The one with no pictures of my kids

Last weekend I went back to Texas...

wait for it...

BY MYSELF.

It was one of the best weekends of my life. No lie.

Now I love my kids and I may even love my husband more after last weekend since he was the one that made it all possible.

But it was a little piece of heaven to go back to Houston, and spend 72 hours with friends, family, good food, shopping, and no distractions.

I even had 3 hours to myself at Market Street.

I'm anxious to see what this store turns into...

The weather was toasty, but nothing like what I was afraid it might be.

On Sunday I was hanging out with my mom and she commented about what a gorgeous day is was.

I looked down at the car thermometer, and said, "Mom, it's 98 degrees!"

She was like, "I know!"

But really, the weather was beautiful.

After spending some time with my parents on Thursday night at Carrabas, I got to meet my sister in law & niece at Starbucks, and then headed up to the Woodlands and connected with Sheila & Becky.

And I got to love on little Davis too! I hated that it took me 5 weeks to meet this little punkin.

Long distance sucks.

After doing some shower prep on Friday with Sheila, we headed out to Grimaldi's that night.

It was amazing....two of my closest friends in one of my favorite spots ever. Oh, and there was red wine....and no kids.

Saturday, it was all about celebrating Jacqueline and Mark's two little miracles.

Words cannot express how happy I am for them. I have been waiting to help throw this party for a long time.

Because Mark & Jacqueline had kept the gender of their twins to themselves for 8 weeks (rock solid discipline), we used the colors blue, pink, and green to decorate.

Becky made adorable invitations and print outs to go with the theme.

I was almost in tears when this picture was taken.

The football one below me.

A&M played OSU....and lost.

It was a good thing that Andy was in California because the thought of having to lose and look at his grinning, obnoxious, orange clad self would have been too much.

Then it was time for the big reveal!!!

Mark & Jacqueline hadn't even told their families what they are having.

We were all in suspense. I had been trying to (over) analyze everything she's said for the last two months.

I went ahead and chose my pink clothes pin (we had to guess) and waited...

Unfortunately that Houston heat sucked the helium out of their reveal

but it was still awesome...

black balloons? WTH?

Nice try. We know you're not waiting until December.

Tell us already.

Let's hear it for the BOYS!!!!!

and then there were lots of hugs and happy tears!!

Mark & Jacqueline, we are so happy for you!

Want to get away?

This morning we went with some families from our MOPS group to our local airport for a special behind the scenes tour. It was awesome, thank you so much Tami for putting it together!

The kids got to check out the airport fire equipment

This picture was taken about .05 seconds before he Graham realized it wasn't my leg he was holding onto.

Graham was glued to the wheel of the fire truck and taking his pretend role very seriously.

Our next stop on the tour took us to the gate.

Our tour guide told the kids to pretend they were going on a trip with mom and dad....

and this thought alone was enough to give me some anxiety. I think traveling with kids under the age of 4 is #2,324,893 on my list of favorite things to do.

Then we checked out where the luggage gets screened and someone in our group set off a siren with flashing red lights that momentarily stopped the tour.

As I looked around for which kid of mine to blame, I realized that the red button might have gotten pushed by yours truly while trying to capture a picture. Oops.

Next we got to go see an airplane taxi and land.

It was a little loud, but very cool.

Addison was excited. Graham was hungry.

It was such a great 45 minute tour and I think we all enjoyed it.

I even got inside information that Casey Anthony did NOT land at this airport, despite all the media hype.

Good to know. I mean, I wanted to get the most out of my airport tour.

So even though today we just got to pretend we were going on a trip.....

tomorrow I will head to the airport BY MYSELF for a weekend trip home to Houston.

I cannot wait....bring on the Tex-Mex, family, friends, and all the magazines I can read alone on a 3 1/2 hour flight with no toddler to be seen.

First Day....Finally!

I feel like pre-school should have started a month ago....

because it pretty much did for everyone else.

However, Addison's first day was Tuesday and I can't tell you how excited we ALL were.

She had started pre-school last year in The Woodlands, but I had to pull her out after only 6 weeks when we moved. She has talked about it ever since, so this girl was MORE than ready.

Monday night the doorbell rang and The Back to School Fairy had come to visit!

That fairy knew Graham would flip a lid if she only visited Addison, so she gave the little guy something too.

I was too busy trying to document Addison running around and pulling out her coloring books and shoes, that I didn't realize until too late that Graham had wasted no time shoving fully wrapped Starbursts into his mouth, chewing, and swallowing them...wrapper and all.

That fairy might benefit from a parenting class.

Tuesday morning we took some first day shots and Addison made sure Graham knew that...

"It's MY first day of school, NOT YOURS, MINE."

My little pre-schooler......only two more years until Kindergarden.....time stop, please.

Addison helped put together a little gift for Miss Amy, her teacher.

I took a gamble and prayed she liked coffee.

Isn't it the universal rule that ALL teachers like coffee?

Addison was a little shy when she first met Miss Amy, but talks about her all the time now.

I'm so excited for her to be at a great school with wonderful teachers.

I'm sure that Tuesdays and Thursdays are going to be the highlight of her week.

Girls Weekend!

About three months ago, I happened upon my old neighbor, Ashley's, blog.

She talked about a fantabulous girls' weekend, and instantly got me thinking.

This we must do.

It's good for the soul to go away with your girlfriends.....sans kids and husband

And I am very thankful that my husband (and my 7 other girlfriends' husbands) were willing to help make it happen.

So last weekend we headed to Palm Desert (outside of Palm Springs)

I can't remember the last time I rode with girlfriends in the car (without car seats)

Me, Paige, Annie

I forget that we pretty much live in the desert. It doesn't really feel like it because the weather is so mild where we are, but we definitely drove through some honest to goodness desert.....and made a pit stop at the outlet malls.

Then we kicked off the weekend at Tommy Bahamas....I heart this place.

Karen, Amanda, Me, Amanda, Annie, Jamie, Paige

Ahi Tacos, yummo

When we got to the house late Friday, we wasted no time throwing our stuff down and getting hard at work being lazy.

Annie stuffed our bags

with lots of fun stuff

and we broke out our new wine glasses, made especially for this occasion by Amanda & Jamie

So Saturday morning, I thought we were all going to sleep in.

That's what you do on vacation, right?

Well, at 9:00am I woke up to seven girls taking my picture....they had already been on a Starbucks run, a real run, and a golf cart drive ....al by 9am.

I'm blessed with sleepers, so waking up at 9am was actually only about an hour later than my usual wake up time.

I was feeling seriously lazy and unproductive.

But it was VACATION.

and then after a little shopping break

we spent the rest of our day here.

Taking Ashley's lead, we split the meals up, so you only had to cook once, and got to vedge out and relax the rest of the time.

I haven't eaten this well in a long time....

Team lunch

Soula & Annie

Amanda popping the champagne for breakfast

more vedge time.

I think I actually read 5 magazines last weekend.

That had to have broken some sort of record for myself.

My fellow dinner teammates

Amanda & Paige

games & dance parties at night

Karen & Annie

I told Andy the best part of this whole trip in my opinion was the gift of eating and carrying on a conversation with girlfriends with no interruption of kids.

and pool time.

Lots of pool time.

And then on Sunday, we finally had to pack it up....

and head home.

Thanks girls for a fabulous weekend!!!

I can't wait to start planning next year....

because this is going to be an annual trip, right?