Future Dog

For those who don't know, I am working at a doggy daycare facility. I work with tons of dogs, big and small, which has sparked conversations with Joseph about what kind of dog we want in the future. I grew up with dogs nearly all of my life while Joseph grew up with cats. Because of that, we've compromised that we will have one dog and one cat hopefully! I always have wanted a golden retriever but Joseph isn't a huge fan of big dogs. And as I work at my facility more and more, I am starting to like small dogs too. They are easier to move (because you can just pick them up), they can't knock you over by jumping on you, they don't take up the entire couch/bed, and their licking tongues are smaller. Often, I will come home and ask Joseph to look at pictures of a certain breed of dog and see what he feels about it. Here have been some top dog choices over the past few weeks. Now, we're hoping that the humane society has one of these breeds because we're not paying hundreds of thousands of dollars to a breeder.

Cavalier King Charles Spaniel

Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever (a little bigger but still cool looking)

Manchester Terrier (like my parent's dog)

Spain in Texas

This past weekend, we went to San Antonio and Austin. Joseph loved San Antonio because of the Spanish influence that still exists there. He kept saying that the city reminded him of Spain except not quite as old. We enjoyed the Riverwalk, went on a little river cruise, visited the Alamo, went to the oldest restaurant in town, heard a mariachi band play, and did a few other tourist stuff.

The five bells symbolize the five missions in the area.

It's two trees growing through the brick of the building.

Right before this picture, a wedding couple was taking pictures there. We saw about three wedding couples getting married and taking pictures throughout the day.

The cathedral in San Antonio

Thank goodness my camera has a self-timer

The Alamo.

 After San Antonio, we drove north to Austin to visit Joe's family again. His mom came to Austin for a few days so we were able to visit with her as well. In Austin, we hung out with family, went to a park with peacocks, went hiking, and enjoyed playing with our 4-year-old nephew. He was fascinated with sinking ships so we watched a video of the Titanic sinking several times over the weekend.
 

Our nephew at the park with peacocks.

Houston nightlife

Now, we're back in Houston and back to the work week. We're looking forward to celebrating the Fourth of July here and seeing what else the summer brings!

More of Houston

I couldn't think of a good name for the post so it is sort of random. This is what we've been up to this past week.
Joe had to work nights at work for a week, which was tough on us. He would leave for work at 5pm and come home around 6:30am. I got up for work at 6:45am and came home around 4:45pm. So for a few days, we barely saw each other. But we made it!

Friday night, we went to the boardwalk and saw the fireworks. Kemah has fireworks every Friday night during the summer.

The finale of the fireworks!

Then Saturday, we drove into Houston and went to Discovery Green, which is a park that uses solar energy to run the buildings and stuff. They always have something going on in the park and we enjoyed walking around.

Something we saw while walking to the park.

The park had a few of these buildings that were really cool.

Picture of Discovery Green in downtown Houston.

Then, we followed the advice of multiple people and went to Bullritos for lunch. Joe has had several people recommend it to him so we went. It was delicious but I didn't like my pulled pork as much as I like Cafe Rio's. Oh well...

The burritos are HUGE!

After that, we drove up to the Houston Temple. It is a drive for us, about 1.5 hours from where we live but it's so pretty and we love going there.

This next weekend, we're taking a trip over to San Antonio/Austin for a few days to see family and sight see in San Antonio. It should be wonderful!

Houston, We have a problem...

We had some visitors last weekend! Joe's brother and his wife and son came to stay with us. They live in Austin so we're excited to have family within a few hours of driving. When they came, we decided to visit the Houston Space Center because their four-year-old son wanted to see some rockets. The center was alright. I definitely would not give it a thumbs-up but it was interesting. I thought it would be more hands-on as I love those kind of museums/attractions. But this place was much more of the "stare at it and move on" museum. We did get to walk through the front of a space shuttle and see all the buttons, which was cool. This fall they are planning to open a new exhibit where you can walk through an entire shuttle from top to bottom, which would be cool. They also had a huge tour of the Johnson Space Center and astronaut training areas but because of time, we couldn't go. That has the possibility of being cool too. However, my opinion is that you should do other things when you come to Houston and skip the space center.

We spent some wonderful time swimming in our pool and hanging out in our air-conditioned apartment. The weatherman on TV keeps saying that the temperatures are more like August weather than June so I'm not wanting August to come. We've also received TONS of information from Church about hurricanes and what to do. I'm crossing my fingers that we don't have to worry about that this summer. Hurricane season is officially under way and doesn't end until September. The weatherman on TV this morning said that the water temperature is 4 degrees above normal, which is the perfect condition for tropical storms and hurricanes. Hooray!

Here are some pictures from the weekend.

I made rocket ship cupcakes for everyone!

The big rocket that came from Florida for a new exhibit. It opens this fall and you will be able to walk through all of it!

Joe and his nephew at the boardwalk.

Let the building begin!

Last weekend, Joseph and I drove to Galveston to spend a day at the beach. Plus, it was the AIA Sandcastle Competition. I found this out in the spring and was so excited to see the huge sandcastles. It was a hot day but I am starting to get used to that. Here are some pictures from the day.

This sandcastle was inspired by the Occupy movement. Basically, the people just left the sand in one big pile, put some signs up, and then partied the day away behind it. I was very shocked that it didn't win any awards.

This one was called "Cup-lete." It won the award for "Most life-like."

This one was very artistic and had some underlying meaning but I don't know what it was exactly.

March Madness of the Penguins!

Houston Astro. Right now, there is a big political ordeal in Houston about rebuilding the Astro-dome so there were a few sandcastles with the Astro-dome.

Sanderella

This was the 1st Place Winner. The DOW sandcastle won second!

Here's East Beach that we went swimming in.

We had a bunch of fun and enjoyed swimming in the ocean. Stay tuned for more Houston excitement as we're going to the Houston Space Center today!