Happy Birthday Danno!

On Sunday the 16th Dan celebrated his (drum roll please...) 38th Birthday! It was an unusual birthday celebration that started the night before at Sherlock's for fish & chips. Then the party continued over at Alamo Draft House to see Pulp Fiction on the big screen. The movie started at midnight (happy birthday!!!) and we didn't get home till after 3am! Talk about tired!
The next morning, after much sleeping in, I made brunch and Dan opened his basket-o-bike-gear and as you can see from the photo he got a new jersey and some new socks. The socks have a little tricycle like a hot wheel on them.

After brunch we moved outside so Dan could detail his bikes and I sanded the coffee table. I only got about 60% finished but I'm well on my way to having a coffee table that matches the end tables.

My sister Wendy celebrated her birthday on St. Paddy's. Oh, and Dan's twin Steve had his birthday on Sunday as well!

A Visit to Nana Perkins'

On Saturday the 29th Dan and I traveled to Decatur with his parents (Max & Caroline) to see Nana (Dan's Grandmother - Max's Mom). What a pretty day! Not only did I get to meet Dan's Nana but I also got to meet his cousins and their families. Everyone was so nice :)















On top of having a nice day with family we also got to play with the dogs.











Reese and AJ LOVED playing with "Uncle" Orvis in the fields, between the hay bales, and just about anywhere else there little legs would carry them.






You can tell from all of the lolling tongues that all three boys were having a blast!

Update on school

I completed my finals last Friday and grades will be posted by the 17th of December. Dr. Kinard let me know via email that I got an A for the semester in ECE 5318 Advanced Early Childhood Development! Woo-Hoo! I'm just waiting to see if I maintained my A in CI 5330 Multicultural Teaching & Learning. When I turned in my last two assignments I already had a strong A going in the class so I'm pretty sure that I'll have a 4.0 for this semester.


I've registered for my final semester of coursework for Spring 2008. I have one class to take and then I'll be student teaching in the Fall of 2008. Technically speaking I will have completed the graduate program in May but I won't actually complete my Certification until after my semester of student teaching.


It has been such a long journey and I am so grateful to have such supportative family and friends. Thanks you guys.

Christmas is Upon Us!

Dan and I attended a retirement party for a co-worker of his last week. We were having such a good time that we didn't make it back up to Round Rock in time for my school holiday party.

In the photo above we have the 'flash ON' photo - harsh lighting to say the least and next we have the 'flash OFF' photo - nice and fuzzy.

The photos have that fun Christmas light haze. This morning on 'Good Morning America' I learned that changing the ISO setting on my digital camera will help crisp up the photos without losing the soft light from the Christmas lights. I haven't had a chance to try this new technique out yet but I'm going to see if it really works.

Note to self...

Okay, today when I got home I made a discovery... It is not a good idea to leave bags of flour and sugar on the counter...as you can see it looked like our boys had a good time while we were at work today!

I'm sure it looked like a bad episode of "I Love Lucy"... There I was vacuuming my little heart out, not realizing that the bag was full and that I was effectively spraying a fine powdery mess out of the back of the machine. Yikes! I hope I didn't ruin my vacuum.

I think the cats must have hid in the bedroom all day not wanting to get mixed up with the crime scene because there were no little feline paw prints among the mess...all canine...I could totally be on CSI! Ha Ha.

The Great Pumpkin

Today Dan and I took Reese and AJ with us for a visit to Red Barn's Pumpkin Festival. We met John, Darby and Eli there mid-morning and then traveled to South Austin for lunch after we had visited all that there was to see at the pumpkin festival. I think Eli really enjoyed all of the people watching, game playing and animal petting that he got to do. I know I enjoyed watching him. Reese and AJ just enjoyed getting out of the house for the weekend :)

Isn't Eli just beautiful perched atop the pile of pumpkins!

Ah, there was a bit of a delay in getting this page posted. Our laptop has been on the fritz and I haven't been able to upload photos from it. I finally have broken down and I'm using the desktop in the guestroom.

Belated Ironman Wisconson Post

Good Morning swimmers! This photo is my favorite shot of the morning. Dan and Steve had just gotten to the edge of the water.

Unfortunately I didn't capture any great bike shots so you'll have to visit Dan's blog to see the professional photos for those photos. I did, however, get some shots of the Perkins Twins while they ran on State Street.

Iron babies hanging out! Alex and Will were such little troopers :) Here we are taking a lunch break while Dan and Steve continued to run, and run, and run.

Mr. Steve Perkins (second place...again? What, was it 6 minutes out of the chute? Well, at least you're bridging the gap.)

Iron Babies at the end of a long day! I'm not sure how they were asleep at this point with how loud everything was at the finish line!

Ah, I finally got my Danno back at the end of a very long day.

I had a fun day running all over Madison, Wisconsin and I was glad to call it a night.