Our wedding did indeed get a feature on Baylor Proud, which was so exciting! I just submitted the story/photos (finally) to try to get on their "Baylor Weddings" Pinterest board, but we got a lovely surprise! Subsequently it was fun to check out my "stats" here on blogger...the post got way more pageviews than all of the previous posts combined, and way more than I would ever hope to get again :) Just glad to share our Baylor fervor with some of the Baylor community ;)
Okay, so NYC Trip #1: a bus trip with my company, pay $90/person and you get the bus down there plus a ticket to the Radio City Rockettes Christmas Spectacular. Say no more, I'm there. The show was early in the day, so we got some breakfast, marveled at the giant tree in Rockefeller Plaza, and then headed over to Radio City Music Hall.
Some people didn't want to cooperate with my desire for a "30 Rock" picture.
LOVED the Rockettes. Great show. Brad tolerated it :) We had some authentic NY pizza, and spent most of the rest of the day just wandering around and taking it all in! It was definitely crowded for Christmastime.
We saw TWO apple stores during this trip. Whoa.
After my previous trip and the crazy-stressful rush back to the Megabus, I vowed that this time there would be no stresses for our trip home. But alas....we got back to the group's meeting spot by 6:15 (plenty early for 7:00 meeting time) and the block where the bus driver told us to go...was now blocked off so that the people were roaming freely in the street. Not exactly desirable for a charter bus to enter.
Our primary concern was that the bus driver, and the group leader from my company, hadn't given out their numbers -- and we hadn't provided our numbers going into the trip -- so we just had to wander around and hope to find our group (and I only vaguely remembered what they looked like since I don't work directly with any of them, whoops). Luckily we walked by a clump of people and a guy holding a checklist (our names), so we knew that we, at least, wouldn't be stranded in NYC. The group leader and bus driver at least had each other's numbers (would be terrible if that hadn't happened!) and the bus driver gave us a different block to head to. We got on the bus, and almost everyone had managed to find their way to the new spot - we were missing just TWO people. The group leader had their names but no one knew them. Turns out the guy worked at the company and the girl was his guest, so the group leader ended up calling our security department, they found his cell number on his "safe" at work, and we started trying to reach him. He didn't pick up at first (ack) but eventually did, then the bus driver told him to go to a new spot 7 blocks away. Traffic was insane, and it took the guy awhile to get to the new location, but at 8:30 (1.5 hours late) we finally had everyone and could head back to Albany. Crazy. So our most exciting part of the day was probably the getting-home part.
Then, just a couple weeks passed by...we were in the usual routine, Brad was finishing his undergrad classes and I was working...and it was getting colder, but not much snow at all. Then it was time to head to TEXAS for Christmas!
We were there for almost 2 weeks and had such a good time. Didn't quite get to see all of our family and friends, but otherwise it was perfect. First order of business when we landed in Austin - CHUY'S. We have our priorities, ya know?
My mom and I made cookie trays to share with family/neighbors...We really outdid ourselves this time, with 11 varieties of sweets. Here's just some of the amazingness:
Armed with trayloads of cookies and some presents, I made my way to Tyler for our first Christmas celebration. (Brad was with Teri and Jared in Mesquite, and we met up there.) Tammy outdid herself, again, with the Christmas feast! It was a Mexican feast, which we appreciated, of course.
I did the ten-second timer on this pic (while balancing the camera on a couch cushion) and I got cut out of the shot, but that's alright...it's a lovely family :)
After Tyler we made our way to Hearne...and shortly after we left Tyler, it started snowing there! It also snowed around Christmas here in the Albany area...a lot (well, by my standards anyway) so I like to think that we're just dodging the snow everywhere we go!
Sadly no pictures from Hearne...it was low-key since Mimi was feeling really sick, but it was great to see Mimi, the Harrises and the Crouches. And Mimi's feeling much better now, woohoo!
Christmas #3: we met up at my dad's house with my grandparents. Another Mexican feast: fajitas! Our families must have known how hard it is for us to find good Mexican food up here :)
Christmas popper crowns. Love this!
Annnd then one more Christmas, at Mom & Sean's house. We had breakfast, stockings, and Christmas dinner! (with tenderloin and moutard sauce, of course).
Got "Nerd Glasses" in my stocking. What are you trying to say, Santa?
No luck on the scratch-off.
Grandma gave us "money mazes", which is a cube containing a maze with a little metal ball...you have to solve the maze in order to open it up and take out the $50 inside! This kept us entertained (and frustrated) for awhile...
Stadium models!
Christmas aftermath
Still working on that money maze
Mum is moving to Montana this weekend! Craziness. But I know she'll be happy there!
After all the Christmas celebrations, it was time for New Year's. We headed over to Cait and Matt's house and rang in the new year with Cait, Cait and Matt! Plus their neighbors :) It was an excellent evening, with steak and potato latkes and Butterfinger blondies, then champagne and an entertaining game of Loaded Questions. Perfect way to ring in 2013. Again, I was lax on my picture-taking duties, but trust me, it was good times.
On 1/2 it was finally time to fly home...the landscape from above looked a little different from when we left it:
We got home and found piles of snow on our cars! We also only had a wimpy ice scraper and a small hand broom. These pics are AFTER we had cleaned much of the snow off LuLu:
Much of that snow has since melted away, although we got some more this week (so, finally, I had to deal with driving in the snow to get to work!)
This has been a massive blog entry (mostly thanks to all the pics) so I'll do a new one for NYC Trip #2!
