Good family fun

OK, so it wasn't my family, but I was still a part of good, clean family fun this evening. I accompanied Mikey and his mom to Baron's house, where I had a marvelous dinner with the aforementioned folks, as well as Megan, Baron's mom Brenda, and his brother Barrett (aka Bull--I'm not sure what the heck I'm supposed to call him!). The neat thing about this is that Baron and Mikey were best buds in elementary school, and the moms were great friends as well. I learned tonight that they spent their Friday evenings with a bunch of friends, playing tennis, eating dinner, and playing bridge. The moms hadn't seen each other in something like 15 years, and it was so neat to see them enjoying each other's company after so much time had passed, the kids had grown up, etc. It was a very pleasant night, and I thoroughly enjoyed the dinner Baron made for everyone. It wasn't just any old spaghetti and meatball dinner--he made homemade sauce, meatballs, and caesar salad dressing. Delicious! The dressing alone had more ingredients than I possess in my pantry and refrigerator combined. Hopefully I will be able to post a couple of pictures (courtesy of the oh-so-technologically-advanced Bull) soon. All in all, I'm very glad I got to be a part of a night filled with great company, delicious food, and yummy wine (that according to Baron tasted like butterscotch).

Trip report

I've had requests for a trip report, but it's really hard to figure out how we managed to fill so much time eating, drinking, and talking! We arrived mid-afternoon on Thursday, slathered on the sunscreen and headed down to the "backwash." It sounds terrible, but it's a lovely private offshoot of the Frio River. The sun had disappeared over the trees, but we still set up some chairs and observed the (slow-moving) world around us. That night was spent on a screened-in porch with me reading excertps from my high school diary. It was so funny that several of us were in tears from laughing so hard. Who knew I was so boy-crazy back then??? I swear, a guy would say hello to me, and that day I would decide I had a crush on him.

On Friday morning, Monique made a delicious bacon and egg breakfast, and we slathered on the sunscreen yet again. As we're headed to the river, we start hearing thunder. We decided to push through it, and as soon as we got to our destination (after wading through waist-deep water, assuring Monique that there were no snakes, and holding our stuff over our heads so it wouldn't get wet), it started to rain on us. Since we were going to get wet no matter what and it was getting cold, we sat in the river and drank beer while it continued to rain. It was actually quite pleasant, except for the occasional claps of thunder. But as soon as someone mentioned queso and guacamole, we headed back to the house. The five of us will drop pretty much anything when you mention those scrumptious treats. On the way back through the backwash, Jennifer took a picture-perfect fall on a slippery rock. I felt bad that she had fallen on her tailbone, but boy was it ever funny. It cracked me up even more that the only thing she was worried about was the fact that she got our (already damp) towels wet. That night, we went to a local restaurant for dinner, but we'd all eaten so much of the aforementioned queso and guacamole that we split a few entrees and headed back to the house. Ashley's sister and brother-in-law showed up with their dogs Bailey and Zoe (I LOVE their dogs, by the way) later that night, and drinking ensued. We sang along to music on our iPods, ate a frozen watermelon that we had funneled vodka into, shotgunned beers (yeah right, you know I wouldn't even try to shotgun one myself--I'm too much of a wuss), and just in general had a fantastic time. The party stopped about 4 a.m., and three of us woke up nice and hungover the next day.

Saturday morning, we bid a fond farewell to Monique (who was, in fact, going to Cancun the next day) and nursed our hangover until about noon. Kimberly took good care of those of us who didn't feel so hot. Then, once again, we slathered on the sunscreen, this time in preparation to go tubing on the Frio River. Alas, here come the thunder and threatening skies once again. Darn the luck! So we decided to lounge around in the backwash, watching Bailey and Zoe have doggie fun in the water. That night was quite low-key, which was a great way to spend our final evening at the relaxing, beautiful Cunningham river house. We did cap it all off with s'mores that we made over an open fire in the fire pit--yum!

I have to mention that one of the best parts of the trip was Friday afternoon, when we spent several hours on the screened-in porch, watching some really cool thunderstorms roll through. It was great to have an ironclad excuse to do nothing more than sit around and talk about our past, present, and future. I may not know where I'll be in five years (it seems I'm not the only one!), but I do know that I can't wait until our third annual trip next year!

We're off to Concan!

Yes, you read that right...we are going to Concan, Texas (not Cancun, Mexico). And I couldn't be more excited! Tonight a slumber party will kick off the girls' weekend, and we will leave bright and early tomorrow morning for a long weekend full of margaritas, tubing, queso, wine, s'mores, more queso, and lots of catching up. We did this last summer and had a blast, so now it's time for the second annual trip. We will celebrate Jennifer's 25th birthday, Kimberly and Monique's graduation from law school, Ashley's presence in the great state of Texas, and...well...me getting to spend a four-day weekend with some of my oldest and dearest friends. Just so you know what I'm talking about, I have included a picture of the first annual girls' weekend in Concan. And yes, Kimberly is wearing pants and a long-sleeved shirt. She was fried to a crisp from the day before, but she was a trooper and went tubing with us anyway. It turned out to be good that she was covered up since we tubed for five or six hours because we missed our stopping point--whoops! A guy even asked to buy her clothes from her because he was getting so burned on the river. Let the fun commence!