Fun Times With Family!!

(THANKS TO LAURA I HAVE PICS TO SHOW YOU OF THE PAST FEW DAYS! MY CAMERA IS A LOST CAUSE........I WILL BE GETTING A NEW ONE. THANKS AGAIN LAURA, FOR SHARING YOUR PICS WITH ME!!!!)

Uncle Sam and Aunt Laura came out from Utah for a visit this past weekend. It was really fun to have them here. We were able to celebrate Laura's birthday with her. Brady and Laura have birthdays on the same day. The kids and our friend Rebecca and her daughter, Stacey, helped us make birthday signs and blow up balloons. (THANKS!!) So, when Brady got home from picking Sam and Laura up from the airport, we had the house somewhat decorated and big banners up.

Wes and Sam being silly as usual....

We went to Rudy's for dinner that night for Brady and Laura's birthday dinner. It is a great place to go for a good Texas experience. We had brisket, turkey, sausage, creamed corn, peppers..........it was all yummy. I think Sam and Laura especially liked the fact that you don't get plates to eat off; you get a place mat size of some sort of heavy duty paper.


Brady opening his birthday gifts. SOCKS!! And he got a new 5 gal. cooler (finally) and Croquet.


Wesley was being a shy guy to Uncle Sam and Aunt Laura. He put that bag on his head and kept hiding from them. That didn't last long though.........He had a blast playing with Uncle Sam.

Playing with Uncle Sam.


The next day we went to the Blue Bell Creamery in Brenham for a tour and had ice cream. That was fun. It was my third trip with the kids, but Brady and Sam and Laura had never been. Later that night, Laura and I met up with some of my friends here for a little treat at the Cheesecake Factory. Laura had never been there. The waiters sang happy birthday to her and brought her a little bowl of ice cream with a candle. It was fun.

Laura is so happy......she just had yummy cheesecake and then they brought her ice cream too!!


Nice hats, hu? When we were on the tour, Wesley asked me why none of the adults were wearing hats, only kids. I had to point out to him that Uncle Sam and daddy had hats on. He didn't say anything after that and he didn't wear his hat either.

Aubrey kept hugging the Blue Bell Girl statue. She kept looking in the bucket to see if something, anything, would appear. But it remained empty.

The next day we celebrated Aubrey's birthday. SHE IS TWO!!!!! We had pumpkin pancakes for breakfast, and since she isn't a big cake eater, we put candles in her pancakes and sang happy birthday to her. I don't know what she thought about that. After breakfast, she got to open her girlie gifts that Aunt Laura and I found for her.

She got some dress ups, and a pretty new dress for church that came with a matching dress for her baby doll. She was in heaven.

Wesley had fun helping her. Daddy brought home a big mylar balloon that said Happy Birthday Princess on it. It was in Aubrey's possession for 10 minutes before it was let go and popped on the fan!

Later that day, we hit the road and went to tour the Battleship Texas. It was really awesome. It was A LOT of walking. It is a huge ship. We were lucky enough to be there right after they had done a reunion for the men who had served during WW2 on the ship. So, we were honored to shake hands and say thank you to a few of those men. It was really neat. We read on one of the plaques that there were 1600 men on that ship at one point!!!

For those who have visited and not gone down there, next time you come we will go. It is really cool.

Before we went down to Pasadena to visit the battleship, we stopped by the Houston temple.

It is always so beautiful and peaceful. It really is a neat temple.