Chicago and Jimmy Buffett

What a combination! Yesterday, Jeremy and I returned home from a 4-day trip to Chicago and Lake Geneva for the Jimmy Buffett concert. We had a very busy couple of days, and are still exhausted.

After dropping off the dogs at their doggy hotel, we left early Thursday morning for the Windy City. We arrived at our swanky hotel - we stayed at the Hilton - and off we set for some fun! We walked down to Lake Michigan, stopping at the Buckingham Memorial Fountain, and then made our way down to Navy Pier. Navy Pier was a lot of fun - we went on a giant Ferris wheel, walked through a pretty greenhouse, and ate ice-cream from Ben & Jerry's. Then it was back to the hotel to get dressed for our dinner cruise on the Spirit of Chicago. We got all gussied up - I wore a cute dress I had bought especially for the occasion, and Jeremy donned his suit - only to find when we arrived that most people on board were simply wearing cargo shorts and t-shirts!! I guess they didn't read the dress code, which calls for "business casual to dressy". Oh well. In the same vein, our food left much to be desired and the DJ was kind of tacky. But the views were beautiful, and the Blues band that was playing on the upper deck was actually pretty good. All-in-all, I definitely wouldn't recommend paying the money, but it was still an ok way to spend the night. After the cruise, we headed back to the Hilton and had a couple of drinks at Kitty O'Shea's, an Irish pub attached to our hotel. They had a (real Irish) lady and a man playing Irish music and they turned out to be excellent, which made our night much better.

Friday morning we woke up relatively early and, after breakfast at the Artist's Cafe, we decided to hit the Art Institute before heading up to Wisconsin. If anyone is ever in Chicago, make sure that you reserve at least a day (you'll probably need two) to explore the museum...it was amazing! We'd been to the Corcoran Gallery in DC, and I had been to the National Gallery of Art in DC without Jeremy, but they simply don't compare to the Art Institute. It was incredible...it's hard to believe that right in front of you are pieces of priceless art by Monet and Renoir and artists from all over the world. It was beautiful. I just wish that we had more time to spend - we only had about an hour and we only got to see 3 of the 15 collections (and that was without taking time to really read about each piece). Oh well...I'm just grateful we got to see any of it at all.

After that it was off to Nikki and Corey's place before heading up to Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. We arrived at our hotel, unloaded our bags, and headed down to the bar for a cocktail and a light lunch. Then we walked around the town, which was very similar to Montville or Maleny in that it's touristy and family-oriented. We had dinner at a cute little Italian bistro (and sat next to a group of middle-aged people who tanned waaaay too much and enjoyed a little too much plastic surgery), and then it was off to Hog's and Kisses for some drinks and dancing. We finally made it home and curled up in bed, ready for a big day at the concert on Saturday.

We arrived at Alpine Valley at about 2pm, and set up for an afternoon of tailgating. Tailgating at a Jimmy Buffett concert is absolutely crazy - there were some amazing set-ups and a lot (and I mean a LOT) of very drunk people doing very silly things. We pretty much just hung around our car, drank margaritas and beer, and enjoyed the beautiful weather. The concert was a lot of fun, even though we were stuck at the very back and couldn't really see or hear Jimmy. We somehow managed to beat the rush of people leaving, and got to bed sometime around 2am (after wrestling with an inflatable mattress that needed four D batteries that of course we didn't have).

Sunday morning (well, it was really about noon but it felt like morning to us) Jeremy and I left and drove back to Jeremy's parents house to spend the night. After 3 days of staying up late and drinking a few too many drinks, it was nice to finally unwind a little and just relax. We ate a delicious dinner at Rosebud, which is a restaurant that has hosted many famous guests - photos of Frank Sinatra, Robert DeNiro and many other celebrites grace the walls. Then it was in bed early, up at 4am, and on a 6:45 flight back to DC and back to work. We had such a great long weekend, and are still buggered. We took a total of 150 photos, so I pulled out the good ones and have posted them on a separate website.

Chicago and Jimmy Buffett

Oh, and a huuuuge congratulations to Andrew and Christie AND Matt and Mel on their recent engagements! Wow!! Two at once! We wish you all the happiness in the world!

Happy Independence Day!!

Well, it's the day after the 4th of July, and Jeremy and I are dead tired from going into DC to watch the fireworks last night. We rode the Metro (DC's commuter train line) into the city at 3pm, to make it to a dinner reservation at 5. After a couple of mojitos for me and beers for Jeremy, it started to rain. We hung around for a bit hoping it would stop, and then decided we should probably just go home. While we were waiting at the Metro station, the skies parted and sun once again shone through. Woo! So we made our way to the Mall (no, not a shopping center, but rather a long stretch of grass/park that connects the Lincoln Memorial to the Capitol building). Of course the ground was wet from the rain, so we had to steal an old box from one of the stalls to sit on. Classy. The fireworks started at about 9pm and went for a good 20 minutes. Leaving the Mall was like taking part in a mass exodus - there were hundreds of thousands of people all going in the same direction. At the Metro station, people were lined up all along the platform, at least 3 people deep the entire stretch. The trains were full by the time they got to our platform, so we had to squish on. I felt like a sardine. Yuck! Oh well. We finally made it home shortly after midnight, and now it's back to work as usual.

Waiting, waiting, waiting....

After the rain...so beautiful!

Still waiting....

Nope, no fireworks yet...

Our stylish accommodations (I look like a hippy in this photo)!

Jeremy getting sleepy...

These kids were adorable! They sang and danced to some patriotic song...fun! Check out the tiny little ones on the far right...they must have been no older than 3!

Finally!! A little blurry, but you get the gist. The fireworks were absolutely amazing!

Wow, have we been boring these last few weeks or what?! I apologize for not writing on here sooner, but we really haven't done anything especially noteworthy. We're like an old married couple! Haha. No, seriously. Here's a list of the few things we've done over the past few weeks:

1. We've gone out to eat (what a surprise) at Sweet Water Tavern, Chili's, and Sequoia.

2. I hit the outlet malls with my girlfriend from work, Melyssa, and spent a little too much money.

3. We finally cleared out the pile of junk from our living room that had been there since we moved (2 months ago!).

4. We've been to the movies to see Knocked Up and Live Free or Die Hard. Knocked Up was actually a really great movie, and Jeremy is still grinning over how "awesome" Die Hard was (it really was ok - much more of a boy's movie than what I like).

5. Jeremy found out that his resume has been passed onto the hiring manager at the US Forest Service (for a police/investigator position), and he's planning on taking his FBI agent interview sometime in the near future. In the meantime, he's been doing great at work - he's pretty much taking over responsibility for his team when the "team lead" is out of the office.

6. I had an exam in DC for my Motivation & Emotion class. We'll see how well I did - I didn't get to read all the books I was supposed to.

7. Jeremy and I had our immigration interview to prove that we did in fact love each other. That was weird. We had to answer questions like "What do you love about each other?", "How did you meet?" and "What was your first date like?". Those questions seem easy, but those types of things are sometimes hard to quantify. It's hard to list the reasons you chose to marry someone - it's much easier to simply recognize that they exist.

And I think that's about it. We've just been working and going about our day-to-day. I wish we were more exciting for you all. Oh well.

Oh, and check out the cool slideshow I did up to show our wedding pictures. Yay!

Our wedding photos...

My work news

Well, I guess I can tell you all my (kind of ) exciting work news...

So, I'm kind of getting a promotion... One of the lady's in Accounts payable is leaving and guess who's getting her job? Me, of course! I'm going to be doing both my original job in Contracts and the Accounts Payable job. Wow! Two jobs at once! My boss in the contracts department figured that since I wasn't terribly busy all the time, I could handle taking on the extra responsibility in accounts. It's not anything too difficult - just invoices and ledgers, that kind of thing. But, it's a fantastic opportunity to learn more and to expand my resume, plus I'll most likely get a pay increase, which is always nice! Go me!!

A grown-up bedroom

I'm so excited - Jeremy and I finally have a real, grown-up bedroom! Yay! No more plain old boring box-set! Woo! We bought a whole bedroom set last weekend and had it delivered yesterday. It was actually quite a steal - we bought the floor stock, which meant that we could get a bed, dresser, mirror, nightstand and a stool for the foot of the bed, all for about the price of just a regular bed. Sure, the dresser has a few scratches on top, but it's nothing too noticeable and, for the price we paid, we sure can live with it! Here are some pictures...

Notice the beautiful linens, courtesy of mum and dad. Thanks a million - they are gorgeous!

Our crazy Brissy hiding under the bed. It's her favorite spot, probably because Adelaide is too big to get under!

Yesterday Jeremy and I went to his work picnic. It was hot as heck and ridiculously humid outside, but his work had booked a pavillion at Burke Lake Park, so at least we were out of the sun. They had it catered by a delicious Mexican semi-fast-food place, which was yummy! It was nice to finally meet some of Jeremy's workmates, although I felt a little out of place - we were the only ones without kids!! Maybe we should work on that...(just kidding mum! You'll have to wait a few more years yet)

Last night we went out for dinner and drinks in DC with some friends. We went to this amazing Mexican restaurant called Lauriol Plaza. The restaurant is in this huuuuuge warehouse type building, and there was still a line out the door of people waiting to put their names on the list for a table! It was crazy busy. But the food was delicious, and the margaritas were pretty good. We went out to a bar afterwards, and I ended up having a few too many drinks. Oh well. It was a fun night.

And that's about it. Today it's been raining lightly all day (sorry guys, I don't mean to rub it in!), and we just been laying around recovering from last night. Oh, I may have some potentially exciting work news to tell everyone, but you'll have to wait a couple more days. So keep checking back in!

So beautiful!

Well, we got our wedding photos yesterday and, being the show-off that I am, I just have to post a couple of our favorites! Ben did a fantastic job - every picture is breathtaking!

Colorado

So, out of curiosity, I just GoogleEarth-ed Colorado Springs to see what the area we might potentially move to looks like. And, after seeing these pictures, I am ready to move!! Oh my gosh - it looks so incredibly beautiful! Jeremy and I will hopefully take a trip out there soonish to scope the area. Bring on the mountains!

Kids stuff

It's so fun to act like a kid sometimes! Yesterday, Jeremy and I bought the most awesome XBox360 game ever - Viva Pinata. I'm officially hooked!! It's such a cute game - the gist of it is that you're given this plot of land and you have to create a garden that will attract Pinata's to come and live there. You are given this plot that's covered with bad soil, weeds and trash, and you have to start from the ground up (no pun intended), planting grass, buying seeds to grow, building houses for the resident pinatas, calling the doctor when a pinata gets sick, etc. You also have to get your resident pinata's to "romance" each other, and then they will have baby pinatas. The aim of the game (even though it has no end), is to fill your resident pinatas with enough happiness candy that they are sent out to parties to make little boys and girls happy. I love it!! It's so much fun! So far my garden has 3 pinata houses (for my Whirlm's, Sparrowmints and Bunnycombs, of course), a pond, an apple tree and two hazelnut trees, and about a dozen different types of pinatas. Woo!!

And if that wasn't childish enough for all of you, last night Jeremy and I went to see Shrek 3 with one of my friends from work, Melyssa, and her boyfriend Dave. It wasn't that bad - it was much better than the second one, but still not as good as the first. The theatre we saw it in showed it in Digital projection, which meant the picture quality was unbelieveable! The only bad part about the night was that we had an obnoxious little boy sitting behind us who kept burping through the entire movie. Yuck! He was clearly forcing them, and his parents did nothing to stop him (except by saying "Stop burping", to which he usually replied with another one). It was disgusting!

By the way, the new Transformers movie looks sooooo AWESOME! Seriously, it looks fantastic! I can't wait until it comes out!

Now, back to the land of adults. Jeremy and I are pretty much all moved in to our new apartment. We did a bunch of unpacking/cleaning last weekend, and managed to get most of our pictures hung. Here are some pictures (don't mind the mess - the cleanliness doesn't usually last long!) -

From the outside...We're the apartment on the top floor, middle door on the left.

This is our living room/desk area.

Living room. We have a real wood fireplace (on the left)!!

Dining room.

Kitchen. It's kind of old, but we didn't want to pay an extra $200 a month for a renovated one. At least everything works (kind of).

This is our resident beaver! Jeremy found him one day when he was walking the dogs. He lives down behind our apartment building, in a little creek.

Our dog's new favorite pasttime is to lay on the back of the couch and look out the window. Isn't Adelaide so cute?! Usually Brissy lays up on top in the sun.

They love laying on our little deck in the sun!

It's an ok apartment - it's older than our last place, but it's clean and the neighbourhood is nice, which is all that really matters. We are hoping to buy our own house by April next year. We would love to buy one sooner, but it makes more sense for us to wait. Our apartment complex belongs to this company called Equity Residential, and they have this program where 20% of our monthly rent can be used as a downpayment on a house if we build/buy from one of their registered builders! It's a really nice deal, and by April next year we'll have about $7000 from it that we will use to help buy a house. We're also planning on moving out of the DC area by that time (don't worry Anne and Joe, we're sticking around until after you come to visit!) - we're thinking seriously about Denver, Colorado or maybe somewhere in the Chicago area. Houses are way too expensive in this area for us - around here $300,000 will buy you a 2-bedroom condo (if you're lucky, most likely it would only be 1-bedroom), or a dinky old townhouse, whereas in Denver or Illinois you can get a 4-bedroom house for about $200,000! Crazy!! Melyssa thinks that we should move to South Carolina (which is where her and Dave are planning on going sometime soon), so we'll see. We're keeping our options open, but are very excited and keen to move someplace new!

Back to the daily grind

Well, we're back in the US, safe and sound after a fantastic trip! Jeremy was back at work Wednesday afternoon, and I went back on Thursday (I needed a little recovery time). The flight home was ok, but not nearly as good as the flight over. We were sitting down the back of the plane, where there were only two seats on each window side which was nice, because it meant we didn't have to sit next to anyone and had more leg room than in the regular seats. Unfortunately, neither of us slept very well, even though we had both taken sleeping tablets. Oh well. We arrived home without any hiccups at about 12:30am, but we couldn't get to sleep until the early hours of the morning (how terrible is that time difference?!). And now we're back to business as usual - work, actually eating dinners cooked at home, and being harrassed by our dogs.

And that's about it really. We haven't had time to do anything too exciting. Today we're going to see Spiderman 3 (Jeremy's as excited as a kid a Christmas), and then we're probably going out to a Mexican restaurant/bar to celebrate Cinco de Mayo with some friends. Bring on the margaritas!!

While I'm here, I want to say a big thank you to everyone for making our wedding day so incredible! What a fantastic time! Having everyone there made the day so special, and we only wish that more of Jeremy's family and friends could have been there as well. Here's the one nice picture I've got so far (I believe it was taken by one of my friends). Hopefully we'll have more to share with everyone soon (and I expect to get millions of others from all you happy snappers as well!)...

Here's my update!

Hey everyone!!

Well, my first week at my new job has been going great! Even though I've gone from waking up at 8 or 9am to waking up at 5:45am, I absolutely love having a "real" job. The people I work with are really nice. My cubicle is pretty big - I have a wrap-around desk, a big ol' leather chair, and lots of room to file all my stuff. So far I've just been learning the ropes - I'll usually sit in with Kelly, the contracts manager (and the lady I'm assisting) for about half of my workday, and just observe her. We chat a lot too, which is nice! I'm learning soooooooooo much about the government contracting world, which will be invaluable to me in the future. So far I've worked on non-disclosure agreements, certifications & representations, and I've put together a mack-daddy of a proposal that TAG has submitted. I've been reading more legal stuff than I've ever read in my life - you know those licensing agreements they make you accept when you install new software?? Kelly and I had to read through one of those thoroughly and make any changes it needed before they put it on the website. Fun! All those disclaimers and agreements that come with everything but that no-one ever reads are exactly what we focus on! And, believe it or not, they're actually pretty interesting!! Once you understand what the company's motives are, and the reasons they put certain things in, it's pretty cool to know that you understand what the heck all those legal documents mean! Plus, I'm learning a lot about the cool products/services TAG creates. For example, TAG has a contract with the Spyker Formula 1 team - Spyker uses TAG's servers because they can withstand heat up to 60 degrees celcius and are resistant to dust/being dropped. Pretty cool!

Other than that, not too much else has been happening. My rear tire blew out when I was driving on the highway the other day, but luckily I was able to control the car and managed to pull off to the shoulder safely. And I was extra lucky, because my wonderful Jeremy came to save me! Woo!

And that's about it really. I just wanted to update this so that I could tell everyone about my new job.

Have a great weekend!!!

Well, I think we got our last snowfall of the season last weekend. At first they were expecting a "wintry mix", which means freezing rain, sleet and some snow, but it turned into a full on snow shower. Anywho, I just wanted to post a pretty picture that I took once all the snow had fallen...

A new baby and a new job

Don't be alarmed - the baby's not ours! Friends of ours, Eric and Shannon, welcomed little Chase Maximilian into the world at 11:47pm Thursday night. We haven't seen them yet, but Eric informed us that both mom and baby are doing great. We're so excited for them, and hopefully we'll get to meet the little guy on the weekend. CONGRATULATIONS RESIENFELDS!! Yay!

On a completely different note, one of the interviews I went on last week apparently went really well, and I've been offered a fantastic job!! On March 12th I start with Technology Advancement Group, or TAG, as a Contracts Administrative Assistant. The company is really cool - they make hardware (computers etc) and provide support to the military and government. I believe they have about 1000 employees spread across their 3 locations, but the one I'll be working at is the headquarters. My position entails mostly administrative support, but it will be a fantastic opportunity for me to learn the ins-and-outs of the government contracting world (which is a hugely lucrative business around the DC area), and it's a great foot in the door. Hopefully, if I enjoy working with the company, there'll be lots of room for me to advance and be promoted to different positions. I'm a little scared to start a new job, but I'm so excited! Go me!!

No real news

Hey there everyone! Once again, I'm sorry that I haven't written on here in a while, but we've got not real news to report. Well, I guess there are a couple of things, but nothing too noteworthy.


First off, we finally had our first decent snowfall last week. Now, by "decent" I don't mean New York decent (yes, they did in fact get 8 feet of snow), but decent enough for the Washington DC area. We got close to two inches of snow, and about a half an inch of ice on Wednesday last week. Unfortunately, because of the layer of ice that fell on top of the snow, everything is still slippery and icy, and because the temperatures have barely risen above freezing the ice is yet to melt. Here's some pictures I took this morning, 6 days after the snow fell...







As pretty as it looks, I wish it would hurry up and melt already! Oh well...

On a completely different note, I've decided that it's time for me to grow up and get a real job. Not knowing when I'll get off work (and sometimes start work) each day is starting to drive me crazy, as is my 30 minute commute each way. As much as I love the kids I look after, and as sweet as it is that I get a lot of time off and freebies like hockey tickets, I'm ready to start conversing with adults on a regular basis. The whole nanny thing is starting to wear me out, especially now that Bobby has remarried and I now have to look after his step-kids. It's time for me to move on! I have a couple of job interviews in the next couple of days, so wish me luck and I'll keep everyone posted!

Now, on another completely different note, I've been thinking lately about just how much I've changed since I've been over here. I guess being in a new country and having to adapt to a new society does that to people! Here's a list of things that I would never have tried/accomplished if I hadn't moved over here...

• I now looooove dogs! Big ones, teeny ones, slobbery ones, annoying ones! I can't believe I spent so much of my life being scared of them. I can't wait until we have our own house, and we can get a big ol' thing, like a Mastiff or a Rottweiler. After watching an episode of The Dog Whisperer, we would love to get a Boerboel, but they're super aggressive towards strangers. Oh well.
• Sports - ice hockey is my new favorite thing to watch, and snowboarding is my new favorite thing to do. Both sports are things that I would never, ever have come across had I stayed in Toowoomba.
• Foods - Oh my gosh...my mother would be astonished to see the types of foods I've come to love since being over here! I peel my own prawns and shell my own crabs (I won't have to ask dad to do my prawns any more)! I actually eat salad with dressing (although it's usually just caesar). Dips, BBQ sauce, all different types of pizza, mustard on sandwiches...the list is huuuge! Although, I still don't like raw tomatoes...yuck!

And of course there's all the not-so-superficial changes - I'm getting married (who knows if I would be doing that if I were still in Toowoomba), I'm definitely more confident and not so scared to try new things, yadda yadda yadda. I'm telling you, everyone needs to do what I did while they still can - I wouldn't change a single thing!

Snowboarding!

Well, the weather finally decided it was time for winter and so Jeremy and I were able to go snowboarding on the weekend. Yay! As promised, here are some photos (although they're not very glamorous)....

Me at the top of the mountain, delaying strapping into my board. Doesn't it look like I have a moustache in this photo?! Hehe. Don't worry, I don't...

Jeremy and I on the lift. It was actually snowing by this time...see all the snow stuck to us?!

That would be me, coming to the base of the mountain.

Me again.

Jeremy coming towards the bottom of the mountain.

Jeremy again!

And that's it! Pretty exciting stuff huh?! On a side note, I am actually really starting to get the hang of this snowboarding thing. On all previous snowboarding trips, I had been unable to turn "toe-side" (turning to face the mountain), which meant that I would constantly be turning "heel-side" (turning to face down the mountain) to slow myself down. Not only did this absolutely kill my legs, I looked like a gimp because that's so not the way to snowboard. Anywho, yesterday I finally began to master the art of switching from heel-side to toe-side (which is what you see all good snowboarders do...they turn one way and then quickly carve the other way), which was a huuuuuge accomplishment for me! I ended the day feeling great - my legs weren't sore because instead of fighting the mountain I was actually letting myself coast down without being afraid! Poor Jeremy didn't have such a great day...he fell getting off the lift and hit his shin on his binding (actually, the skier next to him pushed him forwards and he lost his balance), and then he fell another time (I think my board went over the front of his board) and twisted his knee. But, ever the trooper, he got back up and by the end of the day he was fine. He's a much better snowboarder than me, probably because he's not afraid to go super fast. So, that was our Sunday...fun, fun, fun!!!

Back to Saturday...Some of our good friends, Eric and Shannon, are expecting a little baby boy in February (actually, their due date is the 28th, so keep your fingers crossed he'll pop out a day early and we'll have the same birthday!), and so on Saturday I went to a baby shower. We had a lot of fun playing "The price is right" for baby items and some other crazy games. It was so great to see Eric and Shannon again (we don't see them nearly enough), and to shower her with gifts for the baby (whose name, by the way, will be Chase Maximilian - how cute is that!).

And that's all our news. Oh, it finally snowed here last night, so now everything is a wintery white (and all the roads are icy as heck! Aaarrrghh!). Yay!!

Christmas, New Years, and everything else

I know, it's been forever since I wrote on here. I meant to do it after Christmas, but then I figured I'd wait until after New Years, and then I just never got around to it. But now, due to popular demand, I'm finally knuckling down and getting it done!

As many of you already know, Jeremy and I made the long trip to Chicago to spend Christmas with his family. We packed up the dogs, drugged them up with Dremamine (to stop them from getting carsick), and made the 12 hour drive to the windy city. We were there for about a week, and kept very busy with Christmas, family and friends. Jeremy's parents hosted Christmas day dinner, and so after opening all our pressies we were running around like mad people making sure that everything was done by the time aunts and uncles started arriving. We had the usual Christmas meal - turkey, stuffing, mashed and sweet potatoes, and finished it all off with pie. Mmmmmm....delicious! The day after Christmas (nope, it's not Boxing Day over here) we ventured into the city of Chicago to spend the day with some of Jeremy's good friends, Nicky and her husband Corey, and Julie. We had such a great day - walking around the city, riding the "L-train" (called so because the tracks are elevated above the streets instead of running through tunnels), eating and drinking. Here's some pics...









Jeremy and I looking over the ice-skating rink at Millenium park.











The giant bean at Millenium park - why they have this in the middle of the city I have no idea!


From left: that's me, Jeremy, Jessica (Jeremy's younger sister), Julie, Nicky and Corey




After dinner, all 6 of us piled into Corey's BMW to drive to a bar. It sure was cosy!! Speaking of dinner, while we were in the city we ate some of the best food ever! We ate lunch at this funky little place called the Bongo Room where the wait is never less than 30 minutes and where people line up in the street to eat on weekends. It was so delicious! Then, for dinner we ate the best tapas I've ever had! We had delicious things like octopus with french fries (no, not calamari, but real octopus with tentacles and all), chicken, cheese and ham broquettes, mussells...you name it, we ate it. It was so incredible! Wash it all down with a mojito and you're good to go! Mmmmmm!!

The next day Jeremy and I just lay around the house, and hit the mall for a little post-Christmas shopping. The day after that, we got to go and visit good friends of ours who had moved from the DC area back to Chicago after they had their baby. It was so great to see them, and to play with their adorable baby girl Keira. She is a really sweet baby - always smiling, with chubby little cheeks! Don't believe me!? Look for yourself!



Then it was back to DC in time for New Years Eve. After such a hectic week, we weren't really in the mood to go out and party, so we made reservations at a restaurant by us. We had a couple of drinks, and some delicious food, and then came back home to watch the ball drop on tv. Not very exciting, but still it was nice.

Then it was back to work as usual, and nothing much has been happening since. It's been unseasonally warm here over the last couple of weeks, but yesterday the weather finally decided to act like it's winter and temperatures have dropped. It's been dropping below freezing overnight, and not getting much warmer during the day. It's pretty darn cold, but I'm so glad it finally is because it means one thing - we get to go snowboarding again! Woo! Maybe this time I'll actually remember to bring a camera so we can get some action shots! Haha. I'll have to try my hardest not to fall down when the shutter clicks!

Sports, sports, sports!

Who would've thunk that I'd be so into going to sporting events?! It's ludicrous to imagine little ol' unathletic me actually enjoying watching a team play. I guess it just goes to show how much I've changed over the last 2 years.

So, this weekend Jeremy and I not only scored tickets to see ice hockey, but we also scored some tickets to an NFL game. Woo! On Saturday night we went to see the Capitals play the Buffalo Sabres - what an AWESOME game! It was crazy! There were a couple of big fights (a couple of players got sent off for the game), and some awesome goals! I'll do my best to re-cap one of the most awesome goals I've seen yet...So, after the first big fight both teams were penalised. Sometimes when a penalty is called, they do this thing called a "power play", where the team that was in the wrong has to play with one man less than the other team for a certain amount of time. So, after the big fight both teams had a power play, but the Sabres had one man less for a longer period of time seeing as they started the fight. Now, if a team thinks they will benefit, they are allowed to pull out the goalie and put an extra man on the ice. So, the crazy Sabres pulled their goalie in the hopes of scoring against the weakened Capitals. Hehe. BIG MISTAKE! So the puck is all the way at the other end of the ice, and someone hits it, it bounces off a Capitals player, and ever so slowly starts sliding down the ice. The Caps player and a Sabres guy both take off skating in hopes of catching it, but apparently the puck was sliding just a little faster than them. Slowly but surely, the puck just barely glides right into the unmanned goal. Haha! It was the best goal ever! Hilarious (although I'm sure my story doesn't do justice to the brilliance of such an event - go here and click on "John Erskine with an empty netter" to watch)! It was the best game ever. LETS GO CAPS!

Oh, and did I mention that Bob's $14ooo worth of season tickets to the Caps games also gets the bearer into a swanky area called the Acela Club? Well, we discovered that they do, and so Jeremy and I spent most of the game sitting at a candlelit table with a bottle of wine, with an awesome view of the ice. Sweet!

Then, after our exciting night at the hockey, on Sunday we went to our first pro football game. Holy cow! Crazy! The Washington Redskins were playing the Atlanta Falcons. The stadium was huuuuge and it was packed! I've never heard such a loud crowd in my life. It was pretty cool. The game was average, and considering I don't really care much for football it was pretty boring. Plus, NFL games take forever, because they have to regroup and discuss strategies and all that jazz in between plays. But it was still kinda cool. Once again, Bob had awesome tickets. We were on the "club" level, which means that we had access to a whole level of bars, with a Hooters (yes, that's right, Hooters!) and all that fun stuff. If we wanted to, we could have stayed after the game for a post game party, but we decided to high-tail it out of there in an attempt to beat the crowds. We didn't get any good photos, but here's the two that I did take...

The next picture, however, is a classic. Our cute (and mostly pain-in-the-butt) dog, Adelaide, has had some weird growth on her side for a couple of months. The past week it seemed to double, or even triple, in size, and then the other night it burst. I know...EEW! So, we didn't want her licking, biting or scratching at it, and so my crazy Jeremy had this wonderful idea (NB:that was sarcasm)...

Yep, that's right...he put one of his t-shirts on our poor doggie! Haha. She sure looked ridiculous, and the picture doesn't even do it justice. Oh well. She didn't seem to mind too much, but in the morning when Jeremy got up to let her out she had somehow managed to get it off of herself. See what madness I have to put up with!!? Haha. Oh, and we took her to the vet but apparently she's fine. She has to take some antibiotics to help the busted thingy heal, but other than that she's back at home, being her normal annoying self. Lucky us.

And that's about it. It's getting pretty cold here - at the moment it's -2 degrees Celcius outside. I guess winter is finally upon us, which is both good and bad. It's super good because it means that Jeremy and I will finally be able to put our snowboards to good use (the ski places are making snow as we speak, and will hopefully open sometime this week). It's bad because it means that my little fingers and my little nose will feel like icicles for the next 3 months. But oh well, we love winter, and I absolutely love the snow! So be on the lookout for lots of snowy pictures in the near future! Hopefully we'll get some good pics of us snowboarding this season, so you can all be jealous that we're so awesome! Haha.

Christmas already?!

Yes, I know it's been a while since you guys have seen anything from us, but I don't know that we've done much that's been particularly news-worthy. Mum is always saying that we're ALWAYS doing stuff, but that stuff isn't much more than dinner. Oh well. Here goes...

Over the last few weeks we've seen Halloween come and go (we had a miserable 4 trick-or-treaters at our apartment), gone to an ice-hockey game to watch Will play during the break between 1st and 2nd period, had Thanksgiving dinner at a restaurant (as opposed to having it with family and friends, like most normal people do), and pushed and shoved our way through the mall on one of the biggest shopping days of the year (the Friday after Thanksgiving, curiously name Black Friday). And that's about it really. We've both been working hard (or not so hard, but shhhh...don't tell anyone), and are currently enjoying a loooooonnng weekend together (we have off from Thursday through till Sunday for Thanksgiving). Other than that, not much else is new.

At the moment, Jeremy and I are seriously considering moving to a new city. Our top choices at this point are Portland (Oregon), Seattle (Washington) and Denver (Colorado). We would really love to buy a house sometime in the near future, and if we stay in the DC area that most likely won't happen. Housing prices are ridiculous around here - friends of ours bought a 1-bedroom condominium last year for just under $400,000, and that's about 40 minutes outside of the city!! If we buy a house, we would love for it to be big enough for us to stay there for at least a few years, and hopefully it will be big enough for us to raise a family when that time comes (don't worry, it's not coming for at least another 3 years). Moving to a new city will hopefully allow us to find such a house, and at a cheap price relative to the prices out here. But we'll see...moving is such a huge deal, and if we move at all we most likely won't do so until after the wedding in April. In the meantime, we'll keep slogging it out here in DC.

Speaking of money, it's so weird working for a family that is so incredibly wealthy. It blows my mind to think of how much money is floating around the area that they live in. For example, this house is just around the corner from Bob's place, and look at the price! It's crazy! I look after a 15 year old girl who has at least half a dozen pairs of jeans that cost $200 each, and we recently found a pair of Dolce & Gabbana boots in Will's closet. Caroline and Russell go to a school that costs $20,000 per child per year, starting in kindergarten! Can you imagine paying that much money for a 5-year old to play and eat glue?! It amazes me that so many people have so much money. I try my hardest not to get jealous, and am constantly reminding myself that Jeremy and I are really doing pretty damn well for ourselves, but still....it would be so nice to not have to worry about money. Oh well. I guess we'll just keep working hard, and one day it will all pay off!

Trick or treat!?

Well, I think it's safe to say that I am now officially an "American". Today Jeremy and I picked up some pumpkins so that we could make our first Jack-O-Lanterns together. After not finding any pumpkins at the grocery stores (apparently it's time for them to put our Christmas stuff), we made our way out to a local farmers market stall to pick some up. They had hundreds of the things...big ones, teeny ones, wrinkly ones, moldy ones. So many to choose from! We eventually found our perfect pumpkins - big and round, perfect for carving. Jeremy also insisted on getting apple cider and powdered sugar donuts (somewhat of a tradition for him at Halloween). Then it was back home to get friendly with our pumpkins....

Other than that we've had a pretty lazy week/weekend. Oh, we went out to dinner on Saturday night, to a pretty nice place called Sweet Water Tavern. It was really nice, and the food was awesome, except for one thing. Jeremy was eating his coleslaw when he chomped down on....wait for it.....a piece of glass! Crazy!! Luckily he didn't hurt his teeth or cut his mouth, but that was pretty freaky! We both got fresh meals, and then the manager gave us a gift card to use next time we ate at one of their restaurants. And THEN, I looked at my cocktail shaker that my drink had arrived in, and we saw that it had a big ol' crack running down it too! I'm telling you, in between all our car drama and getting glass in our food, I swear that one of us broke a mirror inadvertantly or something. Oh well.

PS - the absolute best thing in the world is a steaming cup of hot apple cider! Mmmmmmmm.....so so good!