The past two weeks, or maybe it’s been since I got back from Mexico, have been so incredibly busy, dealing with working, all my many Dr. appointments (nothing major, mostly checkups) and getting my classes and everything set up for school, I’ve hardly had anytime to breathe, much less blog! So clearly, with all of that going on, and my lack of blogging, I’ve failed to mention that Thomas and I are going on a little vacation of our own! We’ve been planning it for over 3 months, which might not seem like much, but it felt like eternity to us! On our little vacation, we’ve planned to visit the better half of Southern Texas. 

This is from this morning (Thursday) at 6am! We both made it out of bed, dressed, and in the car by 6! Can you believe that?

Our first stop, of course, was The Czech Stop! If you know Texas, you KNOW the Czech Stop! It’s a small little place, with a connecting gas station, in West, Texas (just a few miles away from where the West Fertilizer Plant explosion occurred a few months back). Growing up, this was somewhere we always stopped on the way south for soccer tournaments, so why not keep the tradition going? We enjoyed some delicious fruit & meat and cheese kolaches! This place will forever be a 10.00 on my scale!

Our next stop was just a few miles up the road, at Collin Street Bakery. Although I’ve passed this place a million and one times, I’ve never stopped. A few weeks back I had a cookie from here that solidified my plans to visit this place on my next trip south. They have oatmeal cookies with golden raisins! I strongly dislike normal raisins, but LOOOOOVE golden raisins, so these cookies totally changed up the whole oatmeal raisin cookie game for me. We also got a couple cherry icebox cookies as well, I haven’t bitten into any of them yet, but my mouth is watering just thinking about them.

After the mouth watering cookies that I begged Thomas to stop for, he decided it was his turn to indulge, so we headed to Robertson’s The Chopping Block, just south of Belton, in Salado, Texas. He had been constantly bragging the entire morning about some beef jerky place… and this was it. When we arrived (I WISH so desperately I would have taken a picture) I was so excited at how cute the little store looked. When we got inside, there was tons of cute stuff. Lots of home decor, as well as different Texas Themed do-dads and such. Once we finally settled on the beef jerky and some gummy candy, we went to check out… Thomas paid $32 for this jar of beef jerky… THIRTY TWO DOLLARS Y’ALL! It’s a struggle for me to pay $3 for the ones from the gas station, but I mean, he says its real beef jerky or something like that. So I guess if it makes him happy, I wont complain!

Next, it was time to check out Texas State! Which I lovedddd! I’m still bouncing around the idea of which college I’ll go to next fall (2014) but I’m really liking Texas State! The campus was much nicer than I expected, everything seemed relatively close, and uh… The river is practically in my back yard. Yeah, I could for sure see myself there! And did I mention the San Marcos Outlets are like a ten minute drive? Absolute perfection! 

Speaking out The outlet mall…. Did you really think Thomas and I weren’t going to stop? It was a lovely 102 degrees outside today, but we conquered the mall, only after a quick lunch at Whataburger (our somewhat tradition when we go on any type of road trip). They had a Victoria’s Secret outlet store. That place was like heaven with 4 walls. I got 2 bras, originally priced at $63 each, for $20 each.. Can you say steal? I sure can! Also grabbed a pair of Tory Burch flip flops for $30. Although I wasn’t a big spender while at the outlet, Thomas sure was! He snagged two new Ralph Lauren Polos for less than $50, as well as a sweet new Micheal Kors watch, and a very nice UT hat! Also included in this picture is the two shirts we got from buc-ee’s, our two croakies for when we float the river tomorrow, three Texas State t-shirts, and a Buc-ee’s cooler bag that I got for Thomas’ mom! Everything you see in this picture was bought with less than $350! can you believe that? I LOVE outlets and I LOVE sales even more!

Today was my very first trip to Buc-ee’s! I’ve lived in Texas my entire life, traveled all over the state, but never been here. This is, by far, the greatest gas station/mall/superstore/bathroom/everything store there could ever possibly be! From the minute we walked in I was amazed. I wanted to buy everything I saw! There was so much cute home decor that I wanted to stuff all in Thomas’ trunk and take back to Dallas… But then I remembered I don’t quite have a home, or even an apartment of my own to decorate yet, so it’d all go to storage or in my (mom’s) garage. Boooo! But really, not sure how I’ve never been here, but if you haven’t either, you should!

One of the cute finds at Buc-ee’s! Can’t wait to hang fun signs like this one day in my own home!

There were so many crosses here, some that I for sure think I could mimic and sell in addition to my other crosses on Etsy! 

After all of those adventures today, I was exhausted! We made our short drive down 35 to our hotel and unloaded everything, when we realized we still needed to head to the grocery store to grab some food to take on the river with us, so what better way to shop than H-E-B?

Thomas and I loved H-E-B! We’d both been here before, but it’s always fun to go to somewhere we don’t go to every day. We grabbed some yummy stuff from the deli in addition to browsing around the store and enjoying lots of yummy samples! We’ll for sure be returning before we head back to Dallas!

Today has been so much fun, but yet, so exhausting. Tomorrow we tackle the Guadalupe River! Can’t wait to see how much fun that will be!

Do any of my readers have any great Texas places they love to visit? I wanna know about them!

P.S.- Just bit into that oatmeal-golden raisin cookie, mainly because thomas offered me one  forced me to have one… IT’S AMAZING!