Camping Parties are S’more Fun!
Every single year as I am prepping for Harper’s birthday party I swear up and down that the next year we are doing it somewhere else. Somewhere that requires me to do nothing but hand over my credit card. Having her parties at home I always go overboard. I always spend too much money. I always stress about decorations and food being ready in time. I always invite more people than could possibly fit inside my home. And I always, I mean always drive my husband crazy. But…
An Interview with Grandma and Grandpa
A few years ago I stumbled across an article (knowing me, probably from Pinterest) about interviewing grandparents about their lives. Ever the family archivist, I was shocked I hadn’t ever thought of doing this before and knew I had to get busy. Harper was just a toddler at the time, but this was something I wanted to do for my kids, and heck, for the rest of the family too. My Grandpa was just starting to show signs of memory loss and he and Grandma had recently moved…
Our Family Costume Themes for Halloween
If my family is known for anything it is for our Halloween costumes. And maybe that our house always reeks of stinky bulldog, or that we have a ton of pilots, or that the kids are… crazy… But we are definitely known for our family Halloween costume themes. I wouldn’t even say Halloween is anyone’s favorite holiday, but it has kinda become a thing with my family. Way back when our dogs were our only children, we started dressing them up for Halloween… okay we dressed them up…
P6 Farms Fall Festival
Harper’s school had a 4-day weekend for Columbus Day and though Dustin had to work, I was determined to make it a fun staycation for the 3 of us. One of the many things we did was spending a day at P6 Farms in Montgomery, Texas. We’ve been to other farms around Houston, but when I talked to Dustin that night I told him that P6 was my new favorite farm of all, hands down. First of all, I bought the tickets online just before we left the…
Destination: Destin
Since summer is almost over and it’s our last summer before Harper starts kindergarten (I’m only crying a little over here), we planned a last-minute trip to Destin. It also happened to be over my mom’s 60th birthday so I coerced her into tagging along. Then I remembered that my sister, Jackie, was wanting to take her kids somewhere within driving distance, so I invited them too. And then suddenly we had a lot of people. We decided to rent a condo, which, you know, has its pros…
Galveston Family Photo Session
Since Hudson is officially a year old, we decided it was time for a family photo session with our friend Laura from Studio Bloom Photography. We met Laura a few years ago when I stumbled across her website looking for a maternity photographer and she has done so many of our family photos ever since! Since its so super hot here I’d been trying to think of places we could go that we wouldn’t just be gross and sweaty and flushed. Without going indoors, Galveston was about the only…
Hudson is a Wild ONE!
Back in the days when I thought I could plan a pregnancy and birth whenever I wanted, I swore I would never have a summer baby because, well, Houston. But because God likes to laugh at me, I delivered a sweet baby boy at the end of June. This means summer birthdays for the rest of my life. On the bright side, at least He had a little mercy on me and didn’t go for August. It could always be worse. Before my sister had kids, she always…
Hudson’s First Birthday
My Sweet Hudson, I cannot believe I am sitting here reflecting on your first year of life. The baby I thought I would never have just turned a year old. We prayed so hard for you and thought God was saying no when I finally found out I was pregnant. We were hopeful but realistic, and when we thought we were going to lose you too I was beside myself. I still cry when I think about the day I finally heard that beautiful heartbeat of yours and…
Just Keep Swimming…
I can’t swim. Not really. I always say I can swim well enough that I won’t drown…right away. So Harper has been in swimming lessons of various sorts since about the time she could walk. Last summer she would have been ready for swim team but being very pregnant with a husband who works out of town, I refused to put her in. I have friends who have kids in swim team and all I had ever heard about it were horror stories. 7 am practices every day,…
Great Wolf Lodge and Arkansas Road Trip
Dustin had been in training for the majority of the month and he finally had a week off. Before he left for training we kept saying we should do something when he got home but we didn’t start looking until he was back home. Seattle, LA, San Diego and San Fran, New York, Ontario, Orlando, Nassau… everything was so expensive. Everywhere. Guess that’s what happens when you look at flights for tomorrow. So I literally opened the map app on my phone and zoomed out as if I…
