Baby Avance Reveal Party

Tonight was the big moment for Tim and Stephanie (and family and friends) to find out what baby Avance's gender is.  Is baby Avance a boy or a girl?

Stephanie had yummy food for everyone, and the table was very cute with touches of pink and blue.

It was so special that Tim and Stephanie shared this moment with friends and family.  I am excited that we were able to be there to share this with them.  Everyone was anxious to find out if they are having a boy or a girl.

I wanted to take something, but since I didn't know what to buy, we played it safe and got both.  Which gift will Tim and Stephanie get to open...pink or blue?

Stephanie's friend Celia had made delicious cupcakes for dessert.  One of them was filled with either blue or pink frosting.  Finally, it was time for the big reveal.  Tim and Stephanie led the line to get a cupcake.  Tim tried to cheat and pull the toothpick out of a few to see if he could get  a sneak peak.

Once everyone had a cupcake, it was time to dig in.  Stephanie could hardly stand it and looked around expectantly waiting to see who had THE cupcake.

I had been waiting to catch their reaction, but when no one spoke up, I decided I'd better bite into mine.  Meanwhile, Stephanie was instructing parents to make sure their kids bit all the way into the cupcake!

Low and behold, I was holding it in my hand.  Once Stephanie realized I had it, I had to get a picture before I turned it around.

It's a GIRL!!!

Here are some pictures of the reactions at the front of the room.  Lots of excitement!

Gayland and Brenda had brought a gift that was quickly transferred into a cute pink bag.  It was a precious Willow Tree Musical Figurine.

A little later, Tim and Stephanie got to open the pink gift that Michael and I took.  I love the monkeys!

Stephanie's brother and SIL bought their niece a pretty silver piggy bank.  It was engraved with a quote that Chris and Stephanie's Nanny used to always say, "Watch the pennies and the dollars will take care of themselves." - Nanny

How sweet and thoughtful!

Congratulations Tim, Stephanie, and Baby Avance!  You're halfway there.  We can't wait to meet your precious pink bundle of joy!

Weekend in Austin

On Friday afternoon we left Dallas and headed toward Austin.  Traffic getting out of Dallas was terrible!  Since it took us so long to get going, we made a pit stop in Hillsboro, and I scored this amazing ice cream cone at Dairy Queen.  Can you believe this isn't even the large size?  What a great start to vacation (after getting through the traffic, of course!).

We were thrilled to have the opportunity to spend this weekend in Austin with Michael and Jessica.  We are sad that they don't live in Dallas any more but excited to have friends to go visit.  We arrived at their house Friday night just in time for dinner.  Even though Jessica is 24-weeks pregnant and had worked all day, she had dinner ready and waiting.  She was just finishing up icing her homemade blueberry cake (with homemade lemon icing) when we arrived.  She is amazing!

The Hixons' new house is gorgeous, and Jessica has done a great job decorating it.  Michael and I love our house, but visiting them did ignite a little jealousy over the spacious garage and awesome kitchen!

For lunch on Saturday, we went to a cute little bakery/cafe called Rolling in Thyme and Dough.  It was an old house with a nursery in the yard around it.  Michael noted that it was very "Portlandia."  Our food was great!

I enjoyed my girl time with Jessica on Saturday afternoon while the boys played golf.  Jessica is always willing to talk about any topic, and she isn't shy about asking the tough questions.  I love that about her!  Thanks for the awesome conversation, Jessica!

Michael has been wanting to eat at as many BBQ restaurants on Texas Monthly's Top BBQ list as he can.  He got to cross one of them off the list on Saturday night!  We went to Salt Lick, and had a great experience!

The atmosphere is a lot like the Gristmill in Gruene.  We arrived at 6:00 to find out we had a wait on 1 hour and 45 minutes.  We had expected this and went before we were starving.  They have a great outdoor waiting area with live music.  We found a comfy place to sit and enjoy the weather.

Once it was time to be seated, we walked by the smoker pit on the way to our table.  It smelled so good!

We opted to go all out and get the Family Style, which is all you can eat brisket, pork ribs, and smoked sausage along with beans, cole slaw, potato salad, and bread.  We also wanted to try the turkey so we threw in a half pound of the smoked turkey as well.  It was all amazing!  I normally don't like ribs, but they were tied with the turkey for my favorite meat.  I also don't typically eat cole slaw or potato salad, but they were both delicious!  Of course, dessert was a must.  It was hard to decide what was the best: warm pecan pie, peach cobbler, blackberry cobbler, or the ice cream that accompanied them all.  Even Michael Hixon ate dessert!  If you know Michael, you know it must have been good if he was eating it.  After one bite, he couldn't stop!

It was great to spend Easter Sunday with Michael and Jessica worshiping at their new church.  It seems like they have found a great place to call home, and we really enjoyed the service this morning!  We were sad to leave after lunch, but we are excited to have arrived at our final destination - Barons Creekside in Fredericksburg, TX.  We are excited to have this whole week off work!

Cosmic Jump!

Yesterday, we went to Cosmic Jump with our Foundation Group.  When we first arrived and found ourselves surrounded by what seemed like hundreds of kids, we weren't too sure.  However, after "jumping" in and joining the fun, we really enjoyed ourselves.  It's definitely something we'd do again!

It took me a while to get up the courage, but I can still do some trampoline tricks!  Although, I am definitely not 18 anymore.  I may have hurt my knee and had a limp today.

After two hours of jumping, we were all pretty tired!

Super Birthday Party!

Tonight we got together with friends and family to watch the Super Bowl and celebrate Candy's birthday.  There were birthday decorations and lots of birthday gifts.

We had lots of yummy Super Bowl finger foods.  We were more excited about the Super Bowl commercials than we were about the game.  We enjoyed the company!

We had yummy birthday cake that Melody made, and Candy opened birthday gifts.  Happy birthday Candy!

Holly's Baby Shower

This afternoon we got to celebrate Holly and impending arrival of little Lainey!  I hadn't seen Holly in a while, and she is looking amazing!  I can't believe Lainey will be here in about five weeks.  I am glad that we got to plan a special day for Holly.

We had tea at Lavendou.  They did a great job with the service, and it was all delicious!  The tea that we had was some kind of chocolate tea.  It sounds weird, but for someone who doesn't like tea (and loves chocolate), it actually wasn't bad.  The scones were amazing!

Lindsey added some pretty flowers and yummy lemon covered almonds for guest favors.  Her mom made the cutest corsage for Holly.  It was made out of tiny frilly baby socks!

Holly got lots of great stuff for Lainey!

We had almost all the girls from our old Bible study group together for the first time in a long time.  It was good to see everyone and catch up.  Holly's wonderful SIL and one of her close friends and mentors were also there to make it a special day for her.

Love you Holly!  I am so glad that I was able to share in a small part of this exciting time with you.  I can't wait to meet Lainey!

Renew, Refresh, Rejoice

This weekend, Stephanie and I went on the Watermark Women's Retreat.  It was a wonderful weekend.  The women who worked hard to plan the retreat did a fantastic job organizing everything and planning the schedule.  We had four wonderful sessions with great speakers, amazing worship times, some time for reflection, several small group sessions, and lots of free time!  The retreat was held at Allaso Ranch in Hawkins, TX.  The camp property was beautiful, and the cabins and other accommodations were very nice!  The camp staff did an amazing job cooking for 500 women.  It was all quite tasty, and I think I had some of the best hot chocolate I've ever had in my life!

The theme of the weekend was "Renew, Refresh, Rejoice."  We had great speakers talk about

1. Identity in Christ and how we can renew and realign that identity.
2. How we can be refreshed in Christ by spending time in his Word (and using our "mind time" to meditate on Scripture and His promises), focusing on eternity instead of always thinking about now, remembering that the Lord is sovereign, and loving and remembering we are loved.
3. Rejoicing in the value that we have in Christ and His eternal, unconditional love for us.

In addition to the great encouragement we got in each session and the great conversation we had with our small groups, we enjoyed lots of free time to play and relax.  There were lots of activities to choose from during free time - zip line (which was over the water and so fun!), ropes course, horseback riding, mountain biking, hiking, DIY nails and facials, movies, Zumba classes and more!

Saturday night, we made s'mores at the campfire behind our cabin.  When we got over there, the graham crackers were gone, so we made chocolate marshmallow sandwiches...pretty good!  It was chilly outside, so some of the girls decided to stay in the lodge and roast marshmallows in the fireplace.

It was nice to get home today, but I am so glad that I got to have this weekend away!

WHAT?!?!?

I got news tonight that Britney had her baby today!  We knew she might be early, but I didn't expect to hear something today.  The biggest surprise of all, is that she has a beautiful, precious SON!

WHAT?  This was a surprise for everyone!  That's right, this is now two in roughly nine months.  Remember this?

There will be a little work to transform a perfectly precious, pink nursery for a baby girl into a cute one for a boy.  However, if he comes home to a pink nursery, it will just make him more manly!

I can't wait to get back up to AR to meet this precious little boy!

Weekend in Arkansas

This past weekend, Jenni, Kristin, and I got to travel to Arkansas for Britney's baby shower.  I had so much fun with my college friends, and I am so glad that we were able to be there!  It was great to catch up with Jenni and Kristin on the drive up, and it was so fun to see Britney pregnant.  Of course, she looked amazing as always!

We were all able to stay at Britney's parents house, which was a lot of fun.  It felt like old times.  We also got to see Zach and Britney's house, and they have the nursery fixed up super cute!  Everything is ready to bring that precious baby girl home!

Yesterday Britney's aunt and cousin hosted a beautiful shower for her.  All the food was delicious, and they had everything set up very cute!

We played a game to see who could get closest to guessing Britney's waist size right now, and we also got to guess how many M&M's were in the plastic bottle.  I didn't do very well at either game!

Britney got lots of great gifts as well.

This baby is going to be smothered in love and spoiled rotten!  Zach and Britney, we love you and can't wait to plan our next visit to meet your little one!

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!

Last night, we had a few friends over to help us ring in the new year.

We had a lot of yummy food...

We played an intense game of Catch Phrase...

And had fun ringing in the new year...Happy New Year!

Foundation Group Christmas

Tonight we had a wonderful Christmas celebration with our Foundation Group.  Sean and Melissa hosted a lovely dinner.  We had salmon, halibut, steamed broccoli, roasted potatoes, and yummy garlic bread!  I loved Melissa's Christmas table!

After dinner, Melissa was going to take some leftover fish to a neighbor, so we took advantage of the opportunity to go caroling.  Fun times!

We had two birthday girls tonight.  Elyse's birthday was yesterday, and today is Stephanie's birthday.  We took a break from the Christmas celebration to sing Happy Birthday and enjoy some cake and ice cream.  (Note to self: Birthday candles and dump cake don't work well together.  The hot cake melts the candles!)

Happy birthday Elyse and Stephanie!

After cake and ice cream, it was time for our Christmas gift exchange.  We were told we'd do a white elephant gift exchange, and the only criteria was to bring something wrapped from home.  You really had no idea what to expect when you opened a gift.  Some were crazy but had redeeming qualities like a Top Golf gift card taped to the bottom, or a book that may be a good read, or a puzzle that would be fun to solve.  Others...well, others didn't have a lot of long-term redeeming qualities other than the fact that we all got a good laugh!

Sean and Melissa, thank you for hosting such a fun evening for everyone!

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