YMCA Thief

I have been a member of the Y since we moved to Bis two years ago.  It is my first time using a fitness center that isn't specifically for students.  I love it because I love swimming laps in addition to using cardio machines and weights.  Since I don't usually have anywhere to go when I leave there in the morning I don't pay extra for the fancy locker room with free refreshments and stall showers.  When I swim, I just pick an empty locker (they are all empty) and leave everything in there.  I have never heard of anything getting stolen from there. 

Two weeks ago I got done swimming and when I left the shower I remember setting my swimming suit on the counter after I used the little spin cycle machine that spins out the water so it won't soak your bag.  When I got home I noticed that I didn't have it.  I called and asked if they had a lost and found and where I should check when I went there the next day. 

The next morning I went through the lost and found (which was nasty, by the way, and full of mens' socks and other nasty items.  They provided latex gloves for those digging for anything!).  The suit wasn't there and it wasn't in the locker room.  I checked again the next day without luck.  So, that means that someone stole my swimming suit! (Yes, I blame myself for leaving it behind, but who would want a used swimming suit?).  I guess excersise suits like that are expensive if you buy them at a store, but I have a secret.  My mom found a website called swim outlet (swimoutlet.com) where you can order them for much cheaper.  They have a grab bag option where you specify the brand and size and style and they send you whatever they have laying around in their discontinued and overstocked supply.  It only costs $15 and they can cost as much as $70 in a sporting goods store.  I have had two from there, both acceptable black with brightly colored, sporty streaks similar to what a swim team member would wear. 

I gave up the idea that I would see my old back an bright green suit again and asked my mom if she would order me a new one with her account (she orders my dad suits regularly).  She picked the grab bag and it arrived last week.  Guess what they chose for me, at random?

Hahaha!  It's Bison colors!  I was so excited.  They are usually  mostly black with a color accent but this one is green with gold trim!  Swim Outlet, you have a customer for life!

An the subject of athletics, my mom and dad are going to run a 1/2 marathon in Fargo Saturday morning if anyone wants something to do.  It will be my dad's 2nd one and my mom's first attempt.  It looks like it will be a very nice day as opposed to raining like it was when they ran back in May.  It should be fun (for me to watch and for them to run)!

Homecoming Part 2

 The Saturday of Homecoming was quite a whirlwind.  I don't have many pictures because I was busy talking to people all day.  I posed for a few big group shots but they were on other people's cameras so I will have to wait for them to show up on Facebook to see them. 

When I was younger, after I turned 21 and the first few years I was out of undergrad, my friends and I always had a goal to go to the bar at 8 a.m. before the parade and other festivities.  We made it I think maybe one or two years.  Last year I remember getting up at 6:30 am and waking up everyone at Andrea's house and jumping on their beds until they wanted to murder me and also calling and texting everyone who wasn't there repeatedly until they got up.  This year, we finally gave up on the idea and instead planned to be at campus around 9 or 9:15.  We made it!  This lovely shot is me waiting for my ride with all of my friends' mugs that they had left in my car the night before. 

I should mention that Justin was not here.  He left after the ribbon cutting on Friday for a long planned trip.  So, although it may seem like I am focusing this whole post on my own activities, I am not disregarding him.  He wasn't there. 

The traditional brunch at KD was pretty good.  The cook there always makes some kind of egg dish, which is welcome after a night of little sleep.  I have never ventured to the fraternities brunches, but I have heard that there are alot of stale donuts so I think I will stick with KD's brunch.  Haha.  I spent alot of time at that house, more than most alumni probably would after graduation, because my sister lived there and after she moved out her friends still lived there.  Also, some of my friends who still lived in Fargo after I moved to Grand Forks were involved as alum advisors so I would go there with them sometimes.  Well, it's official...I am old now and no one there has any idea who I am!  I used the dorm bathrooms and walked into rooms like I still lived there and none of the girls had any idea who I was.  Roommate and I were up there together (she is a member of house corporation) and she heard me talking and started yelling "Rooooomate" from one of the bathroom stalls and a current member was getting ready and looked at us like we were crazy.  Hahaha. 

The parade was typical, kind of long and boring but liveable.  I used to go to that parade as a child with my brother and sister and my cousins.  It was in the days when the football games were still played outdoors and I remember it always being cold.  I have a specific memory of my cousin Brenna at the parade in her snowsuit!  After we went to our parents' houses my dad and my uncle would dissapear (I believe they were probably having drinks at the Turf or something like that) and my mom and my aunt would take us kids to McDonalds.  We would get Happy Meals.  Remember when in October the Happy Meal toy was not a toy at all but a pumkin or ghost shaped bucket intended for trick or treating?  Oh yeah, we got that!  Then, we would go back to my aunt and uncle's house where their neighbor's teenage daughter was waiting to babysit us for the rest of the day.  Fun times. 

Tailgating came next.  It was short but fun and the weather was perfect.  There were people to see and talk to everywhere.  I think I only got one beer down because I didn't have time to drink!  Which is probably a good thing.  I went to the football game in my dad's place because he had to stay home and work on the farm.  And we lost.  The homecoming game is supposed to be an easy team!  Before the D-1 days, it would always be Moorhead or some team like that and we would win 80-0.  I guess those days of dominance are over...Hahah. 

After tailgating I walked with my cousin Katie and her husband Adam to the Turf and we jostled our way to the bar to order some delicious food.  My sister and our friends were already on the way to being in the bag and some had even moved on to the next bar already.  Wow, I was behind! 

I finally met up with my "old" friends and soon we were indulging in our new homecoming tradition (I guess to replace the old 8am drinking one!).  Since Chub's doesn't serve food, we have started having pizza delivered there.  Hahaha.  Let me tell you, it really hits the spot! 

Another fun weekend.  I love football season. 

Homecoming Part 1

The weekend of homecoming was alot of fun, just as I knew it would be.  On Friday afternoon, there was a special event.  As you may or may not know, Justin was a member of Alpha Gamma Rho, a national fraternity that traditionally emphasized agricultural interests.  It can be found at most land grant universities.  Justin's father, Dennis, was an AGR as well.  He died in 1991. The chapter at NDSU has just completed a big renovation of the chapter house and during the fundraising campaign Justin and his mom, other family members and Dennis's fraternity brothers donated to the project and now Dennis has a room in his name at the new house. 

On Friday afternoon, the new house was formally revealed at a ribbon cutting ceremony.  It was a perfect fall day that emphasized the spirit of homecoming.  It was cool but lovely outside, with leaves falling and the sun shining.  And the house looks so great!  I feel an attachment to AGR myself because my house was right across the street.  The members of our houses and the other greek houses lived our day to day lives together and while we were walking to classes, doing afternoon studying or night time socializing I became friends with alot of great people that remain my friends.  Roommate and I even lived in AGR for one summer to avoid dealing with leasing and paying bills for an apartment. 

Here is the text of the tribute to Dennis that was printed in the ribbon cutting program:   

 

This is Justin with Mary and Michelle outside the room in the new house.  It is on the third floor and outside the windows you see trees and campus.  It's very nice. 

One of the active members brought two gigantic pumpkins for the ribbon cutting and I couldn't resist posing!  I love pumpkins!  Also, I love how you can see my old home KD in the background!

Check back to hear about the rest of the weekend!

Homecoming approaches...

I don't really have anything to write about right now because I am distracted...I have a fun weekend ahead of me, filled with friends I don't see too often and definitely don't see all at the same time!  It's Homecoming week!  I loved this week during undergrad.  It is a beatiful, summer-like Thursday evening right now and if it were 2002, 2003, 2004, or 2005 (the years I was in undergrad) I would be unstoppable right now.  My friends and I would be amped and ready to have a blast!  If we were underage, money and a shopping list would be discreetly slipped to a 21+ person and if I were of age I would be helping my younger friends (usually my sister was the negotiator) get their night started.  There would be float building combined with dance parties, long dinners at the Turf, homecoming show tickets for sale, skit rehearsals for the homecoming show and other fun nonsense.  Something that was nowhere to be found was books or studying. 

By the way, although I was never nominated for the homecoming court like my younger cousin, I was in the show once, when I was a sophomore in college. Our skit was a little caper about stealing hamburgers or something.  It didn't make any sense.  We are supposed to be chicken McNuggets.  I don't know why we are wearing eye black like football players.  This photo makes me laugh every time I encounter it.  

OK, you know that when I get nostalgic I keep carring on and I guess I was wrong at the beginning of this post. I, of course, do have something to write.  It just doesn't pertain to our life, homeownership, or anything specific like that.  Oh well, whatever!  Check back early next week for a full recap of the weekend.  Well, the appropriate parts anyway.  

Shooting Range

Yesterday afternoon Justin called me and asked me if I wanted to go to a nearby shooting range that is located about 20 miles north of here so he could sight in his hunting rifle.  Although this sort of activity isn't usually something I enjoy, it was really nice out and the trees are turning lovely shades of gold and red so I thought it would be fun. 

Here is Justin getting down to business.  That green case is full of his "reloads" that I mentioned awhile back. 

This attractive shot is to show the earplugs that Justin so kindly bought for me before we left.  They look like headphones! 

This photo kind of gives me the creeps, but it also makes me laugh.  I don't look too uncomfortable, do I?  Well, I was.  I don't really like shooting.  I don't like the noise or the way guns kick back.  Oh well, it was an enjoyable evening.  We were the only ones there so there was no one to laugh at me. 

Speaking of the leaves changing, this whole city is so beautiful right now.  I want to take photos so badly but it makes me uncomfortable to be walking around snapping random pictures.  I'm afraid poeple will think I'm a creep or something.  I tried to take some pictures of the trees and houses across the street in a discreet fashion but the pictures didn't turn out.  I have never seen it like this because we moved here in late October after the leaves had fallen and last year there was some sort of wacky phenomenon where it got really cold really fast and then it got warm again and the still green trees dropped thier leaves before they could turn.  I remember posting about it because it happened to the tree in my front yard (which is still mostly green).  I am frustrated because I won't get to see how it looks when it changes.

I won't get to see how it looks because I am going to start working in Fargo again for a few months.  I start tomorrow.  I was supposed to start two weeks ago but there have been delays beyond my control.  I'm glad to be working again, but I am pretty despondent about not being home for the fun things that will arise in the next few months.  I won't be here to decorate my front step with pumpkins or for trick or treating or to decorate for Christmas.  And of course I will be very lonely for Allan and feel guilty about not being around him.  Last time I think he forgot me.  (Of course I will feel lonely for Justin also, but I will see him every weekend and he can actually communicate with me!)  But at least there will be fun things to look forward to in Fargo such as football games and tailgating and the fun and comaraderie that accompanies hunting.  And I will enjoy the sprawling flatness of Fargo.  People make fun of it but it feels familiar and welcoming to me.  I will also enjoy the shopping in Fargo.  While it can't compare to a major metro area it is about 85% better than the shopping here.  So, back to my sister's basement I go...sigh...

I Thought It Would Never End...

Does anyone know what this picture is?  It is construction workers gathering up orange cones.  Yes, the orange cones that have been all over the place on our street since the snow melted.  They are being hauled away! 

The street is open again!  It's such a pleasure not to have to weave around huge piles of dirt, parked machinery and huge pits cut out of the pavement.  I won't have to worry about getting ready to leave the house only to find a huge truck blocking my driveway.  And people besides construction workers get to see my nice flowers!  It actually isn't completely done...it needs to be resurfaced and painted but the gates are gone. 

Although I am happy, I forgot how loud this street is when it has traffic.  Kind of annoying.  It is an emergency route, but the ambulance and fire truck traffic hasn't resumed yet.  Although the noise is kind of a pain it is nice to live on an emergency route in the winter time because the snow is always cleared immediately.  But...I don't want to think about that yet.  The high forecast for today is in the 80's.  Keep in mind that it snowed about 10 days ago.  Crazy ND. 

Baby Quilt

OK, I will show you what I gave Roommate for her baby shower gift!  It was a quilt and I think it is very cute.  I like it so much I wanted to keep it but that would be selfish of me and what would I do with a miniature quilt? 

This was my first attempt at a quilt with blocks of any other shape besides squares.  The pattern is called "tumblers" because they are shaped like a tumbler/drinking glass.  I suppose you could call it "trapezoids" if you wanted.  You can make them short and wide or tall and skinny.  Mine were, if I remember correctly, 6 inches at the wide end and 4 inches at the narrow end.  I tacked my indimidation about using a rotary cutter and now realize how lame that was.  It is really not that hard. 

I chose the aqua and red combination because we don't know what gender the baby is.  It was challenging not to make it overly feminine because alot of fabric, regardless of the color, is floral.  There is one floral pattern in here but oh well.  Babies don't know what is going on anyway when it comes to what textile patterns are socially acceptable for their gender.  I mostly wanted to pick attractive fabrics.  I like the contrast of the two colors. 

This is a close up shot of the quilting.  I wish I could say that I quilted it with painstaking detail as I watched TV at night.  However, that is not the case.  My grandmother, Phyllis, has a machine with a long arm intended for quilting so I sent it to her in the mail and she probably quilted this whole thing in 30 minutes or less.  She's kind of a pro!

Baby Shower

Although I am 27 years old, very few of my friends have had babies.  Also, I am on the older end of my relatives so I don't have any older siblings or cousins who have had babies (I'm speaking of my side of the family...Justin's on the younger end of his relatives and his siblings are close to our age and have decided to start families and give up the selfish lifestyle Justin and I live, where we do whatever we want and Justin spends his money on hunting supplies and spends quiet nights watching hours upon hours of sports without interruption and I drive around in my car blasting obscene rap music so loud that I usually don't hear my phone if it rings and swill mass quantities of caffeinated beverages and beer).  Therefore, I haven't been to many baby showers compared to some other women my age and I haven't ever thrown one without a responsible "adult" taking care of the details.  (I hosted one for my sisters-in-law last spring but Justin's mom took care of most of the details involving the menu and preparation). 

Well, my friend Ashley, the person I often refer to on here as "Roommate" because she was my roommate for three years in college, is expecting a baby in November.  We love each other.  I was in her wedding in October of 2005 and she was in mine in 2007.  She is friends with my sister as well, and we have taken over her house for our wedding related needs several times over the years (she hosted the pre-party for my bachelorette party and we set up a makeshift hair salon in her kitchen the morning of Andrea's wedding) so we decided to have a small baby shower for her last night. (Well, we decided to have it last month but it took place last night). We chose a Thursday because no one had a free weekend and it worked out perfectly!  We had a "Bison Baby" theme because the baby's gender is going to be a surprise, for us and for the parents, so the probably would have lead us the the gender neutral colors of green and yellow anyway!  The food was similar to food one would eat while tailgating at a football game.  Andrea grilled kababs and we had some chips and various cream cheese based dips on the menu.  We kept the beverages non-alcoholic because almost 1/2 of the guests were pregnant and it was a week night anyway. So, unlike real tailgating there were no 32 oz. plastic mugs of beer. 

We played a game of my own invention called "Baby Names:  Real or Fake".  I made a sheet with a list of about 50 baby names, all absolutely ridiculous or overly trendy or spelled like the person giving the name might be illiterate.  Some the names came from hospital and newspaper birth announcements websites and some of them I made up.  It was a hit and very hilarious. 

There we are, the roommates!

Ashley/Roommate got alot of great gifts and everyone seemed to have fun so I guess it was a success!  I must admit, baby things are so cute.  I especially love the fuzzy little sleepers with feet and little cardboard books about baby animals. 

That gift is from me...I wrapped it in red, white and blue to make it patriotic because we have an inside joke about overtly patriotic things.  Not patriotism in general of course (that's good).  We used to make fun of cliched patriotic country songs that were rampant in the years after 9/11.  Mostly because the songs were musically bad and trying to exploit tragedy to make money.  Haha.  Yeah, I know, so funny.  I can imagine everyone thinking "Ummm OK, those songs were bad, but I guess I never thought about it that much."  Anyway, that box stood out in the pile of cute pastel boxes and bags, and not in a good way!  In that box was a quilt that i made!  I finished when I finished those other ones I showed awhile back but Roommate reads this sometimes so I didn't want her to see it before the shower.  I will showcase my work in a later post. 

Have a good weekend everyone!

Photo Edits

I was experimenting with my camera software tonight becasue the photos often look muted or blurry.  I have read the instructions and tried the settings and I can't seem to get the look I want.  Since most of my photos are of Allan, I edited some of him and now you get to see them!  Lucky you! 

This one is my favorite.  I moved the contrast setting up the the higher end of the scale and it looks much more vivid.  He sits on the back of the couch and stares out the window like this most of the time. 

I caught him with his tongue out!  Haha.

He is laying haphazardly on a bunch of crap I left on the floor in this shot...it looks like an issue of House Beautiful magazine (I always leave magazines on the floor and Justin hates it) and one of his toys.  Lazy cat.   

Big stretch after an exhausting afternoon of staring out the window. 

I didn't take this...Justin sent it to me as a picture message.  He likes to recline himself against the wall in certain areas of the house, expecially one certain spot in the kitchen and this spot in the basement.  He's so cute, if you like this sort of thing!  

Fall on the Way

Although, scientifically speaking, it is still summer, there is autumn in the air.  ( I just looked it up an the autumnal equinox is on September 23 this year, so we have three days left of Summer!)  It really doesn't feel like summer anymore.  Last Friday, a few slushy snowflakes fell overnight here in Bis.  I wasn't here to see it with my own eyes, so I don't have any pictures to horrify anyone who might be reading this in a Southern climate.  Today the temperature went back into the typical 60's, so winter is not quite imminent yet.  I believe it will probably get hot again because last year we moved into this house at the end of September and it was hot like July.  Of course it was, when I was climbing three flights of stairs all day, every day, for two weeks. 

Although I love summer and warm weather and sandals and all of that, I always enjoy the change of the seasons.  I even enjoy the first snow (the FIRST snow, the one that happens in November or December, not the feet and mountains of snow that fall into April around here).  The slight chill in the air is invigorating.  A few weeks ago I put on jeans for the first time since early June (when you are not working you can get buy with not putting on long pants for three months.  It is great.) and realized I missed them!  And they still fit, fortunately.  Although I love an excuse to buy new clothes, my penchant for expensive jeans would make replacing my collection cost prohibitive. 

An especially fun fall activity for both Justin and I is tailgating at Bison football games.  Saturday was the first home game of the season and it was a lovely, crisp day.  I recall that it was really hot on this same weekend last year and it was nice to be able to wear a cozy sweatshirt instead of shorts and a t-shirt!  For tailgating, warmer clothes just seem right!  Almost everyone I know was at or was invited to a wedding this weekend, so most of my usual drinking buddies (I am referring to my female friends who like to tailgate and then watch the game at the bar while our  husbands/boyfriends/other friends watch the game in the stadium) were not available.  It was still alot of fun, but I wasn't in a photographer-like mood so I will have to do a more extensive tailgating post later in the year.  Here are a few that I took...

That is our friends' baby daughter, Greta, at her first Bison game.  She liked to touch Justin's prickly face.

I watched an entire game in person for the first time in several years (I think the last one I watched was when the Bison played the Gophers in 2007).  It was pretty fun.  I'd do it again!  It would be nice if beer in moderation was sold in the dome though...