Dunaway - Party of 6!

It's official!!! Justin & Jordan are engaged!!!! Wooooohoooooo!!!!!!!

Selfishly I am excited because now I have a sister by the end of summer 2011! And also selfishly, Jarrett & I are so excited that our bestests are also going to all be family. We are so lucky to have such amazing people surrounding us!

I know, I know - I need to get to the good stuff! DETAILS! Justin called Jarrett on Tuesday around 5:30 pm letting him know that he was proposing that night! J came in the house, told me... and I naturally freaked out, dropped everything and went hunting for "happy engagement" gifts! An hour later a Facebook post broke the news to the world! Right now you are thinking.. "so how'd he do it?!" Sorry folks, I will leave that for JoJo's blog (justinandjojo.blogspot.com) ... which I am sure she will update when she comes back down from floating in engagement bliss!

I had been hoarding magazines in a random cabinet for a while now....just waitinggggg to hand them over! Yesterday was THE day!

Much needed celebratory drink.... okay.... maybe drinks

Prezzies! Happy Planning JoJo!

The happy couple! (We love these Future Dunaways!)

Thats right, girl, s.h.o.w. IT. o.f.f. !

ALL of the Future Dunaways! Aka J3A ((I feel like we need to all break out those shirts.... its highly appropriate these days... Homies 4 Life!))

Bob & Marianne will have their hands full in 2011.... and well, forever with the 4 of us :)

Sisters!!!!!!!!!! (Can you tell I never got to have one?!) Showing off the wonderful taste of the Dunaway Boys! We are some LuCkY girls!

A family outing at The Grande Lux Cafe. The Dunaways & Erwins!

I think I can speak for everyone involved - we are so thrilled for Justin and Jordan and cannot wait to enjoy this exciting and special time with them!

Season of Favorite Things

Tis the season, so they say... This time of year for me is filled with all of my favorite things; amazing family, awesome friends, beautiful lights and decorations.. a realization of so many things to be thankful for.

Everyone kept asking me what I wanted for Christmas... and I literally couldnt think of anything that I needed/wanted (okay, maybe a new computer bag, but thats only because the handle on mine has a fight with me every time I put it down as I get on a plane.. which we all know is OFTEN!) We truly are blessed with all we have - and thats all I need!

We were just hanging out last night after an amazing dinner with Miss Amber at Uncle Julios, and I was looking at our tree and thought it would be fun to share with you my 5 most favorite ornaments on our tree. And I asked J if he would like to do the same... he said yes, so enjoy seeing our difference of opinions ;)

1. J & I had our first "vacation" in New Orleans... I had a huge program there for work almost a year ago, barely slept in 10 days and he met me once it was all over... we had such a great time even though I couldnt make it much past 9 pm!

2. San Francisco Trip - we had just gotten engaged and I was more than overwhlemed - such an amazing experience and a perfect get-away after our engagement - One of my favorite cities


3. The fact that the Aggie ornament gets to be on the tree is a feat within itself - of course I'm excited!

4. When I was little my dad and I used to make fishy faces... my parents gave us this ornament this year, and well - its perfect!

5. Recently I noticed an ornament I didnt personally add to the tree... and this makes my heart warm - I love the old school ornament and probably the first one J has ever had :)

Jarrett's Top 5:

1. This is in my Top 5 becuase this is the only time I get to talk shit about Ashley in this blog - ever. Wreck em Tech!

2. This was one of the best times of my life hiking with my fiance in Muir Woods ouside of San Fran and is made of one of the Red Woods from the park

3. This is from my 27th birthday party - Not only did we celebrate my birthday, but both of our dads (Bob & Scott) birthdays in a big bash! It was a great time and the first of many celebrations for the 3 of us.

4. This is our first ornament of our collection we bought together in the French Quarter. It was late January and there were endless options - this obviously was our favorite.

5. I picked this one because it is the first official ornament in my "extravagant" collection and was the only ornament in my collection until our visit to the French Quarter.

Merry, Merry Christmas - Enjoy your loved ones... we sure will!

Love -

Santa Baby Party

The time has come... Heather and I turn TWENTY-SEVEN this year... eeeesh it hurts to type. The downward slope to 30 has officially begun. This year I decided to have our annual birthday party a Christmas party and a Charitable Event. We were also blessed enough to share our party with the young Miss JoJo turning 23 this year.

Our Invitations

I always thought building a GingerBread House would be sooooo much fun.... which the below was... the subsequent 7 we did, not so fun.

One of the many cutie details around the house

Santa and His Mistress, Miss Candy Cane

JoJo & Amber

Toys for Tots! Thank you everyone for contributing!

Some of the ladies - Courtney, Heather, Ashley, Allison, Jenna and Jordan

So sad we did get a full shot of all of the girls and all of the guys.... maybe next year!

Zaky GRADUATED on Friday & made it in town Saturday for the Party... we are so proud of him and cannot wait to see what is in store for him next (Selfishly I hope he finds a job in Dallas!)

Jacqueline made the most amazing birthday cake for us - it was PERFECTION!

We l.o.v.e. the Masseys!

Sweet Chara (Miss Snowflake) and Amber (Miss Claus)

Overall, a great night - I didnt take many pictures on my own, and everyone hasnt posted theirs yet onto facebook BUT a little looky into the night :)

T minus 4 days until Christmas!

Ho Ho Ho!
The future Dunaways

Feelin' the Love

Raleigh/Durham - Day 6: Its been a long, but not toooo bad of a week. I am familiarizing myself with the Durham area.. I can basically get to the GSK campus and back to the Doubletree, and of course to the mall area that has all of the restaurants for to-go dinners. Thaaats about it.

Friday I came back to the hotel and checked the front desk for a package (J was sending me the wedding invitation samples that came) and I had one! HOWEVER it wasnt from J - it was from Sweet Amber. It was such a great, totally unexpected, surprise to start off my "weekend".

I have been so blessed with an amazing friend like her, and I am so, so thankful that she and I have grown so close, and are continuing to get even closer. :)

A few hours later there was a knock on our "office" door and a second package was delivered! This time I knew it was the package from J - I mean who else would love me enough to overnight a package to me?!

I havent been able to sleep since I have been here - so he included Tylenol PM for me.. Our favorite Potbelly sugar cookie, Burts Beeswax, my favorite candies, the new West Elm booklet, the invitations, and even a paw written note from Layla - where she informed me her "daddy was being so nice to her" and you cannot forget the Kazoos!

Love it all (I think I have found our invitations!) and love him the most - missing my leetle fam, but at least I have passed the halfway mark. 6 and a half (ish) days to go.... come oooon Friday!

A Lallaway Thanksgiving

We have so much to be thankful for; our health, each other, amazing families, really great friends and of course Layla Love.


Thanksgiving is probably one of my favorite days of the year - and I hate turkey, BUT there is family, Cowboys Football, and the Aggie/Texas game. What more could you ask for?!


This year we combined Thanksgiving with both of our families over at my parents house. We had all of the traditional fixings, 3 types of turkey (fried, cajun infused and regular), and my mom made lasagna for me (and it was delicious!).

The Cowboys game was an epic fail - thanks a lot Roy Williams, but the Aggies beating TU totally made my day! Waiting on the bowl announcements, but hoping they get a bid to somewhere close enough for us to enjoy an Aggie game this season!


We took some last minute pictures before everyone started leavng for the night.

The Lallys:


And with the newest addition to our little fam:
With Nana & Papa The Dunaways:

With the girls:


All of the "Lallaway" Clan:

We are so so blessed to be surrounded by such amazing people - and should remind ourselves of this every day.

I hope everyone had a wonderful an happy Thanksgiving!

Christmas Comes Early at the Future Dunaways

I will be leaving the Sunday of thanksgiving weekend for a 13 day program in Raleigh, North Carolina, so naturally I used this as a great excuse of why Christmas decorations needed to go up early... "But baaaaabe, I'll be gone half of December! I wont even get to enjoy the decorations.."

So up they went.

I have been waiting for this day since September (Hobby Lobby put out their Christmas goodies and I was there at lunchtime stocking up!) Yes, the check out lady hated me - but I cant help that I loved all of the individual ornaments, rather than pre-packaged ones!

We are also hosting a Santa Party/Jordan, Heather, & my birthday party on December 18th. Super looking forward to being able to share the holiday with our friends, share our birthdays, AND raise Toys for Tots.. So many great things, all in ONE!

Layla helping Daddy (of course, Heaven forbid she missed out on anything)

Making progress

And a bit more...

We have light!

All of my little children I spent so much time picking out.

Adding the Topper

Ta-Da!

This is the shelving unit - picture doesnt do it justice - you'll just have to come and see in person ;)

And our mantle - my FAVORITE part!!!

And my favorite little guy!

Now to tackle the outside and I am sure that I will add more as time goes by. So excited for our first Christmas officially living together and about to start our lives together!

PS..

On a totally separate note - the Aggies beat Tech AGAIN this year... that makes me 2 - 0 in this relationship. J is supposed to wear an A&M shirt while hanging my flag out front ... although I havent gotten him to do this - I was able to get him to do this:

I told him now that we will be getting married he can be part of the winning team by default. ;) It feels good to be #19 in the BCS, but it'll feel even better to beat Texas next week! Gig 'Em Aggies! BTHO Texas! Whoop!