November 25

My friend Jill got us this awesome wine book for the wedding and tonight I pulled the wine labels from that bottle of Bella and put them in the book. I thought this was really cool because the winery is small and family-owned and they dedicate their wine to their children. The labels are art from the kids, and on the back of this one was a poem to their son.

November 24

Tonight we went to Indy to hang out with Jay.

Hubs voices his displeasure at the picture-taking

Jay and I pose with the leg lamp

November 23

Today we hung out in Logansport, stopping off at Mr. Happy Burger for lunch. Seriously one of the best tenderloins that I have ever had. Oh, and they have a giant cow outside the restaurant.

Dade holds baby Odin. After I took the picture, he said "Did you take a picture of my baby? Is the picture of my baby and me together?" So cute!

November 22

Today was Thanksgiving and I totally forgot to take a picture.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

I am thankful for:

• My wonderful family. Dad, Mom, Katie and Jay - you are so very important to me and I am so happy to have you in my life
• My extended and new family. I am so very blessed to have warm and loving extended family; both original and married-into families.
• My husband - he is my foundation, my best friend, and confidante. I love him and love that he was made specially for me. I also love that he will execute bullet points on a honey-do list such as shampooing the carpets. And he is quick to volunteer for those projects which I really do not want to do, such as shampooing the carpets!
• All my friends.... it means alot to have such great homies
• I'm thankful for so much more!

November 21

Tonight my best-friend-from-high-school-and-freshman-roommate Jill and her husband Chris came into the city and had dinner with us (Her hubs is from Naperville, just outside of Chi and they came into town to visit the in-laws.....). This is the bottle of wine we had, a bottle that I have been looking forward to drinking since August - a bottle of Bella Pinot Noir..... so good!

November 20

no pic today, nothing interesting....

November 19

Today I got my NEW! PINK! LAPTOP!

November 18

No pic today... Sundays are wayyyyyyyy boring, as a rule.

November 17

Today we bought a gnome. And we named him Herman G. Wells. And that's all I have to say about that.

November 16

This weekend we headed to Bloomington for the annual IU-Purdue faceoff. Here is the pic of me and the boys with our AMFs at the Upstairs!

Sunday, November 11-Thursday, November

Like I said, I was on Sabbatical this week, but I did take a few pictures when I happened to be out in Oak Park

November 10

Tonight we went to the Black and White Ball - it's a fundraiser for the Boys and Girls Club that is SO MUCH FUN! They have this great cover band called Maggie Speaks that is great, and the event is catered by China Grill. We had a great time last year and got together a big group to go this year, including my parents. Here Mike and I pose like we're going to the prom or something!
Mom and Dad dance to "Stayin' Alive"! I had so much fun with them, and am soooooo glad they came up for the birthday weekend. It was one of the most fun weekends I have had.

November 9

Tomorrow is my birthday, but today we had a birthday dinner! Chicken noodles and my some of my favorite gals... nothing could be better.

November 8

Tonight I made all the noodles and sat out all the fixin's for the dinner on Friday night. I couldn't get over the fact that we not only have this condo, but that all of our family and friends were so kind to give us all this cool stuff! The crockpot Jay got me for Christmas a few years ago (I think the quote was "this thing is the Mercedes of Crockpots") but the rest is all wedding gifts!

November 7

Tonight I started the preparations for the birthday dinner we are hosting for my birthday on Friday. Our close friends are coming over and we are having chicken and noodles, the traditional "April Birthday Dinner".... this is a pic of my boiling the potatoes, I boiled and mashed two bags of potatoes tonight!

November 6

No picture today, but Mike took off for Orlando for training today. So I basically just came home and cleaned the house.

On vacation....

I'm on hiatus from the blog this week because we're doing thank-you notes for the wedding every night! I know I am a slacker just getting them done now, but we MOVED! And we (by we I mean me) painted! And we cleaned and organized and moved things around until we felt like we were going to die!

Pictures from last week and blog update from the coming weekend in Bloomington will be completed on Sunday. Thanks ya'll!

November 5

The boy puts felt on the bottom of our new furniture. Exciting night!

November 4

We got a cool shelf to put our wedding champagne Jereboam on... nice, huh?

November 3

Tonight my friend Amy Duff came into town and we all got together for dinner at Tracy's...

Choater accepts the Major Award

The gals
Me, Em, Choater, and Amy hang out at Mad River

November 2

Tonight we had a date night at La Gondola. Oh my gosh, SUCH great food. They have this pumpkin ravioli in a butter sage sauce that was to die for. It is definitely going to be cycled into our regular rotation of restaurants.

After dinner, we watched "Blades of Glory" - this scene from the beginning of it, where the mascot catches fire cracked me up for some reason. The movie was awful, but moderately entertaining.

November 1

Tonight Carl and Mike and I hit up a happy hour for the mentoring group that I'm in. It was lots of fun!

October 31

Today I had lunch with Dora and this guy dressed as Beetlejuice was handing out candy apples. He was hilarious.

October 30

The boy made weight! How cute is he?

October 29

Mike's final weigh-in for his weight loss challenge is tomorrow, and he's purchased his breakfast already (to be eaten AFTER the weigh-in, of course!)