We had such a great time with our family and friends in Texas over the holidays! We were blessed to be able to spend two weeks there–which is about the minimum amount of time we need to see each of our immediate families, extended family, and just a handful of our friends. We typically make it home only twice a year, so it is always special when we do.
Even though I didn’t take as many pictures during our trip as I had hoped to, I think I can give you a good glimpse of most of the highlights. Again, please excuse the bad quality of the iPhone pictures…. I’m hoping that once I upgrade to the iPhone 5 in April I’ll have much better quality photos!
Part of the reason we are able the travel away for so long is that both of us have the ability to work remotely occasionally. I had to work the first few days I was in Waco with my family, but it was okay because I had my favorite chubby snowman mug filled with a warm drink most of the day!
During the first weekend, we went to a Baylor basketball game with several of our family members.
We won!
The day before Christmas Eve, we traveled to a small town in East Texas to celebrate Christmas with my dad’s side of the family. We had so much fun! We even pulled out some old toys from when me, my sisters, and cousins were little…..
We were also given fun toe socks to put on when we arrived!
My grandparents know how to keep all the family members happy!
Opening stocking goodies!
My sisters are definitely too cool….
My grandma collects nativity scenes. This one was just too cute not to share!
All of the stockings for all of the family members
Christmas Day in Waco was not very cold. That was somewhat of a bummer for me since I always hope for that white Christmas, but we made the best of it and went hiking in Cameron Park with the family.
A couple of days after Christmas, my mom’s side of the family had a scavenger hunt around Waco that my uncle put together. It was a blast! Daniel and I were on opposing teams, but we were able to forget our rivalry to take a few pictures. 🙂 I won’t go into the details on the scavenger hunt here, but I will say that one activity required the whole team to sing the National Anthem barefoot in front of a Cracker Barrel while having a stranger film us….
A few days later, we had lunch at McAlister’s with Daniel’s parents. I definitely missed this sweet tea!
One evening we were able to slip away for dinner and dessert with our friend Shannon and her new fiance Jonathan!
It was so good to see them!
The next day we made our way back to Downtown Fort Worth to say goodbye to our favorite Barnes & Noble ever on the last day it was open. This Barnes & Noble houses so many high school and college memories because we went here on date nights and with friends a countless number of times. Now it is closed, but we were happy to get to see it one more time!
Unfortunately, most of our time with Daniel’s family was filled with sick days. We still made time for fun though! This is us bowling with the family. I’m terrible at bowling, but it’s so much fun!
Daniel went with some college friends to the Baylor Fiesta Bowl game in Arizona, so I was able to spend New Year’s Eve in Dallas with Becca, one of my best friends!
On New Year’s Day, I drove back down to Waco to watch the bowl game with my family. Let’s not talk about the results of that game….
The next day I said goodbye to my family and headed back to Aledo to hang out with Daniel’s family.
On our last night in Texas, we went to Fort Worth for Daniel’s favorite BBQ of all time: Cooper’s. He was very, very happy!