3 months later...

A few pictures from the last couple months:

July

I went home for the fourth of July for a fun time in Oklahoma with my mom's family.  I "worked from home" (or was on call? - I don't know, but I didn't actually do much!) that week while spending a few days at the lake enjoying the extended family while baking in the Texas/Oklahoma heat!  Somehow I didn't take a single picture that week, so the few here are courtesy of Natalie's blog.  She came to visit me for a few days before the family headed to Oklahoma for our reunion.

Super fun to see Natalie!  Can't wait to meet her sweet baby girl, due at the end of next month! :)

The parents. So thankful for both of them!

La Hacienda!

My all-time favorite: La Hacienda fajitas.  What more could a girl want??

This isn't actually from my weekend at home, but I didn't want to leave Laura out.  Here we are in New Orleans in June!

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The week after Oklahoma, I went to New York with a few girls from church.  We had a great time exploring the city, but my favorite part was seeing The Lion King on Broadway.  It was so fun and I was thoroughly impressed by the level of skill of the actors!

In front of a Central Park fountain - me, Cerrelle, and Brooke.  Not pictured is Dorle.

August

August I had a sweet birthday celebration with some friends.  It was the night we got the hurricane (and the week of the earthquake!), so it was a memorable time.  I have just been so blessed by the people I've met here!

Can you tell we took this on auto off a bookshelf? :)

Our hurricane damage.  Thought the hurricane wasn't bad until I walked down the street...

Thankful it wasn't this - just a few blocks south of us.

Our earthquake damage consisted of a broken mirror that fell off the wall and shattered and two cracked windows.

September

The fun suprise for September was a weekend with Dad in NYC.  He called me last Sunday night to say he was going on a last-minute trip to New York for work.  I worked four 10 hour days, took off Friday, and rode the bus up Thursday night to see him.  It was a lot of fun!  It was a short trip because I had to be back in DC by Saturday afternoon, but we got to spend some good time together trying a couple restaurants and walking around in the pouring rain.  The hotel was just a couple blocks north of Times Square, which was really awesome.  The last time I spent extended time with my dad was also when he was on business - only in Botswana!

Taking advantage of a dry moment for a picture - yummy hamburgers at Bill's!

And a not-so-dry moment in Times Square!

Also, in September was a trip to the fresh fish market with a new friend that resulted in a delicious dinner of salmon, PW "Crash Hot Potatoes", and a couple other yummy sides.

Back in Knoxville (with lots to blog about)

I got back to Knoxville last night after what felt like a very short trip home. It included a trip to Austin to visit friends, a trip to Houston for Christmas with my dad's family, lots of fun at home, and then a trip to Raleigh to see my best friend from childhood, Natalie, get married! So, there's a lot to catch up on. I will post chronologically and include pictures as I go.

My mom, sister, and I went to the ICE! Exhibit at the Gaylord Texan. It's a whole exhibit filled with sculptures made of ice and it's really neat. My favorites were a massive gingerbread house made of ice, a huge nativity scene, and an ice slide (which goes incredibly fast and freezes your butt if you don't sit on your parka!). It is nine degrees inside, thus the massive blue parkas that they supply before you enter. We had a great time.

We celebrated Christmas with my mom's side of the family the Saturday before Christmas day. That was hectic as usual, with tons of little kids running around and a very full house. It was good to see everyone and we had a great time. Here are all the girl cousins in age order, excluding Noel, who lives in Singapore. Usually Grandma's included in the leg-kick picture (and we usually have to do a dance and song as well) but I'm not really sure where she was when we took this.

This is Brie and Cade. Cade is one of four boys, but that did not deter him from carrying around Brie's babydoll all night. It was cute!

Kallie and Laura see who's hair is longer.


I went to visit some of my good friends, the Hales, in Austin for one night. I used to babysit their four kids, Faith, Will, Grace, and Hope, and now am really good friends with their family. We had a great time!

Me and the girls played lots of games.

Me and Mrs. Hale listen to the piano and recorder concert.

We also celebrated Christmas with my dad's family in Houston, and it was the first time in almost ten years that everyone (excluding my Aunt, who got stuck out west due to snow) was together. It was good to reconnect and we finally got the full family photo that Maw-maw has been wanting us to get.

We celebrated Christmas again with the immediate family when we got home on Christmas day and had a really fun time spending time with just us. Here are a few pictures from that.

Laura and I made "We Love Conner" shirts and wore them to one of his basketball games. He was embarassed, but still liked them. Dakota also got in on the school spirit.

After I came back from Knoxville, Anne and I drove to Raleigh for Natalie's wedding. It was so fun to be in her wedding and watch her get married! We had a great time hanging out for a few days before the big day and ran around crazily trying to get all of the last-minute details worked out. She looked absolutely gorgeous in her dress! I didn't take one single picture because I was just running around too much, but here is a picture of her and Matt taken by her brother Joel. It's still weird to think that Nattie, who I met when I was 5, is now married! I mean, when did we get old enough for this??

Home! (and more)

I'm home!! I've been in the great state of Texas since Sunday and have been having a great time. It's so good to see my sweet family. We've been busy non-stop. So far I've gotten to eat lots of Mexican food, watch the Cowboys beat the Giants, shop with my mom, watch a movie with my sister (Made of Honor, not that great), and cheer for Conner at a basketball game!

Finals ended last Thursday and then Anne and I went to Raleigh for two nights. I went to Natalie's shower and got to spend a couple days hanging out with her. It was great to see her and it was so fun to talk about all the crazy things we used to do...her friendship has been such a blessing to me over the years!

After leaving Raleigh we headed to Gatlinburg for my office's Christmas party. Carli and I brought Anne and Sarah with us. The company rented hotel rooms at The Lodge at Buckberry Creek and it was wonderful! We had a fireplace in our room, free hot chocolate, tea, and coffee, and a massive room that overlooked the mountains, which had snow on them! It was a great way to wrap up the craziness of finals before heading home the next day! Here's a picture of us after dinner:

Now to add to the craziness of this post, I almost forgot what happened Monday morning. I was joyously awoken by my dear sister and her friends getting back from camping at 7:00 in the morning. Not only were they screaming, but I also had a wet nose pressed against my face at the same time. Why, you ask? Well, they had found two puppies while camping and had brought them home. The two puppies, Dakota, and three screaming girls woke me up early Monday morning. The puppies have since found homes with someone else, but they were very cute and we had fun playing with them all day Monday. I really wanted to bring one home with me to Knoxville, but I already knew that plan would not be approved by one of my roommates, so I sadly had to let them go to someone else. :-( Here's a picture we took of them, although it doesn't even begin to give you a true picture of their cuteness:






Today's Conner's birthday. He's 15, which means he can start driving now...crazy!! He's also 6'2", which means he towers over me and the rest of the family, and has been doing an incredible job playing for his high school basketball team. He's an awesome brother and I respect him greatly. Here is a picture of him and me from this summer.

Well, I've got to go run errands, bake a cake, and clean the house with my mom and sister, but hopefully I will be more on top of blogging. However, I make no promises!

The Craziness of Life

So I think I've definitely proved that I'm a HORRIBLE blogger. Maybe I'll get better after finals are through and I have a little less craziness going on. Maybe not though. Probably not, actually.

Here's a super-quick summary of the last few weeks:

I went to Alabama with my friend Hannah and her family for Thanksgiving. I had a great time and I was so grateful that they invited me to join them. It was the best thing I could have done outside of going home!

I have written about 10 papers in the last two weeks, which is totally insane. I would never recommend it.

I am done with finals on Thursday. I go to Raleigh for two nights for Natalie's shower (I still think it's weird that she's getting married, but I'm coming around to the idea :-) and I cannot wait!! Anne is coming too to visit this one boy that she likes. So, that will be fun. We're trying to get Sarah to come too. She and Natalie have both lived in Chile, so I think it's a fabulous idea. She said no so far, though.

Last night I went to a party at Diana's apartment. We had a great time and no one got upset during the games, including myself. I am quite proud of that, I might add.

Oh, and the Cowboys are not looking probable for the playoffs. Ugh!

Here's a picture of some of my sweet friends:

I'm off to bed. Work tomorrow, then studying will dominate my life until Thursday @ 4:45.

Have a great week!

These are a few of my favorite things...

Organ transplants. My mom received a kidney transplant 4 years ago, and it is truly a miracle that changes lives. Become an organ donor here or just get more information! And this is an AWESOME story about an organ donor.

Adoption. I love the idea of adoption and I really have a heart for orphans all over the world! There are around 143 millions orphans presently living around the world. What would it look like if people started following Christ's call to care for the orphans and widows? AWAA is one of the major Christian adoption agencies in the US. Here's some thoughts on abortion/adoption.

Tennessee sports (especially football and basketball!).

The Dallas Cowboys.

Texas.

That's my random list for now... I have to study!