Lately...

It's hard to believe it's December 14th & my baby sister is getting married THIS Saturday! Figured I should post an update on a few fall happenings before Bethany's wedding and Christmas are here. :)

Javier & I have spent a good bit of time up in Clemson this fall - but have actually only been to 2 football games. We had a great time at the Clemson v. Virginia game here though - thanks again, Mom & Dad!

We got to see our Tigers clinch the ACC Atlantic Division Champs title - we'll just forget about the next two games. :)

Thanksgiving was spent in Chapin with everyone there. Mom - next time we take a picture like this I think you need to be in front of Jon!

At Thanksgiving, Javier's parents brought Lola to us to keep for a couple weeks. She and Gracie are so cute together - most of the time I can't get the camera fast enough to capture whatever they're doing, but this is pretty typical for them.

Gracie enjoyed us putting up our tree. I didn't even have time to fix the tree skirt before she decided it was a great place to lay.

And... this picture is actually a couple months old but I ran across while I was looking for the rest of these pictures. I couldn't resist posting it. :)

Meet Miss Lola

About a month ago, we found Lola at the Greenville Humane Society and got her for Javier's mom for her birthday. We had Lola with us for about a week before taking her to Charleston. She's a super sweet dog and everyone loves her!

Can't stop reading...

... these blogs.

We sponsor a boy, Luis, in El Salvador and it is both amazing and heart-wrenching to read these stories. I can't help but wonder if Luis is at this particular project, meeting this group of travelers.

Skytop

A few weeks ago, we went apple picking at Skytop with Rachel & DJ. We picked some yummy apples and had a great time. We even waited in line a whole hour for the apple cider donuts - they were worth it! :)

So we thought it'd be fun to get some good pictures while we were there, and asked Rachel to take some. These are some of the highlights - in most of the other ones Gracie has her back to the camera or is looking off into space somewhere. Rachel & DJ were really patient and took a lot of pictures so we could get these good ones!

Gracie wasn't too sure what to think about apples - she liked them a little bit but didn't love them.

This is where we're trying hard to get her to stay still and look at the camera...

So then we took a few pictures for Rachel & DJ... and THEN Gracie decided she liked being in pictures after all. :)

Need some new pictures of Gracie

Since Gracie wasn't able to go to New York or backpacking with us, I just have to put up some new pictures of her. :)

Walter & Cooper (Jonathan & Katie's dogs) came to visit and really liked hiding under the couch. We had a hard time getting a picture of all three of them... this was about the best we could do. :)

Gracie & Cooper got to be buddies - it was funny to see Cooper play with Gracie. Even though he's only 10 pounds, he thought he was Gracie's size!

Gracie & her friend Ella! Only thing was that when we gave Ella attention, you could bet that Gracie would come over and demand some, too.

Typical Gracie look.

This is where Javier thinks Gracie likes being held... but she really doesn't. He keeps picking her up, hoping she'll get used to it!

Gotta pull for the Tigers!

New York

So this picture doesn't look too "New York-ish" but we rode bikes around Battery Park... so fun. And yes, we matched the bikes, but Clemson had a game that night.

I love Grand Central Terminal... esp. at rush hour. It just sort of amazes me to see so many people all headed somewhere and all in a hurry.

Brooklyn Bridge from the Brooklyn side... rainy Saturday.

With Carla on the Brooklyn Promenade... very fun views of Manhattan!

Mmm... New York pizza.

Yay!

So we tried to go to the US Open Friday, but it got rained out. Went back Saturday night... and got to see....

... a bunch of zambonie machines dry off the court! They even had a synchronized routine.

We weren't really there for the zambonie machines... we got to see Kim Clijsters vs. Serena Williams in the women's semifinals. This was the view close to our original seats, actually a little better, but with the rain the stands were pretty empty. So... a nice usher brought court-side passes and....

... we ended up with this view. This is not zoomed in at all. It was so exciting, especially after all the waiting in the rain and thinking we might not even get to see any tennis played at all.

We saw Serena's crazy outburst.

And Clijsters took the match. She also went on to win the finals!

Javier & Chewie

Fun view from Central Park... amazingly enough you don't see people in this picture. There were people everywhere - makes sense for a beautiful Sunday afternoon after a couple days of rain, I guess.

This is the only picture I ended up with of all four of us... thanks so much for letting us visit, Chris & Carla! We had so much fun.

I think this was from the castle in Central Park. We only walked for hours to find it.

Museum of Natural History was pretty neat!

Our favorites here were obviously the animals.

Backpacking

Near the beginning... not tired yet :)

Adam & Stephanie

Pretty views on the trail

Campsite

Shining Rock