Oh, Christmas Tree

Stephen and I had a lovely time decorating our Christmas tree on Tuesday night.  Even though the Christmas tree stand broke, we were able to rig something up to make it sturdy. 

Or so we thought!  Wednesday night it came crashing down!  Luckily only a few of the ornaments broke...only my favorite ones of course.  This was taken after everything was mostly cleaned up.

Here is the before and after of an ornament Stephen made for me on our first Christmas together.  We'll still hang it on the tree of course; now there is another story to go along with it.

This one's for you

We get lots of really great light in our apartment at all different times of day.  This was at about 4:35 pm today.  The afternoon sun perfectly illuminates solitary objects in the apartment depending on the window it shines in.  Today, an empty case of Coors.  Isn't it lovely.  Stephen has been drinking just regular Coors lately.  This picture reminds of one my good friend, Keith, would take for some reason.  Maybe it's the light, or the composition...I'm not sure.  But Keith, this one's for you.  

Stephen...

...at the Black River.

...on a log.

...deep in thought.

Halloween!

I hope you all had a wonderful Halloween!  Stephen and I had a really fun night with all of our Port Huron friends.  We participated in something called a Witch Hunt where our friend and upstairs neighbor, Matt, had to dress up like a witch and run around town to different bars while the rest of us, in teams of three and four, had to try and find him.  There were a lot of other rules involved which basically involved drinking beers and drinking more beers.  It was great!

Everyone dressed up, which was one of the rules, but it also made it really fun!  Here are mine and Stephen's costumes.  Stephen was blood spatter specialist/serial killer extraordinar Dexter Morgan, from the Shotime series Dexter.  I was a beehive, an idea I got from Martha Stewart, duh.  I set up a photo booth in my apartment and took pics of everyone who participated.  You can see them here!

Fun Fall Weekend

Stephen and I had a pretty fun filled weekend.  Here are some pictures.

Friday we went to see one of our all time favorite bands ever of all time...Wilco.  They were awesome!  Actually, they were better than awesome.  I'm really glad that we went because Stephen has been wanting to see them in concert since as long as I've known him.  The show was at the Hill Auditorium in Ann Arbor which is where my sisters graduation from the U of M school of ed was.

Here we are waiting for the show to start.

That's Wilco.  A horrible pic, but you can kind of make out Jeff Tweedy in the middle in the black pants.  Did I mention they were awesome?

Stephen enjoying some Sangria at a delicious cuban restaurant in Ann Arbor.  We had these delicious pork tacos as an appetizer that had carmelized onions and pineapple on them.  Yum!  I also had a really delicious margarita...one only to be rivaled by the ones served at Agave in Newburyport.  

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On Saturday we went to the Michigan v. Delaware St. game.  I really did feel bad for Delaware St.  I mean, they essentially got paid $500,000 to show up and lose.  At least they were on time though.  When U of M paid Bill Clinton $500,000 to speak and my sister commencement he was 45 minutes late.  Classy.

The Big House.  This game set the record for lowest attendance ever.  Sad.  

My dad and I tailgating before the game.  It was actually really cold that morning.  Not the best tailgating weather, but we made the most of it.

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Sunday was a beautiful day.  Stephen and I took a bike ride around my old neighborhood.  

A park that I used to play at a lot as a kid.

My parents house.

We play a lot of games at our house.  Rack-o is a family favorite, even if my dad almost always wins, and then brags about it.  Here is the champ shuffling the Rack-o deck.

We also checked out the Detroit Marathon.  It was really fun.  

Here is one of my best friends, Liz.  She was in our wedding.  Sorry this is so out of focus...I was running along next to her so we could chat for a second.  She ran the half marathon and her husband, Josh, ran the marathon.  They are awesome!  

On a weird side note, I know the person who won the Marathon, I went to high school with him.  And I know the guy who won the Half Marathon, his twin brother used to date my friend Heather.  What are the odds that out of 19,000 people I would know both of the winners.  Crazy.

Anyway, it was a fuuuun weekend.  

Wine Making

Last Christmas Stephen and I gave our parents gift certificates to have wine made at a local wine making place here in PH.  A few weekends ago our parents finally came down for the wine tasting and purchasing.  We got to taste about 15 different wines.  It was so much fun having someone explain to you the differences in the wine and why you might like some more than others.  

I still usually prefer dry whites, but there were two or three reds that I loooved too.

All the parents involved purchased some delicious wines which I can not wait to taste in the near future.  

Garbage Dweller

The other morning Stephen went to go throw away some trash and this guy started hissing at him.  He must have fallen off the porch into the empty trash can full of stinky rain water and garbage juice (GROSS.)  Stephen rescued the little guy by tipping the garbage can over.