Thanksgiving Weekend

We had a great Thanksgiving and so much to be thankful for this year.  We had my parents, Anthony and Laura, Grandpa, and my Uncle Lionel over this year.  Everything was just about ready at the same time and was delicious :)  It was such a pleasant meal and everyone seemed to have a really nice time.

 Jamie and I started cooking early and the Turkey took just over 4 hours to cook.  Of course we completely devoured everything in under 30minutes,  lol.  Here we are digesting before desert.

Of course my Mom made her famous Cherry Pie and we made a very deep dish pumpkin.  Anthony and Laura stayed after dinner and we played a game called Origins.  It was so much fun, I don't think any of us have laughed that much in a long time.

With the long weekend, we decided to go out for the day.  We went to the Getty Museum in Los Angeles to see the illuminated manuscripts exhibit.  It was such a beautiful autumn day, a bit chilly with the wind but the sun felt pretty good.

The museum is located on the hills overlooking the ocean which makes a great view.  The manuscripts were pretty spectacular.  They had books from Belgium, The Netherlands, France and a few English ones as well.

It was a really nice day out, we had a good time at the museum and enjoyed being outside.  It was so nice to not be at work on a Friday.

Saturday we went to Pasadena to see the Gamble House.  It's now part of the USC Architectural School and is located very close to the Rose Bowl.  The home was owned by the Gamble's as in "Proctor and Gamble" and they donated the property to the City of Pasadena and USC to maintain.   

We've seen a lot of houses and stately homes over the years and this one definitely is one of the top houses we have seen.  It's a classic Craftsman house and every detail of the house was thought out.  The wood throughout the house was just beautiful, it's really amazing how the other half lives.  Afterwards, we went to Colorado Blvd for lunch.  The weather has been pretty cold the last couple of days.  It's definitely starting to feel like the Holiday Season :) 

Milissa's Wedding

Last night was a big night for my Aunt Milissa!  She married my cousin's dad, Mike G.  It was a great night and we all had so much fun.  The newly wed couple looked so happy together and it was nice to talk to family and meet friends we had heard about so many times but had never met before.

Milissa has always loved decorating and putting on parties, so we new her wedding wouldn't be any different.  This time she was able to team up with Anthony's girlfriend, Laura, who helped her coordinate the wedding and put together all the decorations.  Laura did an amazing job!  The ceremony and reception was in Milissa's backyard and the place was stunning.

We arrived a bit early to help out :)

The lighting made it difficult to get decent pictures and for some reason the flash was not cooperating with us, but I kind of link this picture of the ceremony.  It has a dream like effect to it, its pretty cool.

Mom and Anthony

Milissa chose a black and white themed wedding and so asked all the guests to wear black and white.

Here are the Saldana's getting their grove on, someone had to get the dancing started! 

It was a really great night!  Milissa and Mike looked so happy together and we are happy they finally realized they were meant to be together. 

Halloween

Halloween has come and gone.  It was a really nice weekend, a bit of rain on Friday night but the rest of weekend was nice and clear.  I am now part of the LEET (Local Employee Engagement Team) Team at work and so I had to dress up on Friday and help host the pumpkin and costume contest.  It was a pretty hectic day but everyone had fun.

Here I am as the Sheriff :)

With the new front patio we had to find another place for our gravestones.

It came out pretty good and our new front door still looks amazing!

Of course we carved pumpkins.  I went with a vampire pumpkin (right) and Jamie went with traditional (left).  Instead of candles we used glow sticks and it worked much better.  The trick-or-treaters started a bit later than usual which had us worried we bought too much candy.  They eventually started coming in huge groups and we ran out of candy around 8:15pm.  Luckily, I stashed away some candy corn to have later :)

Termites

Now that Jamie is back from his business trip to the U.K. and to visit the family, I can finally post some pictures!  The week before Jamie left for England he was in Salt Lake City, Utah for a conference.  While he was gone we decided it was a good time to termite the house.  Something we have needed to do for a while now.  So I spent a few days at my parents house but made a trip to the house to get some pics :)

I know its silly but I was so disappointed that the tent wasn't the same color/pattern.

Everything went as planned and our house is now bug free.  Although the cleanup of small bugs was not fun and somehow a black widow managed to make it through three days of deadly gas!  But he didn't make it past the spider killer.  I'm glad Jamie is back and we are looking forward to the weekend and a fun Halloween :)

Oak Glen

Autumn is finally here, hot days, cool nights and even an early storm.  It's sort of become a tradition for Jamie and I to make it up to Oak Glen in the fall.  It feels just a little bit more like Autumn there plus it's a fun and delicious day out.

Last year we went up in November, just after a storm, and had the fun of trekking around in snow and not having to deal with too many people.  This year, we decided to go up this weekend.  Partly so it would feel more like fall than winter and partly because November is starting to get pretty busy and it's still a few weeks away.

It was a warm day and it was pretty busy but we still had fun wondering around the apple orchards and pumpkin patches :)

This is one of the farm houses that has been turned into a Colonial style pub overlooking a strawberry field.

Of course, the trip isn't complete without some apple pie and ice cream!  Thankfully Jamie and I shared this and still couldn't finish it together.  It was pretty amazing :)

Jamie's Drinking Implements

Over the years, Jamie has acquired a few drinking implements from various family members on different occasions. 





The most recent one came from Germany, a gift from his brother David and his girlfriend Deborah.

He has one from Hull, also from David.

I got him a taster set as part of his 30th Birthday present.

So if you ever have wondered if he ever uses them, he does and he likes em :)

Happy Monday!

What Did You Do This Summer?

The summer is now officially over and Autumn has arrived.  Although with the heatwave this week it doesn't really feel like it.  We've been pretty busy this summer and have done a lot of work on the house.  

We finally got a new front door.  Our old door gave us a lot of problems.  The lock had been changed so many times it didn't fit very well, so you had to push the door in to lock and unlock it.  If it was unlocked it wouldn't stay shut and would blow open with the slightest wind and no one could figure out how to unlock it to get out.  The lock would occasionally fall off and we had to use pliers to unlock and lock the door until Jamie could super glue it back on.  I also broke two keys trying to unlock the door.  It was pretty bad.   

But now we have a beautiful front door, that stays closed, locks easily, and to our surprise keeps the house so much cooler.  We spent a few weekends painting it but it looks amazing!

We also needed to replace the wood on the back/side gate.  We would have loved to have completely replaced the gate but  it's a big gate and it would have cost a lot of money.  So we did the next best thing, replaced the wood and spray painted the metal.  It looks a hundred times better and I'm sure our neighbors are happy they don't have to look at the old, weather beaten wood.

The garden has looked great all summer.  The avocado is looking really healthy and has a lot of new leaves and branches on it.  We also got a raspberry bush (to the left of it) that we have been enjoying all summer.

The citrus plants have been growing like crazy and are now loaded with fruit.  They should be ready to pick around Christmas time.  It's been another amazing summer and we are so happy with all that we got done.  There is always something to do on the house but I think we have earned a few lazy weekends :)