apologies!

I’ve decided instead of going through a painfully long blog entry, that I would highlight what we’ve been up to in a picture montage!

We just celebrated Curt’s 30th on Saturday, and it was a blast! I surprised him with a trip down to Galveston to ride in a Stearman WWII biplane, and he had such a great time - he was so giddy when he found out what he was going to be doing! I also presented him with his scarf that I have spent the past few months knitting (he thought it was for Kendyl for Christmas) so he was a true Red Baron pilot… the *real* pilot, Tom, was such a hoot, too! He actually owns the red Stearman biplane that is in “Secondhand Lions” and flew it for the movie (including under the overpass 7 times – whoa!) so hearing his stories from his 60 years of flying was pretty cool. Here is their website if you want more information, but I highly recommend doing this – it’s something different, and what a memorable experience!

Lone Star Flight Museum: http://www.lsfm.org/

Then later that evening he thought we were going on a birthday dinner date, when truly I had invited friends and family for a surprise dinner at Saltgrass Steakhouse, one of his favorite restaurants. He was so surprised that I think he was a little shocked, but we had such an amazing time, lots of great people were there to wish him a happy birthday, and Saltgrass was superb in their service (we were all so impressed that such a large group could be handled so well when it was steak and everything that was served)! Anyway, here are pictures from what we’ve been up to lately, including his birthday which will be at the end:

The backyard in the fall - we actually completed two major projects back here before Christmas, one staining the arbor (so it actually looks different now than in the picture, a more enhanced cedar red color), and two calking the pool, so two huge things to cross off the projects list! We've had fun with the chiminea and hot tub already this year, AND Santa brought me a hammock and stand for Christmas to put under the arbor, so this will make spring, summer, and well all year so enjoyable! We also got windchimes from Santa and they just sound so melodious... sigh... we love our backyard!

The surprise of the season - we're driving up to CP & Judy's ranch and I look to my right at the tank as we're coming in the drive, and there was a SWAN! Talk about the last animal you would think to see in Giddings, Texas - but there she was... a beautiful Mute Swan. They are not native to the continent, so she had to have been bought as a novelty or for a park or something - she ate bread but didn't get too close either so it was hard to tell the extent of her knowledge of us humans, but so beautiful!

Kendyl and her girl, Cottonwood. CW is getting a little old, but hanging in there with the best of them...

Dad's 50th Birthday celebration! We flew in Grandpa Dan as a surprise, and debuted his presence at Grotto at Market Street - it was so classic and he was *completely shocked!* This picture was taken almost directly after it dawned on him and they had hugged... it was too sweet! Grandpa was only in for a few days, but we had fun taking him to my parents new ranch out in Anderson (55 acres of beauty!) and hanging out... As Dad would be in China for his actual birthday, this was early December.

Family photo after the surprise and birthday dinner!

Curt and I at his company Christmas party in early December - this was a perchance shot, but we liked it so much we used it as our Christmas card pic (and because printing these pictures was WAY cheaper than doing a picture collage like last year)!

Our first Christmas in our new house! We picked out our *REAL* tree the first weekend in December (and just took it down yesterday) and it smelled heavenly... Curt also built me my "tree box" so the presents all fit nicely under and it looked perfectly displayed in our front windows in the study!

Church on Christmas Eve night - in front of a *gorgeous* poinsettia tree!

Kendyl, Mam and me in front of the "tree!"

Christmas morning after checking what Santa brought... Maverick went right over to the bunny that Santa left for him and knew it was meant to be his friend! LOL!

Steamboat Springs, in between Christmas and New Year's! My family and myself met Aunt Whitni and Parker there, and it was FREEZING! I skiied in 3 degree weather, which was a first for me, but the snow was *FABULOUS* as it had been dumping and dumping... we had such a great time! One of the funniest moments was when we did our White Elephant and everyone kept stealing from one another (not mine though, I liked mine and was hovering)! I came home earlier than everyone else as my poor Curt was at home working, but it was a fun several days with them, and hanging with Whitni and Parker was a blast.




Curt's big flight! Here's a picture of him and Tom, his pilot, in front of the Stearman and flight museum hangar! (Look at that smile, man!)

Curt's surprise dinner party - this end of the table was a lot of our Young Life friends: Bill, Danny, Adam, Claire, Mike, little Dylan hidden behind Rachel, Rachel, Heidi, and Heather.

The other end of the table was Curt's family: Nonnie, Heidi, Carrie, Don, Greg, Sam (YL friend), and Pa Pa. Nonnie, Pa Pa, and Heidi all came in from Ledbetter which was so sweet!

End of Table #2: Charlie and Carol Sternau (awesome family friends), Judy, Curtis (also came in all the way from Giddings!), Curt, Courtney, Mam, and Mom (Dad was already in Holland - he was so bummed he couldn't be there for the birthday, but also to meet Charlotte! He's a sucker for little girls)

And the other end of Table #2: Fred, little Miss Charlotte, Elizabeth, (me, but I'm taking the picture! :-), Kendyl, Yvonne, and Vinny. These two couples had fun chatting as Vinny and Yvonne are from New Orleans, and are starting the "having kids" process so the conversation was lively!

Lighting the 30 candles! Fred gave us a hand as we didn't want the meltage, but Curt loved his "Cars" cake - KaCHOW!

Curt one of his best buddies, Dylan! Dylan loves Curt so they have fun together whenever we're hanging with Rachel and Mike!

Roomie picture with Curt, myself, Fred, Elizabeth and Charlotte! Charlotte was SUCH an angel all during dinner - and of course such a cutie... she LOVED a shiny green blowhorn the best, though! She was cracking us up!

And funnies with Maverick when we got home with all of the balloons. We tied one to the end of Mav's tail and he was just making us roll with laughter... I'll post a video later when I go through them and find the best one!

Sorry again to take so long...

Love, Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and talk soon!

Tasha xx

Joys of Cabo and Halloween!

Well I know it’s been way too long, so my apologies…

After I last wrote, we went to Cabo! Yea! We had such a great time, but it was definitely a unique trip for a few different reasons:
• First, we were there to celebrate our 2nd anniversary which was so fun
• We were also there to celebrate a friend’s wedding (Jonathan and Heather) – Jonathan was in my grad program at school and he and Heather have been together forever, so it just so happened to fall on our anniversary weekend so we said, “why not?!” as we don’t get to see them hardly ever as they now live in Georgia
• We were shooting to also make it a dive vacation (4 day trip so give us a couple days in between to dive)
• First time to stay in an all-inclusive resort so we tried to eat and drink as much higher-priced stuff as possible to get our money’s worth
• We attended a time-share presentation for 1.5 hours and then they paid us $300 in CASH
• There was a huge storm off in the Caribbean somewhere else which created the most monstrous waves EVER… I mean I’ve seen big waves, but the intensity of which these guys were pounding the shore was so incredible that I really was scared… it was so loud that you could be a 400 yards away from the beach and it sounded like thunder, clear as day… so intense, and I thought to myself, if the wrath of God had a sound, that would be it, man… whew!
• Because of the huge storm, we only got 1 dive out of our planned 6 in… bummer… but the one dive was really cool! We saw two seahorses (YEA – our first ones to see in the wild so far!), a nice sized moray eel that I spotted (YEA! I was so proud), some great fish, and a HUGE school of sardines… I mean when I say huge I mean millions. This was our first experience with so many fish at once… it was such a cool and bizarre feeling to be in the middle of all of these guys, and they’re literally forming all around you to still be clumped up, yet when you reach out to touch them you don’t touch one because they’re SO fast! They were so thick that we could look up (and I’d say we were about 30-40 feet deep so still within much sunlight distance) and it was just DARK! Wow, so fun…

So overall it was an awesome trip, but definitely very memorable because of all of the unique stuff about it… we had some great meals, great time relaxing by the pool, fun exploring the town (there was a huge fishing tournament going on, and we saw a very large marlin!), and a great time just enjoying some time away.

Then came Halloween, which most of y’all that know me know that it’s one of my favorite holidays! This year we decided to go as Shaggy, Daphne, and Maverick as Scooby! :-) We even took Maverick to the Halloween All Area YL club (as he was part of our costume) and he was a huge hit, and SO well behaved… he has been such an angel lately, it’s so wonderful! We only had *2* trick-or-treaters on the actual Halloween night, but Curt and I had carved our pumpkins that weekend, I had decorated, and we had Campaigner’s at our house so I was at least distracted by all of that fun with our YL kids and other leaders, so all in all it was an awesome Halloween despite the lack of kiddos ringing doorbells… it so stumps me because we have kids in our neighborhood, but I’m thinking that they all were taken to Market Street as we live so close?! So anyway… yea for Halloween and PUMPKINS! October is so my favorite month… sigh….

And now it is November… I’ve started a new project which requires me to commute an hour away (ugh) but it’s ok so far, and only 3 weeks left on it so it’s a pretty short one. We’re very busy and stressed currently with getting our house in Fort Worth ready to sell, so we have a double mortgage starting this month so we went up last weekend, and I’ll be going up again this weekend, but we’re feeling really positive so hopefully all will go well and the perfect person will walk into our house and fall as much in love with it as we did!

So that’s the latest… I’ll try to update again SOON!

Love,
Tasha xx

Busy Bumblebees!

So today is my last day here at my client – I’m really sad! Who knows what the future will hold with my next one, but this last year has been pretty fun, I must say!

This past weekend was really fun – we hung out with my family for dinner on Friday evening, had a 1 year old’s birthday party and a wedding on Saturday (Vicki’s younger sister Machelle), and then Sunday was the Renaissance Festival – yea!

At the birthday party, I was so jealous because Dylan leaned towards Curt to hold him and I was like, huh? LOL - it was too cute... Dylan is at a super cute age... last night at Campaigner's though Dylan chose ME! Apparently he'd been all about the ladies that day as he'd felt a little puny, but normally he prefers men... haha

Adam, Claire, Little Dylan (1 years old - yea!), Curt, Mike, Rachel (the parents).

The Dooly girls: Kelly, Vicki, Machelle's friend Megan, and James the MOH:

Now I know a lot of people don’t get why I love the Renaissance Festival so much, but I really honestly do… I just think it’s so great! I mean I've been going every year for my whole life, and there's just a special kind of magic when you have YEARS of memories like this... sigh! This time we had the whole family there (Dad is not always a given as it's not so magical to him - LOL) but he did really enjoy telling Curt about the year that I was 3 months old, and my mom was all into it, and my Dad saw rain clouds so suggested they should go, but she wanted to stay and they ended up getting stuck in the mud for HOURS all wet and cranky... OMG I was dying... they finally made it out by driving over the baby pine tree rows which are not babies anymore!! We went to plenty of shows this time, too - we had a great time at a comedy show in which I was invited on stage and was giggling like crazy!, watched my favorite, the Birds of Prey show, belly dancing, two GREAT music bands, one of which is E-Muzeki and the other is Tartanic of which I have a video…

Me and Arsene for his trick and me giggling because I had no idea what he was up to behind me but I wasn't allowed to look (but then I would, and he would get mad at me!) LOL

Me assisting him with his hat juggling - he was going so fast! I dropped a hat a couple of times, but overall everyone agreed I did a great job helping!

The Birds of Prey show... this year my best pic was of the North American Great Horned Owl... beautiful!

Other than that this week has been pretty crazy with me trying to wrap things up here at work, and getting ready for another busy weekend! Tomorrow I’ll be in CS all day for a conference that I’m speaking at, then we’ll be in Giddings/New Braunfels for a wedding and then YL on Sunday evening! Whew! I’m already so tired, maybe Curt will let me sleep in the car! LOL!

Enjoy the music from Tartanic!

Love,
Tasha xx

I think you guys will like this...

Ok - so found this link on a fellow blogger's website (thanks Aggieland Mommy! She has an awesome Aggie blog, by the way! Wow!) and thought it was really great. Basically it's 11 questions about your views on the good ol' US of A, and then based on your views it shows the presidential candidates that closest match your opinions!

I'm *very* happy to report, that although I have not been following platforms, who stands for what, etc. that I most closely match Rudy Giuliani, who is my favorite so far anyway! I truly answered honestly, without dwelling on political party, etc. and he was at the very top, and guess who was pretty close to the bottom? :-) LOL!

Anyway, go take the quiz - some of the questions really made me think and "bucket" my opinions, but thought it was pretty fun...

Also good news - Curt and I are officially registered to vote in our new county! Whoop! So we're all set for this November and *especially* next!

Check out the link to see who you share opinions with!

October... YEA!

Since I last wrote, we’ve been busy (what’s new), but it’s been with fun things so yea for that! Last weekend was crazy – Friday I was out in the heat all day for a charity golf tournament for my client, and it was just non stop from 6:00 a.m. until 5 p.m., and then Friday night was the high school homecoming where we went to see Chelsea as she was on the Homecoming Court! Saturday was equally as nuts – we woke up at 6 a.m., were picked up by Heidi by 7 a.m. to head up to College Station to see Chelsea play in her tennis matches (she won!), and then off to the Aggie game! I was so exhausted at the game that in the third quarter I actually did a head bob b/c I started to nod off! WHAT?! I slapped myself around and quickly got back into it… the halftime show was GREAT though – Baylor did Thriller and actually started doing the dance and it was so fantastic – other than our Fightin’ Texas Aggie Band performances, this is the best one I’ve ever seen! So good… then after the game we went to Tom and Carolyn’s for some water and cheese and to visit for a bit, then drove home to *rush* to get ready for dinner with Vicki and Paul at a great Thai restaurant in The Woodlands! We loved our chicken curry, but unfortunately Curt was down for the count for the rest of the evening – I guess those spices didn’t mix well with his meat and potatoes tummy… (LOL)! Sunday I slept for what seemed like forever, and we took it easy for a bit and did some chores, then drove out to Kendyl’s new house! Yea! We had fun moving her in some, and will go again this weekend I’m sure, too!

This week has been eventful as well, and mostly stressful as a bunch of stuff has happened – sigh! First, we found out our renter decided not to buy our house, which is totally fine, but adds ENORMOUS stress to us! I’m so at the end of my rope about it that this is all I’m going to say about it… ugh. Then I found out my project here at my client is going to stop for the moment for various reasons, which are also understandable but now I have my next project to worry about. So two major things, and then other stuff as well that just showed me that this week was just not my week, but Curt and I will keep the faith and just keep moving forward and hope for the best as most of it is out of our control. Send any prayers our way, people! We thought we had a lot on our plate before, but oh no, we didn’t, so let’s just hope this is it for awhile.

This weekend, we have Dylan’s first birthday party, Machelle’s wedding, Kendyl’s house, a potential visit from Andrew, taking the boat out (I am insisting!), and a car inspection – LOL! Should be fun… Oh! And we'll probably conclude Harry Potter 1 - moving right along!!

Last night, though – a Halloween Phantom came to our house! It was so fun… Curt and I are sitting down to eat and watching Grey’s, and the doorbell rings, Mav goes crazy, we go to the front door and no one is there, but a bunch of Halloween stuff is with a note from the Halloween Phantom! So tonight I have to go shopping to participate which should be fun, but there was a light up pumpkin included in our goodies, and we thought it would be interesting to see what Maverick thought about it, so here’s the video… he’s so unsure, and keeps looking at Curt for reassurance! Too cute…

Here is Maverick and the Great Pumpkin!




Hope everyone has had a great start to their October – my favorite month! We’ll hopefully buy some pumpkins tonight… Muah-ah-ah-ah-AH!

Tasha xx