I am back a little sooner this time, which I am sure everyone is very happy about! 🙂 Since, sadly, summer is coming to an end I wanted to give everyone a recap of our very busy summer. Loren and I teach in neighboring school districts, and we are very lucky to have the big holidays off together, so for us school ended at the beginning of June (crazy right??). We started off our summer working the Texas State University Band Camps, which is something that we really enjoy. As I tell people, who look at me crazy when I tell them that I went straight from teaching into being a counselor at camps, we basically get paid to hang out with our friends for a week. We get to reconnect with our friends and faculty, learn from some amazing Texas band directors (well Loren does), and get to interact with some pretty amazing kids. If you have middle school or high school kids in band I would strongly recommend you sending them to some type of band camp. It lets the students explore their instrument deeper and get to play some awesome band literature, all from the best band directors in the state. If you click on the link in the paragraph it will take you to this past summer’s band camp page, but it will give you prices and some information about the band camp in case you are interested. All in all it was a great, tiring, and fun filled week of seeing and meeting new friends.
Our next adventure takes us to Omaha, Nebraska for the NCAA College World Series. Loren, his best friend, Sean, and myself started this tradition in 2010. We are all big baseball fans so this is the perfect vacation for us. In years past, we have had friends come with us and Loren and I also missed last year since we had a wedding to pay for, but this year it was the original three that started it all. Loren and I usually drive to Austin and spend the night and then make the trek from Austin to Omaha. Yes the drive is long, but totally manageable in a day especially with three of us. We just take I 35 North, and if you ever decide to drive to Omaha beware of Kansas. I 35 going through Kansas is a tollway so be prepared to pay $12 to get through the state. Also, make sure you fill your gas tank up before you go through. There are not many towns along the way and the towns you do run into you have to get off of the tollway to get to the gas station. It is not really easy accessible. While they do have gas station and food combos in the middle of the highway where you can get out to rest the gas is usually pretty expensive. Other than that Kansas is great! We usually stay in Council Bluffs, Iowa which is just on the other side of the Missouri River, it is really close to the park and downtown, and you can gamble. 🙂 Omaha is a really cool town with some good restaurants and interesting sights. One of the must sees of Omaha is the Henry Doorly Zoo and Aquarium, it has been voted one of the best zoos in the US. There are also a handful of museums and historical sites to see, as well as shopping and outdoor activities. Along with all the attractions Omaha has there is also a lot of things around the ballpark, including sports memorabilia for the teams that participated in the world series, and a lot of games and booths for the kids. For a list of restaurants, attractions, and places to stay in the Omaha area, click here. We go for the finals which is the best of three games. This year it was the University of Virginia and Vanderbilt playing in the finals. Sean is a huge UT fan, so we were rooting for the University of Virginia since Vanderbilt beat UT for the spot in the finals. We all had a really good time, and I was glad to make it out for another year.
My first posts were about my trips in July going to the valley and camping. Well we went back down to the valley for the wedding of our really good friend, which was absolutely beautiful. The one other trip that we took was to Austin. Loren got nominated to be on a textbook review committee, which was at the Hilton Austin Airport, so the state paid for us to stay at the hotel for the week and meals, well they paid for Loren, but I got to come along. While Loren was off in textbook land I was thoroughly enjoying my time doing absolutely nothing!!! Both Loren and I are ALWAYS on the go, which I am sure you will pick up on that soon, so it was so nice just going out to Austin and not have a single thing to do. I spent a lot of time lounging in bed (it was a king, what up) watching HGTV, eating, and sitting out at the pool. For me it was a really great, relaxing week. We were also to able to see our best friends who still live out there.
Although I am so sad to see summer come to an end (I am still in denial that school starts in 3 weeks) Loren and I had such an amazing summer. This is our first summer married and it was really great not having to worry about flowers, food, decorations, and how we were going to pay for everything. Plus, I didn’t attempt to kill him once, I guess we are still in the honeymoon phase. 🙂 So here is the end to a wonderful summer and the beginning of a great school year! Until next time…
Love always,
Amie
between the Gray margins 