2012 in Pictures

I love looking through the photos of the year stored on my hard drive.  At the end of 2011 I did a post with photos from each month of that year, and I wanted to do the same for 2012.  It forces me to organize my photos for the year, and it's sentimental.

January
Ben and Will (before or after church).

Will got his first big boy bike.

I love Texas weather.  The boys can play outside year-round, even in January.

February
Ben copies whatever Will does.

Ben's a baller!  He can shoot and score on his little goal.

He's pretty good at swinging a bat, too.

March
Our annual spring break trip to the Dallas Arboretum to see Dallas Blooms.

April
Easter egg hunt at Mark's family at his parents' house.

Easter morning

Easter

May
Mother's Day

Will's pre-k graduation

June
Ben turned 3!

Ten year anniversary trip to Las Vegas

Once we were home the boys wanted to go on a trip so they made an airplane.

Father's Day

Vacation Bible School

Our actual anniversary.  Ten of the best years of my life!

July
Swim lessons at the YMCA

Creating all sorts of things.  Gas stations for the hot wheels.

Road Trip to Red River, NM with a stop along the way in Amarillo, TX and Cadillac Ranch.

We drove Route 66, which made my boys super happy.

August
One last mini-vacation before school starts to College Station!
Whoop! Gig 'em, Aggies!

Sul Ross statue in front of the Academic building on the campus of Texas A&M University.

We visited the George Bush Presidential Library that is located at Texas A&M.

Brenham is a short drive from College Station so we toured the Blue Bell Ice Cream factory while we were in the area.

Will started kindergarten.

 September
My good friend and former roommate, Kayreen, and her friends from Idaho and Seattle visited.

Ben rocking out.

October
The boys after church.

Fall is my favorite season.

Halloween


Soccer
Will's first soccer season.

November
Will turned 6!

Our family at Thanksgiving

December
Will wrote his letter to Santa all by himself.

New Christmas tradition.
The boys counted down the days until Christmas by opening a book each night starting December 1st.

Making cookies for Santa

Playing in the snow on December 26th

Ben and his favorite costume, Captain America.  He spent many days of 2012 in this.

2012, you were a very good year!

I can't help but feel blessed beyond measure--immeasurably more than I could have ever imagined.

Ephesians 3:20 

Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us,



Road Trip 2012 {Red River}

I was determined to blog about our Road Trip to Red River, New Mexico before 2012 ended.  Back in the summer before school started, I wrote about Santa Fe, our drive on the High Road from Taos to Santa Fe, and the first stop on road trip Amarillo, Texas and Route 66.  School started at the end of August, and I had very little free time after that.  The relentless pace of our fall schedule picked up and I rarely spent time on the computer, therefore I never completed sharing our road trip photos.  Here's the post about Taos. 

I hope I can remember most of the details of our fun and relaxing vacation.

We stayed in Red River for about a week.  We were fortunate to have a family friend who owns a condo there and we stayed at it.  We shared the condo with Mark's parents.  The boys loved having them with us and we were able to have a fun night out on Mark's birthday because they could watch Will and Ben.

One afternoon Mark and I decided to ride the ski lift to the top of the mountain and look around while Will and Ben stayed back with Jerry and Carol.  It was really sunny on the way up, but once we were on top of the mountain it started to thunder.  That made me really nervous so we didn't stay long.  We asked someone to take our photo before we headed back down the mountain.

The views from the ski lift were majestic.

One of the neatest memories from the vacation was a Native American dance in an open area near the shops at Red River.  I'm pretty sure they were called the Taos Pueblo dancers.

He was so talented.

Will and Ben posed for a photo with the dancers.  The people from this Native American tribe have won awards for their dancing and singing performances.

What was even cooler was that Will and Ben joined them for a big group dance!  I was surprised that Ben would join in, but he did since he could hold Will's hand.  Will and Ben are in the green and yellow and have their backs to us.  They had a blast!

After the dancing, there was an old-fashioned, Wild West gun fight.  Several days during the week there's a bank robbery and shoot out at Frye's Old Town.  It's local business owners and community members who do the performance.   I think we all agreed it was funny but mostly corny.  The boys really enjoyed it, and it attracted a pretty large crowd, but, in my opinion, the Native American dancers were the true highlight.

We had dinner one night at a local dive, The Dairy Bar.  I had the green chili stew.  It was amazing!

One day we met at the community center for a hike. 

Will, Ben and Jerry are waiting for the hike to begin. 

One of the stops on the hike.  This is the view from the bridge.

Ben is serious about his safety tips.

Carol, Ben, Jerry and Mark

One of the rustic buildings in Red River.

Will got a ride from Papaw.

It was Mark's birthday while we were on vacation so the boys made him a birthday cake. 

One of my favorite days was the day it rained and we didn't go anywhere.  I remember drinking hot tea and reading a book.  It was so relaxing.  That's what vacation should be!

I thought this was such a cute photo of Ben and Mamaw!

He loves his mamaw!  How sweet!

A few more of my favorite photos from my phone.

Mark on his birthday

We watched Hugo at the Community House on the night of his birthday.

Will and Ben the day before we left. 

View from our hike. 

One last view from our balcony. 

 Amazing scenery when we were driving into the mountains before we arrived in Red River.