On the Frio with the fam...

We had a great time at the Frio with my family this Christmas. Like always, there was a ton of eating, drinking, playing cards & dominoes and singing by the campfire. We lucked out and had great weather too! Here is a link to all the pictures I took and a few of my favorites are posted below. We miss everyone!

Bigger & Better!

Can you tell? I'm working on a method to post bigger photos. I'm such a visual person anyway, I think the bigger the better! Here are some of my favorites from our Christmas ski trip to Jackson Hole. We had never skiied in such deep powder! The snow was up to our waist one day! While we were there the resort had record snowfall- 31" in 24 hours. It made for great skiing until the last day where they couldn't even open the lifts it had snowed so much overnight! We were finally able to go out that afternoon after they worked all morning to avalanche and plow. What a fun trip! We were exhausted after 6 straight days of skiing!

Congratulations Karl!

You made it! After a long, stressful semester you're finally finished and have your Master's degree! I am so proud of you and so happy to see you sitting on the couch right now relaxing, watching basketball. It's been a LONG time since I've seen you do that. You continue to amaze me every day....Hook 'em Horns!



(Thanks for posing in front of the UT Tower lit up in 2008 just for you. Yes, you have a crazy wife who is obsessed with perfect photo opps.)

Happy 30th Birthday Christine!

The first one of our gang to turn the big 3-0! And, we're all still partying like we're 18!

A White Thanksgiving!

I am just now getting to my Thanksgiving pictures and post...get ready for a big share since I took alot of pictures during our visit to see my dad in New Mexico. Taylor, Casey and I flew out to visit my dad and Todd in Los Alamos for a week. It was a perfect trip but we really missed having Karl and Riane there with us! =(

Casey, Dad, & me on the balcony night of Turkey Day

We had a white Thanksgiving which was a first for all of us! We woke up and it was raining a little and then all of a sudden in the late morning it started snowing....and snowing. It turned everything instantly white and we had a blast taking pictures and walking around outside. Dad worked on his famous deep fried turkey (true Southern style) and us girls worked on all the sides for the Thanksgiving feast. It was very cozy eating Thanksgiving dinner and watching the snow fall outside. We all pigged out and munched on all the leftovers the rest of the week- turkey sandwiches with gravy...mmmmm.

Casey, Taylor and me

The feast! Missing Casey in this one but she's taking the pic

The next day Taylor and I decided to go to Taos since I had read online they opened on Thanksgiving day (early for them) and since they had enough snow and were able to make enough snow, they opened a lift and a couple of runs. I was so pumped since Taos is one of our favorite places on the planet to ski and how fun to ski the day after Thanksgiving?! We bundled up and headed out for the hour and half drive. Once we arrived, we quickly got fitted for boots and skis and took off up the mountain. The snow was so soft and fluffy- just the snow I remember loving at Taos. It never lets us down! Taylor was such a trooper skiing along and even tackled some moguls with me for her first time. She was such a good sport even when she fell and tumbled a couple of times. Go Tay!

tay & I riding up lift 1 at Taos

Tay about to ski for the first time in a few years!

Skiing in my windpants from High School since I didn't bring my ski pants to Thanksgiving =)

We spent the week touring around Los Alamos, shopping around Santa Fe plaza and Dad took us on a drive to their local ski hill and some of the National Parks in the area. It was beautiful. One day we lucked out with a perfectly clear ski and the views from my Dad's balcony were stunning.

The view from my dad's balcony. Amazing.

View from the balcony again. You can see the Sangre de Cristo mountains in the background with snow caps.

Overall, I think we gained 10 pounds each after eating such yummy food all week, but it was worth it! It's pretty rare that at least 4 out of 5 of us are all together these days with work and school schedules and it was a treat to all be together. We miss you Dad and hope to see you again soon!

Long lost blog....

I am back...after almost a month from my last post. wow. We just had a fun weekend celebrating Reagan's 30th birthday?! I can remember celebrating her 11th birthday with her and we've been friends for almost 20 years now...unbelievable! We had an awesome steak dinner at Sullivan's with 15 of our friends and then went to explore the new bars downtown. So many new ones have popped up since we've been gone. The new ones we went to are similar to Vegas clubs, which is different than the 6th street we know and love, but they were still fun. We had a great time and helped Reagan mourn the end of her 20's appropriately :)

Hope you had a great birthday weekend Rae and I'm glad we have 6 months to recover before we party like that for mine....

Sigh...

We skiied for possibly the last time this season at the lake this weekend. The lake level is at an all time low and Karl was able to stand in the ski cove we normally ski in. It was very strange.

Finally!

My Ireland pictures are all uploaded and ready to view! I widdled them down as much as I could (from 1600!) to 970 total in the slideshow. So...grab a glass of wine and get ready for a show ;) I'm still labeling them and having fun reliving the trip as I go. What an amazing trip.

I have also uploaded all my London pictures some of which Riane will most likely be annoyed I'm posting of her but they were too cute to leave out and that's what big sisters are for right? :) I miss you Ri Ri and had so much fun exploring London with you!

For your listening pleasure...

Haha. I have added some new songs to our playlist below. After hearing so many different bands at ACL it inspired me to update it...a little. Now, rest assured, there will always be the random 70's and 80's songs, (You can call me Al, etc.) but in between I will add some newer favs. I am on a Neko Case kick recently...can you tell? Also, in case you want to do other things on your computer but still listen to my playlist, you can click the "pop out" feature so you can play it on your desktop. Ok, back to working on pics. Thanks for visiting and give us a holler!

ACL Festival

It was go go go the second I got back into the states since ACL festival started the next day. (Austin City Limits music fest) Taylor and some of her friends came up and we went all three days....whew...still recovering. The heat wasn't near as bad as the first year we went when it was 108 degrees out (end of Sept?!) But, it was still hot during the day. The lineup was great this year and the 3 day pass was worth it to me just to see my favorite- Neko Case. In case you can't tell by all the songs of hers I have playing below on the website, she is one of my all time favorites :) Our other favorites were John Fogherty, who actually played some old CCR songs. Band of Horses, CSS, Tegan & Sara (another recent fav), G. Love, Mates of State, Robert Plant, The Raconteurs, Robert Earl Keen, Blues Traveler, Slightly Stoopid...sooo many good bands!

And, no, I didn't take this aerial shot from my private helicopter. I just found this pic online and thought it was cool to show how awesome Zilker Park is with the Austin skyline in the background. It was way more packed than this on Saturday and Sunday.

I went into hibernation mode Monday after being at the festival all weekend and still recovering from jet lag. But, I'm back to normal now and in the process of uploading all my trip pictures to post....stay tuned!

MIA

I haven't blogged in a while since I've been a away for a few weeks. I just got back from biking through Ireland for 2 weeks and then went to visit Riane in London for a week. Ireland was absolutely gorgeous and very green! The biking part wasn't too tough but wasn't that easy either. We did about 30 miles a day with stops to sight see and lunch along the way. I was a little nervous since I haven't really biked since my triathlon a couple years ago but we all did great and tackled the hills just fine.

We biked in the pouring rain a couple of days which was actually pretty fun because we weren't cold and we dressed for it. We lucked out towards the end of the tour with some sunny, gorgeous days. We learned two things: Ireland is NOT flat and the wind can be killer, especially when you're biking in it! We even had to abort one afternoon ride one day due to gale force winds that were knocking us over as we rode along the coast. Craziness! It was an amazing trip. Our bike tour company planned awesome routes and chose amazing bed & breakfasts to stay at each night. The Irish people were so welcoming and very friendly. Thanks to our bike tour guide who was from Ireland, we had a truly Irish experience while we were there. We also toured around on our own via car for about 5 days and saw almost the entire west coast of Ireland by the time we left. We're ready for the Italy bike trip next...uh, I think.

Riane and I had so much fun in London! She did a great job of showing me around. We walked alot and I got to see where she hangs out and meet all her friends. We saw two plays and had a blast together just walking around the city. I was so happy to be there for her 20th birthday! We went to this awesome little restaurant for her birthday lunch called Archipelago and we ate crocodile and kangaroo! Both were actually really good. We decided to pass on the locust salad and the chocolate scorpion though. I miss you Ri!

I had a chance to play around with my camera alot on this trip and came home to realize I took a total of 1600 pictures! I am in the process of uploading them and will post a link to view soo...so stay tuned!

One picture while you wait :)

Dingle Peninsula, County Kerry, Ireland

We're back!

And we miss Greece! After an awesome trip to Athens, Santorini and Crete we are back and still recovering from the 10 hour time difference and almost 24 hours of travel on the way home. Needless to say, it was an amazing trip and we had a great time with Ben and Meredith! Greece is truly an amazing country and each city we visited was beautiful and unique in it's own way. Here is a sneak peak of some of our pictures. We're still compiling all of them from all the cameras but here are some of my shares. We swam at a black beach, red beach, white beach and pink beach! Yes, it really was pink..see pic below. We ate wonderful Greek food, drank local wine and ouzo (yum!) We went sightseeing, walked around ruins and saw some of the most amazing sunsets I've ever seen.

More pics here!

Parthenon, Athens

beautiful Oia village, Santorini

Oia, Santorini

Red beach, Santorini

"Pink Beach", Elafonissi Beach, Crete

Sunset in Paleochora, Crete

Christine Visits!

Christine & I had so much fun this weekend touring around SF & Napa! She got to experience a San Francisco summer for the first time when we attempted to walk across the Golden Gate bridge today in the freezing cold & fog.

Fun in the Texas Sun!

We made a last-minute, surprise trip to Texas for Uncle Doug's 50th Bday party. We took a red-eye out of SF and drove from Austin to Corpus to meet my family at the beach for the weekend. Luckily, we went the weekend before the hurricane hit the coast. We had such a great time and were really happy to visit with everyone before we see them next over the holidays. Happy belated Uncle Doug!

More Pictures Here

....watching the full moon rise

Slideshow!

My mom & I made a slideshow for my Uncle Doug's 50th Birthday party. She spent the many, many hours scanning in all the old pictures we didn't have as digital files. I put it all together with the music and put it on a DVD. This is the second one I created (first one was for Reagan's wedding.) I just learned how to upload videos on Blogger to show it off! I think I might start a business creating picture slideshows for birthdays, weddings, etc. So, if you know anyone who needs a DVD slideshow, let me know.

You might have to scroll down to the bottom of this page and press Pause on the music playing below to hear the music on the slideshow. Enjoy!

Album Fetcher

As most of you know by now I use SmugMug to organize and share our photos. I've been really happy so far with their service and recently was able to see some prints and they look great! Smug Mug is much better than printing at starts with a "Wal..." I recommend printing in a matte or lustre finish.

One of the main features I have wished for is a bulk download option for my friends and family who want to save more than one photo to their computer. Well, FINALLY a SmugMug user has created an application just this purpose-- AlbumFetcher and it works great! It is very simple to use and in just a few steps you can download an entire album from my SmugMug page to your computer. It's also pretty cool because it will embed those files with my captions too ;)

I have created a step by step tutorial here. ............Cheers!

It's Summer!

We went to the Russian River Valley this weekend and camped on the river. This was our first time camping in this area. Normally, we go to Napa or Sonoma and camp and bike around those wineries. The vineyards in Russian River valley look dramatically different as they are surrounded by hundreds of huge trees. The landscape was gorgeous.


As members of La Crema winery (home to some of our favorite Chardonnays and Pinots), we were invited to a members only lunch at the winery in Windsor, CA in the valley. The actual winery isn't open to the public for tastings (only the tasting room in Healdsburg does tastings) so this was a treat to be able to see the winery and tour around it. The grounds were pretty and they had the inside of the production room decorated and set up for the lunch. We had their awesome wines paired with different courses and everything was wonderful! It is obvious being inside the warehouse this winery produces a ton of wine! There were rows and rows of barrels stacked all the way to the ceiling.


Our campsite was just a few miles away and it was a perfect summer day and hot out so we jumped in the river as soon as we got back. Our campsite had a good beach and the water felt great. Karl & I jumped off huge rocks with the kids into the swimming hole. The scenery was awesome and there were huge homes hanging from the cliff side over the water.

The 4th...

This is how we dress to watch fireworks on the 4th in San Fran
......just to see clouds glow red through the fog.

Not the typical 4th of July weather we're used to.

Happy Birthday Julie! The Dodgers won but we still had fun!

4 year anniversary!

I can't believe it's been four year's since our wedding day because it seems like just yesterday we were there celebrating with our friends and family. At the same time it feels like so much longer since I can't remember when it wasn't us.

Hot in San Francisco?!

Thought we's never experience this! It was almost 90 degrees in SF this Friday and Saturday! We were so gitty to be outside in shorts and no jackets! The city was going crazy with tons of people out and about, the parks were packed and all the restaurant and bar patios were packed. We sat outside at one of our local restaurant patios and had a glass of wine and were actually warm! We walked down the Fillmore steps to get some shots of the sunset over the bridge. It was Summer Solstice the next day and the sunset was amazing.

Our apartment was still 86 degrees inside at 8:30pm Friday night! (No a/c either so this was HOT!) Saturday was another warm day hitting 87 degrees and we decided to go on a hike around Land's End on the Coastal trail. The views were awesome and it was so clear out we could see all the way to the Farralon's.


After our hike we went to the beach and it was packed, of course. Even the breeze that is normally cold was warm- it was bizarre. We laid out and then walked into the water. I made it up to my waist and Karl actually made it all the way in and swam around- crazy! The water was still bitter cold. Sure enough, later that afternoon, normal SF weather started rolling back in and it started to get chilly and the wind turned cold again....glad we enjoyed it while we could!

Congratulations Elizabeth & Will!

We had such a great time celebrating Elizabeth & Will at their amazing island wedding on Guana Island, BVI. It was so much fun catching up with the family and seeing everyone!
Pictures here!

Congrats Tim & Pam!

Our wedding circuit began in Long Island for Tim & Pam's wedding. We had a blast seeing Darmouth friends and partying over the weekend with everyone!
Pictures here!

Wives club!