Tish's Shower

We had such a great time last weekend at Tish's shower! Great food, good friends, & time with family.

This little nugget spent so much time running around she couldn't stay awake.

Happy fathers day

This year I was blessed to spend time with my father, my grandfather, and the father of my baby on Father's Day. We had a great time at church and then went to help Rustin pick out his new boots.

Then we went to my parents for lunch.

My Dad loved his gift. Each year in his card we'll add 4 new pictures for him to put in his frame.

Date with Daddy

Summer time is especially busy for Rustin. Yesterday he actually got home about 3 which is a nice change from 10:30. So we after a quick bite to eat at Longhorn Saloon we took Molly for her first icecream cone.

This was followed by a quick trip to "the toy box", a cute little you shop near the icecream place. Molly got a few new things. Her favorite seem to be her new stacking cups.

Mother's Day Gifts

Here's a fun little peek at the gifts our Moms got this year for Mother's Day.


You can see the whole book here

Piggy Bank

I've had an opportunity come up that would allow me to stay home with Molly part time. *Insert happy dance here!

Along with part time work comes part time pay. *Insert financial stress face here

So I've made some efforts in the last couple of weeks to really look at where our money goes. I mean I know we make it, and Lord knows we spend it, but on what exactly? I started reading this blog. Where this family of 6 is living on $28K/year. She's got some great practical tips and is very inspiring. But sorting out a budget (I mean a real one where you don't just toss it out the window halfway through the month) is a little overwhelming. So I poked around on Pinterest and found a few different budgeting forms.

This is my favorite

These would work too but I wasn't up for spending any money

Then I came across something about the envelope cash system. Which I have sort of done in the past I just didn't know that's what it was called. All my fixed bills were paid first (rent, utilities, etc) then whatever amounts were budgeted for the other categories I put onto giftcards. Grocery budget went on an HEB gift card & gas budget on a gas station gift card. When it ran out it was out. I'd have to decide if I wanted to use "entertainment" for it or not. If there was anything leftover it ran over to the next month and I could put the difference into savings.

So I've decided for experiment's sake to give it a try again this month. I filled out our budget and I'm going to make envelopes for my store specific cards. (I know you're suppsed to use cash because it's harder to spend than "plastic" cards but I'm being realistic here) I'll need 5:

HEB (groceries)

Target (diapers)

Wal-Mart (gas)

Dining Out (cash)

Entertainment (cash)

We'll see how it goes this month. Maybe this budgeting thing won't be excruciating so hard after all. And if I get stressed I'm going to go to these for comfort

Because when it comes right down to it....

This is what's really important!

Mother's Day

This year I was blessed with an AWESOME "first" Mother's Day. I woke up to this sweet little one.

Yes my sweet girl and her daddy hit up Jared's for Mother's Day and gave me the most beautiful Ruby ring (Molly's birthstone)

After I opened my card & present we headed out to our favorite Sunday breakfast spot. Then we ran around getting the house ready for company. Today at church we were blessed to be able to join with our family (30+ of them) and our congregation as we dedicated Molly to the Lord.


Church Service



After service everyone came back to our house for BBQ.

Pre-Easter Festivities

This year Molly & I spent the Saturday before Easter with Tish's family out in Taylor. This is "Little Molly Foo-Foo" in her bunny ears before we left.


Snapped a few pics in her pretty new dress at Mimi and Papas house



We had a great time just hanging out and eating AWESOME food with family & family to be.





This was the sweet scene when we got home


I can't wait to see her open her basket on Easter Sunday!

BBQ, Bald Eagles & Birthday Cake

After church this week we jumped in the car and headed to Llano for some BBQ at Cooper's. It was A-MAZE-ING! If you havent been out there it's everything people say it is. Their slogan is "It's all about the meat y'all" and let me tell you as someone who's a fan of all the other stuff (beans, potatoes, bread, cobbler, etc.) it really was all about the meat.


After lunch we stopped by the roadside to see the bald eagle nests. It really is an awesome site to see, these eagles and their babies just hangin out in the nest along the side of the road.





Our last stop of the day was my parent's house to celebrate my little brother Joe's birthday. We had a nice time eating cake and opening cards.

Christmas Morning

This was our first Christmas as a family of 3 and we celebrated together on Christmas morning. Rustin made tamales and eggs for breakfast and we drank hot cocoa as we opened our stockings and perused through Molly's gifts from Santa. Then we took some time to play with our new toys. And if you still want more Christmas memories here's Molly opening her stocking & playing in the leftover wrapping paper.