buddies

won't be able to hold her much longer

kevin's new distraction

home from the hospital

post-swimming

new sailing toy

new past-time

self portrait

kevin and grandma

her idea of fishing

bay-fisherman kevin

We're Back... and with 4 more legs!

Well after giving myspace a good run, we have decided to resort back to our old reliable blog. Seeing that we haven't posted a blog since Christmas, there are quite a few things to catch you up on. The new year was nice as Laura's parents took us on a ski trip to Leadville, Colorado. Yes, you may remember a few blizzards this past winter, and yes we happened to catch ourselves in the middle of the second one. But thankfully dad's passat handled like a 4 wheel drive, we had our handy emergency candle, and a trusty navigation system (aka Jill) that found the only open road into New Mexico. Oh and the skiing's never been better!

After a month of working and life as usual, we bought our first place in February! We had somewhat committed to looking around, and just happened upon the perfect place quite quickly into our search. It has 2 bedrooms, 2.5 bathrooms, and an open lofty feel upstairs. Conveniently it was located across the street from our apartment and even closer to Zilker Park than we were before....we couldn't find a better combination for our lifestyle.

In late Spring, Kevin's grandma treated the family to a week long trip to Galveston. She rented a large house on the beach with plenty of room for everyone to spread out, a large play fort for the little kids, and a huge yard for everyone to play. Of course we spent plenty of time boogey boarding in the water and building sand castles in the sand. We were also treated to a trip to Moody Gardens. It was a nice large venue with a rainforest, an aquarium, and an imax theater. All in all it was a great trip and a fun time to spend with the cousins.

Also at the beginning of the summer Kevin decided he would like to find a new sailboat. Well as easily as we happened into the house, we happened upon a Laser II sailboat. The same guy also happened to be liquidating some kayaks...so of course Laura had to have those! Needless to say, we have had an enjoyable summer out on the water in and around Austin. We look forward to taking the toys up to Granbury quite soon and having some lake time up there.

And probably the second most important news is that we have added a new 4-legged member to the family. Yes after being eaten up by the guilt of Lilly's big, lonely brown eyes, we decided it was time to get her a friend. After a couple of sad, unsuccesful almost adoptions through local agencies, we found a puppy that we couldn't part with. She is 5 months old, part pure bred greyhound, part collie....oh and her name is Daphne. We've had her for 1.5 months now and already have grown attached beyond belief. We didn't know she was ill when we adopted her, and after several boughts with various intestinal protozoa and an upper respiratory infection that turned into pnuemonia and a lengthy hospital stay, she is finally healthy!!!!

That should catch you up on the most major events of the past 8 months. We want to thank the faithful subscribers who have continued to hold out hope that we will someday post again, and for those of us giving us a second or third shot...thanks! Please stay tuned for further developments as we have a fun Labor Day and a crazy Austin City Limit's Music Festival approaching in the next few weeks.