Thanksgiving Weekend

I just realized that my last posting was more than a month ago, so I thought I'd write something this afternoon. I can't help but feel that blogging is somehow outdated, and Facebooking is so much more popular now. I've been uploading pictures and updating statuses on FB lately that I simply don't know if anyone is actually reading our blog anymore.

Anyway, the holiday season is finally here! Yay! We have been waiting for Thanksgiving and we can't believe that it has come and gone. This year it was just the two of us and Ruffy, as Baba and Mama are in Taiwan visiting relatives. Kyle went for an easy 5-mile Turkey Trot run on Thanksgiving morning. When he came home, I quickly whipped out an appetizer, a fully loaded brie and crackers, to aid my hungry hubby. We then started cooking up a storm! This year we had a simpler Thanksgiving spread than the usual as we planned to just make the dishes that we both like -- the herb-roasted turkey, stuffing, gravy, cranberry-orange sauce, green bean casserole, mashed sweet potatoes and pumpkin cheesecake! Ruffy had his own version of doggie turkey meal too! Well, all of us had a great meal and we were really stuffed all day!

This year we went shopping on Black Friday for the first time. No, we weren't one of those hardcore shoppers who stood in line at 4 in the morning. We left home at around 8-ish and by the time we got home after lunch around 2pm, we were dead tired! We didn't get anything big, but we bought a few things that we need around the house and we were happy with our purchases.

On Sunday, Kyle put up the Christmas lights while I made some snacks for our usual Sunday football tv routine. We haven't had the chance to decorate our x'mas tree yet, so it will be a definite to-do this week. Ah, I love love LOVE the holiday season!

Well, enjoy some of the pictures we took in November.

Ruffy loves the sun!

I was putting the dishes away this morning and turned to look at the couch where Ruffy normally would "hang out" in the mornings. He wasn't there and I wondered where he was. So I went upstairs and looked into our bedroom. Nope, he wasn't under the bed. I peeked into our master bath and he wasn't there either. Neither was he in our guest bedrooms. So I went back downstairs to the mudroom, he wasn't there, and I proceeded down the foyer to our study room. And there he is, all stretched out, soaking in the morning sun!!! :D Oh my, our Ruffy loves the sun! I can't help myself but smiled. I gave him a kiss on his forehead and took a few pictures of him getting a nice tan! 30 minutes later, he is still on the same spot, relaxing in the sunny area of the study, not fazed by all the boxes around him! :)

Apple Picking at the Orchard

This past weekend, we went apple picking at Lynd Fruit Farm, about 28 miles east of our home. The weather was sunny and in the low 60s, so it was a great day to be outdoor. There were 4 types of apples opened for picking -- Suncrisp, Red Delicious, Golden Delicious and Melrose. We love the Suncrisp and Golden Delicious the most!

We were actually pretty surprised to see the number of Chinese people at the orchard that day. Oh, and the funny thing is, I overheard one of the moms said to her kids, "吃饱一点"!! My my, it reminded me how "kiasu" Chinese are, even in the States!! ;)

Anyway, we had a great time picking and eating the apples! If we decide to go apple picking again, we would bring Ruffy along. Many families brought along their doggies, so we thought Ruffy would sure have a great time making friends and eating apples off the ground!!

Before we left, we stopped by the pumpkin patch. The pumpkins not only reminded us about the delicious Thanksgiving's pumpkin pies, but also the flavorful Pumpkin Ale that we had last week at BJ's! Hmm....Now that they brew pumpkin beer, I wonder if it's just a matter of time that they'll make pumpkin wine?

With 20+ apples sitting at home, I decided to bake an apple pie last night! My first attempt at baking apple pie turned out to be pretty darn good. We had a couple slices with big scoops of vanilla ice-cream! Mmmmm....What a great way to end the weekend! :)

Still unpacking...

It's been 1+ week since we've moved into our new home. We, as well as Ruffy, are settling into the new neighborhood. Ruffy, being such a rambunctious doggie that he is, had ran off his leash several times over the past week! During these "escapades" of his, he definitely helped us break the ice with our neighbors as we were chasing after him on our neighbors' yards and front porches.

This neighborhood makes me feel like I'm living in the Wisteria Lane. Let's see. We have a neighbor with 5 kids (kinda like Lynette) and a neighbor who is very friendly and organizes the neighborhood activities (like Bree), and I'd like to think that I'm like Gabrielle (I mean, the Gabby before this new season of course) as I think I'm the only one who is without kids yet. Ok, I know, I'm not a size 0 nor as hot as Gabrielle. But one could dream, right?! =)

Alright, back to the house. I've been unpacking for the past week, trying to put things away, one box at a time. I'm not laboring away though, as my Mom said, we shouldn't be a slave to the house. I take it to heart!! haha!! Anyway, it's going slowly but surely. It's nice to finally able to use the nice dinnerware, stemware, etc. that we received from our wedding! It's like opening our wedding gifts all over again. That part was fun!

This past weekend, Kyle brought me to the Alum Creek state park. It's just about 2 miles away from our house and the place is simply picturesque! There is a big pond (or lake??) and is surrounded by big lush trees. Ah, fall foliage is just so beautiful!! We'll try to remember to bring along our camera next time so that we can take some pictures.

Our New Home!

Yes, finally!!! We've just closed on our new house today! We felt like superstars, autographing non-stop for almost an hour!! We both have done this years before, but this time it's different -- this is our very first house together!! After seemingly signing our lives away, we were handed the keys to our brand new house! Yay!

Here are some pictures of our new home. Most of them were taken weeks ago when the house was still in construction, but we took a few more today when we brought Ruffy there for the 1st time this evening.



Now that the excitement of owning another home wears out, I'm dreading tomorrow when the movers move our 200+ boxes from the storage into the house! Oh what "fun"!

Back to the Stone Age...

Instead of turning on the lights, we used candles; instead of running the dish washer, we washed the dishes by hand; instead of watching tv and surfing the net, we read books and magazines. No, we are not conserving energy to this extreme, but thanks to Mr. Ike the hurricane, we had been living without power for a full two days!

It all started this past Sunday after the NFL games when we looked outside the sports bar and noticed that the trees were swaying from side to side! Man, that was not just a regular gust of wind! The 50-mile per hour gale almost blew me off the sidewalk as we were walking toward the car. As soon as we got home and right after Kyle put our dirty clothes into the washer, BLINK BLINK, the lights went off and on, and then "poof", the power totally went out!! Yikes! Our dirty dishes were still in the dish washer and our clothes were soaking in water in the washer. But then we thought it would be back in a few minutes, but oh no, no no no, it won’t be back until Wednesday night, said the maintenance guys! And that would be 3 full days away!

As you can imagine what went thru our minds! How were we going to live without electricity for so many days? Ah, it was pretty inconvenient! Lucky Kyle, he's in Chicago for business. As for me, I pretty much "camped out" at Panera (thanks to its wifi, I managed to stay connected to the outside world) and Barnes & Noble (for all the books) during the day. When the sun went down, I just hung out with my little 4-legged boy, taking him out on walks and such. It stinks that I couldn't brew coffee in the morning and had to eat out pretty much every meal, but we were not the only ones – about 260,000 households in central Ohio were out of power like we did. In fact, we were the lucky ones if compared to the people in the south who were directly hit by the unforgiving hurricane.

Surprisingly on Tuesday evening when I came back from the bookstore, I saw lights being turned on and felt the cool air blasting in the apt! Yay, the power is back!!!!!!!!!!!!! I have to say, I have a whole new appreciation for electricity after this ordeal!

Anyway, my favorite big oak tree at the apt complex couldn’t hold up to the gusty wind on Sunday. One of its "arms" was blown to the ground, broken forever. :(

My thoughts on the Sunday games...

I'm still licking my wounds from yesterday......all three of the teams/player that I rooted for lost their games. I thought that the Chiefs would have a pretty good chance of winning their 1st game of the season when Tom Brady tore his ACL in the middle of the 1st quarter. The Chiefs put up a good fight but after a close game, they lost 10 -17 to the Patriots.

Next up was the US Open men's semifinal. My favorite player Rafael Nadal was down 2 sets after the rain-interrupted game on Saturday. Again, I believed that he would bounce back, but Murray came up with a better game plan and much better shots. Sadly Rafa lost in 4 sets and that was his last game of the season. Wouldn't it be great if he had won the US Open too? It would have been a hard record to break, to win the French, the Wimbledon, the Olympic gold and the US Open all in the same year, wouldn't it?!

Then came the Bears vs. the Colts. Unfortunately Peyton Manning didn't perform like his old self and the Bear's running game was very effective. Also, the Colt's defense wasn't strong enough so the Bears simply dominated the game, spoiling the Colt's debut at their new stadium, winning 29-13.

Well, that's sports! There is always a winner and a loser! However, there's always the next game to prove themselves all over again! :)