Happy Halloween!

My pumpkin. It's a haunted house I like to call Edgehill Manor
(our complex is called Edgehill).

'Tis the season

For snuggling up on a cold day.

For family visits.

For silly gourd decor.

For apple eatin'.

For Autumn!

Midterms....

Yay! I finished one of my midterms! That means only one midterm and 2 assignments left to do before Wednesday...to (sort of) celebrate, here are pictures from Pizza Night (every Thursday), and today's simple and delicious lunch of salad, potatoes, mushrooms and onions. Yum.

Pumpkin fame!!

So Messiah Lutheran sells pumpkins every year to raise money for various area ministries. I believe I already talked about unloading the huge truckload of pumpkins, but we had not yet experienced volunteering to sell the pumpkins. We had signed up for the first shift that we actually had available, which happened to be this past Monday, from 4-dusk. And guess what folks? Monday at 4 is exactly when WBIR Channel 10 decided to come to the church and do a live piece on the pumpkin patch. Since Pastor Eric is on vacation, Vicar Zach was designated at the interviewee! We've heard from lots of people that said he did an awesome job, but unfortunately we weren't able to see the clip since it was done live and then replayed again before our pumpkin-selling shift was over. But I'm still pretty excited to be married to the most famous vicar in Knoxville! I'm kind of a big deal now.

Another fun part of Monday was getting to pick out some pumpkins of our own. I forgot to bring much money, but I had enough to buy 2 minis and one funny gourd. I am pretty excited about them and I had creating a little Halloween arrangement on the mantel...here's the pics!

They make me happy.

A short weekend trip

Last Friday Zach and I got to go on a lovely date downtown. We gussied ourselves up and went to Market Square restaurant Koi Fusion for some Asian fare. After dinner we strolled over to the Tennessee Theater to enjoy the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra. We had awesome seats (some church members let us use their season tickets), and the concert was wonderful...all Tchaikovsky.
On Saturday morning I got up early and headed to NC for a quick visit. I got to see lots of special ladies on my mama's side for a luncheon, and I also got in a fantastic visit with my Gammy and Pop-Pop. Plus it was nice having some time with just my mama and daddy by myself. Unfortunately I couldn't stay long, but I was really happy to be there.


Love ya'll!

Quick recap

So there are no new pics for this week, but I thought I'd post a little update anyway. Zach was out of town from Monday-Thursday. He first traveled to Southern Seminary in Columbia, SC and then up to Lutheridge for various intern/leader/pastoral conferences. He had a good time and especially enjoyed seeing folks like Rachel (an LSTC friend) and old college friends like Stacey (my room mate of 3 years), and he made some new connections within the synod. But oh, how Mr. Wilson and I missed him!

While he was away it was work and school as usual for me. Midterms are here and it's crunch time...yikes. I did go over to church on Monday afternoon and help unload about 2500 pumpkins from a huge truck. Messiah Lutheran sells them all month to raise money for various Knoxville ministries. Afterward all the volunteers were treated to a yummy chili dinner, and they even made veggie chili for me (and I also got to take home the leftovers...they take care of us)!

When I returned to our house after class yesterday evening I found Zach and Mr. Wilson reunited on the couch (where they both spend most of their time when we are at home). I was so happy to see him, and even happier when he gave me a present from my favorite chocolate store in Asheville, the Chocolate Fetish. He brought me two rounds, one with real mixed berries in white chocolate and the other mint swirls in dark chocolate....absolutely divine!

Fall Break

Thursday and today are my UT FALL BREAK, which in undergrad was awesome, but in grad school it means that I only missed one class. So while still good, it doesn't elicit the same enthusiasm it used to. Even so, we did make it over to Winston-Salem yesterday for the Clemson vs. Wake Forest football game (if you could call it that). Clemson lost, but worse than that was that both teams were LACKLUSTER at best...not too entertaining. We still had fun tailgating with James Li and some folks from Clemson LSM, and we got to see our good friend Caroline, and a friend from CFLC, Joe. Plus we stayed at Mama and Daddy's house and got to see them for a short while, and had a little visit with Susie at her school. Seeing all those FOLKS definitely helped make up for the game.




We're back in Knoxville again tonight; back to work work and school work and whatever else comes our way. Here's a couple of fun pictures of potatoes from Daddy's garden.


A little mouse with a tomato.


Big 'ol sweet potato.

Wild weekend

We were really sorry that my brother Josh is sick and he and Arden couldn't come to Knoxville, but we still had a full weekend. The weather has been BEAUTIFUL so we just had to get outside!

We started Friday evening with a good run at one of our local parks. Then we got up on Saturday morning and drove over to the Great Smoky Mountains for a HARD, but FUN hike up to Chimney Tops. The trail was gorgeous and steep, and we had to scale rocks to make it to the top, but we did it, and the view was AWESOME! We rested at the top for a while, then headed back down, grabbed some lunch on the way back to Knoxville, then came home to get changed.


We were happy and tired upon returning home from the hike, but our friend Michelle, Zach's supervisor at the Tyson House, prayed at the UT game that night. So we put on some orange and headed over to campus to support her and the Vols. We had a lot of fun, but the game was slow and we were tired, so we left with the game still tied (the Vols ended up winning, though).


Finally, Sunday held church in the morning, a library school picnic in the afternoon, and a pet blessing at the Tyson House. Mr. Wilson was so excited to take a car ride and even happier that he found Zach when we got to campus! He was a really good boy, but he did try to run up the aisle every time he saw Zach up front. A wonderful, wild weekend indeed.