Today is going to be yet another one of those “spit out what we did today” posts. Tomorrow morning we’re leaving for my sister’s place near Chicago to spend a day with her and the family sledding, hanging out, and eating sushi. We’ll be leaving Green Bay around 5:30 a.m. for the 4.5 hour drive, which should put us there around 10 a.m. So in the interest of us getting some sleep tonight before that barbaric hour of the morning, I’m going to keep it short and sweet.
We stopped for lunch at Panera Bread for a salad and bowl of soup in the afternoon. Panera is probably one of the most unhealthy places ever for a salad or bowl of soup (with the exception of the ever fabulous and astronomically fattening Olive Garden, which we tried first but were discouraged by the 25 minute wait…at 2 p.m. on a Tuesday….) – but whatever, it was delicious and I’ve been suffering from a serious lack of vegetables lately, so a hearty dose of veggies of any kind was totally necessary. We strolled the mall for a little while then caught a matinee showing of Little Fockers where we savored a few bites of solid gold (or significantly overpriced movie theatre popcorn, if you prefer). Reviewers only gave it a half of a star and basically slammed it in any and all ways possible, but I tend to not trust reviewers and like to formulate my own opinions, so we went anyway. And you know what? It wasn’t that bad. We laughed. The cast is packed full of talented personalities and it’s a fun family story. It’s nothing I recommend blowing twenty bucks to rush out and see, but worth a rental one night after it hits DVD. Honestly, you wouldn’t have even had to see Meet the Parents or Meet the Fockers to understand the third movie. After the movie we met up with our best man from the wedding, Barnie, and his wife Michelle for dinner at Maria’s – a Mexican restaurant in Green Bay. It was great to see them again and to catch up. Tonight we’ll be hitting the hay early, so that’s all I’ve got for today folks (and no entertaining pictures, sorry), but I promise amusing posts will return in the future. In the meantime, hope your week is going well and that you are all looking forward to the bright new year ahead.
If you missed the first half of this post, please scroll down to the next post. Hmmm, now where were we? Ah, yes! Enchanted Christmas tree forest. At the National Railroad Museum, among the steam engines and tracks, they had a small forest of uniquely decorated trees. Here are a few of my favorites. Please excuse the hideous placement and odd formatting of these pictures – as I’ve mentioned, wordpress is an unreasonable beast to work with and places all the photos you’ve carefully arranged any old place with reckless abandon, and I’m too tired to care about fixing it
Buffalo Wild Wings tree (YUM!)Campfire tree
Old fashioned tree
Gold swirly ribbon tree
Nature treeSnow treeVintage colors tree
We also managed to work in a little snowjoyment time.
For lunch we ate at Chili John’s, which is one of the best restaurants in Green Bay. In Texas, chili is eaten atop burgers or hot dogs, or as a hearty soup. Up north chili is eaten over a bed of cooked spaghetti and oyster crackers, with or without beans. I used to think that was so. weird. I mean, spaghetti and chili are two distinctly different entrees, right? But in some parts of our great nation, I guess it’s normal to combine them. I’ve gotten used to this custom though, and Chili John’s has a super secret amazing recipe for their chili. Every single time we are in Green Bay, we have to eat here – the smell walking in is enough to bring about instant drool syndrome. Tonight we curled up with popcorn and blankets in the basement to watch Meet the Fockers in preparation for seeing Little Fockers at the theatre sometime this week. But before that we stopped by Green Bay’s Botanical Gardens for their holiday lights in the garden walking trails. With a little over a mile of walking (or horse-drawn wagon, if you prefer) trails and millions of LED lights, it was quite the light bright fest – we’ll forget about the 6 degrees outside part (boooo!) and let the pictures speak for themselves. Keep in mind that the pictures really don’t do it justice. It’s very difficult to accurately capture the brightness and saturation of Christmas lights at night with a flash camera, and even more difficult when you are completely unwilling to shed your gloves to operate the tiny buttons on the camera for fear of instant frost bite.
Lately my posts feel like they’re more informative than creative or interesting. I put a lot of thought into my writing and the topics I choose to discuss here, but when you’re on vacation – as odd as it seems – it’s hard to find the time to sit down and think up an awesome blog. Not to worry, I have some clever ideas up my sleeve for use in January. I’ll be honest – I’m lazy this week and it’s just plain simpler to recount my day, attach a couple pics, and call it done. I could just not write (and occasionally, for any number of good reasons, I won’t) but I don’t like to get into the habit of not writing if I can avoid it. So, in short, here’s another recap of how we spent our day.
We got a bit of a late start – opting for a late snooze and waffles before braving the frigid wind chills. Green Bay is home to the National Railroad Museum. As a child, Ted loved trains and always enjoyed trips to the NRM. We visited the model train exhibit at the Natural History Museum in Cincy a few weeks ago and decided to hit up a tour of the NRM while we were in Wisconsin for Christmas. We saw everything from informational videos to photographs of locomotive wreaks to the tools used to build the railroads to real retired trains and their insides, including the Big Boy, Dwight Eisenhower, and Aerotrain.
We also found time to stroll through a forest of decorated Christmas trees on display and play a bit in the snow. I had grand plans of adding plenty more photos to this post, but wordpress is a butt and a completely not user-friendly program, meaning it won’t allow me to insert two separate photo galleries – at least not in a way the average person can easily figure out how to do. Fail. So there will be a continuation posted soon.
I hope everyone’s Christmas was merry – full of joy, surrounded by love, and relaxing, with lots of fabulous holiday foods, presents, and a reminder of blessed we all truly are. For Christmas we slept in, had breakfast casserole, and opened gifts. We had a white Christmas with plenty of snow still on the ground and a few more flurries in the early evening – much unlike Texas where the sun is shining bright, we wrap chili pepper lights around the cactus, and serve up some margaritas and queso dip.
In the afternoon the rest of the family came over. We enjoyed each others company, ate holiday goodies, and played party games on the wii to determine the drawing order of the gift card exchange. I love gift card exchanges – such a great way for everyone to receive something in a fun way – especially when paired with wii games. Wii Party is awesome, if you’re looking for a fun (albeit very random) new wii game to add to your collection. Fun for the whole family. After everyone left Ted and I went for another long walk around the neighborhood, through the snow, just to get a little exercise and see all the pretty Christmas lights and decorations on the houses. It was a good time and fun to see everyone again.
Today we are going to the Packers v. Giants game at Lambeau. It’ll be in the mid to low 20s during the game, so I’ll be bundling up in my 17 layers of cuddlecuds that make me waddle like a penguin just to survive 3.5 hours on freezing metal bleachers with cardboard scraps beneath our feet to keep them off the cold ground. Though we certainly hope they win today, just attending a game is so much fun – the cold weather, the expensive hot chocolate and munchies, the game itself, and the overwhelming amount of team spirit makes the games a real treat to enjoy in person!
This may or may not be me with the hot chocolate...
I have high hopes for the remainder of our vacation as well – some favorite Green Bay and Milwaukee eateries to hit up (cue fat ass alert), hopefully sledding, visiting my sister and her family in Chicago, New Years Eve movies and wii games, and I’d still love to see Black Swan and Little Fockers. We haven’t been to the movies in months, which is so unusual since we used to hit up the movie theatre several times a month when we lived in Michigan. Right now we’re really just enjoying the down time to relax, make up our schedule as we go along, and spend some time together and with our family.
Hope you all continue to enjoy your holiday as well!
We left Cincy at 6:30 yesterday morning and arrived safely in Green Bay by early afternoon. We were lucky to have nice driving weather and the drive actually seemed reasonably short for 9 hours, though we did encounter our fair share of idiots incapable of staying in their own lane as we passed through Indiana’s beautiful ice-covered trees, windmill city, and Illinois’ snowy cornfields. According to the news, 93% of holiday travelers this year were driving.
We arrived at Ted’s parents house just in time for a bowl of his mom’s homemade chili soup. Then last night we spent six hours at a Christmas party with a group of Ted’s friends from high school and their husbands/wives. It was a really fun time (obviously or we wouldn’t have stayed 6 hours!). I enjoyed finally meeting people I’d heard so much about and I think Ted really liked catching up with his old group. The snacks and tasty liquors to sample were jolly as well. It is definitely one of the few times since college that I’ve been out past 2 a.m. I’m lame and haven’t been to a party, other than our wedding, in months and months. I think the last was a Magik party of some kind when I was still working there. I’d like to think I’m not getting old at 24, but even for as much as I love a good party (and who doesn’t?) I definitely don’t get to do it very often anymore – living cross-country from all your friends will do that to you. By the time we headed to bed at 3 a.m. I was ready for that long winter nap. It was a great change of pace to hang out with a group of people in my age range – especially since I now spend most of my days alone at home.
Today we enjoyed our Christmas Eve and day off by sleeping in for a change, then heading to the Neville Public Museum in Green Bay with Ted’s parents to check out the museum’s restored exhibit of the mechanical moving Christmas figurines from the window displays of Prange’s department store in the early 1940s that were originally displayed in the windows at Marshall Field’s in Chicago and sold to Prange’s in Green Bay the following year. They were neat! More old-fashioned Christmas stuff for me to swoon over! Afterward we drove by Bay Beach (Green Bay’s little old-fashioned waterfront amusement park) to check out the construction progress on the roller coaster (Elvis Presley’s favorite) that they’re putting in. It should be ready by the summer.
Tonight we’re going to listen to the choir at church sing some Christmas carols then attend midnight mass to properly ring in Christmas with a celebration Jesus’ birth. I wish you all a joyful Christmas with your families, friends and all the blessings we’ve been given!
Rise and Shine – but hopefully not as early as I had to! As you read this we are well into our 9-hour drive to Green Bay, WI for Christmas and New Years. We are praying for good driving weather, safe travels, and hoping our house will be just as we left it when we return. Or maybe even better if Santa’s elves and reindeer feel up to insulating our basement and installing shelving in our absence when they stop by on Christmas eve to drop off our golf cart snow plow and winning Ohio lottery ticket so we can pay our electric bill. I don’t think that’s such a stretch – we’ve been pretty good this year. Last night we celebrated our first Christmas together as husband and wife. We opened our gifts from each other, enjoyed our lighted Christmas tree and watched a wonderful Christmas movie my mom sent us. That’s even nicer than pre-installed insulation!
While we spend the day nestled all in snug in our bed truck while visions of sugarplums snow-covered cornfields in Illinois dance through our heads, with five pieces of luggage, four bags of presents, three trays of baked goodies, two winter coats and a partridge in a pear tree, I didn’t want to leave you without something mildly entertaining to read on your Christmas eve’s eve. You can breathe that big sigh of relief now. You’re welcome.
And now, a story. Yesterday, like any other normal day, I walked outside to get the mail praying my long awaited package had arrived (it did!), only to find our mailbox knocked off it’s wooden post, dented, and laying face down in the snow. HUH? Two workmen were trimming the trees/messing with the power lines and, in the process, littering our entire driveway with tiny tree shards, apparently wiped it out with their giant utility truck. Excellent – the day before we leave town and actually need that mailbox to be operational. So Ted came home early and off we went to our old friend Home Depot. We are now owners of a new mailbox – freshly installed by my handyman husband. Dear Companies Who Work for Duke Energy, in the future, please ASK before parking your mammoth honking truck in our driveway, leaving branches haphazardly scattered about for us to clean up after you, and if possible, try to avoid taking out our new mailbox. Thanks.
I’ve done some thinking over the past week or so about what our 2011 does and does not need. Here’s what I’ve come up with:
Things we don’t need in 2011:
1. An obscene heating bill – Two nights ago we got our electric bill for the past month, which includes our hot water, heat and electricity. MERRY CHRISTMAS to you too Duke Energy and you’re welcome for the jolly holiday raises everyone got from our electric bill alone. Our bill was 50% more than we budgeted for. When I hear people talking about an outrageous electric bill I used to assume that it was because they were heating their home to a swampy 84 degrees and using their house as runway lights for Lunken Airport. We’re pretty conservative with our electricity – we keep our house at a cool 62-64 degrees when we are home and at an even cooler 50-55 degrees when we aren’t home, because that’s what we thought we could afford. We only leave the lights on in rooms we are presently in. If we leave the room, we turn the light off – always. And while I do love a nice hot shower, I don’t spend hour upon hour in there nor do I shower three times a day. All of this careful energy consumption and the bill was still several hundred dollars for a two-person family. Ridiculous. No wonder so many people in our nation cannot afford heat and have to make the decision between putting food on their table and freezing all winter long. So we’re brainstorming ways to lower our bill. Maybe we turn down the hot water heater, maybe we limit ourselves to 3-minute showers, maybe we keep the house at 60 and wear sweaters when we’re home. I don’t know. But we definitely do not need another bill like this one every month. We are grateful that, unlike so many others, we are fortunate enough that we can afford any kind of heat at all. I know we are very lucky and truly blessed, but I think Duke Energy is a little too blessed this time of year. I can’t imagine how a single parent with two kids can afford heat this time of year.
2. A storage-only garage and basement – Our house is all unpacked. What isn’t unpacked yet is the garage and basement. It’s not that we have an incredible amount of junk we’ll never use, it’s that a lot of it is tools and equipment that we don’t need in the house, but still need for work purposes. It is somewhat organized in terms of where everything is, but we cannot fit my Buick into the garage right now, nor can we easily get at something specific in the basement without having to move box after box. Fortunately, we do already have a plan of action. We have purchased a DIY shelving system for the basement that will allow us to line one of the walls with hot yellow lumber (aaaahh yes, thank you “damaged” Ikea doors) hanging shelves so we can neatly store boxes off the ground. It will also help us get stuff in the basement and out of the garage so the garage can be functionally used as, well, you know, a garage. And the basement will be roomy for the bowling alley, big screen TV, air hockey table, and bar (with Leinie’s berrywies and woodchuck ale taps!) we intend to put down there with the winning Ohio lottery ticket from the elves.
Things our 2011 does need:
1. A Lara job – If our asinine electric bill isn’t enough to drive the point home, I need a job so we can comfortably pay the rent on this house we love, pay our bills, shop at the grocery store (since they don’t approve of stealing), keep our vehicles running and put money away for savings and retirement. I’m still looking for a job in theatre, a job I’ll be happy at that matches my qualifications, experience and education, and is fun and challenging. But right now that is too much to ask for when I need a job – like a month and a half ago. So at this point I’ll take any job I can find. I’ve been applying and applying and eventually one of them has to bite, right? I’m hoping that after the mad rush of the holiday season that I’ll get some calls. Then once we have enough income to cover our expenses, I can start looking for a job that actually suits my intended career.
2. Exercise – Because nobody likes to feel like a blob. I already make sure we eat pretty healthy, but we’d both like to get into an active routine that consists of more than running around at work (well, maybe not Ted – he has a very active job as it is) and running errands. We like taking walks, bowling, roller blading, biking, and dancing. They’re all fun, all widely accessible here in Cincy, and now we just need to prioritize and make the time to do it. And if all else fails I seem to get good exercise running from coyotes and shoveling our driveway of doom. But we’ll set our sights above mediocre and aim for something a little less terrifying.
3. Travel & a honeymoon – I think taking time for yourselves and your family should always be a priority. We have plenty of siblings, parents, cousins and other family we’ve love to see more of. Being in Cincy we are in a reasonably central location – enough that we can hop in the truck for several hours and spend a long weekend with them or even meet them halfway and explore a new city in the process. Family is family and there’s no excuse for not making time to see them. It is definitely tricky to find vacation days, especially when you’re new to a job and don’t have any really, but there’s always the weekends. There’s also plenty of places we’d like to discover on our own. We’d love to drive Route 66, we’d love to vacation in Alaska, I’d like to check out some of the Eastern sea towns, and some of the Southern cities. Kentucky horse races are literally next-door. We also have a honeymoon to take – delicious exotic foods, awesome excursions and adventures, a complete change of scenery, and time for just the two of us – YES PLEASE. We’ve saved the money for it, but we have to find the vacation days from work to make it worthwhile.
Since you actually took the time to read all of that (assuming you didn’t freak when you saw how long this was, pansy out a quarter of the way into it, skim the rest and cut to the bottom), I suppose I can put up a few pictures as a reward for your patience and diligence. I know I can be long winded – and anyone who puts up with that should receive something in return.
One of the many crazy huge icicles I've been pulling off our house. What a weapon!Backyard wildlife O Christmas Tree! O Christmas Tree!
No picture of our newest addition (the mailbox). Sorry. Merry Christmas eve’s eve!
Today we are celebrating our first Christmas together before we head home for the holidays….and our two-month anniversary!
We’ve been married two months today…wow! But with all that we’ve accomplished since the wedding with a move to a new state, a new home, unpacking, adjusting, new jobs, etc., it feels like we’ve been married much longer! I can hardly believe that only two months ago we were in beautiful Door County, one of our most favorite places, beneath the bluest sky and most vibrantly colored trees, promising our lives to one another in a church we drove by two years ago and said “hey, let’s get married there one day!” surrounded by so many people who traveled so far to celebrate with us. We had a gorgeous sunset, delicious food, a 9-piece swing band, cozy bonfire, flavorful wines and dancing galore. I think we both wish we could go back to that weekend, though we’ve decided to try to make it up to Door County for at least a weekend on every anniversary. I love our house, I like Cincinnati, we have so much love and support from our family and friends, and I have a wonderful, funny, loving husband. In that I find all I’ll ever need. He is the best Christmas present ever.
Not that I nearly launched myself into the mailbox or rocketed down the driveway like a banshee or anything….ahem.
I am so glad we made an excellent photographer one of our financial priorities for our wedding. After a ton of research, he was the most reasonably priced photographer I found in the Door County area and he had the most impressive images, angles, preparedness, and variety of shooting styles. He took at least a half hour to explain his entire photographic approach to me when we spoke on the phone last December – and I loved what he had to say. We also really liked that with him we could create our own package – hiring him for the exact number of hours we chose – and that we could purchase the reproduction rights to our photos. Plus he was willing to go to as many locations as we wanted, was great with getting families and kids geared up for shots, and was able to do a fantastic mix of traditional photography and contemporary photography with unique shots – like hanging out the back of a speeding convertible snapping pics, for example. We were looking for quality and creativity – and he didn’t disappoint!
Nothing brings back all the memories and emotions from the day quite like looking at your wedding pictures together for the first time. It’s such a rush to see everything from the outside looking in – to see the details and the looks on people’s faces during the ceremony that we missed. We still have a lot of looking and organizing to do – we’ll be putting together albums for us and our parents, combining the best of the best from the pro pics, the family & friends cameras, and the disposable “I Spy” cameras we put out at the reception. We’ll be deciding which ones to frame and hang in our home and which ones to use for other purposes. But all that will come in 2011! In the meantime: Friends, if you have any pictures in your camera that you haven’t shared yet, please feel free to send some of them our way!
So without giving away too much just yet, I’d like to share a few images with you from our October 22, 2010 Door County, WI wedding day. All photos are courtesy of Matt Normann Photography.
(That’s 250 people total. LOVE it.)
(The stunning weather & breathtaking fall color we were blessed with – just look at how blue that sky is!)
(Detail shots – the stain glass window and lighting in the church, wheat bundle decor at our reception, our classic getaway car which was my old, borrowed and blue (my new was Ted!), and a very special dress.)
If that isn’t enough excitement for you for one day, our neighbor is tearing up her yard. We have no idea what’s she’s really doing – she could be putting in a pool, a fenced in animal area, or simply adding to her agricultural wonders – but whatever it is all I know is that bulldozers and a small work crew showed up yesterday and are going to town right across the fence. I guess we’ll have to wait a few weeks to see the new addition.
Today I’m going to give the house a quick cleaning, finish packing for our trip, make some peppermint bark, and do some cooking to use up all the food in the fridge. Happy Tuesday!
Today is Lara’s Buick Appreciation Day. In honor of this day, let’s all marvel at how brilliant my Buick is, shall we?
Anyone who knows me knows I have a major crush on my Buick. It’s gorgeous and is, quite simply, the best car ever made. Buicks get crap for being an “old person” car, but I’m pretty sure that’s just because everyone else is incredibly jealous of how sleek and roomy they are. I adore my Buick. I’ll go out of the way to park next to another Buick in a parking lot, and I can spot other Buicks on the interstate from hundreds of feet away. It’s a sick talent. While I think most Buicks are nice, mine takes the cake (obviously). I’ll give others a quick examining glance before declaring that mine’s prettier – and it is. Ted likes to rag on my Buick from time to time (read: daily), but I know deep down he loves it just as much as I do. And what’s not to love? Anyway, I’ll get to the point. Today Buick got a bath and if I had another twenty bucks to spare I’d be tempted to go through that car wash myself because that is one sparkly Buick sitting in front of our house! Buick was filthy – between the dirt from the cross-country trek up from Texas, dingy brown snow, salt, and Arkansas grime, this bath was long overdue. So I went to one of the nice places – you know, the real nice ones where the track takes it through all these crazy blasting machines and colored soaps while you watch through a tunnel with windows. I know if I were covered in Arkansas grime I’d want a monster cleaning too. Seriously – this place rocks. They vacuum every crevice, they scrub the interior, blast the salt from the underbody of the vehicle, polish all the windows, and apply a gloss coat of goodness over the whole shebang. I wish my shower could do that! Anyhow, please take a moment to appreciate a Buick near and dear to your heart today as you make a quick run to the bank, grocery store, or barber shop. When you see one, give it a quick pat and say Thank You for being hardworking and beautiful.
Today my goal is to find a way to use up all the food in our fridge before we leave for Green Bay. This includes fruit, a ridiculous amount of vegetables and some other random things like lamb, pumpkin, and cheese. I have little hope of finding one glop casserole recipe that could incorporate all these ingredients without sending our taste buds into a tizzy. So I might have to make two or three things tomorrow. I’d prefer to find something that freezes well. If not, It’s all coming to Green Bay with us because I can’t stand to waste food.
Still waiting on our pro pics to come in. Our photog said he mailed them last week and is surprised they’re not here yet. I may go ballistic if our post office was dumb again and returned them to sender like they did with our marriage certificates. Also still waiting for my medicine that I ordered over a month ago to arrive. I’m not thrilled about that either. Lately, I have little faith in or praise for the USPS. Which is sad because John, our mail carrier, is super nice.
We’re back from Columbus and thought I’d take a few minutes for a quick post before we settle in for an evening of Packer game and stuffing Thank You cards. This morning we made the two-hour drive to Columbus, OH to meet Mike, Mary, Michaela, Marcus and Martin for lunch, football, and some catching up time at Buffalo Wild Wings. Columbus is about the halfway meeting point for all of us, and since the weather was nice today and the Bengals v. Browns game was in Cincinnati, it was a great day for a drive to Columbus. It was so nice to see family and we had a great time hanging out and catching up! We’re hoping we can meet up with them more often now that we’re a little more settled. Having family around is wonderful! And sweet Michaela reads this blog too (Hi Michaela!) and brought me some peppermint tea since I mentioned tea last week. I love peppermint tea! An awesome surprise for sure :-)
On the drive there and back we drove by King’s Island – a roller coaster amusement park and water park just outside of Cincinnati that is a competitor of Cedar Point in Sandusky, OH (where we went for a weekend for our anniversary last year). It’s only about a 40 minute drive from our house (that was my daily commute from my house to my job in Texas – that’s nothing!). It’s close by and the season pass pays for itself in only a visit and a half. So if we can scrape up the money we’re considering season passes and we’re looking forward to taking a trip there sometime in the spring hopefully!
Hope everyone had an enjoyable, relaxing weekend! The first few days of next week will be busy for us – hopefully our wedding photos will be in (seriously. my patience is out the window as of a week and a half ago), we’ll be packing for Christmas and New Years in Green Bay, readying the house for our absence, celebrating our own little Christmas together, and tying up some last minute job and work related details. We have a lot to accomplish before our long drive to Wisconsin and some long overdue “do nothing” time, but I’ll try to stop by and say hi every day as usual.
