Vacation 09 part 1- Mommy and Daddy only

Christi and I are celebrating 10 wonderful years of marriage this year. So, the first part of our family vacation was a couple of days in Dallas with the kids at my mom's. It's been wonderful to not have a schedule, worry about public environments not suitable for children, and the like.

We started our time with some Pei Wei in Arlington and a brief trip to the Park's Mall. Afterwards, we headed over to the hotel.


This is our hotel room. We stayed up by 635 and 35E at a Holiday Inn Select. It was pretty nice.


For our anniversary dinner we went to Ruth's Chris. It's truly amazing. I've never paid that much for a meal, but it was probably actually worth it! And they gave us free dessert for our anniversary, so that was really nice.

For our second day, we had our sights set on downtown with some time spent at the West End and then JFK museum. Unfortunately, the West End in Dallas is now closed! No more Market Place. So, we decided not to wait around for half price JFK tickets and just did the tour in the morning. But on our way...


We found this weird office complex. It wasn't labeled at all, we just knew that some place inside sold drinks. And then, once that place opened, it ended up being hilarious!


This was probably our favorite item in there. They also had a set of angry mob action figures, lunch lady action figure and crazy cat lady action figure, complete with some cats.

We hit the Sixth Floor Museum (we're both still conspiracy theorists), lunch at the Galleria mall at a place called Pot Belly's, and then back to the hotel for swimming and reading (Christi) and napping (Jay).


This is us entertaining ourselves in rush hour traffic on the way to dinner.


Since we were eating in Frisco, Christi decided to take the "opportunity" to visit the IKEA store. Let me just say this: it's big.

Afterwards, dinner at Fuddruckers and dessert from Cheesecake Factory to take back to hotel.

So, lots of fun and probably gained 10 pounds a piece. Happy Anniversary!!!!

Heads up, sharks squeak

Here is Anna actually enjoying tummy time! She's usually not a fan. So this was a blessing.


Adelade got Andrew this shark on her vacation. Chad made good on his promise to get us the worst toy in Florida. This thing squeaks. Loud. Real loud.

July 4th festivities

On July 3rd, we had the Edgingtons and the Bruces (families from our church) over for a cook-out and sparklers. On the 4th, I was out of town but Christi took the kids with the Edgingtons to the local fireworks display.


Tommy and Heather show us how it's done.


Everyone enjoying a little sanctioned pyromania.


Andrew and Chad with sparklers.

Here's a video of Andrew and Adelade with sparklers trying to burn our yard.



Adelade set a pretty good fire later.



Andrew and Adelade at sparks in the park.


Anna getting her firework on!

Our butterfly!

Here's some pics of our sweet little girl!


Some time around the beginning of the summer.


First cereal feeding. She's actually mad because it's not coming fast enough.


Beautiful!!!


Our dynamic duo!


Nana and the kids!

Andrew in Spring

Here are some pics and videos of Andrew this spring. He doesn't get as many photo ops any more so here goes.


Our guitar hero!


Andrew prepped for his first day riding his bike!


Day 1 wasn't a smashing success. It was way more work than Andrew wanted to put into it.


Andrew and Ms. Calvitt, his preschool teacher on the last day of school. He'll be in Kindergarten in a month!!!

Here are some videos from kids singing in church. The little girl next to Andrew is his best friend, Adelade, Chad and Melissa's daughter. Sorry about the video quality, but you can hear him just fine!!!

Long time, no posts

Wow, sorry! We have some serious catching up to do. So, in several small posts following, I'll try to briefly explain stuff that's from the end of spring and this summer. Christi and I are currently celebrating our 10 year anniversary! More on that later...