Art Goggle and Joe's Run

We have a busy weekend head of us and we want to invite everyone along. First we have Art Goggle. Its a fun Open House type event for the Near Southside, that's our barrio. Restaurants and businesses all along Magnolia along with others will host artists and have music, drinks and appetizers. Its like a house party, a big fun house party. Look at Mat below, that is how much fun you are going to have.


Check out here for all the details. We'll be marshaling the troops at our place around 6:30 pm and heading out soon after. It does kick off at 5, but you don't want to be the first one to the party!

We are also running Joe's run on Saturday. So come and cheer us on or come pick me up from wherever I drop. Check out the details for Joe's Run and the Samaritan House right about here

Two posts in one day!?!?!

I can't remember if Sean and I posted about our "road trip" to Austin after Christmas. Yes, I realize that was already 3 months ago, but time flies!

We took a weekend trip to Austin, thanks to Megan and Kevin. They won the trip on a Austin Tourism website, and we had so much fun! Thank you Meg and Kev (and Dami)!!!!

More recently, Atticus has started "Good Citizen Training." He has his 3rd of 8 classes tomorrow night. It is going really well and he is just so smart. He did sneak out of his collar last week to try to get the trainer's attention, but I think it's because he's used to being an only dog - he sure does love his grand-dog Nutmeg though. A couple of weeks ago Atticus had his first sleepover at our house. My friend and co-worker, Sarah went out of town and we watched her chocolate Cocker Spaniel, Duke.
Here we are relaxing on the couch.

And now - our home projects! We have been pretty busy....painting the bathroom, the office, killing weeds in the backyard and recycling brick to prepare to build our driveway. Look at this cute painter - Sean was working hard - and it looks great! We did an accent wall in red and the other three walls are chocolate brown.



Last week, Kristen came into town, so we had a fun night to catch up at one of Sean and my fave restaurant's, Nonna Tata's!


We also got to see Anna and Michael and their dog Aubrey on Saturday. We enjoyed getting to catch up with them! We hadn't seen each other since Laura's wedding this past June! We got to show them our progress on our house and then went to a local restaurant.


We finished off the weekend with a fabulous dinner at my parents' house with Mom, Dad, Grandma Pauline, Grandpa Ramon, Anna, Megan, Kevin, Damian and Sean! What a fun Sunday night. I guess we haven't uploaded the pics yet - we'll add them soon. :)

Well, I think I'm off to bed - I need to get better!

Guess who?

Wow - I guess it takes me being sick for us to catch up on our blog posting. I had to go home from work after lunch today sick and I've been sleeping/resting ever since. So - everyone....take a guess what famous singer my Mom and I took our picture with on Valentine's Day! It's blurry, but I guess that makes the guessing more interesting. A couple of clues are that he played at the Democratic National Convention, he lives in Austin and he played in Fort Worth, TX on Valentine's Day! Dad, Mom, Sean and I got to enjoy the awesome concert and had a great time!!!

WOW!!! Look at "Our Old House"

So, our neighborhood website has this cool feature that Sue McLean put together....it shows pics of every house in the neighborhood sometime in the late 90's, 2005 and 2008. Here's a link to ours:
http://historicfairmount.com/gallery/College_Avenue_Fifteen_and_Sixteen_Hundred_Blocks/1601_College_2003.aspx
If you click to the next two photos, you will see our house as well!

I'm going to post some more pictures of our house soon - I've been really busy painting (the office is next)! Also, once we have the last freeze, we're going to plant turfallo grass in the backyard!

We had a wonderful weekend too....Friday was relaxing, Saturday night we went to a wonderful Latin fusion restaurant with my parents, Philip and Tim, the McD's, the Moaks and Jeff. It was a lot of fun. :)
On Sunday, we went to church and celebrated Grandma Pauline's birthday with a wonderful afternoon party! It's always so great to get together with everyone.

Well, I better get to bed - morning workouts come earlier than I would like! I'll post pics soon!!!

Hey, How you doing?

Hey, how's it going? Is the new year as you expected? While there are no flying cars and I haven't actually met Springsteen yet, its going pretty good over here. Above are some more pics from New Year's Day and the the tree planting event. Look at the second picture and you can actually see Kevin and I decide not to bury John in the hole with the new tree. The tree looks tremendous in our backyard and is one of the best gifts we've ever received. Thanks to John and Kevin for getting that thing into the ground. I hope everyone is well and we'll talk soon.

Delicious Restaurant!!!

We went to a delicious restaurant with Mom, Dad, Mat, Anna, Meg, Kevin, Dami and Joseph tonight...it's called Celaborelle's. http://www.celaborelle.com/
This is a place my Mom has wanted to try for years, and we finally did. Thank goodness, because it was great - we will definitely go back soon!

It's a buffet, and although I am normally very anti-buffet, this was delicious. For starters, we had a big group so when we arrived they told us that we could order any of the items off of the menu that we would like and it would be included in the buffet price. Some of the favorites at our table where the homemade falafel, the spinach pizza, the beef kebabs and the chicken kebabs. The tabouli was also fantastic. All in all, everyone loved the place. It is located in an old house and the people who work there are so hospitable. I really loved it, can you tell? I can't believe that I haven't mentioned the baklava - "This is the best baklava I've ever tried," is a quote from my Mom.

Meg and Kev have pics from the restaurant, so we'll have to add some soon :)

I worked on our yard all day long, so at least I got a good workout in before such a yummy dinner. My goal for our yard is to be the "Yard of the Month" in our neighborhood newsletter before July/August timeframe....I'll keep you posted on that.

Happy NEW YEAR!!!

Wow - it's already 2009! I know, I know - it's been 2009 for 5 days already, but I guess I am a little slow! Anyways, things have been busy at our house. We have two new trees - Sean, Dad, Mat and Kevin planted trees - one on Christmas Day and one on New Years Day.

In the background you can even see our new retaining wall (isn't it awesome?) and my herb garden and new plants! I am just getting so excited!!!!

During the whole tree planting process, Mom, Meg, Dami and I stayed busy straightening up other areas outside - we even introduce Dami to his first shovel!




On the weekend after Christmas, Sean and I took a fabulous trip down to Austin (thanks to Megan and Kevin!) We had a wonderful time - we stayed on Lake Travis, went to shop on South Congress, ate at Ranch 616 and relaxed. I'll post pics of that soon too.

We wish everyone a wonderful, happy, healthy, blessed 2009!