Rural Studio Reminiscing

A couple of weeks ago Lions Park (a Rural Studio Project that I was a part of in my thesis year) was published in this magazine. It starts on page 81 and my part of the park was the toilet rooms. It's always fun to see the project or any Rural Studio project published. It also made me reminisce a little bit. So here's some fond memories of a video by my team mate, Mark Dempsey, of our tilt up construction on our toilet rooms. The quality had to be lowered a little to upload in a reasonable amount of time, but you get the idea. Yay Rural Studio and Lions Park!

Puppies and Treats!

Here's a few little puppy videos for your enjoyment. The first one is of Ben trying to wrestle with my roomie's much larger dog. They wore each other out after quite a while of this. The second one is Ben showing off all his new tricks. He's getting pretty good!

This week, one of the guys I work pretty closely with is retiring. Tuesday mornings we always have a weekly staff meeting, so tomorrow will be his last one. I made some treats for everyone for his last day. Some blueberry streusel mini muffins and pumpkin scones. I love delicious treats in the morning!

We have also been taking a great East Coast Swing class at the Century Ballroom in Seattle. It works out so nicely because it is so close to our apartment and it's Sunday nights. It's a 5 week class and we just had our 3rd week. Soon we'll have some sweet new moves to show off! Our instructors are in the top left picture here.

A Bice Wedding :)

Highlight of the weekend...LEIGHA AND NINO GOT MARRIED!! I've known Leigha since 6th grade(ish) and have had the pleasure of getting to know Nino the past year or so that we've lived in Seattle. It was so great to be able to see them tie the knot! The wedding was at a small farm in Poulsbo, WA (a ferry ride and short drive from Seattle). Luckily it ended up being a mostly sunny day for their cute little outdoor ceremony. Leigha's dress was fabulous! I had gone with her a few months ago to pick it up, but it looked even more stunning since it's been fitted and tailered perfectly for her. Another highlight of the wedding was reuniting with several more of my favorite middle school friends! There were several girls there that I haven't seen in almost 10 years and it was so good to see them all and meet some of their hubbies too. There were so many cute little details to the wedding that made it so personalized and cute, I loved it.

After plenty of wining and dining and dancing, we came home to a little puppy who did a great job blocked into the bathroom. He's been doing pretty well just out in the apartment for a few hours here or there. Since we were gone for about 10 hours that night we blocked the dogs into the bathroom to contain them without sticking ben in the crate. It seemed to work out really well. We went out on Sunday and got a little baby gate to block off that area a little easier without closing the door on them. Also Sunday night we had our first dance class! We signed up for a 5 week East Coast Swing class and the first night was last night. The teachers seem like they'll be really good. Can't wait for next weekend!

Jordan Comes to Seattle!

Little brother came to Seattle this past week! Kristen's older sister was getting married this weekend in Seattle, so Jordan was coming up with the Freels' for that, but came up a couple days early to hang out with me! The first day was a little overcast and sprinkly so we wandered around the city for a little bit then did some relaxing at the apartment before meeting up with Ryan for a fabulous dinner of crepes!

Wednesday was supposed to be a pretty nice and sunny day, so we planned a hike just outside of Seattle. It's so nice being able to drive for less than an hour and be out in the middle of nowhere! We took Ben (the puppy) with us too for our 8 mile trek through the woods and up a mountain. He did great climbing all over everything and jumping through the streams! It turned out to be a really nice day too with lots of sunshine peaking through the trees. 

Thursday we went to the museum of flight, which I hadn't been to yet. It was pretty intense and had a ton of small planes in the actual museum as well as flight simulators. Across from the indoor part of the museum, there was also a large parking lot that had the larger planes that you could tour. They had a Concorde (fastest passenger plane ever) as well as an Air Force One! It was a retired one obviously, so it would be awesome to see what the newer more high tech one looks like now.

The rest of the week Jordan had a lot of wedding related events to attend. Ryan and I met up with them a few times for happy hours and bar nights. I even got to see one of my old Rural Studio  classmates! She was a friend of Katie's back in school as well so was in town for the wedding as well. It was super random seeing her again in Seattle. Can't wait for my next visitor (Kimberly's coming in October!). Also can't wait for next weekend for Leigha and Nino's Seattle wedding!!! YAY!

DC!

I spent a few days in training in DC. I was told I needed to attend this training at some point and when I saw the option to go to DC I jumped right on that so I could hang out every night with Evelyn! One night we all went over to Evelyn's for food, drinks, and to watch Citizen Architect (a documentary about the Rural Studio). It was amusing to see so many people we knew as well as our own projects on TV! The last night I was there we went out to a bar for a surprise party for one of Evelyn's friends. It was a lot of fun meeting new people and hanging out with the crazies that I already knew. I can't wait to head back that way for any other 'training!

Back in the Mitten

We had a fabulous several days back in Michigan at the end of August. We were coming home for the weekend to go to my cousin, Melissa's wedding, but extended the trip a little bit to do a little planning for our own wedding and hang out with more friends and family. We got in Wednesday afternoon and spend the evening hanging out with the parents and little brother and relaxing. Thursday we started some wedding planning by meeting with the caterer to go over potential food selections. It went really well and she was able to come up with an amazing menu of different food stations as well as hor'dourves for a cocktail hour between the ceremony and the receptions. It all made me so excited!! After that we all headed over to the theater again so Ryan could see it and we could get a few more ideas. The caterer came with us too and Aunt Elaine met us out there as well. We all walked around the place throwing out fun ideas as we went along!

Thursday night we had the Dougherty side of the family over for a little dinner party and Kristen's family all stopped by as well. It was so good to see everyone and let everyone meet Ryan finally! 

Friday we spent most of the day with Jordan and Kristen doing a little engagement photo shoot for them. It was so much fun and the pic turned out really great! My lovely fiancee is such a great photographer! We started out downtown Rochester at Knapps with some milkshakes, then headed out to the park for a little more naturey pics. Later in the afternoon we went out to Yates Cider Mill...mostly to get some cider and donuts, but took a few more pics there! What a fun day!

Lots more pictures here!

By Friday night Jason was in town, and Dipti came over as well, so we all headed over to Buffalo Wild Wings for a little drinky drink and some hot wings!

Saturday was the big wedding day! We wedding was supposed to be on the waterfront in downtown detroit, but it ended up being a little bit of a rainy day so it was moved into a little tent next to the Omni. It still ended up being an awesome wedding and a great party. Melissa looked amazing!! It was great to see all the Raetz Family too while we were home!

Great times were had by all! After a relaxing rest of the weekend in Michigan, I was off again, this time to DC!