It takes a village...

To babysit Jackson and Dean for the weekend. Ben had a conference at the JW Marriott Hill Country in San Antonio this weekend, and spouses were invited. So on their way through Austin on Thursday, they dropped the boys off at my mom's and kept on driving. I doubt they looked back ;)

I took the day off on Friday so that I could help. We hung out in the backyard and blew bubbles:

And Elaine dropped Sydney off so that Jackson could see "Cindy".

That night after dinner, we went back to the backyard to eat our ice cream cones :) To say the boys enjoyed them is an understatement.

It was also John's birthday, so my mom made him a strawberry cake to celebrate! Because what birthday party wouldn't be complete with cake and ice cream?

Saturday morning, Jackson helped my mom make his pancakes by adding green food coloring and sprinkles to the batter. Yum / yuck!

Nelson had found that Alamo Drafthouse on South Lamar was doing a kids event by showing "Minions" and it was donations only. Since Jackson had never been to a theater, Nelson thought this would be a good opportunity for him to try it out and see how it goes. The movie started at 11am, but we got there early so we could walk around the theater and explore a bit. Although we didn't make the entire movie, he did great and talked most about one of the previews: "There was a dragon, and the police said, 'Dragon!' hahaha!"

Best buds :)

I texted this picture to Lindsay and she commented that he must be in Heaven.

That afternoon, we did a little bit of swimming in the yard.

And John tried to teach Jackson patience by playing guitar with him. You can just assume how that went.

Lindsay and Ben showed up Sunday morning shortly after breakfast, fully refreshed and re-energized. Lindsay had fun at the adults only pool, sleeping whenever and for however long she wanted, and putting on normal clothes / make-up. But I think they both missed the boys, and the boys surely missed them.

The rest of us, however, were exhausted. It literally took all 3 of us - me, my mom, and Nelson - to do Lindsay's job. I think we all collapsed once they left, but it sure was fun spending such quality time with Jackson and Dean!

From Boozers to Babies

While at Erin's wedding in January, the crew group realized we hadn't gotten together in a while. Josh's parents have a new lakehouse in Lakeway, so we planned a weekend reunion trip. Unfortunately, a lot of people ended up cancelling at the last minute so it was a much smaller group, but being small has it's perks!

On Friday night, we met Josh, Kimberly, Erin, and Katie (Nevels / Baker) at Lucy's Fried Chicken. The view was pretty (full lake!), the fried chicken was delicious, and we found out the Menk's were expecting! They wanted to warn us ahead of time since she was going to be calm on the boat, not drink, and probably sleep early.

Example of our lame-ness: we went to HEB after dinner to get groceries for the weekend. When we got to the beer and wine aisle, everyone just kind of looked at each other and said, "Naaaah...." Sweet Kimberly thought we were doing it for her, and we partly were, but none of us felt like being hungover / bloated / sick all weekend. We decided that the homemade ice cream sounded much better instead :)

The next day, Josh took us on his family's boat for some cruising. We were laughing because our time spent together has gone from playing drinking games to talking about babies (Katie has a 1 year old, Erin has a niece and nephew she's close to, and I have Jackson and Dean).  Times have changed for sure.

Nelson and I ended up tubing for a little bit. It was super fun! Josh did the perfect amount of speed and "let me try to flip you off". This may have been Nelson's first time and I think he really enjoyed it (based off the pictures):

He got off and Erin got on. These pictures seem like it was a lot more intense, but I think the photographer just missed the ones with Nelson.

Probably gossiping, per usual:

Check out that air!

We ended the night with a wild game of Mexican Train, and everyone headed home the next morning. It was great seeing everyone and catching up. We decided that we MUST go to a football game this fall, so now I'm just looking forward to that!

Happy birthday, Dean!

Happy happy birthday to my precious nephew! You have been such a blessing to this family, and I love watching you grow into the little boy that you're becoming. I love you so much!

Cake Smashes and Swimming

This past weekend, we drove to Southlake to celebrate Dean's first birthday! Lindsay put together a little party for the family, and we all enjoyed giving Dean (and big brother J) as much attention as we could.

Nelson and I drove up (with John in tow since my mom went up during the week) on Friday after work and got there after the boys had already gone to sleep. We helped Lindsay with some last minute decorations, chatted some, and then went to bed. I was woken up by Dean (with Nelson), and we played for a bit until everyone showed up for the party.

Swimming is the #1 activity at the Liggett house, especially now that Jackson has passed the level 4 swim test! So, needless to say, that's what we did most of the day. Lindsay ordered some delicious bar-b-que, made a salad and cheesey potatoes, and cut up a watermelon. And before Dean's nap, we decided it was cake time! Jackson was more into it than Dean was...

But he eventually got the hang of it. I think he liked the icing more than the actual cake.

And luckily I was still in my suit and could hold the birthday boy while Lindsay hosed him off.

I think Jackson opened all of his presents for him (second child problems), but he got some new bathing suits, a sports activity center, puzzles, and money for his bank account! The rest of the weekend was spent "relaxing" and spending as much quality time with each other as possible.

Happy birthday, baby Dean!

Cause I'm Proud To Be An American

This past weekend was the Fourth of July. It was pretty low key, relaxing, and had lots of fun mixed in :)

We kicked off the long weekend by trespassing into homes being built. Yup, you read that right. Although it really wasn't that big of a deal. We have our design center appointments starting next week and they suggested checking out model homes for ideas. Well, the model homes always go ALL OUT and the ones near are house are about 5 years old (so some stuff probably isn't available anymore while it doesn't have new stuff). So we went into another new Circle C community to walk through the houses being built to see what the people chose. Our main things we were focusing on were cabinets, countertops, floors, and tile (backsplash and shower). It was a success because we got some really good finds! But we'll just have to see how much it all costs next week....

Saturday was a lounge day, and we went to the neighborhood pool to read. That night, we had dinner at Hyde Park Grill and reminisced about the night that Nelson met Lindsay and Ben for the first time. That's where we'd had dinner, then went bowling and got cupcakes at Hey! Cupcake :) But this time, we went and saw The Purge: Election Year afterwards.

Sunday, after church and grocery shopping, we went back out to the houses being built to take pictures. I realized I wanted to be able to reference actual images next week. And then we went to a really nice dinner at Trattoria Lisina. Cheri had given us a gift certificate for this winery / restaurant when we closed on our house as a thank you. We enjoyed an antipasta appetizer (we've recently realized that, while we're not drinkers, we're meat and cheese people), main course of chicken (Nelson, go figure) and pork chop (me), and topped off the meal with vanilla bean gelato (me). Thanks, again, Cheri!

Monday morning was July 4, and we met the Lindahl's at the swim center for the Circle C parade. It's always interesting being in public with them because there are so many stares and murmurs; you can just feel all eyes on you. But they're super cute girls, so I'm sure they were noticing that, too ;) On our way home, Nelson found a pretty cool "<3 Mom" tattoo on the ground, and we decided to put it in a prime location.

That afternoon, Allison, Bino, Jenni, and Trevor came over for some swimming, sand volleyball, and a potluck dinner. It was a lot of fun, and then we capped off the night with fireworks in Buda!

Happy 4th of July! And thank you to those who have served and are serving to protect our freedom!