Boring for you, exciting for us- GARAGE DOOR!

So about 6 weeks ago, about 3 days after we started the bathroom project our garage door kinda imploded. Not sure what happened but it got of the tracks and made a sound comparable to something from Jurassic Park and jumbled all up. So after 6 weeks of waiting (note: do not buy a garage door from Home Depot if you are needing it soon) it was installed this morning!

Old door (Molly posing again!):



New door:

Visit from Mom and Dad! Yea!

So this weekend my mom and dad drove down to hang out! This was such a treat since I just got to see them in June! We just hung out, ate lots of food, dad helped Andy with the bathroom, and mom taught me how to make bread (I think I will devote an entirely separate post to this). It was a wonderful weekend!

Mom and Dad at Phil's Ice House



The boys grouting the bathroom floor




Then my dad recruited (didn't take much convincing) Andy to help his build a soap box derby. Andy was all over it, here is them making a mock racer so Andy could get the measurements right and weld him a real one eventually. Also, where is a better place to make a box racer and cut lumber than in the living room? ;)



For my brithday dinner we ate at Z Tejas, on my goodness, that place is AMAZING. We had been there before, but not in a long while. I think it is officially my new favorite restaurant. SO GOOD!

Birthdays are nature's way of telling us to eat more cake.

I've always LOVED birthdays, well any holiday really.....don't even get me started on my love of Christmas. Birthdays are great though because it means, well another year of life and getting to hang out with loved ones doing fun stuff! So this last week we celebrated my 26th birthday!

It was truly one of best birthdays I've had (I think I may say that every year, but it is so true this year!) Andy and I both took off work Friday and he had the whole day planned out. The started with Andy making me some yummy pancakes. Then we went to the dog park, then hiking, then picnic lunch.



Then we went shopping- and it wasn't at Lowes! It was nice to just stroll around and spend some time together and explore some stores I've been wanting to go to. Unfortunately while we were out we got hit from behind in Andy's new car. It was so much hit as it was tapped but it dented the car a tiny bit and chipped the paint. Kinda of a bummer but glad it wasn't any worse!

Then that night we went to Melting Pot. To say it is amazing would be an understatement- holey moley. I LOVED it! Two days later and I still feel full!




Then Saturday night we went to Main Event with some friends. We had 14 friends come out, it was mixture of friends from church and work. What a fun group of friends I have been blessed with and didn' think I was a weirdo for having a typical 8 year boy's birthday party, they jumped right in and we had so much fun!

Westover Church Friends

Fellow counselors I work with- John, Chris, Dinah, and Brian




Friends from Work after an INTENSE game of laser tag! My team may have lost by over 100,000 points but we definitely had more fun!


Whooping up on Brian with my Dance Dance Revolution skills....

Rock climbing!!!!!


Kim, my bestie best friend from work!

Deceptively Delicious

So I love salads and Andy loves meat. It has been a 'fun' challenge to try to compromise and try new food for both of us. Since I get off work at 3 pm I usually cook and try to remind myself that 'a big salad' isn't nearly as exciting for Andy as it is for me. Well, I found a possible solution!
While wandering around the library this weekend I found a book called "Deceptively Delicious". It was written by Jerry Seinfeld's wife and it is all about tricking your kids into eating veggies without them knowing it. Basically you make a bunch of purees of fruits and veggies, freeze them and then pull them out as you need them and slip them into recipes. Tricky eh?
So tonight I made Italian Meatloaf, roasted veggies, and brownies from the book.
I was dubious of the brownies.....there was no oil, butter and 1 cup of spinach puree and 1 cup of carrot puree.

My purees



Andy ate 2! They were actually good! Were the the best brownies ever? No. Were they awesome 133 calorie brownies with 2 servings of veggies? Definitely.



The meatloaf was de-lish, it had 1 cup of carrot puree in it. I will definitely make it again. Later this week I am going to make some mac and cheese with cauliflower puree-it's definitely not for everyone, but I think it is a good compromise for us right now. I made some healthy Greek dip this weekend and found Andy dipping bacon into it ;) To each their own.



Happy tummies!

We are nuts...

I think this is proof of our craziness. I keep going in there and just laughing. There is nothing! What an opportunity to start from scratch- very exciting!

Sledge Hammer Therapy

BATHROOM DEMO HAS BEGUN....

Relaxing 3 day holiday weekend? Oh no, that would make too much sense. We've decided to started tearing apart the 2nd bathroom. It will be a complete gut. By the end of this thing everything will be new. We are planning on doing it all on our own. I think we are naive enough to even think that we can handle it but not blissful in our ignorance enough to know that it going to be a real challenge!

Good bye ugly bathroom! We will not miss you.....



Not too bad after a couple hours of work....



The floor comes up tomorrow and then hopefully the popcorn ceiling will be Saturday! It's been a while since we've done any house projects so I'm excited to see how it turns out and to not have a gold chain light fixture with a sea shell sink!

Being a Beach Bum with my Besties

So this weekend I got to hang out with 2 of my best friends in Port Aransas! Holly and Marie have been my friends since 7th grade Mrs. Tubb's journalism class and I don't know how I would of gotten through the awkardness that is middle school, the drama that is high school, the craziness that is college without their friendship. I know it is rare for people to stay friends this long and I am blessed by their friendship.
So Holly and Marie drove down Tuesday and spent the night in Austin. I unfortunately had to work that week, so they went down to the beach Wed morning and I planned to join them Friday evening after I got off work for the weekend.
So I get up Wed morning and I am sick but in complete denial. I refused to acknowledge "the funk" that is creeping over me. Thursday morning I am working and on the phone with a client and I get the "holy moly, I'm going to be sick" feeling, which in my opinion is one of the WORST feelings ever. The lady will not get off the phone! Literally within 5 seconds of getting off the phone I get sick. I realize that not everyone enjoys a good throw-up story as much as me so I will spare you the details, but let me say this: it was bad. I could deny "the funk" no more. It had revealed itself to me and it was not happy.
Determined to go on beach trip I called in sick to work Thursday and Friday and rested all day long and chugged Emergen-C and popped pills like no other. It worked! To utilize the most of my time and since Andy didn't want me to drive the truck down to the coast on my own I flew down to Corpus Christi and Holly and Marie picked me up. I had to switch planes in Houston. When I walked into the Houston airport the first thing I hear is "Ashley Luksys, please report to gate 24, your flight has boarded..." I think they said something else but I was FLIPPING out because I looked up and I was at gate 54! So I pulled a "Home Alone" and sprinted through the airport! I made it!!! Nothing was going to stop me- not "the funk", not stupid SW flight schedules, NOTHING!

So it was just a fabulous weekend. We did a whole lot of nothing. It was great to just lay around on the beach, in our condo, and to eat good food. We did had a traumatic eating experience, let me just say- NEVER eat at Castaways. You've been warned.



Our fabulous condo.....




Swear we didn't plan this....



Holly is a floppy hat connoisseur and she bought me this amazing hat! What a good friend I have. I seriously can't wait to rock this hat out all summer long!