The Weekend, Late

I meant to post on Monday, but Josh was off of work for the last two nights, which is devastatingly distracting to me, because he is rarely home when I get off work. I get sucked into his pjs/lounging/watching Netflix habits and then I don't get anything done! I don't mind though, because it is so rare he is home after I get off work - I have to say, it is really nice to come home to someone instead of an empty house! I can't wait until the day it's like that all the time.

So, the weekend went by ridiculously fast (I can't say the same for this week that is dragging by!) because my parents were here and we did lots of activities with them!

Friday night - Josh worked, I cleaned the whole townhouse and went to bed early. Could not be any more boring. I had to get my sleep though, because on Saturday morning....

I did the color run!

I'm going to write a little more about that later, but it was a blast, and it felt good to have 3 miles under my belt by 9:45 on a Saturday!

Then, my parents and two little sisters got here around lunchtime. They wanted to go downtown to the museums Saturday afternoon, so we did that. It was cold and windy on Saturday - wayyy different from the 80 degree days we had the week before - so it was good to be inside. Emma likes the Natural Science Museum and Jenny likes the History Museum and Josh likes everything, so they were pretty happy. I didn't take any pictures in the museums except for this one:

Haha!

After the museums we ran by Trader Joe's to stock up on some snacks - they don't have one yet in Asheville, and Trader Joe's is pretty much the best place to get delicious, cheap, unique treats ever.

On Saturday night we had Lilly's Pizza - definitely the best pizza in Raleigh! Again, no pictures because we dug in too fast for all that. Josh and I played Scrabble with the girls and my Dad - it is very interesting to play Scrabble with a ten year old!

Sunday we went to the State Farmer's Market to check out the pumpkins!

Of course in addition to pumpkins we also got tomatoes, tons of apple samples, orangeades, sweet potato pie and pumpkin ice cream - lots of fall treats.

I wasn't going to make my family walk around campus on a cold Sunday but Josh needed to go to the library for some printing so I figured I would give them a little mini tour around State. I mean, I spent two years there as a student in grad school and I've worked there for two years next month, so it really is about time they see where I spend a good part of my life!

Dad in one Wolf Ear....

and Emma in the other

Getting a kick out of the library furniture while Josh prints

interactive tables

Mom's favorite room

Mom and me out on the balcony looking over the brickyard

Jenny, just hanging out

Me and my babe in the Farmer's Market

It was a nice, fun busy weekend! As I'm typing this, I'm hanging out at the house on Halloween. It is 7:14 pm and we have had NO trick or treaters! Maybe it's too early? There are definitely families with young kids in this complex. Maybe they went to a ritzier neighborhood for more (better) candy? Hmm, we'll see!

The weekend

This weekend started off not so great - I got rear ended on Friday afternoon. It wasn't too bad - some girl hit me with her Jeep Wrangler, which was no match for my little Civic. Her car was totally fine, but she had never been in a wreck before and was super upset so I tried to be nice to her.

Friday night we finally went out to Cafe Luna to celebrate our anniversary - their food is SO good! After dinner we went to Fox's (our FAVORITE bar) and then to Foundation, which is another liquor bar that we had never been to.

Some kind of rosemary applejack thing and a whiskey sour with egg white

Friday night after we got home we went next door to our neighbor's house. They were having people over and are apparently pretty serious beer brewers, which we appreciate!

Saturday and Sunday were pretty lazy days, which was really nice.

All morning, both mornings

Tiajuana Flats for the first time - so good!

Trader Joe's trip

Good hair day with no where to go

Cinnamon sugar apples to go into oatmeal

apple/brown sugar oatmeal bake

Enjoying a clear sunny Sunday outside

Random Mid Week Things

This week has felt like a million years long already. We watched the presidential debate last night and it was pretty much what I expected. I'm ready for this election to be over! I spend way too much time and energy thinking about it and making myself upset.

On another, much more random note, J and I discovered that the Broken Bells radio station on Pandora is the BEST. It has become my favorite station and I am not even a big Broken Bells fan. I can't think of an occasion when this station should NOT be on.

http://www.pandora.com/broken-bells

Also, this is the best note I've ever seen left on a car that is parked somewhere it shouldn't be:

Two years

Yesterday J and I celebrated two years together. It feels like it's been 5 minutes and it also feels like it's been 10 years. The time we've been together has been so happy and filled with amazing fun new experiences that it has flown by, but I also feel so comfortable and happy with him and our life together that I can't remember what it feels like to not have him in my life.

Mondays are tricky for us (just like every weekday!) because I get up early and go to work while he is asleep and he has a super long day class, then heads back to campus right when I get off work for his night class. He usually gets home around 8, which is nice, because when he is working it is much later than that. Because we weren't going to be seeing each other during the day, I decided to pick out 12 small gifts and wrap them individually so he could open one each hour.

I labeled them all at 2 minutes past the hour for the 2 years we've spent together, and timed them to coincide with his day. So, for 10:02 am, when I knew he was getting ready for class, I gave him a new shirt. Then, at 4 pm when I knew he would need a little pick me up, I gave him his favorite black cherry soda. He got to open other little stuff throughout the day like m&ms, legos, golfish, etc. At 8 pm when he got home, I gave him a new pair of gym shorts and at 9 pm I gave him his very favorite specialty beer. He really liked having something to look forward to every hour, and it made a long, boring, standard, not-seeing-each-other day much better. 

I think my favorite was the gangam style shirt I got him (found on Etsy, of course!)

After he got home, we made tacos, drank champagne and sat around in our pjs. Perfect way to end the long day!

Champagne, J's sweet card for me, guacamole in the making

:)

The Weekend

Every week, I put my head down and get through five days of work just so I can get to my sweet, amazing weekends. I started this weekend with vague plans of sleeping in, enjoying the cooler weather, and being lazy all afternoon with Josh.

On Friday, we made lemon chicken for dinner, one of our go-to easy meals. I've discovered the perfect lemon sauce recipe is:

3/4 c. sugar
1 c. water
1 T cornstarch
The zest and juice of two lemons

I just simmer it all in a pot until it reduces enough to be a glaze/sauce for chicken and brown rice. I would have taken a picture but we devoured it before I could.

Our good friends came over on Friday night for cards and wine - two of my favorite weekend activities! I don't think we will ever get tired of card games. We ended up at the bar down the street for late night snacks and Ewa taught us about polish rappers :)

On Saturday I wanted to go outside and downtown somewhere, so I checked my usual events sources and found the Cooke Street Carnival in a little neighborhood right outside downtown Raleigh. We saw the food trucks as soon as we pulled up and knew we were in the right place!

Band from the back, my view, and Josh enjoying his first vegan lunch

There were a bunch of local artists and vendors, food trucks, local breweries, dogs and live music. We people watched for most of the time then walked around and did some (window) shopping.

NC necklaces, duct tape wallets, a sleepy weiner dog

We headed to a friend's house in Durham for a pumpkin carving party on Saturday night. We don't have any Halloween plans this year, which I'm okay with. I don't really feel like going out to a bar and fighting crowds, and I don't have any great costume ideas, so I was pretty excited to do something Halloween-y!

Shannan's halloween themed treat table, Josh getting serious about carving

 Today is our 2 year anniversary and we both have work/school all day, so last night I surprised him with a quick trip to a really good little local pizza place for a quiet Sunday night dinner. We had big plans to go to our favorite Italian restaurant downtown, but my friend's younger brother got married and rented out the whole place for his reception! Wow, what a ridiculously delicious place to have a wedding reception! 

Some lady asked if it was our first date (because Josh was being a little Instagrammer and taking pictures of the food!) and if we wanted her to take a picture of us. We took her up on the picture offer, but told her we have probably had over 700 meals together in the last two years! It was the perfect way to end the weekend.