You've gotta have friends...and sometimes work.

I work with some good ones so it was a no brainer to have Amy join our team. Can you imagine what work is like with this group. I'll tell ya, It's awesome. I just wish I could hang out...err work with them every day instead of just once a week. 

These are just a few of our lunch pictures...

 Jimmy Johns

 Vito's

We laugh to tears many times while at work. I really love these people. 

 And we often show up to work wearing the same things. Our students think we are so weird. 

NACHOOOOO NIGHT

 We love a good reason to party and I'm so glad that my friends do too. Our good friends, Cindy and AJ hosted a Nacho Night where we go over, have some nachos and watch Nacho Libre. 

Preparing my re-fried beans and Horchata. 

It was so much fun and who doesn't love a good old Mexican party? 

 ARRRIBAAA!!

Celebrating Wendy

I was so excited to throw this baby shower for my sister. I began prepping for it for weeks. 

Luckily she wasn't picky about what she wanted so I did whatever I wanted to on the planning. 

I went all out making banners, chalk painting everything and making sure to get every detail just right. 

I have to admit that we had the best food spread. My sisters and mom sure pulled through for me. 

So excited to put up this welcome sign for Wendy and Baby. 

Wendy had such a great turn out. It was so touching to see all those people there that loved her. 

 And they were so generous. She received so many sweet gifts. It was so nice to see that outpouring of love. 

She was so cute sitting there with her big belly opening gifts. I really am so excited for their family having this baby. They have been through a lot in the past losing their last baby and so I was so so happy to see her happy and excited. She sure deserves it. 

See, I was happy. 

(My cousin secretly took this picture of me)

Speaking of my cousin, It was the first time I got to meet her little boy. I hadn't met him in his 4 months of life.

 Obviously we had to put these three together. 

And Lastly

Wendy and I were remembering when we were younger and how we accidentally took the funniest photo without realizing. It looked a little something like this...about 12 years ago. 

I love you Wendy! So excited for you and your family. 

Adventure Time Costumes

This year for Halloween Oliver wanted to dress up as Finn on Adventure time. We thought, Heck yeah! an easy costume. And then he told us that he wanted all of us to be adventure time characters. Okay, so here you have it...

Oliver as Finn

Briony as BMO

Milo as Jake the Dog

Luke as the Ice King

and I am Princess Bubblegum

The only thing we had to buy for Oliver's costume was his hat.

For my costume I bought the wig from amazon, The leggings from a local store and the dress from the DI. Everything else were things that I already had. 

 And for Mr. Ice King. We just borrowed a graduation gown from a friend and the only think I had to buy was his wig/beard. 

 My sister made Milo's hat and I found this weird bird costume at the DI that was perfect for a soggy dog Like Jake. Briony's dress was made by my talented friend and I just put her in some black tights. It was perfect. 

I didn't think I would love dressing up as this, But in the end I loved how it all came together. We got so many compliments (by those that actually know Adventure time) and it really was one of our best costumes ever. 

The Twins are 9 Months!

Three quarters of their way to being one year old. What???

This month not much has changed except for their hair. 

Bee's hair has been fun to play with as well. I tried out a little pony for the first time and she hasn't tugged at it or been bothered by it all. Plus, how cute is that tiny little pony? 

 Milo's hair is growing and growing and I know I should cut it, but I don't want to. Milo reminds me so much of my dad and his hair is a big part of that. In fact, I want him to have grandpa Bill hair always. 

I took them in for their nine month check up and they are looking great! They got their first dose of their flu shot and something else. They weren't too happy about their shots but they recovered quickly. Milo was so curious to see what Dr. Templeman was checking him with. He was just such a little busy body and Briony was just calm and observant letting the doctor do his thing. 

I see these babies every day and I can't believe they are mine and that they are here and that there are two of them. It took a while to get them here and a lot of tears and prayers and pain and emotion, but man all that was SO worth it. 

Frightmares!

Season passes to Lagoon have been the best Christmas gift for the past two years. Our favorite part about it has got to be hands down, Frightmares. I love that fresh excitement that you get when fall first hits and seeing hay bales and pumpkins and all things scary and harvest. I love it. We also love that we get to enjoy the rides in the cool weather and not in the blazing heat. If I could just buy a frightmares season pass, I would. 

They have the best decorations and I think they just keep getting better and better. 

 Me and the twins mostly hung out, 

 while Oliver and Luke went on the rides.

 My most favorite part was seeing the shows. We got to see the Hack and Slash show and the Zombie Mambo performances. It is weird that I have always wanted to be a part of the show. It is. I realize this. 

 Milo couldn't stop staring at the guys and they were fun to play along with him. 

 Like I said, best decorations. Moment after this picture was taken, those dang vampires got me and scared the living day lights out of me. 

Missing body parts

 There was also this zombie at this booth that would chomp his teeth at us and talk to us. When he saw the twins he was talking about how he wanted to eat them. He asked if he could grill them up and put them in a tortilla. We were all pretty amused with him and he did a great job. 

Love Love Love doing things like this with my family. I hope I am able to pass the excitement of Halloween onto them. 

Mexico Part 1

We finally decided to celebrate our ten year wedding anniversary with a trip to Mexico. I was so happy when everything was booked months before and that we were able to arrange sitters for the kids and request time off. This was something that we had been planning on doing for a while and I was so excited to go and experience this with Luke.

 

We had a layover in Georgia {where we had the worst customer service ever known to man} and we hung out in the airports for a little while, but it was all so thrilling knowing that we had an amazing adventure waiting for us. 

 

We arrived.
 The moment we stepped off that plane, we could feel the hot humidity of the coast and it felt incredible! It took us about an hour to get to our hotel {via shuttle} where we checked in. As we were checking in, the nice workers brought us a cold margarita. when we refused the alcohol, they were so surprised and brought us some virgin drinks right away. Looks like we may be the only non drinkers in this part of town.

After we dropped off our bags and changed into our suits, we ran to the beach.

It was Luke's very first time stepping foot on an actual beach. He had a wonderful welcome by a soft sandy beach with beautiful clear blue waters. It was a little cloudy when we got there but that was certainly not going to stop us from having the time of our lives. 

And I wouldn't want to be there with anyone else. 

 

The following day we had a full day planned of adventure. We booked a tour of the cenotes where we were picked up by a tour guide and a shuttle bus and taken out to the middle of nowhere to explore the Cenotes. The Cenotes are natural pits, or sinkholes resulting from the collapse of limestone bedrock that exposes groundwater underneath. These are out in the middle of the jungle so the surrounding are incredible and lush and so amazing to explore. Our tour guide, Edwardo was so great and we had a pretty fun group that consisted of people from Canada, England, Australia and Mexico. We were the only Americans.  

 

 

It was so much fun to see the Aztec culture and to learn more about their Gods and the traditions that took place. Each Cenote that we visited had a different God.

 

At the first stop, we did some zip lining. Luke was the first to go and he showed us how NOT to do it. His hands slipped and he quickly fell in the water. I was up next and was a bit nervous but ended up making it all the way down the line and into the water. We swan down the river in just our life vests and got to enjoy the amazing scenery.

Floating down the river.

 

This is where we did a little cliff/ledge jumping.

 

Luke and his mad Fish-out-of-water skills. He sure got the crowd laughing on this one. 

 

That day was a bit overcast with a little rain so when we weren't in the water, it was a little chilly. One of my favorite parts was warming up to a delicious concha and some really good Champurrado. YUM!

 The next stop was to another Cenote where we got to repel into the cave. It was really cool and a bit spooky all at the same time to repel into a dark cave.

 

Inside the cave we jumped off the ledges and tried not to get freaked out by the dark roots all around us and bats flying around.

 

 Floating in the depths of the cave with Bats flying around us. Pretty eerie if you ask me.

A better picture inside the cave with our group.

 The next Cenote was where we got to kayak and snorkel. Since the water was high, our kayak trip was very short but it was still amazing to be surrounded by so much beauty.

 And the snorkeling was fun, even though we didn't get to see much.

 

The last Cenote was the best one. We got to zip line some more and because there were a few people that "dropped out" early on, Luke convinced our tour guide to let us play at this one a bit longer, to which he obliged. 

Some cliff jumping with a Canadian.

Swimming back to squeeze in just one more run.

This seriously was so much fun to do. We spent the entire day doing such fun things. They fed us lunch which was delicious and there was just so many memorable moments. Just to include a few more...

-Luke getting farted on by a French man

-The rich couple and their wet suits.

-"You shouldn't be cold, you have wet suits on"

-Playing in the rain

-Switching busses

-Getting pulled over by the 'Federales'

-Paying $80 for pictures

-My bottoms skidding off

-Tiny life jackets

 

 Already our trip to Mexico had been perfect. We loved that we still had the rest of our vacation to bum around and do anything we wanted. No schedules or itineraries to follow. Just the two of us, as much food as we wanted, and the beach. We were in paradise.