A Birthday Celebration in Texas

To begin, for those of you who don't know...I recently went through a break up. Prior to this break up I had picked out a lovely necklace from Tiffany's I had wanted my then-boyfriend to purchase for me for my birthday. Needless to say, I determined that the best option for this beautiful gift was for me, the hard working law student and law clerk, to put some of that hard earned money to good use on the necklace I wanted. So, I bought the necklace as a birthday present to myself. It's the Eva Peretti Bean necklace which I wanted because it reminds me of "the Bean" in Millennium Park in Chicago.

 

A photo of my new neckalce...hard to see.

 

My mom and me!

My family and I gathered for a great time over the Fourth of July weekend which also coincides with my birthday. So, I flew in from Chicago and met up with my family for a "camp out" in New Braunfels, Texas.

We spent the weekend playing foosball, volleyball, the game kind of like horse-shoes that I can't remember the name of right now, swimming, hot tubing, dancing and singing to karaoke, camping in the rain and eating way too much food. My family is big on food. We always over prepare, over-pack and overeat everything in sight. There is a joke in my family that when we gather, all we really do is "eat".


For example, on the Friday when we arrived, my aunt and uncle had already prepared a large brisket that was so tender and juicy it fell off the bone and melted (literally!) in my mouth! The rest of the weekend we pigged out on fajitas, mexican casseroles, hot dogs, fried green tomatoes, fried okra, Blue Bell ice cream and a ton of other calorie intensive but delicious meals.

                                                         Fried Green Tomatoes!

After the eventful July 4th weekend, it didn't seem anything could top that for me. Before arriving in Texas, I hadn't been around my whole family in a long time. I saw them last on Memorial Day but only for three days. Before that, I hadn't visited my family since Christmas. So, to spend a week and a half with my entire family was extremely exciting to me.

On Monday my mom, grandma and I went shopping. My mom totally splurged on me and bought me three beautiful dresses and the cutest top. She's really excited for me that I've been losing weight and she wanted to buy me some new clothes in my new size! By the way, I'm down a dress size which is so exciting!

 

My new birthday dress I wore to my birthday lunch with my mom!

For my birthday, my mom and I went to my favorite Mexican food restaurant, Cantina Laredo in downtown Austin. We stuffed ourselves with "Top Shelf Guacamole", margaritas, brisket tacos and way too much of their delicious chips and salsa. Then my mom and I bought a Dairy Queen Ice Cream Cake (Cookies and Cream) which I secretly adore and we celebrated my "birth-day" together. Here is a photo of me with my cake. We didn't have any candles, so my mom improvised with a lit match. :)

Happy 23rd Birthday!

After celebrating with my mom, I spent the night with my best friend in the entire world, Jenn. We went to my favorite wine bar in Austin, Corks & Company and ate tons of cheese and drank delicious wine. We also went to the Arab Cowboy, a hookah bar in Austin, where we lounged with friends and laughed the rest of the night away. The first is a photo of my friend, Moe and me. He is American soldier who lived in Iraq for a great deal of his life. The second is a photo of my best friend, Jenn, and me.

Moe and Me at Arab Cowboy

Me and Jenn at Arab Cowboy

On Thursday I went to visit the family I used to babysit for. The mother of the family is also known in the online world as Vetommy. Jennifer, the "Vetmommy", made us a lovely dinner and the kids, Anna (9 year old), Colin (7 years old) and I played all sorts of fun games, like "Doctor" and each of them showed me all their collection of goodies. When I first started watching Anna and Colin, Anna was three years old and Colin was 18 months old! It really makes me feel old when Colin asked before bed if he could read me a book! Jennifer and Anthony (Dad of the family) then stayed up laughing, talking, drinking lots of delicious cabernet sauvignon and eating peach gelato! If you want the recipe, here is a link to Jennifer's post all about her delicious gelato!

On Friday my 21+ cousin, Jenn, and I went to Highball, a great bar that hosts karaoke parties, bowling parties, and includes a restaurant and dance floor. We sang the night away in our own private karaoke room (which was a blast!) and then went to Players, where we played pool. At the end of the night, we all went over to my cousin Darrell's and his wife, Pina's, house. We stayed up late playing Farkle and laughing.

 

This is Matt, my cousin, trying to keep up with the rap song he chose to sing! Poor choice Matt!

  

Jenn takes a bite out of her brownie sundae.

 

Pina, Darrell's wife, tries to sing along to her country song.

 

Darrell laughs as he tries to keep up with his song. He said, "Don't they know I can't read!"

 

Jenn and I sang together a song I didn't even know...of course, I made it work! :) 

Darrell and I posed for a photo at Player, Pina demanded he try to keep his eyes open!

  

Pina gets ready to break!

 

Jenn and I posed for a photo at Players.

The rest of the weekend my mom and I spent buying her a new big screen TV! My mom is officially "Hooked Up". She bought a brand new 46" LCD Samsung TV and it's so clear and crisp. When I arrived home in Chicago, I took one look at my 36" flatscreen and was bummed! But then again, there's a reason she's the mom and I'm the daughter. :)

My mom and I spent our last few nights stuffing ourselves with Mexican food (which I think my mom is totally sick of now) and watching our favorite movies like The Family Stone, Rambo 4, and some new favorites, like 16 Blocks and A Perfect Getaway. We also searched high and low for the perfect summer sandals and shopped all our favorite discount treasures like T.J. Maxx, Big Lots, Nordstrom Rack, Marshalls, etc.

My mom and I were really excited to see a new movie by Sylvester Stallone is coming out with Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger. We love action movies and we secretly love Sylvester Stallone, okay, it's not so secret. Here is a trailer for the new movie called "The Expendables"! Doesn't it look awesome!? Not sure why it is going off the page...



Needless to say, returning to my life of school, work and less play was a total bummer. I was so sad to leave Texas and all my family and friends. I wish I could express to you all how much I miss you. It's hard being away, but I know sometimes we have to make sacrifices to follow our dreams. I love Chicago, but I miss Austin. I know one day I'll have the opportunity to move back and I hope whatever decision I make, it will be the best one for me.