Hello Again!

I made a New Year's resolution to get back to blogging.

My husband tells me all the time that he misses reading it.

True story.

He sent me an email yesterday with a link to this very blog.

The Soladay Family

His message said, "look what I found..."

I gave in and tried to log in
but couldn't even remember my password.

Long story short, here I am!

I guess the best thing to do is to recap a little of

what's been going on since my last post...from APRIL!

 

*The boys are still the same.

I love them so!

 



 

 Halloween!

We only have 1 child left that wants to trick or treat with us or wear a costume.

That is if you count wearing Ryan's trucker hat, with a built in mullet, a costume.

Why must they grow up so fast!?

Notice The Teenager missing in these pics?

That's pretty much par for the course these days.

He's much too busy to hang with us.
Teenagers.
Oh, and he drives now!
It's scary, my friends.

* Ryan and I are still

living like newlyweds.

It really does keep getting better!

 

 I still love my job teaching elemenary art!

I even did and art camp this past summer

and can't wait to do it again this year!

 

*We took an incredible vacation to Destin

with my whole family in July.

The house my parents rented was awesome.

They hired a chef to come in and cook meals for us.

THAT is the way to vacation, friends!

We cannot wait to go back in August!

Memories in the making!

 They spent hours on their skim boards.

 

What handsome men!

 Life is always better at the beach!

 My husband, the hopeless romantic.

Love him!

We took one night out for just the siblings and spouses

while my parents corralled the pack of 9 grand kids!

Love my brother and sister!



The last night, we took some family pics on the beach.

My world right here, ladies and gentlemen:

The WHOLE family!

What a fantastic week of memory making!

See you in August, Destin!!

 

*Ryan and I celebrated our 6th anniversary in October

and made this little token below to commemorate the occasion.

That's a good man who will willingly take his wife to a mosaic class!

 

*We are renting a cute little house until

the perfect house house pops up for us to buy sometime

between now and August.

I know it's out there somewhere,

but until then, I'm having fun changing up our decor

from dark and heavy to light and happy.

Remember this ottoman?

It used to be covered in a zebra print.

I found this new fabric online at Pottery Barn

and fell in love.

Ryan thinks I'm obsessed with putting everything on trays as seen below.

Trays and faux coral.

I'm pretending we live by the beach.

A girl can dream, right?

Remember these lamps Ryan gave me over a year ago from Pottery Barn?

They finally work in our house.

The side tables also used to be black.

I stripped the paint off and stained them.

Never again.

It was a total beating.

 See....more coral.

 I bought this bar cart from Target

after Christmas and saved about $90 of the original price.

I gave Ryan the monogrammed whiskey decanter for Christmas.

In about 2 more weeks,

there will be white slip covered club chairs on either side of the bar cart.

And yes, I said white.

It's one of the perks of having older children!

You don't have to worry about sticky hands all over the furniture.

The frame with the drawing in it is one I did.

It has the words from 1 Corinthians surrounding roses.

Our rental has a great little bar area off the family room.

It really is a cute house.

 More trays =)

Everything just looks better on a tray!

Okay.

When I brought this home,

Ryan thought I had lost my mind.

He gets it now.

It was even his idea to hang him here!



I used to have lots of blue and white porcelain

but sold it in a garage sale years ago.

Now I have to start all over!

Our kitchen

 

Yep.

It's on a tray.

Love the color palette.

There will always be monograms in our house. =)

 

*To close out this post,

my birthday is coming up this month

which is never a big deal to me.

BUT, this year's a big one.

40

I have been dreading it for a long time,

but I can't wait now because my sweet husband

surprised me on Christmas with this:

He sent me on a scavenger hunt

with clues in the form of poems that he wrote himself!



The final clue led me upstairs to this:

 And this:

We're going to Vegas for my 40th!!

Turning 40 doesn't seem so bad after all!

 

*Well.....there it is, friends.

Our life since April.

A lot has been left out, I'm sure, but you get the gist.

So until my next post,

have a great week, friends!

Newlywed Weekend!

Okay.

So, we're not technically newlyweds,

but it sure felt like it this past weekend.

Ryan bought us tickets to the

Zac Brown Band

concert in Dallas awhile back,

but, in true Soladay fashion, he surprised me with so much more.

Of course he did.

One of the many reasons I love the man.

How about a night at the beautiful Omni Hotel?

Yes, please.

With the romance package?

Duh.

Welcome to our room!

A little bubbly was waiting for us when we arrived.

The view of the Dallas skyline from our room:

I loved the art above the bed.

I told Ryan I would like a television

in our bathroom mirror like this in our next house.

I'm easily impressed.

We took showers and head out for dinner at Kenichi

where Ryan had made reservations.

The atmosphere was great as was the food.

The company?

Impeccable of course.

That was our table right in the middle.

Next up,

the driver came back to take us to the concert.

We made it just in time for the ZBB to take the stage.

They played a little bit of everything including some of their new music.
How handsome is this man!

After the concert,

we went to the sports bar, The Owner's Box, at the hotel for a drink.

Lot's of fun was had.

Back up in the room,

a robe awaited my arrival. =)

Annnnnnnnnnd the next morning,

breakfast in bed.

Wait, it doesn't end there!

Once we finally checked out of the hotel,

we drove over to The Katy Trail Ice House.

The weather was wonderful,

and the place was packed with lots of people eating, playing and hanging out.

Ryan and I discovered a new game.

Cornhole.

Google it.

So much fun.

He killed me of course.

We are definitely getting one to play with the boys.

Doesn't get any better!

Ryan I eventually head back our direction and had lunch on a patio,

did some shopping and finished the evening at Bluefish!

Ryan,

Thank you for such a wonderful weekend together.

You turned what could have been a simple but fun night out for some live music,

into a nonstop romantic "getaway".

You definitely know how to make a girl feel special.

It just keeps getting better. =)

Love you so much,

Your Wife