OK, so for those of you who are confused....Larry & Sandra have been legally married for well over a year. The plan was always to have the reception/church celebrations later that year (2013) when we could all join them. Then Zoey came, and Dad got sick, and it just got pushed back.
Basically, Life happened.
So they finally picked a date and we got to celebrate!!
June 13, 2015!
It was an outstanding party and celebration. Our families and cultures blended and there was lots of self-proclaimed "spanglish" going on. And let's be real, I was the token "white girl" in the bridal party. I totally had to ask for translations so I knew what was going on! I learned a few new things, too ;)
Daughter, Sister-in law, Bride, Maid of Honor.
I loved every damn minute of it.
Sandra recited her vows in Spanish while Larry recited his in English. It was just so meaningful and beautiful to see both cultures represented in their blending of families.
And I cried like a baby when she walked down the aisle, because for real, I love my sister in law. I bet not every woman can say that!
And then I cried when she did her first dance with the important men in her life instead of the traditional Father Daughter dance.
And then I cried while giving my speech, telling her that if I had to choose someone for my brother, it would be her.
OK, I cried a lot.
It meant so much to me to be invited to be one of her "girls" and to be able to stand up alongside her as she joined my brother in marriage in the eyes of the church, and in the eyes of the party-goers afterward.
Brothers, Sister, New bride, and Dad's twin Sister, our Auntie Linda
The boys got to be Ring Bearers, which Uncle Larry explained was a super important job when Aidan was really nervous about it. But he did well, he walked down the aisle all on his own, While Mason walked with me and Chris (which was not the actual plan).
"Eeeeeeeeeewwwww!!!"
My 2 older brothers were also in the wedding party, and it was simply amazing to spend time with all 3 of my brothers at the same time!
I got to walk down the aisle with my brother Chris, and when we were announced at the reception I was supposed to walk with both Chris and Jim, but my boys were tired and refused to walk on their own when they were announced and tagged along with us, instead.
(if you look closely between me and Jim you can see Aidan crying, poor tired buddy.)
It was a long day for those 2 little studs.
We partied to English and in Spanish music, drank delicious specialty drinks created by the bride and groom, played corn hole on their custom detailed boards, took silly photo booth photos, and at the end of the night, Uncle Jimbo even let Aidan hold a sparkler as Uncle Larry and Tia Sandra left the reception! (even though Mommy said no, ahem Uncle Jumbo.)
I am also extremely grateful for how amazing Ryan was throughout the whole process, keeping the boys in line while I did bridesmaid duties all weekend!!!
I'm thankful Aidan loved school and his teacher, and that he learned a ton!
I particularly like that he can read on his own now, and he loves to bring books for car rides and keep himself entertained. He is constantly reading everything he sees: signs, papers, things on TV, writings on the wall at the grocery store.....
His love of knowledge is adorable. Always asking math and spelling questions and teaching his brother what he knows.
Math, Reading, and Spelling, Oh my!
So many adventures!!
Friday during the school year is "future friday" where the kids are encouraged to wear t-shirts from colleges and universities! We started out with 2 shirts from SLU, but in the end we acquired lots from family:
Syracuse
Utica College
HCCC
and Arkansas.
I also got the chance to attend all of Aidan's class Holiday parties and other fun events.
The year was coming to a close when Aidan's teacher announced she would be moving to first grade, and that all her students would be allowed to be in her class again, provided their parents signed off on it.
Aidan came home absolutely begging to be in Ms Holcombe's class again next year, and I certainly have no problem with it!
When the last day rolled around, Aidan started to get teary-eyed when I woke him up to get ready, and he said he wanted "just 10 more days" of Kindergarten, and then he said he wanted First Grade to start right away. He said he didn't want a summer vacation.
If only he realized that viewpoint will change in a few years......
Who knew when we bought this house last April that it would be one of the best things we've ever done?
The friendships that Ryan and I have made have been wonderful. The boys have bonded with kids in the neighborhood as well, and they all play nice (usually ....lol). It's amazing to live in such a close-knit neighborhood, where the neighbors not only like each other, but are willing to spend every single weekend possible together. We're also grateful to have met friends of friends, who though they may not live immediately in this neighborhood, we consider honorary members.
Who knew that a tradition we lovingly named "Neighbor Saturday Fun Day" would be started, where we rotate hosting the neighborhood every Saturday night for pizza and beer?
I am blessed to have had friends from PA come visit in the new house, and to have had family visit from NY as well. I love that it's big enough that we can invite everyone we want, and we'll all fit!
I love that we have already had so many great memories here, not only just as our little family of four, but with our friends who have become our TX family.
Here's just a small sampling of the great fun we've had since moving into this neighborhood last June:
Backyard Birthday Parties
Our first Crawfish Boil (the weekend after we moved in)
The Easler's came for a visit from PA!
The last day of Summer Vacation 2014!
Halloween @ the Teague's
Thanksgiving (Friendsgiving)
Ugly Sweater Party @ The Barrett's
All lit up for Christmas
First Christmas in the new house!
NYE
Crawfish @ The Teague's
St Patty's day with Krysta (visiting from PA)
Houston Rodeo with the girls
Houston Rodeo x 2
Easter @ The Hines'
Visit from some of the NY Lawless boys
I look back and realize how truly lucky we are to have landed in this neighborhood with these wonderful friends and neighbors. It must have been fate that made Ryan decide to turn into this neighborhood last Spring when we were looking for houses up in this area.......
Thanks for the best "first year" ever to the Teagues, Hines', Barretts, Davis', Markerts!
PS- Ackermans you are honorary Summer Lake Ranchers too, and we love you as well!!!!
This time we got to travel to Anaheim and visit Disneyland! And we brought along Ryan's mom, Char, to hang with the boys in the hotel while we ran the race, which was an added bit of fun!
Ryan and I ran the Tinkerbell Half, and it completed our "Coast to Coast" RunDisney challenge, so we got an extra medal! Too bad for Ry that it's pink. Sorry dude.
A RunDisney Coast to Coast Challenge is when you run a half marathon at Disney World and a Half Marathon at Disneyland in the same year. Since our two races were the Princess half and Tinkerbell half (both "girlie" races), the Coast to Coast medal we were given was pink, not the usual blue.
Ready to start!!
We'll also be doing the Wine & Dine half again this November, which we could have used as our second race for our coast to coast (to avoid Ry getting a pink medal), but when we signed up for Tinkerbell Half, we had no idea we would be doing the Wine & Dine again this year.
Neither one of us thought we would actually be running this race...... We thought we would be walking.
2 weeks before the race I threw out my back, and it appeared to be a slipped disc. 2 nights before the race Ryan was playing softball and tore a quad muscle (the massive hematoma that appeared on his leg 2 days later definitely solidified that diagnosis for him). We were both super disappointed and bummed. And hell, I was in corral B alongside Ry for the first time ever, so I was super bummed!!
We decided to try to start out running and see how it went. To our surprise we actually ran most of it. I had to stop a few times because since I hadn't gone for a run in over 2 weeks, my legs were tired. Oh so tired. I had to fight very hard to finish that race, and Ryan was motivating me the whole way; each and every time I wanted to quit. It was actually funny, because he thought that he was going to hold me up, but it was the opposite, lol.
We both decided that we loved the race course. We went through California Adventure, then right into Disneyland, ran through downtown Anaheim, then back around California Adventure and to the finish line right outside Paradise Pier.
The corrals were literally outside our hotel, and we finished in the parking lot behind our hotel.
There were no buses that you had to catch 3 hours before race start, which was nice. We walked to our corral with about 15 minutes to go before race start, and it was plenty of time! It allowed us to sleep in way more for this 5:30 am race than we did for Princess Half, where we had to catch a bus by 3:30.
(Being on Central time didn't hurt either, hee hee)
We made it back to the hotel after we finished and had some Mother's day drinks with Char, then headed out to our first choice of the 2 parks: California Adventure.
First ride we did was Mater's Junkyard Jamboree, which was super cute, and the queue was themed like the adventures from Mater's Tall Tales....an absolute favorite of my boys'.
We were fascinated by this water fountain over at the Cozy Cone (Which has awesome snacks, y'all. Mini churro bites with chocolate dipping sauce and flavored popcorn, oh my!)
Mother's Day themed props over in Cars Land
It was fun to see so many different things to do compared to all the stuff we're used to at WDW. The Bugs Life-themed area was perfect for their age group!
The next day we headed to Disneyland, and had an absolute blast. It's definitely smaller than Magic kingdom at WDW, but we barely waited in line for anything! We got in all the rides we wanted to do before lunch!!!
First up....Star Tours for Daddy, Char, & Aidan, while Mason and I rode the Astro Orbiter for the first time (he's not tall enough for Star Tours yet).
Ryan even went on the teacups with us (which he never does...he's not a fan of all the spinning).
We were also super stoked to be able to visit Toon Town again, since WDW got rid of theirs when Aidan was a baby to replace it with the new Fantasyland.
We rode a few more things after lunch, then called it quits and headed back to the hotel to swim before heading to our dinner reservation.
ps- Steakhouse 55 was really yummy, but the service was terrible slow, considering the place was practically empty.
Since we only had one more day in the parks, it was a tough call to decide which of the 2 parks we wanted to go to the next day. In the end, we decided on California Adventure, which all 5 of us loved. My favorite part was most definitely Cars Land. I've loved that movie since before Aidan was old enough to even sit through it. Being in Radiator Springs, and seeing how perfectly Disney themed it was a blast!!
Radiator Springs Racers was my absolute favorite!!!!!
I took this video on my 4th ride so Mason could see what it was like, since he wasn't tall enough. He watched it a dozen times.
We even ate at Flo's V8 Cafe!
At night, they play "Life could be a dream", and turn on all the neon lights, just like in the Movie. It's pretty amazing!
That day also happened to be Char's birthday! Since mine is 2 days after hers, we wore Happy Birthday buttons during our trip and got free dessert each night at dinner!! woot woot!
Birthday Girls & their Birthday buttons!
The boys got to meet Buzz and Woody, which was actually pretty neat because we were in line to meet Woody only (because we never wait in line for him at WDW), and when it was their turn, Buzz came out to switch places with Woody, and we were the only family able to snag a pic with both of them!
From there we walked the rest of the way through Paradise Pier, and since the area was totally empty, we stopped and got the photos in front of Mickey's Fun Wheel that I was dying to take!
While I'm not usually one for fireworks shows and such, I really wanted to see World of Color in front of Mickey's Fun Wheel. It was amazing. We even got to get into a special seating area because of our birthday buttons!!
So to sum it up, I am a Disneyland convert. I loved it. Every frigging minute of it, and I can't wait to get back there!!!
Not only was the race course better than most at WDW (Wine & Dine is my favorite so far, Princess was the worst), but the parks were less crowded, lines were shorter, and weather was much nicer. Our hotel (Paradise Pier), as well as Disney's other two on-site hotels are walking distance to the parks; we didn't have to spend time waiting for/and riding buses.
Disneyland gets two thumbs up from this Disney Diva!
