Thanksgiving Part II

This is fairly representative of a fair amount of our days in Atlanta. Just like on my side of the family, all the kids love Nathan, but they love to attack him even more.

Some of you may already be aware of Nathan's desire to match/embarrass his brothers. (On their brother mancation he would wait for Ben and Aaron to get dressed, then find his matching shirt...they wouldn't notice until it was too late). Thanksgiving twinners was just a lucky coincidence...or was it???

Who doesn't need a vestido ho ho ho (ho ho ho dress)?! While Nate and I were padding around a Wal*Mart at 5:30am on Black Friday, we found this beautiful dog vestido. We didn't like it enough to buy it (Kathryn doesn't wear just anything), but enough to take a picture.

This belongs in the aquarium post, but I just wanted to remind you that we saw sharks there.

Tiny Aaron and the 30" pizza. That size didn't really register with me as being incredibly huge, but it is. It was a disgusting amount of pizza, but it was tasty and our group easily finished it off.

Ben and Jenn took us to their local mall so we could people watch...it didn't disappoint. Kudos to Nate on this capture.

Nathan and Oscar. Oscar is enormous and incredibly tolerant. After we got home, I expected the same out of our cats (but only got the enormous part). I bet Oscar would wear a vestido ho ho ho.

Pictures after church. Jenn stayed professional, but I couldn't stop laughing. Why? Because I had this image in my head:

I don't know; a lot of kicking occurred after church.

Thank you to our Georgian hosts, we had a great time!

The Georgia Aquarium

Nathan and I went to Georgia (Atlanta to be exact) for Thanksgiving. Since I have more than a little bit to show and tell, I figured I'd split it up into parts. We'll start with the Aquarium. It's the largest in the world and it was awesome! Here's some of what we saw:

We determined that anyone would want a fish tank like this one.

We also determined that we were glad glass was separating us from these guys...way too big.

Piranhas! I didn't see much teeth on them...I wondered if they'd been deteethed (think declawed...word wise anyway) or if that is just how these kind are. They still looked hungry.

Ceiling fish! We knew these pictures would look fake, but here it is anyway. The ceiling is a tank for these fish to hang out; it was a very cool/creepy effect.

School of fish.

School of larger fish (or sharks...)

Jaws will always scare me. In turn, sharks like this will always scare me.

Liz, David Cross (of Arrested Development fame), and Nathan. Nate's brother Ben deserves the credit of initially approaching him...then Nate went over...then I couldn't help myself. I stayed at a distance and waved. He reached out to shake my hand...who was I to say no? He wanted to meet me. He told us he's from Atlanta and he was in town for Thanksgiving; I say "ya, us too". Yes, Nate and I are actors "in town for Thanksgiving". I wrapped it up by telling him that I loved him; Nate agreed so it seemed to work. So we say bye and start to leave. Nate, not being able to stop himself, went back and asked for a picture. It was a bit awkward, but he was really nice. He complimented Nate's wedding band. (that I bought, David). While the picture was being taken, Nate said: "we washed our hands, I promise" David said: "I didn't". I decided to chime in with another clever bit, saying "that's okay". "That's okay" made my mouth look the way it does in this picture. I'm glad we didn't find a really attractive celebrity to meet...as it is, I think we are pretty equally matched in the photo...right? ps-I didn't realize until after, but I'm fairly sure the girl he was with was Amber Tamblyn (she took the picture)...so she was treated like a commoner. Sorry Amber, the next time Nate is out of town I promise "The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants" will be watched.

After our brush with the stars, we headed for the jellyfish tanks. We were both ridiculously giddy, so I'm glad Nate had the presence of mind to take pictures because I wasn't really paying attention. They turned out pretty well. It's probably because the jellyfish isn't talking in this picture.

Nate and I in front of the Barrier Reef tank.

Nate missed the "do not pick up sign". Once he was noticed, there was a flurry of "don't pick them up, don't pick them up!" Ha. He DID pick it up.

Whale shark and some fish friends in the big tank.

Continuing in Nate's spirit of rebelliousness, we didn't "keep off the rocks".

We loved the aquarium!

Tis the season

Nathan and I took the cats into the vet today for their yearly check up and vaccinations. I made the appointment because I care. Do you hear that cats?...because I care. We trick them into their cages because we care. We hide their faces from the dogs (once at the vet) because we care. We pay the vet bill because we care (and because we have to).

...and we apparently feed Kathryn a lot because we care. Kathryn (see my side panel) gained another pound from last year's visit. She is now almost exactly twice as heavy as Mal. The kitties hated their Halloween costumes almost as much as I hate taking off fake eyelashes (it makes me cry, okay), but both are sacrifices we make for the holiday. In light of Kathryn's somewhat recent weight gain, I'm wondering if she'd be willing to make yet another costume sacrifice for yet another holiday:

Halloweekends

October 24: Law school friend party

Nathan's friend, Nate Capperman invited us to a pre-Halloween party at his house. The party was so fun, someone was throwing up by 10:00pm. Fortunately this picture was taken before that happened.

Can you find us?

Just in case, here we are back at home...relaxing.

October 27: Ward Primary Halloween Party

Nathan and I helped out with one of the booths for the kids. We were in charge of "Pumpkin Bowling", which soon became "Taped up and Cracked Pumpkin Bowling". For obvious reasons*, we switched out our costumes a bit.

*who doesn't want to see Nate in this "tache and hat combo just one more time??

Ya, we definitely wanted to find a costume that didn't seem scary for the kids...maybe next year.

Nate convincing the poor witch that his hand had been cut off.

Liz trying to look as scary as the dead "Things" (Thing 1 and Thing 2). Thing 2's proud mom in the background...she'll want to kill me if she sees this, but she spent Halloween in Mexico and is super cute, so I don't feel that bad.

October 30: Law school's "Fall Ball"

James, Rob and an amused Liz.

Nate and most of his moot court team he's coaching. Cleveland is on the left and Pria to the right.

Our favorite picture of the night.

Nate with our favorite curly mullet of the night.

October 31: Halloween parties

Party 1: Brandon and Denay's house.

Party 2: Our house with the Snyder's over.

They brought Lucille (their cat) and we discovered our cats probably shouldn't be forced into a friendship just because their parents like to hang out. Nate was hissing because Kathryn is too wussy to hiss herself.

Party 3: Family pictures.

I'm happy to report I'm not in the least bit tempted by a goth makeup, clothing or hair style. (obviously Nate as well) Waaay too much work. And we'd probably both be waaay unemployable. Happy Halloween!

They be trippin'

Another event that has kept our October exciting was a visit from my parents a couple of weeks back. Here are a few pictures from their stay:

My parents at Marblehead. It was really hot; I mean, really guys, coats??

Nate had a moot court v. law review football game the same day. It was pouring and freezing, so this is about all we saw of the game.

My mom and an exhibit at the Toledo art museum.

Mom and I watched the glass blowing display for a bit-very cool!

Kirtland temple-we finally made it! Special thanks goes out to Google Maps. You suck.

Looking out the windows of the Kirtland visitor center.

Outside the Whitney store. Moments later I would be asked by the sister missionary if I felt okay. After an awkward "yes, I'm just cold", we toured another house. Outside of that house, she stopped me and said "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to single you out. It's just that you look pregnant and I wanted to make sure you felt all right". I struggled with liking this woman after her statement. At least ask, right? And no, I'm not. hiss.

Back room of the Whitney store. This was taken a few moments after we were told President Monson had sat in the very room. That same day. We missed him by possibly the amount of time it took us to be lost. It was sad, but at the same time, very cool that our paths were that close to his that day.

Thanks for coming Mom and Dad!

Apple Festing

The first weekend of October was filled with cold weather, General Conference and the Apple Fest in Holland, Ohio. We've attended the past two years and enjoyed the official kick off to autumn (read: apple fritters) it provides.

In front of MacQueen's store.

I just like the idea of animals wearing necklaces...with pride.

We loved watching these girls dance...with pride. I'm actually not sure how a tween hip hop dancing troupe matches an apple festival, but it was, well, festive?

Also festive: Nathan and the pumpkin assortment.

Doing ponies in front of the ponies.

We didn't, but we liked the sign.

The kitties celebrated the cool weather kick off a bit differently than we did: