On the Road....to redemption...

Today I am on the road to Ft. Worth.

For those of you that live in Abilene, this is a very normal thing to say..& do.

Sometimes you just have to get out of this little town!

But this time...its much different.

I am leaving for the first time in almost a year...

without Shayne.

without Michael.

without anyone to take care of or worry about.

with no laundry to do.

with no noses to wipe or lost things to search for.

with nobody endlessly yelling my name.

I would probably NOT do this "on my own". But this week/weekend is going to special. amazing. possibly even life changing.

I am loading up all my stuff and heading to F.W. with Megan, Lauren, Natalie & Sarah for the Pink Impact Womens Conference at Gateway Church. And I am SO excited !!! GIRL TRIP !!!

For those of you that dont know..or have never been to a Pink Impact Conference..here is what its NOT.

NO...its not a femenist meeting.

NO...its not somebody telling me over and over that being a mom / wife is my only role in life.

NO...its not JUST an excuse to go shopping in south lake :).

Last year I went to this conference with Megan..and I can honestly say it DID change my life. It was an overwhelming 4 days spent worshiping, falling in love with and realizing the realness of God.

It's a weekend spent LEARNING...and I am SO ready to learn some more!

I hope to have incredible stories to share...lots of pictures...and of course the unbeatable SouthLake shopping duds to show you when I get back on Saturday !

Please say a prayer for all of us going.

A prayer for a safe trip.

For awakening.

For renewal.

For a new heart.

For courage to share and follow threw.

A prayer for learning.

And a prayer for acceptance.

oh...and a prayer for our wallets! (my husband would appreciate it!)

Thank you !

God Bless

work and play

Lately my creative juices have been flowin'.

More like pouring.

First task at hand....a diaper cake for a friend of mine's baby shower.

This was by far the most creative I've gotten with a diaper cake...yes..even more creative than the drum set diaper cake I made.

The little girls theme is pink hunting camo.

So it ONLY made sence to do rhinestone antlers!

i absolutely LOVE it.

I'm pretty sure this has never been done before.

Next up on the list was a tutu for my friends little girls very first birthday!

I absolutely love making things for little girls. Everything is so pretty and sparkly and fun! I'm so happy I could make this for her...she will look so beautiful on her birthday!

THEN there was Laura's tutu! I had the pleasure of making Laura a tutu to help her stand out for her first full marathon! I'm sure this will bring her pleeenty of attention! Good luck girl!

All work and no play is noooooo good.

So naturally the cure is a hot dog picnic at the park...right ?! So we loaded up all sorts of fun goodies and headed to the park with the whole gang..and by that I mean...Daddy, Shayne, Myself, GiGi, Uncle Cheese, Aunt MayMay (and little baby Gibbs), Breanna & even Moby.

I THINK my adorable little girl might be a hippie.

(check out those shades haha)

The wind was out of control.

But it WAS good for some kite flying!

Shayne LOVED this. She's not the most cordinated little girl...so kite flying is RIGHT up her ally. Not much balance required. Sweet baby.

GiGi kept it up the longest. We were so glad she could join us..we miss her when she's away !

PREGGO MEGGO!!!!

look at that adorable little baby bump! SOOOO sweet.

We are ALL super impatient for that little baby to show its gorgeous face. Shayne asks her auntie to "take the baby out" all the time. I think we all agree with her!

thank goodness we had chef michael to cook us some yummy (all beef) hot dogs.

he's such a wondeful cook. and a wondeful husband. i think ill keep him around for awhile.

i think im not the only one who enjoys daddys cookin'.

this picture is just FAR too big girl for me. isn't she supposed to need my HELP!? AH!

Friday, at school, was picture day.

We searched and searched for a cute little outfit for Shayne to wear...and finally decided on this one. Thanks to aunt MayMay, Lauren and the amazing little store Suprises. SO much to choose from...but I'm pretty sure it cant get much cuter than this.

we figured why waste such a perfect outfit on ONE picture?! So Michael had a little photo-sesh in our front yard...how convenient that there was a gorgeous purple flowering plant to match us right ?!

She is growing up so fast.

Too fast.

I really need it to just sloooooow down.

Oh, and before I let you go. I have to do a weee bit of bragging.

On a outing to Academy to get Michael a baseball glove (hes playing on the team up at work)...I found this.

I know...you're thinking "cute...but whats so special??"

WELL..let me tell you! This very cute Nike jacket that I plan on using for my future chilly runs outside.... is a $40 jacket. Kinda rediculous right?? What's even more rediculous is that I paid only $2.98 for it !!! YEAH...less than 3 BUCKS! I just MIGHT be the queen of discount shopping...i LOVE a good deal !

Hope you had an awesome weekend as well...

God Bless

pictures are worth a thousand words

This...is a picture blog.

Mostly because there are so many pictures to show, that if I wrote about them all in depth you would be reading this post all week!

Daddy & Shayne at Little Italy.

(if you've never eaten there you are missing out!...nasty little building, YUMMY pizza. )

our pizzas before.

and after.

mmmmmmmmmm

and then daddy treated us to some frozen yogurt. Nikkis has become our new favorite place to go.

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Michael spoiled us last weekend.

He really did. And not in the way most people think of when they hear "spoiled". He planned all sorts of little fun trips around town for us to do together. He spoiled us with his time and thoughtfulness. We soaked up every minute of it.

a donut picnic at HSU

She sure did enjoy it.

feeding her donut to the ducks ... silly.

the time they spend together is MY favorite time.

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I got Shayne some sidewalk chalk the other day. Turns out a $1 container of sidewalk chalk = hours of fun, a huge mess and a whole lot of work for me! HA!

um...she is adorable.

Shayne made me draw...a LOT. She just sat there and named off people, I drew them, and she colored them in.

papa and patti lauren and eli

missykayla andrew and sarah grandpa and dina

MayMay and Cheese (notice MayMays tummy??) Jaxon Britt and Abbie

Shayne Me and Michael Natalie Baby Lella and JayJay ( & peanut )

cool kid...i know.

Oh....and can i just comment on these sunglasses? For the past 2 years, I have bought every kind of sunglasses immaginable, and Shayne will just NOT wear them. I figured she just didn't like the way they felt on her face or something. Apparently all this time it wasn't that she didn't LIKE sunglasses...it was that my taste in sunglasses didn't meet her standards. She picked these out, in the $1 section of Target. Out of all the styles, colors and patterns, she chose these. Lime green ray bans with frogs....all over them. She has worn them ever since.

I hope you enjoyed all the random snap shots!

We sure enjoyed taking them.

When Grandpa comes to town........

My dad came to town last weekend!

It's always a good time when he comes to see us. Good food, good family, good talks.

We love it.

(i appologize for the awful pictures, they were ALL taken on a phone. oops!)

This was the first stop in our food filled weekend.

Pretty good start.

incase you needed PROOF that this place is awesome....see below.

SO good.

The food wasn't the only good thing about dinner. We had such a good time...although I think the couple seated right next to us didnt appreciate our "good time" haha. Or the waiters constant laughing at Shayne. But we sure did!

all of us at dinner.

Shayne has her grandpa around her finger. seeeeriously. she nabbed this out of his wallet.

and then...she claimed a $20. And of course he let her keep it. If only i still had this power over him...!

The next day we took a little family trip to the park. Shayne decided this before grandpa even got in town, so it had to happen. I love watching my dad play with Shayne. It makes me really happy that she knows who he is, even though he lives so far away. And he truly enjoys every minute they spend together, she's a lucky little girl to have such an amazing grandpa. We love him, a lot !

so many things to play on. so little time. tons of pictures.

follow the leader.

precious.

even MayMay got in on the action.

and daddy.

and me too!

someday these are going to be the pictures that I look back on and cherish the most. I love having all of our family together.

SNOWCONE stands are open! Shayne's first snowcone flavor choice ..... pickle.

Yeah. pickle.

I completely blame Megan for this one. And now she's obsessed!

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Everytime my dad comes in town, we go to Perinis.

Every single time.

And every time, we LOVE it. mmmm I'm getting hungry just thinking about it! It's so delicious.

Everybody we know has their picture with the giant armadillo outside Perinis. Not us. Untill this weekend!

Shayne made friends with the armadillo...that lived in the "forest", according to her. Such a funny little girl.

Haha this picture makes me laugh.

love.

If this doesn't make you drool, I don't know what will.

best. steak. ever.

We were sad to see grandpa / dad leave. Shayne especially. She asked to "go to the restaurant and see ganpa" for the next couple days haha. We are still upset Nana Dina didn't get to make the trip, maybe next time! Or maybe California is calling OUR name?! Hmmmm.

This weekend was full of fun....it will be hard to beat.