Plants and Decor

From A:

Yesterday was the first hot day in Gainesville this year.  Inspired by the warmer weather, we cleared out the dead plants on our front porch and replaced them with new ones:

Left to right they are: Mexican Heather, Jade, Mini Tomato, and Boxwood Basil.  Keep your fingers crossed that I don't kill them off too fast!

We also got this awesome new lamp for our condo:

Just kidding!  That lamp was part of the staging decor at one of the homes we toured.  It was so incredibly ugly that we just HAD to take a picture.  We also saw a familiar face in one of the picture frames on a dresser in a home we toured:

Did you recognize her?  That's right, it's Nigella Lawson from the TV Food Network, host of "Nigella Feasts" and "Nigella Express."  I'm pretty sure she doesn't live in the home we toured, but I can't be sure.

Yesterday afternoon we finished the last half of the Parade of Homes.  There were a few disappointing homes with terrible layouts, but several were very nice.  Our favorite was a 2-story with just under 2000 square feet.  It had a great design for the living area on the first floor and had two good sized bedrooms on the second floor:

Engineering Banquet

From A:

Last night was the Spring Banquet for J's engineering department.  After going through nearly every dress I own in pursuit of the perfect one, I finally decided to wear this:

Highlights of the banquet included:

1. The first ever poster session.  Each group in the department presented one of their ongoing projects during a pre-dinner poster session.

2. The guest speaker, a departmental graduate who now owns a very successful solar energy company in Silicon Valley, recounted some of the nice things his research adviser did for him while he was a PhD student.  This included loaning him money to pay for his wife's medical bills after the birth of their first child, helping him work on his car to install new brakes, and taking him boating for the first time.  It was a very touching speech.

3. NFL Draft updates about whether Tebow had been drafted yet.  As it turns out, he was drafted about an hour after the banquet ended.  And it was great to see.  Go Broncos!

4. The desserts!  The best desserts were definitely the mini strawberry shortcakes and the gator cookies:

Photo Sneak Peek #3

From A:

Here's the final installment of sneak peeks until we get all the photo shoot images from our photographer.  Enjoy!

Photo Sneak Peek #2

From A:

Here are a few more samples from our photographer.  Now that I've seen the samples I can't wait to get all the images!

Yes, this is in the laundry room of Hume Hall, the dorm where we met in college.

Photo Sneak Peek #1

From A:

J and I took advantage of the beautiful UF campus to take some anniversary photos (our 1 year anniversary is in less than 2 months!).

Here are a few of the samples we've gotten from the photographer.  More samples to come for upcoming blog posts, plus many more once we get the DVD with all the images.

Busy Weekend!

From A:

J and I had surprisingly busy weekend, but a great one!  Here's what we did:

Saturday afternoon: Went to a pool party with a bunch of J's PhD program friends.  It was a farewell get-together for one of the guys in the program who will be working in Germany this summer.  It was a beautiful day to us since there was a good amount of cloud cover.  Others seeking tans were disappointed, but we pale, pasty people enjoyed the lack of sun.  Here's a photo of the guy leaving for Germany which made me laugh (Note: this photo includes much Photoshop work; as in, it's his head added to a photo from Jersey Shore):

Saturday evening: J's friend Jeff and his girlfriend Lisa were visiting from south Florida.  We had them over for dinner and made turkey burritos and nachos.  Here's photo evidence that J was eating chips prior to dinner:

We also pulled out the Rummikub game we got for Christmas and played a few rounds.  I'd love to say that I won a round, but I didn't.  Oh well, it was still a fun time getting together and catching up.

Sunday morning: Jeff and Lisa came over for breakfast.  J and Jeff had egg bagel sandwiches, while Lisa and I made waffles.  While the guys went to the gym to do strength training and play racquetball, Lisa and I watched home decorating shows that our men don't enjoy watching with us.

Sunday afternoon: J and I went to the Parade of Homes around the area.  We made it through half of the subdivisions today and plan to see the other half next weekend.  We saw some amazing homes, the most expensive being upwards of $850K:

We also saw a few homes that were really overpriced, some with super weird layouts, and a smaller one that we both agreed had a very smart, usable layout:

It was great seeing the homes we toured today and I'm looking forward to seeing the rest next weekend!