Happy (early) Valentine's Day!

Since we won't be together on Valentine's Day (I'm about to leave for San Antonio for TMEA, and Dave is working out west), I thought it would be fun to pull out an old Valentine's Day picture. This is from Valentine's Day 2004, my senior year at Taylor.


We were still newlyweds, and my parents came out for the Taylor Sounds' annual Valentine Banquet. Of course, memories of the Sounds are dear to our hearts (no pun intended!), since that is where we first met!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Conducting at the Meyerson

Today I took my 2nd graders to hear the Dallas Symphony at Meyerson Symphony Center. They saw a wonderful concert called "The Recipe of Music," which reviewed the "ingredients" of music. I always love taking my students to the orchestra; so many of them would never have a chance to hear a live orchestra if we didn't go to the symphony on a field trip!

At any rate, the symphony's education director e-mailed me last week and asked if I would conduct part of the audience during the concert while the orchestra demonstrated the concept of round/canon. During the concert today, the audience was divided into 3 groups and sang "Frere Jacques" in a round. The orchestra conductor, the "chef," and I each directed one group.

I didn't tell my students that I was going to do this, so when the condcutor called me up on stage during the concert, my kids went CRAZY! They were so excited!

I know my all my conducting classmates from TU, along with Dr. Rediger, will be so proud.

Super Bowl Party

We had a great Super Bowl party on Sunday night with friends from our community group along with Brandon & Alicia's community group!

Nobody was too interested in the pre-game, so this is what was happening at our house before kickoff!


Audrey was definitely the life of the party, and she was much more entertaining than any of the commercials! :) And once she realized she was the center of attention, she was even funnier!

Dave & Eric watching the game and eating AWESOME Jet's pizza! (We love the new pizza place they just put in near our house on North Tarrant!)

Brian, Alan, Stephanie, and Audrey (who tried to be in every picture I took!):
Josh & Lara:

Brandon, Alicia, and Trenton were here for a little while, but unfortunately I didn't get any pictures of them. (However, Trenton did a have a lot of fun with my sight-singing textbook from Taylor! Maybe we introduced him to a future as a theory professor!) And, Tiffany came after work--just in time to see Audrey get really silly! :)

Our New "Woodshop"

Dave used his birthday money to buy a router and a sander, because he's been wanting to do some woodworking projects. Since then, all his Saturdays have been spent in our garage, which is also now known as "the woodshop." Because we both love to read so much, we have way too many books at our house (even though I recently sold several on Amazon) and not enough shelf space for them all...so, Dave's first major project is a bookshelf for our front hallway! Today he cut and sanded all the shelves.

(No, he's not graying prematurely--that's just all the sawdust in his hair!)

Welcome, Caden!

Our sweet friends Jenny and Joel had their baby boy, Caden Michael, last Thursday morning at 1:15 a.m. We couldn't be more happy for them!

Jenny was in the hospital for a while before Caden arrived, so we went up to Baylor on Wednesday night to have dinner with them. It was a really fun time together; plus, our friend Tiffany, a NICU respiratory therapist at Baylor, was working then, so she was there, too!

My grandma made this beautiful afghan for Caden. Here he is on his way home!


Caden is truly a testimony that God is faithful! He hears our prayers and shares our tears even when we don't feel that He does. We are so thrilled that God blessed Jenny and Joel with such a beautiful baby! Welcome, Caden!

Eliasville...Ghost Town Bridge

It's been a while since our loyal viewers have had a construction update, and, unfortunately, even longer since we've posted a picture of a crane. Well, today is your lucky day as I take you to the bridge in Eliasville (close to Graham), Texas.


This scene unfolded back in Sept. when the job started. Most jobs start with clearing the project area so it's suitable for construction to begin. Our job is to construct small sections of road and a bridge next to the existing bridge and then tie the existing road to our new bridge.


Just about every road involves moving dirt, and here we are loading dirt into an off-road dump truck so we can build up the grade of the new road. Driving these trucks is always an adventure, and as there is little to no suspension, you're in for a bumpy ride if the haul road isn't maintained... I've considered selling tickets for rides on the weekends!


Here we are pouring the columns for the bridge. I call this one "Billy IN the Can." Other than appearing to have fallen in, he's actually smoothing the concrete where the top of the column is going to be.


Right before Christmas, we set beams on the caps. This is always a big production because of the incredible weight of the beams and the very real possiblity of dropping one if something goes wrong. The next picture is a great shot of both cranes taking a beam off of the truck and preparing to set it. The tall crane has 130 ft. of boom on it!

Happy Birthday!

Today is Dave's 29th birthday!

Here are a few of my favorite pictures of Dave from the last year...

Working on the crane...one of Dave's favorites!

Time spent on the gazebo...(which, despite our problems with it, Dave still hopes to complete!)

Lots of Scrabble games! (It's never good to have letters like this...)

Time at the golf course...

...and many, many wonderful times together!

Happy Birthday, Dave! I love you more than life itself and can't wait to see what #29 brings!

P.S. I'm sure Dave would love to read any birthday messages you'd like to leave for him!