GREG AND LARA: 2010

Monday, December 20, 2010

Stain-Glass Window, the best present ever

PRESENTING...

Paul and his specially tailored stainglass window for US!

Look closely at the design...can you tell what it is? Any oboe nerds out there?

They are oboe reeds!

Check out the dark cork, the verigated thread, and the "cane-like" appearance of the glass in the tip.

(And for any quilting nerds, I stole the idea of the "piano key" border from my Mom's quilts.)

Paul (pictured above between the reeds) is the father of my former oboe student, Ariel. As a gift, he wanted to make this window for us. You would probably guess that either myself or Ariel came up with the design for the window, but that is not the case. It was Greg. That's right, Greg thought of and designed this window of oboe reeds for the transom above the music room! What a brilliant reedmaking husband of mine (and yes, Greg really can make a good oboe reed)!

We love it! Thank you Paul!

Friday, December 17, 2010

A Charlie Brown Christmas

Before Greg and I ever got married, his mother gave him a Christmas tree. I thought it was terrific that not only did my new husband come with bedroom furniture, but also a Christmas tree!

But after 4 years, I felt like maybe it was time to move past our Charlie Brown Christmas Tree.

Greg was very attached, and it took a lot of convincing.

I don't think I really had him convinced until I bought THIS pre-lit 8 ft. tree for $30 off Craig's List.

You have got to love Craig's List!

There, isn't that much better? Now we finally feel like grown-ups.

Friday, November 5, 2010

Halloween in Peachtree City

Truth be told, I've tried to get Greg in this Scarecrow costume for THREE YEARS NOW! Yes, I bought it three years ago, and this was the first year we actually were able to go to the ward Trunk-or-Treat party.

Although I thought my costume was pretty cool, everybody loved Greg's the most. They kept asking me if I made it. That is seriously like the funniest thing I have ever been asked. I'm still laughing!

Obviously my costume wasn't that original....

The Rennicks came for the celebration too. I forced them to dress up, so Elizabeth is wearing my Pocahontas costume (which she insisted was Sacajawea) and Jacob wore Greg's Mustard costume. Aloysia brought her own duck costume of course!

Some more Wizard of Oz gang - Yes, there's even Toto!

And instead of making cupcakes, we decided to start a new annual Halloween tradition and make dinner in a pumpkin. Good thing Elizabeth is a good cook, and made some New Orleans-type-rice to put inside!

It turned out awesome, and the pumpkin was really good too! I can't believe all those recipe books that say pumpkins aren't any good to eat - all lies!

The Marshes came to our neighborhood (Ardenlee) to trick-or-treat.

And I think we got more Trick-or-Treaters willing to trek up our steep driveway because we had this cool pumpkin on our doorstep, compliments of Elizabeth. Of course, since she was already gone, I claimed all the credit!

I wish you could see what Ardenlee was like on Halloween. It's totally awesome! Can you see the line of golfcarts parading down the street?

Wednesday, November 3, 2010

Dollywood, Cupcakes, Air Show, Savannah...

My title pretty much sums up the month of October. Except for the fact that my camera battery and charger somehow made its way to Kentucky for the last two months and we haven't had a camera. So all of these pictures are compliments of Greg's phone. And no, I'm not super conceited, it's just that Greg took all of these pictures of ME because it's HIS phone!!!

WEEKEND IN TN AT DOLLYWOOD

First stop in October was a trip to Tennessee for Greg's nephew Ty's baptism. And we celebrated the momentous occasion by going with the boys to Dollywood. I've been begging Greg to take me to Dollywood since we started dating. Since he spent much of his childhood there he was not interested in going back. Thank you Ty for providing a great reason for me to go!

A picture of Greg! (And incidentally, he loved Dollywood--it was even better than he remembered it!)

This was the a really cool Adventure Course. Everyone's hooked in by a harness to a system ot tracks above, and then you can choose your own level of difficulty of the rope course.

Greg was like a mountain goat scaling these ropes. Greg liked taking pictures of me being a scaredy-cat.

Does it look like I'm smiling? It's all an act.

WEEKEND OF CUPCAKES...LITERALLY

Elizabeth came and visited for another weekend and wanted to make cupcakes. In this picture we are featuring our banana pudding cupcakes, not to be confused with the strawberry or oreo cupcakes we also made. Funny thing is, we had never even made cupcakes before, and neither of us really likes cupcakes. We thought maybe people would view us as more domesticated if we could make cupcakes, and it seems to have worked so far!

THE AIR SHOW WITH BEN, JENNY AND TYLER

You can't see any planes in the sky, but trust me, the airshow in Marietta was amazing! We saw the best of the best. Unfortunately, no camera, no pics of actual people you may know. But we had a blast Ben and Jenny! Thanks for coming down from Nashville!

And while taking a golf cart ride with Ben, Jenny and Tyler on Sunday, we ran across a recently put out fire...of a golfcart. It was still smoldering and the fire engine was still nearby. I hope this never happens to Obama!

WEEKEND IN SAVANNAH WITH MY MOM

My mom came to visit a few weeks ago, and as she had never been to Savannah we decided to all go for the day. This was a cool clipper ship but with a really weird crew.

One of our best stops on our trolley tour. We ate lunch at the Pirates House. It was awesome!

This is the room where Blackbeard died? Something like that. Why I am standing so strangely, I have no idea. I guess I'm preparing for my modeling career...

The explanation of the secret tunnel in the Pirate's House

Looking down into the bottom of the beginning of the tunnel. Glad I wasn't a pirate back then! They said men used to pass out from drunkenness at the Pirate House, and upon waking up in the morning would find themselves on a strange ship traveling to a strange destination. They had been smuggled through the tunnels and out to the boats in their drunken stupor, and suddenly found themselves in a new vocation!

My mom and I also did a bunch of other things, like go to the Country Living Fair in Stone Mountain, go to the World of Coca-Cola Museum, CNN Tour, and of course visited quilt shops. We had a great time!

Soon to come, Dorothy and the Scarecrow...

Monday, October 4, 2010

Biking in Cade's Cove

A few weekends ago Greg and I traveled to TN for a big Dahl get-together. Greg's dad, Tom, invited his brothers Eric and Phil to Oak Ridge for a family reunion. We went biking at Cade's Cove, an authentic pioneer settlement from the 1800s in the Smoky Mountains, Saturday morning.

Here we are at 8am, pretty much freezing to death.