PHOTO SHOOT!

As I promised... Here are a few pics. I'm posting "the fun pics" - not that all of them aren't fun, cause they are - but these made me laugh!

Can't wait to get together again SOON! I loved it!

Drum roll please........

awww

too cute!

Kyle makes me laugh!!! haha!

I almost want to say TA-DA!

"Daniel... open your eyes!!!"

"ok, lets put some sunglasses to make your eyes adjust"
Daniel looks like he's Mr. cool stuff - haha

This was the 1-2-3 and on 2 you both smiled and on 3 you both opened your eyes to each other... if that isn't meant to be than I don't know what is - haha!

Daniel's touching Courtney's booty - haha hehe :)

Derik holding EVERYONE'S sunglasses - haha thanks babe!

AND - I did not appreciate this Derik Wayne! :)

AND OF COURSE - the boys and their fountain impression - priceless... I still laugh!

Well, as for the rest of them, you have to wait for the postal services to bring that by. Love you all and I hope you enjoyed...

brittney

Sleepless Nights & Clean Closets

Cherokee Cycle Park - I know - what a name huh? haha! That's where we went 4-wheelin' a couple of weeks ago (from post below) and last weekend.

I had a blast with Derik and his family this past weekend... there was about 20 of them there - cousins, aunts/uncles, family friends... it was a lot of fun, but I am so tired!

Now with Derik being home, I see him in the evenings and he or I don't leave until 1am or after. It's been a tiring week, but I'm so glad when he is home.

Derik and his Dad and D.J. were going to leave Friday day and us girls would leave Friday after I got off work. Well, Derik used his "son magic" and talked his dad into leaving Thursday night - at about 1am. I left soon after. So - night #1 my bed came at like 1:30am.

Both nights Sat/Sun I didn't get to bed until close to 2am, there's night #2 and #3. We woke up at like 8-9am. I was exhausted... and we rode 4-wheelers almost all day, and some in the night.

Monday I took off just to have a day off with Derik. We met his sister Janeane and his sister's boyfriend (D.J. - from the last 4-wheelin' trip) and my brother Kevin for lunch. At good old McAllister's - I love me some sweet tea, oh I want some now! haha!

We went to the Family Christian bookstore and all got CDs and D.J. had to leave for work and my brother home to do homework... So, the 3 of us left went.... SHOPPING!.... I have come to the realization that I'm a shop-a-holic. Hello, my name's Brittney and I'm a shop-a-holic. I felt so guilty for buying some things that day, that when I got home, me and Janeane did a thorough cleaning of my closet and drawers. I couldn't believe it, but I STILL had stuff from high school - all the way from my freshman year, and some in sophomore and senior year. People that's 10+ years -- I AM SO OLD! Janeane was ashamed of me - haha! But, some of it fit - so what's a girl to do... Janeane's criteria was "I like it" "I don't like it" "It's up to you"... so whenever she said "It's up to you" I took that as a - "ummm, no" So, needless to say I came away with 2 FULL Trash bags and I mean big trash bags. I even got rid of..... SHOES..... *gasp* - So, let me know if any of you want me to pull some things out for you. Otherwise, I'm trying to find a consignment store around Austin - never done that before, but if I can get some money out of this... then hey, let's go for it.

So, I feel a lot better about the things I got, cause I really did need them, I just didn't know it with all the stuff I had. Night #4, I didn't get to bed until 2:30am.

Tuesday was a somewhat normal day... work, and then a text from Derik "want to see a movie". Of course I do! Movie was at 9:50pm - yes, left work a little early :) Movie ended around midnight. We decided we wanted some coffee... came to the realization that it really was 12am and no Starbucks would be open, so we resorted to IHOP. I haven't eaten there in forever. We had a blast cause no one was there. And, we relived our jokes from the weekend. Night #5, I didn't get to bed until 2am. Do you see a pattern?

Wednesday Derik came over and we watched some Office seasons - I now have 1-3 yea! We went to eat lunch at the famous Pecan Street Deli in Pflugerville - yum :) Then I was off to work... Derik came over again and left around midnight. But, I have been working on the photos from my Photo Session #1 - with my neighbor Brent - during work when it's not busy. I still had to finish editing/retouching the ones with him and his older brother Brandon for their dad's birthday present (which is next Tuesday). So, Night #6 - bedtime 2:30am.

Today I am just so tired! I finished up the retouching of the pictures last night (or this morning) and my printer is out of ink and I have no photo paper... so, didn't think about making a CD, but I went and bought ink and paper before work - why is ink so expensive!

Right now, I'm ready to be off and in a bed, but I still need to work on some photos... and pick out my favs. I'll post some later on... when I'm conscious - haha. I absolutely love it when I'm doing it, but I'm so tired from lack of sleep. Here's hoping that Night #7 is going to be an early (earlier) night's sleep.

I'm looking foward to this weekend :) and looking foward to some sleep!

brittney

Photo Session 1

I'm so excited that I get to take photos tomorrow. My neighbor Christy's son - Brent... who I've known since before he was born (even though I may not remember everything :)...) is a senior this year at Pflugerville High School - my alma mater!

My mom talked to her about me getting a camera and wanting to explore photography and Christy got excited and asked if I'd take Brent's senior portraits. OF COURSE I WILL! I'm really excited...

Tomorrow we'll meet early and go to the park and various places to take photos... and I'll be sure to post the favs. Pray for good weather... :)

brittney

Valentine's in LBK

Well, since Derik and I weren't able to get together for Valentine's ON V-day and not until this weekend... this became our Valentine's weekend. I was so excited to see him!

Well, Friday night was crazy because I got off work at like 5pm and went to pick up my dad at work (he took the bus downtown so he could then take my car home). On the way there, I got stuck in really bad traffic. What would've usually taken me 15-20 mins. to go from my work to my dad's took more like 45 mins. and I was getting afraid that I would never get there and never get to my flight on time.

Well, I made it and I pull up to the parking garage.

We then proceeded to the airport which took a lovely 15 mins. - a lot faster than I was thinking.

Let's just say that after leaving Austin I had to land in Dallas for a change in planes and I had a delay in flight along with. Boo... it wasn't all bad... I brought a book to read, but then sat next to these horrible kids on the plane... all the way to Lubbock they yelled - and they weren't even brother and sister, they had JUST met - total strangers, but they sure did fight like brother and sister. It was pretty bad. Yelling and everything - even yelling at the flight attendant! gees! anyways...

So, Derik picsk me up and saves me from this terrible nightmare and we drive home. I share all my wonderful plane stories and we pull up to his apartment. We walk in - lights off - and I set my luggage down. Derik says "let's go in the kitchen" which I head to and find this -->

My WONDERFUL boyfriend surprised me with a wonderful bouquet of roses, lit candles, he MADE chocolate covered strawberries (not shown here, I forgot to take a picture the actual night and had to remake this "event" right before I left Sunday) and had the most wonderful card for me to read. It was the most romantic surprise ever - thanks babe! love you! MWAH!

I also brought my new fun camera to Lubbock and on Saturday, I told Derik I wanted to go take pictures of Texas Tech's campus - which is lovely and the buildings are beautiful Spanish architecture. The weather was perfect and beautiful, so, this is what came of our Saturday outing... thanks for the tour babe!

TTU'S stained glass on the front of their football stadium... (Jones AT&T Stadium)

Here's the stadium a little farther away... see the stained-glass in the middle?

And, once again a little farther away... they have a really pretty front on their stadium.

Derik wouldn't let me take any pics of him... but this was the only one.

I tried something a little interesting with this picture and put a colored filter over top of it... makes it look kind of cool I think...

Close-up of some of the fences...

THE Masked Rider

Some cool looking grass... hey - I liked it...

I can't remember how much the actual percentage is, but, for every building Tech builds, a certain percentage has to be put towards art/sculptures of some type. They have A LOT of different sculptures around campus. This one is one of many different punctuation marks (they had # : !) It's pretty cool.. Derik wanted me to get the ? so here it is...

This is a Double-T bench donated by some Senior class a long time ago... still, pretty cool!

More types of grass... it's from the pic above...

Tech also has BEAUTIFUL arches that cast all sorts of BEAUTIFUL shadows... I loved that.

Tech's bell towers...

Thought this was too good to pass up...

I loved all 3 of them...

Will Rogers and Soapsuds - the horse... this statue is the most well-known on Tech's campus. Here's a little excerpt off the site -

"According to one legend, the plan to face Will Rogers so that he could be riding off into the sunset did not work out as it would cause Soapsuds' rear to be facing downtown. To solve this problem, the horse and Will was turned 23 degrees to the east so the horse's posterior was facing in the direction of Texas A&M, one of the school's rivals.

Before every home football game the Saddle Tramps wrap Old Will with red crepe paper. Will Rogers and Soapsuds have also been wrapped in black crepe paper to mourn national tragedies."

I know you faithful Aggies won't appreciate that... haha!

Tech's Seal at front of campus...

Pretty waterfull...

Well, I know that was a lot, but I really like telling stories and taking pictures. So, whoever reads this, sorry! :) haha!

REMEMBER - tomorrow is Election Day in Texas - so GET OUT THERE AND VOTE!

Love,

brittney

4-WHEELIN' CRAZIES

This past weekend, Derik made a a quick decision to come home. 1. because he wanted to 2. most importantly he's been interviewing for jobs/internships and a company in Austin wanted to meet with him and paid for his gas money (nice)

But among all those things - I went 4-wheelin' with the Melton's. It was Derik's Dad, Sister Janeane and her boyfriend DJ... and then me and Derik. Now I have to say that this was my first time EVER 4-wheelin' and it was so fun! I got so frustrated in the beginning because the 4-wheeler's we were riding were manuals and therefore you had to start it up and move the clutch and shift gears - something I have NEVER done - in a car... or anything!

So, needless to say it took me like 30 mins. to even start up the darn thing and it was to the point where I was going to say - "y'all have fun, I'll just stay here" but... thankfully they were all patient with me.

We rode a couple of trails and then me and Janeane were done and let the boys have fun... They then came back and asked us to go to the "track" to take pictures of them. Janeane's going to school for Photography and was giving me advice and pointers on what settings worked best in what type of situation you are in. We were in action mode :)... She also, has this AMAZING lense that that she let me borrow and when she gave it to me she said - "Brittney, I'm going to warn you that when you use this, you're going to want one!" I thought - NAH! maybe later, but I don't need one now... boy was she right! the lense is AMAZING. So, I bet you can tell which photos were used with her lense... hope you enjoy.

Derik doing one of this many jumps... you'll see later... that crazy boy!

Janeane's boyfriend DJ and Derik...

DJ was very dusty... we all were by the end of the day!

Now, there's a story behind this picture, because Derik started making a bunch of circles and stirring up all kinds of dust... then he left and I caught a couple more pictures of him doing jumps. This boy on a dirt bike - no kidding probably 10 years old - maybe! - he came up to us and said "hey, is that guy on the red and white 4-wheeler with y'all... (we said yes)... well, you need to tell him that he shouldn't be stirring up all that dust because it's very dangerous and he could cause an accident... I know I'm younger than y'all but I know what I 'm talking about!" haha we about died... Derik's dad didn't appreciate a little boy telling him what to do let alone Derik... then the boy left and stirred up some dust haha! There's also a sign that says - RIDE AT YOUR OWN RISK! so boy... read the sign!

Derik was proud of this picture!

The Boys

You can barely read it - but that sign in the middle of the picture is the RIDE AT YOUR OWN RISK sign... Derik was doing circles right by that sign... and the little boy was giving us his opinion right by that sign.

somebody looks tired! haha!

We're going to go camping at this place the first weekend of Derik's spring break... so that should be more fun had!

Hope you all have a great weekend - I'm going to go to LBK! (this trip was planned like a month ago before Derik found out he needed to come interview this past weekend... so 2 WKNDS in a row! Halleluia and so much fun!)

brittney

Into the Park

Hello all...

Well, I told you all about my new adventure into photography and I'm so glad I've actually been able to use my camera this week (now that I'm not feeling like I've gotten run over by a bulldozer)...

I used it a little the first weekend but not as much as I wanted... took a few pictures of my brothers and their girlfriends and also of my brother's dog... (see below) but it wasn't until Tuesday that I actually got to spend a good amount of time with my camera. ahhh... me and my camera (jk)

well, I went to Pfluger Park - in Pflugerville... :) and I took all kinds of nature shots. I'm kind of embarassed to say I took about 120-150... but, hey... the more the better right?? I've gone through and picked some of my favorites and edited them - and here they are (I've also made an album on Facebook...)

This is my brother's dog - Sadie... this wasn't the same day as the park, but I loved it anyways!

Well let me know what you think and which ones you like the best. It helps to know what I'm doing that's right and what everyone likes...

Thanks!

brittney