Austin, TX

DuBose had an NAES board meeting in Austin, TX this week so I flew out to meet him Thursday night so we could spend the weekend exploring Austin. We stayed at the brand new JW Marriott right downtown which was an awesome location. It was a beautiful hotel and we had a great corner room which meant that we had two complete walls of windows with amazing views.

Thursday night, we went to an NAES dinner about an hour after I arrived, and it was nice to see all of the other board members who were there as well.

DuBose had meetings all day Friday so I was free. And thankfully, so was Amy!! I've "known" Amy for 7 years now, but we've never met in person. When our first borns were babies, and we were home most of the time during naps, we both spent a lot of time blogging and reading other mommy blogs. We found each other's blogs through friends of friends. We started commenting on each other's blogs and found we had a lot in common. Pretty soon we were friends on Facebook, emailing each other and sending Christmas cards every year. Her husband even called me one time when he was surprising her with a birthday trip to see if I could meet up with them in Greenville for dinner. Sadly, I couldn't go then, but today was finally our day.

(I have to document here that my dad was a bit concerned about me meeting someone I met online. He wanted to know how I knew she was normal. I tried to explain that she would have to be faking her normalcy on her blog and Facebook and through her emails for years and years. I just didn't think she was all that interested in scamming a random girl from Charleston on the off chance she would ever come visit Austin. Love my dad though for worrying about me. I sent him the picture of us and told him not to worry  - she didn't seem like a serial killer.)

Amy picked me up from the hotel for a lunch date. We headed to Matt's El Rancho talking nonstop. I had so many questions (finally got her family tree all sorted out :) We told stories and just filled in a lot of blanks. It was perfect. Especially when we both had worries about the fact that, hmm, maybe we wouldn't click, and it would be awkward. Nothing worse than forcing small talk! But thankfully, it wasn't awkward for a second. In fact, we were having so much fun together that I tagged along with her to pick up her youngest, Charlotte, from preschool. We just kept right on talking and ended up at her house to meet her precious pup, Shep, and to have a tour of her house which is beautiful.

Our time together had to come to end sadly so we headed back to the hotel so she could drop me off. On the way, I looked over at a car next to us and saw her husband, Jack, waving at us. And when we got to the hotel she saw DuBose standing on the sidewalk before I did. I think it's crazy how we can pick each other's husbands out like that even though we've never met!

Having a blog has been awesome for me. I've loved documenting our lives as a family for the past 10 years. I've also loved reading about other people's families as well. It's like a good book that just keeps going on and on. And I've become attached to Amy's family through these readings over the years. And I have made a new friend. And now she's a true, real life friend! Icing on the blogging cake!

Thank you, Amy, for a wonderful afternoon. I truly enjoyed our time together and hope we can do it again soon! Come visit us any time in Charleston!! You are just as great in person as you are on line! XOXO

DuBose was finished with his meetings by the time Amy dropped me off so we checked out bikes from the Bcycle program (basically you rent them and just return them to various stations all over the city - awesome concept that every city should have!)

We headed over the Congress Ave bridge toward South Congress in search of a few recommendations from Amy.

We made it to Allen's Boots where we tried on a bunch of fun western stuff,

and DuBose left with new cowboy boots and jeans.

(Not the jacket, sadly :)

We browsed several more stores including Big Top Candy where we picked up treats for the kids. It sprinkled on and off while we were wandering but never really rained. It looked like it might be coming soon though so we started the trek back to the hotel.

After a rest in our room, we met his colleagues for one last dinner at Second Bar and Kitchen which was great and right across the street! We got lucky with the rain - it poured while we were eating but was only drizzling when we had to walk back across the street to the hotel.

Saturday, we were up early and started out after a breakfast at a cute neighborhood restaurant. Our goal today was to visit the Capital and the University of Texas, my dad's alma mater.

We walked along for a while and made it to the Visitor's Center which was a bit disappointing - no one was very helpful and there wasn't much information. We headed back out, grabbed a Bcycle, and made out way (uphill!) to the Capital.

We rode around the Capitol for a bit and then continued on to UT.

The University of Texas

where my dad spent his college days in the 60s.

The Tower 

I have known about the Tower all of my life because my father was attending UT when Charles Whitman climbed the tower and began shooting students on August 1, 1966. Not only was my dad attending, but he was right in the thick of things when the shootings began. I've listened to his stories all these years about where he ran to hide and witnessing such a tragedy. And, today, I was able to put a place to the stories I had heard. Standing there, underneath the tower, it's hard to imagine being a terrified college student running for my life. Charles Whitman's 96-minute shooting spree was our nation's first introduction to a mass murder in a public place. SWAT teams came into existence after this because there just wasn't a precedence, and students were firing back at him with their own guns. He shot 43 people, killing 13,  before he was shot down by a police officer. DuBose and I read this article while we there which is where all the information above came from. 

(http://www.texasmonthly.com/topics/ut-tower-shooting)

 So on to more cheery subjects, like football!!

Here's Memorial Stadium which was brimming with activity. We had no idea until our Uber driver picked us up later that we standing in the middle of the Orange and White Game festivities.

There were people dressed to the hilt in UT paraphernalia and even Bevo, the Longhorn mascot, was out taking pictures with fans.

We left UT, crossing the street to the Lyndon B Johnson Museum. DuBose and I both enjoy these types of historical places, and this one was very well done. We learned a lot about our nation's 36th president.

Being a "first lady" myself, I got a kick out of this quote of Lady Bird's. Clearly, her service was much greater and more important than mine ever will be, but I can relate to the fact that I'm only doing it because of the man I married.

There was a replica of the Oval Office as it was when LBJ was president.

We Ubered to Iron Works for a BBQ lunch after the museum. 

We both enjoyed our lunch and sitting down for a bit.

We decided to sit by the pool for the afternoon. It was a grey day except for a few patches of sunshine, but we still enjoyed relaxing a bit. DuBose swam and napped while I read.

We went to a delicious Mexican dinner at Manuel's and then walked down the street to the Congress Ave Bridge to see the bats. Apparently, when the bridge was built, bats took up residence in the crevices underneath the bridge. At first, the city tried to get rid of them, but soon discovered the benefits to over 1 million bats - they eat around 20, 000 pounds of insects every day!

Well, we waited with hundreds of other people on the bridge for over an hour, but the bats were a no show tonight. Oh well, we'll have to go back!

We went back to our hotel just in time for a huge storm to roll through. The wind was crazy, but the hail really grabbed our attention, especially since two sides of our room were completely glassed. It was a loud storm!

Sunday, we woke up early again and grabbed a rental car so we could explore the Hill Country before our 4:30 pm flight home. Before we left the hotel though, we had breakfast in the lobby. We were gifted this breakfast by the hotel for the "inconvenience" of letting someone go out of our window onto the roof to fiddle with the internet. We were also gifted a box of amazing cookies because our TV had gone out for a few hours. The hotel was great, but it was brand new and there were still some kinks to be ironed out - we just happened to benefit from two of them while we were there.

This guitar was one of several all over the city. The music scene is big in Austin (we didn't experience any though - another reason to go back!). I had to take this picture because Mills had left me a voicemail that asked me to bring him back a guitar from our trip. I gave him this picture along with a guitar keychain - not sure that's what he had in mind...


We hopped in our little Kia rental and took off exploring. We drove along the TX farm roads and saw beautiful countryside. We stopped at Pedernales Falls State Park to hike. This was a beautiful spot and one our kids would have loved exploring!

We could have spent more time here, but we had to keep moving. We drove along several scenic roads going through Dripping Springs, Johnson City, Blanco, Wimberly, and Kyle.

We stopped for lunch at this little cafe in Blanco, the Redbud. I had a super hamburger! And then, we had to head to the airport to catch our flight. The Austin to Atlanta flight was a bit late so we had to book it through the Atlanta airport to make our connection. Why am I always running through this airport!!? We did barely make it and were back home to our babes by 10 pm.

What a fun little getaway for us! Austin is a great city with great people (AMY!!), and I hope we go back one day. Thanks to Nana, Granddad, GG and Ryan for taking care of our little people while we were gone. They all had a blast and haven't stopped talking about their weekend!! Thank you!!