Happy B-Day to Me!

Greetings all,

I have absconded my wife's blog-sphere to bring you this series (of really long-winded and full of specially selected verbage) - special announcement.

Today is my Birthday.

As if you didn't know. Anyway, I've gotten all sorts of congratulations (and tribute!) for surviving another year. And what a year it was. A wedding, a new job, a bumper harvest of goodies from the garden, a Brand New Car!, a huge house, and of course - an awesome new woman (Insert obvious joke here).

Well, this year for my birthday, we decided to have a good day. Come on, who doesn't want a good day for their birthday? And what a day it was.

We were originally planning to make this a wonderful weekend. We had made plans to go to "Peaks of Otter" on the Blue Ridge Parkway and camp for the weekend. Unfortunately, we made our arrangements right in the middle of a tropical depression. But, our spirits were undaunted. We went out friday night right when the rain started. We found the place easy enough. The parkway was beautiful. We couldnt see very far ahead due to the clouds and fog, but it was still beautiful - and wet.

We got the tent set up, and dinner cooked, and the dining fly up, and had a blast the entire time. And yes, it was still raining. We were dry, and happy. Camping still is fun. But we called it a day saturday after lunch. The rain didn't look like it was letting up, and you can only do so much around a camp-fire in the rain. We walked around the campgrounds (yes, in the rain) to look around and see what was there. We found a few other good sites, and a family of deer (who apparently don't mind the rain). After that, we packed up and came home. And it was still raining when we left. But we kept to our meal plan anyway and had chicken and italian dressing HOBO's on the grill. They were tasty, but a little charred. Oh well. We re-set up our stuff in the garage to dry out and called it a night.

Sunday was a new day. We started out with a classic flapjack recipe on the huge griddle. Tasty start to a good day. Then, off to a new church.

Let me tell you about this church. It was the Central Church of the Bretheren (in Roanoke). I didn't know much about this church before I heard about it last weekend. But seeing is believing. This church seems to be the absolute perfect combination of Episcopalian and Mennonite. They were missing a central altar (true to M), and had an Acolyte Torchbearer (true to E). Thinking back, we probably should have kept score to see which this church was more like. But anyway. It was a really good service. The congregation is on the small side, but they were very friendly. At least a quarter of the members said 'Hi' to us - I only really remember two people's names. We were invited to join the handbell choir, the chancel choir, the pastor for lunch on wednesday, and to a spaghetti dinner. It was a dramatic change from a church we visited recently where two (TWO!) people reluctantly said 'Hi'. I don't know if this will become our home church or not, but it is certainly a contender. Sunday school was interesting. Full of people who wanted to know us (and wanted us to join hand-bells too). Very friendly. Lana got to show off her knowledge of the new testament - and I was very proud of her. She even made the teacher pause for a minute. He was even surprised at her thoughtful, intelligent, insightful, and otherwise astounding answer. I'll say it again: awesome woman.

Let's see. after church we came home - putted around for a bit - and then went shopping for dinner. Half of the items Lana picked up for my birthday feast were un-pronounceable: Co-co-nut? what are those? Pea-cans? And something that sounds really gross: Feta. Is that foot cheese or something? I don't know. it came in a tub and was kept cold. Anyway. For fun, I picked up some stuff to change the oil in my truck (or is it a car? I still don't know). We came home, and began.

Began what? you ask? Well, the FEAST. And no, the oil-change stuff isn't on the menu. Lana must have spent about three hours putting around the kitchen. I tried to help, but even with my years of experience with a knife and a wooden spoon, she was concocting something truly obscure. But, I'll attest that it was wonderful and utterly deserving of seconds. She called it Mannacoti, but i've never seen manacotti (how do you spell it, anyway?) with meat in it. I fully recommend this recipe gets a gold star, and a place of honor in our cookbook. We charge $4.00 plus postage for a copy of the recipe. Or you can try bribing my wife for it. We also prepared a greek salad. This I knew was tasty, but besides the lettuce, and the olives, and having had it once before, I still couldn't tell you what was in it - but it was yummy. We broke into a bottle of "Rioja" wine - although it wasn't the best I've ever had, it was pretty good. I'm told there is a very authentic "German Chocolate Cake" in the kitchen. Lana baked it from scratch this afternoon. I know it has a bar of german chocolate in it so it must be good.

We've watched a few episodes of Star Trek : The Original Series today - second season (Thanks Ma!) I've read four chapters in "Brisingr" (Thanks Lana!) and tried really hard to get the oil plug out of my Murano (Thanks Glen - nice grip!). All-in-all, this was a wonderful weekend.

Well, that's all from me for now. I probably should let Lana have her laptop back.

Bye for now!
-Matt

What Now?

Matt and I have now finished Star Trek The Original Series season 1. The local library does not have season 2 or any of the other Original Series....

Where do we go with this now?

Two New Additions

I was at class on Saturday from 9:00am to 4:00pm. When I got home I was welcomed to a few new additions. Matt had gone shopping. During the time I was gone, he had bought and planted two new blueberry bushes to join the one that was left for us by the previous owners of the house.I think that the blueberry bushes will be very happy beside our three grape vines from my sisters (Amy and Carol...thanks by the way!)


Between all of the fruit bushes, and fruit vines, and the plan to make our garden about four times what it was this year. Our yard next year will hopefully be very busy making food :)

Chess

Matt and I went to the Belmont yard sale in Harrisonburg one of the first weekends of September. It was rainy that day so there was not much to look at since not many families braved the rain. But we did manage to find a glass chess set that we willingly shelled out $5.00 for (it was brand new, the tape on the box had never even been removed).

Now, I know how all of the chess pieces move. But I have only played one or two games. And during those two games I lost so badly that I did not even know what was happening. So, when Matt decided one night this past week that we should play chess I proceeded hesitantly. He began by reviewing all of the movements of the pieces. Then we got into the game. We talked through the first few games with comments of "why did you do that?" "did you really mean to move that there?" etc. That really helped me understand the game.

By about the fourth game I was ruining some of his plans! (yes, I am happy about that) And the last game that we played I actually got him in checkmate!!!!! Yes, I got a bit of help from him, but I still had my very first checkmate of my life (maybe my only one...) so I am going to enjoy it.

I am learning that chess is a lot of fun if you have a good teacher and a fun person to play against.

The Vest

A while back in one of my blogs I mentioned that I was working on a vest for Matt. Here is the story. On our second date we went to a Renaissance Faire. At that event Matt found a vest that he loved that was a bunch of strips of material that were connected by lacing. So he asked if I could make him one. I had no pattern or real idea of what he wanted, but through many drawings and guessing I came up with this.
Which thank goodness is almost exactly what he wanted. We have already decided on some alterations that need to be made for the next version.
And it even looks good with a back view! Piece of trivia: There are about 300 metal eyelets, that had to be hammered in, holding it together.

I finished the vest at 12:00 midnight on Friday. Just in time to go to a Renaissance demonstration at 10:00 am Saturday. Where were were both able to show off our garb (yes I made my dress too!)

We met a few people at the demonstration that I think we will see more of. Matt met a few people that will help him get back into fencing (I might even try that sometime). And I met some contacts for dancing (which, yes, Matt will go to also).

However, if the pictures indicate anything...no matter what we do...we will be looking good!

A Day At Home

Today was a wonderful day at home. We managed to do a lot of chores around the house (and in between each chore we got to watch an episode of Star Trek :)
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I was able to repaint and polyurethane our headboard for our master bedroom. It is almost ready to be reinstalled. Matt wants to make it very high-tech and wire it for many uses. So it might be awhile before we use it.

We installed our knife magnet finally. They have been laying on the cabinet since we moved in. The above picture is of our nice, clean counter top and knife magnet. Yes, we had you in mind when we did this Amy. You will no longer have to fear putting your hands in our cabinet drawers.

We ordered a shed. We also almost finished wiring up our grape arbor.

Houses are so much work, but it is also so much fun!

Set The Night To Music

I just had to use that title since we had just seen Starship do that song in concert a few weeks ago.

But we did set the night to music, that was so that we could learn how to Foxtrot and Tango.

Yes, last night was the first of our ballroom dancing classes and we learned the very basics of Foxtrot and Tango. It was fun, but I think that we finally got into our groove and really started enjoying ourselves when we got into Tango.

There were a total of 5 couples in this class. There was not much talking between couples but there was a lot of bumping and "excuse me" going on since it was a fairly small place for dancing (well for 10 people dancing). The only down side that I can see to this is that we only have three more classes. I just have to remind myself to enjoy what I am doing while I am doing it and not dread the end.

Musicals with Hanna

I am one who loves musicals of almost all kinds. In fact the first CD I ever owned was Cats, the second was Phantom of the Opera. I have music from Chicago and Into the Woods on my running iPod. I love musicals (and I am happy to say that so does my husband :)

So needless to say, when I find a musical that I know of and have desired to see I try to get tickets. I lucked out recently when I was randomly looking on the internet I found out that Wolf Trap (a performance center near DC) was playing Les Miserables. I did not know much of this play other than it is one of Matt's favorites. So after discussing it a bit, we got tickets.




Fast forward a few weeks and Matt and I were driving on 81 and 66 with Tropical Storm Hanna pounding the car. We made it to Wolf Trap in good time and got drenched walking from the parking lot to our seat (even with an umbrella). The seats were wonderful, not so close that you could see the actors make-up, but close enough that we could see details on costumes and hear actors if their mic was not working at the time (thanks Hanna). The seats were also on the right side of the stage which was a great blessing. Let me explain: This arena has a stage, and a roof and partial walls on the right and the left side. During the show there was constant rain and mist drenching the left side of the audience.

The show its self was WONDERFUL! Even with the stage hands coming on to the stage with blue towels to wipe up the many puddles that were on the stage. It was beyond words. It caused shivers down my spine, and brought us to tears. If you have a chance I can only say...you should go.

I look forward to our next musical adventure, whatever it might be. I just hope that Hanna will decide not to attend this time.

Dance Class

Thursday was supposed to be our first Ballroom Dance class that we were going to have through the Roanoke Parks and Recreation Center. We were so excited about going. Matt and I both love to dance but have not had any real way of fitting or finding the dance scene in Roanoke (at least the kind of dance that we like...swing, contra, salsa...)

Matt came home from work at the usual time and we rushed around to get ready and be at class by 6:30. I had never been to this location so I did not know what to expect but I figured "I have googled the address and got a map, what could go wrong..." That should have been my first warning sign.

We got to the area that the google map said was the location of the dance class at 6:30 exactly. The location looked kind of like the standard set of any movie about a haunted mansion. It was a very old, very large building that needed a lot of care taken to it. But it had the right sign in the front so we decided to take a chance on it. We drove in the drive way only to find no other cars! We decided to keep going (now that I think of it, this is staring to sound like a script for a haunted mansion movie too). All of the doors were locked. We tried calling all of the numbers that we had that were in relation to Parks and Recreation but it was after hours and we got answering machines. I was starting to get very upset at this moment, mainly because I could not figure out what went wrong.

Finally I found an address for the headquarters for Parks and Recreation. We quickly drove there in hopes to find someone and some answers. We drove in the parking lot just as two people were about to leave. We caught both of them and found out that they were staff members who were at work late. We told them of our troubles and had to reassure them over and over that: Yes we were signed up for the class and Yes the class did start today.

They did some asking around and found out that the class was postponed till next week. And that I was supposed to have gotten a call (I didn't). But at least we did not miss anything. In addition we met a very nice lady Marion (she was one of the Parks and Recreation staff) who not only invited us out to a meal with her husband also invited us to visit her church. She was a blessing to meet while I was so frazzled because I could not figure out where we were supposed to be.

Can't wait for next week to actually be able to go to the class.

The Race

On Sunday Matt and I woke up at 5:30 am to get into our racing corrals by 6:30 am. One might ask why we are getting up and around so early on a holiday weekend? It is because we were going to run a half marathon. Which leads to the next question "Why would you want to run 13.1 miles?" Well all I can say is that it is fun.

I am not one that does local 5K races or anything like that. The only race I run each year is in fact this half marathon. Each year (for the past 4 years) I have gone to Virginia Beach on Labor Day weekend to run this race. It is a nice race. It is a flat course (it is at the beach...how much flatter can you get?), and this is called the rock and roll half marathon because there are bands at almost each mile playing for the racers.

Matt and I started out together, then quickly he got ahead. We met up twice during the race. I finished in 3 hours and 9 minutes (not too bad since my best time of all is 2:55). Matt finished somewhere around 3 hours and 30 minutes (very good for him since he did not get to run half as much as I did before the race).

Matt and I before the race.
We wanted to take an after shot, but were too tired!

Another of the joys of the weekend was that the race was not the only event that was happening at the beach. It was also the weekend for the American Music Festival. This meant that at any point in the evening there were about 6 concerts that you could attend. So on Friday we got to see Starship (or Jefferson Starship), Saturday we got to see Billy Idol, and Sunday we went to a swing concert.

We had a great time. It was a wonderful weekend.