Things that make me happy: Fall edition

The bride (Sarah) and bridesmaids singing "Don't Stop Believing" with the wedding band. Did I mention it was a fun wedding?


In an effort to keep this blog alive, here's a quick post of what's been making me happy this fall:

1. Sarah and Dave's beautiful and fun wedding in Baton Rouge (Second Line! Dancing! Friends!)
2. All the great fall TV (There are no words for how happy I am that Lilly and Marshall are pregnant on How I Met Your Mother...yes, I know how crazy that sounds). I also think I love 'American Horror Story' despite being one of the most twisted shows ever.
3. Concerts- there have been some great bands in town this fall. My favorite so far has been The Head and The Heart (Their album is my favorite of the year). We're going to see Iron and Wine and Josh Ritter in November.
4. Friends- Just when I need it, I'm always reminded how great my friends are. I feel so grateful for this.
5. Family- Just like #4
6. Fall- the leaves, the colors, the weather. Fall in Atlanta is awesome!

Paris and Heidelberg

It's been almost two months since we took our amazing 9 day trip to Heidelberg and Paris (thanks FF miles!) I think pretty much everyone reading this has seen more of the pictures and heard about our trip, so I won't go into blow by blow detail about everything. If you want to know more, please ask! I thought that I'd just list my favorite places to eat and things we did.

Paris:
1. Falafel at Au L'As du Fallafel: They say it's the best falafel in the world. I know that it was definitely the best I've ever had.
2. L'Avant Comptoir: A teeny, tiny bar/restaurant that's adjacent to a much more expensive, fancier place. This place was incredible. You order from a huge menu (pictures of the different items hanging from the ceiling) tapas-style and eat standing up at the bar. Awesome!
3. Bread! Every kind and everywhere!
4. Spring Restaurant: Our fanciest, most unique meal of the trip. The chef is actually American, but has been in Paris a long time. It's also a very small place, with the tables seated around the kitchen so you see and hear everything. It was awesome.
5. Fat Tire Bike Tour: We took a 4 hour guided bike tour around Paris. Highly recommended!
6. Musee d'Orsay: I love this museum. My favorite museum in Paris is the Picasso museum, but it's closed for renovations. The d'Orsay is a close second. We ended up going on the first day of the month, when it's free to everyone....so the line getting in was long. But, I guess it was nice to save that money.
7. The Latin Quarter, St. Germain des Pres, and the Marais: Beautiful neighborhoods. One of my most favorite things was to just walk around these areas and the parks within each. We stayed in the Latin Quarter and liked it, but we might want to stay in the Marais district next time. So beautiful!
8. The Eiffel Tower at night: We didn't go up at night, but we watched the sunset behind it from the lawn. A lot of people had picnics and wine- very romantic!

Heidelberg:
1. Vetter - awesome, traditional brew house. We ate there 3 times in 3 days!
2. Hot chocolate at a Belgian chocolate house on the Hauptstrasse.
3. Walking around the Hauptstrasse (main shopping drag) and people watching.
4. The castle lighting and fireworks at night, illuminating the Heidelberg Castle.
5. Our hotel- it was right off the river in a historic townhouse with a little balcony.

Things that make me happy

...at the moment:

1. The new Bon Iver album
2. The new Fleet Foxes album
3. Planning Sarah's bridal shower
4. Thinking about Sarah's wedding and the fun we'll have in Baton Rouge in October
5. Listening to music with Matt (this is always)
6. Tacos on Buford Highway...followed by a foot massage at a Korean spa on Buford Highway
7. Reading some new blogs that I've discovered
8. Cold drinks
9. Talking to friends (this is also always)
10. Family (also, always...of course!)
11. Thinking back on our wedding day, now that our 4 year anniversary is next week
12. Dreaming about the beach- our trip to FL is coming soon!

Good friends have great kids

Hi everyone,

Again, I realize that I have major gaps between my posts:(
I've been thinking about changing the name of this blog for awhile now, so I did. What do you think? For some reason, I feel that would help me to write more and find a better focus to this blog. We'll see....

I need to post some pictures and details of our recent trip to Paris and Heidelberg, which, in a word, was amazing! I will do that soon, I promise. I'm co-teaching a summer class this semester, so that and a research project are keeping me fairly busy this summer. I can't believe that we're now in July!

This week I've been thinking a lot about my friends who have kids (which is now most of my friends). One of the coolest things about the last few years has been seeing my friends become moms and to meet their beautiful kids. On Monday, I watched my friend's 2 year old son while she and her husband ran the Peachtree Road Race. It was such a nice morning and he is just the coolest and smartest kid ever. He's not the only cool kid though. It's been lots of fun to meet and spend time with my friends' kids and see how their own personalities and parenting styles are coming out in their kids. And while I realize that this is not a revelation, I thought the other day- Wow- Cool people have cool kids! (Insert the duh! here). Of course, I know this already because just look at my parents and me/ my siblings:)-

I took a couple of pictures from Monday morning, but I'm becoming more conscious of posting kids' pictures on the web, so I won't post it here. Instead, I'll post one from our trip as a teaser:)

Shopping with the girls

Last week, my good friend Cathy was in town visiting and it was great to see her and her kids. Cathy, her 3 cute kids, and I had a fun lunch of Dim Sum one day. Another day, I met Cathy and her daughter, Berkeley, at the mall for some shopping and then dinner, where Matt joined us. Berkeley is definitely a girl after my own heart- she was all about anything girly, pink, or twirly as we walked through stores. Here's a photo of her trying on about 10 necklaces at Urban Outfitters. I love her thought process here- if one looks cute, 10 will be even better! What a fun time!

This weather....

is awesome! We've had a great last week or so of weather (in the 60s and sunny most days), which has really done wonders to my mood and allowed me to really get more serious about training for the half marathon that is coming up very soon (!) Matt has joined me on some of the longer runs. Last weekend we did almost 8 miles around our 'hood and into Freedom Park, which we love running through (it ends at the MLK Memorial Site, overlooking the city- maybe my favorite view in Atlanta). Today, we did a little less (long story), along the same route, ending at our favorite burger spot, Grindhouse Burger. Guess we kind of negated the run we had just completed...but oh well.

Happy Weekend!

Updates

(photo retrieved Feb. 1, 2011 from http://www.world-city-photos.org/Paris/photos/Eiffel_Tower/Eiffel_Tower_orange/)

I try to refrain from not posting for awhile and then the post being a list of everything that's happened since then- but I'm not doing so well so far this year! But, to quickly recap-

We went to CA for Matt's Grandpa's funeral service a couple of weeks ago. It was a lovely service and great to visit with family that we don't often see. We also managed to squeeze in a couple of trips to In N Out and Coffee Bean, of course. We were also introduced to a dance game on Matt's cousin's XBox, which started something....more on that in a minute. It also happened that were home for Matt's mom's birthday, so we got to celebrate it with her.

School is keeping me busy! I thought things would slow down since I graduated, but some of my newer job duties are keeping me on my toes. But, I haven't been working on the weekends so far, which has been awesome. I've been spending a lot of time with Matt, friends, and family- which keeps the weekends pretty full, but in a good way:)

Dancing- So, we (I'm including Matt here, he may not like that) loved playing this XBox dancing game in CA, where you have to dance along to a song and follow the moves of the dancer. We don't have an Xbox, but there's a similar game for a Wii...so, we got that this weekend and we are enjoying it so far:) It's a great workout and lots of fun. I have to say that I'm happy to finally have a video game that I can actually beat Matt at:)

Europe!!!: We're starting to plan more for our trip early this summer. Originally, we were thinking we'd go to Belgium too, but the more we thought about it, the more we realized that we'd rather take our time in Paris and do some day trips there, and add an extra night to Heidelberg too. The 'Castle Lighting' there happens to be the weekend we're there, which is cool because it only happens a few times a year. We booked our hotels for Paris and Heidelberg, and we've just started looking for some great restaurants to try in Paris. I get excited every time I look at my Delta app and it tells me how many days until the trip. Definitely something to look forward to at this time of year....

Next up: I'm helping to throw a baby shower for a friend this weekend, we're going to a concert and to a nice dinner the following weekend (thanks Lindsay!), and crossing our fingers that this weather improves!

Talented Cathy

My friend Cathy is so multi-talented and creative that it might make one feel insecure if she wasn't such a great person:) Along with being a full time mommy to three young kids, she has a photography company in Maine where she lives (CathyClicks.com). Now, she has an Etsy site where she's selling her awesome art. She's doing paintings of Chinese Zodiac animals and it's called Zodiac Squares. Check it out! The one above is my favorite, of course:)-

http://www.etsy.com/shop/zodiacsquares

Snow Days

We've had record snowfall here in Atlanta and so far, we've been home every day from school/work. It's kind of crazy. Matt had the idea yesterday to shovel and melt (using multiple buckets of hot water) our walkway and driveway, so I helped him out (and my arms are feeling that today). However, it was a great idea because it's totally clear and not iced over again like everything else.

Today, things started to melt a little and we decided to take a little adventure to the Kroger less than a mile from our house. The roads were mostly slushy and it was actually nice to see the 'hood all snowy and white. The Kroger was a madhouse, so we turned around and went to BP instead for some junk food. We ventured out to our neighborhood Mexican joint tonight with some friends and the roads were pretty fine. I'm hoping this ends soon....

It's been awhile...

Well, what can I say? It's been quite awhile since I last posted and I don't think many are reading, but I thought that I would update anyone reading this with the last 6 months of so of our lives.

In August 2010, I successfully defended my dissertation. Yay! Matt and my parents attended the defense and so afterward, we went to lunch at my favorite burger place, Grindhouse Burger in the Sweet Auburn Curb Market. Matt had to head back to work and so mom, dad, and I went to one of Atlanta's oldest pubs, Manuel's Tavern, for a celebratory drink.

Soon after, we traveled to Southern California for Labor Day weekend to visit Matt's family. Since we didn't go on a vacation that summer, we took a mini vacation and drove to Del Mar and stayed for one night at a fabulous hotel on the beach. The next day, we drove to San Diego and enjoyed some yummy tacos and a baseball game. Back in Orange County, it was great to see family.

Even though I was sort of 'finished,' I still had some edits to make from my committee members and several applications for awards, so the next couple months were very busy with this and with the many new demands of my job....But, finally, at the end of October, I turned in the final and official version of my dissertation and prepared for graduation. In November, I presented at a conference in Fort Worth, TX. Finally, on December 12th, I graduated, with many of my family members (including both of my grandmothers) present. My Grandma from Ohio made the trip down and stayed with us, and we had a great weekend showing her our house and visiting with her.

As we do every year, we headed to Park City, Utah for our annual K family ski trip around Christmas with the family and enjoyed the skiing and time with family. Shortly after we came home, Matt's Grandpa, who turned 99 in December, passed away. We are heading to CA later this month for his memorial service and look forward to celebrating his life with the family. I know that I didn't know him for very long, but in the time I did have, he was sweet and kind and I feel lucky for that time.

Matt and I both lost grandfathers this year, and I think for me, this has just reminded me to live each day to the fullest and to continue to show love and gratitude for the awesome family and friends I have.

I promise to share more about this year as it continues....For now, here are some photos....