Dallas weekend with the Parents!

So Andy built a box car derby racer (apparently it is called a gravity racer though if you are an adult though) for my dad. This is the second year for my dad's to compete for him work in a soap box derby race. The race is in a couple weeks, so we met half way between Tulsa and Austin, in Dallas, to exchange the derby car. The boys went to a big Top-Fuel/dragster race (hopefully I called it the right thing-sorry boys if I didn't!) and my mom and I spend the day together roaming around Dallas.


We went to Galleria mall (neither of us had ever been there), it is huge! We did some serious shopping. I think the highlight of our afternoon together was going to Penzey Spices. I've mentioned this before, but my mom is serisouly the best cook ever. Seriously. She is all about quality ingredient and buys all her spices from this catalog-Penzey's. Well Penzey's has a store in Dallas, so you better believe that we went! Equipped with her page long list that only someone with OCD could appreciate, we had fun picking out spices, which is a hard thing to do when there is 5 different types of any spice you could ever imagine. I bought some things there and am super excited to try them out!
We also went to Sprinkle's Cupcakes. How to I even begin to describe the deliciousness of these little bits of heavens? They were AMAZING. This is a cupcake place that started in Beverly Hills, and I've heard of celebrities being obsessed with them, well now us common folks can have a taste of the good life too! Mmmmmmmmm.

After the race we all ate dinner together and then Andy and I headed over to Midlothian to visit Andy's sister's family. It was so good to get to see everyone, but sad since it was such a short trip and didn't get to really spend much time with our nieces. I forgot to take pictures unfortunately, but we had a blast and am looking forward to seeing them again hopefully soon!
The race!





It was a fabulous weekend, but so glad to be home and get back to life. I even got a guarantee from Andy that the bathroom would be finished by the end of the week- we'll see....
Have a great week everybody!

Self- Care

So today I am taking a "mental health day". My work has been stressful and I am feeling the physical and emotional tolls of burn-out (I studied about it in school, but never made the connection that it is real thing that happens to your mind and body). I am glad that I chose to take care of just myself today.
So here goes my big day of beautiful unscheduled goodness! I hope that you all can do something to do just for you!

VIVA LAS VEGAS

Holy Moly. LAS VEGAS WAS SO FUN. I am so never planning another trip again, most of the fun of the trip was just showing up and doing whatever the heck we wanted to do and everything worked out so perfectly.
I hadn't been there since I was 14 or so with my family and Andy had never been there so we didn't really know what to expect. We had stand by tickets and were kind of expecting to not get on a flight or be stuck at the air port for hours on end- nope! We walked right up and got on the exact flight we wanted. We arrive in Vegas around 9 am Friday morning, so we had all of Friday to explore and see what we wanted to do.

We stayed at New York New York and it was so great. They have a little mini Central Park, SoHo, downtown area. We really enjoyed just exploring our hotel.




We couldn't check in to our hotel for a few hours so we decided to gamble our $10 that we allotted for ourselves each day. Well I put in $5 in the penny slots, made $35, then put that in the $1 slots and won....$832. Andy and I of course were completely spazing out in the casino of New York New York. As I told this to a friend of mine she commented that "the craziest part of the story isn't that you won but that the Luksys' were playing the $1 slots!". Everyone knows we are cheap, like to a fault cheap. So for us to gamble at all was a stretch, but then to win that amount of money in such a short period of time- crazy.


Andy called our winnings "dirty money" and convinced me that we had to spend it as to not "taint" our bank account with it. Did I know this was his excuse for me to not feel guilty about spending the money? Yes. Did it work? Absolutely. So we set aside the money for our hotel and food and then with the rest went to some shows!

The first Cirque show we went to was Zumanity. It advertised as the "Sensual Side of Cirque du Soleil" and after seeing the show I would say that is putting it very tamely. Now I know that I am sheltered Church of Christ girl from the buckle of the Bible belt- but holy moley. We were both a little out of our comfort zones but it was still an enjoyable show none the less.

The next night we went and saw David Copperfield. I remember as a kid watching his prime time tv specials and just thinking he was the coolest guy ever. Well now he is kind of sad. Andy and I both noticed that he seemed a little annoyed with the tricks, the audience, and just kinda over the whole magic thing. Anyways, during the show we threw out 4 frisbees in the audience and 1 landed right by me. I tried to get Andy to go up on stage, but of course he wouldn't- so I got to go up on stage and assist in a David Copperfield magic trick! I held this big rope around these other guys, they put up a sheet, and then 5 seconds later there was a car there! It was crazy- I was 2 feet away from this and still have no idea how it worked. That was a once in a lifetime experience for sure!




One of the Cirque di Soleil shows we saw was LOVE- it was all Beatles. The Beatles have forever and will continue to be my favorite band/obsession forever. The show was so amazing and beautiful.



I was a tiny bit excited if you can't tell....


There is no doubt that Vegas is a wild town and has a lot to offer people who are into that sort of thing. We wondered if we would run out of stuff doing being that we aren't too into the whole Vegas scene, but we absolutely did not! There is so much to see! Just walking down the strip and walking around the casinos and seeing all the free stuff can easily take a weekend.

VEGAS OR BUST.....

In the true spirit of trying to be spontaneous, we have decided to use some stand by airline tickets we were given (thanks John!)and fly to Vegas this weekend! My head is about to spontaneously combust as I am a planner and since we just came up with this idea last night and are leaving tomorrow morning, I'm a little anxious to get everything done. Also we are going to see "Wicked" tonight. I'm so excited!!!!!

MY NEW FAVORITE THING

http://www.yearbookyourself.com/

See a lot of people do this on facebook, so one night we tried it out and about peed our pants laughing it is so great....

I always wanted to live in the 1960's, but after seeing myself in these photos, I'm sure glad I wasn't!





I kinda look like a freak in every era, I may be a little bias, but I think Andy looks handsome in all (well maybe not so much with a mullet ;) )





The best one of all......


Try it! It is super easy and a guaranteed laugh!

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!