Dallas Trip

Recently Justin and I decided we needed to get rid of Maverick, our Catahoula puppy. Mostly because we made a not so wise decision in getting him, he will be much happier on a ranch ect with lots of land to run and play on. Also because we have a 50lb limit for dogs at our rent house(oops) he will easily be 80-100 lbs. So we are currently looking for him a home but in the meantime Justin already found me a replacement dog(although I knew it was the smartest thing to do I was verrry sad to get rid of Mav) So we are getting a Toy Australian Shepherd. All that to say last week Justin and I drove to the other side of Dallas to take a look at all the puppies the breeder has and pick one. We left at 7:30 Sunday morning and got to the ranch around 1 and picked out this guy!

He is soooo cute!! And little! He will most likely be around 12-14 inches tall. He will be ready to be picked up on August 31st, I can't wait! After we left the ranch we drove into Dallas and went downtown to this cool place we found on foodnetwork.com its one of the places Guy Fieri went on his Diners Drive Ins and Dives Show

This place was soooo good and really neat. They had lots of different meats to choose from(bison, venison, armadillo ect) Then you pick your cheese and toppings or you can choose from burgers they designed, which is what we did. Also when you order they give you a name(ours was Minnie Mouse) and when your order is ready the call your "Name" 

I got the "Big Tex" burger. It was a 1/2 lb burger(and yes I ate every last bite of it) with cheddar cheese, guacamole, shoestring onions and chipotle sauce. YUM!!

Justin got the "Freshmen 15" burger 1/2 burger with cheddar cheese, french fries, a fried egg, and bacon. We also got fried pickles but we hardly ate any because our burgers were so huge!! 

Yup finished every bite haha.

Then we headed home! We did decide his name on the way home, he will be "Texas Blue" since he is a blue merle. We will call him Tex for short :) Can't wait to get our little Tex on August 31st!!

Jenny

Fort Davis & Balmorhea

We took a family trip to Fort Davis & Balmorhea. We stayed at the Davis Mountains State Park, right outside Fort Davis and made a day trip to the natural spring fed pool at Balmorhea State Park.
Justin, Patty and I drove down Saturday night when Patty got off work(around midnight) We got there around 4 am and drove around for almost 30 minutes looking for the campsite due to poor signage. The next morning we got up and ate breakfast then while Mom and Dad took some of the kids hiking Patty, Justin, the rest of the kids and I drove to McDonalds Observatory to get Mom's camera she had left there the night before at the star party. It looked so cool! I definitely want to go back at night for a star party. After that we ate a quick lunch then drove to the Fort in Fort Davis which is where the hiking trail they went on ended up. We walked around the Fort for awhile then drove into town and went and had Ice Cream at this super cool little shop.

The we went to a rattlesnake emporium. GROSS!! Haha the kids loved it though

After that we walked around downtown Fort Davis, it was a very cute little town.

This was a cute little place, I don't even know what to call it, there was a small hotel upstairs along with an art gallery/store. Downstairs was a restaurant and store. So cute!! (Justin, Patty and I had to leave early and didn't get to eat here but everyone else did and said it was really good)

After that it started raining so we mostly stayed in our tents or the trailer and talked then ended up having to cook supper in the rain. Annie and Kellen got there shortly after we finished eating and we ate s'mores and went to bed. The next morning we got up early and went to Balmorhea State Park. There is a spring fed pool, partial man made partially natural. I wish I had an underwater camera because it was soooo cool! 

We all got to snorkel and mom and dad got to scuba dive!

You can kind of see in the back of the picture close to that little building where the water gets darker, that's the natural bottom part, it was really cool.

                                                  Mom and Dad getting ready to scuba!!

Family picture before Justin, Patty and I had to leave

Matthew would put leftover bread from our lunch in between his toes and then stick his feet in the water and let the fish eat it from between his toes. We had a ton of fun and can't wait to go back!!

Jenny

Skydiving

We finally got to go skydiving for Patty's Graduation, we had taken the class to be able to jump by ourselves about a month before but it was too windy to jump that day. We got up about 3:30 and pulled out about 4am to head to Dallas. We got to SkyDive Cowtown around 8 and took a refresher course and then started jumping! It took most of the day for all of us to go. Justin and Patty went first, the both had to jump IAF(with and instructor strapped to you rather than free falling beside you) Patty, because it was her first jump and Justin, because they were worried he wouldn't be heavy enough to control his chute in the wind to land. Kellen was next, he got to jump AFF(By himself with 2 instructors falling beside him) he did great and made a perfect landing. After Kellen was Mom and then Dad. By that time it was almost dusk and you cannot jump after dusk, so Annie and I had to jump IAF to save on time(4 people in the plane for 2 jumpers=1 plane trip and less time as opposed to 3 people in the plane for 1 jumper=2 plane trips)

After Annie and I jumped we loaded up, got supper and headed home. We got in around 4 am making it a 24 hour day for most of us and a very long day for those who had naps and/or slept on the way home. But it was so worth it! Skydiving is so much fun and I can't wait to go again!!

Jenny

Our 2nd Anniversary

For our second wedding anniversary Justin and I made a trip to Dallas.

We left on Friday night when Justin got off at 10 and drove to our hotel and crashed. Saturday morning we got up and went to the Dallas World Aquarium. It was really neat

Justin got to feed a toucan. The toucan eventually ate the food but at first he just wanted Justins ring haha.

Then we went and had a late lunch at Joes Crab Shack. It was so good!!

Then we headed to the IMAX theater to watch Star Trek in IMAX 3D. After the movie we headed back to the hotel and cleaned up and dressed up and went to eat at P.F. Changs which was also super yummy! The next morning we got up, packed up, and checked out of our hotel room and headed to the mall, we shopped around a little bit, ate lunch in the mall, and drove to the Dallas Zoo. We spent the next couple hours at the zoo it was really neat! They had tons of animals and it wasn't unbearably hot which was nice. We ended our day at the zoo with a monorail ride around to see the last of the animals. 

It was an awesome trip, it seems like yesterday we were headed to Daytona Beach for our honeymoon! I love you Justin can't wait to spend the rest of my life with you!

Jenny

Maverick

So starting at the beginning. About three weeks ago it was super windy in San Angelo and our already old fence fell over and broke. Long story short it took our landlords about two weeks to fix it. During those two weeks we mostly had Sophie chained up in the back yard. We didn't think it would take so long and thought she would only be chained for a few days. The day before our new fence was finished, someone came into our yard and un buckled Sophie's collar and either let her go or took her. We've looked and looked. Looked at the pound, drove around our neighborhood every day. Posted on Craig's list and every other pet social media site we could find. It's been almost a week and we haven't heard or seen anything. We were beginning to realize Sophie wasn't coming back. We talked about getting a lab but they were $500 and 5 hours away. Then Justin was talking to a friend about her new dog and Sophie being lost/stolen and she said "Well, my dog was free and the guy has more. " So we contacted him and came home with Maverick!!

Catching Up!

Wow! I can't believe its been so long since I posted! So heres a quick(ish) overview of whats been going on :)
First we put up our Christmas tree! We were excited to put it up because its our first year to have a full size Christmas tree, last year was a mini tree :)

Then came the HOF Christmas Party, its always so neat to see people donate tons of money and gifts for all the kids. And to see the kids utter joy when opening the presents! So much fun!

Next was Twas The Night at the river stage. Joshua, Joy and Jimmie participated in the live Nativity and of course Kellen and the gang sang lots of Christmas Carols. Amy looooved this blow up penguin. (I couldn't get it to flip)

Then CHRISTMAS!!!! On Christmas Eve Justin and I opened presents from each other. Justin got me seasons of Friends! I looove Friends! I got him floor mats and lots of other fun stuff for his new truck and a game cube.

Then we went to his parents house and did Christmas there. I didn't bring my camera but it was lots of fun! We ate dinner and visited and then watched Elf(Justin and I's FAVORITE Christmas movie) and opened presents. Then late that night we drove to my parents house, snuck into the bunkhouse and went to bed. The next morning we walked over and opened present and ate cinnamon rolls.

Amy and Stella with their Build a Bears

The boys with their new HOOey hats 

The Patty played for us on her brand new Guitar!

The we just hung out. The girls had fun taking pictures :)

Next we went to Papa's New Ranch "Red Creek" in Munday. We got to hunt, play, and visit our long lost Thompson cousins!

Justin's First HUGE buck

Amy bein cute!

Then came January, we went to Kelli Criner/Sullenger's wedding.

Amy got to spend the night with us after the wedding, she looved it :)

It snowed too which Sophie loooved :)

Thats about it for now :) now maybe that I'm caught up I'll stay caught up haha at least I'll try :)

Jenny

Goodbye Red Bullet, Hello Cara The Titan!

Well lets start at the beginning.  On November 7th Justin was driving to work (at Sitel) he was on the loop about to exit on Knickerbocker. It was almost 8 am and the exit was backed up because of the stoplight at Knickerbocker and the access road. So Justin slowed down a little to get into the exit lane when the car behind him slammed into him. After pulling over he called me and told me he had gotten into a wreck, and he would call me to come pick him up once the police got there to write the report. So he called me back a few minutes later and said to head over. When I got there I couldn't believe it was so bad! The car looked totalled!

So I took him to work while they towed his car away. I went to House of Faith BBC and then picked him up from work and we went to Concho Collision to clean out his car. We got the police report the following day, and Justin called the other guys insurance company to file the claim. It took 6 days after the accident to even get a rental car. After that it took a little over 2 weeks to get the money for the claim. So after lots of unanswered phone calls, lots of stressed nights, and a little less money that we were hoping for, we received the claim money yesterday and headed to Jim Bass Ford and bought this beauty!

Justin is sooo happy to finally have a vehicle! And even more excited to have a pickup that he has wanted for a loooong time! I'm just happy the stresses of insurance claims, rental cars, sharing a car, and buying a car, are done! I'm am also very happy that my hubby finally got his dream car! :) And very thankful that other than a little whiplash he is fine, and that we got a greeeat deal on the pickup(about 3500 less than blue book value) So thats the story! Now onto regular life, less stress and my favorite time of year, CHRISTmas! <3