Deep in the Heart of Texas

Sunday, March 25, 2018

Grandmother's 100th Birthday Celebration

It really is hard to believe that Grandmother Taylor is ONE HUNDRED years old. Think of all the changes she has seen in her lifetime. . . telephones, television, airplane travel, computers, and the internet to name a few. We had her reception at Trinity Terrace but the cousins gathered before the celebration at Joe T's to catch up.

Brothers at Joe T's. I love that place.

I'm glad Emily and Peyton joined us

Cousins at Joe T's

The Walker Family

My favorite picture of Grandmother and me from the weekend. I had my hair done at a BlowOut place! :-)

So many parties and outfit changes - this was the after party at Leigh's gorgeous house

The Risingers with Grandmother. I can tell that she is weary of pictures at this point

Me and my cousins - Leigh and Blair. We look so much alike.

Emily took the girls on a TCU tour!

Celebrating at Joe T's

The boys were dying with the outfits - but they look so cute!

Brunch the next day at the country club

The Jones extended family came!

The James Taylor family

Cousins

Second Cousins

Crazy cousins

Blair and John

Leigh and Michael (and James)

Katherine and Whitney

Saturday, March 17, 2018

Spring Break 2018 - SKI TRIP!

So after MANY years of thinking about it, we finally pulled the trigger and took the kids skiing. I really didn't know what to expect. Since I was hesitant I thought it would be a good idea to go to a ski resort that I was familiar with - WOLF CREEK! I went there several times with my high school youth group and really loved it because it's low-key and relatively easy to get to from Texas.

We decided to book a house in South Fork (NOT Pagosa!) which was a surprise but we realized South Fork is about 20 minutes closer to Wolf Creek and in the morning when you want to ski with kids you just want to get there!

The kids did GREAT! We put them in all day ski school for 2 days. On the third day Alivia took some more lessons but we skied with all the kids. . . this was HARD. Matthew was still really a beginner. I think three days of lessons would have been better. The fourth day Will and Matthew chose to stay behind at the cabin and relax while Alivia and John each took a one hour private lesson and we skied with the other child. That was a blast! I loved having one on one time with each kiddo skiing. Alivia is quite good and John is so fast and has no fear.

I think we would love to make this an annual tradition but it is expensive. . . Thankfully we borrowed all of our ski stuff from Anna and Sam so we literally didn't have to buy any clothing. I was so thankful for that. I brought all the food from Austin to cook so we didn't have to go out to eat. I put my foot down and asked Matt if we could buy lunches at the ski resort and he agreed! I was so happy. I love having a hot meal at lunch on the ski slopes. When John and Matthew were in all day ski school their lunches were provided. I was really impressed with the Wolf Pups ski school (ages 5-8).

The first day was really warm! Definitely spring skiing.

Hardly any snow in South Fork which worried us - but Wolf Creek had tons of snow!

Beautiful San Juan Mountain Range

Walking around South Fork. The kids loved playing in the snow.

Riding the chair lift with my girl!

We loved working together on a puzzle every night. We finished it in the nick of time.

Getting all the kids outfitted with skis on is a lot of work! I was so glad I had Matt around. We rented skis from Wolf Creek and could store them there so we didn't have to bring them back and forth. This was AWESOME.

We fed the deer and turkey bird seed and they would come eat right off the front porch!

3 Pines Cabin in South Fork through VRBO was a hit. Matt loved the wood burning stove.

Rainbow Grocery is the coolest local grocery store with everything from food to snow chains. Everything you could possibly need. Part grocery store and part general store.