tricked. treated.

here is my favorite halloween story.

when i was on my mission, i served in the eniwa branch. the eniwa branch put on a big halloween party every year. and, for being in japan where halloween is not really a thing, it was a pretty great halloween party. and every year for the past 10 years they had been decorating the church gym with a banner that said, "happy helloween."

so amazing.

usually, as has been well documented, i actually hate halloween. you might say that to me it is "hell-oween." but, this year we sort of got into it.

for starters we put out pumpkins on the front stoop. we didn't bother carving them but that turned out to be just as well because the squirrels gnawed big chunks out of them and did our work for us.

then we went to the ward halloween party (no offending banner, alas) and AWD even baked a pan of corn bread to contribute. luckily we were really late and only half of it got eaten because it was delicious.

on saturday, my company hosted a carnival for the surviving family members of service members who have died on active duty. AWD and i volunteered to be clowns. (correction: i volunteered us to be clowns.) it was about a 5o/5o split between kids who loved us and kids who ran away. we are counting it as a success.

and tonight we are sitting home, willing trick-or-treaters to come and take this candy off our hands, watching "it's the great pumpkin charlie brown" and having a grand old time.

happy halloween!

fall fell fool

today i read this article, about how global climate change could put an end to the gorgeous fall colors of the northeast.

i hope with all my heart that this is not true.

that is all.

half yearly

yesterday marked six months since briana died.

it feels like a lifetime.

i don't think about it all the time, like i thought i might. but i also never forget about it either. especially not when i really need to call her up and ask her something.

i miss her terribly.

sometimes i cry when i think about her or talk about her. and sometimes i don't.

i find that i am a much more nervous driver. it seems equally preposterous and reasonable that that is one thing that has stuck with me more than almost any other.

i am not sad. or rather, i should say that i am not sad for her. sometimes i feel pretty sad for me, though.

a day or two after briana died my then future father-in-law called and he told me this. he said that he really believed that when faith and love-filled people like briana die, whatever the circumstances are, when they get to the other side they are not sad or disappointed. they don't feel robbed or cheated, even though those of us left on earth might. instead, they see things wholly and clearly and they understand that the arc of their life is complete.

i have come to feel that this is probably true. and i would add that then they get the work on the other side. if i have felt anything over these past few (can it really only be six? so many and yet so few) months, it is that bri is busier than ever. and i think that if i could talk to her again, she would tell me not to worry about her and to get busy, too.

the thing is, i never do worry about her. i worry about me, about all of us left here. but i suspect she would tell me to knock that off as well. there is, after all, plenty of goodness and work to go around, no matter where you are.

and so, to mark the occasion, i made a batch of lemon bars (her favorite) and thought about how much i love her and all the things we'll have to talk about when i see her again.

on an unrelated note, except that it also happened yesterday, AWD and i made homemade corn dogs and oven fries for dinner last night and it was the most delicious thing. we high-fived about it, we were so proud of ourselves.

i can't decide if briana would have thought homemade corn dogs were a little bit gross or a little bit awesome. but that's OK. i'll just have to ask her about it later, i guess.

brandon, you're a star

some of you may recall my close and personal encounter with the killers, which, though a while ago now, is still one of my chief cool kid cards.

so, given my close and personal relationship with the band, you can imagine my delight when this video of my homeboy brandon flowers, sharing his belief in mormonism with the entire internet world surfaced. maybe you've seen it already?

if not, check it.

way to go brandon! way to go mormons!

hustle, bus(tle)

i made the quickest of quick trips to new york this weekend (as in, left d.c. at 6:30a.m. and left manhattan at 7p.m.) for ck's baby shower.

i didn't take a single picture so you'll just have to trust me that my new hot curler hair-do looked pretty cute, and that ck's baby bump is adorable. guess you had to be there.

when i was at crafty bastards a few weeks ago there were millions (exaggeration) of darling baby things and i actually thought to myself, "too bad i don't know anyone who is about to have a baby."

hello?!? duh.

but, i recovered with a little package of my favorite books for mama and the little lady, including "make way for ducklings," "blueberries for sal" and several installments of frances the badger. because, you know, i like to force my way into the consciousness of babies as early as possible.

after the shower ck and i took a walk around her neighborhood, reveling in the stunning fall weather and the good fortune our lives have been filled with lately. we also saw julia stiles and mariska hargitay. so there's that.

i got a shake shack burger on the way back to the apartment, and then i was off.

when i got home, AWD had already watched a whole season of "battlestar galactica" (dreamy!) so it was a pretty productive day all around.

i love me a friday.

happy friday, my babies! even with a short week, friday seems like it's been a long time coming. and boy, am i happy it is here.

ever since we went to truckeroo, AWD has been craving another lobster roll, so we decided to make our friday night date night a trip to luke's lobster (for him) followed by a screening of "real steel" (for me). what can i say? if the review says it's everything a seven-year-old could want out of a robot movie, i'm sold.

hoping all your seven-year-old dreams come true this weekend, too.

falling slowly

one stop on our wedding tour extravaganza was twin falls, idaho, where we visited my dad's side of the family and, on one particularly lovely morning, took a walk down to shoshone falls.

it was basically impossible to keep up with my grandma, but the rainbow at the end was worth it.

mid week end

wednesday sure comes quickly when monday is another saturday and tuesday is like a monday and there you have it and here we are.

we had a lovely long weekend. it went down like this.

stop 1. winchester, virginia, for our fourth and final wedding reception. AWD's family put on a beautiful party at the handley library, a totally rad historic building (with a rotunda!) that also happens to be my mother-in-law's place of work. we had a great evening.

stop 2. charlottesville, virginia, where we explored the downtown mall via the funky warehouse district, and ate bodo's bagels (virginia famous!) for breakfast, the virginian (longest continuously running restaurant in charlottesville!) for lunch, and the local (nothing to say here except that it was delicious!) for dinner. we also strolled around the UVA campus, including a tour of the rotunda, aka: thomas jefferson's temple of the mind.

stop 3. louisa, virginia, for paul and kyle's wedding, during which we enjoyed ourselves immensely, but during which we did not take a single photo. it was mostly a delight to attend a wedding that was not our own, so it didn't even matter if anything went wrong, which i don't think it did anyway.

stop 4. montpelier, lifetime home of james madison, father of the constitution. the house was just rescued from the clutches of the dupont family and underwent a major restoration that only ended a few years ago, so i would classify it as a work in progress. but standing in the room where the constitution was conceived is never a dull thing, and the grounds were lovely. AWD and i decided that we are sort of like james and dolley madison, he shy and brilliant, she social and stylish. (i bet you can see it, too, right?) i loved thinking of the great and deep friendship between madison and jefferson, and was totally jealous to learn that madison spoke seven languages fluently.

stop 5. home, where we are settling back in to our married life routine. so far, we really like it.

welcome, long weekend. we're glad to see you.

happy friday, my babies!

i started the weekend last night with a gorgeous walk across the key bridge to georgetown for shopping at anthropologie with EH (our favorite) followed by a frozen hot chocolate at serendipity (our second favorite).

when i got home AWD had taken out the garbage, washed the dishes, hooked up my new printer and fixed the furnace. winning!

today we are heading down to winchester for our fourth and final wedding celebration (yep, still going!) and then we're spending the rest of the long weekend in charlottesville. i hope a really good bagel and a plantation tour are in our near future.

have a wonderful fall weekend!

fallen

when we woke up on saturday morning, it was fall.

just like that.

the sky was gray, the air was crisp and clean and not bogged down with the weight of sweaty humidity, and everyone outside was wearing hats and scarves and boots.

it was wonderful.

fall has long been my favorite season. i always feel such a rush of anticipation in the fall. it makes me want to warm my home, to nestle in, to make it organized and pretty and safe and comforting and lovely so i can retreat there with a happy heart all winter long.

to me, fall feels like starting over.

i was born in the fall.

i left for college and started my life as an adult in the fall.

i left on my mission in the fall.

i fell in love in the fall.

i was married in the fall.

i love the fall.

so, while AWD was away earlier this week i made a new fall wreath and put together a little fall centerpiece and baked up the rest of my pumpkin-chocolate chip-oatmeal cookie dough. i cracked open my sweater box in the basement. i wore a pair of boots.

last night we made a big batch of bri's caramel recipe (sure wish i could have called her to ask if it was supposed to boil that much, but it looks like it came out all right so i think it was fine) and poured the extra over some perfectly ripe pears.

did i already say i love the fall?

because i do.

peek-a-photo

since i won't be seeing AWD's face until tomorrow, i decided to put it on the blog today. and lucky for you, because that means another wedding photo sneak peek, this one shot by kirstin roper (who we loved, loved, LOVED!) before our reception in salt lake.




man, i could live that day every day for the rest of my life.