good intentions

well, I did have good intentions of blogging daily about my family's visit over xmas. But I was too busy enjoying my time with them to actually follow through on that. So this will have to suffice. A quick update on how the 3 weeks of family visits went. In a nutshell, it was AWESOME! We didn't do any typical touristy stuff and discover Austin. No. We've done all that before. We just spent time. We shopped for xmas, we ate dinners, we relaxed. But we didn't forgo all of the Austin traditions - we ate Salt Lick with Mike, Tara, Barbie and Jett. Soooo good.

Mum and dad spent the first week, then Daz & Mel & Louise arrived for a one week overlap. It was a full house! But everyone seemed comfortable.

Trent insisted on calling Louise "HelLouise". We don't really know where he got that from, but it lasted the entire visit, even though we corrected him. We rented a minivan (kudos to Brian for the ridiculous deal he got), and packed everyone and all our gifts into the van, and made the 3 our trek to Houston for the Bauman xmas extravaganza. We followed some of the usual Bauman traditions and injected some of our own, though we got a sense that we were being graciously tolerated. As with any family gathering, though, there's always a few raised eyebrows.

We arrived back in Austin grateful to be in one piece after a near miss on the highway. Mum and dad went home a couple of days after xmas and Daz & Mel accompanied me down town on new year's eve for a very fun evening with Michelle and the boys of Suede (and some crazy bitch watching). Brian volunteered to stay home with the kids.

The remainder of our time was spent shopping, hanging out, playing with the kids, drinking Bailey's on ice, cooking great food, and eating entirely too much including another visit to Salt Lick at Mel's request - even though we had it only a week before, it was still BBQ Nirvana.

I was so sad when everyone left. I miss my family. I wish they were closer. But I am so grateful that they love me enough to make the long trek over here :-)