Christmas in Michigan

This last weekend started the holiday travels as we traveled the long trek across Illinois and Indiana to visit Tony's family and have a Hammond Christmas. We arrived at 2am (EST) Friday night exhausted and ready to fall into bed. Saturday was spent helping Mom set up for the extended Hammond family Christmas while taking some time to hang out and chat. People started arriving around 5pm and dinner was served. It was a fun time visiting with the family and we spent some time looking at slides of the old days. Full out projector and screen of the very old days debating which kid was which back in the day. I think one of my favorite slides was seeing an American flag without Hawaii and Alaska as states. It was nice to get a glimpse of the Hammond family as they grew up and history itself. I'm sure there were some great '70s pictures in there. Soon everyone left and I had a great time catching up with my sister-in-law Beth until it was much to late to still be awake. Sunday brought about an afternoon filled with hanging out with the family and present unwrapping!! I loved all my presents (soup pot, sewing kit and cookbooks) and I'm sure Tony loved his too (tools!). We ended the night with an amazing dinner by Mom and watching White Christmas, one of three Hammond family movies to watch at Christmas. Overall, it was a wonderful day and I am blessed to have such wonderful in-laws. Monday (a personal day for Tony) brought about another long drive back home to Iowa and back to real life...at least for Tony. I'm off for Christmas break, my longest one ever!!

A Driving Hiatus

The month of November contained lots of driving. We spent a weekend in Michigan hanging out with Tony's family. Thanksgiving came and we traveled to Wisconsin for some quality time with the Dieringer family, and last weekend was spent in Milwaukee. Tony was invited by our friend Kyong to play for Night of Worship, an event with Intervarsity, allowing for a nice visit to MSOE. Overall, it was a great time to reconnect with our friends from school, as it was Tony's first time back since graduation. However, all this traveling has resulted in quite a bit of exhaustion.

Before the traveling begins for Christmas, Michigan next weekend and Wisconsin the following, we took this last weekend off. What a wonderful choice since I have finals next week and Tony has needed some quality time by himself. Friday night brought about the chance to pick up some Christmas decorations for the apartment. We also spent some time with our friends Sami and Ben watching Firefly and hanging out. (Sami works in my lab). Saturday we went our separate ways. I spent 9am to 3:30pm at Starbucks studying for finals, while Tony had some quality time fixing my computer and working with some of the desktops we've acquired. Needless to say, he had a lot of fun experimenting with linux (an operating system) and combining the two desktops.

Saturday night, Tony traveled up to Cedar Rapids to hang out with our friend Matt. They ended up playing some quality games on the Wii while I stayed home to finish some more studying (got a lot done!) and make some cookies for our Monday night cookie exchange. I settled on making some of my mother-in-laws famous ginger-not-so-snaps. Now just to keep them away from Tony until tomorrow. He loves them!

We also took the time to run to Lowe's a pick out our Christmas tree. It's real!!!!!!! It turned out to be very nicely shaped and did need much time for the branches to fall so the lights and ornaments went on this afternoon. We now have a real Christmas tree sitting in our living room! I also discovered that Tony has a lot of ornaments. (despite the pictures, it's actually quite nicely shaped)

The weekend ended with some final studying (my wrist hurts from writing too much), more computer working, peanut butter cookie making, and sitting on the couch watching some Packers vs. Lions with some delicious popcorn and nutella with Ritz crackers.

This next week brings about a very busy week at work for me, along with finals, followed by my longest Christmas break ever. Tony works for another two weeks before Rockwell shuts down for the holidays. Next weekend we travel to Michigan for Christmas and the following week is Christmas in Wisconsin.

The next thing to happen here is for it to SNOW!!!! and stick.

New Glarus Brewery

Moving to Iowa has been slightly stressful for Tony.  He has been struggling to find some good Iowan beer. He has been wishing for some good Wisconsin beer and the trip back from the family reunion was the opportune time to get some. So, on the trip back to Iowa we stopped at the little town about 30 minutes south of Madison area known as New Glarus. To those of you who don't know, New Glarus contains a brewery that brews a number of well known beers in Wisconsin, including Spotted Cow. We spent the two hour detour walking around the gift shop and taking a self guided tour of the brewery where we found an employee to explain to me the process of beer making and a few other facts about the brewery itself. We jumped back into the car at about two o'clock eighteen bottles of beer heavier and a couple more hours to drive.

Thanksgiving Travels

Being newlyweds, firsts are abundant. This included our first Thanksgiving together. Actually, I'm not going to lie, Mom did all the work, we just showed up. We left Iowa mid-afternoon on Wednesday, detoured through north-east Iowa accidentally, to arrive at about 8pm. Thursday brought about Thanksgiving with Mom, Dad and the three little girls, with Tony and Naomi's boyfriend Zach. We all fit around the table without more than one leaf! Mom cooked a delicious meal and Tony roped all of us into doing the dishes. The afternoon was spent playing dominoes and apples-to-apples followed by eating delicious pie, made by Naomi, and watching Elf. Friday was spent hanging with my friends from Wisconsin, Saturday chopping wood with the Feyereisen's and the weekend rounded out with the Dieringer Family reunion. It was a busy week, but such a blessing to see so many people on the Feyereisen and Dieringer sides, as well as friends from back home.

Date Night

I know we are grown-up people now and college is behind us, but I just can't get used to the idea of going out for dinner quite yet. Maybe it's because I haven't have a few kids and had to cook dinner every night for the last number of years. Anyway, regardless of the reason, I had the week of from school and decided to make a special dinner for Tony and I to enjoy. I guess you could call it something of a date.

When our friends visited from Milwaukee, they treated us to the Mongolian grill in town. Tony loved it so I decided to replicate their traditional Asian stir fries. Since we only have one car, I spent a good half of the day walking around Coralville to get some remaining groceries, candles and check out Goodwill for a larger frying pan. Dinner didn't turn out to be terribly spectacular (I overcooked it a little), but it was a fun night ending with some Pride and Prejudice and falling asleep a quarter of the way through the movie on Tony's lap. Maybe one day we'll go somewhere else.

Michigan Meandering

Tony started No-Shave November...thankfully got rid of it for
a mustache for about ten minutes

Why do I feel that the beginning of the month was so long ago? It's only the 18th (a little over half way through) and not that much has happened with us. Maybe that's why.

Well this month starts the holiday seasons of Thanksgiving and Christmas. We had the opportunity to visit Tony's family in Michigan last weekend for the first time since the end of July. It was nice to see the whole family again. Most of the weekend was spent doing everyday tasks. Tony spent Saturday morning and afternoon in the garage, while Beth and I did homework in the living room. When Heidi got home from work pizza was picked up and we all spent the night watching movies and TV shows, everything from The Avengers to Star Wars: A New Hope. Tony and I also got to show off our popcorn maker, however, I failed to salt the popcorn so I don't think anyone was impressed, including me. Sunday, ended with a delicious dinner made by mom!

Video Games and Good Times

This last weekend found us gazing upon some old, but wonderful, faces. Tony and I were visited by Percy, Austin and Nick, three of our good friends from MSOE. It was so nice to just hang out with some old friends and catch up. The weekend consisted of playing Taboo on Friday night, guys vs. girls (we won!!!). Then Percy and I talked until 3:15am about everything from God to painting our nails. The guys managed to outstay us by playing video games until about 4am. I forgot how long people can play video games for. Saturday morning was a lazy time of waking up. Percy managed to get her Tony time in the afternoon before our friend Nate, who also works at Rockwell, came down. We ended up playing Settlers of Catan with 6 people. Man alive was the board crowed, but it was fun. Tony won that one. The night ended with Percy, Nick and Austin taking Tony and I out to dinner at a Mongolian Grill and a night at the movies. The guys went to Taken 2 while Percy and I opted for some great laughs at Pitch Perfect. Perfect movie for us girls. It was so much fun to get in touch with my ridiculous side with them and I know Tony truly appreciated the time with Austin and Nick.

This week once again finds us going through life and settling in. Tony continue to works long hours while I am  adjusting to a new school and my increase responsibility in the lab. Life is good through it all and we are continuing to learn much about life. I have found that Thursdays are quite boring for me. They are usually my short day so I get home early from school, but they happen to be Tony's long days due to a volleyball league that he joined through work. Since it is all the way in Cedar Rapids, he usually stays after work until the game starts anywhere from 6:30 to 8:30. Tonight's game is at 8:30 so he came home and I get to go watch this time! Maybe I'll convince him to get some ice cream on the way home :) I have also found that it is awesome to skype with family and friends. I had the chance to have long conversations with both Naomi and my friend Jenny in these last two weeks. Amazing times to just catch up!

Fall Festivities

Blessings have been in abundance since we moved here. The first weekend we spent in Iowa, we attended Life Church and met Matt and Kimberly Peloquin. Matt invited us over for dinner where we also met Jennie and Zach Miller. It also happened that that night they were delivering meals to Joel and Abby Whitehouse because they were having a baby. Since then, those three couples have become some of our good friends here. 

 It just so happens that every Monday night, we get together at one of our places to enjoy a wonderful mean and time in fellowship and prayer. Two Monday's ago, it was hosted at our apartment, where another couple joined us. Jennie and Zach had the idea to carve pumpkins so we laid cardboard down on the floor and had a great time. Here are the finished products!

The Miller's, Peloquin's, Whitehouse's, Ham's and ours

Here is our final product. Tony carved it all himself!

Long Hours

We spent the last weekend in Wisconsin catching up with friends and family. Tony spent the weekend golfing and hanging out with my brothers and dad, while I stayed at MSOE to hang out with Percy and friends. I also had the chance to see some of my sisters and mom. We had so much fun talking over dinner.

The following week brought about little sleep and lots of long hours. Tony, once again, has been working long hours to finish the second half of the project he has been working on. The last few days he has been going in to work at 6 am and coming home at about the same time pm. I have also been waking up early and working long hours to prepare for a series of studies that have come in this week. Through it all, it's a reminder that we are blessed to have jobs and that the Lord is taking care of us.

Car Troubles

Friday night, 9/14/12, started out as a fun night. Tony and I hadn't gone on a date in a while so we went out to the mall to walk around and window shop. We were having a decent amount of fun when the mall announced that they were going to close in 5 minutes. (It closes at 9pm. What mall should close at 9pm on a Friday night? Honestly.) So we walked back, my feet were getting tired anyway, and when we got to the car to drive home to possible watch a movie it wouldn't start, didn't even turn over. O boy! We popped the hood and checked the oil to see that it was dry, very dry. Usually extra oil is kept in the car, but Tony had just used the rest of it the other day so there was no oil. O brother! So my feet are killing me in my shoes and the nearest gas station is approximately half a mile away, too far, but the trek was made anyway and we successfully purchased the oil. When we got back to the car, Tony put some oil in and we just sat and waited; waited for the car to take up the oil and hope that the engine was not seized up too bad. So 9:45 comes around and the car still doesn't start. Now it was time to call on some friends. By 10:20, Zach had arrived and the boys were ready to try starting it up again. Nothing. They even tried to jump the battery to give it some more juice. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. We ended the night with bad service at the Steak n' Shake for some ice cream with Zach and his wife, Jennie, and another couple, Joel and Abby. When we were all ready to leave, Joel amazingly asked us if we needed a car to borrow since they had one they don't use very much. Praise the Lord!

So this last week we have been borrowing Abby's car for Tony to go to work and shopping for a new car. Tony got the car towed to a nearby mechanic who looked it over. It turned out that the air conditioning compressor broke and seized which caused the belt not to turn which caused the car to not start. It also had gasket problems, the battery was going and needed to be replaced, the tension arm pulley for the belt was also bad, and it had transmission problems. We knew something was going to happen, but we'd hoped that it wouldn't happen for about a year. Anyway, for the car to get to a functional level we would have had to put $800 into it, not quite worth it, but it would work and last a bit longer. However, the mechanic called soon after saying that one of the other mechanics was willing to buy it for $500 as is. What!?! That's crazy! But, once again, amazing and true knowledge that God is watching over us. Tony also asked the mechanics expert opinion on what car to buy and he mentioned a Honda Civic or Accord or a Toyota Camry, specifically a 2006 Honda Civic. So this is how our week went from there:

• Shop for cars at the local dealerships online
• Find two 2006 Civics at a Honda dealer in Cedar Rapids on Wednesday night
• Call on Thursday morning to make sure they were there
• Tony went and visited at lunch to find only one was left (the other had just been sold)
• Talk about whether or not we'd want to get it
• Sell the Lumina on Friday to the mechanic guy
• Check out the Civic again on Saturday so I could get a look at it
• Decide we were going to purchase it even though it's a little out of what we wanted to spend
• Realize we have no credit score since neither of us has had a reason to have one
• Still get approved, PTL!
• Drive away to return Abby's car and then take our car home. OUR car!!

So we are now proud owners of a white 2006 Honda Civic with approximately 66k miles and in really good condition.

Hawkeye Craziness

The one thing about Iowa is that it has no professional sports teams. None! Not that this is a bad thing, but it is different. For example, this past weekend was the big rival football game between the University of Iowa Hawkeyes and the Iowa State University Cyclones (whose mascot is a bird...explain?). We were invited over to a friends house for tailgating which was a lot of fun. I felt so grown up bringing something to eat over to someone's house for a get-together. It was a wonderful meal and us ladies had fun times watching the boys play some yard games. However, neither Tony or I own any Hawkeye apparel. I opted for a black sweatshirt to at least try and blend in, but Tony opted for the blue t-shirt. Thankfully, we were warned to not wear red since that is a cyclone color; MSOE did not prepare me for that one. As for watching the game, only one person in our group subscribed to cable so we decided to traverse the two miles to the nearest sports bar and not a minute too soon. It was soon packed with both kinds of, soon to be drunk, fans. The hawkeyes lost, but overall, it was a fun time hanging out with our friends from the church we have been going to.

So onto my rant about football in Iowa. Growing up, I was never a big college football fan and here, it's all about college football, specifically the hawkeyes. It's everywhere. Herky, the mascot's name, is haunting me. Saturday home games, speculating from my single sample of this last Saturday, consist of everyone tailgating, regardless of whether you are attending the game or not. The university rents out part of the driving range on their golf course for vehicles to park so they can tailgate. This is not a bad thing, it's just my observations. Lastly, college football is played on Saturdays and not Sundays. Very strange to me. I feel like my Saturday should be composed of doing something productive, like homework or cleaning. Sunday afternoons are meant for watching the Packers play and relaxing/finishing all those productive things that were started on Saturday. However, when Sunday came around, after church meant the ladies hanging out in a coffee shop while the guys played a round of frisbee golf. I fortunately did get to see the last three quarters of the Packer game with Tony.

So there is my little rant about Iowa football and wishing I could watch all the Packer games without having to pay an arm and a leg to watch them, so here I am watching the play-by-play update on nfl.com as the Packers, hopefully, beat the Bears...again. And I must confess that Tony and I both own Iowa football apparel. (Thanks to my sewing machine, I got to resize the large for me :)

And so it begins...

I have officially been through two weeks of school now and Tony has been working long hours at work in attempt to finish a project that is past its deadline. Life is starting to pile up, my to-do list just keeps growing and growing. However, I'm going to take this time to mention everything we are thankful for...stay with me, the list might get long.

• A wonderful support system who has been with us every step of the way, including, but not limited to: our parents, our siblings, other family and definitely our friends, and has greatly blessed us with more than enough in our wedding gifts (Thank you's are coming!) and with psychological and other kinds of support.
• Finding an apartment and being able to move in and get everything settled within our timeline. Also the fact that it is in a great location, such that, Tony can hop on the highway to get to work in a short time (to the highway, not to work), and I have public transportation and the ability to ride my bike to school, only 2/3 miles away.
• Tony's job at Rockwell, even though it's proven frustrating, to financially over-provide for us and to offer him two days off for labor day and other great benefits.
• My fellowship at school to allow me to hopefully have a less stressful, and less busy, graduate school experience and to continue to financially provide for us.
• For a vehicle, cheaply purchased, so that Tony can drive to and from work. 
• The fact that we have found a church that has welcomed us and has made an effort to be friends with us, even though we are still deciding if we want to stay.
• The friends we have made at work and at school. I know my lab has been wonderful to be a part of and Tony has talked about the people he works with.

These are only a few of the things that we are thankful for, as the list is ever-growing. God is and will continue to provide for us as we continually trust in Him. 

1/2 Egg

This new-found duty as wife has found me cooking and baking in the kitchen much more often than I had been. (Sorry Mom, but I just didn't know what was in your cabinets or what to do with it.) Now, however, I know exactly what is in the pantry (the pride of the apartment) and in the frig. I have also taken to planning a tentative meal schedule by the month, one month to be exact and emphasis on the tentative. We'll see how this goes in months to come. I have so many intentions to be organized, but I haven't had any schoolwork to do yet.

I have been working in a research lab at the hospital for the last few weeks and they have been very welcoming. It has been almost effortless making friends with them. Anyway, every Wednesday is a lab meeting with everyone involved in the lab and it was treat day. I hadn't baked anything in a long time so I figured it was time to bring out the sweets. Monday, I decided to make brownies from scratch to try out my skills. Not quite up to par with what Heidi (my sister-in-law) makes, but they were good enough for Tony to say he liked them. I thought they were too dry, or burned, its hard to tell sometimes. The treats I decided to make for treat day were Monster Cookies!! I made them once during this last school year and they are forever since my favorite cookie. Once again, Tony (and everyone) said they were delicious, but I thought they were too dry. This weeks quest is nutella cups, little bowls of dough with nutella in the middle of them. About to come out of the oven this very minute. Didn't quite turn out the way I wanted them to, but anything with nutella is bound to be amazing regardless of its current state.

This brings me back to the title. 1/2 Egg. The egg. The limiting ingredient in further dividing the recipe down. I'm not baking for an entire chapter anymore, or a small group, or a family of ten, but I'm baking for two people who would really prefer to maintain, if not shorten, their waistlines, and the egg prevents me from doing just that. I have profoundly discovered that cooking with an apron is very useful. I love being able to not worry about wiping my hands on my clothes, which I would do anyway, so it is just perfect. Now I use it all the time. Well, it is time for me to go. Tony cooked dinner tonight and it is bound to be fabulous. TTFN!

Big Red

A momentous event has occurred in our lives: we have finally obtained a couch!! (and all other furniture that we have wanted to purchase). I was looking for places to buy furniture and I ran across a consignment shop and a few other places. Last Friday we had some errands to run so we decided to check it out. We looked around and didn't see any furniture, but then I noticed a sign that the furniture was downstairs. There was a lot of furniture and a decent amount of couches. We looked around didn't see anything at first, but the second time around in the last row we saw Big Red. Jokingly passed and it and then decided we actually liked it; a nice burst of color to our black and white apartment. No more camp chairs! Now we have a nice, big, red couch!

Two Weeks of Craziness

The constant craziness in our lives has finally stopped! The month of July has been a month of constant stop and go for Tony and I. Here are some of the highlights of the last two weeks.

Michigan Open House

Naomi and I (thanks Naomi!)

After getting back from our honeymoon and unpacking, we traveled across the Midwest to Michigan where Tony's mother had organized an open house at church. It was truly a blessing to not have to organize the event and for that I am eternally grateful. Thanks Mom! While there we had the chance to spend time with the people and Tony grew up with and quality time with some of the Hammond clan. Another blessing was the chance for my parents and my sister, Naomi to be there for the open house. Tony and I had a great time with everyone and enjoyed visiting with everyone. It was really a joy being welcomed and accepted into Tony's immediate, extended and church family. 

Week 2 in Iowa

Tony's first day of work

Tony officially started work on Monday, July 23rd. He spent the week doing basic training for work, while I spent the week finding things to do. I attacked the second bedroom right away and it took me a day to turn it from this:

To this:

 I thought it'd take me a longer time to do this so I had to be creative for the remainder of the week, aka, sit and do a little more organizing, but mostly fall into boredom. However, Thursday I received an email from a professor at the University and arranged a meeting for the following day. She gave me some training to do so that I could start working in one of her research labs in the following weeks. Finally. something to do!!

Natasha and Pat's Wedding

Joanna, Laura, Me, Zach, Pat, Natasha, Paul, Jenna, Michelle
Lisa, Tony, Becky, Adam

The following weekend we took another trip across the Midwest, back to Wisconsin to share in the joy of watching one of my oldest friends marry an incredible man. It was a beautiful ceremony and a wonderful chance to see everyone one last time for the summer. Congratulations Natasha and Pat!!

We then traveled home for the last 4+ hour drive of the month. Not that we don't love all of you, but I think we're all sick of driving for the time being and are going to stay put for quite some time here.

Week 3 in Iowa

This last week involved much less boredom on both mine and Tony's part. While Tony began officially working and was settled into his position, I spent the week biking all over Iowa City and running all over Coralville. Monday, I started the official name changing process with both the government and the school, new social security card, new email address, change name at the bank. So much change, but not a new drivers license due to the DOT (Department of Transportation) being closed. (I biked 3 miles one way only for it to be closed!) I also accomplished most of the training given to me, met with the head of my department to register for classes (done!!), learned more about my fellowship for school, and took out my sewing machine for some relaxing time.

Thursday brought about my birthday. 22!! Not much of a difference. I have come to believe that our age does not make us old, but rather our current stage in life. Being married has made me feel so much older than 18, 21 or 22 has ever felt. Anyway, I had the chance to do mostly nothing on my birthday. It was a wonderful day to which I received two surprises. One: a basket of flowers with balloons was delievered. Thanks Mom and Dad Hammond! Two: Tony arrived home from work with a bouquet of flowers and a bag of candy. Another part of my birthday included Tony making me dinner on Saturday, which was a sweet onion sauce over pasta and chicken with some broccoli. It was very delicious. 

Birthday surprises!

Friday night Tony and I had the chance to get out of the apartment and go see The Dark Knight Rises. We both enjoyed the time together and movie was excellent. It also helps that Tony gets discount tickets to the Marcus Theaters from his work. Thank you Rockwell!

Friday Night Escape

Yesterday, we finalized the name change for me by traveling to the DOT to change over our drivers licenses. Who knew you needed that much documentation to switch over your drivers license. I must say my picture is the worst one yet, but it wouldn't be a true license with a good picture. We then traveled to the library to pick up some library cards. There also happened to be a book sale going on, our weakness, so we ended up buying a pretty large pile of books, to which our bookshelves are now full. 

My pile on the left, Tony's on the right

While at the booksale, there was also a torrential downpour that puddled the streets (yes, puddled is now a word) and I'm pretty sure it caught the ground off guard. However, it was nice to get some rain. I spent the rest of the day reading one of the books I got from the library while Tony cooked dinner. It was truly a nice weekend to just sit and relax.

Moving In

Tony and I started our move to Iowa on July 3rd before the wedding. We packed everything up in a truck and a trailer and took the forever long drive across southern Wisconsin to arrive in Iowa. Once there we arrived, we took a couple of hours to unload, drop everything off in the middle of the living room, put our bed together, drink some nice cold water and get back on the road again to arrive back in Wisconsin a little after midnight.

After our wonderful honeymoon we traveled back to our apartment in Iowa to spend the next week unpacking and getting our apartment ready for living. It looked a little bit like this:

• organize where each box goes
• start unpacking the kitchen
• realize how much basic essentials are needed
• go shopping to return things and buy the essentials
• attack the pile of clothes in our bedroom
• do 5 loads of laundry and put the clothes away
• put all the bathroom stuff in the proper place
• buy shelves for the pantry
• stock the shelves and refrigerator
• unpack all the books and buy bookshelves
• set up the TV and unpack the living room
• place all unpacked boxes in the second bedroom for me to clean out the following week

Here are some of the pictures:

The loaded truck

Everything still in the living room

Unpacking the kitchen

The mess of our bedroom

The boxes in the living room

Measuring out the size of the pantry

Our kitchen table

The rest of the kitchen

The filled pantry

Our bed

Our clothes put away

The bathroom put together

Taking a little break to play some video games

Unpacking the living room boxes

All the boxes pushed into the second bedroom for later

The TV/living room

Our wonderful living room furniture

All complete...for now.