Dallas Roadtrip

Last weekend, we took a little road trip down to Dallas. I was wanting a change of scenery, and we were looking for somewhere within reasonable driving distance, but still feeling like we were "getting away". Dallas fit the bill, and we put together the trip that week.

Are you familiar with urbanspoon? It's a website that features places to eat in your local city. I use the app on my phone. What I like about it is that you can search restaurants by user ratings. People give it a "thumbs up" or "thumbs down", leave reviews, leave recommendations, etc. It also tells you what the average price per plate is, and a lot of times lets you view a menu.

So we got on urbanspoon and looked to see what was good. It brought up a restaurant called "Mesa". 100% of the people "liked it". It said the average was $10 bucks a plate. Reasonable.

Matt loves mexican, so of course he didn't turn down my offer of trying there.

We put the address in our GPS and it took us there. The final turn led us to a street that was definitely Hispanic. All the signs were in Spanish, they had the "quincinera" shop right there...I was like "YES!" this is going to be authentic.

Matt pulled right up in front of the place, and a kid came out and took our keys from us. Valet? we were thinking... Valet was very out of the ordinary for the street we were on. But, what the hey. We were there, and we were hungry. Matt passed off the keys to the dude, and we went inside. We ordered the food and it was fantastic. It wasn't $10 a plate like urbanspoon advertised- oh well. Matt's humble reply always is, "it's okay, we're on vacation."

 So we paid for our food and went back out of the restaurant. Matt handed the kid our ticket to get our car, and the guy grabs our keys and goes to "pull up our car". The DUMB thing was is that it was literally two parking spaces down. The guy backed our car out, passed one parking spot, and then pulled the car into the empty slot. He definitely made an easy few bucks.

Across the street from our hotel was a place called Pioneer Plaza. A lot of sculptures like the one below of cowboys on horses, and TONS of sculptures of longhorns. Pretty cool.

Continuing the theme of "good eats" we ate at a place called Twisted Root Burger. Good Burger, but probably not in my top burgers I have had. Still enjoyable, nonetheless. I loved the atmosphere of the restaurant...the signs, the toilet planters...

After lunch we went to Dallas World Aquarium. Cool place.

 Rolling our stroller up to the entrance, a guy was playing a saxophone. Very Beautifully, I might add. He looked at Selah, and then pointed at her, and said, "this one is for her." And started playing "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star." How precious. He played it very jazzy like. Selah liked it.

A place recommended by Guy Fieri, was Pepe and Mito's. All I have to say is, "THANKS GUY! We owe ya one, buddy."  this was awesome food. Can't say enough about it. Matt ordered nachos and said, "these nachos are great." If you can please the nacho man, you know you've done good.

 photography by Corinne.

And another stop from Guy Fieri's Diners, Drive ins, and Dives was called Cane Rosso. A pizza place.
Again, great food. This was my favorite meal of the trip.
Guys head and signature was above the door on the wall. 

 This dessert pizza was amazing. Crust, with mascarpone cheese spread, apples, carmel, and cinnamon. Fantastic. I WILL be repeating this at home.

 check out that red oven behind me. Their claim is that it gets so hot the pizza can cook in just a few minutes.
Wouldn't mind having one of those.

And a stop on the way home at Corinne's Catfish. We didn't eat here, but it was a good picture location, i think. Especially when the Corinne in the picture is just so dad gum pretty.

We had a really good time. Not pictured is jumping on the bed in the hotel, swimming in the hotel pool, and a few other fun activities including going to the Dallas Farmers Market. The girls were very well behaved, besides the common complaint of "I'm tired of walking." I told Matt we weren't ready for Disney World yet. He agreed. ;)

All in all, good trip.

Creepy drawings

The girls go through paper as fast as the folks at Ryan's Steakhouse make it to the dessert bar after dinner.
They draw and draw and draw.
Then write letters and make me cards.
And then they draw some more.

Audie has developed an interesting way to draw people...

Personally, I think that these figures look like they will come off the page and come to life, running after you to take yours. They are though, very cute in their own sort of way. I also like how she distinctly draws straight hair and curly hair.

I love my life. Currently, I am listening to Matt play school with the girls. Audie is playing the teacher, "Miss Spankbottoms", Corinne is the student, "Charlotte", and they are seeing how loud they can yell the alphabet.
I sit back and smile when I see (and hear) life take place like this. I am one blessed mommy.

Family Pics

We have been long overdue for some family pics. The last picture we took of all 5 of us was when I was in a hospital bed hours after delivering Selah. It's crazy how the kids change so much, and it seems like even after a few months the picture is "outdated" due to changes in the kids appearances.

I think this was the fastest photo shoot I have ever been a part of. It was really like 5 minutes, max. It does drive me bonkers that I can't be the photographer of my own pictures, but what can ya do?
The photo below fits the bill of what we set out to do.

 Sometimes I feel like I will look back and not be in any pics with my kids, since I am usually the one taking all of the pictures. So handing the camera off to a friend is nice.
Especially to be included in some of the candid photos below.

Christmas Card Outtakes

Here are a few pictures that didn't make the cut for this years Christmas card.

Over the weekend

Phew! What a weekend. Friday night was my sisters baby shower, Saturday was family pictures for the Christmas card, and a carnival at Matt's work, and Sunday was church and my nephews 2nd birthday party!! Hardly any room to relax, but everything we did was a lot of fun and the girls got their fill of junk food. Here are a few pictures of the carnival we went to.

The girls got to be put inside a bubble! This guy has been around awhile. I remember being put inside a bubble by him when I was in elementary school.

The carnival was perfect! There were many rides for the girls to go on, and all the rides let the girls "slip" past the 36" rule. (you had to be at least 36" to ride). So little Audie got to go on them too, she had a blast.

A clown named "Troubles" was there to make balloon animals. After nearly a 30 minute wait in line, we came out with a reindeer and a killer hat.

Free Hotdogs, chips, cookies and pop for dinner, a bag of popcorn for a snack, and it made this evening wonderful! I think it is awesome that we have events like this to go to for free instead of dropping a hundred bucks at a theme park.

Over the weekend

We took a quick trip to Nebraska over the weekend. The 4 (well, technically 5) of us went with my Mom, sister Leslie and Jon and Cameron to see my Aunt and Uncle, cousins and Grandpa. I always like travelling up there, we have a good time laughing and being sarcastic. Matt talks politics with my Uncle John and Leslie and I go back to our childhood and fight with each other.

Friday we went to Omaha's zoo. The weather couldn't have been better, and since we went on a weekday, it wasn't crowded at all. Besides Corinne gagging herself and spitting up due to the smell of poo, the day was a success.

Jon brought his 4 wheeler along...and we all took turns riding it around.
a shout out to my Aunt Suz and Mom who took a turn too!

My aunt and uncle live across the street from an apple orchard. Leslie took these pictures of the kids out front while Matt and I rode the 4 wheeler

This is a picture of the apple orchard. it is so pretty!!

and little Audie who is not afraid of anything, petting a grasshopper.