Yearly Archives: 2011

For a reason unknown to me in some parts of Cincinnati people have the unruly habit of depositing their crap in public places like it’s their own personal storage unit. Not all of Cincinnati is like this. In fact, throughout most of Cincy people tend to keep immaculately maintained yards, gardens, and homes. We live in Anderson Township, and we chose to continue to live in Anderson Township with this current move because it’s a really nice area. Generally speaking, it is clean, quiet and safe. People don’t deposit rusting bikes, muddy tires, old furniture, or anything else of this nature in their front lawns. They mow their lawns, shovel their snow, keep their stuff contained within sheds or garages, and all the neighborhood kids gather outside with a parent or two to play touch football after school. This is our area of town. It reminds me of the 1950s that I did not live through, so I suppose it would be fair to say it conjures images of Boerne, or the 1950s, in my head. With, of course, the exception of one of our new neighbors at the apartment complex. Part of why we chose this apartment over others is because it was quiet, peaceful, and appeared to be well-maintained. Except for the one building we oh-so-luckily ended up in. Really, it’s not that bad. But I’m an anal retentive freak so this consumes me with annoyance. Dumping the junk you don’t know what to do with under the public stairwell of your building is rude and I think any normal person could see why this would irk someone who doesn’t subscribe to this philosophy. No I don’t, in fact, want to open my door every morning and see an old tire or three cobweb-riddled bicycles in an otherwise pretty area. If you have too much stuff then you need to man up and throw it away, store it on your private balcony, or rent a storage unit like the rest of us had to do. We did express our disappointment to the property manager, who had the cleaning crew remove the bikes, cobwebs, and dirt and clean up the stairwell since residents aren’t allowed to store stuff down there anyway. But no sooner were the bikes gone when a tire appeared, mere days later, and it’s been there ever since. I’m struggling to fight back the temptation to laminate a sign that reads “This is not your personal storage unit. Remove your shit or I will do it for you.” and slap it on the wall at the base of the stairwell.

This is a lesson in letting it go. I do not “let things go” very well. I’m working on it. Maybe this little obstacle was a precisely timed challenge from God to me. Some things in life I cannot help, and this I think, is just one of them. I can continue to alert the property manager every time a new dazzling piece of crap appears, and I can urge him to put a note in the mailbox of all 6 residents of our building reminding them that they are not allowed to store their junk under the stairwell, but really, that’s about all I can do. I have to let it go. As I’ll be needing to learn how to let other things go. Like the 200 lb. dog and teenage boy who likes loud metal music that live with his parents above us, or the apartment’s maintenance man who sloppily soaked a broken kitchen drawer in glue instead of actually fixing or replacing it and didn’t even bother to repair the timer on the stove despite the fact that our maintenance request list has been in his hands for nearly two weeks, or the snooty woman who lives above them who muttered under her breath that parking our vehicle in front of the complex “isn’t going to work”…..we were moving in. It leads me to question where precisely she parked her moving truck when she moved into the building? Likely in the exact same damn spot we did.

Though we don’t even actually live in the apartment yet (we’re moving in this weekend), so we haven’t given it a fair chance, Ted and I are already a little worried we may not like it here. Part of it may be that a house in a peaceful, lovely, private area really spoiled us. After a year we need to get re-used-to general apartment noises – footsteps above you, slamming doors, woofing dogs, public areas that people seem to be under the impression are private storage, a maintenance person who inevitably seems poorly-trained for the work he’s supposed to know how to competently do (I’m sure this is not an uncommon problem), etc. Maybe we’re just not used to these things anymore. Maybe I’m just sulking because I’m sad to leave our house behind. Maybe this place will grow on us and we’ll discover we like living there once we give it a shot. And maybe I just need to work on letting things go. Because I can’t fix all annoyances in life, and though it may irritate the heck out of me, is it really worth wasting the energy to get upset over? Honestly, no. But even though I know it, I have a very hard time accepting it and just letting things go that bug me.

So this move will challenge my “let it go” skills. I only hope it can teach me a thing or two.

Oh, yes.

For the record, I don’t recommend it unless you are actually an advanced ballet dancer.

Let’s discuss.

So this week is free dance week at Cincy Ballet. Because we’re flat broke and I’ve been itching to get back into dance, you can bet that I was on this like a cat on catnip. Monday morning I took an adult modern class. Though I was in a modern dance company in a modern dance based department in college for three years, modern is not my comfort zone. I can swing it, I really love watching it, and I even enjoy doing it myself sometimes, but a modern dance guru I am not. I think I like structure a little too much for me to be a modern dancer. I always felt more comfortable in tap, jazz, and ballet classes, which I clung to as my only form of a social life in college. Okay, not really, I did have a social life but I was also coming off a tough breakup and all my other super close friends went to college elsewhere so I threw myself into dance 5 days a week until I made more friends. It was awesome.

So on I moved to the rhythm & motion class Tuesday morning. I, apparently, skipped over the part where the description stated it was a dance “workout” class. “Workout” is not one of my favorite words so the reason why I missed that little tidbit is obvious. In the future I will actually read so I bring sneakers instead of jazz shoes, and then I won’t have to dance barefoot and blister the crap out of my feet. I clearly just read the part that I wanted to hear – you know, the part where it says the choreography is a combination of multiple styles including jazz, African, Latin, Hip Hop, ballet and modern. Sounded good to me! I made a damn fool of myself because it was already 5 weeks into the regular class schedule and therefore the regulars had already picked up on the choreography for the ten songs we danced to, but at least I was in good company with the other newcomers. Despite my inability to read and come prepared, the class was an absolute blast. I was impressed with myself for being able to do as well as I did picking up the steps since this was the first time I’d seen the choreography. And it’s an amazing workout! But I will definitely be signing up for this one once my finances perk up a little bit (I’m waiting finances…).

And this brings me to the class I was looking forward to the most…adult ballet. On the free dance week schedule all the adult ballet classes were labeled simply “adult ballet.” This, for future reference, is not the case. I chose to go to the Tuesday night session because that’s just what worked best for my schedule. Tuesday night, I and a handful of other free dance week newcomers learned, is advanced adult ballet.

Yeah.

I took beginner’s and intermediate ballet in college along with a weekly adult ballet class at a dance studio in town. For not having started ballet until college, by the time I graduated I was pretty good – not a great ballerina by any means, but I was good for only having had a few years of experience. But I haven’t taken ballet in three years. On a good day I’m at an intermediate level. On an utterly crappy day I consider joining the Toddlers in Tutus class. An advanced ballerina I am not.

But since none of the promotional materials specified that this was an advanced class and it said “all are welcome” they can’t really blame any of us lowlifes for showing up. So about 7 of us showed up and tried our hand at provided entertainment for the rest of the class. For mistakenly joining the realms of awesome dancer land, I’m damn proud of myself. I was perfectly thrilled that A) my leotards and tights from college still fit, B) that my muscle memory kicked in and I not only knew what some of the terminology was, but I was actually able to do some of it still, and C) that I neither face planted it or whacked anybody with a wayward leap or battment.

Let me be clear: I was definitely among the small group of pansies that hid in the back of the room behind the baby grand piano when it came time to do the final combination – some grand and preposterous combination of leaps, spins, hops, kicks and other crap I’d never even heard of or attempted in my life that only professional ballerinas could possibly pull off without a rehearsal, but I didn’t totally suck! I was able to do every barre exercise with proper posture and, well, somewhat correct arms. I even got most of the floor exercises and across the floor combinations…not well, but at least I got them and I didn’t die! I accidentally ended up in an advanced ballet class when I was never advanced to begin with and hadn’t danced in three years…and I made it out with only a minimal amount of mortification!! Do you understand how monumental this is?

Will I be signing up for another advanced class again? Hahahahahaha. No thank you. But I’m kind of stoked that I didn’t utterly horrify myself.

But from now on, I think I’ll stick to the beginner/intermediate level. Sorry folks, no pictures this time. I’ll spare you that awkward joy.

P.S. I’m still waiting finances…

Yesterday, by some act of God, a random miracle, or sheer dumb luck, Ted and I both found ourselves with a Sunday off from work. I know, right!?

Yesterday, by the way, was absolutely lovely. It was a touch chilly (but mostly because of the wind) for October 2^nd, but the sun was shining, the grass was a rich green, the sky was a vibrant blue, the trees in various phases of transition to red, orange and yellow, and the birds were a-singin’.  I think we both really felt like sleeping in (and we both could have used it too!) but we woke up early for 8 a.m. mass and our Sunday morning breakfast at Panera. Sunday morning breakfast at Panera is always a welcome tradition in our household because no matter how crazy it gets we always have at least this half hour together to relax. It’s worth not sleeping in for. We spent the morning running errands and striking up a friendship over the Packers, classic cars, and Palm phones with the chick at Sprint in hopes of gleaming some useful knowledge about discounted plans and details on which phones are really the best. Totally worked. After nearly a year of marriage it was about time for us to finally take the plunge on a family plan and upgrade our old faithfuls.

Our afternoon was booked with a CCM lighting class & staff picnic out in Maineville at the home of one of the head honchos at CCM, and of course, the Packer game. We only planned to stay an hour at the picnic because somehow the thought that the picnic was mandatory is a little off-putting (like it’s going to be that miserable that you have to force people to come), but we ended up staying nearly three hours. We found ourselves in good company with the lighting faculty and their families, and the lighting undergrads and grad students. The home had a lush green backyard that spilled out onto a glistening lake. Since the weather was just gorgeous we all enjoyed a game of croquette out back and filled up on hot apple cider, chips and queso, veggie and fruit trays, lasagna, pasta, pizza, breadsticks, salad, brownies, cupcakes, and of course, good old fashioned conversation. The radio was turned up to broadcast the audio from the Bengals and then the Packers football games. It was so nice to just relax for a change and enjoy conversation, good food, football, croquette, sunlight, and some sweet scenery. After we said our goodbyes we caught the last quarter of the Packer game at a nearby sports bar. All in all, it just felt awesome to have a full day off together where we weren’t moving or packing or cleaning and didn’t really have to do anything. I could just feel my shoulders sinking down to where they actually belong.

This week is also free dance week at Cincinnati Ballet! I’m stocked to try out 3 or 4 classes this week! I really miss dancing and I feel like the less you do it, the more out of practice you are so the harder it gets to stay flexible, keep your balance, and hold your posture. I haven’t taken dance classes for over three years so I feel like I’ve really fallen behind! So far the only two things that have been stopping me from taking classes are money (cause dancing 3 nights a week ain’t cheap, people) and time. When you work all day, multiple jobs, it can be hard to schedule anything else in when all you really want to do is go home and hang out with your husband. But I miss dancing, it’s good to do something just for yourself every now and then, and it’s exercise. So I’m definitely taking advantage of free dance week! Modern dance was this morning and even though it’s probably the form of dance I have the least experience in and therefore feel the most uncomfortable doing, it was a lot of fun and it felt great to be back up on my toes!

What have you done for yourself lately?

The house knows we’re moving. And it’s pissed.

In the past week alone more insects than I’ve seen all year have moved in to terrify and taunt me. Giant ants, leggy spiders, a symphony of crickets, baby roaches, and huge flying winged things. I see them snoozing on the basement door, skittering across the carpet, and wafting through the kitchen. As soon as the boxes and furniture began to disappear, they began to appear with a freaking vengeance.

She’s getting back at us for giving up on her, I just know it.

Hey House, I feel guilty enough about leaving you as it is! The curse of insects is totally unnecessary.

Some days I hate that we have to downsize and leave you and your old-school fruit stand charm and your peaceful privacy and your leaking basement and falling trees and your hardwood floors and your luscious but severely uneven backyard with a never-ending assortment of surprising plants and fireflies and wildlife and weeds and your “vintage” basketball hoop and your stupid long-ass driveway I hated shoveling and your pretty crown molding and your awesome six bedroom windows behind. You don’t have to plague the place with creepy crawlies if you want me to feel bad for hurting your feelings, because I already do. It’s not your fault that everyone gives up on you after a year because your landlord is an incompetent fool and refuses to put the money in to perk up your crumbling foundation or update your insulation and electrical wiring and plumbing and landscaping and carpet to make you as wonderful as I know you already are. I fought for you every single day even when everybody we knew would point out your flaws and tell us to move, I still said you were pretty and perfect and that I loved you.

And though I know this move is going to save us hundreds of dollars every month which means we’ll have to work less and can spend more time together, I love you dearly and every single day I dread leaving you just a little bit more and every day I walk down that long-ass driveway and look at you in awe and wonder if we’ve made the right decision and if this new place will ever feel like home the way you did. I wonder how many times I’ll accidentally pull into the driveway after work only to realize that I don’t live here anymore.

So if that was your point with all the insects, you can knock it off and cut that crap out immediately. Because the bugs? Not okay.

I can handle working four jobs for which I am paid approximately zero dollars a month. I can handle cleaning and packing until my eyeballs explode. I can even handle trying to teach a farm of boll weevils musical theatre, romance, and stunts in a miniscule school library with immobile furniture and nowhere to move or room to even breathe, although it makes me cranky. But I’m a weenie and a pansy and a fraidy cat and a spider on my toilet paper roll at 7:37 p.m. is the last straw and it is something that I absolutely cannot handle at this point in my life.

And it is precisely that last straw of “I hhaaaaaaaaaaaate bugs and all this overwhelming nonsense!” that drives me to unabashedly down my body weight in massive Chipotle burrito followed by half a quart of Haagan Dazs caramel apple pie ice cream that results in what I like to call stress eating, which results in me lying useless on the couch, groaning in overstuffed pain, for the rest of the night. You can see how this is, obviously, an unpleasant situation.

So, nix the bugs, por favor. They are not necessary. Life as I know it is sliding to shambles without the buggies, and with them I can be found clinging to the top of the ceiling fan whimpering.

I will miss you house and you will always hold a fond place in my memory, sans the insects.

Yours truly,

Your Favorite Renter

Everyday on the way to work I drive through about five miles of Kentucky. The bright blue “Welcome to Kentucky” sign is positioned on the steel beams of a bridge that takes me across the Ohio River, from the aviation state to the state of unbridled spirit. This is my favorite part of the drive. Beneath me a wide river of deep blue water ripples gently, glistening in the sunlight or peacefully lapping in the rain, depending on the weather. On either side of me, extending up and down as far as my eyes can see are thick green trees, many of which are starting to turn muted shades of orange, yellow, red and brown. A large lighthouse that I’m fairly certain is now someone’s house, with a clean wooden dock and heather red roof juts out from the shore into the water. It’s so scenic that for a moment I forget where I am. I forget that I’m not in Door County or Vermont, but between Cincinnati, OH and Highland Heights, KY on my way to work. Every day as I drive by I think how peaceful and perfect and full of hope this place is. Then another thought, without fail, enters my mind: “I can’t wait until we can open our own little equity theatre, tucked away somewhere beautiful, just like this. Then this will be what I see when I open my eyes every morning and this will be where we do the work we love to do and live the life we want to live.” Then the road becomes bumpy with potholes and cracks, the lanes merge, the person in front of me slows down because she doesn’t know to shift her car into 3rd gear to make it up the steep hills in this area, and the traffic backs up as we round a sharp curve. And I’m back in the real world.

A cold snap is coming through. This weekend we’ll have lows in the 30s and highs in the 50s. I’m grateful for this because it’s the first real push into autumn. The sun is tucked away, the wind is blowing swirling leaves across lawns and driveways, and it’s cool enough to bundle up in a pretty fall sweater with a hot tea or latte in hand but it’s not so cold that you’re uncomfortable. The humidity is gone, the squirrels, birds and neighborhood cats are out in full force, and I can brew up a batch of homemade chili in the crockpot, throw some pumpkin snickerdoodles in the oven, and curl up with a good book or a photo project I’ve been working on. Yes, there’s a lot to love about autumn, and I’m ready to love on it…in between all that moving and work nonsense that is.

Fall also inspires me to get creative with my cooking. Last night I made chicken cordon bleu and baked up two mini cinnamon apple pies I’d prepared and frozen in personal-sized mason jars. I’ve found a pumpkin mac n’ cheese recipe I am just dying to try, and I think I may have to cook up a batch of chili or stew and baked cinnamon vanilla pears in the coming weeks. I’m also anxious to put up a Halloween decoration or two! Halloween and Thanksgiving are my two favorite holidays and I’m always bummed that they get skipped over so often in anticipation of Christmas. I won’t have time to dress up this year and I’m sure I have a show or something on Halloween night that would conflict with any planned festivities anyhow, and I don’t see the point in spending money on useless decorations, but I’m thinking I’ll make a decoration or two with craft supplies I already have on hand so I can at least still celebrate the season in style. I’m thinking a few bat and ghost cutouts to join the pumpkins and possibly a leaf wreath.

What are your favorite fall recipes?

So far, this whole iPad thing has been working out. Also, she’s kind of a beaut. The red on white is a strikingly handsome combination. And the wireless keyboard, which I’m breaking in as I type, is pretty sharp too.

Front and back Zagg protective shields were excellently installed by Best Buy, for a nominal fee of course, but absolutely it well worth the cost to have them installed by, well, anyone other than Ted or I. Your iPad will be thoroughly protected from anything short of a nuclear disaster, but installing them is a giant time-sucking, mind-blowing, frustration-inducing, pain in the ass, the likes of which Ted never wants to repeat and I never want to attempt. I’m nearly 100% convinced that the reason the Zagg protective shields have so many negative reviews is because putting them on is like the brain surgery of the technology world, even if you have stable hands and the patience of a saint. Between the hazards of dust, fuzz, fingerprints, stickiness, bubbling, and lining the thing up correctly with the cutouts for buttons and cameras, etc. $15 suddenly seems like the bargain of a lifetime. Money well spent, we think. Plus I feel much more comfortable with my iPad knowing that it can’t get dirty or damaged as easily. The iPad is a delicate beast and I’m a paranoid person…so together with the screen and back protectors, we make a good combination.

I’m also loving the wireless keyboard. Not only is it attractive (Duh. Isn’t good looks the most important quality here anyhow?) but it makes typing so much quicker and more accurate. For my tastes the iPad’s little pop-up on screen keyboard is great for quick little things – like jotting down notes or updating a status, but the keyboard is nearly necessary (again, this is just personal preference) for anything more lengthy than a few lines of text.

Ted also got me an iTunes gift card for my birthday, with which I can purchase movies, music, iBooks or apps. Because I’m extraordinarily cheap nearly every single one of my apps is free. But if you’re a little more fancy or you do work on your iPad that requires some more pricy apps like Ted does (he has lighting software and stuff on his), then going crazy on apps can get expensive fast. However, if you’re like me, you search out the free stuff and splurge on the few goodies you can’t resist. Here’s a few of my favorite apps:

– Blogshelf ($4.99) – This is the only app I have paid for so far. I love my blogs and this app organizes them all in one easy, convenient location iBooks style so I can easily see a bookshelf full of the blogs I read regularly. I don’t even have to have a wifi connection to do it…it updates when it connects to the internet, and then I can read it when I’m away from wifi. All I have to do is click on the “book” and the blog comes up. Easy as pie.

– Pandora (Free) – Free music. If you’re unfamiliar with Pandora (I boarded the Pandora train late in life too, so no shame) it’s essentially a radio. You type in the name of an album, artist, song, or genre of music you like and a radio station of similar tunes plays for you. You can thumbs up the song if you like it and want to hear more of it, or thumbs down it to skip ahead to the next song. I love it for exploring songs from musicals I haven’t heard yet without having to purchase the CD until I know I love it. The musical nerd in me is feeling highly fulfilled.

– All Recipes (Free) – I use this website all the time for recipes when I’m looking to try a new dish. So, obviously, I love the app. I can take the iPad into the kitchen with me, search for a recipe and it appears on the screen with a well-layed-out list of ingredients, pictures, and step by step instructions.

– Easy Note (Free) – This is the app I use to make notes, to do lists, grocery lists, and to generally organize my life. Super handy.

– Angry Birds Rio (Free) – Let me explain: Angry Birds and the monkeys and birds from the animated movie Rio. How can you not love this game? .

– Intellicast HD (Free) – The best app out there for everything and anything weather related! It’s awesome. I can see radar in motion, hourly, daily, weekly forecasts, weather alerts, precipitation and probably a hundred other things. It’s fast and accurate.

– Fast Food (Free) – This app does so much more than locate restaurants. Based on your location it lists the closest restaurants, gas stations, coffee shops, free wifi hotspots, ATM’s, and hospitals. It kind of rocks. It also gives you great info on the restaurants, like menus, hours, and nutritional information.

I have a slew of other apps I’ve downloaded and am enjoying, including Flixster for movies, TV Guide, and Clock Pro. For more specific things the GasBuddy (gas prices), Zillow (real estate if you’re looking for a new place to rent or buy), TripAdvisor, UrbanSpoon, USAA (banking), and Yelp are pretty exciting.

What are your favorite apps? Please share! :-)

Today it is raining (um, again.) and I would like nothing more than to curl up on the couch with my forest green knit blanket, a carton of Haagen Dazs sweet chai latte ice cream, my next book obsession, Heaven Is for Real and a cuddly ball of orange fur known as Sancho.

My carton would be endless, and the book excellent and addicting. Sancho would snooze on my lap, and I’d indulge in a mid-afternoon nap myself. I’d take a break to whip up a batch of scrumptious pumpkin chocolate chip muffins and to stir the crockpot which would be, miraculously, cooking tasty black bean burgers and sweet potato fries for dinner. If anyone knows where I can find this crockpot, let me know.

Evidently, or so my calendar tells me, I am supposed to be simultaneously at work, at the grocery store, at strike, doing laundry, preparing a lesson plan, printing directions on a mysteriously disconnected printer, driving to work in the rain, teaching little kids musical theatre, cleaning, and moving a houseful of crap into an apartment.

I think I am in the wrong calendar.

My posts have been a little sparse lately, and in all honesty, they’ll probably continue to be so for the next few weeks. Autumn, my favorite season, is setting in here in Ohio – the leaves are starting to change color, the rain has picked back up, and cool weather is breezing on in, but so is the reality of our street being under construction while they put in a sidewalk, moving, maintaining both the house and the new apartment, cleaning, paiting, working four jobs, and keeping up with all our other obligations. Finding time to cook a decent meal, or plan schedules, or spend quality time together, or even think, much less finding the time to actually blog is a far-fetched challenge right now, but I’m going to do my best to keep up with it! Please bear with me. Lord knows how I’m doing to remember a new address on top of all this!

Lately (and finally) I’ve been reading The Help. I literally cannot get my nose out of this book. It is so good. It absolutely sucks you in and keeps you there. I love it! Clearly, this is a problem considering I have no time whatsoever to be reading. I’ve resorted to reading at what I’ll refer to a “job #1” when we’re slow. Which, lucky for me, has been often. I’ve managed to read the first 338 pages in the past three days at work. I was number 200-and-something on the waiting list for it at the library. My turn finally came and I was so darn busy that I just couldn’t get to it in an adequate amount of time to get the whole book read. And since there’s about a million people on the waiting list behind me also wanting to read it, the library wasn’t allowing renewals. One of my co-workers very kindly lent me her copy since I became quickly addicted to it in the nine chapters I read before it was due back. If you haven’t read this book yet, it is worth all the hype. I think it’s a keeper for our bookshelf and Ted and I are both anxious to see the film.

And since fall had officially fallen around these parts I’ve started in (again, on an extremely limited basis) on some of my favorite fall recipes! I’ve stocked up on cans of pumpkin for my pumpkin chocolate chip muffin recipe, and we have our fresh pumpkins lining the door, waiting to be carved and gutted at the end of October, their innards turned into pies and their seeds roasted and seasoned.  But my favorite quick fall recipe is so easy and so tasty you’ll be amazed you didn’t think of it before. I eat it by the batch and take it to any and every potluck or picnic. It is delicious with just enough hints of summer flavors and just enough notes of fall to make it perfect for September.

Ready for your mind to be blown? All you do is cut up a few granny smith apples into bite-sized pieces, mix them with vanilla yogut, dried cherries or cranberries, walnuts, and ground cinnamon. Mix, chill and devour. You might want to make a large batch…just a word of advice from the person who eats it like candy.

Last night Ted and I signed the lease on our new apartment and got the keys. I detail-cleaned the place from floor to ceiling  (it’s amazing and disgusting what cleaning crews miss!) and then we spent the evening painting two walls accent colors. One of the living room walls we painted a pencil lead gray color with just a touch of blue in it, and one of the dining room walls we painted a nice shade of mossy green. It looks great and helps the place to feel less like an apartment and more like home. The transition from house to apartment is a big change, so anything we can do to make it feel a little more our style is a good thing. So we taped off the walls, tarped over the carpet and set to work with the brush and the roller. Since none of our stuff is moved in yet we had a pizza delivered and took a break to eat pizza and soda on the living room floor while our walls dried, just like college kids – our first meal in our new home! Then we drove over to ETC to catch the understudy performance of Next to Normal. We’re pleased with the look and I think it’ll compliment our furniture nicely. We’ll post pictures soon.

In other new and exciting catch-up news, our family welcomed a new baby this past week. My neice, Halle Grace, was born on Sept. 18 in Virginia. She’s cute already and I look forward to meeting her before she turns five. I hope.

Ted and I also welcomed a new addition to our little family….my iPad 2! It was my wonderful birthday present from Ted, my parents, and Ted’s parents. And she’s lovely! I spent about two weeks frantically researching every iPad 2 case in existance searching for just the right combination of protection, style, and functionality. After a lot of mind changing and trial and error, my decision is an obvious choice but it was a hard one to come by. I selected the white iPad 2 with the glossy clear Zagg front and back screen protectors, a red leather Smart Cover, and this sleeve from DoryDesigns on Etsy.

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Ordinarily I’ve not a red girl – I tend to stick with greens, but I’ve always wanted the white iPad and the red color complimented the white iPad just so vivdly while still looking both fun and professional, plus it’s a (PRODUCT)RED item so I know a portion of the purchase goes toward a good cause. The sleeve is playful yet protective and original, so that made me happy. We’re going to finish getting it all set up this weekend and I can’t wait to start using it!

So I guess that’s about it for this week’s game of catch-up. I know of I’ve also been slacking on Open Letters Thursday and Epic Fail Friday. Not because I haven’t had plenty of snarky passive-agressive thoughts twirling around in my mind or because people have suddenly smartened up (ha! Oh my goodness, no!), but because sometimes life throws other plans your way. I also hope to resume these happy little rituals shortly. :-)

Last weekend was our last free weekend for a while. October is going to be slammed with the big move from house to apartment, as well as a packed theatre schedule for both of us, but Ted especially. October is also prime pumpkin patching season, an experience we do not miss out on. The first year we were dating I was a recent Texas transplant aching to enjoy a real autumn with real autumn festivities, so Ted took me to a pumpkin patch to pick out my very own pumpkins. The next year we got engaged in that same pumpkin patch. The following year we were married in October, surrounded by pumpkins. So it follows that this year we had to find time to do a pumpkin patch so we could carry on the tradition with our first year pumpkin patching experience in Ohio as a married couple. I called around to several farms trying to find a pick-your-own patch that allowed pumpkin picking in mid-September, and our chances were looking slim, but I finally found one! An hour and 15 minutes away. Each direction. Near Beavercreek, Ohio which is practically Dayton. Yes, Beavercreek. I know.

It was a bit of a trek, but boy did we find a gem! This place is not only a pick-your-own pumpkin patch, but also a ginormous corn maze, and a petting farm with tractor rides, corn cannons and fire pits. Jackpot. It’s called Adventure Acres and it’s one of the top 10 corn mazes in the nation in addition to being the biggest corn maze in Ohio. We will be returning next year. Want to know why?

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That right there is an aerial view of over 11.5 miles of this year’s corn maze. For real. Is that not the most amazing corn maze you have ever witnessed in your life? Enlarge this beast (seriously, do it) and you’ll see they’ve spelled out Adventure Acres, 1851-2011, 160 years, have a tractor, a horse head, a barn, a silo, and a windmill – all carved out of 8 ft. corn stalks. You could literally spend the entire day playing hide and seek in that maze. It’s more challenging than it looks! The best part is that on weekends they’re open until midnight so they gear you up with a map, flashlights, and a glow-in-the-dark necklace (so you don’t get run over by a tractor on the farm…I’m not kidding) and off you go to get lost in the corn maze beneath a full moon and starry, starry country sky. As if that weren’t awesome enough, they also have a Clue/Who Dunit?/ Farm Scene Investigation game in the maze. You’re given a booklet with 7 farm animals, 7 farm weapons, and 7 farm locations and based on clues you have to find hidden in the maze, you determine who kidnapped the missing Farmer Joe. The more little clue stations you find hidden in the maze, the more coupons you can win for free stuff at the stores in town. Amazing, right? It was fun.

Right when we got there it was already sunset, so we piled on a tractor and headed out to the pumpkin patch where we dug around in the leafy greens for a while until we selected and picked our pumpkins for year…and what beautiful pumpkins they are! We ran amuck in the corn maze for a while and discovered whodunit, then we shot ears of corn out of a cannon at pumpkins, hay bales, and a gong (I think my backyard needs one of these), and then we hung out with the horse, duck, goats and barn cats for a while. There was also a nice little fire blazing in the fire pit. I don’t have great pictures because it was night-time, so please excuse the lack thereof, but it was loads of fun and we’d love to go back again…pronto! Bringing a group of pals here in October is just about one of the most fabulous outings I can think of! Wanna come?

The next day we finally made time to check out the Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Gardens. I love me some animals and I’ve been craving zoo since we moved here, so it was about time we got around to it! We’d heard from multiple people that it was a wonderful zoo, so we were excited. We saw a lot of neat creatures and had a great time exploring. While we were in the Night Hunters exhibit (which featured a lot of wild cats) one of the zookeepers had a large snake out that we could pet. She was standing in front of the bobcat’s home and the bobcat was going positively nuts with desire to get his paws on that snake. He was pawing at and licking the glass, desperate to take a bite, but drat! that glass wall!!  It was really cute. We also caught the cat show where the animal trainers show off the porcupine and a few of their most talented felines. They have a fishing cat that loves to dive right into the water to pull out meals, a jumping cat that can launch itself high into the sky without a running start, and of course, the cheetahs. They have a little fluffy toy attached to a string that gets pulled across a long expanse of land. What’s really cool is that using this system they can show you a cheetah run so you can actually see their cheetah, Sarah, go from 0-60 mph is mere seconds. It’s really awesome to experience!

After the zoo we headed over to Buffalo Wild Wings for the Packer game. It was an excellent final weekend of freedom!