Michigan Getaway

Back in April, a few friends from college met up in Sawyer, Michigan, for the weekend.  Both the company and the general area were fabulous.  Here are a few photos from the weekend.  The most important one, mind you, is the photo of a completed sandcastle.  It was my first time making one and number 16 on my 30 before 30 list.  Thanks, Michaun, for always being willing to help me cross things off my list (we worked on number eight of 30 last summer).  You're the best.  And thanks for being so photogenic.

No get-together is complete without food

Christmas Festivities

Josh and I attended a beautiful candelight church service on Sunday morning.  The service was quite special and I'm so glad I had this opportunity.  Also, I could have spent the whole morning singing the beautiful Christmas songs.  The song service is always my favorite part of church services, but Christmas songs have a special place in my heart and I could sing along for a while.

Then, I spent some time  Sunday evening wrapping gifts.  I love taking care to wrap gifts beautifully, and it was quite a luxury to have enough time to do this.  I also like it when my gifts under the tree coordinate, so I get metallic wrapping paper on sale at Target every year, and then spice up things with ribbon.  Since I had quite a lot of ribbon leftover from Cassie's wedding programs back in August, I used the ribbon to adorn the gifts.  I'm a little partial, but I think it turned out quite lovely.

Last week, we had a blizzard...which makes everything feel like Christmas (I posted about the storm as it was happening here).  I love how beautiful the icicles and fluffy snow looks in frozen tundra.

On Christmas, we were up in Minneapolis with the Huntley side of the family (see our Thanksgiving festivities here).  To spice things up, I challenged all the cousins to wear ugly sweaters (I had my awesome shirt from this holiday party earlier in December).  I think we should do this every year. 

We're one good-looking bunch

Yummy desserts

Awkward family photos

Josh rocks this sweater.

A toast to our Kappa legacy!

We ended the night at Josh's parents' farm with a game of Monopoly.  It's kind of a tradition to play as a family during the holidays.  I'm not competitive, yet I won this year.  Score!  $20 for me!

Winning.

We still have two Christmas celebrations this week.  Sophie can't wait to wear her Mrs. Claus outfit for them.

Carrie Underwood Concert in Des Moines

Carrie Underwood performed in Des Moines last Friday night.  Since Jessica's husband was out of town, she offered to take me instead.  I obliged, of course.  Who wouldn't?  The concert started off pretty great.  Newcomer Hunter Hayes opened for her and sang one of my favorite songs, Wanted.  Watch his official video here.  He was adorable.

While we were waiting for the big show to start, we were upgraded from section 205, to section 101.   Basically, we could see Carrie's facial expressions up close (no need for those big screens).  We were happy girls!  The concert was wonderful even though I'm pretty sure Carrie lip-synched a couple songs in there (I don't blame her; she had a cough and rough voice).  However, we were lucky we saw her when we did because she canceled her show on Saturday night in Kansas City.  Thanks for a good time, Jessica!  Our seats were WAY better this time than our tickets to see Rascal Flatts at Iowa State Fair were this summer...

The Iowa Winter is Here

Winter is officially in full force here in Iowa (and the Midwest, really).  Starting at 6 last night (the precipitation started falling at 4), the area was under a blizzard warning.  It was supposedly to last until 6 PM today, but was extended to 9 PM.  The wind is still blowing like crazy, it's pretty chilly, and there is quite a bit of snow out there.  We got about 13 inches of snow.  Here are some shots from last night and today.  It really is like a winter wonderland out there.  I like it a lot.

Sophie's first steps in the snow this year.

We can buy her all the toys we want, but she loves plastic bottles best.

Pretty sure this is Sophie's way of letting us know she likes the snow.

It's bright white out there!  Now I remember why I have blackout curtains in my bedroom.

A perfect day for a big pot of chili.

My dear friend, Michaun, and her husband (and sweet puppy Ted) planned to stay the night at our house last night on their way from Chicago to Lincoln, Nebraska.  Due to the poor driving conditions from the blizzard, they had to stop last night and stay at a hotel in the Quad Cities.  Today, they've been stuck on Interstate 80 after this nasty pileup.  A trip that should have taken them a little more than five hours (to get to our house from Chicago), has taken more than 24 hours.  Winter sure did come in fast and furious this year!

Thanksgiving Extravaganza

Last week, we celebrated Thanksgiving three times.  It was a Thanksgiving Extravaganza, and it was wonderful and exhausting.  I made lots of delicious goodies I was able to share at all the events (I planned out my recipes earlier last week here).  Thursday was the Haugo Family Thanksgiving in Mt. Vernon, Iowa.  After making all my goodies, Josh and I were an hour late.  We missed eating a warm dinner, but the cold leftovers were delicious!

I'm a stickler for fresh pumpkin pies.  As in, I only make pumpkin pies with fresh roasted pumpkin.  So, the first thing I did when I got off work on Wednesday was roast a pumpkin.

While the pumpkin was baking, I put together the ingredients for the fresh apple pie, mini pecan pies, mini salted caramel apple pies, and chocolate peanut butter pie.  It was a little hectic.  I baked for about 12 hours.  I finished baking everything and still had some extra pumpkin leftover so I made mini pumpkin whoopee pies.  These desserts were certainly a labor of love, and I was so happy to share the with our families.

Haugo Family Grandkids

The "older" Haugos

Friday, we headed up to Maplewood, Minnesota, for the Huntley Family Thanksgiving with Josh's mom's side of the family.  There were almost 30 family members in attendance, and it was great seeing them all.  Josh and I accidentally wore matching shirts.  It makes us easy to spot in the family photo.

Huntley Family Photo

Saturday, I hosted Thanksgiving dinner with my mom, sister, four kids, and Josh and Sophie. On Wednesday, I made the brine for the turkey.  It was my first time making a brine, and I feel very sophisticated for making a "fancy" turkey this year.  I also tried making mashed potatoes in a slow cooker.  The convenience of letting the potatoes cook for hours on their own seemed lovely, but I don't think I'll ever make them like that again.  They ended up being kind of hard (not like my normal fluffy version); I think they were overcooked and I wasn't impressed.  My sister took photos on her camera; the only one I took was of my delicious peanut butter chocolate pie.  I doubled the peanut butter filling...and I don't think I'll ever go back to the original recipe.  More peanut butter is always better.

The Color Run

On Saturday, I participated in The Color Run in Des Moines.  There were two waves of races - one at 1 PM, and another at 4 PM - with a total of approximately 27,000 participants (and 600 volunteers) according to the Des Moines Register.  Gena and Luke drove down from Minneapolis, and Kari drove down from Ames, and we all ran together (well, we walked and talked a lot, too).  We arrived around noon for the 1 PM race, and ended up being in the first wave of the race (there were about 13 waves).  I had a blast.  I would love to do it again.

Check number13 off my 30 before 30 list!  And then Gena found this other fun run, The Glo Run.  I think it sounds super fun to run at night with a glow-in-the-dark shirt and three other pieces of glow swag.  Sign me up!

The Apple Orchard

It's officially fall.  Maybe not on the calendar (the technical date is apparently on September 22), but in my world it is.  Yesterday was Josh's grandparent's Annual Harvest Festival.  It was amazing as always, and this year there were more attendees than ever before (or at least it seemed that way to me)!  The high temperature yesterday was 82 - it was a perfect day!  I forgot to put the memory card in my camera, so these pictures are from my iPhone and then the really nice ones are from Josh's Aunt Pam (remember, she took some of our wedding photos).  I look forward to this event every fall.  It makes me proud to be a part of such a wonderful family, and I really enjoy helping out and meeting/greeting the guests.  This year, my mom and nephews came along with me.  They all loved it (their naps on the way home were proof of that!) and my mom wants to come back next year to help set up.  I think if she hadn't had back surgery this past June, she would have asked to help make the fresh-pressed apple cider.  Overall, the day was a success!

Pam made this Ad for the family to post on Facebook to promote the event.

Pictures courtesy of Aunt Pam

 

Since we didn't get a family picture this year, here's one from last year.  And then for fun, below that are photos from 2009 and 2008.  Apparently we didn't go in 2010...which is kind of disappointing.  Seeing how Sophie's changed over the years is quite fun - she was so fluffy in 2008 (when she was just a few months old).

2011 Apple Festival

2009 Apple Festival

2008 Apple Festival