the last month....

I swear, everyone is asking where I have been. I really think had my internet been working, you would have known...however, I have now had 3 trips to my house from AT&T in the last few months, and FINALLY it appears they have fixed it. Keep crossing your fingers it keeps working!

The last month has been CRAZY busy - but also SO MUCH FUN. I love it when you can just look back at all your pictures and re-live how much fun it was. I think God has truly blessed my life lately - he has opened my eyes to so many things, let me spend my time with people who are truly a blessing to me - and let me do some of the things I love. 

I've been home a few times lately...I love going home. I've told you guys that before, but walking into my parents house for me is like walking into my sacred place. I get to relax hang out with my family, cook and just be loved on by mom and dad. I LOVE it. We all went home one weekend to hear about mom and dad's latest trips and mom had SO MANY tomatoes. It was almost unreal...so I made this...

 I'm going to say I don't think this picture really does it justice. But home grown tomatoes, fresh basil out of the garden and then fresh mozzarella and a balsamic reduction. You just can't beat it. 

When we are home, we usually meet for breakfast on Saturday morning with my grandfather. It is a big joke in my family about who is the favorite grandchild. Actually, just about being favorite anything - cousin, aunt, whatever. So we have a new "favorite"....SR is marrying my sweet cousin E and he had to drive in the car in silence...for 7 hours....so she could write thank you notes. He said he deserved an award. So he got one:

"Favorite Future Spouse of the Grandchild" award. Don't ask for an award from someone in the Lippe family...you'll probably get one. Even Papa signed it! ha! LOVE IT! (don't worry, i just had an extra favorite grandchild award printed and ready to be signed with my name on it....just to razz E and to get some laughs!)

Then we had our monthly girls dinner. This time we let the boys come and play too! Here I am with KC and MG. It was our first real monthly dinner since she's been back! It is such a blessing to have her back in Houston!

 Here are all the girls. LOVE these girls....LOVE LOVE LOVE them. We have been friends the entire time I have been in Houston - they have truly helped me through the rough times and we have had lots of fun and laughter together! (and probably a little trouble here and there, but it was worth every second!)

 SM and I were cracking up that we were both wearing about the same dress! Here we are in our dresses!

 And here I am with Miss MG. I heart her....so so so glad she is back! I missed her while she was living in Dallas!

 And then I got to go visit my sweet friend JM in Minneapolis. Don't ask me where it is on a map....I'm still not sure. What I am sure of is how much I love it - well, in the summer anyway! It is a GREAT town and I think if I lived there I would be always walking around the lake...and enjoying ice cream afterwards too! And what else I love is these two sweet faces:

 I wish I could tell you which is which - I would guess L is on the left and M on the right  - but without seeing their toes, I can't tell! M has her toes painted to help tell them apart! They are SO CUTE....and they play so well like this. I loved getting to love on them a bit. They really are the best babies EVER! 

It rained a bit - and in case you didn't know - when it rains, you just have to go to Chuck E Cheese. Here is sweet E - she was posing because this "ride" takes your picture - don't think it was just for me! 

 And this sweet thing - Little L - she LOVES her leopards and smells them all the time. She is SO CUTE and I love this picture because it captures her perfectly. 

 And here is sweet JM. I HEART this girl. Its like we never left college or things haven't changed one bit...besides she's married with 4 kids and moved to Minnesota. But whatever. Nothing big.  I LOVED getting to spend time with her, hanging out, getting to see the town and getting to love on her sweet girls.  I want to go back in winter and see what this whole "-15" degrees is all about!

 And here is one thing I LOVE about that place. The Lake....this was taken as we were driving past. I know....who would have thought my camera on my phone would take this!

 And my favorite picture of the whole trip....at the Mall of the Americas after riding some rides....little L just looking up at me. I captured her sweet heart right here. JM has texted me telling me that little L asks for me every day and prays for me every night. She is just so SWEET. 

 And then there is this. I feel like I shouldn't admit I did this, but I did. To help out a friend, we judged a beauty pageant. Yes, I said beauty pageant. And this guy came to help crown the winners:

 It was an experience. That's about all I can say. This is one of the "Queens" getting crowned. She was SASSY and so cute! 

 And this little thing.....I mean, she walked the run way with this smile you couldn't believe. she was SO CUTE! It was an experience that is for sure. 

 Then it was time for the monthly Girls dinner with the 2010 Camp Rainbow Blue Team Counselor dinner. I have to say, I have met a lot of girls through the Houston Junior League. And I can say that these girls are some of the most amazing girls I have ever met. We just clicked. All of us - which is so rare. We still get together every month to hang out and catch up. I LOVE seeing them....this night we showed up at the restaurant at 7:30 and shut the place down at 11. Now, that is what I call dinner! 

Then I made another trip home to bake some cookies....just a few....like over 200. My sweet cousin E's wedding is next weekend so I had offered to bake the "going away presents" for the guests. We decided to do it in Seguin since my mom's kitchen is WAY bigger and she has double ovens. I think she was a little worried too since that was a lot of cookies. She apparently should have been more worried about the mess I was going to make.....

 And to think - that was the last batch of cookies and  that was what I looked like. After the icing, it was MUCH worse....don't worry, no pictures of that. It would definitely scare small children! I even made the bride come in and help....and put her to work!

 And don't think I stopped with the bride....the mother of the bride came too! She learned all about icing cookies...the cool way - with icing bags and squeeze bottles! 

 Here is the finished product - all 200 of them!!! you will note the perfect two rows around one side. It was like a race track - me scooting my chair around to put the initals on it and my aunt and cousin coming along behind me moving the iced cookies and putting clean ones to be done in a row. It was awesome! 

 And here is the fnished product. The they turned out SO CUTE!!!! And of course, match the cake topper! 

 Then it was off to meet the family for family breakfast...and on the way home dad took the other route -- which just happened to go through luling. I told him "if you go that way, I might not be able to smell the BBQ and not stop". His response, "why do you think I chose to go that way?"  Evil man....but this is in the parking lot. I am going to send it to my boss and suggest we make all our pumping units look cool like this....I think it could get us some street cred! 

 and a picture of what I had for lunch. definitely not on the "diet". definitely worth every single bite. All the places in Lockhart get all the fame on all the cooking shows, but I still like this one best. 

And now we are all caught up with the pictures. I have some more things to share, but I'll have to find some time to do that. Tomorrow is defensive driving and getting ready for a long week at work! Thanks for checking back in....now I have no excuses since the internet works again! Hope you had a great last month like I did! Have a blessed week!