so i've been married now for 8 years...

and that's quite a while, considering i'm only 27. some have been good, some have been bad, but i've loved them all.
hubs and i returned last night from a few days away in cooperstown and the surrounding area. i've got to say that every time i go away to central ny, there's a chance i won't come back. because i don't want to. i want to stay in some beautiful farm field or sleepy little town and just forget about the world. if hubs didn't work for the state (which has this silly little rule that you actually have to live in the state where you work), we would have moved up there already.
our trip was like magic. we did so much, but we didn't really do much at all. the scenery was gorgeous, since it's peak leaf season there right now and the colors were amazing. we hiked mt. wellington on lake otsego at glimmerglass state park. we took a walk on the oldest covered bridge in the country. we took in a baseball game at doubleday field, the birthplace of baseball. we went out to lunch and dinner everyday. we took long walks around the village. we stopped at wineries and general stores and cider mills and diners. we took our time driving and stopped in little town to explore. when we got breakfast at the bakery on the last day (yesterday, our actual anniversary), we sat at a cute little park where lake otsego runs into the susquehanna river. hubs told me to grab his ham and cheese croissant out of the bag, and when i reached in there was a little box with gorgeous diamond studs inside! how romantic my man is after such a long time! we usually don't do presents, but i thought that was so cute...he said he took them everywhere we went all weekend, looking for the perfect time to give them to me!
in honor of my husband and our anniversary, i want to share a link with you:
grooms blown away by their beautiful brides. some of the faces and reactions are priceless. hubs said that when i walked down the aisle, it felt like slow motion (like i was on a people mover going the wrong direction is what he really said) and he was worried i'd never get there. i'm so glad i did!

so long sweet summer

ok, it's official: summer's over. in fact, it's been over since the weekend. know how i know? we had to make a fire in the woodstove this morning. in fact, we made a fire at the cabin while we were camping saturday night (but it's always colder in upstate ny). saturday night hubs and i slept out on the screen porch (while stenni was snug as a bug in a rug in my parents' camper) and nearly froze to death, and when i woke up i could see my breath.
also, i'm drinking an oktoberfest beer instead of a summer weiss. that should tip you off.
speaking of camping, on the way up we drove following the delaware river and got to see all of the leaves changing, which was awesome.
i'm not too broken up about summer being over. while i lament the loss of my outdoor swimming privileges (trust me, i tried to swim in the river this past weekend and lets just say, no dice), i also look at fall as the most romantic season. sure it's baseball playoff season, and sure it's when i get to do all the stuff i like like pumpkin and apple picking and dressing up like an idiot to beg for candy and bobbing for apples and whatnot. but it's also the season on my anniversary. and since my wedding was fall-themed, whenever i think of fall i think of my wedding and my honeymoon and obviously romance (and baseball. we stayed at the skydome in canada and watched like a thousand playoff games in seedy bars. well, as seedy as you get in canada. plus we've been going to cooperstown for our anniversary lately, which is all the more baseball-y).
so right now i'm going to don a sweater, finish this brew, chomp an apple and get to making a pot of soup. maybe i'll make a fire in the woodstove too. i'm also gonna let hubs stack some wood outside because let's face it, if i were doing it we'd have a woodpile collapse sometime around late-october. and nobody wants that.

sorry, so sorry

i haven't posted anything in a while because i had no computer for about a month, after hurricane irene blew through and fried my power source (or something else that sounds similar) in the computer, basically meaning that i couldn't turn it on anymore. i totally dragged my feet on getting it fixed too, because at first, i didn't particularly miss it. then when i finally took it to the shop, the IT guy told me it would take like a week to get the part. That was fine by me, but then when it turned into like three weeks i was about ready to string him up by his ankles and throw rocks at him. still, i didn't miss the computer too much except for the fact that i couldn't check my e-mail or the million blogs i was used to checking all day every day. not having the computer for so long even helped me kick my sims addiction (kind of)! i never realized how much time i wasted on the interwebs! i'm trying to limit for weekday computer usage to like an hour or so so that i can actually return to having a normal life that isn't for lazy people. theoretically.
on a completely unrelated note, i love october for so many reasons but mostly because of the MLB playoffs. they always remind me on when teddy and i got married and how much fun we had in toronto on our honeymoon, running around in the bars and trying to find the playoffs on tv! because of that, we are going to the baseball hall of fame in cooperstown, ny next week for our anniversary and i am SOOOO PSYCHED!!! but right now i can't watch the game because stenni is addicted to yo gabba gabba and despite my feeling that she shouldn't really watch TV since she's a baby, she is being good and quiet and seems happy and i can't argue with that. plus biz markie is on, and that's great. they totally make some good TV shows for babies nowadays. it isn't all barney and that garbage. i LOVE nick jr, probably more than stenni does. plus there are the old standbys like sesame street that all kids love and learn from, and when we get a chance we watch them. I know that "they" say not to let kids under 2 watch TV at all, and i really don't like the idea of using the TV as a babysitter like a lot of people do, but seriously, get real. all babies watch a little TV sometimes. it's a fact of life if you aren't amish. it just is. i still feel guilty about it though! i don't know, does anyone else have the guilt/TV issue?