A little of this, a little of that

Over the weekend, we had our first snow. Not quite the "epic" storm that was forecasted, thank goodness, but enough for Scoop to sniff around in for a little bit Sunday morning. Most of it melted by the end of Sunday, which I was glad for because I had to drive to school bright and early Monday morning to prepare for my defense. (Unfortunately, Quincy was hit way harder than Reno was and my Mom wasn't able to make the drive to come to the defense). Chris came for my defense, and it was easier than I imagined (I tend to get really nervous speaking in front of people - especially people who decide whether or not I've earned my master's) and my committee all thought I'd done a good job and signed all the necessary paperwork. What a relief! Chris took me out to a big Mediterranean lunch to celebrate. Now, I just have to write one more paper and take a final and I'm all done! It snowed some more yesterday, and overnight our low was 5 degrees, but it warmed to about 11 by the time Scoop and I got up. Time to get out the boots and gloves!

We hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Indie Reno

On Saturday, my craft group held our first craft fair, Indie Reno. I had never done a real craft fair before and wasn't sure what to expect. I didn't have as much inventory as some of the other tables (I've been a little busy preparing for my master's defense) but I still exceeded my sales goals, and it was fun. A lot of my people I knew came by, and Na stayed to help me all day, and she and Erin both helped out with giftwrapping (we offered giftwrapping and hot cocoa for free). I'm pretty sure I have the best friends ever.

Here is my table. The light in the window behind made it hard to get a good picture.

We also gave swag bags to the first 25 people who walked in the door.
People actually were lined up outside before we opened!

I'm looking forward to our next show, sometime in the spring!

Fantasies in Chocolate

Last year, I volunteered at the annual fundraiser for the RGJ Foundation, Fantasies in Chocolate, and thought it would be fun to go, uh, for fun. Then Julie told us she and John were going to go for her birthday, so that was the perfect excuse for all of us to go.

Erin, Na, Me and Julie

John, Chris and Sandor

Team Gabel

We had lots of chocolate, wine and some savory food as well, even barbecued pulled pork with chocolate sauce and chocolate-covered bacon! It's always fun (for the girls at least) to get dressed up, and we all had a good time.

Movember

Chris shaved! He's growing a mustache for Movember, to raise money for prostate cancer research and to raise awareness. He's actually also growing a beard, despite my attempts to persuade him to just do the mustache. I mean, it's only for one month, right? I'm still holding out hope he'll shave down to just a mustache on the last day - at least long enough to let me take a picture. In the meantime, I'll be taking a picture of the progress daily. Here are days 1, 3, 4 and 5. (Day two was election day and Chris was asleep when I left and came home that day, so I missed the picture.)

If you want to donate to the cause, find Chris' profile here.

I yam what I yam and that's all that I yam

This weekend we went out with some friends to celebrate Halloween. Chris and I earlier in the week were trying to find simple matching costumes and Andrea came up with a great idea - Popeye and Olive Oyl.

We went out downtown during the Zombie Crawl, though only some of us were zombies. Zombie pirates, that is.

John and Julie went as Fred and Wilma.

These guys joined us after the Wolf Pack/World Series games were over.

Good times.

Sketchy

I've always enjoyed drawing. I've never had any formal training, and I wouldn't claim to be an artist or anything, I just like to do it. When I was a kid, I drew things all the time and once or twice entered my drawings in the fair. I still doodle, especially while I'm in class, as you can see by taking a peek inside any of my notebooks.
My mom and stepdad always encouraged me to draw, and once invited a friend's daughter who was a trained artist to give us a lesson in drawing faces. Stony kept things I had drawn hanging in his office at our house, and for my 20th birthday, he sent me a sketchpad and a drawing kit with pencils, charcoals and chalk to remind me that I hadn't been drawing enough.

When I read that my cousins Mandy and Denise and their mom Jane were participating in The Sketchbook Project, I knew I also wanted to do it. I signed up a couple weeks ago and received my sketchbook in the mail last weekend. My theme is "... you'd be home now" and I imagine that I will interpret that quite loosely. I decided that I will dedicate my sketchbook in Stony's memory, since I know he would be just delighted by this project.

I still have the drawing kit Stony gave me. (I still haven't been drawing enough.) So that is what I used for the the first drawing.
I'll post some more updates on the progress of the sketchbook before I have to send it in. I hope Chris and I will be able to go to San Francisco in June to see the Sketchbook tour.

Laurnesto does Vegas

A few weeks ago, our friends Ernesto and Laura were both going to be in Phoenix and we really wanted to be there, but we couldn't make it happen. Luckily, Chris was able to join them in Vegas a couple days later ... but since Chris never writes blogs anymore, Laura agreed to write a guest blog. Enjoy!

So Ernesto, my cousin Eddie and my friend Nikki made a short but very sweet trip to Vegas to feed our (or mine mostly) Vegas itch. Short is an understatement as we were there for just about 24 hours. So the question was how much trouble could we get into in such a short amount of time. After a long car ride that consisted of a lot of “ would you rather” (in which we all learned a little bit more about each other) and lots of pictures of the new Hoover Dam bridge we arrived.

So we had a crazy fun night of boozing and gambling.When we woke up the next morning Ernesto was missing, there was a tiger in the bathroom, Chris was missing a tooth......oh wait I am thinking of a different trip to Vegas.

Ours was not as crazy as the Hangover, the highlight of the night was when I sat next to a fun old lady who helped me play Pai Gow Poker. After I was up $100 dollars, she said to me, “raise your bet el cheapo.”

The rest of the night consisted of some dancing in a bar, me outlasting everyone, then everyone thinking I got lost when I was just out gambling still, taking a short nap, getting breakfast at noon at Denny’s,a little bit more gambling and a very long car ride home.

In other news Ernesto and I got engaged 2 days earlier, if you know who we are or just want to see something that might make you cry in a good way, check out this video.