family time.

look who came to visit us recently! my timmy and my momma!

and, of course, two little furry friends came along.

and no, i don't mean austin, but rather tucker and miss abi!

i always get so excited when momma and timmy come visit and this time they came the weekend after i took my board exam, so some much needed fun was long overdue. friday night we all headed down to nightfall after grabbing some burgers at urban stack, one of my and austin's favorite places. i highly recommend the southwestern veggie {you know, no food with a face}.

i honestly can't remember what we did on saturday... i do remember we went to lowe's and ate at a new mexican restaurant in hixson. the rest of the day? yeahnotsure.

but i do think there was lots of puppy cuddles happening. tucker thinks he's a lap dog...

on sunday we went to the farmer's market and bought our veggies for the week and supplies for us to have a cookout that evening.

aren't my momma and timmy just the cutest?

and these puppies cuddling together. i mean, can you even? i can't.

so we grilled out on sunday evening. juliet hid in the shade of the elephant ears and hostas and austin got to use his new grill and his new smoker, too! we have way too many meat-cooking appliances for a household that is 50% vegetarian...

i'm so glad my momma and my timmy came to visit. it's always a great time when they are here!

and the pups are always entertaining...

signal point and fall creek falls.

i'm working on getting caught up on some recent happenings including sharing a couple of hiking trips austin, ben and i took back in june.

for our first trip we took the very short drive up to signal mountain to hike the trail at signal point. you may remember that austin and i took a hike up there about two years ago as part of our first wedding anniversary. this time we actually hiked all the way in {about two miles, i think} until we found a swimming hole.

a ridiculously, extremely, awfully cold swimming hole.

i got in, but only for about three minutes. because i could no longer feel my toes.

the second trip we took was up to fall creek falls. i'd never been before and it's just about an hour drive so we loaded up the car and the dogs and took off. we started at the top and hiked down to the base of the highest waterfall in the eastern united states.

the puppies had a fun hike, too. ben's dog sandy really loves the water, juliet just appreciates being in my lap and keeping her paws dry.

it was a seriously hot day, but the hike had lots of shade so it wasn't miserable.

we packed some food for a picnic lunch and break from all the hiking.

after eating we went to what i think was the most crowded part of the entire state park to find a spot to swim/wade in the water. we tried to get as far away from the crowd as possible, so juliet didn't eat anyone. and would you believe it that we actually got juliet to swim?! it took a lot of coaxing and some lead-by-example demonstrations showing her the water wasn't too deep for her to touch, but by the end of the day she was {almost} voluntarily going in the water! i was so proud.

i can't wait for austin and i to go back to fall creek falls to camp! hopefully it won't take another 7 years before i can convince austin to take me.

also, recently austin and i have been doing a fair amount of traveling for his work. first, we spent a few days at a conference in nashville and i got to meet up with brandi, katie and boomer for some non-air-conditioned dinner. the next conference was in knoxville and apparently austin and i decided to take a 6 mile hike through downtown to prove a point to some middle-aged ladies who thought it was too far to walk.

turns out, they were right. it was too far to walk. but we did it anyway because i was not about to be told how far i could or could not walk by some strangers.

totally should have listened to them. but at least we burned some calories. and austin ordered us some drinks that looked like dirty dishwater. yum?

aaaand cue completely unrelated pictures to end this post. because i've got no good way to end.

a little trip home.

as i mentioned at the end of my last post, i recently had a quick trip back to virginia to see my family and to see my bff kasey! juliet and i jumped in the car and made the drive up i-81 to my most favorite place in the whole. entire. world.

juliet is so smart that as soon as we take the exit she starts crying because she knows where she is and she gets so excited. like, head out the window excited.

although i don't blame her. if i wasn't driving i'd probably hang my own head out the window to breathe in that fresh country air. :)

but seriously. do my parents not have the best view in the world?

and it's a good thing they have a nice patio and view because poor juliet was so incredibly disappointed to find that momma and timmy weren't even home when we arrived! but she hopped up into her usual spot to watch over snakey acres as we waited. she loves being up on that wall and spends 95% of the time we are home outside by herself so she can sit up there. and she won't come inside until she's good and ready.

one of the sweetest things about visiting home {other than seeing everyone i love, of course!} is that my momma always put fresh flowers in my room before i arrive.

after momma and timmy arrived, we let their new puppy abi {abby?} and juliet meet for the first time. this face. how could you not love her?

and no, her tongue does not fit into her mouth. ever. actually that's not true. there's also this face:

silly puppy.

after a bit of time spent chatting/catching up/napping we all headed down to the blue ridge country music festival where we got to see colt ford, hunter hayes and little big town {gloriana played too but we missed them}. the music was good, the food was sold out, but the people watching was probably one of the best parts. i can't even explain some of the things. but we had a good time.

on sunday I GOT TO SEE KASEY! for anyone who doesn't know, kasey is my bestest friend from high school who moved to michigan right after we graduated. i actually drove her up there {okay, fine, i rode in my car with her as she drove and i slept most of the way} and spent a few weeks helping her get settled/hanging out/being silly. michigan is pretty far away but fortunately we get to see each other about once a year. last year she came to see our new house in tennessee! and while we usually spend about 6 hours taking pictures i somehow managed to only get this one picture of us this trip.

the best thing about getting together with kasey is that it's like no time has passed since our last visit. i'm so, so glad i got to see my best friend!

and now just a few random pictures i wanted to share from my trip. when momma came to visit me for my pinning ceremony i sent her home with some succulent cuttings and they've really taken off on her porch!

tucker puppy was begging for food and i thought this was the sweetest little face.

if juliet wasn't out on the wall, she was claiming this entire chair for herself.

and after a long day of playing in the yard, abi looks like this.

you and me both, abi.

stay tuned for more posts coming soon about more family fun and traveling!

the beach!

so austin and i just got back from the beach over the weekend. before we got married we used to go to fort walton beach/destin, florida at the beginning of every summer with austin's parents. but the year we got married we didn't go {we were a bit busy gettin' hitched and all} and we hadn't been back since. i'm not really sure why, but i'm sure it had to do with austin having/changing jobs and me not having a job/being in school. but not this year!

i really don't have that many pictures to share. mostly because blinding sun + greasy sunblock + sand + digital camera = hot mess. but i do have a few because i whined to austin that i just had to have pictures to prove we went on vacation i wanted to have the memories recorded.

although it was a bit seaweed-y some days for the most part the water was so clear!

we arrived on saturday afternoon and after the drive none of us were interested in going grocery shopping or cooking. instead we decided to grab dinner at dewey destin's seafood. and by "we" i of course mean everyone but me because they had zero food i could eat. they couldn't even throw some lettuce on a plate and call it a salad for me. i later had a frozen dinner meal back at the condo.

on sunday we hit the beach. obviously. and i slathered on spf 60 the entire week to keep from getting burned. #palegirlproblems. austin and i headed out to the boardwalk to wander around. a people watch. there's always interesting people-watching at the beach.

and bird watching. we saw lots of these birds. you can get crazy close to them and they just sit there.

we also saw lots of pelicans. a favorite.

oh what a wonderful bird is the pelican. for his beak can hold more than his belly can. he can store in his beak enough food for a week and i don't know how in the hell he can.

we grabbed a few drinks and then had dinner at mcguires just over the bridge into destin. listen to me here: if you go to destin, you MUST get pizza at vinny mcguires. it was delicious. no joke. and our server was ridiculously awesome. and the decor inside mcguires is... interesting.

{is this picture blog appropriate? idowhatiwant.}

on monday austin and i packed the cooler and the car and headed to the state park for some snorkeling. it was really fun. i so badly wished we had thought ahead to buy one of those cheap-o disposable under water cameras. but we didn't. but then again no one needs to be photographed with those goofy looking goggles and snorkels on their face anyway.

tuesday, wednesday and thursday were mainly beach days. although we did take a trip to the movie theater to see the great gatsby {two thumbs up right here}. we also ate a "celebrate rikki's graduation" dinner at callahan's one night. thursday night, austin took me on a date night where we went back to the board walk to people/bird watch, shop and enjoy dinner at crab island cantina.

we had yummy margaritas and and delish guacamole {oh, i eat guacamole now, who woulda thought?}.

on friday we soaked up as much sun as possible since it was our last day. and by "soak up as much sun as possible" obviously i mean hide under the umbrella to keep my pale skin from frying.

hiding from the sun all week was, of course, alternated with floating on the lacking waves water that is found in the gulf {i tend to prefer the scare-the-heck-outta-you-gotta-dive-through-em-to-keep-from-being-turned-upside-down-and-drowning-waves you find at the east coast beaches}.

after swimming/frying all day austin and i decided on the spur of the moment to drive back home late friday night instead of waking up super early saturday morning to head back. we had a full moon to light our way the whole trip.

and for any of you who have ever taken a road trip with me you know i am like an infant who falls asleep almost instantly in the car. but not this time! i'm proud to say that i was able to keep myself awake for the entire drive home. who am i? we made it back in town in time to get a good night sleep before picking up the pup in the morning.

she was pretty excited to see us. and kinda blurry.

and if you're wondering why we had to get back in town so early it was so we could make it in time for my sweet sorority sister, kailan, to get married to austin's fraternity brother, mason!

i may be a bit biased, but adpi+phi delt weddings are the best weddings.

and as much as i'm hating having to wait until july to take my boards, i'm really enjoying all the vacation-ing i'm getting to do during this time. i even get to head to virginia soon to see kasey!