Thanksgiving

I am thankful for so many things in my life.  I have a wonderful fiance who happens to be my best friend.  He listens to all of my complaints, he appreciates my bad dance moves, he lets me sing badly, he is there for me no matter what, and he loves me unconditionally.  I have a fantastic family.  They love me no matter what and I know I can always depend on them.  I have so many amazing friends.  I am so thankful for all of my friends, old and new, that accept me just the way I am.  I am thankful for a job that works around my school schedule, pays me well, and has some people that really do appreciate what I do.  I am thankful for the opportunity to get an education at a university.  I am thankful for my reliable car.  The white dove is always good to me.  I am thankful for my home that is just big enough and is in a wonderful location.  I am thankful for the city I live in that has so many places I love to frequent.  I am so fortunate for everything and everyone I have in my life.  I wish everyone a happy thanksgiving and a happy holiday.  May everyone have more blessings than they can count.

New Orleans and the Wedding of Mr. & Mrs. Compton

Flash back to last month!  It was October 20th and Josh, Jonathon, and I had gotten up early, packed up the car, and were New Orleans bound.  I really like the drive to New Orleans.  Mainly because there are a limited number of turns (I think it's only two highways the whole way there), which means it's pretty difficult to get myself lost.  It's also just a beautiful drive.  Especially when you get to all of the great, tall trees that aren't very prevalent in our area of town.  We hit more traffic than we would have liked, but ended up getting there and checked into the hotels in just enough time to change clothes and head to the ghost tour.  Here are a couple of haunted places we happened upon.

After the ghost tour, it was time to party on Bourbon Street.

The next day, we grabbed some breakfast and everyone split up to do their own thing.  Josh, Jojo, and myself went to Reverend Zombie's House of VooDoo.  We got a VooDoo doll to protect our home and we found our cake topper for our wedding!  It's a Day of the Dead bride and groom.  After that, we dropped off our goods at the hotel and headed to the casino!  Woooo!

I had never been to a casino before.  It was really fun!  I love slot machines and nice people bringing you free drinks.  You really can't beat that!  Next, we headed to the rehearsal dinner.  We made the mistake of taking the trolley that lies about what time it will pick you up and drop you off at your destination.  We were a little late, but it was alright.

A cool sculpture in the sculpture garden.

The Compton family.

That night we all went out again.

Peter's last night as a bachelor!

The view of Bourbon Street from our hotel room.

The next day was the big day!  We had some errands to run, mainly getting Josh's hair cut because it was slightly out of control.  Before that, we had breakfast with Jojo, Mary, and Trevor at this great little place that I can't remember the name of.  A lot of the beautiful houses uptown were decorated for Halloween.  This one was especially awesome!

Pretty soon it was time to head to the wedding!  I had to bust out some pretty awesome defensive driving to make it there on time.  We made it just fine (by the way).  The wedding was absolutely beautiful.  I cried like a baby the whole time.  I love people in love.

After the ceremony, we all headed upstairs for the reception.  Before I knew it, it was speech time and I promptly continued my crying when Mary spoke.  Then, I wiped my tears and tore up the dance floor (thanks to those glasses of wine).  After that, we decorated the car and went back up to the reception to hang out, drink, and dance some more.

I met Kendi Everyday!

The beautiful couple.

It was a wonderful trip and beautiful wedding.  I'm so thankful for our great friends and being able to share such a special time with all of them.  Congratulations Mr. and Mrs. Compton!

Blink 182, My Chemial Romance, and Matt & Kim

On September 27th (geez, that was seriously almost two months ago!  I suck at blog updates), Josh and I went to Dallas to see Blink 182, My Chemical Romance, and Matt & Kim.  We arrived in town a little early, so we sat in the car taking pictures and preparing for awesome things to happen!

Soon enough, it was time to go inside the venue.  We ended up having pretty great seats which were totally worth the price.  I think you are officially an adult whenever you prefer a huge concert specifically because you get an assigned seat where you can sit down at your leisure.  After we got a Mountain Dew to quench our thirst, Matt & Kim came on.

They were awesome, as they always are!  At the end of the set, they took off their shirts (as you will see below).

Next, My Chemical Romance played and they were amazing!  I haven't seen them live before and I was pleasantly surprised.

Also, they played my favorite song by them, Helena.  It was super awesome.  Finally, Blink 182 came on.  I've seen them once before, they were awesome then and they were just as awesome this time.  As usual, Tom and Mark were hilarious and Travis didn't talk.  Although, he did say something because Tom and Mark made him.  I think he just said, "I'm Travis." or something like that.  It was a lot of fun.  I love Blink 182 so much.  They did a good job of playing a good variety.  There were a few songs I didn't know/didn't care about, but for the most part they played the hits.  The one thing I didn't like was their teasing about playing Josie.  For all we know, they played Josie after we skidaddled.  We left after they were playing their encore for awhile because we had school the next day.  (Spoiler, we got tired on the drive home, stayed at a hotel, and skipped school.  Totally should have stayed for the full extent of the show, oh wellsies).

Totally awesome great time.  Here are a few videos from the concert:

Jeannie and Carolyn's Birthday and the Superhero 5K

I am so behind in blogging things!  These two things happened over a month ago...

First off, Jeannie and Carolyn had a joint birthday party where we saw friends we hadn't seen in awhile (which is always a good time).

I love Esther's face in this one

Second, we did a Superhero 5K!  It was a lot of fun and I felt pretty good because I jogged the first almost half before I had to stop due to my extremely weak body.  I dressed up like Zatanna  (Google her and laugh at how silly I look).  One person realized who I was supposed to be and took a picture of me (which was really nice since I look nothing like her).  Josh had his Marvel shirt on and Mary, Trevor, and their dogs (June Bug and Murphy Brown) were a super family.  SO CUTE!

We had a great time.  Afterwards, we went to breakfast.  Luckily, Mary let me borrow a shirt, but I was still rocking the fishnets and volleyball shorts.  Awesome is my middle name, except it's in quotations.

Enchanted Rock Field Trip

So, I don't think I've been on a field trip since elementary school, but my Geomorphology class had one scheduled that counted as extra credit.  Needless to say, I signed up!  We went to Enchanted Rock and had a really fun time.  At first, I was nervous because I didn't know anyone in the class.  On the way there, I made some friends and it ended up being a really cool trip.  On the way back, we stopped in Fredricksburg to have dinner.  The group I was hanging out with went to the Fredricksburg Brewery (which Josh and I had gone to before for a "Bed and Brew").  That place is awesome and so is their beer. Here are some photos from the trip:

ACL 2011-Day Three

We began day three with breakfast at the Galaxy Cafe in the Triangle.  Josh, Mary, Trevor, June (their bull dog beagle mix), and I had an awesome breakfast.  Josh and I had never been there before, but it was really swanky and neato.  I got a saucer with my coffee cup, need I say more?

Awhile later, Mary and Trevor picked me up and we headed out to our final day of music filled fun!  When we got to the park, we caught the last half of The Head and The Heart.  I thought they were pretty good.

After that, the Walkmen played and they were super awesome!

Next, we saw Broken Social Scene, which was also really good.

Then, we headed over to Death From Above 1979.  This is not my kind of listen to at home music, but it is great for festivals!  They were super awesome and very fun to dance to.

On the way back to the group, Mary and I stopped at Gomez.  They were pretty good too.  There was also this adorable old man baby that was way too little to be at a super loud festival with no ear plugs/earphones.

We saw some of the Fleet Foxes.  They were alright too, just not completely my thing.  After that, we headed to the other side of the park and saw the end of Manu Chao La Ventura.  They are so full of energy, they had the whole crowd dancing.  Although, they weren't singing in English, I was totally loving it.

Next, Social Distortion came on and they completely rocked!

On the way back over to meet up with our group, we stopped to see some Randy Newman.  Although he didn't play my favorite (You've Got a Friend in Me), he was great.  He's still got it, for sure.

After catching the end of Empire of the Sun, it was finally time for the big closer, Arcade Fire!

They were wonderful, just like they were the first year I went to ACL and saw them in the middle of 107 degree weather.  This has been a great ACL year, the only thing that could've improved it would have been Josh being there.  But, he says he will come next year!  Yay!

After I got home from the festival, Josh and I had a double date at Trudy's with Lily and Javi.  It was so much fun!  I hadn't been to Trudy's in awhile and almost forgot how yummy their mexican martinis are.  We had a great time and ended up closing the place down (by that, I mean the dining room closed at midnight and we were there for a good 30 minutes later before we realized everyone was cleaning up and starting to give us the eye).  Great times!