( Steph Lloyd )

On Thursday Matt and I slept in. We weren’t sure if we wanted to “waste” time by sleeping but I was really dreading the overnight drive home and figured it would help if we got some extra sleep. We ended up getting up around 10, put everything in the car and cruised up to Round Rock so we could go to IKEA and some outlet stores.

I got two purses from the Fossil store, a couple of t-shirts and another pair of Converse All-Stars. Matt made me get the shoes. It wasn’t like he had to twist my arm though. Haha. Matt got a pair of shoes too and a shirt. It wasn’t busy there, so we had a lot of fun shopping around. Next we went to IKEA. It was tons of fun! We just wandered through, checking out all the room displays and getting ideas. If we would have had more money and a truck, I would have been tempted to load up. Instead, we bought two nightstands for our bedroom and some cute glasses.

We also ate in their cafeteria. Matt had some chicken wrap and I had Swedish meatballs. I’ve been thinking about making them for several months but have never gotten around to it. They weren’t quite as good as my mom’s but they definitely satisfied my craving. I also drank Lingonberry soda… so good! We didn’t walk through the food area, so I didn’t see that they sell Lingonberry syrup there. I think I might have to order some so I can have it more often. Either that or live in a Scandavian country for awhile. Hehe.

After shopping our hearts out, he headed to the church where Trey Ratcliff was going to be speaking. We got there ten minutes before the meeting was scheduled to start and found the room packed. We had to sit in the very back. Matt took notes the whole time and I just kinda sat there absorbing it. I have worked through Trey’s tutorial online before, so I had an idea of what was going on, but I wanted t see if it’d actually just sink in while I was there. Happy to say, it did. Something clicked and I was like, I get it!

Afterwards, we went up to introduce ourselves and thank him for everything. He actually knew who we were, because of this blog or Twitter, which surprised us. We took our picture with him and Matt asked if he could show him a few of his HDR photos and get his opinion on them. We were really impressed that he actually took his time looking at them and gave Matt some good advice. Matt, of course, was stoked that the Master of HDR (haha!) said that he was above average. Hearing Trey speak was the reason for going and it definitely made the entire trip worth it.

Our drive home was uneventful, thankfully. Matt drove the whole way while I kept music going and talked with him. We pulled into Tulsa around 5 a.m. He stayed up, showered and went to class at 9, returned the rental car at 12, took me to work at 2, stayed up all day (even worked out at some point), picked me up at midnight and then we both crashed. He stayed up for 38 hours straight. Crazy yet impressive. Haha. I slept as soon as we got home until I had to go to work and was still pretty zonked out during my shift.

Overall, we liked Austin. We would have liked more time to get to know the city but we were happy with our short trip.

Tags: Austin, HDR photography, IKEA, road trip, Trey Ratcliff