Well… I thought this was a picture of Pinot slobbering nick in bed tonight, but I guess I missed the reunion moment. 
Nice to have the kids back in tow:)
Aw, so cute. I think the girls want a screen door of their own.
Thank you so much to my mom for watching the ladies while we’re on our trip! Rainy trip to the ROC today, but nothing some chocolate almond ice cream from don & bobs and a husker victory couldn’t fix! I love fall weekends when we are all decked out in game day red:)
There is nothing better at 1 AM than a plate from Mark’s!
A beautiful day for a gorgeous wedding- and I’m really excited to hang with all my neices and nephews at the reception!
…. I will start being better about updating the blog with things that are happening once again. In a timely fashion, rather than months after the fact.
With that said, I may as well do a quick catch-up post to bring us up to date. So let’s see – since the last time that this was posted – wow. I just realized I didn’t even do an inauguration post.
January was cool for us, living in DC, and being pumped about Obama. C&J were very nice to host us at their pad on Pennsylvania Avenue, prime viewing location for just about everything, but especially the parade. Obama and Biden got out right in front of us and waved right at us, which was the cool – and after that, we (along with Mehul, Liz & Julie) threw our very own Presidential Inaugural Ball. It was the awesome. (And three of us were in the exact same dress – thank you to Melanie for letting me borrow her bridesmaid dress from our wedding!) A slideshow of that is below.
February, already posted about Miami. Otherwise we were playing volleyball and getting through the cold. March came, and my mom came down to visit – we took her out for her first sushi experience and I now have a favorite roll, though I don’t remember what it’s called (blasted chef’s special). We went to Colorado for the annual Pender gathering at the end of Feb/early March, but it was cool because in addition to Nick’s usual group of high school folks, we also got to hang out with Seth and Dave & Rach. Oddly enough, our flight back was delayed by 1.5 days due to a snowstorm on the east coast (Denver was like 70 degrees that day). We got a free flight out of the deal though so we were pretty excited (and honestly, I would have worked from home that day anyway, hate driving in DC when it’s snowing.) Highlights from the Colorado trip are below.
End of March/early April, thus far, has been very eventful, and I think Nick and I are both looking forward to some ‘down’ time, if that ever really exists – especially with the summer coming. Cooking wise, made a really good chocolate cheesecake on a pistachio crust covered in chocolate ganache, went all Polish with pierogui && glumpkies, and a bit Irish with corned beef & cabbage and Irish bread & cheese. YUM. Nick’s grandpa Rutar recently became very sick, and Nick, Pinot & I made the drive from DC to Nebraska for a last visit with him. I’d been bugging Nick to drive to Nebraska for a long time, and though I wish it had been under better circumstances, I admit that I did enjoy driving out. Pinot sort of stressed us out though – we think she was abused by younger children before we got her (rescue dog thing, so we don’t really know), but Derrek, Dalton & Dannika were her first real exposure to kids and that went….well, not as well as we’d hoped. We’ll have more time to practice when Derrek comes out to visit in May though! Anyhow, we drove back from NE (with a big old print from Hobby Lobby – aka best store ever – and a mini Heineken kegerator in tow) just in time for the Cherry Blossom Festival. We checked that out – and the naval observatory open house, booked tickets for Derrek and Louie to come visit for Memorial Day, and then found out out that Nick’s grandpa had passed – he made it to 92 and said that was enough, so earlier this week Nick flew back for the funeral. We’re in Rochester this weekend to discuss some family matters with my mom and siblings. Busy week, to say the least. We’ve also been to a Caps hockey game and the Cavs/Wizards game recently which were both fun. OH – and my big computer thing – we upgraded to iLife 09, and I recently went though and tagged faces and places of all 21,234 pictures in our album. Been keeping up with the family tree site too. Anyhow – a few pictures of recent stuff is below.
So yeah! If I keep this up, then lots of fun stuff coming up ahead – Easter brunch tomorrow, possible iPhones in our near future, Pinot’s 2nd birthday coming up, heading to Vermont to see K’s derby dames finale this season and possibly a last minute trip for my birthday – and fun fun, Louie & Derrek’s trip out for Memorial day – and that only takes us through May. 
It’s been awhile. So the quick rundown on what we’ve been up to since the last time we updated this is going to be a bit long…
Nick headed down to Austin for the Supercomputing conference towards the end of last month. I’m told that Austin is as weird as it’s been kept, and that it would be a cool place to live.
While Nick was down in TX, I was finishing up the last parts of the home improvment fall project – mainly repainting our bedroom and getting the backsplash up in the kitchen.
We headed back to Rochester for Thanksgiving (that was an earlier post), and then came back to MD with a full week including my company holiday party and our annual holiday party back to back. All of the holiday baking was put to work in the form of take out boxes for everyone to take home.
We splurged a bit on a pre-Christmas present to ourselves – a nice Nikon digital camera and an extra zoom lens. We headed down into the DC on a lovely brisk Winter day to play tourist with the new camera.
December was flying by, and (amazingly) I was able to hold out until we had ‘our’ Maryland Christmas to give out presents to Nick, Cashew or Pinot. Good times were had by all, Christmas at home. 
Right after that, December 19th rolled around and – just in time for the biggest snow storm of the year to hit the east coast – it was time for us to drive to Rochester. (Nick was amazing through non-stellar driving conditions the entire route.) We picked up a real tree and decorated it with my mom, and had a lot of fun watching Pinot romp around in (her first?) big snow experience. Cashew wasn’t so happy to be away from home, but we had a wonderful few relaxing days with my mom in the ROC. 
The turntable that we got for my mom was the awesome (loved listening to some old 45s), a few classic holiday flicks, and my mom did a great job of shopping this year (too much!)
After a few relaxing days in ROC, we drove to Buffalo to fly out to Nebraska. A bit of snow on the way there, we thought we were going to have to shovel ourselves out on the way back. The Christmas trip to NE was great as always, with the fun amplified by 2 youngun’s under 2 years old, and everyone’s willingness to let me play with all of the new camera settings. 
And alas – after heading back to Buffalo (60 degree weather no less), driving back to Rochester, sleeping a bit, having lunch with my mom and then driving back to MD, we’re back home, momentarily at least. Excited to see my neice Vanessa tonight (who is down visiting Melanie for the new year). And soon…. very very soon… our new year trip awaits
It twas a very busy week! We started off on Monday the 24th by a small make-your-own-pizza dinner 
when Colby & Josey dropped off CJ. We were dog-sitting Mon night – Weds AM. Once Julie picked CJ up on Weds, we headed out the door to drive up to Rochester 
for the long weekend. It took about an hour longer than normal, but otherwise no complaints. Got in to the ROC and unpacked by 9PM, just in time to meet Mandy out at the Distillery for her 21st birthday. What better way to end the night than garbage plates. 
Thursday was Thanksgiving proper – I got up and made stuffing and candied sweet potatoes to bring to Debbie’s house – Debbie and Bob had prepared all of the makings of a full dinner (which we were able to have firsts, seconds, and
sometimes thirds of). Yum.. turkey induced coma on Thursday night, just in time to wake up early for some black friday shopping in the morning. We got some Buffalo Wild Wings for lunch (my first time), and headed home to watch the Nebraska game. I will admit that I slept through the first half (turkey + early waking+ battling stores = sleepiness), but I woke up during half time, 
and didn’t miss the 57 yard field goal and interception-TD to win the game over CO! (Insert victory dance here.) Good stuff. We had dinner with my mom, and headed out to meet up with Melanie, Javed & Borch @ Oxfords. Somehow, we ended up with garbage plates on Fri night too! Saturday we tried to track down Vanessa at Wegmans, but we couldn’t find her…. got some Bill Gray’s (worlds best cheeseburgers!) and then got ready for my 10 year HS reunion. Meet up with the ladies & Paul at Johnny’s Irish Pub for a quick hour of pre-game and then headed over to the Daisy Flour Mill for the reunion proper. It was not as awkward as I’d imagined, so that was good 
Sunday it was time to head back to DC, which ended up being a much longer trip than anticipated due to blowing out a tire about an hour south of Williamsport, but we were able to change the tire and get back on the road without losing too much time. Minges & Javed were nice enough to follow us back (going at donut speeds no less), and the tire was still covered under warra
nty so it was not an expensive fix yesterday.
Phew. So I hear it’s December now, or something!
We headed up to Rochester last weekend to celebrate my sister’s 21+ birthday. 
I only had to work for about 3 hours on Friday morning, and we were able to get on the road by 10AM, with Pinot & Melanie in tow. The ride up was great fun – wegmans subs and grape pies and driving by the ski slopes of bristol mountain. We were able to get some QT in with Debbie on Friday 
(and Pinot with Snowball) before heading home to watch the debate – after stopping for a Wegmans run of course. My mom got home right at the tail end of the debate. A nice low key night. Saturday we ran a couple of errands before heading over to Debbie’s birthday party. I made punch, and Melanie & Matt did a great job with all of the cooking. 
The party was fun – and after the 
majority of folks left, we got to take turn driving my sisters 1964 Mercury Park Lane in Bittersweet pink, which was the awesome. 
While Pinot went home with Nana, Nick and I headed out to Champps sports bar in Eastview mall to watch the VA Tech/Nebraska game, which was frustrating and exhilerating to watch, all at once. Got stopped at a sobriety checkpoint on the way home, which was funny b/c Nick was driving, and he didn’t remember the name of the mall we went to watch the game, or the name of the sports bar/restaurant. Got home just fine (go 
ahead sir!) and headed to bed before the drive home today. Actually, today started out cute with my mom saying “stay in bed as long as possible, it’s miserable out” – very drizzly – but then she wore her nebraska shirt under her suit to work which was adorable. We got out of the ROC fairly early – well, early enough to make it to Catocin Mountain Orchard Farm 
Market about 45 min from our house in MD, so we were able to pick up a few jars of Nick’s favorite peanut butter AND some concord grapes. And other assorted produce, I love farmers markets. Cashew is glad to have us home 
