Another surprise visit to Colorado and Thanksgiving in Dallas

My brother Joseph played hooky from work to pick me up from the airport-
I finally got to try Snooze for breakfast and it was worth the hype!

In August, two of my oldest and dearest friends got engaged to each other! Jesse (who I've known the longest- since 1st grade) and Michelle (who became an instant friend freshman year) are high school sweethearts and two of my favorite people (the sweater party/Christmas burrito people of blog posts past).  After almost 10 years of dating Jesse, finally popped the question!

Cheers to the happy couple!

I had been feeling pretty homesick in October/November, and flights were cheap so I decided to book a quick weekend home.  Guy and Thomas had a trip planned to do an early Thanksgiving in D.C. with their sister Rebecca the weekend of 11/9, and I was debating between going home that same weekend or the following one.  Once I found out Jesse and Michelle's engagement party was the 2nd weekend, my decision was a whole lot easier to make. Even though I wasn't 'officially' invited (they only invited people who live in-state), I thought it would be fun to make a surprise appearance.  Sadly my friends can't keep a secret and someone told the happy couple and ruined the surprise, but the end of the day, that didn't really matter. What mattered was I got to be there to celebrate with them and all of our friends. Sometimes I feel like I am the only one of our group who moved away, which means I very often suffer from FOMO (fear of missing out).  Their wedding is going to be so much fun! After the robbery incident, I was even happier to be home and able to spend extra time and get extra hugs from my parents and brothers. My parents made a turkey dinner one night so we could have an early family Thanksgiving together too.  So much to be grateful for!

We went to Dallas for the actual Thanksgiving holiday weekend.  Guy's parents had planned to go to Durango, but I convinced them to stay in Texas so we could all celebrate together.  After work on Tuesday night we drove up, and enjoyed a relaxing long weekend with them.  I am very thankful they live close (but not too close) in Dallas. On trend with the rest of 2013, I got to see Adrienne again because she spends every Thanksgiving in Dallas also.  I saw her two weekends in June, the 4th of July, the first weekend in September, twice in November and of course when I went home for Christmas! That is like 2-3 times more than I saw my parents- she's the best.

Our 2013 Lights in the Heights!

He helped trim the tree this year!

Guy and I decided to beat the traffic and returned to Houston on Saturday, allowing us to put up the Christmas lights and tree on Sunday.  We finally got to utilize the hooks that were already on the house for the outdoor lights! 

He did a great job risking his life to get those lights so high up on the roof.

Thanksgiving was late this year (11/28) and because I'm a stickler about the Christmas season beginning on Black Friday, I had to wait what felt like extra long this year to start getting in the holiday spirit.  Don't worry- I caught up.