Welcome Baby Emily!!

On October 14, a new addition arrived to our family. We have a new cousin; my Uncle Ron and his wife Mai welcomed Emily Jordan Droegmyer into the world after waiting 4 days past her due date. She was born in Portland, Oregon so we haven't met her just yet but we are certainly hoping to meet her soon (maybe around Christmas). Congratulations Uncle Ron and Mai! Welcome, Emily, we can't wait to watch you grow!!

Ari's Birthday, Part II

To keep the celebration going, Saturday the 13th Dan, Amber, Jason and Jen came to town. We joined them, Tom, and Sarah for a bike ride along the intraurban trail that is just a few miles from our house. It was a perfect day for a bike ride and we completed 20 miles round-trip. After we got back, it was time to get cleaned up and have some celebratory libations. Andy, Tara, Corey (yes, Corey!), and his girlfriend Angie arrived as well. We rented a chauffeured van to drive us around so we could enjoy the evening. Once it arrived we went to pick up Tomer and Michelle and we headed to Buca di Beppo. Brian and Rob met us there... are you keeping track? We all enjoyed a delicious, family-style Italian dinner. We even embarrassed Ari by singing and the brought a candelabra to the table! We then headed to the Hi Hat Lounge and Garage for libations. The martinis were delicious but the company was better. Before we knew it, it was time to head home. Some of our guests stayed up, but this old lady headed to bed. 2:30 am is WAY past my bedtime! Thank you everyone for coming to celebrate!!

Ari's Birthday, Part 1

On Ari's true birthday, last Friday, we celebrated at home by opening presents and carving pumpkins. Since Ari's favorite holiday is Halloween, he got many Department 56 pieces to put together a miniature Spooktown. (See pictures). He loved the gift and had a great time setting it up on our console table. We then went to pick our pumpkins. We picked 4 very large pumpkins so that we could use stencils to make more intricate carvings. While I ruined dinner... my second attempt at gnocchi was better than the first but I am definitely finished trying to prepare it, thank goodness I made good asparagus... Ari prepped the pumpkins. After dinner we got down to business with Ari carving a bat and I chose a cat. I think they turned out awesome. We have two pumpkins each still to carve when we get a free moment. It was a low key night in preparation for more festivities the next day, more soon...

Cheeseheads

After the marathon, when Ari was feeling rehydrated and refreshed... which amazingly didn't take long, we headed to Tara and Andy's for dinner and to watch the Packer v. Bears game. Since we moved to Wisconsin, I have become a bit of a Green Bay fan so I brought along my cheesehead. We ate Wisconsin fare: brats, baked beans, cole slaw, and at first were enjoying the game. Then things took a turn for the worse and the Bears won! Ari was thrilled but the rest of us were disappointed.

Run Ari run!!

This past Sunday, Ari completed a huge fete: he ran the Milwaukee Marathon! The enormity of this accomplishment was increased due to the fact that it was 86 degrees on race day... the average temperature for the day is 54 degrees! You may have heard that the Chicago marathon was cancelled due to these extreme conditions. The morning started early as we met Tom, Sarah, Conner, and Tom's work colleague Doug to drive up to Grafton, Wi together. There was so much excitement and nervous energy at the start line. Nearly 2500 people were registered to race and then additional people were running the marathon as a relay. We cheered the boys on as the started off and then went to grab a quick breakfast in nearby Cedarburg. We caught up with them again at about mile 14. I was amazed at Ari's split time... just 2 hours! We caught up to Ari again at about mile 17 and he was lookin' a bit exhausted. We then made our way down to the lakefront for the finish. Sarah and I were getting nervous waiting; it was so hot and the medical tent was filling up. Luckily, Ari, Tom, and Doug finished without major incident. Ari's time was 4 hours and 50 minutes... a bit longer than he had hoped because of the heat. I was just proud of him for finishing!! I also told him not to worry about his time... that he would do better next time! To which he replied, "There will be no next time!" I think that was just the lactic acid talking. I want him to run another just because I was so unprepared for this one... next time I will definitely have to make a shirt and get a cow bell! Way to go Ari!!