Pecan Tree

Don't despair... our pecan tree has not died!  Hooray!  Jump for joy!

Oh, what is that you say?  That you weren't worried about our pecan tree? 

Huh... well I sure was.  It was nearly the only tree in the neighborhood that wasn't covered in green leaves.  I was getting so worried that we lost it in the drought.  Jason was convinced we did.

But, if you squint really hard, you can see the small buds at the ends of the limbs. 

Can you see them?

Hooray for our only tree!

Sicko

We had so many good things planned this weekend... Hunger Games Friday evening, spending time with Trey, Melanie, and Luke yesterday, and Matisyahu at Miller Outdoor Theater this evening.

Well, Hunger Games went well. 

And some of the hanging out with Trey, Melanie, and Luke went well.

Until I got extremely bad allergies/ asthma, a 24 hour stomach bug, and a head cold all in the same weekend.  Not sure what's going on with my body.... but it ain't pretty. 

Hoping I get over it soon as I have a work conference in Dallas Monday through Wednesday.

Well, enough of the poor me stories... enjoy these cute pictures of Luke swinging at the park down the street.

Lake Ouachita

This past week Jason and I headed to Lake Ouachita State Park in the great state of Arkansas for our first camping adventure together.  For our first attempt at outdoorsy life, I think it went rather well. 

The setting was beautiful.  The state park had nearly 100 drive up campsites for both RV's and tents.  We stayed in one of the twelve walk-in tent sites located on the end of a peninsula.  Out of all the campsites in the entire park, ours was probably the prettiest.  It was located at the very tip of the peninsula and had gorgeous views of the lake.  

The state park was full of fun things to do.  There were several trails you could hike and the marina had all types of boats you could rent.  On our second day, we rented a 16 foot fishing boat to take around the lake.  There was also a swimming beach, but the water was still a bit too cold for swimming.

We enjoyed good food and drinks during our trip.  Below, Jason shows off Houston-brewed Karbach Weisse Versa.  We grilled chicken and vegetable foil packs and had sausage with baked beans for dinner, usually ate sandwiches for lunch, and made some wonderful egg, mushroom, and potato scrambles for breakfast.  The first night we made smores and our last night we had banana boats for dessert... yum!



In the evenings, we had beautiful views of the sunset.

And each morning, we woke up to beautiful views of the sunrise.

Jason tried his hand at fishing in various locations around the lake, on various days, at various times, with various lures - with no luck.



 

And while Jason attempted to fish, I was bored and took self portraits.  :) 

Overall, it was a very fun, relaxing trip.  I miss it already. 



For more pictures of our trip, click here.

A Few Things

1.  We went to a Radiohead concert this weekend.  Much fun was had by all.  Laura, Joel, and Jared stayed with us.

2.  Jason bought me a plant for Valentine's Day for my office.  It is pretty.

3.  My dreams of staying home and knitting all day were dashed here, here, and here.  My desires to grow vegetables in the back yard, crochet, and use natural solutions to clean the house just make me a statistic in the rising New Domesticity movement.  My realization of this just made me sad.

4.  I am like totally hip and cool and get my picture taken at hip and cool events around town.  Not really.  Well, maybe.  No, not really.

Artopia

Grand Opening of Hay Merchant

5.  We are currently practicing for an upcoming camping trip.  I hope we survive.

That is all.

Hay Merchant Grand Opening

So there has been a ton of press over the last months about the long anticipated opening of Hay Merchant (like here, here, here, here, here, and oh-my-dear-god-why-has-there-been-THAT-much-press here), so I'm not going to reinvent the wheel.  But, I do have to share that Jason and I actually checked the place out... on opening night, nonetheless.  Yes, we're total beer snobs.  And, yes, like one of the articles mentioned, it was full of tons of people "in the know."  Too bad I'm not "in the know" and couldn't identify half of them.

Interior shot.  Sorry for the bad picture quality.  I headed there
straight after work and didn't have a camera with me.

I do know that the guys from Karbach were there.  Also, we had an encounter with Chris Shepherd as he made his obligatory rounds.  While it's unclear how much input Chris had with the Hay Merchant menu offerings since his future next door restaurant, Underbelly, will be kept completely separate, it was still kinda funny.

Water was served in 32 oz. Budweiser bottles.  Get it?  Ha.

As Jason and I ate our blood sausage queso fundido, delicious local daily ground hamburger, and onion rings, I said, "Hey, maybe we should tell Chris how good the food is."  Jason says, "Why, he's just going to go, 'I know.'"  So later, Chris comes by the table and asks if every thing's alright.  I say, "Yea, thanks... the burger is delicious."  He so nonchalantly, responds, "Yea," and walks away.  Then Jason and I giggled cause he was totally called the response to a T.

Only an after shot of the food since it we ate it so quickly.

Anyways, we were pretty impressed by the whole experience.  Good food.  Over 75 beers on tap... and good ones too.  Attentive staff.  Nice interior.  Oh, and they have a couple dart boards so of course Jason was happy.

Dude Jase, chill out with your stalking of the
dart boards.

I'm sure we'll keep this place on our list of frequently visited beer establishments.

Update:  According to this article, the executive chef at Hay Merchant is Antoine Ware.

Crochet

Guess who has a new hobby?  Well, it's not Jason.  He has too many anyways (e.g. soccer, biking, running, darts, record collecting, etc.)

Today I learned to crochet.  After a quick class at Hobby Lobby this morning, I mastered one of the four crochet stitches.  

I practiced this afternoon, just hoping to make a square that we could use as a coaster.  After about five rows though, I noticed my rows kept getting shorter and shorter.  Once I figured out how to correct that and make it go straight, I figured I would flare how the other side to match my mistake on the starting side.

I ended up with this little guy.  I wasn't quite sure what the heck we were going to do with it, but Radar quickly remedied that situation.  

Apparently, he thought it would be a nice addition to his collection of toys.

Up next?  A scarf maybe.  Or a blanket.  Or maybe just a few more oddly shaped squares as I continue to learn the other stitches.



This Weekend Thus Far

Happy weekend, friends.  Do you have any exciting plans?  I've heard there's some football game going on, but I'm not really sure of all the details.  ;) 

At Thursday night sushi night (at which, by the way, two waitresses now have our order memorized), I asked Jason, "Hey, are we watching the Super Bowl this weekend?"  He said, "I dunno.  What day is it... Saturday?"  I responded, "Um... I'm pretty sure they call it Super Bowl Sunday for a reason."  Obviously huge football fans.

Nope, we rather do things like go watch community theater.  Last night we headed to the lovely metropolis of Pasadena, Tx with Ferryn & Steve to watch puppets sing about the hard facts of growing up. (I feel ya, puppet... I really do.)  It was actually a really great performance.  It was our first community theater experience and we both enjoyed it.  We had dinner at Don'Key's before the show and it was really good as well.

Avenue Q at Stage Door Inc.

This morning I woke up to a huge thunder storm passing through the area. Radar thought it was imperative that I wake up and enjoy the morning with him.  So, we headed to the reading room to listen to Carole King on vinyl and watch the rain come down.

Exciting stuff, huh?  We think so.  Can't wait to see what the rest of the weekend has in store for us.