It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas

Its the most wonderful time of the year! We had lots of fun checking out the Zoo Lights at the Cincinnati Zoo.

We Still Love Our Buckeyes!

This weekend was the big Ohio State vs Michigan rivalry game. (To those of you in Utah who think Utah vs BYU is a big game you have no idea..) Its rare for me to watch an entire football game (I'm more of a check the final score and watch the highlight reel type of fan) but I wanted to watch this game play out in all its glory. After living in Ohio for two years I am finally starting to catch Buckeye fever. It was sad to see the Bucks lose to the Wolverines for the first time in 8 years but it really was a great game. I got more into it than I was expecting to. It was sad to see them lose but our other rivalry games this year went well. The Utes beat the Cougars and the Bulldogs beat the Gators..I guess you can't ask to win them all.
Go Buckeyes!!! O-H-I-O!!

Geek Greek and Philharmonics

This week I was inducted into the Nu Pi chapter of Phi Theta Kappa. (Which is an Honor's Society, not a sorority. Geeks want to to be Greek too! :) I'm really excited to be able to a part of PTK.

Here I am coming up to sign my name into The Record Book of Phi Theta Kappa (Spoiler alert: It was just a binder :)

Then this weekend I was able to go to a Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra concert at the Schuster Center with my brother Brent. Brent got the tickets from a friend and we had a lot of fun going to the concert.

Ready to leave for the concert...

Inside the Schuster Center...not too shabby of a venue.

The ceiling of the Schuster Center, the top had lights that were meant to look like stars..so pretty.

An usher was nice enough to offer to take a picture of both of us but she was having some trouble getting my old camera to work. As I was offering suggestions on how to get it to work, it finally snapped. Quite the glamour shot huh?

Happy Halloween

Okay I know I'm risking looking like one of those crazy dog owners...but come on look how cute Brinkley looks in his costume

Then mom was convinced that Copper was "jealous" of Brinkley's costume so we got one for Copper too. That didn't go over quite as well...

This picture cracks me up

Rain on Our 5K...

Earlier this month my dad and I were planning on running/walking the Ghost and Goblins 5K in downtown Dayton. Here we are the day before the race all geared up in our shirts. Unfortunately it was down pouring the day of the race and we weren't quite dedicated enough to go in the rain.

Ducks and Conference

This weekend we took a Duck tour around Cincinnati. (Duck meaning an old army vehicle that can go on land and water) It was so much fun to see the sights and learn more about Cinci

Lunch at Tom and Chee. We discovered this restaurant on the Newport Levee. It serves every imaginable different variety of grilled cheese and tomato soup. Since grilled cheese sandwiches are one of my favorite foods I was definitely a fan!

Check out the awesome things you can see in Cincinnati!:

The Great American Ball Park - Go Reds!

Beautiful historic buildings downtown

Fountain Square

We're also blessed this weekend to be able to listen to General Conference. I'm so grateful to be a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and to know that there is still a prophet on the Earth today. My little sister Andrea whose enthusiastically studying French in school was absolutely thrilled to hear the announcement that plans are being made to build a temple in Paris, France. While we're still looking forward to being able to one day welcome another temple in the Midwest in Indianapolis.

Shrimp and Mount Echo

This weekend we traveled the not too far distance to Urbana for the Shrimp Festival. I had never been to Urbana and even though its out in the middle of no where, it was a really cute town. (Reminded me a lot of Logan, Utah) We found out about the Shrimp Festival through the newspaper and couldn't figure out why none of our neighbors had ever heard of it. Well we quickly realized why...it was the smallest festival I've ever been to! But it was a lot of fun and the shrimp was good. Then later dad took me to Mount Echo park, which I had discovered on the Internet and wanted to go see. Its a park on top of a hill overlooking Cincinnati. It seemed like a really nice place, however we didn't get to see half of it because it was closed for a wedding. Oh well I guess that means we'll just have to visit again.

The pretty farm field views in Urbana.



Fresh shrimp cocktails were so good!

Anyone who knows my dad knows that he has quite the sweet tooth. The family had fun discovering the Sunshine Bakery stand at the festival.

The view of Cincinnati from Mount Echo.

First Post/ Summer Recap

I decided to start my own blog mostly out of "blog envy" in seeing my family and friends' cute blog posts. I really tried to come up with a more creative title for my blog but in the end I just couldn't come up with anything and decided to resort to simplicity.

My fall quarter at Sinclair started on Thursday so it is back to school for me. Taking 17 hours this quarter makes things quite hectic but I was blessed to have an amazing and relaxing summer break.

Summer started off with a soccer game at The Columbus Crew  Stadium. We got to watch  The Crew take on ReAL Salt Lake for "Mormon Night."

On the way home from The Crew game we stopped by the Columbus temple...one of my favorite
places in the world.

I spent two weeks in the Atlanta, Georgia area with my brother, sister-in-law and nephew. I had so much fun spending time with my family and they took me to so many fun places. We went to Zoo Atlanta, The CNN Center and the Atlanta temple, just to name a few. Unfortunately I wasn't being very good at documenting things and I didn't take very many pictures. (What was I thinking???) 

When I came home from Atlanta I went with my family to see The Lion King in Dayton's Schuster Center. This was my first experience with a Broadway style play and I thought it was amazing!
It made me very grateful to be living in the wonderful city of Dayton where such shows are actually
pretty common place. I'm sure grateful to be here in Dayton. 

My new puppy Brinkley! For quite a while I had been looking at dogs. I was planning to not get my own dog until after I graduated from college but I just fell in love with this puppy. It sure has helped me a lot to have him around when I'm feeling stressed. And to my fellow You've Got Mail fans, yes, he is named after Joe Fox'sdog in the movie. That has always been one of my favorite movies and the name just seemed to fit him.

My parents were kind enough to get me Josh Groban tickets for my birthday. Josh Groban is one of
my favorite singers and I was looking forward to the concert all summer. The concert was in Cincinnati and it didn't disappoint! Definatly one of (if not the) best concerts I've ever been to.

As one final fun thing to do before the school year began we went to River Scape Metro Park in
downtown Dayton. I'd heard of the park before but never had been there myself. I loved it though!
Ohio sure knows what they're doing when it comes to beautiful parks.