Part 3- Recap of the trip

Travis and I returned from our ski trip to Winter Park, Colorado today. We had a wonderful time with Alli and a great time skiing.

We were fortunate enough to stay at Alli's family home in Winter Park. This beautiful cabin was built just a few years ago and is only minutes away from the slopes! It is a 3 story, 3 bedroom, 2.5 bath house. Below you will see some pics of the cabin:

Front of Cabin

Living Room

Kitchen

Alli brought her sweet puppy, Zoey, to the cabin with us. Zoey was adopted from the Boulder humane society in December of 2007 and she is just as precious as can be. She is a basset hound mix, so she reminded me a lot of our Redbones(Coon and Parker).

This is a picture of the 3 of us on our first day of skiing at Winter Park. We skiied Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. The weekend crowds were heavy, but we started skiing around 9 each morning and stayed out until 2 each day. Travis and I are both very sore from skiing so much, but it was worth it!

Alli is a GREAT skier. That girl just flies down the mountain and Travis even had a hard time keeping up with her. I didn't even try. You would think I'd be a better skiing since I started at the age of 5, but unfortunately all I really can do is the dredded pizza wedge. I hoped the class I took would be a good refresher for me and provide me with the confidence I need to ski decently, but no such luck for me. I am still HORRIBLE. We plan to return to Winter Park next year and I will be taking a private lesson.

Alli Skiing

Sunday night we went to the Fraser Tubing Hill which is just outside of Winter Park. They have 2 tubing hills that sent us flying down the hill going at least 25mph. When you reach the bottom of the hill you walk over to a lift and they attach your tube to the lift, you sit in the tube and it takes you back to the top. You get to tube for an hour and we had a blast. We decided to take pictures while going down, so you can see the excitement on our faces:

Travis

Alli

Nat

We had a wonderful trip and we cannot wait to do it again! Alli, thank you for being such a great friend to both of us! You were a wonderful host and a fantastic chef!

Part Two- on the mountain

This is a picture of Alli and Travis at the rope of the mountain. We started skiing this morning and I only fell once! Granted I had my pizza wedge going pretty good today. I'm improving slightly with my parallel moves, not much though.
I'm hanging out at the base of the mountain watching people compete in a slalom race while Alli and Travis ski some harder runs.
Tomorrow morning I will be taking a class to improve my skiing skills :)

The weather has been wonderful. It snowed about 2 inches Saturday night which made for perfect skiing on Sunday.

Colorado, part one

Yesterday afternoon travis and I left for our trip to Colorado. We had
a pit stop in Amarillo last night at the home of Jon and Meg Curth.
They were wonderful hosts and have a gorgeous
New home.

A beautiful weekend

A beautiful weekend calls for a lot of time outdoors with our animals!

 

Sunday after church Travis and I took off to the equestrian trails at the 428 Greenbelt in Aubrey. We have now been there 3 times and have enjoyed it each time we went. On Sunday we went in about 2 miles and turned around for the truck and trailer. I rode on Sloan and Travis rode Moose. We had a lovely time enjoying a peaceful Sunday afternoon!

 

I had Monday off for President’s Day and Travis and I took Coon and Roscoe out to the 380 Greenbelt and went on the hiking trail 2 miles with the dogs. The dogs LOVED their time outside. Coon spent the entire hike with his head down sniffing everything and Roscoe just wanted to be let off the leash and go play in the woods!

 

I am so glad we live out in the middle of nowhere that allows us to utilize the Texas state parks that are near our house!

 

Travis and I leave tomorrow for our ski trip to Winter Park and visit with the lovely Alli Aman! We cannot wait.

Interview Me

My sweet friend and co-worker, Julie, has "interviewed" me. If you are wanting to be interviewed just let me know!

 

1.  What is your favorite thing about your iPhone?

 I am going to be truthful and admit I like having access to Facebook during the workday. We have so many websites blocked at work now, it's nice to be able to go where I want to go and see what I want to see...even if it is just reading peoples status updates or looking at who posted on who's wall....it's a guilty pleasure I have. Although, Travis would say it's an addiction to the iPhone and I refuse to admit I have an addiction :)

 

2.  What is your favorite thing to bake?

I love baking Travis his favorite cake: chocolate cake with white icing. His face lights up like a child when I pull the cake out of the oven. However, I really like baking anything sweet that tastes good.

 

3.  What is one of your favorite memories of your grandpa?

One of my favorite memories of GDad is having him take me and my brother, Trent, on road trips around Texas to places he and Gram thought were important for us to visit. We visited Marshall, Texas over Christmas to see their AMAZING Christmas lights display. We also went to Brenham, Texas to the Blue Bell Factory and Washington on the Brazos to get some good Texas history, and many others. When we went I thought they were boring, but over the years I grew to love my time with my grandparents and enjoy those trips we took as kids.

 

4.  How did you and Travis meet & fall in love? (not just "in college" I want the whole story!)

Well, we first met in October of 2004 at Pete's Piano Bar in Addison, TX where I had come with some girl friends from college to celebrate a friends birthday (Alli Aman). Alli had known Travis at Baylor and knew that he had already graduated in May of 2004 and that he was working for Pulte up in Dallas. So, she called him to see if he would want to join us. Well, sure enough a cute red-headed bearded boy walks in and sits at our table. I immediately looked at my friend, Jaran, and said he is CUTE and i was determined to get him to speak to me that night. Turns out he wanted to speak to me too and we talked most of the night until we left. The boy did not ask for my number that night, so I thought that was it.

Fast forward a year later to September of 2005 and Travis asked me to be his friend on the beloved Facebook. He sent me a message asking what I had been up to, where I was working, etc. After a few days of messaging he finally decided to ask me out. Our first date was October 2, 2005 and the rest is history :)

 

5.  Where do you see yourself in 10 years?

In 10 years I would like to see us living on our ranch somewhere in the heart of east Texas (outside of Tyler-Jacksonville area) with more horses and cattle. I would also like to have a couple of kids by then and have gone back to school and have my nursing degree and be falling more in love with my husband and kiddos every day :)

 

To play along:

1. Leave me a comment saying, "Interview me."

2. I will respond by sending you five questions. (I get to pick the questions).

3. You will update your blog with the answers to the questions.

4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview others in the same post.

5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.

Fred the 5th Wheel

Meet Fred. He is our 5th wheel trailer. He is twenty years old but has been kept in wonderful condition and we plan to keep it that way. He recently got a brand new set of wheels!

This past September Travis began working for a new company. This new job has him traveling near and far across the United States, well that’s the hope, right? J. Travis was in Waco for some training with this new job and staying with some of our near and dear family friends, Drs. Steve and Trish Raley. These guys are like second parents to me. We lived across the street from them for many years, before they moved out to their new house in the country with their Tennessee Walkers (horses).

While Travis was staying at their house, Trish’s parents were also visiting as they had evacuated from their home due to Hurricane Ike. Well, Trish’s dad (Mr. Kelly) and Travis started talking about his new job and how he has the potential to travel all over and has to stay in hotels for extended period of time. Mr. Kelly mentioned that he has an older 5^th wheel RV trailer that he and Mrs. Kelly used during their retirement years to travel around the country and that he would GIVE it to Travis for FREE. Travis didn’t know that to think as he just met Mr. Kelly and he was just going to give him a 34 foot travel trailer?!?!? We have never seen anybody be so generous especially having just met them!

So, after Travis completed some work in November he headed out to the Kelly’s home in Louisiana and picked up our new trailer, Fred. Fred is a Nu Wa Hitchhiker 34 foot beast complete with queen size bed, full shower and bath tub, toilet, sink, stove, oven, microwave, a/c and heat, fridge, kitchen table, sofa that folds out in to bed, flat screen TV and surround sound. Fred looks a little older on the outside, but he’s had a bit of an internal and external makeover. We had 4 new tires put on, the water heater re-vamped, new stainless fridge installed, flat screen TV, play station 2, and a good ole wash down on the inside and out!

I still cannot believe the generosity of the Kelly’s. Travis cannot wait to take Fred out with him when duty calls. Fred might not look the prettiest on the outside, but he’s been well taken care of and I know he will treat Travis well on his journeys around the states.

Hundred Pushup Challenge

Week one was a success! I actually look forward to coming home on
Monday, Wednesday, and Friday to do my pushups. I can already tell a
little difference in my strength as it is getting easier to crank out
more!

I just hope I can do 100 by the end of the challenge. Amy, thanks for
motivating us to do this!

If you are looking for a fun and free strength challenge, this is it.
It takes no more than 10 minutes of your time. Try it...I date you!

On another note, congrats to Ryan and Derek (Madelyn too) on expecting
baby #2!! I'm thinking it's going to be a boy. That's just my gut
feeling. Congrats Bird family.

Sent from my iPhone

Picture

Small Town Wedding

Travis and I had the privilege of attending the wedding of one of our closest ‘couple’ friends over the weekend. The wedding of Tara Daniel and James Newman took place on Saturday January, 31, 2009 in Rusk, Texas.

 

Where is Rusk? 40 miles south of Tyler on Hwy 69.

 

Rusk is a cute little town of about 1,500 people. You see, James and Tara are both from this tiny town. James was Tara’s first real boyfriend. They started dating when he was a senior in High School and she was a Freshman. James went off to Baylor and Tara was still at home in Rusk. They dated off and on while he was at Baylor and when she went off to Aggieland. The two re-kindled their relationship in the fall of 2007 and were engaged in May of 2008.

 

Tara and James are perfect for each other. It just makes me smile when I see them together. When they opened the church doors and she began walking down the isle to meet James, his face lit up and he had the biggest smile I have ever seen. It was a smile of happiness and pure joy. The wedding was beautiful and tastefully done and her dress sparkled with every move she made.

 

I took one picture the entire weekend and it’s the picture seen here. It is such a small town that the owner of the pennzoil shop congratulated the couple on their big day!

 

James and Tara, thank you for including us in your special day. Travis was so excited to stand by your side as a groomsman just as James was the Best Man in our wedding. We are excited as for y’all as you embark on this journey together. We love y’all!

 

Now they Newman’s are off to a week in beautiful Antigua.