milestones are getting thrown at us from all directions

who is looking forward to memorial day weekend?

hope you all are getting geared up for a relaxing extra day off too!

if you didn't get enough graduation fun from the pictures i posted a week or so ago, we have more!  steve's little bro graduated from high school last night and we swung back to the zoo to watch the festivities.  we arrived about 10 minutes after the start of the ceremony (and had to scoot in front of a bunch of different people cloaked in our tardy shame).

apparently the new grad trend is bedazzling the f&%! out of your mortarboard with the emblem of your future college.  holy sparkles huskies.  it was surreal listening to my 9th grade math teacher retell the same dreadful joke he did in advanced algebra and hearing familiar last names of the younger siblings of alumni i knew.  as the youngest child of 3 and a former member of the choir (they sing at every graduation) i thought the 8th husky graduation i attended would finally be the last, but i have to say it was fun getting to watch with the new eyes of a semi-grown up.  perhaps #9 is the charm?  congratulations paul!

but mother of god tell me we weren't so tone deaf in 2008...  cringe.

fixing the hippie hair.  p.s. is steve's tie the best or is steve's tie the best?

grandparents!  yay!

and in case you are wondering why steve and i would be so rude as to show up halfway through the first faculty member's speech (didn't know who she was... feeling old)....

we were busy signing the lease to our new home!  we will be spending yet another year in ann arbor!  and though i can't say i wouldn't have been up for another adventure in another place, we've got lots of time for that in the future!  right now we are both just completely stoked to be getting ready to move in together!  a walk in closet, washer drying in unit, and a fireplace?  we don't feel too shabby.  grown ups ahoy!  check out our cute little one bedroom floorplan!

hope everyone has a very happy friday and a very lovely long weekend!

wearing it down

some days you leave the house feeling cute enough to brag about it.  today was one of those days!  we're going to go see steve's little brother graduate from high school tonight, and i need to leave straight from work so i figured i'd just wear it all day long.  here's what i'm wearing:

goodness don't you just love maxi dress season?  i do. 

carrying on

well we are still busy apartment hunting because it sounds like someone may have snatched up our little small town pad... but we have some more options in the works and hopefully we can find our little home soon!

for now we are still enjoying all the outdoors we can get!  i also invented us a very tasty teriyaki chicken tacos recipe that i will be sharing with everyone soon!  for now here are a few more shots from our walk around the art museum on saturday!

weekenders

happy monday!!  hope everyone had as lovely a weekend as we did!

i don't know about you, but now that the weather is nicer we are living for our friday nights, saturdays, and sundays!  

the lilacs are in full bloom right now so friday after work we had drinks al fresco and went for another walk in the arb (nichols arboretum for the non-locals who read this blog).  "drinks al fresco" is a bit of a stretch actually since we were really just people gawking watching in the outdoor section of quickie burger.  let me tell you, some of the people who populate this city in the summer do not make me proud.  this place is a ghost town without the college foot traffic.

saturday we went apartment hunting and i got used to the idea of moving to a small town... i say "got" in the past tense, but i think both of us are still in the "getting used to it" phase.  we found a very cute little place though, and we're really really really excited about the big move (t.b.m.) coming up in a few months!!  realistically we are still going to be very close to AA and the rest of metro detroit (and of course the big D herself, but unless there's a tigers game or traveling exhibit at the D.I.A. we try to avoid momma D at all costs).

speaking of art museums, we decided to hit up the UMMA after we apartment-toured.  i'll post more photos later in the week but for now here's our instagram review.

i am actually kind of super obsessed with this picture.

in addition to just about everybody splitting town for the summer (at least temporarily), a bunch of steve's roommates went camping over the weekend.  camping is not high on my list of enjoyable things (i somehow ALWAYS manage to go on weekends with 30 degree evenings...), so saturday night we hotwired a room in south haven and road tripped across the state to have a beach day on sunday (it's soo wonderful having a more reliable car for such things).

sun-day was true to it's name and we spent the better part of the day laying in the sun and playing in the water.  it was still too cold to go swimming (if you click through you'll see we were somewhere in the 54-57 degree range... brrr) but we had the beach to ourselves in the morning and were all ready for a late lunch and some shade by the time the place got busy in late afternoon.  we are SO looking forward to a weekend at the cottage my parents rent each year... there is nothing better than having time to yourself on the sands of lake michigan.

it's great getting to start the week with such a fun look back at the last few days.  i'll catch up later with some more pictures of the art museum.  

and, again, for a live feed of our up-to-the-minute adventures:

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cocktail spectrum

happy happy friday!  i am SO looking forward to sitting outdoors for drinks after work so i figured i'd get everyone in on the party!  here are my drink recommendations based on your drinking gender identity.

feeling girly: 

i recommend a fizzy fuzzy navel

it's the genius love child between the fuzzy navel and the mimosa. 

1 1/2 oz peach schnapps

2 oz orange juice

fill with champagne

feeling womanly:

i recommend a classic cosmo

as someone who has never watched so much as 2 minutes of sex and the city i have no idea what my love of cosmopolitans says about me.  c'est la vie, they're delicious.

1 1/2 oz vodka

3/4 oz triple sec

3/4 oz cranberry juice

1 oz lime juice

feeling boyish:

i recommend a tom collins

because they're named after a guy, but they are like a baby's gin and tonic!

2 oz gin

2 oz lime juice

3 oz club soda

1 tsp sugar

feeling manly:

i recommend a boiler maker

because i mean.... come on.  you said you were feeling manly.

(it's a beer and a shot of whisky)

my favorite place in town does them the right way

1 bottle stella artois

1 1/2 oz johnny walker red

feeling androgynous:

i recommend an old fashioned

they've just got that little bit of everything.  everyone looks cool drinking an old fashioned.

2 oz bourbon

2 dashes bitters

2 tsp simple syrup

1 tsp water

1 slice orange

1 maraschino cherry

hope everyone has a fun and responsible weekend!

trees

i didn't get around to blogging yesterday because sometimes you just need a second to whine to your boyfriend about being blamed for others' sloppiness at work.

and sometimes you just need a second to go outside and enjoy the 80 degree weather.  we took an adventure in the arboretum and i got all instagram happy (and actual happy too).

it's been so great that steve finally has a chance to relax before starting work in june, but it does make my job feel like such a bummer time-suck since i can't go out an play in the sun until dinnertime.  how am i ever going to get anything like a tan?

it's not the most fun feeling kind of bored, but i suppose we should get our kicks now because i don't think we are going to get a chance to be bored too often in the near future.

for now we are looking forward to the weekend and hopefully we are going to be able to tour our potential "first place" on saturday morning!  it's so exciting that we are finally moving in together after all this time!! happy thursday!

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recent pins

1.  tandoori chicken burgers

2.  crockpot caramelized onions

3.  olivia cut-out oxfords

4.  poppy bouquet

5.  mismatched tiles

6.  hair jewelry

7.  golf tee balloon anchors

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