Weekend in Cowtown!

So Matt's cousin is married to a country music songwriter. How cool is that?! He is the main songwriter and executive producer for Brad Paisley. But he has also written songs for  Darius Rucker, Josh Turner, Lee Ann Womack & Blake Shelton(maybe more?). He's had over 20 songs hit top 20 and several #1 hits. He has even won song writer of the year!

Both Chris & Shanna are EXTREMELY gracious, kind, giving people who I enjoyed getting to know better over the weekend. We are wanting to plan a trip some time to go visit their neck of the woods in Nashville. I'm ready to go now! ;)

So, anyway, they were coming to Ft. Worth and invited the cousins to tag along! We made our way to Ft. Worth & got to see Jerrod Nieman & Wade Bowen. We were able to get on Jerrod's bus and check out all the pre-show stuff and see how he "lives" while on the road. It was a super cool experience and we are so thankful to Chris & Shanna for inviting us! Here are some pics from the trip!

Headed to Ft. Worth....my honey surprised me with new boots! 

I LOVE them and they are exactly what I would've picked out!

Friday night backstage with Jerrod Niemann

 Jerrod put on an AWESOME show.

If you ever get a chance to see him, GO! It was very entertaining!

 Backstage at Billy Bob's

Us with Matt's sweet cousin!

On Saturday, Matt & I slept in late(AWESOME!) 

and then strolled the stockyards. We had Cooper's BBQ for lunch. Yum!

 Saturday night, the rest of the fam arrived! 

And we ate Cooper's again for dinner! ha! We couldn't get enough!! 

Sisters in law!

The sisters in law! Clockwise from bottom...me, Heather, Erin, Melody!

The WHOLE gang! 

BJ & Melody, Doug & Heather, Erin, Matt & I, Shanna & Chris

The girls! We had a blast backstage waiting for Wade Bowen.

Wade Bowen performing.

The brothers! Matt, Doug & BJ

The siblings, minus 1...he's still to young to get in! ;)

Matt, Doug, BJ, Erin

 

Matt & I with Wade Bowen. 

His show was not as "rockin" as Jerrod's, but still great! 

I enjoyed visiting with him...he has 2 little boys and we got to talk golf. It was fun!

I LOVE this man! We had SUCH a great time. 

We missed our Owen boy but had a ton of fun with it just being us. 

We need to do this more often!

Many thanks to Aunt Bekah & Uncle Michael and Nonna & Poppa 

for taking such great care of our little boy so we could get away! 

Start of Fall!

The weather is getting cooler...I had to wear long sleeves Sunday..the smell in the air is a little different...we are entering our favorite time of year...FALL! With Fall comes so many fun activities! Here's an iPhone photo dump to play catch up on my ole bloggy blog. :)

The weather was great for a BIG garage sale at Mom & Dad's new casa. While we were tagging & setting up the night before, the boys found antlers, a flashlight & a toy gun. Therefore, "Deer hunter" game was played all evening. :)

Our Girls Night Out(In) for September was at my house & we had a 

"Saw It, Pinned It, Did It!" Party! (aka- craft night!) 

We all made fall wreaths for our doors. 

FUN FUN FUN and lots of cute crafts( and LAUGHS!) 

came out of that evening!

My Fall Wreath

Pumpkins on candle holders...great idea, Pinterest! :)

Bekah brought us all a cute pair of socks for Girls Night IN! :)

Close up of my wreath. Turned out SO cute! I love it!

My cousin Carrie had her SWEET baby girl, Adilyn Grace, so we headed to Houston to meet her! Road trippin' with my boys! What we do best! 

Just a pic of the back of my camera of Miss Adilyn. PRECIOUS PRECIOUS angel! More pics (and better quality!) can be found at www.facebook.com/mandlphotography

Back in Tyler it is FAIR TIME! We had a blast  together just the 3 of us. Sometimes it is so nice to do things together without a big group. We had corn dogs for dinner and spent under $100! ha! Pretty successful for a night at the fair! Owen loved the little pig races. He is still saying "soooo-weee pig!" 

My sweet lil family!

Shooting game...seriously he would have sat here all night...

Riding the dragon ride! Look at his face! I'm obsessed. LOVE watching my boy have fun! Even "dinky" old fair rides are fun when watching through their eyes. :)

                                  

His Halloween costume came in the mail! :) He loves knights ever since we took him to Medieval Times. There is also a show on Nick Jr. he likes called "Mike the Knight." So this costume is perfect for him this year. 

Mom & Dad got "grandkid corner" set up on the side of their new house. A sitting swing & a horse. 

All they need now is a pool! ;)

Seriously...obsessed with shooting. 

Ready for a pumpkin farm & carving them & leaves & fires & s'mores and wearing layers...bring on more Fall weather! 

GiGi & PaPaw move!

So my parents have moved from Houston to our little East Texas town!! We are so thrilled! I feel sad that they left my older brother, his wife & family behind, but at least we are in 1 town (only 2 miles apart!) when they come to visit. 

On August 12,  Owen & I (and sock monkey) headed down to Houston with Dad to help him get the last load of their things. I'm SO glad I was able to do that. They still had a TON of things left.

The next morning was August 13, Dad's bday! My sweet sis in law, Jen, made pancakes and put a few candles in Dad's. We sang 'Happy Birthday' to the birthday boy then headed over to their old house to get busy working!

After many hours of working, we were ready to head North!

Completely cleaned out!

Goodbye, 19807 Big Timber Drive in Humble! It was a great house for my parents and my Granny,who lived there in a garage apartment with them before she died. Many memories were made here and to me, it is always a bit sad to move on from any house, but also exciting to create new memories in a new place!

Since it was Dad's birthday, I let him pick where we would stop for dinner. 

Bueno in Lufkin it was!

We were DEAD tired that night when we got back, so the next day, we went to Mom & Dad's NEW house to celebrate Dad's birthday, for real! :) Dinner & carrot cake. :) 

Already making memories at the new address! 

Owen turns 3!

August 4, 2012, we celebrated Owen's 3rd birthday! We had our family &  friends over for snacks, cake & swimming! The kids played upstairs in the play room for a little while, then we sang 'Happy Birthday' and cut the cake! Everyone snacked on snacks & cake while Owen opened presents. After that, everyone changed & went swimming. It was a great day!

*Side note: I finally found curtains! I still want to add some sheers in between...but I was glad to have SOMETHING up on this window before Owen's party! :)

Just a swamp themed bday banner I made for the fireplace. 

The backgrounds I used were alligator skin & burlap. :)

The AMAZING cake my mom in law & sis in law made! 

It was just as yummy as it was awesome looking! 

Our big THREE year old!

All the cousins after the bday festivities were over. 

They enjoyed playing bows & arrows and guns outside. 

I just love these little boys!! 

Owen in his "cowboy" clothes that his Nonna got him for his bday. :)

Down 21 pounds!

Still a ways to go but slowly I am getting there! I notice the biggest difference in my face, arms & tummy. I still want to see more flatness in the tummy & a little less mass in the underarms! ha! BUT, as a good friend told me, "stop focusing on what needs to be improved and be proud of how far you've come!" So, I am taking her advice! 

I am proud that I have gotten up (almost) every week day morning for the past 3 months at 4:35 a.m. to work out. I'm proud that I have made a habit of eating more fruits, veggies, lean meats and "good" starches. I'm proud that I drink a lot of water! 

So, although I still have 39 lbs to go to get to my ultimate goal of 60 pounds, I am SO excited to be seeing results! 

July 4th!

We had a GREAT 4th of July! I wish I could just keep repeating that day over & over. We started off the morning with coffee in our PJs. Then, Matt & I got busy cleaning the house. We normally clean on the weekends and with being out of town a lot lately, our house has suffered MAJORLY! But, we got it done & its nice & clean...for now. ;)

After that we headed to the lake with Michael & Bekah, the kids & our parents. I only took one picture and it was of sweet Mikah Ann! She was CHILLAXIN' on the pontoon!! Passed smooth out. Sweet girl!

After the boat ride, we headed to Matt's parents house for BBQ and swimming. I took no pics there. Oops! But we had fun & ate great! Then we headed to Pleasant Hill Baptist Church in Whitehouse for their firework show. It was AMAZING! It was so close & bright, mom had to put her sunglasses on! It was insane! But we had a great time & Owen LOVED the fireworks. It was fun to "see" it through his eyes. 

Enjoying the 4th with ALL the grandparents! 

My sweet family!

He kept saying, "WHOA!!!" 

In a completely unrelated topic, I got a new car! I LOVE LOVE LOVE my minivan. I know...that sounds crazy. But I really did. BUT- I really needed some type of vehicle that gets great gas mileage. I pretty much just drove the van back & forth to work. So, we downsized to a car & I absolutely LOVE it! Very fun to drive! We got it last weekend while in Houston for Logan's bday party. It is a Hyundai Elantra. 

Gas mileage I got the other day on my way home from work...36.2! Woo hoo! My van only got 17 mpg.

First fill up! Just under 35 bucks. My van filled up for about $65. So this was cool, too! 

Looking forward to enjoying the rest of the summer...may have to take a weekend trip to Galveston now that it won't cost us a fortune to drive down there!! :)