Boston Trip

Last week, Jeremy and I took a trip to Boston. We drove up Wednesday night after we got home from work. We stayed at the Bullfinch hotel. It was a pretty good price for being right in the middle of downtown. They even upgraded up to a suite, one of the ones right at the tip of the building.

 

On Thursday we drove out to Lexington and Concord. Our first stop was the Buckman Tavern. This is the place where all the "minutemen" waited to hear whether the British were coming.

 During the tour here and a bunch more times during the rest of the day, we learned that these men weren't really "minutemen", they were militia. It was kind of funny to Jeremy and I how big of a deal this seemed to be to everyone in Lexington and Concord. After the tavern, we walked part of the Battle road. It was actually really interesting for me to learn about the battle of Lexington and Concord.

 

The fighting continued all along the "battle road" as the British retreated the 15 miles back to Boston. Hundreds of people were killed.  Also in Concord, we went to Walden pond and the cabin site where Thoreau wrote Walden.

 

The area all around Concord was so beautiful. I would absolutely love come back here in the fall. After Walden Pond, we went to Louisa May Alcott's home, Orchard house.

Little women was one of my favorite books growing up and it was really interesting to visit here because the book was largely based on her life and everything in the house is almost exactly how it was when she lived there. Our last stop in Concord was the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery.

 

 

We walked up "author's ridge," where Thoreau, Emerson, and Alcott are all buried. It was a really interesting cemetery. On Friday, we took the subway to Harvard University. We took a tour of the university and learned a few interesting things while we were there. This is the statue of John Harvard.

 

 Supposedly it is good luck to rub his toe. Our guide told us that one of the things every Harvard student has to do before graduation is to pee on the toe. All of the freshman dorms surround this statue and I have no trouble imagining them watching all of the tourists touching the toe and laughing. Needless to say, we did not touch the toe. This is the Widener library.

 

As the story goes, the mother of one of the student's donated the money for the library after her son died on the Titanic. She was convinced that he would have lived if he had been able to swim 50 yards to the lifeboats. One of the conditions of her donation was that in order to graduate, all Havard students would have to be able to swim 50 yards. This rule was in effect until the 70's when the Americans with disabilities act struck it down. Of course, while we were there, for lunch we had to pay a visit to Mr. Bartley's Burger Cottage. The onion rings were delicious!

 

 Later that day we walked around Boston Common, walked down Newbury street, and went to the Boston Museum of Art. On Saturday we walked the Freedom Trail with our friends, the O'Farrels. It was so great to see them again! As we walked through little Italy, we stopped at Mike's Pastry and Modern Pastry.

 

I guess there is a big debate about which is better. Kind of like the debate about Pat's and Gino's in Philly. We got dessert from each. I think the consensus was that Mike's Pastry was better. The specialty in both shops was canoli, which i discovered I really do not like. Give me a cupcake any day. We also visited Paul Revere's house, Faneuil Hall marketplace, the North Church and the battleship USS Constitution.

It was a great trip...good food, good friends and history for the nerdy at heart, couldn't ask for better!

Landscaping Project

Before:

Our lawn was in bad shape upon moving in (in contrast to the house which was in great condition). The above picture is a pretty good indication of what we inherited (with the exception of the marking paint). After drawing up a plan and soliciting a quote to get the work done, I decided that I'd do it myself as a learning project. Scroll to the bottom of the post for the 'after' picture if you want to skip the boring stuff.

I quickly found out why none of the previous plants had done well--our "soil" was actually a combination of rocks and clay. Part of this project was simply amending the soil with compost. Additionally, I wanted to extend the beds around the front, so I started by removing the sod in these areas. If you look closely, you'll be able to spot the elusive wildlife of the Kuhre's front yard.

The next step was to install the stone edging along the perimeter of the sidewalk. This gave the walkway a more 'framed' feel and also allowed me to raise the beds. I set the stone edging in about an inch of sand to minimize future movement. What's the trick to getting your course to start and end in exactly the right spot?--prayer. But seriously, it was difficult to match a multiple of the 6" width of each stone to the various lengths of sidewalks.

After that, I backfilled the areas that were excavated. I don't have a good photo of this, but I actually brought in a couple yards of screened topsoil to raise the beds. The last step involved choosing a few plants that were either native or adapted to life here in Pennsylvania. We ended up going with a couple of blue junipers, a nandina, a holly, and another I can't recall at the moment. Whenever I teach a class about greenbuilding, I always pose the question: "Who watered plants before humans came along?" It may seem like a bizarre question, but even more bizarre is the answer--No one! Water hungry plants aren't good for the water bill, my health, or our local water source.

After:

And there you have it! Melody is planning on planting annuals such as flowers and mums depending on the time of year. The grass even looks better now after some much needed rain. You'll have to visit to get the whole picture--our cherry tree had beautiful blooms this year.

Texas

Melo and I recently spent a week with my family in Texas. We spent half our time in Dallas and half in San Antonio. Still quite busy, so suffice it to add some photos with captions.

The Alamo

The Riverwalk

SeaWorld

World-famous "Pizookie" from BJs

"The Robbery"

We knew the Pizookie was too good to be true, and sure enough, minutes later, we arrived at the rental car which had been robbed. Luckily everything was replaced and everyone is alright! Overall we had a great time and look forward to our next visit.

Valentines Day

Since Christmas, things have been pretty quiet around here. I think this is the time of year that i hate the most: New Years through February...it's just so cold and gray and just gross. The one good thing about the month of February is Valentines day. I've been trying to do a few things to be festive this month. Last week i made red velvet heart shaped whoopie pies with marshmallow frosting. They actually turned out really well. Here is a picture and the link
I got the recipe off of pinterest. Pinterest is my new found obsession. For those of you who have never heard that word, the best way to describe Pinterest is to think back to the days before we had internet and how we used to cut out magazine pictures for outfit inspiration, ideas for hair styles, home decor, crafts, outfits, etc. and pinned them on our push-pin cork boards. Now… imagine doing that but without the magazines and without the cork board...all virtual. It is basically just a website for sharing good ideas. I have found tons of great recipes that I can't wait to try. Here is a link to my boards. Let me know if you want me to send you an invite!
Last night we had an early Valentines day celebration. Jeremy got me some really pretty flowers
and we to dinner at the Melting pot. It had been a long time since either of us had been there and we had a great time. I think the cheese fondue is my favorite. I could eat that stuff all day.
Happy Valentines day!

Christmas with the Kuhres

This year, Jeremy's family flew in from Provo and Texas for Christmas. It was great to have them here. On Christmas Eve, Jer and his family (I had to work) went to the Franklin Institute. They have a lot of really awesome, interactive exhibits there. One of them gives you age enhanced photos of yourself. This is Jeremy at 70 years old.

This picture scares me. Apparently this is best care scenario, without obesity or sun damage...love you Jer. We had fun doing all of our Christmas traditions with Jeremy's family. We went to look at Christmas lights, read the Christmas story, watched a Christmas Carol, and had a yummy Christmas dinner together. I made garlic prime rib, homemade rolls, asparagus and red mashed potatoes (it was the first time I had ever made prime rib and it was actually pretty easy).

On Monday night, Jer's dad took us out to a Italian restaurant in Philadelphia called Vetri. According to a couple of reviews, Vetri is the best Italian restaurant on the east coast. They only have a "grand tasting menu." They just bring you out random plates from the menu. Here is a link.
Some of the more adventurous items we tried were texas antelope, black angus tar tar, and chestnut fettuccine with boar and cocoa. It was quite the experience. Really yummy but I don't think my palette was quite refined enough for some of the items on the menu. We took our Christmas decorations down a couple of days ago and now our house is empty, sad and naked. At least there is Valentines Day to look forward to in a month.

Holiday Time!

It's crazy that it's almost Christmas again. I thought I would catch up with a few pictures that we've taken during this holiday season. We had our friend Sam over and had a nice Thanksgiving at home

I made a caramel apple pie for dessert and I was pretty proud of how it turned out. It was delicious!
It's been really fun having a house to decorate for Christmas this year. The day after Thanksgiving we went out to pick out our tree. They always look so much smaller when they are in the lot...we cut a bit off of it and it ended up looking great!
One of my favorite ornaments from this year...excuse the nudity
Here are a few more pictures of the house decorated for Christmas...
found this cute card holder
We did peppermint cupcakes for our neighbor gifts this year. Last weekend we went to Longwood gardens to see their Christmas display. The theme this year was "gingerbread fantasy." They had a couple of pretty awesome gingerbread replications of the buildings at longwood
all of the windows were made out of sugar, I wanted to poke one really badly! Here are a few more pictures of longwood
Have a wonderful Christmas!

Colonial Williamsburg

Last weekend we took a little mini vacation to Williamsburg, Virginia with my parents. The weather was gorgeous and we had a great time. The first day we visited colonial Williamsburg. In the early 1900's, the historic district of Williamsburg was restored by the Vanderbilt family to look like it did during the revolutionary war. A lot of the buildings are original. It is pretty amazing (we are big history nerds). We went to the reenactment of a trial in the old courthouse, went to the actual jail where blackbeard's pirates were held, and toured the governor's mansion


They also had a bunch of cool reenactments, like when the town was captured in the war by Benedict Arnold. The next day went to the battlefield at Yorktown, where the last battle of the revolutionary war was fought. We went on a pretty great ranger tour of the battlefield (I do love those rangers!). We also went to the original settlement at Jamestown. My family is pretty big into genealogy and family history and while we were there we saw a picture of one of the ancestors on my dad's side, one of my great great (lots of greats) grandfathers, Thomas West the 3rd "Baron de la Warr."
(can't you see the family resemblance?)I didn't know anything about him and I guess he was the first Governor of Virginia and was a big reason that the Jamestown colony didn't fail. Thanks mom and dad for a really fun weekend!