Snowing Again!

The snow has started again and we've bought the ugliest little pink coat for Hina to wear. After looking out the window for a while listening to Bing Crosby sing x-mas songs, we went out to the yard to see what Hina thought of the snowflakes. Mostly she seemed confused, but she did look pretty awesome in her coat. Pretty soon it was back to the warmth of the house. On another note, we've taught Hina to "shake" - see the video below! Tonight we're continuing the x-mas theme by going out to see the Nutcracker downtown. Should be fun!

Making Beer

This winter Jeff and I decided we should do something productive with all the time that we have to spend indoors, so we've decided to make beer. We've decided on a recipe with lots of hops in a pale ale style. Of course, we accidentally bought the wrong kind of malt and were too lazy to sanitize every piece of equipment, so it might not turn out EXACTLY how we hope. In any case, it's fun and the bucket of beer is currently fermenting away in our basement. Hoping to bottle it before everyone leaves for the holidays.

Thanksgiving

This was the first turkeyday where Nikki and I (but mostly Nikki) attempted to cook for other people. All in all, it was a great success with something like 14 different dishes (including desserts) and Nikki adding at least 7 of her own creations (sweet potatoes topped with carmelized walnuts and 'mellows, potatoes au gratin with gouda and manchego cheese, mexican stuffing with chorizo...). We had the actual meal at Jeff Glenn's house with his parents as well as my cousin Christian and his girlfriend Meredith. Jeff cooked the turkey and his mom made some great pie and cranberry sauce. We even made our own gravy after a quick call to my parents and Aunt Johanna to figure out how to do it (minus the giblets this time, but maybe in the future...). During our digestion period before dessert, we busted out the board games for a bit of trivial pursuit and scategories. Christian challenged everyone else to a game of trivial pursuit and almost won! Also, it happened to be Jeff's birthday, so we got to surprise him with a super chocolate cake!

Chris and Meredith were around for the weekend, so we saw what Boston has to offer - candlepin bowling, the USS Constitution, Bunker Hill, the Cheers bar, and of course, the Harpoon Brewery tour! We also fit in time to see crazy fans outside the Bruins hockey game and a car lighting on fire outside the museum of modern art! Check out the jumping skills below! I've posted more pics from the weekend at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/31445205@N02/sets/

Miami Sound Machine

Remember that Gloria Estefan song about La Conga? Well, now I know all the lyrics. A couple of weeks (months?) ago, the Fletcher school hosted "Fiesta Latina" to celebrate the song, dance, and food of Latin culture. Of course, me being the model Fletcher student, I was obligated to participate in the all-important "surprise performance" of the night, which involved dressing up and lip synching to Gloria's hit song. You gotta admit, the costumes are pretty rockin. The crowd seemed to appreciate the show! There's a video floating around somewhere I think...

Halloween?

OK, I know it's over a month since Halloween, but I think it's still worth putting a couple of pictures up. We were overall pretty lame and ended up staying home and passing out candy. However, Hina had an AWESOME bee costume and tried to eat the trick or treaters. We carved a couple pumpkins, including one dedicated to the puppy and one to the president-elect! Note that we all pretty much passed out at the end of the night...

Fall Activties

Nikki, Hina, and I have been taking full advantage of the fall season out here. We started things off with a little apple picking with our friends Jeff and Lisa. We're still finishing apples from that adventure! Leaf-peeping is all the rage (though winding down now) and there's a nice open space preserve with good foliage not too far from our place where we've been taking Hina for longer hikes. When my buddy Chris was out here, we took her out for maybe a 5 mile hike (she had energy to spare!) and last weekend Nikki and I took her out again. Chris and I also did a bit of historical peeping along the minuteman trail near Concord. Last weekend, we took a longer drive out to the Berkshires in western mass for what might be one of our last nice weekends. We went all the way to the northwest corner of the state to check out natural bridge state preserve and pay homage to Williams - the alma mater of Nikki's dad. The football team was just finishing up a win for their last game, which we celebrated with a purple cow cookie. Winter is fast approaching and we're gearing up now for our favorite winter activities!

Seattle

Hi all. So, time for an update on what we've been up to over the last few months. Finally had a chance to download a few pictures and recap a few adventures. First up is the trip that we took to Seattle in August for the wedding of Nikki's cousin, Summer. The wedding itself was a ton of fun (some might argue that I was bordering on too much fun...) and we got to hang out a bit with Summer before and after. We flew out a couple of days early to see the sights - Victoria, the Olympics, and a bit of Seattle proper. In Victoria (which is on Vancouver Island in Canada), we went whale watching for Willy, rode a scooter around town, did a bit of kayaking, and visited the awesomely cheesy miniature world and bug zoo. With Nikki's parents, we hiked up on Hurricane Ridge in the Olympic range - too foggy for a view, but we did see a tasty looking blue grouse (or something like that) to add to Chuck's list. Fun as always to see Nikki's family!!