The BIG 3-0!!

Holy Moley, I am THIRTY!  Yowza... that's a lot of birthday candles! :)  I was fortunate to be able to have an AMAZING birthday.  Here's the recap....

The Tuesday before my birthday my mom came into town to watch Beckett while we went to the Arboretum/Chihuly Night.  The next morning I dragged her to my mom's group meet up at the fountains.

It was SO stinkin' HOT.  I was dripping sweat from chasing Beckett around.  He did like the fountains, but thought it was more fun to run off laughing and have me chase him.

The next night we celebrated my birthday by all going to sushi for dinner.  It was super yummy.  My mom isn't a sushi fan, but she ordered these really delicious coconut shrimp and vegetable roll appetizers that were perfect.  Thanks, Mom, for the birthday dinner!

Friday night Emily came to pick me up.   Of course, I had to get a couple of pictures :).

I had ZERO idea what we were doing - I figured that the two of us would go out to eat and consume a few glasses of wine.  I was partially right - we went to a new restaurant in Parker's Square called Decanter.  AND the best part was that a lot of my 3rd grade work buddies were there too!  I hardly ever get to see them anymore, so it was a special treat that they came to celebrate with us!  

And Emily got the most delicious cake in the entire world.  It was chocolate coconut cream - about as fantastic as it gets.  I'm still thinking about that cake!

But the fun was just beginning!  The day before Guy had told me that I needed to mentally prepare myself for my first night away from Beckett.  Since I breastfed for a full year I really hadn't had an opportunity for a getaway, but now that he is weaned it was definitely time.

Guy refused to give me any details.  He did tell me that my sweet little sister was driving all the way from Norman to watch Beckett for us.  She is the best!!

And to pack a fancy dress, casual clothes, and "outdoorsy" clothes.  That had me perplexed.

So Saturday afternoon we were off!  After stopping off at Fuzzy Tacos for lunch we drove North for about an hour.  I nearly made Guy turn around when I realized I had completely forgotten my camera :(.  What did we do before cameras on our phones???  Anyhow, we finally reached our destination... Elm Creek Manor Spa Resort!!  Honestly I couldn't have been more surprised.  Guy is romantic in his own way, but I never thought he would go to such lengths to plan a surprise getaway for us.  

Check out our itinerary!  Yep, he even booked us a couples massage!  Heaven.

The resort was amazing.  Every detail was carefully thought out.  We were really spoiled.

As soon as we unpacked we took a walk around the grounds.  We had a lot of fun with checkers and boccie ball.  (I definitely kicked booty at checkers.)

We quickly learned that we weren't just at a bed and breakfast or spa resort - it was actually much more than that.  The owners had 800 acres that had been in the family since before the Civil War.  First and foremost, the property was a working true organic farm.  Cows, chickens, rabbits, goats, vegetables, herbs, fruit trees - all helped produce all of the meals at the resort.  Everything was fresh and homemade - even the cheese!

After our walk we got back to the room to get ready for our massage.  I could seriously get a massage every single day and be very, very happy.  

Afterwards we got dressed for dinner and headed downstairs for "social hour" in the library.  We met the other resort guests and got to know the owners.  

When everyone else headed for the dining room for dinner, we got to stay put in the library.  Guy had made special plans for us to have our dinner privately.  Isn't this library so cool?  I can imagine how neat it would be to have the fire going during winter.

Now,  I have been with Guy for 10 1/2 years so I am no stranger to fine dining.  There is nothing more that Guy loves than a fancy dinner!  But this had to have been the absolute BEST meal I have ever consumed in my life.  You can taste such a difference when you are eating fresh, farm raised food.  Plus, the owner is a gourmet chef that has trained all over the world so I guess that helps too.  Ha!

We were so stuffed but later that night Guy had arranged for us to have a campfire, s'mores, and Bailey's hot chocolate.  I could barely finish my s'more, but I rallied.  I'm not one to shy away from a dessert!

The next morning was my actual birthday.  Hello, thirty!  We woke up bright and early - we had important business waiting for us!  

Yep, we milked goats.  Actually, to be precise, Guy milked goats - I was only able to get three measly drops.  Guy seemed to have a hidden talent for milking.  Hmmmm.....

Afterwards we were treated to another fantastic meal.  It was cool enough to eat outside, which always makes me a happy girl.  

It was the best getaway - relaxing, fun, and unique.  I am so appreciative of Guy and Stephanie for setting this up!  I did think about Beckett, but I wasn't going crazy missing him.  It was actually really nice to just be a wife for a bit.

Unfortunately the drive home was NOT so relaxing and fun.  All of a sudden I was hit with the worst stomach bug EVER.  Guy had to pull over so that I could get sick on the side of the highway.  :(  And it only got worse.   I ended up spending my entire birthday in bed (or in the bathroom).  I don't think I have ever been so nauseous in my life!  For two days I hardly left the bedroom.  It was really sad because I couldn't be around Beckett at all.  He was so excited to see me and kept wanting me to hold him and I just had to stay away.  It about broke my heart every time because he just sobbed.  This was NOT the way I planned to spend my 30th birthday!

But I was cheered up when Charlsi surprised me with some birthday decorating!  Isn't that fun? 

I have the best friends - they are so sweet.  Oh, and I didn't even mention that Cori had sent me a summer essentials birthday package.  A cute sundress, hat, sunglasses, and good book.  They will all come in handy when we set off for our birthday cruise in August!

Cheers to turning thirty - a whole new decade of love, family, friendship, and good times!

A Boy and his Rock

Ahhh, the joys of summer!  Tonight Beckett and I walked up to the neighborhood school so that we could explore the playground.  He's too young for most things, but here's what he did get in to:

Climbing on slides

Practicing walking

Watching airplanes

Giving the BEST smiles

My ornery face

Getting dirty

But all of that paled in comparison when we found the rock.  Once he saw that rock it was GAME ON.  The rock went everywhere.  The rock was tossed like a ball.  The rock went on and off the black step 50 times.  The rock got handed to mama again and again.  The rock was carefully inspected then buried in the wood chips.  And, yes, the rock was taste tested.  

Apparently rocks are also delicious.  Who knew?

 Love my sweet boy.  

Date Night

Date night.... what does that mean to you?  B.B. (before Beckett) it usually meant dinner out and sometimes a movie.  If we got crazy we might do something like go to a friends house for dinner or attend a community event.  I don't think we ever even called it a "date night."  It was more like "let's not cook tonight" or "let's go do something fun night."  Pretty typical, right?  But now that we are A.B. (after Beckett) I look back and think "wow, did we really appreciate getting the freedom to whatever we wanted WHEN we wanted?"  For the most part, yes, I think we did.  We intentionally waited 7 years to have children, just so that we could enjoy each other and do what we wanted for a bit.  I'm glad we had that time.

Anyhow, now that we aren't so footloose and fancy free "date night" takes on a whole new meaning.  While we are very lucky to get to see our families who gladly watch Beckett for us, that doesn't necessarily coordinate with every time we want to go out.  If you are paying a babysitter $10 an hour to go out, then you better make your time worthwhile.

So, to get to the point.... I have been trying to make it a mission to spice up our date nights a bit.  Yes, we will occasionally go to dinner but anymore neither of us really want to go to a chain restaurant and we aren't crazy impressed with the local cooking around here either.  Sometimes I think I do a better (and healthier!) job at home.  We have been making conscious efforts to do different things.

Our most recent date night was pretty fun.  We went to the Dallas Arboretum's Chihuly Night.  We packed up some frosty beers, Scholtzskys sandwiches, and our picnic blanket and headed out.

It's really a perfect summer event - tour the garden while seeing amazing art, listen to music (Journey tribute band - ohhhh yahhhhh), and have a picnic!

Nice white pants, dude.

Check out the sunset over White Rock Lake!

On a sidenote, while we were sitting and enjoy the view/picnic/music, I happened to check out and slightly obsess over everyone else's picnic gear.  People were fancy - we were wayyyy outpicnic-ed.  But check out some of the cool things I saw - 

First up, check out these two awesome wine holders!  You just stab them in the ground and voila!  WHERE do I get this???  It is a necessity for our upcoming Florida trip.

Now that's a picnic basket!

This cooler had it all - rolling wheels with a handle, side pockets, padded bench on top, and a little drink station in the back.  Well done.

Ok, back to the date night... Here are some of my favorite exhibits.

It was a really fun night, and definitely something "different" to do.  I'm scouting out more fun dates, so if you hear of something then please let me know!

Beckett's Tie Pictures

I realized that I never posted my series of "tie pictures" of Beckett.  Every month I took a few hundred some pictures of Beckett with a sticker to show his age.   For his birthday party I picked a favorite one of each month and created a banner to hang.  Actually, I couldn't always choose my favorite because I needed all of the pictures to be portrait style (as opposed to landscape style) for consistency.  I also chose to convert them to black and white so that they would look the same.  I didn't mess with the anything fancy of the black and whites tones because I just ran out of time, so it's probably not optimal.  But, the banner turned out cute and it's something I hope to hang on to for him and plan to embarrass him with  proudly display when he graduates high school.  

Sadly, this month I lost the sticker so I never did the tie shot.  But, really, this is about the most precious picture EVER of him!

Fun, right?  I think the biggest difference in the months was from 1 to 2 months.  Amazing what  few weeks of plumping up does.  And I think he started to really look the same around 9 months - just bigger.  

I love these photos.  I am so glad I took the time to do them each month.  

Oh, and here is my banner that I made - it's actually two separate ones, but you get the idea:   

It's still hanging up over our fireplace.  Because, really, we kinda celebrate Beckett Day everyday around here. Ha!