It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

I love having 70 degree weather in December! Texas is a great place to be during the holidays.

One of our highlights has been making Christmas cookies. We gathered tons of cookie cutters, food coloring and sprinkles and invited Denise & Don over. We decorated a lot of cookies that night and got to doorbell ditch a lot of Christmas cheer. Overall, Don won the award of "The Best Cookie Decorator", although most of them looked like they were done by a bunch of little kids :)

Our very first Christmas Tree

• Tree: Given to us, the same tree that Dave grew up with
• Lights: Cheap from the Goodwill store
• Ornaments: Perfectly matching and 50% off at Hobby Lobby
• Angel Topper: Also 50% off and we found one we agreed on
• Candy Canes: Dave's favorite Christmas tree decoration

We can't wait for Christmas!

Called To Serve

So we got a second calling. We thought it would be ward missionaries, but we were pleasantly surprised when the Bishop asked us to be Ordinance Workers in the temple. We're so excited! Statistically, we're really messing with the average age of the workers, we're major outliers and everyone seems so surprised to see us young people there.

We got started just in time for the annual Temple Christmas Fireside. It was an amazing experience to be piled into the chapel with so many great people who love the temple and love serving the Lord there, very humbling. It was a beautiful musical fireside with some talks from the temple presidency. Afterwards, there was the biggest shmorgasborg (Dave says this is how it's spelled) we had ever seen. Tables and tables filled with all kinds of desserts and snacks from cakes, brownies, sandwiches, meatballs, veggies, fruits, etc.

We tried to fit as much as we could on our plates, but probably only got to 1/10 of it all.

A Christmas Affair

For the past few years my mother-in-law has been going to a big Christmas shopping event there in Austin. This year, being so close, I was able to go and also my sister-in-law Katie. Susan brought her sister Patsy so the four of us set off to do some major shopping. We spent the day shopping, eating plenty of samples and laughing. They came up with the joke that my shopping legs weren't really seasoned yet compared to Susan and Patsy's, cause I was tired by noon! We had a blast though and finished off the night by going out to get some...bet you can't guess... Mexican food. (Those Roderick's really love their Mexican Food! )



This was my favorite purchase, it's called Basket Case of Basket Head, one of those two. When I saw it I knew it'd provide Dave and I hours of entertainment :) His nephew loved it too!

My beautiful Young Women

I have the best calling ever!

Six Month Anniversary!

So time is flying and we've been married for six months now. Crazy! The real shocker is that it took David a whole 6 months to finally give me this award.

It was also the day we flew back from California so we celebrated our anniversary by visiting all three states that I had lived in (California -> Utah -> Texas), in one day.

Halloween!

So we didn't have much time to put together a Halloween costume. We looked up couples costumes online, went through our attic and the costume bins, etc. I finally went in and told my dad (the very non-Halloween celebrating type) our dilemma. He simply said, "why don't you just be Texans?" I wish I had thought of that a lot sooner! My dad got a nice cowboy hat from Dave's dad at our reception, I got my dad a Texas tie when I came back from Houston, Thomas had some Wranglers and boots, and I got my dad a nice Texas apron as a souvenir when they last came into town. It turned out great, the ward loved it and anyone we saw that had ever lived in Texas came up and told us they loved our costumes and missed Texas.

We got to take my little neices out Trunk-or-Treating at the ward Halloween Party. We really thought people might offer us candy because we got dressed up and all, but that wasn't the case. Afterwards, we played a game where Tia's friends had to try to throw their candy in Dave's cowboy hat. We won us a lot of candy that way, I came home with an apron full :)

Thomas Family Photos

Dave took his first train ride, from his conference in LA up to Fresno, to spend the weekend with us. I was soooo happy to see him after 5 days! My mom took advantage of us being in town and invited a family friend over to take a family picture in our back yard.

One of the hardest parts of family pictures in my family is finding a color scheme that everyone can agree with. We usually end up borrowing each others clothes and hiding behind eachother to hide any unmatching article of clothing. But here we all are!

University of Farmers

Dropping off Dave at the airport
(Don't let the big smile fool you, it was sad moment having to say goodbye)

So Dave started working as an Insurance Agent here in San Antonio for Farmers Insurance. He's been doing great. All agents start out as Reserve Agents. Once they sell a total of 40 P & C policies and 4 life policies they become Career Agents. This brings a lot of great benefits including subsidies, group insurance, bragging rights, and much more. As an incentive they offered to buy Dave and I a nice bed and breakfast in a nice little town outside of San Antonio and Dave surpassed their expectations and did it in 2 months. (Fredericksburg here we come!) Also, he got shipped out to Los Angeles to the University of Farmers for his first official business trip.

Dave had a great experience there. He spent his days learning successful marketing strategies and how to be a great agent instead of a salesman, and all about opening up his own Farmers Branch and what is involved. He spent his evenings chatting on the phone with me. It really got him pumped about opening up his own business and applying everything that he learned. I'm so proud of him!

While he was there I flew out to Fresno to visit home. It was fun just being a part of the family again. I got to go to Tia's water polo game, Emily's cross country meet and soccer game, I hung out with my brothers and also my sister and her cute little family, and of course my parents and I got to play the ukulele with my Grandpa all week. What a great week!

Parents Visit

My dad was able to attend a work conference right here in San Antonio. My mom decided to come out also and they spent the weekend with us. It was so fun to have them in our little home and show them around our town.

The men made us a nice salmon dinner and only set the fire alarm off twice. It was delicious!!

We took them mini golfing and although it's hard to admit, my mom and dad beat us at mini golf.

We got to show my parents the beautiful San Antonio temple. They were blown away by the beautiful stained glass windows and nice landscaping.

To keep the hot afternoon sun from baking our apartment in the afternoons, we put up my beach towel. It's been working great (until mom comes into town). The minute my mother walked into our apartment she said, "Oh Lisa, what is that towel doing up there? You need some curtains!" So we went shopping and the guys had a Friday night activity. Shopping for home decor just isn't that fun when you have to go alone, so I had such a fun time with my mom and our apartment's looking great!

At the famous Alamo. My dad was fascinated by all the history there.
Our first stop was the movie theater to actually learn the history, then we went exploring.

One of our favorite activities was visiting the River Walk. The weather was absolutely perfect! (Last time Dave and I went we went at 9 or 10 in the evening and it was ridiculously hot!) We decided to take one of the River Boats to get the full experience.
As you can see, my dad was really enjoying the ride. We had to squish on a tiny little boat but it was such a fun ride and we got to see the whole River Walk.

One thing we love about San Antonio is that there is always something going on. This weekend there was a free Accordian Festival right on the river. We got to ride right through the middle of it and the music was amazing. Down on the other end by the mall there were some Peruvian bands playing. It was such a fun night and weekend!

Kettle Mania!!!

We really do love San Antonio and being in Texas, but our one complaint is that they don't sell KettleMania popcorn. I got hooked on this Kettle Corn and got Dave hooked real quick. We tried having movie night with the other brands and they just weren't the same. After requesting special orders from local grocery stories and having no success, we took matters in our own hands. Naturally, we had to stock up and thanks to Amazon for their free shipping :)

Garner State Park

We decided to go on an adventure this weekend so we packed up the back of Dave's truck with some camping gear. The whole time we were gathering stuff, we caught ourselves saying, "Oh man, I wish we had ____" or "Dang, if only we had a ____". Luckily, we at least had a tent and two sleeping bags, which is all you really needed for camping, right?

We drove about an hour west of San Antonio to a little town called Concan, TX. We called ahead and Dave reserved a campsite with a river-front view. We got there after dark so we set up our tent by the headlights of the truck and the mini flashlights we had. (We really could've used a lantern). In our tent, we enjoyed some spaghettios and chicken salad for dinner. Our biggest worry were the little skunks our wandering around, but we were fine.

It was a hot and humid night by the river. We both woke up sweating and didn't even use the sleeping bags that we had brought. We ate some breakfast and then went exploring . One thing I learned this camping trip is that I married the world's best rock skipper! Dave was amazing!

Since we drove in at night we were pleasantly surprised in the morning to see mountains in our midst! Mountains? in Texas? We had no idea! We set out to hike the tallest one. After our hike we spent the afternoon at the river swimming in the crystal clear water, skipping rocks and playing on rope swings. We're definitely gonna have to make another trip out there and Dave says "Y'all are all invited!"

(Thank you to the nice boy scout leader lady who let us put our memory card into her camera and took a picture of us to prove that we climbed a mountain in Texas)

Hamilton Pools

Hamilton Pools is a natural swimming hole just outside of Austin. We went with Dave's brother and his family and had a blast playing with our little niece and nephew.

There are so many things to do and see around here, we're loving it!

What we've been up to...

We didn't have room to move all of our gifts so we had to take a lot of them back in Utah.  It worked out great because instead of moving a room full of stuff we carried a few gift cards in our wallets.  So the Saturday after we got moved in Dave and I headed off to Target and Bed Bath & Beyond and bought everything back.  We had three carts full at Target and we've never spent so much in a day.  But now we have everything that we need :)

                                                             We wanted to embrace being in Texas so we made some great purchases that we are very proud of.  This is our texas door mat.  We also decided to take back the cheap waffle maker that we had bought and get a much more expensive Texas shaped one (we love our Texas shaped waffles in the mornings)  We also got a famous Texas star to put up in our living room and Dave promised he'd cook often if I got him a Texas flag apron.  It was hard not to buy the Texas star napkin holders or paper dispenser.  Bed Bath & Beyond has a Texas version of pretty much anything for the home.  We had to remind ourselves, "Let's not get crazy" over and over again.

 I think we've already gotten our money's worth out of the tool box that we bought for Dave.  We have a nice variety of furniture in our home but Dave is responsible for putting together a desk, night stand, mini book shelf and a tall bookshelf.  He worked so hard on all of the and they look great!

We've been loving the beautiful Texas sky that goes on and on.  We've seen some great sunsets

One of our favorite dates so far has been going down to the famous River Walk. We went over to the Tower of the America's afterwards and both had a Dr Pepper 750 ft up in the air.

 

 The San Antonio temple is only a fifteen minute drive (up to 45 minutes if you go between 3:30 and 7:00 pm)  It's absolutely beautiful!  It sits on one of the highest hills in the city and you can look out over all of San Antonio.  There are beautiful stained glass windows and fountains inside and out.  We love going and are so happy that it's so close.

 

 We also had some special guests come in for a visit.  Amanda was driving across the country with her mom, seeing all the places where she grew up.  Luckily, San Antonio is a big military town so we were on the list of stops.  It was so fun to have dinner and reminisce about old badminton days and how much we loved high school.

Our Apartment

 The kitchen that is just big enough for Dave and I to be in at the same time, it's perfect.

 

 Our lovely dining room set that Dave's mom found for us from a friend

We have a night stand now and our nice gel bed up on a frame

                                            This is our nice living room with our nice piece together furniture, donated coffee table, house warming gift couch from my dad, Dave's TV, and donated gold recliner.

Helloooo San Antonio!

Last month we packed up everything we owned in our two trucks and started the 1200+ mile trip from Provo, Utah to San Antonio, Texas. My dad graciously drove with us so we could have a 3rd driver to keep us company. The only furniture items we had were Dave's big screen TV and the $100 King gel matress that Jeff & Becca got us a great deal on (which we kept in the plastic and used as a cover for the bed of my truck)

We got a little bit of rain here and there until we got into Texas, where we seemed to be right alongside these huge dark clouds the whole time. About three hours out of San Antonio the road turned right into the clouds and we hit a pretty big storm with some nasty crosswinds. In the truck with my dad we felt this huge gust of wind that really shook the car. My dad goes, "What was that? I just saw David swerving, I hope we didn't lose anything." I turned back and everything looked normal until I realized that I could actually see out the back window. Rather than the mattress blocking most of the view in our rear window we noticed it was gone! We pulled off into the median and jumped out in the pouring rain to see if we could go find our mattress before someone got hurt. Turns out a cross wind somehow got our mattress unstrapped and flipped it over. Luckily it was still strapped on in the back so it was just hanging off the back of the truck, bouncing up and down. The plastic was a little scratched up but the mattress was just fine. We had a few minor casualities of a couple things that flew out, but I'm still grieving and not ready to talk about it yet.

We went out Monday morning to start apartment searching, armed only with some information from a couple local bishops. I guess it's not a common thing to move in in just one day so most of the complexes we visited couldn't get us in that day. We were starting to get a little worried when we saw a complex off to our left that wasn't on our list. They had an apartment all ready for move in that day and it was the best option we had found so we went for it. So, in one afternoon we got renters insurance, contacted both of our previous landlords, filled out an apartment application, passed credit checks, and waited for the managers application approval. The leasing office closed at 6 but we were in there til 8 and there were some dark clouds with lots of thunder coming in. As soon as we got the ok, my dad and David went to start unpacking while I stayed and went over the whole contract and signed a 13 month lease. They got everything inside except the TV before it started to pour.

And to top off the crazy day, they had parked in the fire line to unpack everything and the battery died so we couldn't move my truck. AAA came out and took care of us though. My dad was really enjoying one of his first Texas rainstorms. It was one of the craziest days of our lives, but in the end everything worked out perfectly.

Finally, home sweet home :)