Summer Loving + More About Us

We're mushy. If you've been following us from the beginning, you know this and it shouldn't come as a surprise, seeing as how we are a couple blog. Stop right here if you aren't in the mood for sweet words and a warm heart. 

There's something about summer that brings a little love out of everyone. The warm breeze, the possibility of adventure, and long, lazy weekends with the one you love. This past weekend, that's what we accomplished as we set out for an adventure in Fredericksburg. We've documented the town once before (you can see our post here and here); but this time, we had an amazing photographer to capture every moment. If you're in the hill country area, we cannot recommend Lauren enough.

What I Love About Brandon: 

K: I could go on and on about Brandon for ages but I want this post to actually allow you to learn a little more about us. I'm going to give you the highlights and a few funny things about this amazing man that I married. For starters, he has such a tender heart. The man won't step on an ant (he actually does check where he's walking to avoid stepping on any sort of bug); and although he doesn't cry very often, he's very good at expressing emotion towards me.

He has OCD. Everyone jokes that they're OCD but there's a really big difference between a Type A personality (me) and someone who truly has OCD. Brandon has compulsions but I am never bothered by his need to tap certain objects in our home a certain number of times, or the fact that he touches his necklace that hangs on his car rearview mirror every time he hops in his truck. I love these little quirks about him and appreciate that they make him who he is. 

He's actually a great cook. On one of our earliest dates, Brandon insisted upon cooking me dinner. I was shocked but loved this trait about him and his willingness to explore in the kitchen. I remember thinking he was crazy for cooking chicken in orange juice and dusting his sweet potato in cinnamon but both things turned out to be amazing. I promise it was more than just my infatuation with him at the time; the meal was delicious!

He loves animals. You may remember me talking about this in our zoo post, but Brandon is extremely knowledgable about animals. It stems from a combination of the Discovery Channel, Animal Planet, growing up as a Texas boy, and his love for hunting. I've asked Brandon what he'd do for a living if he was not a geologist and his answer always has something to do with animals and raising wildlife.

He's a dreamer. I love this about Brandon because I'm a dreamer too. When we went to the lavender farm (here), we left talking about how we could grow lavender. He's constantly asking me where I'd like to live later in life, where I would like to travel, and what do I want our lives to look like. I love this quality in him because it makes life so much fun! It's so important to have big dreams and ideas as a couple because you can hold each other accountable and insist upon accomplishing your plans. 

B: Katherine is a wonderful woman that loves unconditionally, supports immensely, always sports a positive attitude, and smiles in a way that can calm or comfort me in any situation. I cannot say enough about how prefect Katherine is for me, but below are a few notables on Katherine's demeanor and grace.

She adapts to any situation. Although Katherine is most comfortable within her own selection of hobbies, interests, and natural abilities, she is willing to step outside her innate bubble to try new experiences and witness interests other than her own. For instance, just two months into our relationship she was fully immersed within a birthday party BBQ in Boerne, Texas surrounded with friends, family, and fully automatic firearms. Katherine handled herself like a champ, and walked away with a dozens new friends who all told me individually that she was amazing and that I could not let her get away. This summer, Katherine has taken on a huge full-time (side-job) task of our puppy Tara who exercises and trains the equivalent of football practice three-a-days with play time in between. I love that Katherine is so very flexible in her plans and ease to cope and excel in any situation.

She has a travel bug. Every girl I have met says they want to travel the world, but after a brief examination of their idea destinations, mostly the old world and beaches are aroused. Katherine on the other hand is open to nearly every destination I have mentioned. All it takes are a few beautiful google images of a destination and Katherine is on board. My travel list of destinations is far more remote, my sense of adventure is more extreme, and my idea of traveling is at times too fast paced for Katherine. Nonetheless, Katherine helps us reach a happy medium while being budget minded in our future escapades around the world.

She is a planner. Long before we met, Katherine had devised a systematic approach to life stages. These life stages include everything from personal and family oriented goals that include career paths, publishing, locations to call home in the future, and a lifelong dream to swim with baby sea otters; all plans that I would love to help Katherine accomplish. She loves to generate planned lists of months long for blog posts, cooked meals, and travel destinations. I actually love this planning, because I literally just need to provide some input or answer a few simple questions and all our planned events are accounted for in Katherine's planner.

She gets hangry. Just for the record, Katherine has posted of my hangryness in the past. It is now my turn to iterate her need for food. Katherine wakes up and immediately heads for breakfast tea and some form of nourishment: cereal, toast, or yogurt. Usually at this point in time, a few words (not just indistinguishable sounds) will begin to make their way from her vocal chords. Weekdays send me to work while she wakes up and we text a bit before I am removed from my personnel phone for the duration of the day. What Katherine does the rest of the weekday for food, I haven't the slightest of clues, but on the weekends frequent snacks are a necessity. Road trips require crackers, Belvita bars, and of course, iced tea. There are times when we both are hangry with the ultimate cure being a deep breath, a few bites of food, and multiple sips of flavored iced tea. We actually love to joke about our incessant infatuation with hangryness and our self-prescribed cures for this malnourishment disorder.