Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Happy Birthday Cynde!

Happy birthday to my mother-in-law! One of the kindest and most giving women I know. I'm so lucky to have acquired such great in-laws :)

Here are some recent pictures of the birthday girl.









We love you - hope you had a great day!

xo

Monday, October 11, 2010

I love weddings!

I just attended my final wedding of 2010...so sad. Matt stayed home with Willow. Too many days off work too close to coming home from Jackson for him! Good thing I don't work too hard - it might mess up my social calendar :)

Weddings are such a great excuse to see friends and family that you many never otherwise have the the time to visit! I spent this weekend back in North Carolina to attend the wedding of my childhood friend Grace. It was like stepping back in time leaving Vermont...almost 80 degrees down there and no signs of fall yet! I had already packed my shorts away - oops.

Grace and I also lived together out in Jackson so I was really glad to be part of her wedding weekend!





I flew in on Friday in time to attend all the wedding events....2 nights to catch up with everyone - how lucky!



Do you recognize my dress? It's the third time I've worn it this wedding season - I tried to camouflage it with new accessories...



I had lots of time with the bride...



And other Jackson friends :)



My parents also attended the wedding so it was fun to have one more weekend with them since they are done with visiting Vermont for the year.....My mom and I went to the wedding day brunch while my dad played golf :)



I had some time to go over and see Grace as she was getting ready for the big day!





She opened her Vermont crafted wedding gift - I had to give it to her quickly so I wouldn't take it back home to use at my house!



We're still close to our old next-door neighbors and stayed at their house this weekend :)





In Grace's dad's speech at the rehearsal dinner he talked about how scared he was that Grace might want to have a destination wedding in Jackson and how much easier it was for him that she got married in North Carolina! To make her feel like she was in the Tetons, he painted this huge mural as a surprise for her and hung it up at the reception.



She also incorporated a little Jackson in her arrangements.



At the reception there was more time to catch up with the bride...



Fellow blogging friends :)



And many more!





I missed the cake cutting (sorry Grace!) but still managed to eat some of it :) Yum!



The band was great and inspired lots of dancing!



There was something about the tambourine....everyone wanted a turn.







I'm posting a parting pic of the groom - just to prove I hung out with him too even though most of my attention was focused on the bride :)



G & V - it was so much fun! Hope you have an amazing honeymoon in Hawaii!

xoxo

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

Hello Fall!

Fall has arrived! We turned on our heat this week for the first time since April and I switched my closet from warm-weather clothes to cold-weather ones. 2 seasonal milestones for me. I thought I would be sad to see summer end, but so far we're loving Vermont in the fall just as much! I have lots of fall pics to post but I'm going to start by filling you in on our weekend fun...

Saturday we participated in a charity event called "Mission: Possible" to raise money and awareness for the United Way of Chittenden County. We had no idea what to expect, but ended up in a competition with 4 other teams riding all over Burlington by bike to participate in different challenges. We were so busy trying to win that I didn't have the chance to take many pictures. Here are the few I did get.

We started at the waterfront on an absolutely beautiful day!





The first challenge was to design your own T-shirt. Neither of us are artistic so we got off to a bad start. Would you pick either of these as a winning design?





Some other challenges included carrying 10 pizza boxes to the nearest Leonardos and folding them all, interviewing local non-profits, creating a tin foil sculpture (we made a skier and he won a prize!), hula hoops, and many more!

Matt participated in an optional event pictured below. BRRR! I think it was in the 60s that day and a little windy :)





His challenge was to paddle out and around a boat - here is another pic to show how far that was....



At the end of the day, prizes were given for all sorts of things (biggest fundraising, best T-shirt, etc). We won 2 prizes! The first was for our tin foil sculpture...a cookbook from a local VT magazine called EatingWell. I've already made a recipe out of it that I'll share at some point because it was delicious! We also won the overall best time of competition (YES) and the prize was 2 Burton jackets. They're awesome. Pictures to come :)

Sunday we drove to Waterbury to run in the Leaf Peepers 5k race with Jess! We had the option to do the half marathon but opted out...maybe next year.





It was a great course for a 5k. I think I'm going to like running races in Vermont...this one had a little bit of downhill, lots of time on a dirt road, and finished up on a path through a cornfield.



I'll be back with more fall soon! Here's a sneak peek at the foliage to tide you over :)

Monday, October 4, 2010

John and Nicole!

A few weekends ago my brother John and his girlfriend Nicole came to visit! They both work so hard...this was their first opportunity to come up all year! We had lots of fun and I was again terrible about taking pictures so a few of these I copied from Nicole on facebook - thanks Nicole :)

Saturday was a beautiful day so we headed over to Shelburne Farms for their annual Harvest Festival.





We had the chance to eat some delicious food...





As well as see tons of really cool animals...







My favorite were these oxen. They are show oxen, not working ones. They were beautiful!



It's hard to tell how massive they really are. We received quite the education on them. Do you know how an ox is bred? I didn't. I'll share what we learned from the trainers. An ox can start as any breed of male cow (bull) or cattle. These pictured were born right on Shelburne Farms property. Anyway, when a bull is castrated it becomes what's known as a steer. What turns a steer into an ox is its ability to be trained and follow commands. They are amazing...they really do listen to commands - very impressive!



No visit is complete without a trip up Mt. Philo - Nicole was up for it!



Other than that fun, we also spent a lot of time relaxing at the lake looking at this view - it never gets old.



Look how cute they are!



It was a quick trip but so much fun! Come back soon...we miss you already!

xoxo

OH YEA - I'm still counting. If I include both Jackson and John's trip then the score is:

Travelers - 8
Airlines - 1

I have to add...my dad also just flew up and was 3 hours delayed. I'm not sure where to put that point so it's still up in the air.