our first christmas tree!!!

Saturday we embarked on quite the Christmas adventure. We started the morning by walking down to our local market. . .not many veggies, but tons of wreaths, swags, greenery, etc. After purchasing our first sprig of mistletoe, we hurried home and hopped in the Jeep to embark on our search for our first Christmas tree. We chose a place that was cheap, but in the middle of nowhere. We're talking miles and miles of unmarked and unpaved roads. Then, all of a sudden, we arrived at this little unpretentious shack on top of a hill. A nice gentleman handed us a saw and a buggy, and we were off! To be honest, most of their trees were pretty barren and unkempt so we wandered through all their fields until we found this beast:


As you can see it is a spruce pine that is over twice the height of Susan Ada. 11 ft to be precise. We currently have 12 ft ceilings and doubt we'll ever have the opportunity to have such a massive tree again, so we went for it! Curt sawed it down and hauled it back to the shack. The boys were barely able to shove it through the baler. They all persevered and loaded up on our Jeep.


So, we're driving home, pleased as punch to find a tree with such character (for only $35), thinking that our day can't get much better. . .when it started snowing!!! Can we say picturesque? We stopped by the Appomattox Court House on our way home. . .because we live in Virginia and there is always a Civil War site handy:


Curt unloaded our tree (at this point, I'm beginning to think we need to name our gentle giant), sawed it off, and got it standing upright in our living room. Susan Ada was quite impressed!! We were still very excited with our find. . .until we pulled out our ornaments. . .all 13 of them. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that is barely 1 ornament per foot of tree. Oh dear. Let the ornament-making frenzy begin!! Susan Ada sprayed loads of pine cone in metallic gold, glittered them, and filled in most of the gaps. Everything's better with a little sparkle.

a free date

Tonight we went on a little holiday excursion. There was an ad in our local magazine for a free brass ensemble and handbell choir Christmas concert at Lynchburg College. We are pretty much always up for a free concert so we decided to give it a try. Welllllll, ya win some and ya lose some. It wasn't terrible, but it was definitely lacking star quality. Our first tip was when the handbell choir began playing The Lion King Suite. . .complete with "Hakuna Matata" and "Can You Feel the Love Tonight?" I am very sorry for this representation, Elton. If you look closely at the brass ensemble on the left you will see the most well-behaved seeing-eye dog. He dozed there the entire time and we enjoyed having him.


Then, a few minutes later the brass ensemble played The Pink Panther. By this point, we had gotten smart and were prepared to make a video. If you make it all the way to the end, notice the french hornist on the far right proceed to take off his jacket and head over to the handbell side of the stage so he could participate with them. Quite professional. We were a little concerned the first time, but by the end of the performance we hardly noticed anymore.



To end the performance, the handbell choir all simultaneously reached under the table to retrieve a Santa hat which they all donned for a lively rendition of "Jingle Bells." They strongly encouraged the audience to sing along, and all 20 of us tried our best, but I don't think we mustered up quite enough enthusiasm for them. However, I must admit, we left with a smile.


The smiles continued when we pulled up to our house and saw. . .you guessed it!. . .a new dress display!! I guess these are their Christmas party ideas:

Had to show off our festive selves:


And we're off to bed. Farewell November. Let the Christmastide joys begin!!

a lynchburg listing. . .

We're behind again, so let's just make a list for efficiency's sake:

1. The ugly dresses downstairs just keep coming. . .

In case you can't tell, those are indeed stripes of solid silver sequins going around a purple mermaid dress with a huge rosette on the right shoulder. We stand amazed.

2. Across the street there is a restaurant called Main Street Eatery. It is owned by a German couple, but we hadn't been because it is quite expensive. However, they had a traditional Oktoberfest menu for most of October and November. It was a bit cheaper than their usual fare and our curiosity finally got the best of us:

Susan Ada ate this. . .really can't remember what it was called. . .Chicken cutlets sauteed with mushrooms and served with cooked cabbage and German dumplings. Delicious!

Curt had Wienerschnitzel. . .basically a fried meat patty served with french fries. Unique, but not quite as tasty.


3. Curt bought Susan Ada birds for her birthday!! She saw zebra finches on our honeymoon and had been begging for them ever since. The night of her birthday we went to the store to buy them, but they had another kind of finch (Orange Waxbill) that had been bullied and were missing some feathers so they were giving them away for free. Sooooo, we got all 3 and brought them home. So far their names are Cheeky, Molty, and Ollie. . .but those are subject to change at Susan Ada's whim. Here is Cheeky (and that's Molty fearing for his life in the back. . .they're a little flighty):

They have red tail feathers:


4. Curt's parents came to visit us. They were our first guests and we really enjoyed having folks to come stay in our home. We wandered around town, went to the local globe museum, relaxed, and ate yummy food. While they were here we cooked our first pumpkin of the year. . .and roasted the seeds. Delicious!


5. We went to visit our babies in Greenville, SC. Kate informed us today that she turned 4 1/2 yesterday. My goodness, the milestones. We had a blast with them and enjoyed raking leaves, helping them carve their pumpkins, and spending all weekend playing.



6. We got new neighbors so now when we open our apartment door this is what we see:


Yes, that is indeed a plastic rat in the bottom right corner. . .

We don't exactly share similar tastes in decor. Yippy. Perhaps this will just give us something else to blog about come Christmas.

7. Curt got to visit his first nuclear power plant for work! Let's just say he had to take a few precautionary measures:


8. Someday you are going to believe us. There really is an unlimited supply of these things:

Just to be clear, that is a layer of pink tulle upon layer of yellow tulle upon layer of blue tulle with a pastel 80's print bodice, sparkle boobs, and a very large flower on the hip. And with that, we must leave you. Hope the nightmares are bearable.

Happy Thanksgiving!!

getting behind so soon. . .

We have been up to lots of fun things in the past few weeks. . .we just haven't taken the time to write about them. Two weekends ago we went to the Sheek's mountain place to pick apples from their orchard so we could make fresh cider! Before we get to that, however, we want to show you just what it looks like for us to load up our car for a weekend trip. Our loft has this rinky-dink shopping cart that everyone uses when they have big loads to take upstairs/downstairs. We often try to fit our entire weekend on one cartload so we can get on the road more quickly. That said, here is Curt. . .


When we got to the orchard, Curt miraculously transformed into a monkey. It was quite alarming. Even Steve commented that Curt didn't leave a single apple on the trees when he was done with them.


Pretty apples!! I think we had 11 of these crates plus a huge washbin full of apples!!


Now, it's time to make fresh apple cider! The loveliest assistants washing away all the dirt:


First, you turn a crank to grind up all the apples into mush - skin, cores, and all. Don't be fooled. . .that cranking is WAY harder than it looks!!


Then, you slide the barrel of apple mush to the end of the trough and crank down a lid that squeezes all the juice out. And that's how it's done. . .there is nothing like sticking a cup in that fresh stream of golden goodness. You can either can the juice or freeze it and it will keep all year!


Apparently we were too distracted drinking the delicious cider to take any pictures of us enjoying it. Know that we drank way more than we should have and are still enjoying it now. This past weekend we went to a pumpkin-carving party hosted by one of Curt's co-workers. We enjoyed getting outside and meeting some new people. Curt scooped out all the slimies!!


Basically, we took a screwdriver to the poor pumpkin and wreaked havoc. It's actually quite pretty when it's lit. Maybe next year we do the entire thing with only a screwdriver. . .


Sunday we drove out to the Parkway with some friends and hiked Sharptop Mountain. The trail was quite crowded and steep, but the 360 degree views at the top were worth fighting the masses. That's about it. Although, I think we just may have another adventure in the very near future. . .

an early birthday treat!

I have been wanting to take Curt to Boone for many months. I spent 4 fabulous years there for undergrad and it is still relaxing to go back to those mountains. So Curt, ever my sweetie, took me camping in the High Country for my birthday. We left Friday morning and drove straight to Julian Price Park so we could set up camp. Then we strolled around Blowing Rock for the afternoon and ate dinner at Storie Street Grille (while we were still clean) - one of my favorite restaurants. Saturday morning was quite chilly so we purchased hot drinks to enjoy while going to Art in the Park - a summer/fall monthly art festival in Blowing Rock. Then we had waffle cones of pumpkin ice cream from Kilwin's for lunch and headed to Boone. We had a great time wandering around King Street, Howard's Knob, and ASU campus. That evening we had Bonzai burgers at Murphy's. . .can you tell I really just wanted to go the mountains so I could eat loads of yummy food?? By Sunday morning we were feeling all that yumminess and decided to get some exercise. We packed up and drove down the Blue Ridge Parkway so Curt could see the viaduct. I had heard there was a trail underneath it, but had never hiked it. We decided to try it out and it was beautiful!! Here you can see the bridge as it curves around the mountain:


Susan Ada getting attacked by the ferocious, and large, tree roots:


Signing off another great weekend (even if we are 3 days dirty):

crazy weekend

This weekend was a whirlwind! Friday night we drove to Susan Ada's family mountain place. That was the first time we had done the drive from Lynchburg - 3 1/2 hours and it was quite pretty. Here is a current pic. . .the stone is well under way!


Saturday we spent the day painting cedar shakes (the green part above) for the new house. One person sprayed, two people painted with brushes, and one person carried and mixed paint. It was quite a job, but definitely needed to be done. Curt forgot his crappy shoes, so here he is all geared up:

And the boys working hard. This is Steve's "house-workin' uniform." He has an endless supply of these beauties. I'm assuming nobody fought him for them at work.


We were pooped afterwards. Note the 11 empty paint cans. . .

Still smiling (and very green)!


While the boys cleaned up, Susan Ada and her mom went over to a friend's house that had grown them some pumpkins. Yay for lots of free home grown punkins!!! That evening we drove down to Charlotte and stayed with Jon in his new house. . .so that Sunday we could go to the Panthers game!! Gotta love those Panthers even if it was rainy and they played terribly. . .I might have made a new tacky teal sparkle scarf for the gloomy day:


We finished it off with some Bojangles and headed back to start our week. A very good first weekend of fall.

happy fall!!

That's really all I wanted to say. I love fall and am really glad it's here. . .now if only the weather would get the memo. We Hamiltons celebrated with pumpkin waffles for breakfast! One of the best things about Curt going to work so early is that we get to watch the sunrise most everyday. Wow. Here is this morning's:

Now, let us eat pumpkin!! Yahoooooo!!!!!

our last summer weekend. . .

Curt's job operates on flex time which means he gets every other Friday off. . .this is awesome!! Thursday night when he got home from work I had the car all packed and we drove to the Blue Ridge Parkway for our first camping trip(lett). It was so fun to spend the night in the woods, and then have a lazy day on Friday. We stopped in Bedford on the way home. Nothing much happening there, but we ate some good fish - gotta get those Omega 3's. Saturday was jam-packed. We started the day by walking to the farmers' market - a weekly must for us. We get all our fruits and veggies for the week. Then we went to a huge art show on the grounds of the high school:

We were very surprised at the amount and high quality of the art for sale. Definitely fun to look at everything. While we were there, Curt discovered this ginormous tree in the middle of the field. He was pretty excited about it. . .


Then we went home for a quick lunch and it was time for our afternoon adventure. . .the Lynchburg Beer and Wine Festival. We were excited about this because it was downtown and we could walk. . .and we hoped to learn about some tasty local wineries. The newspaper said there were approximately 8000 folks in attendance. . .quite a showing for our little 'burg.' We tasted a lot of bad wine - Sweet Blackberry - seriously? We should have known better. Thankfully, there were a few good ones in the mix. It was fun nonetheless and we ran into all 2 of our local friends. Yay!


You can also see the huge fountain in the background of the above picture. Somebody thought the James River needed a fountain to shoot very high. . .the Hamiltons are divided on just how high. . .Susan Ada votes 40 ft, Curt votes 100 ft. You'll just have to come visit and decide for yourself. Curt uses it to determine which way the wind is blowing every morning on his way to work. I'm sure you will hear more about the fountain in the future. And, finally, the happy couple. . .cheers to a fun weekend in Lynchburg! And cheers to baby Finnegan!! We are so happy for the Robinson's new addition!

the last straw

So, we just got married and moved to Lynchburg, Virginia. I am quite certain that getting married and moving to new places each come with their own stories to tell. However, we've been wondering if our combination was particularly entertaining. . .we were quite sure, but this sealed the deal:


We live in a loft downtown, and this is the storefront directly by our "front" door. They change these dresses at least once a week and they are always just as hideous, I mean special, as these. For serious?? Thus, we begin our blog. . .