Galveston Getaway!

Wow it has been a long time since I've written anything! I'm very sorry for being away so long. Work has kept me plenty busy and on top of that my computer completely died. I finally have a new beautiful laptop/tablet! It seems like most of the laptops I looked at had touchscreens so I thought I might as well do a tablet with a detachable keyboard. I'm super excited! Now can someone teach me how to work around in Windows 8?? Anyways, the last I wrote was about the 4th of July. That feels like forever ago and yesterday all at the same time! Well I still have a few things to catch you up on. First of all was a weekend getaway that we spent in Galveston! Us and some friends decided to rent a beach house for the weekend. Best idea ever!! We were 3 blocks from the beach, made all of our meals, and spent the weekend lounging on the beach relaxing. We didn't have to drive very far and we didn't have to worry about having a long list of to-dos like we normally do on vacation.

Our beach house for the weekend!

Beach!

We went to a candy store on the strand and we actually got to see them make taffy!

Jonathan played chess with a stranger while we cheered him on.
There was a zombie walking around advertising a haunted house in the area, pretty random...

Rachel made a friend...

Colleen and Christine excitedly cheered on Jonathan...

and I found a blue tree! Quite an exciting day even without the chess game!



Plus, Jonathan won his game and I caught in on camera!

We ended the weekend at the Spot with a great view of the beach.
It was incredibly windy so I was glad to just have a beach view and not actually be on the beach.

It was the best weekend. Super relaxing and a blast! We might have to make this a yearly thing...

-Chelsey

4th of July Weekend

Long weekends are the best! They're even better if your sister comes to visit for the first time in over a year! (I still can't believe that it's been over a year since our wedding!) It's so weird that we're all grown up now and only see each other on special occasions. Thursday we went to Bayou Bend Collection and Gardens because it was free! It was quite an event. A lot of volunteers were dressed in period costume, there were musical performers, and of course the house was beautiful. (Sorry, we're not allowed to take pictures of the house!) They even had a parade and cake to celebrate our country's birthday but we left before then.

You have to cross this awesome bridge to enter the property!

Jonathan and Carolyn joined in on the musical group!

Learning about why they wore those silly outfits.

It's a butterfly!

A very intense cupid statue.

 



The house is so pretty!

After Bayou Bend we made a quick stop at the Beer Can House since it's right across the street. It's kind of funny how you can see completely differently things in Houston right next to each other. Thank you Houston for no zoning laws! If you don't know about the Beer Can House it's a house that's completely covered in beer cans. Pretty straight forward... Apparently this guy really loved beer and hated mowing or painting so he thought that paving over his yard and covering his house with beer cans would be the perfect solution. He was more creative with it than I expected and it actually looks kind of cool. You can tour the house on the weekends but we just walked around the outside.

After we had spent enough time in the hot sun we headed back to our house to relax for a bit before heading out to Miller Outdoor Theatre to watch the symphony and fireworks. I have literally never seen so many people there before. There were so many people that they were actually backing up to the reflection pool. We squeezed our way in so that we were at least facing the stage. We didn't have the best view but we could at least hear the symphony! The fireworks were beautiful and we even got to see 2 other firework shows from a distance.

We're excited!

Itty bitty symphony!

Fireworks!

Apparently camera phones are ideal for fireworks but you get the idea.

Friday was beach day and, although were slow moving in the morning from being up late the night before, we headed out to Galveston! There were a lot of people visiting the island but it wasn't too crowded. We spent a few hours at the beach and then walked a little bit around the strand.

Check out our sandcastle! It's the tower with the eye from Lord of the Rings.
Can't you tell?

It was a beautiful day!

And I didn't get sunburnt again! I'm getting pretty good at this whole sunscreen thing... Saturday was spent playing games and watching Clue. I forgot how funny that movie was. We also made a quick trip to First Saturday in the Heights. First Saturday is an arts market on 19th street every first Saturday of the month. In the summer it's in the evenings and in the winter it's during the day. Texans are smart about avoiding the heat. There were many different booths with paintings, sculptures, jewelry, etc. It's so nice to walk around and look at all the art and the artists are so nice and love to tell you all about their work. There's also live music so we listened to a folk band for a few songs before heading back home.

Sunday we met up for lunch before Carolyn had to head to the airport. That meant that the rest of the day was spent finishing laundry, dishes, all the fun stuff as usual...

Happy 4th of July! Thank you to everyone who has served for our country and Happy 237th Birthday to us all!

- Chelsey

Canyon Lake!

Last weekend Jonathan and I took a trip to Canyon Lake and spent the weekend with friends. We headed up on Friday and made a stop in Lockhart so we could go to Kreus for some barbecue! Lockhart and Luling are two very small towns that are known for some of the best barbecue in Texas. Jonathan being a huge foodie meant that we definitely had to try at least one of the best known restaurants in the area. Kreus was quite an impressive place. When we walked inside it actually got warmer (if you can believe that in the middle of summer in Texas). After walking down the hall I realized why. The end of the hall opened into a huge room where they were actually smoking their meats. That's where you ordered your meat and then you went into a different room that where you ordered your sides and ate your meal. That room was thankfully air conditioned. The food was pretty good but they were out of brisket. Sad day! I guess we'll have to go back...

It's a huge place!

They have a lot of rules. The no forks rule was a little hard to work around but we didn't mind the no bbq sauce rule!

Check out where you order! Behind the people are where all the meat is in smokers!

Yay air conditioning lol.

Saturday we all went tubing along Canyon Lake. It was my first time tubing so I was pumped to finally cross it off my bucket list. We spent about 3 hours on the lake just hanging out, drinking and snacking, and enjoying the water. I am quite proud to say that I didn't get sunburned! I tend to either forget to apply sunscreen or apply it really poorly and end up with weird sunburn designs all over me. So after 3 hours on the water in the sun we were pooped. We stopped and picked up pizza on the way back to the house and spent the rest of the afternoon being lazy. Check out the amazing view from the house we rented:

The lake was so beautiful. It's such a relaxing place to get away.

Sunday we headed out early to get to church. The church was on the other side of the lake and was in a beautiful area tucked behind a woodsy area. The parking lot was lined with the stations of the cross which was just beautiful. Lucky for us, the overlook park was right next to the church so we made a stop there before heading back to Houston.

Stations of the cross :-)

Even the parking lot was beautiful!

That's the church hidden behind the trees.

Beautiful view at the overlook park. You can walk down the damn but we were too tired to walk too far.

We were pretty exhausted but we did want to make one more stop. We always love going to wineries when we're in the Texas Wine Country. Jonathan gets his BBQ so I get my wine right? Our route took us right through Gruene, TX so we stopped at Winery on the Gruene.

Such a cute place!

Gruene was an adorable town! It looked like there was tons of cute shops and restaurants and there were so many people walking around. It's officially been added to my list of places that I need to go back to. Unfortunately we were also going to stop at Luling Barbecue on the way back but they are closed on Sundays. O well, I'm sure we'll be back again! I think we'll have to go back and stay along the lake again now that I know how relaxing and awesome it is! We had a great and long 4th of July weekend. My sister visited and we had a great time. I'll tell you all about it soon! 

- Chelsey

Date Night!

Last week while Jonathan and I were getting ready for work one morning I asked him, "We haven't been out for a date in awhile. Want to go out for a date?" So we did! On Thursday evening we got all dolled up and went to the Pass. Of course Jonathan could tell you all about the chef and how this restaurant is one of the best in Houston but I'll just tell you that it was really really good! One of these days my nagging will work and Jonathan will write a blog post about all his foodie knowledge... So anyways, Pass and Provisions are two restaurants that are owned by the same chefs and share a building. Provisions is the more casual bar food and Pass is the really fancy/tasting menu only restaurant. It was amazing food and we definitely want to go back to Provisions because they also serve some of our favorite dishes that we had.
 

Apple miso soup with red bell pepper froth, oyster, foie gras gel, and focaccia with white chocolate and olives.
Shockingly my favorite thing was the focaccia, and I don't like olives!

Tofu wrapped in house made pasta (the green thing under everything) with nori sushi.



An amazing salad! They froze salad dressing using liquid nitrogen!



It melted! Hehehe I'm easily amused.

Lobster roll! You know how much we love these!



Duck with a foie gras mousse salad thing on the side that was really good!

This was the cheese course. Looks like an oreo but tastes nothing like it!

Dessert that was a deconstructed fernet.
Don't know what fernet is? Me neither, but it was yummy!


We had a great night. It was one of the meals where every dish had something that really surprised us. I always love meals like that. Plus we need to work better at fitting in date nights every once in awhile since we seem to always be busy!

Friday night we went to Miller Outdoor Theatre with some friends to see the Houston Symphony. Unfortunately it was the busiest I'd ever seen it and we didn't actually see the symphony but we did chat, munch on snacks, and listen to the music. Plus the show ended with fireworks which we had great seats for since we were all the way in the back. How lucky were we?


It was actually quite pleasant weather wise. Being in Texas we are pretty much stuck inside all day during the summer so it's nice to go out in the evenings and enjoy the fresh not quite as hot air.

This weekend we are off to the New Braunfels area for a friend's birthday. I'm looking forward to a weekend and tubing! I've never been tubing even though I lived in Austin for 3 years. That was a fail... It's going to be awesome floating the river, drinking some beers, and enjoying the scenery. I hope you have a fun weekend planned too!

-Chelsey

Rienzi and Bayou Collection and Gardens

A few weeks ago Jonathan and I finally got around to visiting Rienzi! I never knew of any historical houses in Houston to visit. We recently found out that there are two in Houston owned by the Museum of Fine Arts called Rienzi and Bayou Bend Collection and Gardens. Once I heard about them I immediately wanted to go. What was even better was that I found a Groupon for Rienzi! It never has to be expensive to get out of the house and see new things. So anyways, Rienzi was the home of the philanthropists Carroll and Harris Masterson starting in 1952. I believe the home was named after the architect that designed the house. The Mastersons were a fairly wealthy family and developed a large collection of European art, furniture, etc. It is absolutely stunning. I wanted to take many pieces home with me. Our tour guide was really nice and especially patient with us since we asked so many questions. We learned a lot of interesting tidbits. For instance, did you that when the English started creating their own porcelain and china they often had Asian inspired designs? Before that time, porcelain was only available in Asia and those were the only designs that the English knew to paint. They ended the tour with the family wedding gown that has been passed down from generation to generation. Of course only the girls were interested haha. Rienzi hosts many events but the only weddings allowed on the property are for family members. The family wedding gown has been worn by five brides with the last wedding in 2010ish (I think). Unfortunately, we weren't allowed to take any pictures inside the house but I do have beautiful pictures from the outside of the house. By the way, it's free to just visit the gardens!

Jonathan was smart to wear sunglasses. I'm a little squinty.



It's a beautiful place and the tour was well worth it. We've also been to the Bayou Bend Gardens but haven't toured the house to see the collection. Every Thursday in the months of October and March BBCG has a Sip and Stroll. The admission is the same cost as normal entrance plus they have wine and cheese. We went last October and it was awesome. The gardens are amazing and the house looks beautiful. The house was the home of philanthropist Ima Hogg and the collection is American art and furnishings compared to the European Collection at Rienzi. Both locations have events all the time and their website has their calendar of events. I even noticed that admission to BBCG is free on the 4th of July! We may have to check that out. If we do I'll be sure to tell you all about it!

-Chelsey