A couple weeks ago, John and I went to Indiana to see Kurt and Jenny get married. It was a great trip. Look how beautiful Jenny looks!



We got to hang out with a lot of friends we hadn't seen in a long time. Let's see - Tim and Steph L, Andy, John H, Wayne and Dianna, Dave and Nancy, Ryan and Christy (who are moving to Phoenix soon), Jason K and his wife (I'd never met her before but she's really cool!). Oh and Tim's mom, who is just so nice. I even saw a former English professor of mine at a restaurant. I had worked as her secretary my last two years of college. Plus, I saw Teri at the airport in Chicago before our flight home! That was really cool. The weather was absolutely amazing. I wore a light sweatshirt in the morning and evening. And there was so much open green land and water. You need to see that every now and then.

John H. is now using the old Blue Lion for an art gallery and want it to be a place where people hang out. So we hung out there for a while. We also hung out at Spike's and at Maria's (a homestyle cooking restaurant with ridiculously large breakfast plates). Fond memories.

Plus, my parents drove out for the weekend to see me! My mom's brother and his wife live in the town, so my parents and John and I stayed at their house. John's mom and stepdad also drove up for an afternoon. I really liked getting up and eating breakfast with my parents and just relaxing with them.

For a couple days, I really did want to move back to Indiana. But a lot of people have moved on since we lived there. I wish we could have everyone in one spot again, but you just can't go back.

I read half of The Alchemist on the plane. It's a really charming book. I haven't gone back to finish it yet, but I will.

We put pictures of the trip in our Photobucket album. Here are John and me with my parents:

John beat me to it, but here is our house.



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(my mom and dad, me, and John in Mexico)

A little over a week ago, my mom, dad, brother, and grandma came to visit us. None of them had been to Arizona before, and this was my grandma’s very first plane trip! We packed a lot into 6 days: Flagstaff, the Grand Canyon, my soccer tournament, and Mexico.

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This is the view outside our apartment in the morning when the sun is rising. It looked a lot prettier in real life. I like the palm trees in our apartment complex. It looks tropical. I can almost imagine that on the other side of the complex there is a Florida beach and the ocean stretching out behind it. Really, there are mountains and sand. And cacti.

Today at work, my team made "gingerbread" houses (actually, we used graham crackers).

Our three-year anniversary was on Wednesday, so we went on an anniversary date last night. Dinner and shooting. Isn't that romantic?



At the shooting range we shot the 22 I'm holding and also John's Rossi 38 Special revolver (a knock-off of Lenny Briscoe's gun from Law & Order). 



We had dinner at possibly the greatest restaurant ever, Carrabba's Italian Grill. It was probably the most amazing meal I've had all year. Our very attentive and friendly waiter, Marcos, even surprised us with a free dessert for our anniversary - two big scoops of vanilla ice cream covered in caramel and glazed pecans. He also took several pictures for us. Once, while taking a picture, he said, "Here's to three more years!" Really, I think that exclamation works better when the couple has been married for 30 years. As we left the restaurant, we felt we would burst from all the great food.



 Then we stopped at a sports store so John could look at a red-dot scope to put on a rifle, and I bought this hat.

We decided that we're the happiest couple ever.

In response to Kurt's latest post:



Oh, fond memories of hanging out with friends in Kurt's apartment.

I cut my hair.

Last month, Tim and Steph L. visited and we hiked with them and Josh.
These are all from Tucson except the last one, which is from Sedona.









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