Austin weekend (birth/anniv/prebaby)

Almost all of our trips to austin start an hour from Dallas with a stop at the Czech Bakery Breakfast sausage kolache....reeeaall good Once in Austin, we got to our hotel, the JW Marriott, and got ready to enjoy the night out. We went to zilker park for A Comedy Of Errors. Shakespear. We are super cultured. Got drinks/snack from Whole Foods and a pizza. Already had a picnic blanket in the car. It was just a little too hot for me and perfect temp for gentry. Nice breeze. Tough to get a better setup.  Saturday we hit breakfast at a Gentry favorite. Kerbey Lane. Then we walked up and down South Congress checking out the unique stores.  Got us an ice coffee at Jos Next we went to the hotel pool. We found a nice quite spot for our stuff on the ground and snuggled up with the other 200 people in the pool. It was packed.  Total bro-fest. The water was refreshing but we didn't last long. Headed back to the room and took our time getting ready for dinner.  We went all out for our anniversary meal. Barley swine. A recommendation from Andrea. Without the recommendation we probably would have ignored it purely based on the name.  It was really good. Chef choice 10 course meal (actually got a bonus 11th of some fancy carrot cake) Gentry looked good! We of course took at selfie From dinner we tried to catch the bat Exodus to dinner that happens under the Congress bridge but we only saw a few instead of the few hundred thousand we read about.  Sunday we enjoyed some pool time in the morning before party time. The plan from there was to meet Justin and April but April let us know they had yet another person I'm their family get hit by a stomach bug. So we decided to not stay the night with them and instead just met them for an early dinner st Rudy's.  Before Rudy's Gentry and I did the most adult thing we've ever done. We went to a museum and learned stuff. Learned about Texas.  So we headed back to Dallas a day early.  We kept the adult theme going by buying a crib at IKEA and eating at Eatzi's.

Ben College Grad Wknd

Ben graduated from college. He's done and has worked so much harder than I did in college. Proud of him.  It was a fun weekend getting the family together. Steve and Carol came down from Denver which was great since we hadn't seen each other since our wedding.  Dad walked the graduation floor with Ben. He was able to put his right foot in front of his left just fine. Now when it came to putting on the graduation hood on Ben, that was trouble. Dad was able to put it on him but it did end up backwards and upside down. Ben seemed to be over the ceremony pretty quick Mom found a nice house a few minutes from campus where we all stayed. Since it rained most of our time there, we chose to go to top golf instead of playing a round of golf. The women got them nails done This is just ridiculous.  We also played lots of games. Catch phrase with bens friends during his graduation dinner party Carcassone...obviously. And Secret Hitler  

Easter 2017 St.Louis Visit

Griffins and Griffith gathering in St Louis. Did some St Louis touristy stuff on our first day Went to the arch and river front Went to the basilica  Got great lunch in the hill  Gentry is 19.5 weeks pregnant  Checked out Busch stadium Made a stop to Ted Drewes Good Easter service at mid county .....McKnight Crossings. Awesome presentation after service about the recent trip Jeremy Picker and Jeff Fograty took to India with Jeremy's uncle. His uncle leads various ministries there for orphans, windows, and lepers.  Captured a picture of everyone while dressed up And yesterday gentry got a good "announcement" picture....this is the original and he post has the one she edited into a fantasy shot Dad, Guy and I went golfing Sunday afternoon once we noticed the forecast said rain tomorrow morning. We had a good time.  On our last half day in St. Louis we packed in a couple more favorites. 

Spring '17 camping

Gentry and I took advantage of feeling good during second trimester. Went to Ray Roberts Park outside of Denton. A not bad one hour drive from the house. Somehow we packed this much for a two night trip for two. Best way to cook brats Hammock is the best! Gentry relaxing  Meika cooling off The best pancakes!! For real Picnic by the lake  Meika getting comfy  Smores all the time. With dark chocolate 

First Monday - on Saturday

Random visit to first Monday with gray and Lindsey and thankfully, great weather.

Parents Visit Dallas

My parents came down to visit and are seeing our house for the first time NOT via Skype. It's been a good weekend of eating and hanging out. And six games of Secret Hitler.  We spent Saturday lunch at the farmers market and in bishop arts. Ate lunch at Enos.  Hanging after church waiting on lunch. Dave played drums this morning for their worship at Normandy Church. An encouraging morning getting to hear what God has to say to us and worship as a family. 

First Yard Wknd 2017

Saturday started with a free 45 minute class at Callaways about growing veggies. From there we went on to set ourselves up for way more work than we could handle. Gentry was loving Callaways.  Azaleas was the biggest part of the plan. The batch from last year did not survive much longer than a week. We quickly found out why from our conversation with our Master Gardner teacher at Callaways. Unfortunately, the right method requires a two foot so trench.  The other great advise from our teacher was to use the great soil from last year's azaleas for the boxwoods we were also going to plant. Sounded great until we got home and I realized it meant I would need to shovel and move all the dirt one wheelbarrow at a time.  Knowing that job was ahead, I was not going to mess around when it came to picking out a tiller. I went to Home Depot and got the biggest one I could find. I actually first chose to get the mid tiller because it barely fit in the Volvo. But I left Home Depot and immediately smelled gasoline bc it was starting to leak bc of how we tilted the machine to fit in the car. Sooooo since that wasn't fitting I quickly decided to rent a truck and get a giant, new rear tine tiller.   Till up a layer, shovel it out, repeat. The worst part was being done and then immediately filling the trench half way with peat moss and pine bark mulch. Now we wait for the rain. Tomorrow we'll finally put in the azaleas after two days of work.  Getting the boxwoods planted was not nearly as big of a deal. Gentry was a beast and helped a lot. Made sure we got these babies exactly 42inches apart and 18 inches from the deck. Even when I was ready to just dig a hole and throw them in.  Now I know without a doubt I need to work out my back. Gentry had some killer boots on  Yard is looking nice also thanks to the previous owners