Daily Dunkle

First of all, I apologize for not posting regularly for the last few months. I just got out of the habit!

Let's see if I can recount important things that have happened during the last few months:

I have been working full time at Fresh Tilled Soil, and really loving it!! I've learned a lot and consider myself very lucky to be working with a pretty cool group of people in a pretty cool office right on the Charles River. Here's an aerial shot of the Watch Factory where I work:

Back in March, Matthew's mom came to visit! She was our first guest to try out our Ikea futon, and I think she approved! We took a trip into Boston and did a cool ferry tour through Boston harbor. It must've been one of the first warm weekends of the season... It seems strange to be wearing short sleeves in March up here!

In April, Matthew and I drove out to Rhinebeck, New York for his Aunt Chris' surprise birthday party. It was a lot of fun. The surprise party was at a country club right over the Hudson River:

Matthew and I tore up the dance floor with some sweet moves we've been working on:

Chris works for the Catskills Animal Sanctuary and the day after the surprise party, we got to go on a tour there. They accept farm animals only, and a lot of the animals are free-roaming and hang out in inter-species packs - It was really funny. Ducks, turkeys, rams and pigs were all hanging out, best friends NMW. Here's the biggest pig I've ever seen:

And a few other pictures from the trip:

In June, my Aunt Nancy and my sister Audrey came to visit! And we went on many adventures - The first one was to New York City where we saw Wicked on Broadway and ate some delicious authentic New York pizza and bagels. And we discovered Pretzel M&Ms. Also, the World Cup started while they were here! We caught as many games as possible. Here we are in Times Square - Don't be fooled about what time it is by the amount of light... It was midnight! The city really doesn't sleep.

Here's Audrey conquering Central Park:

After our adventure to the big city, we had another adventure but of the exact opposite nature - We went camping in Martha's Vineyard! It was a blast. It wasn't 100% authentic camping because we slept in a cabin with beds, but we made a fire every day! And we went to the beach where Jaws was filmed, and we ate some excellent fresh seafood. I think it's safe to say that now that Nan has an iPhone, she has become Net Girl #2 - She was posting pictures on Facebook throughout the entire trip, so you may have seen some of these before!

Audrey and I worked on perfecting the s'more - The graham cracker in this picture is a little charred because she let it sit over the fire for a few minutes to melt the chocolate.

Nan's chillin' by the fire:

Weenie roast! Audrey wanted to stick the hotdogs on horizontally like in the cartoons.

Fast-forward a few months to September... Mom and Dad came to visit! We managed to go to more sporting events in one day than Matthew and I have been to the whole time we've been in Massachusetts! First we went to the Red Sox game:

Somehow despite the Red Sox gear, the people sitting in front of us pegged us as out-of-towners. I'll do some research on how to blend in better for next time. The Sox lost 3-1 - oh well.

Then that night we went to a New England Revolution game! And we all got free t-shirts too. That was a lot of fun. The Revs made an awesome comeback and wound up winning 3-1! Pretty cool.

There's a park near our apartment in Waltham that used to be a ski area, and there are some nice walking trails and overlooks - We walked up to the top and if you look closely you can see the Boston skyline:

The next day, we drove up to a cool little town on the North Shore called Newburyport and went apple picking! We went to the same farm last fall with some of my friends from school. The weekend we went was one of the last ones for peach-picking season, so we were able to scavenge a few peaches from the trees before they were picked bare. There was some kind of festival going on in Newburyport that day too so we got to hear some live music by the harbor. It was a good day!

Here's Dad getting ready to take a picture from his phone:

When we got back from Newburyport, Mom showed me how to make peach preserves and can them! From the tree to the jar in less than 8 hours... Can't beat that!

I attempted my first batch of apple butter with the apples we got from the farm. I expected it to make a bunch of jars - but it only made two! It's pretty tasty though!

Then on September 7, Matthew began his first semester at Berklee! Here is his traditional first day of school photo:

He's been going non-stop since that day! He's taking all kinds of cool-sounding classes. The very first fellow student that he met at Berklee? Guess what his name is -- Miles Davis. Ha! Matthew is an excellent student and has been practicing a ton. I'm very excited for his first concert, whenever that will be.

A major accomplishment of mine in the last few weeks: I almost did a whole pull-up! That sounds pretty lame, but trust me if you could see me do it you'd be impressed. Maybe I'll get Matthew to videotape me doing it - you'll be inspired.

We also celebrated our 2-year wedding anniversary. WOW! Two years already. Time flies!! We had a great spring and summer, and it was awesome seeing our family who we love and miss. Everyone is always welcome to come visit (the futon has been broken in and approved of by multiple sources now!) - So please visit! I'll try and make sure it's not 100 years until the next blog post.

We visited our new apartment today. Delivered some non-essential belongings and got to meet our new neighbors Megan and Amanda who live on the first floor. It was a beautiful sunny day and the apartment was glowing. This first picture is the living room which has a window that looks out through the large tree in the front "yard" and out onto the main street. On the left there are some french doors which open up to the "office".

Here you can see the ceiling fan, and that shadow in the upper left corner almost makes you think that we have a vaulted ceiling but it is purely an illusion.

Here we are in the same room just backed up a little and facing right. That fireplace is only decorative.....oh shoot. But the window is real.

This is the view you would have if you just came up the stairs and into our apartment and looked right. Through the doorway on the left is the formal dining room which then leads to the kitchen. On the right is the second bedroom which we think may become my music "studio".

This is the second bedroom once again. Through that door is the hallway. In that hallway you have a door to the kitchen on the left, a door to the bathroom on the right, and a linen closet all of which cannot be seen in this picture. Past the hallway you can see the doorway to the Master bedroom.

So this is the hallway mentioned before where now you can see the bathroom and the "studio" from a different angle. Notice the closet and one of the two windows.

Great, simple bathroom.

The master bedroom. You can see two of the three windows and the door to the closet.

Here are two shots of the formal dining room. Love these windows.

Here is the entrance to the kitchen from the formal dining room. The dishwasher on the left. Straight ahead is the door to the patio and the basement.

More kitchen.

Even more kitchen. Now you can see the door on the right which would lead back into the formal dining room. On the left is the doorway which would lead in the hallway for the bathroom.