Thursday, December 31, 2009

Tournement of Roses Parade

Connie will be skating around the Sierra Madre float tomorrow in the tournement of roses parade. Tune in to check her out. Happy New Year everyone!

Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Flaming Orange


We made it back from Montana very early Tuesday morning (1:15 AM) after delays at both airports for de-icing the plane. Here's a picture of Darryl about to eat the dessert he ordered at Chico Hot Springs. After dinner we went swimming outside in the hot springs pool, floated on our backs and watched the snow fall, and Lynn started a minor snowball fight.


Monday, December 28, 2009

solo concert

Can you name this tune?

Sunday, December 27, 2009

spencer kreitzer

These are videos of our fun time last week . Caryn got him this cool bike he rode all day. Too much snow to take it outside. He's quite the singer and apparently quite vocal but shy in crowds.
Wishing you all a happy new year! Thanks for all your support this year.
scott

biking

spencer singing

spencer singing

spencer kreitzer

Arizona Christmas


Happy, Holidays, family!

Well, I have no pictures of snow to show you, just this one of me and the girls in front of our fruitful orange tree in the wonderful sunshine! Despite the great sunshine, it did not beat out of me a nasty cold I have had for a week. And now two days of laryngitis! Oh, well, what you gonna do?


I hope everyone had a nice Christmas and best wishes for a happy and healthy 2010!

Love, Michelle

Monday, December 21, 2009

Snowbomanation


Yeah we got hit hard. I don't know what the official count is but over 18 inches seems like a fair estimate but as you can see from the pictures cumulative effect went over where the concrete and brick meet in my back yard so that means that there is over 4 feet of snow back there. It's basically a big ice box. I can't open the back door all the way.
I shoveled for about 4 hours yesterday and had to cancel a gig in Harrisburg. Still at work at a normal time on Monday morning which really sucks but the weekend was fun. This stuff will be here the rest of the winter though which is really a bummer. We're expecting more on Christmas day so there will definitely be a white Christmas.

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

We make beer here!



Last year for Christmas, I bought Connie a homebrew kit and in 365 days she's made a lot of beer. She's made an IPA, Irish Red Ale, Fat Tire Ripoff, Belgium Seasonal and on Sunday she tapped her first keg of beer - a Strawberry Blonde. That's right a five gallon keg. For her birthday we got a kegerator that sits in our living room. (A kegerator is a mini-fridge that has a tap which hooks to a C02 tank and a party keg. It is like having a mini bar in your house) Since the bottling process takes a lot of time, I asked if the next logical step would be to keg the beer.

With the arrival of the kegerator I thought it would be fun to get a customizable tap and name Connie's beer. We named her company the LA River Brewing Company (if anyone knows LA- they know that the river is just a giant storm drain and disgusting - thought it was a funny inside joke) Here is a picture of Connie pouring from the tap into an amazing pint glass Dad had made for us.



We started talking about what it would take to open a small microbrewery or brewpub in LA. Compared to most cities LA is really lacking, they only have 3 craft breweries. Right now we are in the research phase- sounds like there may be many reasons as to why that is so. We will start attending a women brewers club in January and try to learn from those who have more experience. It has been fun finding a hobby that Connie really enjoys and I get to participate in too. But the best part is sharing the end result with our friends and family.

Sunday, December 13, 2009

A new Hollin Baby


The Hollin family welcomed a sixth grandchild this week! Little Jonja' Theodore Hollin was born prematurely on Dec. 8th. He weighed in at only 4 lbs. 11 oz., but both mom (Liz) and son are doing well.

Tuesday, December 8, 2009

We are cold!



Okay, so no we don't have snow like Reno. And maybe it was only in the low 40's high 30's last night, but that is cold for LA. Also our heater is broken and the guy won't come and fix it till the 17th. So we are cold. I come to work to thaw. I love this picture, our cats follow our little space heater room to room- I'm sure they are jealous of this guy.

Snow in Reno

The storm came through and definitely left Reno with snow and cold weather. The University even closed yesterday so I had a snow day. We got about 8" at our house and I charted -16 degrees as a low on the drive to work this morning. Took forever to get in to work and we'll see if I can get out of my parking spot at the end of the day today!


These pictures are of yesterday from the local newspaper, the Reno Gazette Journal, www.RGJ.com. The Reno arch downtown and Manzanita Lake, the little lake on campus just across from our office. (I took a few at our house too, but don't have them loaded up yet.)

The cold isn't suppose to let up and we might get more snow over the next few days. Winter -- yep, it's officially here!

Monday, December 7, 2009

Jock stories from Houston

Gee. The only jock stories we have are about Darryl swearing at the football games on TV while he is reclining in his chair.

Guest Coach @ Women's Basketball Game


Last Friday, I had the great opportunity to hang out most of the day with the ASU Women's Basketball team. I had been selected (along with Barrett professor, Dr. Diane Facinelli) to be aguest coach at the Barrett Night. The women's team has two freshmen (Joy Burke and Deja Mann) who are in Barrett.


It was an intense experience, but so glad I had the chance to experience collegiate sports, even if only for a few hours. I had lunch with the team, then hung out with them pre-game, at halftime and after game. Something I won't forget for a long time.... Keep tabs of our team by visiting www.thesundevils.com.

Tough Cookies win Champs (Again!)


Photo by Rinkrat
Saturday night, the Tough Cookies took the track to defend our Championship title. It was a matchup against The Swarm, the new team from San Diego added this year. In our regular season game three weeks ago, they beat us, but it was a close game and we felt that we knew what we had to do to win the second time around. And we did! They never led the game, only tying it in the third period. I am beyond excited and so proud of my team - back to back season championships!!



The epic bout intro!

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

On Wheel of Fortune tonight, one of the puzzles was a movie title. After only a few letters had been turned over, Darryl knew it was "Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs", long before the contestant knew. Unfortunately, he didn't win any cash, trips or other prizes.

And speaking of "cloudy with a chance of.....", we had about 1.5 inches of rain yesterday, clouds all day today and more rain coming Friday morning with the temperature dropping throughout the day and a chance of snow about the time the kids leave school. Now that's big news for Houston!