Wedding Weekend Away

My cousin's son got married at the end of August outside of Dallas. The wedding was on a Friday {and kids weren't invited}, so Brent and I got away for a couple of days sans kiddos! We went up Thursday and stayed in an amazing hotel in Ft. Worth and had dinner with my cousin, Hagan, and her husband, Clay.

Driving up!

Not a shabby view for a Thursday afternoon

We ate at one of Hagan and Clay's favorite restaurants 

{where they had their rehearsal dinner!}, Joe T. Garcia's. It was delicious!

    The bride and groom!        

                   

We're cute when we get all dressed up! {grin}

When you twin with your cousin!

We had a blast with family but of course didn't get a picture all together, boo

We rented a house with my parents, my aunt and uncle, and my sister's family. They brought their kids because their babysitters were with us, ha.

Visiting after the wedding.

We got up at the crack of dawn on Saturday to make it home for the kickoff of college football, but we had a great time away!

Blame It On Mexico!

June was a busy month but oh so fun! As I was looking through pictures we packed in so much fun stuff. This will be a fun walk down memory lane. {grin}

On June 1, I went with a group of friends to see Katherine Center speak. I love all her books and think she is just precious. She lives in Texas and always comes to our little indy bookstore. 

Chatting with her after her talk, she is so sweet!

Then Brent and I took a quick 3-night trip to Mexico with his cousin Philip's family and some of their friends. We had a great time - spent lots of time in the resort pools, had some really great meals, and took a great trip out on a catamaran. 

Early flights = a quick nap in the hotel! Ha!

Nothing like family that are also great friends!

June included lots of Gus love OF COURSE. He also got really sick at the end of the month {some failed diet changes} and gave us a big scare. But nothing like a day at the vet getting IV fluids and meds and costing us $850 to make him all better. {grin}

I'm going to do a separate post for my parents' anniversary party which happened in the middle of June. We had such a blast and 50 years of marriage deserves its own shoutout!

The weekend after the party, we traveled to Houston for the annual LJA Stockholders dinner - this is always a highlight of the year because we always go with great friends! This year we didn't stay a second night but went swimming on Friday night at Derek and Dez's house {after a stop for bathing suits at Buc-ee's ha}. Some friends from high school were in town with their newest baby, so we wanted some snuggles with Mark Falcon!

My AmpedUp instructor friend, Lina, turned 50 in June, and we went to a fun place called Game On to play tv game shows with a group of friends! [Spoiler alert - we did this for my birthday too!] We had such a blast! Lina's husband made us a spring roll DIY bar, and we had a great time together. He got seriously injured a few days later in a freak accident, so I'm very glad we got to spend time with him too, and I'm so glad he is doing better now.

The whole crew

I love lazy mornings in the summer! Also love our new patio furniture.

Little Bit got her braces [Round 1] off at the end of June! She was so happy!

Sheesh, I am shocked at how much we did this month as I continue to type this all out! We also had our Girl Scout end-of-year reward trip. The girls voted to go to Kalahari. Paige is transferring into our troop, so she got to go too. She was SO thrilled - she was sobbing that she couldn't go and it worked out for her to go! Made my mama heart so full.

We rushed home from Kalahari to change clothes and turn around and go to the Dell Diamond - literally across the street from Kalahari - for Brent's summer event at the Round Rock Express baseball game.

Being silly with the fun glasses...and tired Drew! {grin}

And we closed out the month with Trent's birthday! He had a fun day of video games and lounging around enjoying a summer birthday. We went out to eat for burgers at a small, local restaurant with both sets of grandparents. [I got a picture of him but won't post it.] He also took 3 of his friends to Kalahari the next week. So wild that he was old enough for us to just drop him off and pick him up!

Since he doesn't like me posting pictures of him NOW...

let's look at baby Trent! GAAAAAH!

Houston Natural Science Museum

Brent's nephew had a great idea in the summer to go to the Houston Natural Science Museum. He remembered going with Brent's parents when he was a kid {reminder - he's 28!} and thought our kids might enjoy it. And they did! We had a great little trip Saturday-Sunday before Labor Day.

We went up Saturday mid-day and spent the late afternoon swimming at the hotel pool, had dinner in the hotel, and had a relatively low-key evening. Trent and Branden shared a hotel room and played YuGiOh for hours! I love that these cousins have bonded over this game!

Sunday morning after a delicious breakfast at Starbucks we headed to the museum. We knew that there were a few extra exhibits happening right now {including a Shark exhibit, and Paige is OBSESSED with sharks}, so we planned to enjoy the main museum but knew we needed time for a few of the extras.

Smile! {sigh}

Drew had to go visit Zoltar, but we told her to 'not get Big'. Ha!

We started out going to see the dinosaurs. This was Branden's favorite, and I think he would have stayed her a lot longer if the others hadn't been more impatient.

A sloth for our sloth-loving girl!

We paid extra money for the shark exhibit, and honestly, it was disappointing. I don't think it was worth the extra money.

Although it was worth getting these shark earrings for Paige!

There was a station at the end with sea creatures we could touch, including some small sharks. The little kids found this neat, and we did have to drag them away.

Touching some starfish

We also paid extra for the butterfly exhibit, and this was a hit for everyone! There was a whole room of insect displays before we even got to the butterflies, very cool.

Look at this cool electric blue frog!

The kids had so much fun forcing me to look at cockroaches.

Nana with her grands

Got them to pose with me, yay!

The last exhibit we went to was the Egyptian exhibit. They had a special {meaning more money} exhibit about King Tut, but we didn't have a lot of time left, so we focused on the main exhibit.

A REAL MUMMY!!!!!

Running out of steam here...

A cool sarcophagus!

If we had planned a little better, there were some movies we could have seen - and there was one about sharks I wish we'd made time for. BUT we bought a membership {cheaper tickets, cheaper parking, discount on the gift shop/food}, so we might have to go back to see all the things we missed.

It was a great trip, and I think everyone had an awesome time!