Early Anniversay gift

Brian and I got to celebrate our 6 year anniversary a little early this year. Our actual anniversary is December 17, but we got to go do something special last weekend.

It all started on Saturday around 4:00 pm. Some of our family was still at our house from the Thanksgiving holiday. We were all in the front living room putting up the Christmas tree when there wound up being some sort of mess and confusion about an already-paid-for-unclaimed-hotel-room at the Adolphus Hotel in Dallas. So after the confusion had been settled, my parents decided to pay the owner of the said hotel room and give it to Brian and I as an early anniversary gift!

Brian and I have also started a tradition a couple of years ago to go to The Melting Pot in Addison for our anniversary dinner. So, we decided, since we were going to be spending the night in Dallas, lets just make it an official anniversary date and go to dinner as well. And that we did. Had I known we were going out to a nice dinner and an even nicer hotel for the evening, I would have washed my hair when I got up that morning, I would have bought a new dress and I would NOT have eaten so much for lunch.
By this time it was about 4:45. I made a quick reservation for 6:15 for dinner. We only had about an hour to change clothes, pack our bags, say our good-byes (Maddie doesn't like to say good bye, it takes forever to leave the house) and drive to Addison which takes about 20-30 min.

We had a GREAT time! Dinner was FABULOUS as always and the Hotel reminded me of the Titanic since its a historical hotel. I didn't get any pictures of dinner since I didn't want to take my ginormous camera inside with me but I got plenty inside the hotel.

This was our view outside. It was neat how the stop lights had a large ornament hanging from the middle. The ornament changed colors also.

A plate with chocolate covered strawberries and other chocolate treats greeted us as we walked in the room.

Yes, the sweet well-wishes were made in white chocolate as well!

I LOVED this bed and the mirror above it. Its SO early 19 hundreds.

I also loved the rotary phone and the mirrored table.

They had the hotel decorated for Christmas. It was beautiful!

This was one of the lobbies. In the back, stands an ornately wood-carved Grand Piano. Beautiful!

Thanksgiving 2011

We had a great Thanksgiving this year. We hosted it here at the house and most of the family came and we had WAY to much food and desert like always. I am not entirely crazy about thanksgiving food, mainly because Christmas food is WAY better. And that is mainly because I like Ham better than Turkey.
Brian, Ashlee and Michael started the day off right running the Turkey Trot in Dallas. I was going to go, but I chickened out. On Wednesday night when we were going to bed, I looked at Brian and told him I wasn't upset I wasn't going with them. They were about to do two things I HATE the most: Waking up early and running.



Like I said earlier, we stayed in Murphy for Thanksgiving, but what set this Thanksgiving apart from the rest was this:

That is my sister and her new Fiance, Michael.

We all gathered up around the living room for my dad to say a prayer. Everyone (except me, brian, my mom and dad because we all knew about the surprise) faced my dad expecting him to start talking, but he didn't. Michael started to talk. He said how much he loved our family etc... then he turned around to face Ashlee, got down on one knee and proposed. Everyone was SO surprised and Brian was finally able to sigh in relief that he didn't have to keep a secret anymore.

After that, my dad said the actual prayer and we engorged ourselves. Just kidding.
Congratulations to Ashlee and Michael!

I'm pretty sure Maddie thinks she has mastered the art of scraping food around her plate to make it look like she ate most of it.

Kaia, My cousin's daughter. So, Maddie's 3rd cousin?

Christmas Pictures

Today Brian, Maddie and I went out for a quick Christmas-time photo shoot. I have TONS of pictures of Maddie that I have done and that are framed through out the house, but I am sad to say, I think the only good picture of the three of us is the picture that was taken for the church bulletin a couple of years ago and I am not crazy about it either. Studio portraits are not my style, and since I take pictures, I have a hard time wanting to pay someone to do the exact same thing that I can do.

But, today, after church, Brian, Maddie and I went out to take a few pictures of us for Christmas. I took all the pictures that I am NOT in, but for the one's that I AM in, I asked my mom to take over. I set the settings and I explained the vision of what I wanted. She did a great job. She has a naturally artistic eye, (I guess that's were I get it from) and I have talked to her a little bit about photography over the years, so she was excited to do it. Here is what we came up with:

Arboretum

Last Wednesday Maddie and I got invited to spend the afternoon at the Arboretum with some friends and we had a great time walking around and looking at the different flowers and plants and exhibitions they had set up. This time they had a Cinderella theme with her carriage and different fun facts about the history of the fairy tail. It was all really cute and Maddie was able to get into it since she has seen the movie a couple of times. Thank you Jamie for letting us tag along with you and Brylee!

Whats down there?


High Five!
Maddie wanted to climb that tree.