Holy Crap!

Two awesome things happened this week.

First, it snowed. This is my car when I got out of work. I couldn't believe it actually stuck to the cars.

This is our friends' house in Beaumont. They got a lot of snow.

Second, we just bought a 2004 Chevy Tahoe on ebay. We went and test drove it earlier and then won the auction. We still can't believe we won it. I am excited to go pick it up, hopefully on Monday or Tuesday. It will be nice to drive a vehicle that still has its clear coat!

The South will Rise Again!!

It is interesting how we southerners really perseverate on the Civil War, like it is something we just can't believe we lost. We re-enact it over and over, and I honestly think that we hope the result will somehow change this time. Well, we decided to go see the show this year at the Liendo Plantation, and it really was an experience. There are a lot of crazy people, and then there are a lot of normal people who enjoy watching the crazy people. Here are some pictures from our weekend.



Shad and Cortney- always a dashing couple in their awesome shades.

Shad, Cortney and Merril (Cortney's dad) in front of the house

Texas Proud!

We love our big oaks! This one is HUGE!!

Part of the show- the Yankees are trying to take the husband to be hung for treason and then the wife shoots the Union soldier and says "Get this trash off my porch." Everyone got a kick out of that one.

Here are the Confederate soldiers dragging away the dead body of the Union soldier the wife just shot. Oh yeah, and they took his boots.

Some of the Confederate canons.

Battlefield- sadly an actor really did get hurt, and they had to stop the re-enactment for almost 40 minutes for the ambulance to clear him from the field. It really took me back to the Civil War era with the ambulance lights flashing and Abe Lincoln pulling up on a John Deere. Very authentic.

married 4 years and it feels like forever

Shad and I just celebrated our 4 year wedding anniversary. Shad, being the loving and thoughtful husband that he is, told me it feels much longer than that. He can't imagine why such a comment might be taken offensively. We are glad that at least he is pretty. Just kidding.

We bought tickets for a Texas A&M football game to celebrate. Shad, surprisingly had never been to one before. It is something that everyone should experience at least once because it is quite a sight. I would argue that the spirit and traditions there trump any other school's by a long shot.

We had seats on the alumni side (finally!!) on row 2. You can see how close were are to the field. It was AWESOME!

It was really sunny at first. Shad can't keep his eyes open and is making the famous pirate face of those with sensitive eyes.

The stands were filling up.

Almost solid maroon throughout.



Well, just in case you were questioning our political position, you now know. Yes we have already voted and are now praying for a miracle. Be sure to read the little words, not just the big one, or you will get the wrong idea. The back of the shirt says "Gig'em McCain 08."

Even when the football team loses, the band is always good.

But WE ACTUALLY WON!!




We are so happy about winning. After all, it doesn't happen nearly as often as it should.

Happy Halloween from Harry Potter!!

Halloween is my favorite fake holiday. It is intended for nothing but fun, as far as I'm concerned. And this Halloween was fun for me. First, at work, we had a party for all the kids and I dressed up as Harry Potter.

Watch out for my magic! I even practiced some spells that I could use during therapy. Yes, I am totally nerdy.

Then on Halloween night, I drove out to Austin to have a girls' night with some friends from PT school. We went to the Carrie Underwood concert and had a blast. Here is all 5 of us, just like old times before we were making any money. From left to right is Marci, me, Lesley, Carissa, and Jenny.

This is a sad attempt of taking a picture during a concert. Doesn't work very well, does it? Well our seats were great, a little high up but right in the middle of the stage. She sang beautifully and was very entertaining.

Owen's Blessing

We really enjoyed seeing some of our beautiful family at Owen's blessing. Here are a few pictures of the weekend and some other fun things.

Jamie and Paul and their adorable children.

I'm almost pretty enough to fit into the Black family.

The family that was at church for the blessing.
Doesn't Shad look sharp in his new church clothes?

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!

We love fall though the leaves don't really change. So I planted some mums and put up fake fall leaves and other fall decorations around the house. This is the front porch of our little house.

Apparently, Shad thought it was funny that Kinzie had her back paw in her nose while she was sleeping. I swear I have a picture of Shad that looks just like this.

New hair color!

Thank you to those of you who helped with the new background. I'm very excited to have something better.

Here is an update of my newest crazy hair color. I like to keep things interesting. Shad says that it actually glows in the sunlight. How sweet. We just consider it to be Aggie maroon!!

Help! Calling all bloggers.

I have not had the chance to figure out this blogging thing really well, so if someone could please help me out that would be great. I want to change my background to something prettier, and I want a link to other people's blogs so that I can look them up easily.

Also, all of my video files are too large. How do I shrink them so I can add them on here?

So please help me figure this out. I don't want to waste the time doing it myself. Thanks.

Oh and by the way, I'm so excited that I still have a nephew and one unknown still on the way!! Jenny, you and me are sticking together. Don't quit on me now!! :D

Stupid Hurricane Ike!!

Well, we survived our first hurricane together. We still don't have power so we took the short drive out to Hempstead where Terri is giving us all the air conditioning we can handle. We brought her all of our food from our fridge and freezer. Overall, we were really lucky we didn't take a direct hit and that Ike travelled slightly east of us. The winds were spectacular and fun to watch but really were scary sounding. There was a constant humming similar to what you might hear with a tornado. We can only assume that this was from the wind. The houses seem to be in good shape in our area, however, as you will notice below, the trees did not survive well.

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This is the view down our street. Our house is on the right where the broken tree has fallen across the street. There was absolutely no way to get down our street with tree after tree across the streets.

These are all the neighbors cleaning up the trees in our yard. We have piles just like this all down the streets from the fallen trees.

This is our tree in the street and the neighbor's tree that fell completely over from the base.

This our backyard with a small limb on our roof. There was no damage, thank goodness, because this tree is HUGE and if it had fallen, we would have been in serious trouble.

This is the sad view of our tree in the front after it lost half of its limbs and all the leaves were shredded off. It doesn't provide much shade anymore.

USA

After becoming really excited about beating the French relay swimming team last night, I have decided to support the United States Olympic team more vocally. Apparently, it is us versus the world since it seems that with a few exceptions, most teams are there to beat the USA. So, GO TEAM USA!!!!

Highlights

Here are some of the most recent highlights of our lives since we haven't blogged in a while.

In May, Shad and I went to the Natural Bridge Caverns outside of New Braunfels with my parents. It was neat but a little too pricey, if you ask me. Good thing my parents paid.


















Here I am at an after-graduation get together with some friends from school and families. These are my best friends from school and are a great group of girls.



This is Shad and I in South Padre at the end of May as our little vacation post graduation. We hardly ever get to go anywhere just for fun, so we spent some time doing stuff that we would enjoy. We went parasailing, deep sea fishing, snorkeling and spent plenty of time sleeping. It was very relaxing. I will post more pictures of these activities later.



























And here is a real adventure. Kinzie was found playing (roughly) with a baby deer which Shad then felt so inclined to bring into my parent's house in Anderson. Smart move? I'm not sure, but it was funny. So here are a few videos to remind you how weird Shad really is.















I mentioned before that we were moving to Sugar Land, and the move is now officially complete. We even took the deer head from Terri's house to prove it. Shad has his own room in the house we are renting where he is allowed to hang anything he wants. It is also where he stores random car parts such as the leather Cadillac seats. Have I mentioned how weird Shad is? Thank you to all the Jarvis' who helped us unpack and move in.

I have also been working at a pediatric therapy clinic for over a month now and love it. I can't imagine doing anything else. I am not officially allowed to state the name of the clinic but it is a nice little private outpatient therapy clinic located about 10 minutes from where we live, so the commute is easy. I am learning new things everyday, including patience and loooooong suffering. The parents of the kiddos have to be amazing. It is wonderful to work with them for a couple of hours a week. I love the kids.

That about wraps it up for us. Our lives really aren't that exciting, but we have some fun moments in there every now and then.

Breaking Dawn!!

There are many who already know, but for those of you who don't, I am completely obsessed with the Twilight series. Needless to say, a friend (Katie) and I went to the release party for Breaking Dawn (the fourth and final book in the series) so we could start reading our books ASAP!!


Here we are back at the house about to start reading the book around 1 AM. We should have taken an after picture less than 24 hours later showing us done with the books. You see, we had to finish them as quickly as possible so we could talk about them. I will just say for those of you who are planning to read it, the closure is great. It definitely completes the story and ends well.

I really just wanted everyone to see how nerdy I really am. I hope you have a pretty good idea now.

Oh, and yes, I did cut all my hair off again.

I'm a PT!!

Well, it is now official. I passed my licensing exam yesterday and have accepted a job. We will be moving back to Sugar Land. This could really be interesting. We will see how Shad handles "the big city." Now I just have to find a place to live in one week. Fun!!

Shad's Beard....and a little Sushi

For all of those who cared to see Shad's somewhat pathetic attempt to grow a beard, here it is. The part under the chin grows well, minus the scar. What is so funny is the mustache. Mark would be so disappointed. Notice how red it is. Maybe we will get some red-headed children too!! And no, that doesn't mean we are expecting, Linsay.








Here is our little Sushi. He was feeling left out because we included Kinzie on our last post. He is so cute but we need to get him fixed soon so he isn't too much of a male. Sadly, I thought I had picked out a girl. So much for all those anatomy classes!