Rehearsal Dinner @ Rudy's

We had the rehearsal dinner at Rudy's (another famous BBQ place here in Austin).
Felt like I was betraying The Salt Lick.
Love this picture. It looks like Carolyn is yelling at Allen.
But, maybe she is. Haha!

My sister Wendy, Andy, Wendy's husband Chris and the back of my cousin Tanya's head.
=)

cousin Alan is never without a video camera. It's just part of his arm, actually.

The Kansas clan. Good friends of my parents. They hadn't seen me since I was about 7 years old! Trippy.

The happy couple!

Alan & Tanya from Chicago. Love them! Such a fun group. Always makes me wish we lived closer. They are a blast.

I went to get a photo of Mom & Dad and he handed me their trash.
#numberonechild

Doug's grandson Sammy! Isn't he adorable! It was coincidentally his 1st birthday on the night of the rehearsal dinner as well, so we celebrated both at the same time. He is SO cute. I think Doug's daughter Jessica thought I was stalking her. I just couldn't stop oogling and squishing his cheeks. And he was SO good.

Cake? Did someone say cake?

Dayy Off

Sydney was excited to have the day off school and was originally going to get manicures and pedicures with MeMaw and her friend Janet (Aunt Janet) but soon decided it wasn't her "thing" and stayed at the house with PaPa (who probably would have preferred to nap and do other things. I was in school and had a doctor appointment. I felt bad when I picked her up from PaPa bc MeMaw was STILL gone (after 6 hours!!!) and there were tea cups and baby dolls ALL over the house. haha Poor Papa!!!

snuggly

She's so cute. I love when I put her down for a nap or for bed and she just looks up and waves at me (bye bye) and as I walk out the door she blows me a kiss. She's SO easy to put to bed. LOVE.

Leftover Balloons!

The girls are enjoying all the party leftovers this morning!!

bed head!

Bridal Shower

I hosted my big sister's bridal shower on Saturday. Can you believe I got this cake at HEB?
I looked around at so many bakers but they were so expensive but our local grocer did it on a whim and for such a good price & it came out so good! Sydney picked the flowers. Jenny's favorite color: purple.

Wendy's gotta eat in style.

I was the designated champagne bottle opener.
(no I did not do my hair. I had tangled tresses all day)

Mom of the groom and mom of the bride!

To Jenny & Doug!

She did really good answering all the questions about Doug! Only got 3 wrong!

Making wedding gowns out of toilet paper. Kimberly won. She said "this is as close as I'll ever get to wearing an actual wedding gown, someone please take a picture!"

Sydney loves her "Aunt" Janet!

Me & the bride!! My biggest sis Jen!

All the sisters together!

We put together a video slide show of all the most embarrassing photos we could find of Jenny (mostly from the 80's) when Jen would have red hair and try and dress like Molly Ringwald. The backround music was all 80's hair bands and Wendy's husband put it together. It was hilarious. Went upstairs into my theater room and watched & everyone got a big kick out of it. Seriously, Jenny had some funny "fads".

Jenny's Bachelorette

Here she is! Single for 2 more weeks! Eeek!

How perfect that two soccer teams from Columbia University (in town to play UT) were eating at the restaurant with us. As the bus dropped them off, we watched as about 40 guys piled in to a table in the back of the restaurant and two of the girls with us (Kimberly & D'a) began hootin' & hollerin'. So that grabbed their attention & they whooped back at us. About 15 minutes later two of them approached the table and told Jenny that "as a gift" some of the team mates agreed to give her a lap dance once we all were done eating. (you didn't have to tell her twice)... all the girls shoved their salads down pretty quick.

The sisters

At Six Lounge next door, which is owned by Lance Armstrong. The manager brought us free champagne and a few of the soccer players followed us over there and continued to "entertain" Jenny (and a couple of the single-and-ready-to-mingle Cougars in our party! haha)

This was Spilly-Spillartons. He was a guy who sat behind us but continued on plenty of fun conversation but kept spilling his drink (#seetowelnexttoWendy). Turns out he is a gay dancer who was floating from party to party. He was fun.

One of the soccer players.... don't know him. He was a nice guy but kept asking questions like one after another and I thought, excuse me are you from the FBI-orrrrr??? What's your deal. I mainly drank water but just happy Jenny had fun!

Should I be doing something else?

This morning Sydney wanted to count all her money. She had $26 in quarters. Memaw asked where she got the shiny gold coin and Sydney said "oh thats probably from Mikey. He's a pirate"

Somehow a search for a lid to my caserole dish turned into an hour cleaning out every kitchen cupboard. But in the end, I felt so copasetic standing in my cooking quarters. The harmony that met my soul each time I opened a cabinet and could see EVERYTHING inside it. aaaaaaah. By the way, I think I put about 52 lids in the recycle bin that apparently went on top of nothing. We just like lids I guess.

We also like to collect cups with cracks in them, bottles without lids and a whole lotta STUFF.

My vitamins. I felt it was document-worthy. A morning dose and an evening dose. I won't lie, they are not 'cheap' vitamins, but they make a big difference in how I feel and have greatly improved my energy and fibromyalgia pain management. And they are such a better alternative to several combined prescription drugs with nasty side effects. So I choke them down.

Baking cookies in style!

Thank you Carey for our stylin' aprons! We rocked them like no other kitchen divas last night while making "veggie cookies".

Sydney & Julia had a lot of fun taking turns pouring and stirring the ingredients.

Once all the flour was sifted into the bowl, stirring got a little hard... these girls were ready for the hand mixer.

Handmade aprons are the best!!!

Oat flour, coconut flour, stevia cane, zucchini puree, carrot puree, applesauce, baking soda and dark chocolate morsels = a pretty good cookie! (it actually tastes like a miniature cake bite)

On the way to school Sydney & I stopped at Kerbey Lane (our usual spot for breakfast). As the hostess sat us at the booth Sydney quickly snapped "Wait! Um excuse me? Can you please bring me a highchair for my baby?"
The hostess looked at me and laughed, then said 'do you really want me to bring a highchair?" and I said "if it's not a big deal, it'd make this little mommy happy"... and so she did.

While she had her baby buckled up, Sydney proceeded to paint her nails. Unbeknownst to me, she had already done one hand in the car. So I had to help her fix that hand and do the other.

Then she dropped the bomb that her teacher took out her earings the day before. HUH?? Why didn't I hear about this? She said one side was hurting. So I took a look and sure enough it was RED and swollen. So we went into the bathroom and (luckily) Sydney had a pair of her cross earings in her purse, so I had some to clean with soap and water and put in before the holes closed. However that one side was nasty. When I pushed on it, a ton of green and yellow puss came out!!!! Lord, this poor kid! We got it all cleaned up and handled but she was hurting so she had to ice it for the remainder of her meal. (it was suddenly all better when her chocolate milk and breakfast taco arrived).

While Sydney was at dance practice little Kelli Belly & I went to Walmart (haven't been there in FOREVER! maybe a year? seriously!) to look at decorations for my sister's bridal shower. We went over to look at the fishies. I used to do this with Sydney around the same age all the time. :::siiiigh:::

She kept puckering and making kiss sounds for fish. She LOVES aquariums and fish, I can't imagine what this kid would do at an actual big aquarium like in Dallas or Baltimore! She'd go nuts.

Shortly after she crapped on me. Good times.