Blue Passion to Remember

The Highland household has been full of projects the past two months.

AM Design, the design firm Boots works for, has had him working night and day on the Passion 2010 conference website. They had another site due back to back with this site that went WAY over the intended schedule, and so pushed the Passion deadline from 20 days to 10 days. YIKES. It finally launched on Monday at 7:30pm, check it out: http://www.268generation.com/passion2010/

They're still making "tweaks" to it, but it's pretty well finished.

In the middle of that, I made plans for us to attend the Family Life Conference: "Weekend to Remember" at the Gaylord Texan over Valentine's weekend. In preparation for that, I had my hair 'did' BLUE.... not completely, just a bit of a peekaboo blue.

As far as the "Weekend to Remember" we TOTALLY recommend any married or soon-to-be married couple attend this conference! It was an invigorating weekend of sessions focused on God's intent for marriage. My favorite aspect of the conference would definitely be the application projects. After each section of the conference, couples were asked to answer a series of application questions (by themselves, or with spouse) sometimes leading into making committments in that area. Such a GREAT way to make the information personally applicable - a way to make us own the content.

We connected with a few of the speakers: the main guy Dennis Rainey, and Dan Jarrell - a pastor from Alaska. We are HUGE fans.

On Valentines Day we tried a new restaurant in town: Hibashi. It's across the tollway from the Galleria, a new sushi/tepenaki bar. Boots took some pictures of our meal - it was CRAZY GOOD.

Since then, we've both been working like CRAZY people! Boots has been adjusting and tweaking the Passion website, while getting ready for the next few sites they're working on this month (the Reunion Church website being one of them - YAY!!!).

We got to spend an awesome evening with Trini and Desi Martinez, at the Chris Tomlin - Israel and the New Breed concert. We had SUCH a good time, that we told Lori and Trini that the kids could come hang with us ANY TIME!

I've been interpreting - a little here, a little there: enough said ;)

But what would life be like without the kitties???

Here are a few shots Boots happened to capture recently:

Jerry has recently started the habit of "going back to bed" after being let out of the bathroom where they sleep at night. Boots captured this shot one day while he was getting dressed (the lump in the background is yours truly)

This shot below is also Jer-bear... We call it: "The Otter" (his most-relaxed pose)

Here is Ben..... he LOVES climbing through the rafters and all over the loft. When we cook or fuss in the kitchen, he perches here on this post, and watches us.

And here's our little acrobat, Ben, finally relaxing with Daddy. He LOVES laying in the crevices... wherever we'll allow him.

Nehemiah, Judah and Benjamin

Last night, while Patrick and Tiffany were at church, I got to spend time with our wonderful guardian-children.

We colored, we jumped, we stretched, and had WAY-TOO-MUCH-FUN... okay, I had way too much fun. Nehi asked me where the pictures of him were on my phone - and that's where the photo shoot began! These are some of my favorites:

Here's Judah! (she soon developed a fever and stuffy nose.... which explains why she wasn't all smiles...)

And Baby Benjamin!

Judah and Ben asleep:

And Nehemiah acting the silliness out of himself:

The evening ended with PT and Tiff coming home - and Judah saying "goo-nye Aunti Lyssa" which, of course, made my heart melt....

Style

I just saw Chris and Holly's great blog: Emersyngrace.blogger.com and fell in love with their style.... (especially their photog whose name is escaping me this moment - Tina Rogers)


Check out her blog: www.tinarogers.blogspot.com

Also, I'm including some updated pictures of Boots and I. I totally chopped my hair off - and couldn't be happier with it. Boots also took a pair of shears to his hair (himself!!! and I think he did a great job!) - but no drastic changes.

my new haircut... and Boots in August.

And then, of course, there is the loft:

The first picture is our kitchen. I LOVE the way the color turned out on the walls. It really makes this space stand out. The islands (back to back) and the mirror are from IKEA. Gotta love IKEA. The second picture below is Boots' office... enough said. ;) The third picture is our living space (notice the kitchen far left and the office over the partition on the right) from upstairs. By living space I mean, our everyday lounging and chatting area. We LOVE our living area!







This is our entryway. On the right is the office. On the left wall is the staircase leading up to the second (dressing/closet area) and third levels (bedroom). Straight ahead is the laundry center.

Apologies

So I would like to apologize to whomever received the 15 emails announcing our new blog and family email address.

Apparently my spontaneity didn't pay off :0) because Boots has to follow and clean up the debris left in my wake.

My apologies.
Alyssa

The Dallas Highlands are Blogging

Every day a new day.

It's Sunday, February 1st, and I'm thrilled to be starting our family blog.

After viewing blogs of friends and friends-of-friends, it seemed an irresistible task. So.... the beginning of the Dallas Highlands blog.Our new family email address is: BootsandAlyssa@gmail.com Feel free to get in touch with "both" of us using this email.

We have entered into 2009 much the same as we left 2008: two cats, two cars, two jobs, one loft, one church, one God (three persons), etc. etc.

Boots is no-longer gigging in clubs with Passing Strangers, and I'm no-longer in seminary. We're praying for a venue that Boots can enter to exercise his massive Bass skills. And, I'm attempting to study for the NCE (National Counselor Exam) so that I can begin counseling with Lee Long in the DFW area. [I'm setting the first week in March as DDay for me to take the exam].

Our 2nd anniversary was marked with cheers and fireworks in Victory Plaza at 12am January 1st. That's DEFINITELY how we are going to celebrate our anniversary every year from here on out... a tradition has begun!

We are the official Dallas Highlands - self proclaimed... as David and Patty are the Austin Highlands and Teresa and her brood are the Tennessee Highlands. We're not going to copyright that title or try to claim royalties on anyone else using the title. But be warned.... we may egg perpetrators' cars... that's all I'm saying.

Anyhoo! More to come.Hugs,Alyssa (representing Boots and myself) Highland