Sun, surf, and sand...

Happy Monday afternoon! I'd like to start with wishing a belated Happy Birthday (yesterday) to Dad David!

This weekend came and went in a hurry. Friday night we drove to Houston for an Spankers concert at the Mucky Duck with Chris, Viet, Lisa, Scottie, Micah and Peter. 'Twas much fun, as always.

Saturday afternoon we attended the wedding of Claire and James (Claire is the daughter of the Pastor who married us). The wedding was beautiful, and since the ceremony was so similar to ours, brought back wonderful memories of our own wedding day.

We got home from the wedding just in time to watch the dismal second half of the Aggie/Pittsburgh game. Time ran out on the Ags and the game ended at 37-26 Pitt.

Saturday evening we headed to the Forman's home for Lisa and Geoff's Hawaiian themed wedding shower, where we finally got to meet Lisa's future in-laws (and Lisa's adorable 2-year-old nephew Danny!).

Sunday morning Richie played volleyball, and we spent the rest of the day playing with the David kids and spending time with Mom and Dad David before we headed back to Austin. Whew!

New pictures from this weekend can be found, as always, on our pictures page.

Good morning and Happy Tuesday!

Today we're celebrating one-and-a-half years of marriage. How time flies! :) We forgot to eat the top layer of our wedding cake on our 1-year anniversary, so we'll try it tonight. We're not sure we want to risk waiting another 6 months!

Last Thursday, Brad came over to watch the Aggies game versus Virginia Tech, played under rainy and windy conditions due to Hurricane Isabel. The Ags looked great in the first half, but bogged down in the second half and eventually were outscored 35-19. We have high hopes for the game versus #17 Pitt on Saturday.

Last weekend we had a much needed "just us" weekend. We went to go see Pirates of the Caribbean with Karmen and Tim on Friday night. It was showing at Alamo Drafthouse, where they've taken an old theater and removed all but every third row and added tables so that you can order food and drinks during the movie. It was a lot of fun, and the movie was good too!

Saturday we relaxed and caught up on some chores around the house. Saturday night we went out to Z Tejas - yum! Sunday, more chores and errands. It was nice to get caught up and recharge our batteries.

Last night, we went to dinner at Mangia with several of our Austin friends to meet Kerry's parents who were in town to visit. It was nice to finally put some faces with the names!

Recent site updates:
Pictures from the past couple of weekends have been posted. Also, there are new pictures (from Brigid) from the Wyoming trip and the beach camping trip. So go check out our pictures page.

I've also added a books page to keep track of what I've been reading lately. Bookworms, feel free to peruse. For the rest of you, it's probably both boring and geeky. ;)

It's Monday, and after another great weekend, being back at work is tough! The guys and the gals split up this weekend... the boys headed out to the lake and the girls headed to Vegas for Lisa's bachelorette weekend! Both groups had an awesome time and we'll be posting pictures on the pictures page soon.

And as if that weren't enough excitement for one weekend, our friend Scott (currently living in Los Angeles) was in town from Thursday until today, accompanying the UCLA volleyball team to a tournament at UT, so it was good to see him again and catch up.

On a sadder note, we'd like to express our deepest condolences to t.u. as their national playoff hopes were dashed this weekend by unranked Razorbacks of Arkansas. No, seriously, we're very sad for them. (Haha.)

Good morning and happy Monday! We had an action-packed weekend...

Friday - Brad, Richie and I went to Olive Garden for dinner and then back to our house to relax and take care of a few things. The new high school football stadium (or should I say, "athletic complex" - it's really nice) that they built near our neighborhood hosted its inaugural game Friday night. From our yard, we could hear the announcer and the band. One of these Fridays we'll have to walk over there and watch a game!

Saturday - We headed to Katy to watch Jason and Austin's first football game of the season. They are in 4th grade and 3rd grade and are playing in the Katy Youth Football league. They are so cute in their pads and their helmets! Jason's team lost by a touchdown and Austin's team won by three touchdowns. Both had a great time playing!

Saturday evening - Richie spent some time with his family while I attended a pottery shower for Lisa. At the pottery shower, we each painted tiles which were used to frame a mirror for Lisa. It was a lot of fun, and afterwards we went out country dancing.

Sunday - Richie played in a small king-of-the-beach volleyball tournament while I attended another bridal shower for Lisa. We found out that Justin (a friend of ours from high school) was in town with his girlfriend so we all went over there for dinner, to visit with him, his family, and several other of friends from high school days. Finally, we headed back to Austin.

Between all the running around, Richie and I have both been fighting off allergy-induced colds. Hopefully we'll have a chance to rest up this week!

Good morning!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Labor Day weekend! Ours didn't go quite as we'd planned, but it was fun anyway. A recap:

Friday - Brad, Richie and I went to Mangia for dinner for some incredible stuffed crust pizza and an ooey-gooey brownie which we'd been craving since our Wyoming trip. We went by H.E.B. to pick up Lord of the Rings: Two Towers for $15 including a free case of 7-Up. Woohoo! Went home and relaxed and watched the movie.

Saturday - Brad and I went up to Rogers Park near Belton to go climbing. But when we got there, I realized I'd grabbed Richie's climbing shoes instead of my own, so no real climbing for me. I just spotted Brad. And while I was doing it, I managed to dump over his chalk bag and spill most of it on the ground. Also, it was hot and humid and we were tired, so Brad only climbed for an hour and a half or so and then we headed back to the house.

Viet and Dave had driven in to Austin to play some King of the Beach volleyball with Richie and some others, and they finished up their games about the same time Brad and I got back from climbing. Chris made his arrival shortly afterwards. We all went to relax in the neighborhood pool, then grabbed some Tex-Mex for lunch/dinner. The rest of the afternoon was spent watching football on TV... including the Aggie game. (26-11 over Arkansas State. Whoop!) Micah and Peter showed up around midnight and we had a pretty full house.

And NO HOT WATER! Richie tried repeatedly to get the pilot on the hot water heater re-lit but no such luck. Cold showers all around!

Sunday - Our intention was to head to the lake for the day but the weather had other plans for us. Under threat of rain and thunderstorms, Micah and I decided to go do some shopping, Dave decided to head back to Katy, and Brad and Chris decided to do some climbing. Richie, Viet and Peter were going to try and take the boat out for a couple of quick runs, but it started raining on them five minutes out of the garage so they had to turn around and go back to the house. At least that meant that the plumber could come out to fix the hot water heater! Yay! The rest of the evening, the boys played poker and the girls watched movies. We grilled dinner and ate on the porch, enjoying the rain.

Labor Day - It was still very cloudy out and everyone slept in. But it wasn't raining or thunderstorming and everyone was pretty stir-crazy so we decided to head out to the lake. The clouds kept it pretty cool but the water was warm and we had the lake pretty much to ourselves. It turned out to be a really nice day. The highlight of the day were Peter and Viet's improvements on the wakeboard. Peter was getting up consistently and got in some pretty long runs. Viet was working on "getting air." He did manage to launch himself into the air but was never quite able to land standing up. At least his efforts gained him admittance to the "busting sick face" club!

That's it for now... enjoy your short work-week!