White Christmas

For Christmas this year we headed up to Denver to spend a week with Chris' family. We had a great time just relaxing and enjoying the white Christmas, even though it sounds like Dallas got one too. We enjoyed the constant snow for a few days and appreciated the warmth of Dan and Meghan's house along with all of the warm cozy clothes we packed.

I really haven't traveled by air too much so close to the holidays, I didn't really know what to expect. To my suprise the lines weren't crazy at all and we actually managed to get to our flight on time. Luckily the trip up there and back wasn't bad at all, much better than a 12 hour drive in the ice and snow, that's for sure.

This Christmas was a special one, we enjoyed celebrating it with the newest addition to the family, Mr. Ben. It was so fun to just watch him and be entertained by him all week long. It gave me confidence that Chris and I can handle a new born, Chris was a pro at burping him and putting him down, I just enjoyed watching him. And as I've been told "babies change your life"... who knew... The rest of the week was spent eating most of all, watching movies, and of course you can't have a holiday with the Shacks without destroying something. Chris, Dan, and Bob got to demolish/retrofit Dan and Meghan's front porch while trying to hang a porch swing for them. It looks great, and we can't wait to see the final product. Leave it up to Chris to start demoing something and then leave town...

On one of the last days up in Denver we got the chance to go sledding with another family from their church. It was a blast! I hadn't been sledding since I was super little and that was on a cardboard box at Angelfire. We enjoyed the fun trips down the hill and dreaded the up hill climb, but it was all worth it. We got some videos of it too, but I'll have to share those later since I haven't gotten those yet. Hope you and yours had a very Merry Christmas!

Auntie Em & Uncle Chris

Don't be alarmed... this is not Baby Shack...wanted to share that we are a new Aunt and Uncle. That’s right; Chris’ sister Meghan and Brother-in-law had our new sweet nephew, Benjamin Ian Bruner on November 4th. He was 8lbs 13 oz, so he was healthy baby boy. We had planned a trip up to Denver way back in the spring when Southwest had a sale. So in mid-November we made the trek up to Denver to visit and help out where we could with the little guy. We had a blast just relaxing and piddling around the house. They recently did some work on their house so it was a lot of fun to see the finished product. And of course it was fun to get a taste of what parenthood with a new born looks like, a little scary, but fun all at the same time. We can’t wait to see them again soon and catch up. Now we are just going to have to battle our kids wanting to always go up to Denver to see their Aunt and Uncle and cousin.

HOV Police

Okay Chris and I get to carpool most of the time to work during the week which has been so so so nice lately and quite a blessing! We get to ride together in the HOV lane and let me just tell you... if I were a cop I would be posted by the HOV lane all day long. I would say about 7 out of 10 cars are in the lane illegally. Which just urks you early in the morning if you know what I mean. HOV stands for High Occupancy Vehicle, meaning more than one person/lady... We are amazed at the number of people that feel they deserve to be in the lane or that they are entitled to break the law. It really makes me wonder what kind of people we have living in our society these days and if they even have morals.

Look for more updates on what we've been up to soon... I'm waiting on some photos then I'll update you.

D.C. Trip

Well it’s been a while now hasn’t it. Things have been super crazy around our neck of the woods; I’ve been traveling a lot with work lately so that has been taking up a lot of my time. My first trip was out to Washington D.C. I got to see the rural side of Virginia and the downtown side since one of my buildings was smack dab in the middle of things. The hardest thing about this trip was actually getting there, so y flight left at 8:00 so of course naturally and obediently I arrived 2 hour early, ate my breakfast, and hopped on the plane. The crew however didn’t mention that we were delayed due to storms in the area until ALL of us boarded the plane. So we waited and waited for three whole hours. I am so thankful that the air was on in the plane; otherwise I don’t feel everyone would have been as pleasant to deal with.

Once we finally made it there I made my way down to rent my first car, what an ordeal. I went ahead and purchased a navigation system in order to help me find my way out to one of the centers I needed to field verify, but more importantly how to get back to the airport to return the car. So I get my little Jeep Compass; which was okay but not my favorite V4. I go to insert my ticket to exit and it says my time has expired. Now wait a minute, what do you mean my time has expired. So apparently the folks at DC Airport expect people to get in and out in less than 3 minutes. So I had to back up through all of these concrete pillars to go get another ticket since there wasn’t anyone from Dollar working at the little stand. How convenient, I know. Anyways so I tried it again after I got a new ticket, and the same thing happened again. So at this point 20 minutes into trying to get out of the stinking parking lot I am now confident in my backing up skills and glad that I purchased the insurance on the car so if something happened it wouldn’t affect me at all. Luckily nothing happened to the car, my parents taught me well. So I go back to the counter and basically tell the guy, OKAY I am already 3 hours behind schedule because my flight was delayed now it’s taken me 30 minutes to try to get out of the stinking airport rental car garage, just get me out of here. So finally he printed me a new ticket and walked up to the little stand, HILARIOUS, the newest ticked didn’t even work. So he typed in some magical code and off I went. The drive was eventful out to Herndon Virginia I tell ya, especially after missing my very first turn out of the airport. Me and my friend Garmin had a love hate relationship from the very beginning. O well it got me there, I did my field check although I made the center team stay with me until 6:00 mind you I didn’t get out there until 4:00 due to the 40 minute drive. So I made my way back to the airport, I had finally gotten the hang of the navigation system. I have heard horror stories of people trying to drive in DC so I decided to return the car that night and take cabs for the rest of my trip. Returning the rental went a little smoother, let’s just say I learned a lot about rental cars on this trip.

So I made my way over to the terminal to catch a cab, and off I went to my hotel downtown. I stayed at the Marriott at the Convention Center, it was really nice, more traditional than I would like, but it was only a few blocks from my center I needed to be at early in the morning. It was an old bank that had been renovated into a hotel, very cool. I met up with my client and we decided to make the trek over to the National Mall. Now just a brief background, I was one of those people who didn’t go on m 8th grade field trip, and my last trip to DC. I didn’t get to see any sites due to certain circumstances. So this time I wanted to see as much as I could. We walked to the National Mall where they were having some Screen on the Green where they were watching a movie, and people were playing softball, flag football, you name it people were doing it. So I walked from basically almost the capital all the way down past the Washington Monument all the way down to the Lincoln Memorial. It was a beautiful site; I absolutely want to make a trip out there when I have a lot more time. I am kind of a history buff and I missed out on a lot of stuff since it was dark and all the museums were closed. It was a lot of fun, Chris and I need to plan a trip back out there sometime soon. I can’t wait to go back. The next day I went and did my Punchlist for one of my projects downtown, and afterwards on the way back to the airport we saw Arlington Cemetery and the National Mall, the White House, and all of the secret service people on tops of the buildings. Overall it was a great trip! More updates to come...

Foodie Finds

Now you might be asking why in the world are all of these random photos shown above...

This past weekend we headed up to OKC to spend some time with Meghan and Dan. We headed up there after work, and of course I was starving by the time we got in that neck of the woods. We meet Meghan and Dan and their friends Gabe and Megan at Sushi-Neko. It was this fun little hole in the wall that served sushi of course. We really enjoy going to new places and trying new things, I was just thankful the waitress offered me a fork. Nothings worse than being really hungry and not being able to get the roll in your mouth. Let's just say me and the chopsticks don't get along too well. Chris and I tried the Spider Rolls and the Red Dragon rolls, both were really tasty and beautiful on the plate. We sat out on the patio which was great, OKC was about 20+/- degrees cooler than Dallas. After we finished up at the restaurant Meghan and Dan took us to this fun place called Cupies and Joe. It is basically a really cute chic coffee house built in their old stomping grounds. The cupcakes were delicious and I just enjoyed the relaxed atmosphere there.

Saturday we helped throw a baby BBQ for Dan, Meghan, and Little Ben on Saturday which was a lot of fun. We cooked out at Dan's moms house for about 30 of their closest friends. It was so fun to be included and we truly enjoyed haning out with everyone. We actually stayed there and I just admired her house all weekend long. She has such great taste and has tons of amazing artwork that tells a story. That night we had a wedding to go to, so of course we went to that, and of course my ride wanted to leave before cake. I told them as long as we could go back to Cupies and Joe I would be alright with it. So we headed back to Cupies and Joe and I tried yet another sampling of cupcakes. They were just SO yummy!

Sunday we headed off to church and then out to lunch to an Oklahoma pizza joint called Hideaway. They have all kinds of fun pizzas to try and it's just a fun atmosphere. They have one in Norman that we went to in college alot. It was fun to reminese on the good ole days.

Anyways all of that to say, we enjoyed our weekend with family and the fun foodie finds that we found. *tongue twister* We will be sure to visit them next time we're in town.

July 4th

For the fourth we decided to get out of dodge and spend some time with Chris' parents. It was so great to get away for a few days, and well needed that's for sure. We both got off early which was a huge plus since it is probably one of the busiest evenings for people traveling to their vacation spots. P.S. 121 isn't complete like we thought. :(

My goal for the weekend was to relax catch up on my magazines and eat all of Nancy's great food. Chris' goal for the weekend was to go fishing, and fishing he went every day twice a day. Chris and his dad headed out around 5:30 every morning and were back by 9:30am. They caught their limit both days, which is a crazy amount. Here are some pictures of all of the fish. Ty had a close encounter with one of them, he was really confused.



We, yes I said we... I even went fishing with them one evening to one of the neighbors ponds. Chris set me up with a pole and so I started to cast, meanwhile Chris caught two fish. He always does so good. All I was catching was the moss on the bottom of the pond and an occasional tree every now and then. But one time I cast it by these trees which is supposedly where the fish hide, or so Chris says. Anyways so I start reeling my line in and it feels kind of heavy, I think to myself, great I finally caught a fish! As my rod starts bending Chris is getting excited that I caught a larger fish... well it gets to the surface and guess what it was. Not a fish, not a boot, but a turtle. Yes, I foul hooked an innocent turtle, don't worry though he survived all 8 lbs of him. No pictures though, we were too busy trying to get the hook out and laughing our heads off.

On the fourth we ended up having our own little fish fry with the fish Chris and Bob had caught earlier in the weekend. The fish fry turned out great, then we headed out to the lake to watch some fireworks. We watched all of the different firework shows going off around the lake. I tell ya, if you've never watched fireworks from the lake, I reccommend it. Everybody has their own little show, and the house we were at had an amazing jam packed fireworks extravaganza. Here are some pictures... We tried like 5 times to get a picture as a family, however Chris' mom always shuts her eyes. So this was the last picture where she was really trying to keep them open.

Trip to Houston

Well we had yet another trip to Houston last weekend, there was a conglomeration of things to celebrate. I still had to give Val her gift for Mother's Day, Grant had his baby dedication, and Val and Justin's 6th Anniversary was this past weekend.

Chris and I headed down on Friday night and actually got there at a decent time and avoided the chaos that is Houston traffic. Funny thing... we were driving and saw all of these signs for wild flower areas. The sign said " Wild Flower Area... No Mowing" Well right beside the sign were two tractor mowers and mowing clippings. We both thought of that email going around "FAILED". Anyways we had a fun time riding down there. We were able to spend Friday night with Val and Justin before all of the parents came down for the weekend. We had a great time cathing up.

Saturday we just hung out and played Wii for most of the day. Justin got us hooked on a game called Boom Blox Bash, it was super fun, I think I'm addicted. Got the chance to play with the little guy some too, he has his first tooth coming in so he was more cranky than usual. Mom and Dad got there right after dinner time, so we just hung out for a while.

Sunday we went to Bedside Baptist, well we watched the video service of Val and Justin's church. Grant got to open up some of his gifts before we headed down to the church for the dedication ceremony. He's a little reader, I tell ya... I was reading to him and he already knows how to turn the pages. What a good helper. We had to be at the church early that afternoon for the baby dedication so we loaded up and headed down. The ceremony was short, simple, and sweet; which is always a good thing with so many little ones in the same room. If one started crying, talking, or making noises they all started. We had to head back home early since we had to work on Monday while the grandparents stayed and enjoyed a nice dinner and some more of Grant.

Thanks Val and Justin for a great weekend. Hope to see you soon.

Weekend Getaway

The last weekend in March we had a great opportunity to go down to Houston for a family friend’s wedding. We headed down Friday night; it blows my mind how many people pull out in front of you once you even hit the Woodlands vicinity. We got there safe and sound and in one piece, as soon as we got there we snagged my nephew up and caught up on stuff with Val and Justin. Then Grant was off to bed and everyone just followed his lead. Ty was excited to see his cousins and finally get in some good play time.

We woke up the next day and Justin made us crepes for breakfast. They were very good, just a different texture than I am used to. We loaded up on the crepes and then packed up to head to one of Houston’s attractions called City on the Green, or something like that. It was Grant’s first trip to the park, he was so cute in his little hat and outfit. And don’t worry we lathered up that baby with sunscreen like there was no tomorrow. The park was great with some fun water features and grassy spots. We enjoyed a picnic with Val and Justin’s small group from church. It was fun to see all of their friends and all of their kids running around. Val and I just camped out under a tree and talked which was great to catch up. Justin and Chris went a played some ultimate Frisbee until Chris got a HUGE blister on his foot from running around barefooted. They had a lot of fun being active and getting a work out. The park is new so the grass isn’t really fluffy grass yet, thus the reason for the blister. His foot is finally healing.

After our afternoon extravaganza we headed back to my sister’s place to clean up. One of the main reasons for our weekend getaway was one of the boys Chris grew up with in Temple was getting married. So we met his parent’s downtown at the Hilton which was a nice experience. The wedding was great, the food was great, and Chris actually let me stay to eat cake at this one. He usually wants to jet before they cut the cake. We found out that the couple getting married was going to Belize and staying at the same resort we did on our honeymoon. It was fun to fill them in on all that there is to offer there. We had a great time catching up with old friends and even family. We have a couple more weddings this summer that we are looking forward to as well.

After all of the festivities we headed back to Val and Justin to get our baby fix and to pick up Ty. We really enjoyed our weekend with Val and Justin and of course the little guy. We are excited to see them soon. Grant is starting to crawl and his personality is growing each and every day. I am such a lucky aunt, he is so great! He adored Chris and it was so fun to see him smiling and hanging out with his Uncle. In fact Chris only made him cry once. Short story but it would be a long story if I typed it out.

The Ranch

This past weekend we got the chance to get away with a few people from our small group. We headed out to Shackelford County to a family owned ranch. Our small group leader has had this ranch in his family for a long long time. It was great to get away from the big city and suburbia and enjoy the beautiful scenery and great friends. 

Once we got out there we all picked a cabin to stay in not before Chris walked in a on a few occupied rooms. (Awkward!) This time Chris and I were luckily able to get one with a shower. Last time we had an old school bath tub... which was a different experience. Once we got settled in all of the guys gathered their small arsenal of weapons we headed out to shoot some skeet. We had enough weapons to invade a small country it seemed. We all got a chance at shooting, usually I do pretty good at that kind of stuff, but this time not so much. We will blame it on the wind. Later that night we all sat down to a great dinner and just had great conversation. We ended the evening with hilarious games and of course my favorite, smores. The men ended up taking a trip out into the country to do what else... but shoot things. I am afraid to say it but they pretty much annihilated some skunks and few other animals. I'm sure that'll make a good story someday.

Early the next morning we headed into the mess hall for breakfast. Then we proceeded to wait around until the guys got all of the horses saddled up and ready to go for a morning ride. It took them a while since only 2 of them really knew how to do it. The theme of the weekend was..."how many guys does it take to_____" I'll let you fill in the blank, almost everything we did it took quite a few of them to figure things out. We finally got all saddled up and headed out for a nice hour ride. Now these were cattle horses so not your typical run of the mill trail horses. When one started to gallop they all galloped/ran. It was a beautiful day with great weather to get out an about. We finished our trail riding session and came in for some lunch, and after that we headed back out to shoot once more. This time with hand guns, so the men set up multiple targets for them to shoot at. It was quite entertaining to watch. Then when the sun started to set we headed back to the camp grounds and started to cook dinner. Good food, good wine, good people... what else could you ask for. After we wrapped up dinner we played some more games. Saturday night was probably the most fun, we learned alot about people that night and there was definitely some interesting topics. You know who you are...

Monday we woke up and started to help cook breakfast, and then we all just packed things up and headed home. It was a great weekend and we can't wait for another chance to head back out there. We are so thankful that God has given us such great friends that we can count on and do life with.

Quite the trip...

I wanted to share my adventurous ride into the Office yesterday morning. So I left the house later than I should have, especially with the Dallas drivers and the icy conditions. Anyways I make my way down 35 and I get to about Valwood and all of these cars are stopped, but they don't have any cars in front of them.  So we keep inching along and then I see a cat in the road, and it's freaking out because it doesn't want to get hit obviously and it doesn't know which way to go. So I pull up until I can't see it anymore. At this point I am looking to the two other cars beside me to tell me if I am clear to drive on or not. So after reading the lips of the guy whose next to me I slowly inch forward. Luckily I didn't feel a bump or anything, however I couldn't see him in my rear view mirror either. So I am already an hour late to work and I hadn't even made it to 635 yet. So I keep driving cautiously due to the weather and make it all the way to work. By this time I have completely forgotten about the whole cat incident. 

Well I step out of my car and I hear a cat shrieking, and again I think nothing of it. We usually have cats down by our office. Well Rita my co-worker pulled in to the parking lot after me and as I was about to enter the office she yelled. "Emily, come back out here your car is shrieking." So I'm thinking to myself well, great I did run over the cat. So my car is still shrieking and so I got down on the icy gross ground trying to see if I could see the cat. So I start calling for the cat like I would my pups hoping that cats come when they are called. I have no clue since I'm not a cat person. Well anyways the cat finally hopped out from underneath my car. I guess he jumped up under my car and held on for dear life. I was utterly blown away that it made it under my car for about another 30 minutes after he had jumped up in it. Thankfully due to the weather I wasn't driving fast, but STILL... So I picked him up and took him in the office and of course everyone swarmed the cat. According to some of the cat people in our office he was maybe 5-6 months old. We gave him some cream, water, and his favorite tuna. He pretty much devoured anything we put in front of him. 

After he got something to eat we brought him back to our pod and blocked off the entrance so he could just roam around our pod and not bother anyone else. I sent out an email with some pics to see if anyone wanted him or knew of anyone who would want him. He hung out in our pod all day hopping from lap to lap. He slept on my desk for a little after he commandeered my mouse pad. It made the day go by quickly and even though I'm not a cat person I have to admit he was a cutie. Well luckily one of our principals ended up taking him home, and took him to the vet this morning, and the updates are good so far. When we got a good look at him it looked like someone had burned his ear (he only had half of one ear), or that he had been in a couple of fights, but overall he looked good, just dirty probably from the ride in to work.  He didn't hurt himself on the ride down which I was thankful for. So I'm glad he found a good home with a family that will love him. He was the sweetest cat, quite the cuddler. (spelling) By the grace of God the cat lives to see another day.

Now today in the office we got the update from the vet, and all seems to be okay. Everyone was pitching in with ideas for names: Some of the names were:  Fender, Rider, Asphalt, Detour, Explorer, Ford, Hybrid, Diesel, Engine, Lucky, Hitch, Drifter, Axle, Piston, LBJ, Stan Jr. (her husbands name is Stan), Van Gogh (due to the whole ear thing, quite clever) and last but not least Kermit after my car. After all they did have a lot of time to bond on my way in. I'm just so thankful he is okay and that he is making a family really happy. Thankfully I didn't pick up any drifters on my way to work today. Merry Christmas!!

Thanksgiving in 528 words...

Thanksgiving started off with a bang, I got to leave the office early which is always a nice treat! We had to wait around the house until Meghan and Dan’s flight got in. So we packed up our things and loaded it all including the pups into the rental car (which isn’t allowed supposedly) and headed to the airport. It’s always so fun to see Meghan and Dan so we were excited to get to see them this Holiday. So pups and all we headed out to Sulphur Springs for Thanksgiving at the Shacks. We didn’t get there until 11:00 or so but we stayed up catching up for a bit.

Every morning Chris or I would have to get up to let the pups out early in the morning. They get really excited when we are there for some reason.  But most mornings consisted of sleeping in and enjoying a great filling breakfast and great conversations. Then we all just lounged around waiting for someone to get motivated to do something. Thursday of course we just lounged around and cooked our Thanksgiving lunch. It was quite the feast, let me tell you. After everything digested we went to the Sulphur Springs movie theater to see Four Christmases. It was okay, not my favorite but still funny at parts. Chris’ parents have a Wii so that was a lot of our entertainment for the week, not only Wii but Wii fit so it was really fun and active all at the same time. It was funny to watch Chris and his Dad ski, play soccer, and do the ski jump.

Friday we ended up making a trip out to Rockwall to do some shopping, no 4 am wake up call for use though.  We divided and conquered, the girls ran to Ulta and the girly shops as the men made their way to Best Buy and Dicks Sporting Goods. We even took all took a picture with Santa Claus and ate lunch along the lake. We made it out of there around 4.00 or so.

We got back to the Shacks’ and began the College football extravaganza!  We ended up watching the A&M/TX game, the Kansas/Mizzou game, the Tech/Baylor game and of course last but NOT least the nail bitter the OU/OSU game. The game was full of nail biting plays, scary acrobatics, and much celebration. We are so pumped that we won, since that nailed us the #2 spot in the BCS polls. Off to the Big 12 Championship and hopefully the National Championship. Yeah for Sooner Football!!

We really enjoyed our Thanksgiving with the Shack’s this year; it was a great time with family and friends. We made our trek back to Dallas to get Meghan and Dan back to Denver in time for their church service. Chris and I enjoyed relaxing the entire afternoon; the pups were zonked from having toddlers all over them this past weekend. They did really good with having kids hanging all over them and playing with them all day Saturday. Once we got home we got our Christmas tree down and started to decorate for the holidays. Oh and I finally got the chance to bake some cookies… I love the Holidays!

The other Bid "D"

Well, we enjoyed our weekend getaway to Denver, Colorado to see Meghan and Dan (Chris' sister & brother-in-law). Dan came a picked us up from the airport which was in the boonies compared to downtown Denver. 

  (chris waiting for dan to pick us up)

The plans were to go camping Friday night, sadly Chris had forgotten his new hiking pants, so we "had" to make a trip to the REI in Denver; which let me just say is a 3 story building full of all of Chris' favorite things. Once Meghan got off work we ended up driving out to just north of Keystone to go camping with some of the families that are involved in planting Park Church up in Denver. It was so beautiful we were right off of a lake and the temperature was perfect for a camp fire and smores. We pitched our tent right off the water and managed to sleep through the night and stay warm. The morning was amazing and we cooked breakfast burritos and they were actually one of the best I have ever had.

 (yes, this is our tent. evidence that we actually went camping.)

We then headed back to Denver and ran around and did some shopping as well as attending their neighboorhood music festival. Everyone was so friendly and everyone brought their dog(s) everywhere. Our boys would be so jealous. It was funny though; it was all regae music and there were some crazy/ horrible dancers.Then we ended up going over to a friends house to watch the UFC fight. We enjoyed our relaxing stay at Meghan and Dans.

(here we are at the music festival watching a crazy old lady trying to dance to regae)

We enjoyed seeing how people live in the Denver area, everyone walks everywhere. We actually ended up walking to church, which was so great. I wish we could walk to church back in Dallas, but we would have to start walking on Friday to get there in time. Church was great! It was such a blessing to see all of the people who moved to Denver with Meghan and Dan.

It's always nice to see family and get a great vacation out of it. Although they were persistent in trying to sway us to move up there we won't be moving to Denver anytime soon, but we can't wait to make another trip out.