Barrister's Ball

On Saturday night the Law School had their Barrister's Ball. We enjoyed a nice dinner of chicken and seafood. We sat at a table with several people that Darrin studies with. It was nice to be able to put faces with names that I hear all of the time. We talked to professors and listened to a presentation honoring the Dean of the Law School that is stepping down in June to become a Professor.

We left shortly after the "Ball" began. We decided that we didn't need to be in the environment any longer. We did have an enjoyable evening. It was fun to get all dressed up and spend the night with my prince charming!

Dairy Queen

A few nights ago I was craving a Blizzard and fries from Dairy Queen. We were out running errands so we decided to grab one on the way home. We followed our GPS to Dairy Queen and found out that they are only opened for "the season" in Ohio.
Well, tonight for our date night we set out on another Ohio Adventure and found a Dairy Queen that was open! It was just down the street from us. Unfortunately they didn't have fries but we did get our mini Blizzards! It was delicious!

Art Projects

Here are a few pictures of art projects that I have done with my students. 

Painting with Chalk. We dipped chalk into white paint and pretended the chalk was a paint brush. This made it so the chalk would stay on the paper and not rub off. The kids loved it!

This was one of my favorite projects but we had paper everywhere! I had a whole bunch of shredded paper at my house so I decided it would be fun to make snowmen with it. I think the kids did a great job on them!

Saturday Adventures

Our Saturday was full of adventures. We left our little apartment and headed for Columbus to do a temple session. About ten minutes into the drive our check engine light came on. We drove to the temple and did a session. We had a wonderful time in the temple and are so glad to have that in our lives.

After the temple we went to the Costco in Columbus. Darrin has been dying to go to Costco so we decided to just stop while we were up there. We got to Costco 10 minutes before they closed so our shopping trip was very rushed. (our check engine light was still on). 

We loaded our groceries and headed for Newark Ohio. It was about a 45 minute drive from Costco. My sister Lizzy found a "Picnic Basket office building" and she told us we had to go find it. So, we set out to find this picnic basket. We found it on main street in Newark.  It was definitely a site to see.  We don't know the story behind it but we are going to go back during the day sometime for a tour. (We also need better pictures. They didn't have it lit up very well so the pictures are not good).

On our way home from the picnic basket, our check engine light went off (a blessing from attending the temple). We also saw a car engulfed in flames on the side of the freeway. The firemen were just getting there as were drove past.

We were grateful to be back home after our little Saturday adventure!

Christmas Break

Darrin and I started a new tradition this year. We thought it would be fun to have a candle light dinner the night we slept under our Christmas Tree. We had a delicious Apricot Chicken dinner and then slept under our tree (a tradition that my family has done for years). 

 

We enjoyed a great Christmas together in our little apartment. We talked to Elder Welch and then headed to Kentucky to spend time with family. 

During the break we went to  "The Greene" (an outdoor mall like the Gateway) and took a carriage ride. It was a lot of fun but it was FREEZING cold! 

We also enjoyed some time in Michigan for New Years. We enjoyed our 2 weeks off of school together and are now looking forward to what the New Year has in store for us. It started off with Darrin starting his second semester of Law School and Nikki becoming a second grade teacher.

Snow Day!

 
Living in Ohio allows us to experience Snow Days. I get a phone call about 5:30 in the morning saying school has been delayed for 2 hours. About 8:00 I get another phone call saying school is closed for the day. We had two snow days last week. Darrin and I decided to venture out in the "heavy storm" and go for a walk to the park across the street to see the Christmas lights. We had a whole 2 inches of snow on the ground (it was freezing cold though)!!
Snow days are wonderful when you are a teacher!

Gingerbread Houses!

Every year my mom makes hundreds of gingerbread houses (well maybe not hundreds but she makes a lot). We always have families over to decorate them. This is one of my favorite Christmas traditions so I thought I would give it a try and start it out here in Ohio. I made 7 houses and they all stayed standing! :)

We had families over two different nights to decorate. We had a great time with our friends. We feel so blessed to have such great friends out here. It sure makes it a lot easier to be away from family.

Our gingerbread house this year has a dog named Clifford and a dog house with a food and water dish. Darrin also added a porch over our front door, we have an igloo in the back and Santa's face on the side.