Thanks to Christine for taking this picture of us. We both won our respective divisions (open and coed) at the 2010 Davis Ultimate Invitational.

Emily: You made a tuna sandwich?

Matt: No.

Emily: You didn’t like the meatballs?

Matt: No.

Emily: You…broke a champagne flute?

Matt: Yea…

Emily: YES!!

Matt: (Extremely confused look on his face)

Emily: WE’RE TIED! Now I don’t feel so guilty for breaking that wine glass!

First up, my homemade wreath.

Next our tree, which we borrowed from Mama’s house. No one remembers her old tree being so short, so it may be Gran Even’s. It’s small size is good, because my ornaments filled it right up. Although, we needed more lights than we expected.

We really wanted to go fancy, with the wires and the subwoofer, where you’ll notice is where Santa found his cookies and milk.

One of our newest ornaments is from Sara, our friend and also a bridesmaid. It’s a SF cable car, so we can remember our San Francisco friend. Thanks, Sara!

I love that our living room is feeling more and more like home. Hopefully it will stay this way once the Christmas decorations come down.

And, of course, don’t forget the nutcrackers! Since I was two, my brother and I were given nutcrackers (as well as a new ornament) each year. And one year I received five, because the Wizard of Oz set was just a normal present. It seemed overwhelming last year, when both collections (50 something in total) filled my parents’ house. Now it seems much better, with my 26 nutcrackers displayed in all over the house.

Matt had requested his present be delivered early, in case it would be something that would enhance a little party we had at our place. Don’t ask me how, but Santa got the message, and his present was waiting for him after his week-long business trip.

Note: It was sent early because he made the extra nice list!

What could it be?

Rock Band! Woo hoo! I’m now considering making a No Doubt tribute band.

That’s all for now. Next I’ll post some pictures from Christmas Day. Hope you all had a merry one!

In reading wedding blogs and forums, it’s interesting to see that many betrothed women are not changing their names. I, for one, am anxious to change my name. Mom and dad — it’s not that Atwood is a bad name. I really love it. I’ve had people tell me that it’s a perfect writer’s name. Sure, there was that boy Patrick in third grade who always called me “Itwood,” “Ofwood,” “Bewood,” etc., but the playground taunting didn’t really come into affect until I interned at a big company.

“I’m sorry, but we can’t change this,” my boss told me. “I guess your parents weren’t really thinking about email addresses when they named you.”

Yes, my first initial with my last name becomes: eatwood. As much as I tell people my email address is “E for Emily and Atwood,” they write it down and say “Oh, eat wood! Ha!” Sometimes a coworker will walk by my desk, mutter it out loud and laugh.

And then there was the woman who said, “Eat wood! That’s great! Like, go suck an egg! Go eat wood!”

Now, unless you lived with me during my last year in college (or you presented me with one major diamond beauty), you’re not allowed to call me that.

(Post-wedding Emily here, and you also can’t call me that because my name is officially and legally changed.)

1. Cooking for one. My meals typically consist of crackers.
2. Taking out the garbage.
3. Being warmed by the heater, not a hug.
4. No one to laugh at my jokes…but myself.

One upside is that my parents had me over for dinner the past two nights. Although, my mom said that they’ll have to invite Matt over without me to keep things fair. Somehow I think they would let me in, too.

]]> http://emilyandmatt.org/blog/happily-married/the-list-goes-on/feed/ 1 http://emilyandmatt.org/blog/happily-married/big-blue/ http://emilyandmatt.org/blog/happily-married/big-blue/#comments Mon, 24 Nov 2008 19:06:16 +0000 Emily http://emilyandmatt.org/blog/happily-married/big-blue/ What are the blue paint possibilities like? Big and blue. Yes, siree, I was put up to the challenge to find the perfect blue to paint our living room the weekend before last. I was keen on a blue-gray mix, but Matt wasn’t so sure and thought a light teal could be nice. Because we all know paint samples lie, I got four quarts:

Yes, I have the blues. After slathering up my four choices, I quickly knew the two on the right weren’t what we were wanting. Going on a hope and a prayer, I chose the leftmost color: overcast. I was just praying it wasn’t going to be so gloomy.

“Dad? Hey, we’re thinking about painting…”

Dads of the handy sort know how that phone conversation ends, luckily he was more than eager to help. It brought me back to the time when we painted three shades of blue to create waves on my room’s walls when I was in high school. My poor brother painted the ceiling while I watched TV. Thanks, Mike!

I was so glad the more we painted, the more I loved the color. Matt came in with one wall painted and thank goodness he liked it, and helped! Here’s some pictures from my phone. They were actually being sent to my mom who was recovering from surgery that kept her from talking for a whole week! Praise God she’s recovering very well!

Our living room is coming together now! This week we hope to add our couch and rug. And just when I thought the painting was over, it had only just begun… more next time!

Unfortunately, I forgot my camera, although I know I would feel really awkward using a flash to savor the memories that seemed pretty standard to the rest of the diners.

This was my awesome martini, the June in January. You can hardly tell in the picture, but it has dry ice in it, so it smokes and bubbles!

I ordered the Signature Filet:

While Matt had the Surf ‘N Turf

Happy Birthday girl:

Matt also surprised me to see “Bolt” in 3D. I love me a cute Disney movie, especially with cute dogs! Here, we model our rockin’ 3D glasses:

It was a sweet way to start a laborious weekend. But more on that later!

Matt took the camera that day, so unfortunately we have no fun photos to share. So, to keep things interesting, I’ll post a fun picture of us:

Now do you recognize her, wedding readers? Good! It’s so funny, people always think we’re sisters. We are also birthday buddies, so the first part of August is always a blast. Anyhoo, back to baking…

We doubled the recipe and had so much batter that we had two attempts to mix the dry and wet ingredients. We filled a bundt cake pan, two mini loaves and a star pan. Turns out, a star pan is really hard to cook evenly, in case you wanted to know.

Here’s the recipe, which we followed to a T, except that we added chocolate chips and had a little less pumpkin to work with:

Pumpkin Spice Bread

Cook Time: 1 hour
Ingredients:
3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 1/2 cups sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 can (16 ounces) pumpkin purée
1 cup vegetable oil
4 eggs
Preparation:
Grease and flour two 9x5x3-inch loaf pans. In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, salt, baking soda, cinnamon, and nutmeg. In a separate bowl, stir together the pumpkin and oil.
Beat in eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.

Make a well in the center of the flour mixture; add pumpkin mixture. Stir just until dry ingredients are moistened. Pour batter into prepared pans. Bake at 350° for 1 hour, or until a wooden pick or cake tester inserted in center comes out clean.

Makes 2 loaves of pumpkin bread.
(Source)

We also made whipped cream, which Christine’s baker friend, Maxine, told us was actually sweet butter because we blended it too long. Whatever it was, it was absolutely delicious complemented the bread well!

This baker friend also had informed Christine of a time-saving, “green” tip: preheating the oven isn’t necessary for modern ovens. I tested this out last night with pizza and it came out just fine without preheating. This was great news for me, since I am an impatient cook who likes to save money and energy when possible!

Everything went fine and dandy. They laughed when I said “awesome,” because apparently teachers and adults in general don’t say that. But right before I was about to start, they introduced me and the class started giggling. Apparently there was a girl there with my new name. She looked uncomfortable and to be honest, I was a little bummed.

I have never met anyone (in person that is) with my same “old name.” But now there’s a country music singer, interesting children’s clothes designer and a local elementary kid who all share my name. And, as Matt is learning and everyone close to me knows by now, I’m not good at sharing.

Seriously though, what is so awesome about Duluth Trading Co.? Their tagline is “seriously usable stuff for women.” Totally usable stuff includes a genuine shearling hat that goes perfectly with … Swedish FireSteel fire igniters? More usable stuff to me would be along the lines of hand soap or even toilet paper. I definitely use that stuff way more than flint. Then there is another publication with 84 pages of cat accessories. I won’t even get started on that one.

I’m sorry that you lost your home, well only partly since it’s ours now and we love it. Maybe lay off the retail therapy temptation by not ordering a bazillion catalogs.

Thanks,

Emily