It's Vegas Baby!!!

Me & my Honey outside PF Changs

Crazy Eyes & Crazy Eyes II

We're cool! :)

Dallas & Paul

Dallas & Jayne at dinner.

The monster omelette!

Do you see the size of that donut?? :)

And the famous "Chicken & Waffles!" The chef even came over to check it out.

Todd and his breakfast (just kidding). :)

The girls.

Me & Sister.

Kevin & Jayne

The Group!

Pirate meets Cowgirl! Yee-haw!!

Paige!!! Haven't seen Paige in forever & we got to meet up in Vegas!!

Bride & Groom.

My Groom. xo

Good times @ Ghost Bar.

That's right... Gabe and I actually had a little vacation this past weekend... we went to Vegas baby!!!!! We went with a group of friends to celebrate Todd and Leigh Ann's bachelor/bachelorette parties. We had so much fun.

We arrived Friday morning, checked into our hotel (we stayed at Bally's), and then we were off to the strip to find something to eat! Since we had such a big party, PF Changs gave us the "Champagne Room." We had our own little private room with a huge table. It was great.

Then we were on our way again, down the strip, stopping into different casinos/hotels. We spent most of the afternoon in The Mirage. Let's just say that the drinks were really good there. :)

Since the drinks were so tasty in the early part of the day, after dinner, I was ready to crash! I could barely hold my eyes open! Crazy!

The next morning we ate at a really cool restaurant called Serendipity. They are well known for their BIG portions and frozen hot chocolate. Gabe ordered the waffles & chicken. I just assumed that the chicken would be tenders...um, no. It was a whole chicken!! It was hilarious. I ordered a ham & cheese omelet which was served with these awesome fried potatoes. MMM, so good. Kevin & Jayne got a donut. Just a donut, you say? No. This donut was as big as Sophie's head! No joke. :)

We then explored the strip some more. We spent some time in Ceasar's Palace (I think this is mine and Gabe's favorite hotel), shopped in The Forum, and hung out with our awesome friends. For dinner, we all ate at Samba, a Brazilian restaurant in The Mirage. Then the girls threw Leigh Ann a lingerie shower. After the shower, we all met back up at The Palms hotel. This is where all the cool nightclubs are. We were kind of "VIP" (long story), so we went to the Ghostbar (for those of you that watched Real World Las Vegas, this is where they went) and Rain. Ghostbar was a low-key, let's sit around and enjoy some drinks place. It is located on the 55th floor of the hotel, so the view from the balcony was awesome!! Part of the balcony was plexi-glass. It was a little frightening to stand on that part, but very cool to look down on. Rain is a nightclub with very loud music. And it was packed!!!! There were dancers/gymnasts (don't know what else to call them) hanging from the ceiling doing tricks. Very cool. It was good to just experience that.

On Sunday, Gabe and I were on our own. Everybody took different flights home, and ours wasn't until 2:30. We walked down to the Harley Davidson Cafe and grabbed some lunch. And then got some souvenirs for the kids. We explored a little on our own and then it was time to get a taxi for the airport.

The flight home was good, but I was anxious to get home to the little munchkins. My mom gave them late naps, so they were still up when we made it home. We heard screams of excitement as we walked in the door. I love taking a vacation with my husband, but I will always miss those smiling faces.

A big thanks to my mom & dad (and Danni too) for keeping the kids. Thank you, thank you, thank you! And to Todd & Leigh Ann... thanks for inviting us to Vegas. We are looking forward to the wedding!!! :)

p.s. sorry the pictures aren't so good. i had to scan them (hence why some of them are also crooked- it's very hard to keep those suckers straight!) :)

Awww!

A little special time spent together. I wish they were always this sweet together. :)

Happy Birthday Zachary

HAPPY 4th BIRTHDAY ZACHARY!! WE LOVE YOU VERY MUCH!! xo

Enjoy the slide show of pictures from his birth to present.

Labor Day Weekend

Sophie sneaking Papa's breakfast...

Sophie with Cousin Danni...


We went to visit my parents at the lake for Labor Day Weekend. We just relaxed (or tried to- Sophie didn't sleep good), because the lake was low. We had a pretty uneventful weekend. No water activities for us this time. But we always enjoy getting away, and visiting Grandma & Papa!

19 Months!

My Baby Girl turned 19 months on Sunday! She is a little ball of energy that loves to read/look at books, sing, dance, and she has turned into my little parrot. She is copying, or at least trying to copy everything I say!
She now says: let's go!, ____, where are you?, there it is!, and she sings/hums along to Taylor Swift songs (hilarious)!
Happy Birthday Sophie! xo

Zach's Birthday Party!

We celebrated Zach's 4th Birthday this past weekend. We had to have it a little earlier this year due to Labor Day Weekend. He chose SpongeBob again when I asked him what kind of party he would like. Silly boy! He enjoyed every minute of it! He got a Nintendo DS, Legos, Cars, Race tracks, Clothes, Movies, and a DJ Keyboard. Thank you to everyone that made his day so special!

Watch & Learn

Not everything Zachary teaches his little sister is a good thing.....

Don't worry, the camera was right there and I did get her down right after I took these pictures. :) Crazy kids!!

Back to School!

Zachary started back to school this past week. He is still going to the same school on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I was afraid that he might not want to go back, but he seemed okay with going and seeing his friends again. The week before, we got a chance to go and meet his teacher and see his new classroom. I think this helped him a lot.
He is now in the Marvelous Monkeys class with Miss Terri. The first week back has been successful. He tells me all about his day when I pick him up.

Here is part of our conversation from Tuesday:

Mommy: "Zach, Sophie missed you today while you were at school."

Zach: (smiles) "I missed everybody too. I missed mommy a lot, I missed daddy a lot, and I missed Sophie just a little bit."

I guess he was ready to go back to school!! :)

Our Little BIG Project

I have been talking about it and talking about it. And finally... we did it! We started painting our living room. Now, if you know what my living room looks like, you will understand. For those of you that don't, let me explain. The living room is two stories!!! The only way we thought we would get it done, was to hire someone. But of course I didn't want to do that because it would cost an arm and a leg (and maybe even a kidney or two). I had almost given up hope, thinking that I would have to wait to win the lottery or something. But then I saw a place on the way to church that rents scaffolding! "Wow, that's what we can do," I thought. And then my wonderful niece, Danni, offered to help paint as well. Last week we drove all over- looking at paint, comparing prices (because I was going to need a lot of it), and going to the scaffolding place. I was a little nervous in how much the scaffold would cost, but to my surprise it only cost $100 to rent this thing for a whole month! I couldn't believe it! This was a sure sign that now was the time to paint the living room. I mean, it has only been six years since we have been living with white walls! :) Here are the first pictures. I will post more as we progress. I do love it so far! Gabe on the scaffold... hope he's not afraid of heights!

Lengthwise...to get the full effect of how tall this thing really is!

The first strokes!

The team in action!

First wall almost complete!

Sophie playing with Danni's hair as she paints.

Zach lounging in the window... reminded me of a cat.

Such a Big Boy!

I am so proud of Zachary!!!!! He has been using the potty now for 5 months, but he has been wearing pull-ups to bed during these 5 months. Well, for the last two weeks, he has NOT been wearing pull-ups to bed at nighttime! YEA!!!! And I am also proud to say that he has only had one accident since.
Good job Zachary! Mommy and Daddy are so very proud of you!!
Now it's time to celebrate with a little dance.......

http://americangreetings.com/ecards/view.pd?i=494138516&m=6032&source=ag992

click on the link above and get a laugh!

My Silly Monkeys

Sophie is 1 1/2!

Can you believe it???? I sure can't! My baby girl is now 1 1/2! She surprises me every day with something new....
Words: dada & daddy, still really won't say mama (unless you ask her to say it), cup, hot, cold, hi (still her favorite word), tries to say Zachary, bless you (when you sneeze), thank you, excuse me/you, poo-poo, tee-tee, uh-huh, and nah (this is no- which she says a lot)!!
She now walks up & down the stairs holding on to the bannisters, as oppose to crawling or scooting- still makes me very nervous.
Still loves to eat! She will eat just about anything you set in front of her.
Loves to dance and sing.
Loves to put her shoes on & off, on & off, etc. I have to hide them so we don't do this All day!
Likes to brush her teeth, take a bath, and fix her hair. :)
And my favorite...when she holds my face, pulls me closer, and gives me a sweet little kiss!!
I love you baby girl! Happy 18 month Birthday! xo

Corpus Visit

We made a trip down to Corpus this past weekend. Gabe is going to be really busy with work for the next couple of months, so we thought we better 'squeeze' a trip in while we could still get away.
We arrived on Friday evening and had dinner with Papo, Grandma BB, Uncle Jesse, Aunt Miranda, and Lauren at Fajita Junction (to visit Uncle Tony at the restaurant that he is now managing). After dinner, the kids got to hang out and play for a while. Here are some pictures of Lauren and Sophie (Lauren is 10 months older than Sophie, but they are almost the same size)!

Awww, sweet cousin love!

That night, after the kids were put to bed, Gabe and I headed downtown to hear Out of Bounds play. Gabe went to high school with Floyd who plays in the band. We had a good time...apparently too good of a time. I did NOT feel good the next day. It was well into the afternoon when I started feeling better. But I think the BEACH had something to do with that! We took the kids to the beach for the first time. They loved it! As soon as Zach got down from the truck, he started playing in the sand. Sophie wanted to head straight for the water (imagine that)! We stayed for a few hours, enjoying the water and sun.

I was a bad mom though- I only took 2 whole pictures of my children at the beach for their first time!!! I was scared that sand was going to ruin my camera! Lol! :)

But, here they are... playing in the sand.

On Sunday, we had a relaxing day. We were wiped out from the two previous days and all of the fun activities. We visited with Grandma Sally and Aunt Kelly, ate a lot, and visited some more! We finally hit the road to come back home around 7pm. Needless to say, the kids slept almost the whole way home!!

Down, Set, Hut!!

Cousin Cole has started football practice for the fall. He came over to visit and brought his helmet in to show us. Sophie wanted to try it on! She looked hilarious!!

Taking it off...wasn't too easy!