On day 2 of our Colorado trip, we woke up bright and early to hit up Black Bear Pass and Imogene Pass. We wanted to be able to conquer both of those trails in one day, so an early morning it was. It was fine by me though, we got to see the sunrise over the mountains! It was such a beautiful drive to the trailhead.
Friday night around 10 pm we got a wild hair and planned a trip to the Texas Hill Country for....the very next morning!! Lucky for us, we have some pretty awesome friends that are just as spontaneous as us and said "absolutely" to our crazy plans! We were talking about planning an event for a group that Nate and I started {Jeep Around Texas} and wanted to make a pre-run to plan it all out. Our admins and great friends Michael & Keri, and Freddie joined us on this trip and we are so thankful that they did! We had a blast!!
This past Saturday we joined Texas Jeep Adventures for a Jeep safari at Fossil Rim Wildlife Center! We were so excited to have Nate's parents join us in our Jeep and we convoyed with another Jeep from our area! We all met at an Expo center not far from the animal park so that we could all convoy over together. If I had to guess I would say there were over 75 Jeeps in total for this event. It was so much fun!!!
Let me preface this by saying that I really, really love sunflowers. They make my heart so happy. We made three trips to the sunflower fields this summer and I loved each and every trip!! The drive there is gorgeous and then the fields are just breathtaking! Backroads are so good for my soul.
Some dear friends of ours booked a cabin for December 26-29th at one of our favorite places ever, Beaver's Bend. They had a spare room in the cabin and invited us down! We weren't sure we were going to get to go because we were anticipating the arrival of our newest nephew and then I came down with a stomach bug. But, by Wednesday the nephew was born and I was feeling better so we loaded up and went down.
Back in November when we camped in East Texas {Palestine/Rusk area} we took the Jeep on a few trail rides. It was our first time to actually take it off-road and we had a blast! The trails were nothing too strenuous and were marked trails. But, nonetheless we had an amazing time. This was also before we lifted the Jeep and put bigger tires on it. We are chomping at the bit to hit some more trails now that the upgrades have been done!!
Happy Friday!! While I am happy that it's the weekend I am bummed another sweet summer week has passed. Long live summer! I refuse to believe that school starts back on the 22nd. But really. We've had a pretty good and not-so-eventful week around here. Below is a little of what we've been u to.
So, on Tuesday I got an email that my blog domain will not be renewed come August 15th because of payment issues. I figured it's because I had gotten a new debit card since I last updated payment info. No big deal, right? Or so I thought! I couldn't get logged in to my admin panel and it kept telling me that I needed a Google for Work account. I would try to set up one and then it would start me over with the process again! It was so frustrating! I emailed customer service and they called me within 2 hours! I was so impressed. He helped me login and update my payment info in less than 5 minutes. I was so fearful of losing the blog I had since 2009! But all is back in business and we're good! Or so I pray. So if my blog doesn't load on August 15th then I take back all the praises of google support. ha.
{T H R E E} // Karate
I didn't go to karate with Nathan and Mason on Monday. I was having the Monday-iest of Mondays and was feeling so overwhelmed. My co-worker called in sick {after being out all last week}, work was crazy, my house was a wreck, and I hadn't even showered all day. So I stayed home. I got my house cleaned, got a couple loads of laundry done, got the dishes done, picked up toys, etc. But then Nate gets home and tells me that Mason had one of his best classes yet and that he did so dang well. But, of course. You can bet I was ready to go the next day!
{F O U R} // One last summer hurrah
We are heading out for another weekend river adventure! Trying to pack as much as we can into these summer days. We have plans of going canoeing/kayaking, fishing, hiking, maybe ride a train, etc. The last time we went to Beaver's Bend it was cold and rainy and so much of the park was flooded. They've done some renovations and we can't wait to check it all out.
I had high hopes of posting my weekend wrap-up on Monday, but life happened and I didn't finish editing all of the photos in time! We had another amazing weekend and filled up our memory tanks once again. I am trying to figure out how to make these sweet summer weekends last forever. We have had such an amazing summer so far.
Friday we went to visit our new friends at Ozzy's for an afternoon snowcone! We love visiting with Donny and Amber, and of course the cones are amazing too. Mason won a free snowcone by dropping a quarter in the water drop. I wish I would have had my camera ready because his face was priceless! Then, Donny let Mason go behind the counter and make his own snowcone!! It completely made his day! {Donny and Amber - if you're reading this - THANK YOU!}
Hi!! I am Crystal. Daughter of the One True King, wife to my high-school sweetheart Nathan and Mama to a 13 year old boy named Mason. We're the Halls and we love to travel around Texas {or anywhere, really}. I blog about our daily life, traveling, DIY'ing, and everything in between. Welcome and thank you for stopping by!