This weekend brought us, what I’ll consider, our first real snowfall of the season. We had some snow last week too, but it didn’t really stick. It snowed most of the day on Saturday, temperatures plummeted to the teens with wind chills in the single digits, and we actually had to finally turn on the heat in the house, use a snow brush and ice scraper on the car, buy a new tall-truck-friendly extendable snow brush for Ted’s truck, and tread cautiously on sidewalks and pavement because of ice. I also had to officially pull out my snow boots, knee-length down feather winter coat, gloves, hats, earmuffs, thermal under layers, and my footed pajamas (don’t hate – they’re amaaazing). It’s also the time I year I start considering a car wash membership so we can prevent rust on our vehicles with all the salt from the roads they’ll be kicking up for the next 4 months. I try to hold off on all this hoopla as long as possible by living in denial that winter could actually be here again already, but alas – it’s apparently time to put away the peep toe wedges, dig out the holiday teas, and face the fact that fall is over.
There are a few trees left in Rochester that still have beautiful, brilliant red, yellow and orange leaves on them. They’re stunning against the white snow. A gorgeous sight to behold. While fall falls away, I’ll hold on a little longer by playing catch-up and sharing a few posts containing the last of our fall adventures this week.
The first weekend in November Ted and I decided to take a quick, surprise trip to visit family in the Cleveland area. Cleveland is only about 4 or 5 hours west of Rochester, so it was a completely random, manageable, and fun trip. We left early Friday afternoon, drove in some pretty substantial and wild winds (ah, lake effect) to Erie, Pennsylvania – halfway between Rochester and Cleveland – where we met up with Ted’s cousin’s daughter Michaela, who is in college at Mercyhurst. We carpooled with her the rest of the way to Cleveland where we enjoyed some good old-fashioned high school eats at the local Dairy Queen and then surprised Michaela’s mom, dad, and two brothers Marcus and Martin by showing up at Marcus’ last football game of his high school career (he’s a senior). It was a perfect, chilly fall evening and we had a blast sitting on the bleachers, bundled in sweatshirts and blankets, watching Marcus play some Friday night football, and catching up with Ted’s uncle, all the cousins, and their kids. And the game had a wonderfully exhilarating ending with a, literally, edge-of-your-seat last second win for Marcus and his team. Oh, and the celebrating that followed! It was so nice just to be out of the field after the game to surprise Marcus, and with all those kids – so many of them seniors – enjoying an important and thrilling moment in their high school lives – their youth, excitement, freshness, and love of life was just totally palpable. It was such a beautiful reminder of all of the fun of my own high school years and high school friends.
The next day, which wasn’t nearly as beautiful as it was freezing cold, windy, and pouring rain, we stood outside by the bleachers, cloaked in as many layers as possible beneath massive umbrellas for three hours, watching Martin’s last football game of the season. Martin’s team also pulled off a win – though they had a pretty nice lead all along. Unfortunately, the awful weather dampened some of the celebrating and excitement of their win. Overall, we were really glad we could spend a few hours with everyone and catch both of the boys last games of the season. It was totally worth the trip! Thanks for putting us up for the night guys! :)
We stopped at a little hole-in-the-wall Chinese restaurant, where I had the best hot and sour soup of my entire life, before the drive back home. The soup was so good that I actually ordered more to take back home with us to Rochester. It was so good that the guy made each bowl fresh on the stove, not pulled from a stock pot. And it had delicious meat in it, which is pretty rare in a hot and sour soup. I’ve been dreaming about this soup for the past three weeks, guys. It was that good and I’m pretty sure we’ll be making a special trip there every time we find ourselves in Cleveland. The drive back, though rainy, was beautiful as well because all the fall leaves were totally brilliant – pretty much right at peak, so poor Ted got to listen to “look at tree!” the whole way back home. The hazards of being married to someone who loves fall as much as I do, I suppose.
At home we finally carved up our pumpkin (using autumn-shaped cookie cutters – leaves, acorns, apples, pumpkins, etc.) and I roasted a batch of pumpkin seeds (salted caramel pumpkin pie flavored! so good!) and enjoyed it with some fresh apple cider. Such a great ending to such a great weekend!
