About the Year

The year was quite a blur for me. In late January I accepted a promotion to Manager. The good news was that it didn't require us to move again, as the promotion was within the same department. And while I enjoy what I do, the downside was my already busy work schedule became even busier. Our big trip of the year was a week in Ruidoso. We were thrilled to have Alicia's parents, my parents, and my grandmother join us for part of the trip. Other than that I went back and forth to Little Rock quite a bit, and on one of those trips Alicia joined me. Throw in a couple quick trips to the east side of Texas, and that sums up the year.

Dallas - March 2007

Alicia and I took two short trips in March. The first was to Dallas to attend the wedding of my cousin Nick to his beautiful bride Carrie. Most of my aunts and uncles also made the trip, so it was a great weekend to spend with family. I ended up being sick the day of the wedding, but I've never let that stop me; I still made the most of it and attended the ceremony and reception.

Little Rock and Hot Springs - March 2007

Alicia joined me in Little Rock at the end of a business trip in late March. We stayed over the weekend, visiting Hot Springs, and returned to El Paso on the following Tuesday. The food was great, from Whole Hog Cafe (a Little Rock must) to Cajun's Wharf to Fisherman's Wharf in Hot Springs. The weather was perfect during the trip, and we took advantage of that each day to take walks. Some of the sites we took in included the Clinton Presidential Library, Pinnacle Mountain State Park, and Garvin Woodland Gardens in Hot Springs.

Ruidoso - August 2007

Alicia and I spent a week in Ruidoso for our summer getaway. It was our second trip to this mountain getaway (check out photos from our first trip here). After a couple days of just the two of us, my parents and grandmother arrived on Tuesday. Alicia's parents arrived on Thursday. We all stayed at the Inn of the Mountain Gods casino and resort. I played six rounds of golf during the week; the highlights was an 88 on the resort course on Wednesday and an 87 at the Links course in town on Thursday. Alicia spent plenty of time in the casino. She certainly enjoyed playing video poker, and at the end of the week she came away spending more than she won. In addition to the golf and casino, we spent time kayaking in the lake and going to the horse races on Friday. We also visited several restaurants in town, with The Pasta Cafe being the highlight of the week.

Christmas Week - December 2007

The final highlight of the year attending my brother's wedding in Phoenix. After enjoying the week celebrating Christmas, catching up with friends that we hadn't seen in some time, and spending time with family, Steve and Sarah tied the knot on the last Saturday of the year. I've added four photos below to the site; check them all out at Calderwood Photography's online site. Another highlight to the trip was playing Rock Band with our families. We played with Alicia's family Christmas night, and with my family the night after. I've included some photos after the wedding photos.

And now...the Rock Band photos!

Other Photographs

June 30 - Alicia and I went to Houston for a quick weekend to visit Kris and Doug. We planned the trip around The Police coming to Houston on their current World Tour. In addition to seeing the concert, we attended an Astros game; we'll just say the concert was a lot better than the game. A week ago it looked like Craig Biggio may be going for hit 3,000 at the game we attended, but two nights earlier he got five hits to reach the magic mark. So we had to settle for hits 3,003 and 3,004. After the game we drowned our sorrows at Stag's Head Pub. This picture was taken at the pub.

December 16 - Hunter once again proves why he is the smartest cat on the block. Last year, I received a "joke" present of a sign that read "Dear Santa: Leave Presents, Take the Cat." I decided to put the sign up, and immediately Hunter jumped onto the ledge next to the sign. The sign was a little too far to reach, but he tried to hit the sign with his paw and knock it down. He was clearly agitated by the message on the sign. Of course, we love Hunter dearly and would never want Santa to take him.

December 26 - Here's proof that if my dad ever gets your name for a Christmas exchange, your gift is going to be a dud. Here's Doug showing one of his Christmas gifts...a rock! However this is a special rock, as it has sentimental value (we used to paint rocks as kids and use them for door stops as our townhouse doors in San Diego were always open as we had no air conditioning). This was one of the rocks that Kris had painted.