A time for Food, I mean, Thanks

As much as I miss Thanksgiving with the fam. and my mom's great cookin', we've found a way to make it pretty great here in C'ville on our own. The past two years a bunch of couples from our ward have all gotten together and rented out a room at the law school for a pot-luck Thanksgiving feast, and both years it's been fantastic! Check out this food!



It was the best of two worlds, because we got the great food, and my sister, brother in law, and nephew drove down and spent it with us!



When we found out we were in charge of one of the birds, we were a little nervous, but Ryan rose to the occasion and went all out. I wanted to shove it in the oven and call it good. When that was my plan, Ryan took over and brined it over night in salt/sugar water in a garbage sack on our porch, buttered it up betweeen the skin and the meat, and stuffed it with herbs and spices.....it was delicious. He also made three dynomite pies. Hopefully this will continue in the future and he'll just be in charge of our Thanksgiving meals.




I'm Thankful that I have so many great friends to spend the holidays with when my family is so far away.

PS. In case you were wondering, I haven't been hiding my son for the past two years...sometimes I just like to hold random kids in photos and pretend they are mine. Thanks Sara!

Oh the Beauty of the Earth

Seriously, check out the beauty that is Charlottesville. Ryan and I can't get over it. I feel like I'm living in a wonderland. Doesn't this make you want to come visit me? I think you should.

This is our parking lot. How amazing is that?

Red Hair to match the Red trees

Ryan has wanted me to dye my hair red for as long as I can remember. Well, his wish came true and I feel like a carrot top. After the holidays I think I'll start working my way back to blonde.

I love fall in Virginia. Tomorrow we're going to go for a drive and take some scenic pictures of the breath-taking, multi-colored trees, but in the mean time, here's some of their leaves I used to create my very own home-made Autumn center-piece. I'm kind of proud of it.

Read Me!

Hey Friends of Cheryl!

You see this beautiful girl?

It's her birthday! Go here and tell her why you love her.

Love,
The Blog Gremlin

New York, New York

So Ryan really wanted to go to a game at the Old Yankee Stadium in NYC before they closed it down and open the new one, and I am always up for a trip anywhere anytime, so a couple weekends ago we headed to the city with my friend from work Nadine....
and Ryan's friend from school Andrew.


The game itself was pretty boring. However I was thoroughly entertained, dismayed and disgusted watching this kid throughout the game.




He was eleven years old and seriously ate for two hours straight. Poor Nadine, he chomped and spilled all over her! The first couple innings he had his baseball glove on one hand and would fill it with chips, eat those until they were gone, guzzle his two liter soda and then continue to alternate. Then it was a jumbo pretzel, a hot dog and a bag of cracker jacks! I felt like it was my duty as a exercise physiology major to say something and warn him and his oblivious grandparents that he was headed down a long, tumultuous road of serious health issues and that the long-term ramifications of his hand to mouth habit would most certainly result in clogged arteries, heart-ache, and regret. Instead, I bit my tongue and took a picture.

We also saw an incredible performance of the Tony awarding Broadway hit musical "Jersey Boys" for only $27.00 a ticket. Turns out if you're one of the first ten people to show up at the box office at 1:00 you can get "standing room only tickets" to the 3:00 matinee. At first I was not happy about the idea of standing for three hours while to watch the show, but I was so entertained I barely noticed I was on my feet! Plus I just kept thinking how much more everyone else around me spent on their tickets for the same view.

If I could have only meet this guy,
it may have been a perfect trip to NYC. Someday Matt, someday.

Arachnophobia

I certainly don't consider myself one to freak out over the occasional bug or spider and will usually grit my teeth, grimace, squash the thing and then run like lightening to the toilet. Last night was a serious exception. After a long day of work, yoga, and med-wives meeting, I came home at 9:30 with this greeting me in my bathroom.


I may have had my first panic attack. Is it just me, or is this a baby trianchula? Of course, Ryan is out of town and I'm all by myself. Luckily I have several friends in my complex so I started calling them, hoping one of their husbands could hurry over and remedy the situation. Of course, their husbands were all off studying, but a couple of my girlfriends came rushing over for support.

After they saw the magnitude of this creature and realized I wasn't just being a wimp, they set off for help. Finally, we stopped this poor, random guy who was on his way to a poker game and apparently lives below me, and asked him if he would kill it for us. I think when he saw it he was a little taken aback, but at this point there were three girls watching and waiting for him to save the day, so he rose to the occasion like a champ. The girls didn't watch and gathered at the other side of the apartment, but it sounded like a battle zone in the bathroom as random joe took off his shoe and went to town.

I am still haunted and continue to hallucinate spiders in ever corner of my apartment. How did that thing get in here? We're on the second floor! I love the East coast, but I am not a fan of the colossal, creeping, creatures that live here.

Anniversary Weekend

Our four year anniversary isn't until this Thursday, but Ryan is leaving me for a month to go do a rotation at the hospital in Roanoke tomorrow, so we celebrated last weekend. Our celebration started Thursday night. I treated him to a facial at the school...

He brought me flowers at work....

Friday we went to a rockin' party at club Rapture downtown complete with food, c-villes hottest DJ and live belly dancing performaces. We got it all for free through hook-ups with work.


We went with my new besty at work Nadine. I love her!!! She makes Vasom so much more fun!

Saturday we saw the new Batman movie; fastest two hours and 42 minutes movie I've ever seen! My thoughts are this; definitely entertaining, too violent for kids, stunning performance from the joker, good movie to analyze over dinner...which is exactly what we did afterward at the Italian restaurant we ate at to finish our celebrations. Happy Anniversary Ryan...I love you!
(Don't have any of the professional pics from the wedding on our computer. This was at our luncheon though with my camera.)

Home to Utah

Okay I know I haven't blogged forever....but its because our internet connection is horrible in our new apartment and it's far too time-consuming now. But someone must have just moved in with a new wireless connection who hasn't set up a password yet, so for now we have a good connection....we'll see how long it lasts. If I don't blog again for another month though, you'll know why.


It was so great to go home to Utah for ten days last month. The only bummer is that Ryan couldn't come because of school. Here are some pics from the trip. Tom's homecoming was awesome. It was so good to see so many friends and family. Unfortunately I forgot to take a picture of Tom... but he looks great and his homecoming talk was fabulous. Good to have ya back bro... we're proud of you.

I love my grandpa! I hope to spend more time with him over Christmas.

Five of my seven nephews. They change so much in a year!

My precious, best girlfriends...so fun to see you girls!

Same group a year and a half earlier. I'm glad our friendship is long-lasting even though I only see you once a year!

Moving Is Crappy

So I'm just really bugged that we have to move out of our apartment. Our apartment management is remodeling our apartment, so we couldn't re-sign for the next two years which we fully intended on doing when we moved in. This will be our third move in less than two years! We're only moving across town, but it's totally annoying because we've actually acquired quite of bit of stuff and furniture, and Ryan is really busy with his hospital rotations which means I am doing all the moving myself. Every day this week I have stuffed my car at night, gone to work, gone to the gym, gone to my new apartment to unload my car and then gone home filled it back up again. It is not fun. One of the worst parts is that they are making us repaint our apartment back to white. This is stupid on multiple accounts; one, it looks better the way it is now and two, why are we painting walls they are remodeling? If they aren't re-doing the walls....why aren't they? The walls have 40 years worth of holes and dings in them.

Lets all just take a moment to appreciate all the hard work Ryan and I put into decorating and fixing this place up only to leave 10 months later.

Mildly Obsessed.

Anderson James King is the most precious, sweet, perfect little gift God could ever send. I am so happy for Wendy and Harley. I've always loved kids and babies, especially my friend's kids and babies....but now that it's my sister's baby, my heart feels like it will burst with love and happiness and I want to cry with joy when I think about him. Is that normal? I'm almost afraid of how much I will love my own children. I'm so happy I was able to meet him at only a day old! Ryan and I went straight from the airport to the hospital on the way home from Mexico.


I definitely didn't get enough of him that night, so I headed back up to DC last weekend for some more quality time with my new little buddy.
Anders has no idea what a great Aunt he scored. I'm going to the best Aunt ever. I can hardly wait to see him again. Right now, we're thinking Wendy will come down with him in three weeks for Memorial Day. Until then....I love you Anders!

Playa Del Carmen Heaven!

That was Angie and I's quote of the trip...."I'm in Heaven". We seriously loved our lives at the Royal Resort in Playa Del Carmen Mexico. It was so incredibly relaxing and wonderful for all of us. We started out a place called the "Reef", but before we ever even saw our rooms they told us the air conditioner in our room was broken and they were upgrading us to the Real, a resort up the coast. From there we decided to upgrade on our own for a small price to the most wonderful resort I have ever seen called the Royal. From the six restaurants, to the nightly shows, to the huge pools, to the endless pina collada's... we were in Heaven. All inclusive is the way to go!

We went with some of our best friends from Charlottesville, Angie and Scott. Scott is a second year med student too, and he and Ryan just finished second year so we all decided to go and celebrate. We also decided we need to make these celebrations a regular activity.

We mostly just hung around the beaches and pools and ate like we've never eaten before, but one day we did go on a tour of Tulum and Koba; both ancient cities. The tour guide said they're Mayan ruins... but we know they are Nephite and Lamanite ruins. It was very cool.

We hiked up this massive temple structure in the pouring rain. It was a blast.

Hangin' out in the Hamicks.

We played some hard-core beach volleyball.

It was so fun hanging out with the Neilsen's and eating massive, delicious meals every three hours.

Snorking...Good times.

Love you Angie!!

Our room was pretty sweet. Check out the tub! We were a little sunburned so I didn't want to get in, but that didn't stop Ryan. He had his own private pool party by himself one night.

Ryan and I with serious faces. My hubby's hot.

Believe it our not... Angie has a ton of great pictures I don't have yet, so their may be more to come. But that's all for now.

Mrsa Me! Wedding Glee! Tennessee!

I was so honored when my dear friend Jessica Bell Gordon asked me to be a bridesmaid in her wedding. The wedding was last weekend in Gatlinburg, Tennessee, and although there were several obstacles thrown in their way that almost prevented the two love birds from tying the knot... I'm happy to say they are married!


The drama started Wednesday when Ryan (Jessica's husband) found out he had Mrsa! Next thing we knew he was in the hospital being pumped full of meds. He had to go back to the hospital Friday morning for his last treatment right before we took off for Gatlinburg. Luckily he was okay, but mrsa is highly contagious so everyone was paranoid all weekend about catching it. Jess and Ryan have great senses of humor. The whole weekend they were crackin' jokes about how we were all going to get Mrsa and "Mrsa Me"!


Then there was the weather. It was nice in the valley, but insanely foggy on the mountain and our lodge was on top of the mountain. One night we were driving back to our lodge and the fog was so thick I could barely see my hand in front of me. It didn't help that every time we drove to the lodge we got completely lost! It was impossible to navigate up there. I thought we were going to drive right off the mountain to our death, but Ryan Gordon is the man, and he always eventually found his way.



Saturday started out a little stressful because we had to coordinate how a ton of different people (mainly the 10 of us who were in the wedding party) were getting to the chapel and the cabin. Ryan and Jessica are so great... they were definitely stressed with trying to figure out the logistics of it all especially with people who were lost and late... but they were able to keep themselves and everyone else under control and sort of laugh at the whole thing. This is why I love them!

It all worked out and they got married in a cute little chapel in the mountains. The wedding was beautiful and the party that night was a blast! Jess and Ryan Rented a huge cabin for about 50 of us to stay in that night and so we all went back and ate, played games and opened presents until late into the night.

The best part was I made a whole new slew of great friends!! The worst part was they all live in Lynchburg an hour and a half away:(

Congratualtions Mr. and Mrs. Gordon! You did it!!


P.S I loved the way Emily did my Hair!