Name Changes

I suppose there needs to be a small change made here in blog land. Boyfriend's title is no longer entirely accurate. The best way to describe him now is Fiance. That's right, after five years together, three states, a pup, and buying a house he and decided to make it official. We're pretty jazzed.

We'll be tying the knot (jumping the broom, getting hitched, and other assorted euphemisms) in Kansas City next summer. I'll have a brand new (easier for kiddos to pronounce) name just in time to be teacher all on my own. Hooray!

The Queen City: Revisited

I am absolutely itching to travel. It never really goes away, this itch. Fortunately, I was able to relieve it somewhat with a little weekend road trip. Boyfriend and I headed south for a wedding in our old stomping grounds, Charlotte, North Carolina.

The best and worst thing about driving to Charlotte from anywhere west of Charlotte is the time it takes to get there. Driving through the Appalachians is breathtakingly beautiful and arduously slow. Heading out from southern Indiana took us through Brown County, Indiana (beautiful rolling hills, picture-perfect farms, a postcard of Midwestern charm) Kentucky (the beginnings of mountains, Bourbon country, more beautiful rolling hills) , a corner of Tennessee (Branson East, river camping and rafting, even more beautiful rolling hills, seriously cute little towns tucked into the mountains), and a chunk of very western North Carolina (narrow highway twisting and climbing around green mountains).  For most of our drive it rained. Spring, amiright?

After our beautiful but pokey drive, we made it to Charlotte, checked into our hotel, and promptly thanked Priceline for providing us with a beautiful view of the city. Then it was off to meet Charlottians past and present. We were walking distance to all of our downtown destinations for the weekend (Seriously, Priceline was killing it.) The wedding we'd come to town for was beautiful despite a cozy (although I'm sure unwelcome) grumble of thunder and afternoon rain shower. We ducked from awning to awning on our way to the reception in a restaurant above the city, Bentley's on 27. Cocktails should always be accompanied by panoramic views. This is my new rule. Walking just a few blocks back to our hotel was a great way to end the evening. We did venture out of downtown for two very good reasons during our stay though. Cabo Fish Taco and Zada Jane's. 

Cabo Fish Taco and the wonderful weather are the top two things I miss about living in North Carolina. I can't control the weather, but I can control where I eat lunch. Barbecue Mahi Tacos. This midwestern girl cannot think of any lunch not improved by the addition of barbecue sauce. These tacos are one of my favorite meals and it was so nice to enjoy them with some of our buddies from our Charlotte days. They also made sure we made it to a restaurant we'd never been to when we lived in town. We were missing out, you guys. Zada Jane's was our last Charlotte meal of the weekend and it was a wonderful choice. Awesome giant breakfast on the patio for the win. It will be added to the "When in Charlotte" list for next time.  

While I'm still itching for more travel, I loved being in Charlotte for the weekend. It may never be our forever home, but it'll always be fun to go back and remember our couple of years there.

New House Tour Part 2: Less Chaos

So...this is way overdue. Better super late than never? I hope so! Here is what our house is looking like these days. We've lived here a little over a month now and have managed to get a few little things done.

Our individual work areas are coming along. I think they say a lot about us. Here's mine:

Believe it or not, I find all that color and chaos comforting. I love having somewhere designated for all of my school stuff. When piles of binders are toppled over and my backpack's contents have spilled across the floor, I can shut the door and walk downstairs.

Boyfriend though, has a very professional dusty blue and dark wood office. It's sophisticated- even the Rage Against the Machine poster. He's got a menacing bookshelf, heavy with academic miscellany, baseball bobble heads and empty space. Something about not getting distracted, I guess. Huh.

Our guest bedroom is pretty bare, but the bed is made!

The dining room has taken on a multipurpose life much like it had at our old house. The dining room is where more bookshelves go (so many, so many) and where game nights happen, where Boyfriend works when his office won't do, where projects get laid out, and where dinner rarely happens. Here it is:

Our backyard, you ask? We haven't done a single thing...because it has looked like this since mid-January. I know, I know, it's pretty, right? Nope. Three weeks ago it was pretty. Now it's just
a sick joke. Melt.

And because I am that pet owner, here's a cute picture of Arley enjoying our new digs.

New House Tour Part 1: Chaos

We're officially moved! During finals week last semester we finished (...pretty much started) packing and moved everything to the new house across town. Moving+ finals week= we've had better ideas. Anyway, we survived the moving process with the help of some great friends and a lot of caffeine. We then fled town for the refuge of Kansas City and our families. Who knew that arriving home in an ice storm would be the least of our weather problems this holiday season?

Chapter 2: The Polar Vortex sabotaged our return to Bloomington!
Our original plan was to head back on Sunday but when we found out that I-70 was all snow-covered car accidents, we decided to wait. Tuesday morning we left Kansas City and made it as far as Vandalia, IL before the highway was so icy that we thought better of continuing. Boyfriend, Arley, and I spent the night at the Days Inn in Vandalia. Wednesday we took a little over 6 hours to get from the middle of Illinois to Bloomington. Along the way we saw dozens of cars off the road, overturned semis (one blocking our access back on to I-70 after a coffee stop), a train stopped in an intersection, and beautiful snowy southern Indiana.

But we made it! In the last few days we've made pretty decent progress but it's still pretty crazy around here. Have some evidence of the madness:

There are books on the floor in every room.

Yes, that's a box spring in the living room? Why?

Stay tuned for a more moved-in tour of our progress!

Thanksgiving

Holiday travel season is quickly approaching! Actually, in our house it's more like Get-all-the-projects-and-papers-done-so-we-can-enjoy-the-holidays time. It's a mouthful. On our docket this year: Kansas City and Springfield, MO with a stop in Columbia for Thanksgiving, a nice long Christmas in KC and back to Indiana to move into our new house just after the new year!

Last year, Boyfriend braved Michigan with me and my extended family. It was fantastic. We ate too much, stayed up late making stupid jokes and it snowed! This year it's my turn to tag along for his family's festivities. We're headed to southern Missouri for Thanksgiving day. Boyfriend has a bunch of family there and we'll all be getting together for too much food and carrying on.

We might head back to Kansas City in time to see the Plaza lighting, which, for non-Kansas City residents is the city's official holiday season kick-off. The Plaza is a beautiful shopping district with Spanish architecture and high-end stores. On Thanksgiving night, hundreds, maybe thousands of Kansas Citians buddle up and mill about until a local celebrity flips the switch and row after row of lights outline the Plaza's buildings. It's one of those simple, pretty holiday moments.

The other side of Eric's family will get together on Saturday where the eating and carrying on will continue! Sadly, Sunday it'll be back to Indiana to kick into high gear and finish out the semester. Whew.

I've had a lot of picture-less posts lately. Allow me to remedy that. Here are some randoms I found on my computer. If you just can't get enough, I'm also on Instagram, Feel free to follow along, I'm pinsinthemap.

We made a feast a couple years ago...for two of us. It was awesome.

Boyfriend and I grinning excessively into my phone

Getting excited about the holidays? Trying not to think about it?

Halloween Costumes

Belated Halloween costume photos! Boyfriend was a very....accurate Macho Man Randy Savage. I am proud and a little embarrassed to tell you that I am responsible for adding all that ribbon, fringe, and sequins to that shirt. So. Much. Hot glue. He was the spittin' image. And had the catch phrase down.

My costume was a bit more subdued. Jessie from Toy Story's 2 and 3. I got completely bogged down in getting everything as accurate as possible. I'm obnoxious but if you ever need to borrow a cowgirl shirt, I'm your girl. I was tempted to make Arley a saddle and have her go as a miniature Bulls-eye. Maybe next year.

Speaking of next year, I think we'll have trick-or-treaters at our new house. We've never had trick-or-treaters! Realer posts coming soon!

To the Ozarks!

This is one of a series of posts that mysteriously reverted to draft form. They were actually posted quite a while ago but they're here for now. Sorry about the craziness!


Boyfriend's parents have a place in the Ozarks in southern Missouri. It's the place where his family congregates several times a year for catching up, overeating, incredibly competitive Monopoly games and the kind of relaxed weekends I thought only existed in movies and on Sandals commercials.

For those unfamiliar with this part of the country, picture hills, not so much rolling as tripping over each other and doubling back, weeds that when left untamed turn into trees and a beautiful, humongous lake smack in the middle of everything. It is as beautiful as it is strange.

The Ozarks is also one of those places with massive resorts and fancy condos just miles down the road from fairly serious poverty. It is, in that way, just like the rest of the state. The wonderful thing about going to the lake is you can do just about anything. Lazy float trip down a cute, little river? Got it. Crazy tubing on the busy lake? Check. Napping on the dock? Yep. Eating round the clock? Of course! This is summer vacation, isn't it?

We headed down for the 4th of July. Arley came with us. She wouldn't miss the opportunity to sit on a dozen different laps in a weekend. She lives for that kind of thing.

Well, the dog got what she came for and so did we. The weekend was a blur of tanlines, food and sleeping in. Vacation success! I'm not getting any better remembering to take pictures...use your imaginations if you want to see me lazy and sunburnt.  

The Kentucky Bourbon Trail

This is one of a series of posts that mysteriously reverted to draft form. They were actually posted quite a while ago but they're here for now. Sorry about the craziness!


A few weekends ago (sorry for the radio silence, by the way. Life, etc.) we got to go on another little beat-the-winter-blues getaway. Boyfriend's birthday was a couple days ago and as my gift to him I arranged a quick trip to bourbon country. For those without booze nerds in their lives, the Bourbon Trail is a small area of Kentucky where half a dozen or so distilleries are located, included some major national brands like Four Roses, Wild Turkey and Jim Beam. We live just a couple hours away so we headed down to Kentucky on Saturday morning. We would be staying in Frankfurt but there are distilleries in several smaller towns close by.

First up was Four Roses in Lawrenceburg, a unique distillery because of it's Spanish architectural style. The tours for most of these places are free so you need to do nothing more than materialize at the top of the hour. The Four Roses tour starts with a short movie and a little history of the grounds. The coolest part of their tour, though, is being able to walk through the actual processing areas. They don't kid around. There are pans of boiling water to watch out for and massive vats of yeasty mixes. The highlight of these tours for bourbon fans of course, is the tasting and at Four Roses you get to taste three different bourbons. I am not a big bourbon fan but even so it is interesting to try different types back to back.

After Four Roses we checked into our hotel and recharged for the evening. I love trips like this because we had a couple things scheduled but no particular plans in between. We consulted UrbanSpoon to get an idea for dinner options and decided to head to a little place in downtown Frankfurt. Pretty good food, really attentive service- as it was St.Patrick's Day weekend the chef brought out a little of his corned beef for us to try. We also got free birthday dessert and we didn't have to listen to anyone sing! Score! After dinner we had a reservation for the ghost tour at Buffalo Trace.

Arriving at Buffalo Trace, we were both taken by the size of the operation. That place is huge! There are not only processing buildings and a visitor's center but a historic home and a large cabin-style banquet facility that was hosting a wedding when we there. As for the tour, we assumed it would be a mix of campfire style stories about the spooky history of the distillery and bourbon info. We were unaware that a lot of the tour rehashes the episode of Ghost Hunters at the distillery. Even better, some of our fellow tour-goers fancied themselves amateur ghost hunters complete with an app to detect...whatever you try to detect when you think your phone can help you hunt ghosts. So, that was...that. The coolest building in my opinion was the storage facility. Rows upon rows, floors upon floors are filled with barrels of aging bourbon. It was a great little weekend away that ended with my acquiring the stomach flu. Awesome.

Back to normal life now. My birthday is next week! Hooray cake!

Two Full-time Graduate Students

For the first time since we started dating, Boyfriend and I are both full-time students. He's a year and a half into a PhD program and I started working on my Master's this semester. Here's what to watch out for if you find yourself similarly afflicted:

We've both stopped doing the little household stuff. I find that being on campus all day and still having homework to do at night is more draining that having a 9-to-5 job that I could forget as soon as I was driving home. Result: mounds of laundry, a sink full of dirty dishes, general grossness.

We have similar schedules. For instance, neither he or I have classes on Fridays. Lunchtime study date? Ok! Running errands at 10am on a Monday? Doable. It's nice to take advantage of the random free time we both have.

Stressful, busy times are now the same for both of us. Midterms? Finals? Those take over both of us, now. I used to be able to shut the door to our guest room/office knowing Boyfriend would be working until the wee hours and go about my evening. These days you'll find us side by side on the couch, computers in laps, bags under eyes.

We're both actively working toward something. I have cut back significantly on freak outs regarding my meaningless job and wasted potential (Yes, I have been a real peach to live with at times). We still take turns being overwhelmed but there's structure, a purpose. I like it.

I'm glad this will not be our situation for more than a couple years. Two stressed out grad students with no one else in the house to keep us in check can get ugly. That and I cannot wait to have my own classroom. Speaking of which, my math lesson looms ever closer. I'm pretty excited.

P.S. Kindergartners are the best people to talk to about Halloween. Seriously.

We're moving!

We bought a house! In just a few months we will (most likely) never pay rent again! The home search was much more brief than we anticipated. We spent a few days scouring listings online and managed to find two houses we found interesting enough to look at. We made a low ball offer and ba da bing, ba da boom. Homeowners!

The house is just on the other side of town which means this will be Boyfriend and I's first move that does not involve getting new driver's licenses. Since we're in school full-time we're giving ourselves plenty of time to get all of our things moved over. By the new year we will be in our new place! We'll have more space so each of us will have somewhere to put our desks. No more office/dining room!

The house does not have anything major that needs to be done but it hasn't had much updating since it was built in the late 80's. It is generally bland inside and out. This is exciting though because we can out our own mark on the place.

That brings me to some of the resources we will be consulting as we tweak and improve. My parents will be on speed dial, of course, because they have decades of experience taking on DIY projects of all sorts. They are experts at biting off more than they can chew and figuring out how to make it work. I have a sneaking suspicion this skill set will be helpful. Another great resource I will be finally be able to capitalize on is the blog Young House Love. It's a very popular home blog in case you haven't lost several hours to this fantastic family and their amazing taste.

We have plans for projects big and small. Of course we'll have to take silly things like time and budget into consideration. Psh!

This and That

There is no structure or theme to this post. I have no deep insight, just some random things rolling around in my head.

First, another submission to Exceptionally Awesome People of Exceptional Awesomeness! I read about this on Friday on Cup of Jo, one my very favorite daily reads. You may already know about it as it occurred in October. Window washers dressed as super heroes brightened a morning for patients at a children's hospital. The article explains that the window washing company spent several hundred dollars on good quality costumes all in the name of making kids smile. Hooray for a business with a fabulous sense of humor!

Next, I'd like to set a goal for myself. I want to take more pictures. I have a phone with a pretty decent camera so there's really no excuse. I forgot or feel self-conscious or wait for a perfect moment that never comes. The result is a lot of memories with no mementos. Don't misunderstand me though, I have no interest in becoming a life-documenter. I harbor no delusions that you care what my dinner looks like, how I'm fixing my hair in the morning or think my dog is half as adorable as I do. I think though, it would be nice to have evidence of the cute moments in life. There are very few photos of Boyfriend and I together despite our three and a half year relationship. I have to get over the sense that I'm intruding. How long does it take to snap a picture? Thirty seconds at the most? So, hold me to it. Demand more interesting posts!

Finally, this week holds some fun! Valentine's Day is on Thursday and while Boyfriend and I went out this past weekend for our celebrating (Oliver Winery tasting room for wine flights and dessert. Amazing!) one of the perks of working at an elementary school is the cheesy holiday parties. So, on Thursday I'll be swapping cheap cardboard cards-I bought Scooby Doo valentines and they come with temporary tattoos-and eating various red and pink forms of processed sugar. But wait there's more! One of my best friend since practically the beginning of time (read: middle school) will be here on Friday! There will be much silliness and eating and wonderful. 

How do you know?

I assume you already know this, but I live with Boyfriend. We've been co-habitating (that makes us sound like zoo animals...) for a few years now. So, how did we know we were ready to move in together, that it wouldn't be a total disaster? We didn't. Here's what I believe helped prevent total mayhem.

We traveled together. The summer before we moved in together we backpacked through Italy for three weeks. We had just finished college and knew that opportunities to travel would become rarer and rarer. So, despite the fact that we hadn't been together very long (just under a year) we booked hostels and train tickets, packed borrowed backpacks and hopped on a plane.

I like to pose awkwardly for tourist-tastic pictures.

My take-away from our adventure? I would advise anyone to travel with their partner before making a big commitment. Italy in July is hot and crowded and neither of us speak Italian. We had a tiny budget and only each other for support. I got crabby and uncomfortable, Boyfriend got frustrated and discouraged, we got lost in Venice when the vaporettos went on strike. It was exactly what we needed. We learned each others breaking points, annoying habits and tendencies to snore loudly and never stop. We also toured amazing museums, ruins, ate delicious food and drank cheap wine. Italy is a magical place.

Boyfriend likes to try to read while I bother him.

At the end of our adventure, I think we both had much more realistic expectations for what being around the other 24/7 would look like. That's not to say that it's been smooth sailing ever since. We're still bugged by the little obnoxious things the other does, but traveling together and being forced outside your comfort zone together can be a fun, exotic relationship bootcamp. 

We're looking at spending a summer in Germany in a few years. Boyfriend may have the opportunity to teach at a university in Mannheim. Relationship Bootcamp Round 2!

Take a great trip lately? Know any awesome, secret travel tips? Think we're crazy people?

What do they want for Christmas?

Happy winter holiday of your choosing! I see that catching on at all the mall stores.

Regardless of what you celebrate there is probably gift giving involved and therefore, probably frustration. If you're anything like me (selfish and dense) you find the trickiest people to shop for are those most unlike yourself. As a female, I find it particularly challenging to find gifts for the men on my list. Whether it's Dad, Brother, male co-worker I drew in Secret Santa- I never know if I'm choosing something I want them to want or something that's actually cool.  If this is not you and you happen to be some kind of perfect gift wizard, this post is not for you and are your services for hire?

Lucky for the rest of us there roughly nine million gift guides out there just waiting for your perusal. Unfortunately, not all of the advice is good. But, how do you ask, can we tell the genuinely good ideas from the stinkers? I have no idea, I asked someone else.

Boyfriend is here to tell us just how accurate one of those online gift guides can be.

For our little experiment, we chose Gifts.com's Top 10 Gifts for Guys. Gifts.com compiles gift ideas from a variety of sources and allows you to browse ideas by occasion, recipient, you get the idea.

So, here's Boyfriend's take as we went through, item by item: 

He'll be in blue.

Ok, first item?

Road Trip Napa Valley Red Wines...I’m more of a beer guys, 38 bucks for six bottles of wine isn’t a bad idea. It’s hard to go wrong with booze.

Fair enough, pretty safe start. Next?

Custom Protein Bars Gift Box" Sighs. “Because nothing says 'I love you' like your face staring off a health food package.

Who is that a good gift for?

Laughs. A grandmother or grandfather of some sort...Holy crap?!50 dollars for 6 energy bars?!

Well, they're custom...

Do you know what that is in Clif currency? That’s like 25 Clif bars!

Yes it is. Moving on then?

Personalized Large Popcorn Bucket. It's a handwash-only popcorn bucket

And…?

We own bowls, right? I don’t know why I would need a bucket that can hold a message in one line up to 12 characters. I can’t even get my full name in 12 characters. And the hand wash only adds to it, when you’re standing there washing fake butter out of a plastic bucket with your name on it. That’s a level of shame I don’t want to associate with Christmas.

Ok, nothing handwash-only for guys, got it.

Needlepoint Flask. I’m gonna be open and up front on this one. I’ve owned a flask. The flask is the container of the inconspicuous drinker. Rarely do people drinking out of flasks stop so they can turn to the person next to them and say 'hey look at the design that’s on my flask.' It’s an inconspicuous way to add hard liquor to things that don’t usually have hard liquor in them. I don’t see spending 35 dollars on one that has “cheerful needlepoint messages”.
Noted.

Timerland Rattler Boots. (Scoffs) I don’t really have anything to say about this. They’re packable boots.

What do you think that gift says about you and the gift giver?

It says I know you’re a person who sleeps outside a lot. I’ve just never really needed more foot warmth than warm socks can provide. 
Hot Sauce of the Month Club!* (no longer on list)

Have we found one you want?

The only problem with this gift is that it only lasts 4 months. They do have longer options but its probably way more expensive than is justifiable for the amount of hot sauce you’re going to get. You could just go into one of those kitchy mall stores and pick them out yourself…I don’t know what benefit I would get from the monthly newsletter…I’m not really interested in hearing what other people have to say about hot sauce.
I don't see why not. Ok, next?

Personalized grilling gloves. (Snorts) I still have a five dollar pair of work gloves from when I worked installing fences. Its never occurred to me to put them on when I was grilling. That’s probably pretty stupid considering the amount of grilling time I spend going “Ah! That’s hot!” but I don’t need a grilling glove with a logo on it. I may try to find those work gloves though. It also makes me happy to know there’s a grillinggifts.com

Your New York Times Front Page on Marble Clock. Oh, that’s good. For a second I was worried it was just one front page but apparently you can get any front page. (Reading from the description) “Geared to mark birthdays, anniversaries and other important life events”- that’s great if you happen to be a public figure mentioned on the front page or if something in your life was addressed. But generally you just have to hope that your birthday is not on 

9/ 11 or something. This could also lead to awkward conversations. 'What time is it? Oh, it’s America’s Drive Before Airfield.' (Shakes head)

Microbrew beer bucket gift basket (Snorts) …Again the…this is 70 dollars for a bucket and a mix-a-six! At first I was pleased they were getting to the beer. The beers in this thing are a $1.50 a piece at the store. I could get these beers down the street for 9 dollars. It’s great that they have an awesome galvanized bucket but... Alcohol is always a welcome gift but paying a random website to pick random beers and ship them to me…it’s just a little odd. Also, the stuff they have as the most popular microbrews are six of the most widely available microbrews you can find anywhere. I mean if you did this at the grocery store at least I’d know you’d put some effort into it.

What if you don’t live near a decent store that carries micro beers?

Then you should move.

Personalized beer holster? (Pulls computer closer) I don’t see what's personalizable here. I mainly just see this as an easier way to get arrested. Yeah, I mean I guess sometimes I’ve thought 'man, I wish there was somewhere I could put my beer'. It does seem very fashion forward though what with the extra leg strap. I’d also like to see this baby in action. I’m not convinced it wouldn’t dump your beer all over you.

How well you do think this list did at coming up with gift ideas?

They got a lot of the genres right, it was clear they were trying to hit dude stuff.

Such as?

Booze- wine, beer, liquor, beer holder, liquor holder. I mean, I got my brother hot sauce for his birthday this year, I have no problem with that concept. They went for outdoors, grilling, a weird combo of appreciation of media and history.

Where did they go wrong?

Execution, I suppose. I think this is a lot of stuff that when you look at it for just a second you think 'oh that’s cool' and then you realize it’s a bunch of stuff that’s more expensive than it needs to be. I’m a big function over form guy, I know not everyone’s like that but in general this stuff doesn’t appeal to me. The beer holster and the flask have kitch value- hey those are two things I don’t expect to go together. I’d probably say that, assuming those bottles of wine are decent that’s not a bad deal.

Is personalized a big sell for guys?

It hasn’t ever really been for me. I do remember a friend getting S-wizzle For Shizzle on the inside of his highschool ring so I guess I shouldn’t speak for everyone but I can’t see him sitting at home with the popcorn bucket, label out, so everyone can see that it’s Spencer’s popcorn bucket.

There you have it folks. A guy's opinion on what to buy them for Christmas. I'm off to find a hand-wash-only, needle-point bottle holster with Boyfriend's name on it! Happy shopping!

*All images are from gifts.com and it seems the "Hot Sauce of the Month Club has since been changed to "Beer of the Month Club."

Aren't people great? And a bunch of other things, too

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend. I travelled to Michigan to hang with family and dragged Boyfriend along for the ride. While there I got to go to a place so fabulous I must share it with you and also change the name of the series I started.

Ok, that was a random and jumbled way of saying:

We have a second entry for Exceptionally Awesome People of Exceptional Awesomeness (because grown-ups do awesome things, too). 

Do All Inc. is an organization that supports people with disabilities and general community betterment through a variety of shops and resources. I had the pleasure of going to Do Art in downtown Bay City which is, as their website describes, "a community arts program which brings artists with and without disabilities together to produce and sell their work." There are paintings, drawings, jewelry, hats and mittens, cards, all sorts of great things. The artists apply to the program and work in every aspect of the business from creating pieces to framing to the working on the sales floor. My parents spoke to an employee who told them an online store is in the works so folks outside the Saginaw Valley area can purchase awesomeness anywhere in the county. I just love seeing a successful, creative way to benefit an entire community. This was the perfect way to kick off my holiday season.

Here are some awesome things to look forward to on the blog:

Boyfriend is going to tell me the truth about how accurate those "Great Christmas Gifts for the Men in Your Life" lists are. Prepare yourselves, internet. Boyfriend is a snarky, snarky man. 

I will attempt to take some not terrible pictures of my Christmas decorating efforts. They are slightly grander than originally intended because I inherited a Christmas tree, lights and more ornaments than you can shake a fist at (that's a lot, right?) this weekend courtesy of my grandmother. 

So tell me, big plans for the month of buying things and crashing with relatives? Have an awesome community organization you want to brag about? Think your grandma is awesome? It's all welcome! 

How's the New Place?

As I mentioned some time ago, we've moved...again.

Having grown up in Kansas City, Missouri, Boyfriend and I got adventurous and moved to Charlotte, North Carolina in 2010 (not before taking a month-long backpacking trip after only one year of dating, but I digress). We lived in Charlotte for two years packed with "firsts", the most significant of which was moving in together. Of course, that was as turbulent as you'd expect- gripes about cleaning, schedules, generally getting annoyed with each others presence. I am a total control freak so I actually got upset, not that Boyfriend wouldn't load the dishwasher but, that when he did, he did it wrong. I know, I know. But we've established that I'm crazy, right? Anyway, Charlotte was great, beautiful autumnal weather that lasts months, little to no winter weather whatsoever (!!!) and all the sweet tea I never cared to drink. Boyfriend got his Master's degree and I worked at a job I felt lukewarm about but with awesome coworkers I'm too lucky to have own.

Enter grad school application season. Boyfriend got accepted to three excellent Ph.D programs (because he's brilliant...when he's not obnoxious). At the same time I was shopping around for a Master's in Education program. Indiana fit the bill for both of us and after spending the summer in Kansas City with family and friends, we packed up and set out to become Hoosiers.

Do you know that feeling when everything's going so well that you're sure there must be disaster looming? Just me? In any case, I still feel that way about our most recent move. Boyfriend had a connection that found us an adorable house to rent, I got the first and best job I applied for and this town has exceeded our expectations on nearly every front. We're walking distance from a great little cocktail bar, make a weekly trip to the farmer's market and may never run out of international restaurants to try. I know I haven't even lived here two months but I think I may never want to leave. 

Let's try again, shall we?

Right...so, about this whole consistent, reliable thing. I've not done very well at it. That's going to change. My primary reason to give this blog thing a real try is because I, once upon a time, felt the benefits of writing regularly. I could think through my day on paper, spend a few calm minutes retracing my mental footsteps. That type of thing is really helpful as I tend to be the tiniest bit neurotic (and by tiniest bit you know, of course that I mean my defining characteristic). 

I invent problems. Seriously. If everything seems to be going swimmingly I start brainstorming about what could change and result in a calamity. It's sick. Boyfriend is a champ about it. He also happens to be the world's most easy-going person which makes him think I'm all the crazier. Here's an entirely too common situation:

Me: We're going to be late.

Boyfriend: It's a party, we're supposed to be a little late.

Me: But it takes like half an hour to get there.

Boyfriend: It's going to be fine.

Me: What if there's traffic? or it starts pouring? or baboons attack the car?

Boyfriend: Baboons?

Me: Maybe they're enraged chimpanzees, it's tough to tell as they're sliding across the hood of the car.

Boyfriend: *rolling his eyes and backing away* ...It's going to be fine.

Yeah. I'm a crazy person. You'll thank me though, when you're prepared for those baboons.