Billy the Kid's Big 5-0

If you are fortunate enough to know the great Bill Brown, you know that he is all about the "wow" factor. Perhaps this is the reason for his incredible passion for life, which may sometimes be confused for extreme intensity. It should come as no surprise then, that Dad's hero would be the infamous Billy the Kid. While Dad may not always be out to please every single person that he encounters, he sure does care and love like no other when it comes to his friends, family and role models. I am so thankful that God blessed me with this man as my daddy, and for all of the life lessons that he has taught me about fighting until the end, winning and the importance of unconditional love. I couldn't wait to put together a celebration to show him just how great an impact he has had on the people that he has encountered over the past 50 years of his life. With lots of help from Mom, Kirby and some very special family members, we did just that-- and threw one heck of a party, if I do say so myself.

 I was so excited to see Mima and Charlie. Thank you both so much for making the journey to SA to help us celebrate!

 Aunt Mel, Uncle Steve and Dad-- pre-party

 The fam just chillin' before the festivities began

 Mom and Mona Tumlinson, long-time friends. Mona's husband Mike coached with Dad in Early, TX, and we became great friends with their family. So thankful they were able to be at the party, too!

The traditional sister pic

Dixie, Pepper and Daicee--precious gals!

The crowd enjoying Bill stories...

Coach Kotzur was Dad's first head coach to work for in Pleasanton, TX. He had lots of stories to share about Dad's intensity and passion for the job at an early age. He even presented Dad with a "sledgehammer" in honor of the story.

Coach Mayfield, Dad's head coach in Comfort, was there to confirm that even at this point in his coaching career, he's still full of the same passion and intensity that he had when he started.

Dad's high school football coach, Coach Peschel, was able to make it to the celebration. How cool is that?

So happy that my sweet bestie could make it. Love you, Christina!

Christina, Britt, me and Morgan. Love these sweet girlfriends so much and had so much fun spending some quality time with them!

Aunt Kathy listening intently to stories about her little bro

Coach Mike Tumlinson, who coached with Dad in Early, TX. They have lots of stories!

Little Daicee bug!

Mrs. Carole Dean, who still thinks of Dad as her "baby". She is my mima's very close friend and has been in Dad's life for many years.

Stephen Donley giving the player's perspective on 'ole Coach.

Uncle Steve telling a few tales about life with his big bro...

... and Aunt Melody continuing them. Pretty sure hers involved something about fork throwing, baseball card collection destroying and Donny Osmond poster vandalizing. :)

Thank you Dad for the impact that you've had on mine and so many other lives. We love you, man!

Birthdays, Babies and More Birthdays

After the events of last weekend's trip to San Antonio, Cody and I have officially decided that we are blessed beyond belief. Sure, we were pretty certain of this before the weekend's celebrations, but we always welcome a solid reminder of all of the love, faithfulness and amazing people in our lives. We knew the weekend would fly, but we were super excited to celebrate our good friend Duncan's 25th birthday and housewarming, the soon-to-be arrival of Miss Hadley Grace Toudouze and a bundle of family birthdays, including my dad's big 5-0. We were able to see so many of our close friends and family during this visit, and we are incredibly thankful that all of the celebrations just happened to fall within one weekend! We missed the ones that were unable to make it down, but can't wait for the next big family get together, which we're sure will be soon.

 Bring on the birthday and housewarming gifts!

Our sweet friends Duncan and Ashley bought their first house at the end of March. We were so excited to see it, and Ashley has really done a fantastic job putting everything together!

The birthday crew, just like the old days.

It was wonderful to catch up with Mr. and Mrs. Morrow, Duncan's amazing parents.

After the 9 hour haul from New Mexico, we were ready to party!

Clint and Cody

Our friends Clint and Shane were the realtors that helped Duncan and Ashley buy their house, so they put the rebate money from the sale into a birthday card for Duncan. What a great gift!

College buddies- Matt, Clint and Cody

Ash & me

Ash, Roxie and me. Love these girls!

We woke up early on Saturday morning in anticipation of our next set of celebrations. Lynn, Tami and Cale came into town, so Cody golfed with them while I attended a baby shower for my good friend Nicole. Nicole married Wes Toudouze, one of my best friends from high school, and they are expecting their first precious princess at the end of June. I had so much fun having (another) excuse to buy headbands and funky onesies!

 Cody, Cale and Lynn--they assured me that the green color scheme was not planned, but I'm not so sure... :)

Isn't she gorgeous? Can't wait to see her mama skills in action. She will be a natural! 

On another note, Cody informed me that Nicole was "glowing" and looked absolutely beautiful. How sweet is my hubby? Hopefully he'll remember that when my time comes... 

Another of my sweet high school friends, Morgan, with Jax Best. He's a sweetheart!

 

Morgan and me-- from cheerleading, to weddings to babies. Wow, time has flown!

On Saturday night, we had a birthday celebration for Daicee, Aunt Stacey, Cale and Dad at Alamo Cafe. I was so excited to eat tortillas and queso, and am pretty sure I got my fill. It was wonderful to eat Mexican food that wasn't filled with chiles-- sorry New Mexico, but this girl will always prefer Tex-Mex.

 I'm pretty sure this was the point in the evening at which Dad insisted that the Alamo Cafe wait staff create a unique rendition of the birthday song. They weren't able to meet his high expectations, sadly...

 Cale the birthday stud!

 Aunt Stacey, Daicee, Cale and Dad doing some weird hand move in honor of his birthday

 Brothers for life

 I was so happy my sweet grandparents were able to make the trek to south TX for all of the birthday celebrations. These two are amazing!

 My incredible in-laws were able to join in on the fun, too. I was so glad to spend some extra time with them, too!

It was an extra special treat to have Aunt Julie in all the way from Cali. Family festivities are always more fun when she's around.

 

My beautiful mother-in-law, me and Mom. I am one lucky girl to have such wonderful women in my life!

For the sake of space, I'm going to carry the remainder of the birthday photos onto the next post. Stay tuned!

Gone Country

Cody and I grew up during the best times of country music. Sure, there's still some good stuff out there, but nothing quite compares to the steel guitar and fiddle of the early 1990's. Because of this, we were super excited to have the chance to see Alan Jackson when he made a stop in Las Cruces on his tour. Perhaps the best part was that Cody's friend Blaine from Harlingen was there playing drums for Casey James, the opening act. (Casey was a runner-up for American Idol and has a couple of famous songs out that are playing on the radio right now.) Blaine was very generous and let us use his tickets for the show, so we had fantastic seats to see one of the members of country music royalty. Every song took me back to my childhood, and we had so much fun singing along!

Easter in the Desert

I'm going to go ahead and apologize for being a blog slacker. I got really good at it for a while, but wouldn't life be boring if it remained predictable? Not to worry though, because I'm about to catch up royally...

The weekend after Cody's birthday, we celebrated our second Easter away from family. A lot has changed since this time last year, and we continue to be incredibly thankful for the journey that God has taken us on and the wonderful ways that He has shown us His grace and power. I am feeling fantastic and have less time for blogging due to the fact that we're super busy being out and about all the time! I'd say that's a good problem to have though, wouldn't you? Hopefully you were all able to celebrate that same amazing love and God's great mercy at Easter this year. It's always such a wonderful reminder that nothing we go through can ever compare to what Jesus did for us. Although we definitely missed the family festitivites, we're enjoying creating our own family traditions and were excited to have a new member to add to the Easter celebration this year. He may be a little stinky, but we love him!

Our Easter featured a powerful illustrated sermon at the early church service, followed by a huge feast for the two of us complete with a ham, deviled eggs, homemade mac 'n cheese, green beans, and of course, the Johnston family track meet via telephone. We had a slight advantage this year due to the powerful winds that tend to blow through New Mexico in the spring, but I'd like to credit the victory of my team with the sheer athletic performance of our family members (myself included!). We missed out on the hula hoop competition, but I'm sure my cousin Daicee and Aunt Pat would've showed us up with their mad skills anyway. :) Rio really enjoyed his first Easter and even got to sample a bit of the holiday ham. Talk about livin' the dream!

The most handsome boys this side of the Rio Grande!

 Easter family pic

 I continue to believe that we own the most photogenic dog ever. Check out that pose!

 Rio reaped the benefits of the Easter bunny with a very large rawhide bone. He finished it in about 3 hours.

 And the track meet begins! Cody rocked the shot putt (cotton ball) throw.

 Me with the javelin (straw) and discus (paper plate). Rio is pumped, too.

 Cody was a little disappointed in our performance on the discus throw. Thanks to the wind, I'm pretty sure I received a negative 4 foot measurement...

Rio held down the fort while we competed like champs. Isn't a dog's life great?

Happy Easter from the Johnson's!

Cody's Quarter Century

This weekend I very generously handed over my birthday royalty title to my wonderful and handsome hubby. I have been planning to surprise him with a very special birthday weekend for quite some time now, and am so glad that the plans worked out. Cody's parents and brother, Cale, came out to the desert for a long weekend, and we had so much fun spending time with them, as always. It wasn't the same without Katie, Jason and Princess, but we'll all be together soon enough...can't wait for August!!

We started off the weekend with dinner at Cheddar's, always a favorite in the birthday boy's book. Saturday brought a trip to the Farmer's Market, where the boys got more than their fill of shopping before their first meal of the day. Tami and I joked that we were "grounded" after the amount of time that we forced them to spend waiting downtown while we checked out all of the vendors and a cute boutique that neither of us had yet discovered. As if that weren't enough, we continued
to shop til we dropped, and Tami definitely spoiled me with some fabulous new spring outfits. Our trip wouldn't have been complete without a few purchases for my super cute prego sis-in-law and her precious little angel. We had so much fun and were very proud of our finds!

My fabulous mother-in-law,Tami, enjoying the scenery of the Farmers' Market

The hubs and me 

Lynn at the Farmers' Market, enjoying the live music, but not really enjoying the musician's political stance. (She was clearly a liberal.) :)

Brothers at the Farmers' Market

I just had to include this photo of our little princess' first pair of shoes. It's never to early to start the collection after all!

After the shopping extravaganza, we returned home where the boys were grilling some tasty steak. Our good friends James and Zetdi and Chris and Samantha joined us, and we celebrated the birthday boy with great wine, basketball and of course, a Funfetti cake.

The hubs and his stack of steaks--we had quite the selection, might I add. Nilgai, oryx, elk and beef!

Cody and his birthday necessity, a Funfetti cake

Sunday brought a birthday breakfast fit for a king and a trip to Mesilla. We toured the square and visited a local vineyard for a little wine tasting. The scenery was beautiful, and we were happy to see sunshine and not the nasty dust storm that the weatherman had predicted.

The birthday king in all his glory, waiting to be showered with gifts

Me and the boys (minus one)

Just soaking up some sun (and needing this yellow rocking chair!)

Cale and me celebrating the infamous Billy the Kid

The boys in Mesilla

Lynn and Tami in Old Town Mesilla

Wine tasting at Rio Grande Winery

Last night when we were going to bed, Cody told me that I did very well with this year's birthday. I must say this was the ultimate compliment, and I only hope that it shows my amazing hubby just a bit of my appreciation for all that he does for me on a daily, weekly, monthly and yearly basis. I'm so thankful for him and every opportunity to celebrate his awesomeness! When we get to have family here to share in the celebration, you simply can't top it. Thanks so much to Lynn, Tami and Cale for helping me to make the birthday king feel extra special this year!

Cody and Lynn taking Rio for a desert excursion behind our house

Lynn, Cody and Rio monster

Happy Monday to everyone!