Christmas at our house!

Kenneth and I are celebrating our 6th anniversary next week. Can you believe it? 6 years! And this is the first year we have decorated for Christmas! We actually have a tree and a Nativity and all sorts of merriment.

We're going home for Christmas in 2 weeks - so it's not like we'll actually get to enjoy it on the actual holiday.... But our little bit of Christmas here in our Boston home makes me really happy :)

Here are some pictures:

We need something festive around here to help ease the pain of not only finals for Kenneth, but our first snow storm. blech.

(trust me, all of you in more moderate climates - this is no good for anyone:)

*Note: I do realize that my basket of pinecones and artificial Christmas tree are not nearly as awesome as some of your holiday decorations - but this is our first time. Hopefully someday we'll be a little fancier..

CHICAGO!

If only I could have the soundtrack to Chicago playing while you read this post.... I think it would be more festive.

Either way, our trip to Chicago was so much fun!! We had a great Thanksgiving and a great time with our friends.

We experienced our first real "chicago dogs:"

We had real Chicago style pizza:

We got to hold this little friend for the first time:

We had a super fun Thanksgiving with some of our super fun friends (and I made my very first Thanksgiving turkey):

We visited the Art Institute of Chicago:

We visited Super Dawg - one of the sites from the PBS special "The Hot Dog Program." (a show I highly recommend):

We got to give Jason and Nadia the quilt I made for them (Nadia picked out the fabric and pattern - I just put it together):

Kenneth and Jason went on a walking tour of Frank Lloyd Wright houses:

We found an actual AUTHENTIC Polish restaurant - run by actual Polish people. It was so amazing. Kenneth was in heaven. (Chicago actually is the only mission in the world, besides Poland, with Polish missionaries)

But mostly, we got to spend time with some of our very favorite people!

Chicago is so amazing! And we are excited to go back to visit often :)

Katie's Quilt

Last fall Kenneth's little sister and her family came to visit us. It was so much fun! While she was here we picked out some fabric for a fun fall quilt to help her remember how lovely autumn in Boston is.

Here is the result:

(It only took me a year to give it to her!)

Big week..

This is a big week for us - and let's be honest - I don't know what I'm the most excited for...

#1 We just bought this new car! We signed all the paperwork today and after they take care of all the licensing and registration (super convenient) we can pick it up on Monday after work. Hooray!

#2  In only 4 days we will be on our way to see these lovelies:

Jason and Nadia are some of our best friends from Boston. Now that Jason has graduated from law school, they had to become grown ups and move to Chicago. lame. 

We are so excited to see them!!! (and to finally meet baby Michael!)

#3  While looking for used cars we stumbled upon this:

If you've been there you know that they have the BEST hamburgers and fries in the world! Kenneth and I have only been there on our trips to Salt Lake - we were super excited to see one right across the street from the place we ended up buying our car from :)

(*We told our friends Chris and Robyn about our wonderful discovery and they were totally unimpressed - I think you have to experience the greatness to know what we're so excited about)

I know - it's hard to know what to be the most excited for..  

Halloween Turnips!

This year for Halloween, instead of carving pumpkins, Kenneth and I decided to carve turnips. As it turns out, this is how jack-o-lanterns originally began.

 As you can see - they turned out awesome. They are smaller and don't have quite as much gunk inside - just turnip. They were so much fun!

I think this is going to be a new Halloween tradition at our house :)

We of course carved them while watching "It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown" and the Garfield Halloween special

Some of my favorite things...

It was exactly one year ago that I started taking care of these cute kids:

I love them so much!!! I am so lucky to get to play with them every day :)

Here's to another great year!

Material Culture

This semester Kenneth is taking a class titled: Material Culture. It's studying the cultural and historical significance of the things that we make. His project this week was to actually interview someone who makes things and then learn to make something himself. 

Kenneth decided to interview me and have me teach him how to piece a quilt block on my sewing machine. He did such an awesome job! So well, in fact, that we made his block into a pillow. It looks so great decorating our couch :)