The doctors are in!

We recently had the chance to see a number of folks that we have known for the past 5 years graduate with their PhD's from U.Va. There were lots of fun graduation festivities and it was really great to see people who have moved away but returned for the ceremony.

4 of the 5 graduates - Lee, Wendy, Loren and Alli

Many of the musgrads!

Yay! Congrats for the grads!

It was also a bittersweet weekend. We've had such a nice community of friends here in Charlottesville. But it's a strange time to be returning to the area, since many of our friends are now leaving or looking for jobs elsewhere. College towns are wonderful in so many ways but the transient nature of places like this can also be slightly depressing. Oh well, I look forward to seeing where everyone ends up. Maybe we'll have to plan a road trip sometime to visit them all!

Steal this glass!

Courtney, a friend of mine since grade school, came to visit us recently.

We had a great time during her visit. It was a good excuse to get out to one of our favorite places--the Blue Mountain Brewery--for the first time since being back in C-Ville. They have a great way incentive to get people there on Thursdays as it's "steal this glass" night. The cool thing is that you get to walk off with a glass for every beer you drink. Between the 3 of us, there were 6!

They have some wonderful beers (and pizza) at Blue Mountain. I'm a big fan of the Full Nelson, it's really hoppy and refreshing. But they have a seasonal kölsch right now that is also impressive, it reminded me of the traditional beers we had last year in Köln.

Courts and me trying not to get caught stealing

Isn't it wonderful how with old friends you can pick up right where you left off?

16 years

A lot has been going on in the last month. When I picked Troy up from the airport after his tour, we enjoyed some time in DC. To celebrate our 16-year anniversary, we ate out a lovely restaurant called Cedar. It was quite a treat. He had the "Herb Crusted Pork Tenderloin with goat cheese grits, applewood bacon and roasted cherries" and I had the "Grilled Local Rockfish with mixed spring vegetables and Frantoia extra virgin olive oil." Yum. Makes me hungry just thinking about it!

Since the weather was too nice to be inside at a museum, we ventured to the national arboretum. The azaleas were blooming and the bonsai garden was incredible!

Koi look funny when they are eating

Japanese White Pine in training since 1625!

Nice view from the azalea trail at the arboretum

Most of you already know that I'm a big planner. Mostly I plan because I need something to look forward to. It's too easy to get caught up in the daily grind and the busy-ness of everyday life otherwise.

Leading up to the tour, we had a very stressful couple of months. I planned this trip, as well as an overnight to Richmond to see one of our favorite bands, Iron & Wine, in order to have a light at the end of the tunnel, so to speak. It worked pretty well.

Now I'm thinking forward to my birthday in July. I always tend to make a plan for birthdays too, to avoid being disappointed by having nothing special to do on the big day. It'll be impossible to top last year's birthday, which we spent in Paris, but a plan involving good food, drinks and scenery is usually a successful one. Maybe we'll head to the mountains this year...

Birthday Boys

When Troy got back from Amsterdam, he wondered aloud if he had been in Charlottesville before the tour. That's how crazy things were leading up to the tours. It's nice to have Troy back home. We've been busy trying to establish a sense of normalcy now, catching up with friends and having some fun.

This past weekend, our friend Steve turned 30. He and Aurie hosted a toga party to celebrate his and Troy's b-days (since we never really got to celebrate Troy's). Most of us had never been to a toga party but it was a funny idea and people got into it. It was a great time. The birthday boys enjoyed themselves thoroughly.

What a difference a month makes!

March 26

April 26

Thoughts of Holland

The dogwoods, daffodils and tulips are in full bloom. Troy is in the Netherlands again, but this time he's without me. It's hard to believe that a year ago we were biking through tulip fields together.

I've been thinking a lot lately about last year's trip to Holland. It was an incredible experience. So beautiful! When our weekly paper ran a story last week about a Dutch guy growing organic tulips in nearby Madison County, I couldn't resist--I simply had to go see them.

Lucky for me, I was able to enlist some friends to go along. Thanks to the Traubs for supporting my tulip obsession!

Ian insisted that this one smelled like waffles

Loved the corny windmill!

Peter and Jaimee ponder which ones to pick

Robots on Tour

The first leg of the EMMI tour kicked off right after Troy's birthday. Unfortunately, there was hardly any time to stop and celebrate. The boys didn't get much sleep at all as they were feverishly trying to finish the robot building. Troy was literally sleeping (if at all) on the floor of the work space that week.

Aurie and I made pies and brought them to the space so that we could at least bring a little celebration to the day. It finally dawned on me this year (thanks Aurie!) that I should make pie instead of cake since Troy is obsessed with pie. Not sure why I didn't ever make that connection. I guess I've never considered myself much of a baker. In any case, I made my first real crust ever and filled it with strawberries and rhubarb. I was pretty proud of the results. And Aurie made a decadent, bourbon, pecan and chocolate pie with a hazelnut crust. Troy was thrilled.

Although they weren't able to complete all of the robots they had planned (due to many ridiculous, uncontrollable hold ups and delays) the tour was still a success. There were a number of stops, including Brandeis and Franklin Pierce universities and MIT, and they made some great connections.

Steve and Troy returned on Sunday night and have continued to work at full speed in order to complete some more robots before they leave for the European tour on Friday.

I'm sad not to be going along, especially because there is a stop in Ghent, I've been missing it a lot lately. For Aurie's birthday, we decided to recreate part of our Belgian experience. We made wafels from a recipe that we got from Godfried (Troy's mentor at Logos). Jaimee and Peter brought over their waffle maker and I inherited by mom's old one, so we had dueling waffle irons!

These are not quite they same as the wafels I blogged about previously, these are more yeasty and not as sweet. They are made with real Belgian beer. We served them with freshly whipped cream and strawberries. It was fun to share this treat with some of our friends.

Speaking of friends, I'm truly grateful for the kind dinner invitations I've been receiving from them lately. It seems they'll make sure I'm not too lonely over the next couple of weeks while Troy is touring.