before heading back to texas for christmas, matt and i were invited to a christmas party by our friends tim & erin which was hosted by kevin & lindsey (for those keeping track, kevin's brother ryan was the one who got me my job at MCE). the party was so much fun with lots of food, drinks and a white elephant gift exchange. some of the most coveted items at the exchange? a 1980's playboy, a leopard print snuggie, and a gift that included mittens, a trucker hat, beer coozies and beer mugs... matt and i ended up with a hot cocoa gift set and a bottle of everclear...yes, everclear! after the gift exchange the group headed out to buca di buppo for a very tasty italian dinner and *lots* of drinks. i don't mean to say that everyone got drunk, but rather, that for the 16 people in attendance (4 of whom weren't drinking due to pregnancy or a detox diet!) there were 8 pitchers of beer ordered. yes, EIGHT! needless to say, despite the guys' best efforts, some of the beer had to be left behind. after dinner a small group of us headed back to the house for some board games before calling it a night. the bonus for the night? i got to see my first *real* snowfall with substantial accumulation! it was *so* pretty driving home!
our cute little girl has been pretty good since the move to ohio. matt and i were both very concerned about her initially, but she seems to be adjusting to colder weather and apartment life quite nicely. we did have an unfortunate incident involving the tree skirt and one of my new scrub tops, may they rest in peace. matt and i attribute this to her feeling lonely in her new surroundings and these being things that she wasn't used to having out, so they *must* have been new toys for her, naturally (her thinking, not mine). but other than that, she has been quite understanding of our new home, new schedules and lack of backyard. in previous posts i've mentioned that we've been taking lexi with us to heather's house and tim & erin's house to play with other dogs, but this week lexi got a *real* treat. our friends tim and erin thought it would be a good idea to take our dogs to the dog park here by our new home, and i think lexi forgot about her old backyard! lexi ran and played to her heart's content! by the time the sun was going down she hardly had enough energy left to run to the car...yay! not to mention, she got to play with her doggie friends, emma & charlie, and a host of other new and exciting smelling dogs! after the dog park we dropped the pups off at our apartment and the bipeds headed to panera for a yummy dinner. thanks to the bates family for a fun day!
the doggie park! tim, erin, charlie, emma and matt
emma fights with her muzzle
don't be fooled, she wasn't trying to go thru that, there was water in the bottom of it!
on wednesday, december 9th my wonderful sister-in-law heather treated me, her son miah and his friend justin to a concert in downtown columbus featuring bowling for soup, shinedown and a local band sighlo. now, if you don't already know, i am a *huge* bowling for soup fan, and one of their songs is actually the reason i met my amazing husband! matt and i also really like shinedown, so the concert was wonderful! oh, and the local band sighlo...they were pretty good, too! before the concert we enjoyed dinner together, then stood in line for entrance. the concert was general admission, but we lucked out by getting an area near the front of the balcony, so we had a pretty good view of the whole show. it was a great concert, and we even got to enjoy some snow on the way home! thanks, heather, for a great night out!
two years ago on december 1st matt and i said our vows at heritage ranch in fairview, texas. fast forward to this year and we're living in columbus and trying to figure out what to do to celebrate....
we eventually decided on a combination of dinner, movie and zoo. i know, you're thinking "zoo?!" but the columbus zoo is pretty awesome as far as zoos go (rated number one in the country), and i had never been. not to mention, i have a small affinity for christmas lights and the columbus zoo has a program every year called wildlights, where they decorate the whole zoo in thousands and thousands of christmas lights....amazing! so we started the evening off with a free movie (thanks for the giftcards!) at the amc at easton (huge outdoor mall near our apartment). we saw planet 51, but neither of us were very impressed. it's certainly no shrek or the incredibles. then we walked around easton and enjoyed their spectacular luminary engineering (read: pretty christmas lights). we even stopped and splurged at the godiva store for some anniversary gifts for us....yum! after that we headed to the zoo. it was amazing! i don't think i've ever seen so many christmas lights in one place like that! and we even got to see some animals. i know, now you're thinking, "duh, you were at a zoo!" but i forgot to mention that while we were strolling around looking at the pretty christmas lights, it was a frigid 25 degrees outside. eek! yes, it was chilly, and considering most animals at zoos are from, well, warmer places i didn't know if we'd get to see any animals. but we did and they were a nice bonus ;) after the zoo we went to olive garden for dinner and enjoyed the warm restaurant and tasty food. then we drove home and watched some movies. yay for fun anniversaries!
wildlights concert at the pond! sorry for the not-so-great video, i wasn't really prepared and didn't know how much memory it would take up, hence the two videos.
