New Challenge 56/365

Tyler attended a proof reading seminar during the day yesterday and it just happened to be near my work. It was nice getting to meet up for lunch before he headed out to Ohio in the afternoon. After work, I headed home and stopped by the grocery store on my way. It was during my drive home that I discovered this new challenge to our Project 365...daylight savings time! I love that we get more light in the morning, but the sun was setting behind the trees between 5 and 6pm. This means no outside shooting after work. We are going to have to get creative!

About Time 55/365

We figured it out last night...we have been trying to get together with Brent and Amy for about 3 months now! I see them each month at our leadership group meetings and Amy and I got together last month while both Tyler and Brent were out of town. But between everyone's crazy schedules during the past few months, we have not been able to get all four of us together since early August. FINALLY, last night, we met for dinner at Alexander Michael's. And thank goodness we made this work. Brent landed in Charlotte at 7:15 and headed straight over to meet us at dinner, while Tyler leaves today for Ohio for the next 3 days. And our schedules don't slow down after that! We had less than a 24 hour window and just had to jump at the opportunity. We had a yummy dinner and enjoyed finally getting all caught up. What a great way to end a Monday :)

Saving your Spot 54/365

We slept until 9 on Sunday morning and definitely enjoyed that extra hour of sleep! We met up with Drew, Lindsey, Jordan and Laura at Jim and Milt's and enjoyed a tasty breakfast before heading back to Charlotte. We got on the road and with our alternating driving and sleeping (Tyler definitely did more driving and I probably did a little more sleeping), we made it back home in about 8 hours. We walked in the door to an excited pup and just had to smile when we saw where she had been sleeping all weekend. We got a new blanket recently and we have a soft and heavier blanket underneath for winter. Apparently, Tess much prefers the soft blanket as she destroyed our nicely made bed to create a sleeping nest for herself. She pushed all of the pillows around and must have cozied up to stay warm. She is always so good when we are gone, if this is the worst we ever come home to...we will happily take it!

The other thing we were welcomed with when we got home...fallen leaves on the deck. Looks like fall is starting to turn into winter...

F-L-O-R-I-D-A S-T-A-T-E 53/365

Boy did 6:55am come early on Saturday morning! The football game was at noon which meant that tailgating would commence at 8am. We all got ready and loaded up our tailgate bandwagon of four cars. We unloaded at the field and started setting up. Our faithful leader Schoonie led the way and before we knew it we had a breakfast burrito station set up with mimosas and bloody marys flowing into cups. We enjoyed cornhole and catching up and we even had a Michael Jackson sighting :) Dark cloud and drizzles had been teasing us all morning and right as the game was beginning there was a HUGE downpour. We all headed into the stadium to enjoy the game on what turned out to be a pretty Tallahassee day after that. We had tickets all over the stadium, but after scouting out plenty of open seats in the endzone, we all moved to watch the second half together. There were several fun pictures that captured the day, but this one from the game turned out to be my favorite.

Enjoying the tailgate!

A little FSU cornhole :)
Hanging with the boys

Matt and I talked cameras during the day. He let me play with some of the different lenses he had in his bag. It made me even more excited to start my photography class this coming Wednesday.

Neal asked for a solo shot....can't wait to have him back in Charlotte when FSU plays Wake!

Brooke and her belly are SO beautiful! It's hard to believe baby Jack will be here so soon!

Always being silly...

The sweet wives...

It had been a long day and we were only half way through it after the game. Luckily, we walked away with a win and after a quick nap everyone geared back up for the night ahead.

We headed to dinner at the Schoonover's house and after yummy ziti and some wii, it was back into costume for our last night in town. By the end of the night we had met back up with our favorite after hours duo, Jules and Peyton, and finally called it a night as we looked forward to sleeping in AND an extra hour of sleep. Daylight Savings Time could not have come on a better day!

Heck of a Homecoming 52/365

We had two choices on Friday morning when leaving Atlanta. We could get up VERY early and beat the morning traffic, or we could sleep in and wait until everyone was at work. We decided to get up and head out at 6:30am so we could get to Tallahassee in time for the Homecoming Parade. We continued our counting of water towers from our short drive the night before, and much to my sadness, Tyler's guess was closest to the actual number of towers spotted on our journey (36 in case you were wondering). As a side note, we were very impressed with the number of water towers that find home in South Carolina. We were spotting them every few miles!

We arrived in Tallahassee around 11:30 and dropped our stuff at Mike's, where we were staying for the weekend. We got changed for the Florida sun and headed over to campus. We walked through the Tri Delta house before the parade and enjoyed seeing the house mom and meeting some of the girls. We watched the parade in front of Painted Lady and enjoyed being back on campus for a beautiful afternoon!

After the parade we went to visit the Phi Delt house. We walked through and met some of the active brothers. It was fun seeing some new additions to the house and smiling at the things that will probably never change. We headed back to Mike's for a quick change into our Halloween costumes (a pirate and his treasure chest) for the BOOster Bash. We had a blast dancing to the 70's cover band and then, against our better judgement, we headed out to midtown. We did enjoy a visit from one of our favorite Tallahassee residents and her friend. We haven't seen Julia since our wedding and we loved meeting Peyton and can't wait until she visits us in Charlotte later this year!

Peyton was sweet enough to laugh at all of Tyler's ARRRGH jokes :)

Halloween Home 51/365

On Thursday, we counted down until we could get on the road to Atlanta. To help break up our long trip to Tallahassee, we decided to stop and spend Thursday night outside of Atlanta with my aunt and uncle. I was so excited to get there because my aunt Jennifer really goes all out for Halloween. The family has heard about this for years and we have even seen pictures, but I had never been there in person to see everything so close to the actual night of Halloween. Well, we were in for quite a treat!

Unfortunately, no pictures or words will do this house justice! The entire front of the house is lit and the yard is filled with scary friends. There is a skeleton in the front yard and the walkway is lined with orange skulls and creepy creatures. There is noise and motion and we later found out that two lifesize mannequins would be put out on Halloween eve. The inside of the house spares no detail. The best way to explain is that even the night light in the powder room is changed out for October. Everything is incredible and we happily spent the first 30 minutes of our stay walking around and checking everything out. What a great way to celebrate Halloween and the month of October!

Tallahassee Dreams 50/365

On Wednesday we went to work and enjoyed a nice night at home with Tess. We got all packed up for our trip to Florida since we were leaving straight from work the next day. We were looking forward to sweet dreams of Tallahassee sunshine :)
Tess hates to watch us pack up the suitcases, so she opted for a nap. She's MUCH easier to photograph when she is asleep!