jennandjeremy.com

We're moving! After much consideration, we have decided not to buy the condo where we currently live and to find a place to rent for the next year instead. While the idea of home ownership sounds good in theory, we honestly don't see the point right now. We can pay less in rent than we would for a mortgage and get the freedom to move whenever/wherever we desire! So far we have no clue where we are going to move to (we have 6 weeks to figure it out), but we're both looking forward to finding out! :)

Posted by Jenn on Tue, 03/17/2009 - 18:56. | Permalink | Jenn's blog | Add new comment

So we've been super busy lately, and I fail at updating the blog. I'll quickly touch some of the things going on in our life right now.

Jenn and I are an aunt and uncle again - this time my brother and sister-in-law had a baby boy, Johnathan, who is doing great. We're going to head to the frozen tundra that is Iowa hopefully in March to meet the newest addition to the clan, which we're both looking forward to.

Last weekend we made an Ikea trip, which scored us the garlic press we've had our eyes on for the last few months. No longer will the box grater claim parts of my fingers! We will press our garlic like champs! We use a lot of fresh garlic in our cooking, so it's a big deal to us :) While out in Schaumburg we also dropped my ring off at Robbin's Brothers to get it resized. Unfortuantely the jeweler wasn't in on President's Day so I had to go a day without my ring and felt completely naked. We don't take our rings off, so going without it for that time really made me feel naked and uncomfortable. Luckily I got my ring back the next day (and they cleaned Jenn's engagement/wedding band!) and it turned out excellent. Clean, polished, and it fits great! Now no more losing weight for me so I don't need to get that done again :)

Two weekends ago, we went out with our friend Brandon, his cousin and her husband, and our friends Nick and Erin to the Galaway Inn in Lincoln Park for cheap beer, darts, and Nintendo (yes, old school Nintendo in a bar). It was a lot of fun to dust off the cobwebs on the throwing arm, however metal tip darts are considerably different than my old plastic tips I used to throw in Iowa. I miss throwing darts, but it seems the city is infatuated with metal tipped darts, and I just prefer plastic over metal.

In other news, the company I work for is currently in the process of being acquired, which has resulted in considerable amounts of work on my end to ramp up our server farm for the forthcoming avalanche of new users. I've been working a lot (and I mean a lot, I've put in a couple 80+ hour weeks). Couple that with some very large projects I've completed and my boss wanted to show me that my hard work does not go unnoiticed, so on Wednesday he surprised me with a new Macbook! It has been dubbed 'goldstar' (thanks Jenn for the name!) and work definitely didn't skimp - getting me the top of the line Macbook model. This allowed us to update Jenn's powerbook to my former Macbook, which has gotten Jenn using Leopard and the new iPhoto, which I have to give Apple credit for is a very nice piece of software, and the faces tagging is surprisingly accurate (and only slightly creepy).

And finally, we've got our friend Mike coming into town this weekend (of course he picks the weekend with the most snow and cold temperatures in recent weeks) so I do believe there is an Ikea trip planned, along with talks of visiting The Bean in Millennium Park so he can replace a photograph he took last time he was in town that didn't turn out.

We're going to try to do better at posting smaller tidbits instead of these long winded rants - stay tuned to see if we can keep that up!

Posted by Jeremy on Sat, 02/21/2009 - 15:20. | Permalink | Jeremy's blog | Add new comment

Being vegan, a lot of people often ask Jeremy and I what we eat, so I thought I would post a quick list of the things we have made in the last 7 days (all of which were homemade unless otherwise noted):

- Sweet & sour tofu with steamed broccoli and brown rice
- Spinach and tofu lasagna with garlic bread (store bought french bread and noodles)
- Pasta with steamed broccoli (store bought pasta)
- French toast
- Pizza and bread sticks (all homemade)
- Garbanzo & potato tacos (homemade shells)
- Black bean burgers and spicy hash browns (all homemade)
- Homemade bread and seitan (sometimes called 'wheat meat')

As you can see, not only do we like to cook but we love variety!

Posted by Jenn on Sat, 01/31/2009 - 17:38. | Permalink | Jenn's blog | Add new comment

It's been a while since we provided any real updates on what's been happening in our lives, so here's a touch of what's been going on.

Things certainly are hectic around here between work and play. We're still making our weekly trips to our friends' place to play pool, video games, and board games which we've also been using as our test bed for delicious treats and deserts. We've made pumpkin cheese cake, all different types of cookies, cupcakes with peanut buttercream frosting, and peanut butter cupcakes to name just a few of the delicious items we've been cranking out to take over to their place. Jenn has become quite the pool shark, dominating the pool table when she decides she wants to play, and I've been steadily improving as well.

Jenn found a stitch and bitch group she's gone to a few times, and she's still trying to make as many Thursday crafting sessions as possible, which has been good as it's allowed me to focus on work which has been insanely busy lately as we prepare for another buyout. I've put in several long weeks lately, and it was insanely nice to have a weekend off and just spend some time with Jenn yesterday and today. We did, however, venture out into the cold last night and attended a friend's birthday bash at the Map Room here in Chicago (be sure to check out a few of the pictures!).

Getting into the bar last night wasn't the easiest thing; for a third of our party at least. Our friend Brandon met us at our place for a pre-trip cocktail, and I drove us down to the Map Room (stupid Armitage bus not running late). I drop the two of them off in front of the bar and go to park the car, finding a spot just a few blocks from the entrance (which, with all the snow we've gotten this winter, was an extremely good find!). I huff it to the door as fast as possible, only to be turned away and told to wait outside - it was one in one out. I laughed as I thought the bouncer was joking, but alas, he was not. Fortunately before I could bring out the cell phone to send Jenn and Brandon a note letting them know I was being held up, I was allowed in. It was extremely nice that they kept to that limit - the bar was full, but wasn't packed. You could actually move around in side and weren't herded in like cattle. Now if only they had good beer (aka cheap, no nonsense American lagers) there we would have been in heaven, instead of drinking $8 Fat Tires, but, it wasn't our party, so we did our best.

Our latest pastime of choice would have to be a guilty pleasure for both of us. Our friend Erin told us we had to read the Twilight series, and with Jenn engaged in a craft swap right now she's needed to work on her projects, so instead of one of us reading the story and then the other, I've been reading to Jenn while she works on her knitting or crocheting. It works out wonderful, and allows us to hang out and do something together, while being productive. Also, the story is, admittedly, surprisingly good. You can't help but root for them while you're reading. Jenn and I see a lot of parallels to the heroine/hero in the story...only she's the ice cold vampire temperature wise :)

Posted by Jeremy on Sun, 01/25/2009 - 18:44. | Permalink | Jeremy's blog | Add new comment

Chronologically of course:
- Jeremy proposed
- I moved to Chicago
- We found an amazing condo that was exactly what we were looking for
- I found a great job that is super flexible and totally me
- We got married

Other things of note in 2008:
- I made some great friends in Chicago
- One of Jeremy's best friends moved to Chicago
- Jeremy and I made it to one of each Bulls, Cubs, Blackhawks, and Bears games
- We put ourselves in a financial position to hopefully be able to buy our condo in 2009
- So many other things that I couldn't even begin to list them all here

I think I speak for the both of us when I say that 2008 has by far been the best year of both of our lives. We're not sure how 2009 could ever compare but we're definitely looking forward to finding out what it has in store for us! :D

Posted by Jenn on Tue, 01/06/2009 - 16:23. | Permalink | Jenn's blog | Add new comment