california dreamin'

Hello all! I'm writing to you on what is my last night in our Iowa City apartment. We head to Ankeny tomorrow for Thanksgiving, and I'm flying to London from Des Moines. Pretty crazy to think that we're nearing the end of living on two continents! Crazy and awesome.

We spent a beautiful long weekend in Santa Barbara. The concert I gave went really well, and was also a lot of fun! We had a decent amount of free time too, during which we did some shopping, ate really tasty food, went for a run along the beach, watched a spectacular sunset, and dipped our toes in the water as we walked along the beach. It was a wonderful trip, and I'm so grateful that Chad got to come with!

 Lunch at a fantastic vegan restaurant. 

The locals told us that this was one of the most beautiful sunsets all year. Lucky us!

More delicious food! This was at a place really close to our hotel, and the day was so nice that we were able to comfortably eat outside! 

Me and my fabulous pianist for the concert at the Music Academy. We only met the day before the concert, and didn't have much rehearsal time, but we worked very easily and naturally together!

Enjoying the sunset on the beach together.

Basking in the sunshine on our last day. It was hard to leave, knowing that it was 40 degrees colder in Iowa! 

It was definitely bizarre to come home to snow on the ground. As the rest of you Midwesterners are probably experiencing, it really feels like winter now! 

I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving, and that you have lots to be thankful for. I know that we sure do!

thankful for two thanksgivings

Hello all! Since it's already quite late, and I'm not as diligent as Chad, this blog entry will be a little shorter than usual! Chad and I are both very busy at the moment; Chad with the expected stress of the semester coming to a close, and me with the unexpected stress of having to learn a new opera role in 2 weeks time! That's right, some more opera craziness came my way, and it turns out I'll be flying to London the weekend after Thanksgiving to record and perform a French opera! Life is full of surprises indeed… But first, we're flying to California tomorrow, where I'll sing a concert in Santa Barbara. I'm so glad Chad is able to come with, and we're hoping for some nice sunny walks on the beach.

This past weekend we took a trip to my hometown to have an early Thanksgiving with my family. We had a wonderful time, filled with hikes, fires (only contained ones, thank goodness), games, laughter, music and FOOD. Oh the food. So much food. I'm considering jaw surgery again so I have an excuse to go on a liquid diet...

Of course there had to be silly picture twin time. There were about 40 more of these. Did someone say blackmail?

Drew is so strong! And Chad is so… cheerful!

We came across a rather funny sign on our hike through High Cliff State Park. We were grateful the hunting season hadn't actually started yet, and we were able to continue walking without wearing blaze orange… 

Oh Wisconsin, you sure are pretty… 

The Thanksgiving meal! So much delicious food! Hmm, that reminds me of the leftovers in the fridge… Time to wrap this up!

That pretty much does it! Chad and I haven't been back in the States for Thanksgiving since 2007, so we're incredibly thankful that we get to have Thanksgiving with both of our families! Stay tuned for two weeks from now, when I'm sure we'll have lots of pictures from the big Thanksgiving gathering at the Grahams'! Until then, have a great week!

family time

Hey all! I'm writing to you from a chilly Iowa City. Yesterday Brenda and I were heading off to lunch in between one of my classes when it started to snow. The flakes were big and, for a little while, coming down fast. Once we made it to the restaurant, our mealtime entertainment was watching people enjoy the first snow of the season. It didn't seem like most of the locals were prepared for the snow based on how bundled up they were (myself included), but they were having fun anyway.

Brenda and I hit the road last weekend to go see my family. Brenda hadn't seen our nephews and niece since March, so she was especially excited to see them.

 Brenda and our adorable niece, Beatrice.

On Saturday Brenda and I decided to enjoy the beautiful weather by going for a bike ride. There is a 26-mile bike path near my parents' house, part of which runs along lake. We ended up biking about 12 miles and were both pleasantly surprised that we weren't sore the next day.

It was a wonderful day for a bike ride.

We're hitting the road again this weekend to go see Brenda's family in Wisconsin. Brenda has agreed to help me study by reading to me from my Family Law casebook on the drive up. I think she's planning on using funny voices while she reads. I'm excited to find out if that will help or hurt my understanding of the material.

I hope you all have a great week, and we'll talk to you next Tuesday!

study buddies

Hello all! This week's blog is brought to you by a united Chenda! Well, what I mean to say is, we're in the same room… Chad is busy working on a law school paper, but at least I can see him across the room while I write this! I arrived Saturday night, after a calm, delay-free day of travel! A big improvement after last week's trip to Copenhagen/Malmö! I thought I'd take the chance now to share some photos I took while there!

My "Titantic" movie moment… In the distance you can see the bridge that connects Denmark and Sweden. You'll notice it seems to disappear into the water, due to the fact that it goes underground/underwater into a tunnel!

Our friend Florian showing off his inner child at a fantastic playground that we walked to. Florian's girlfriend has a 6 year old son, hence the playground time. I know we're both big kids at heart, but we actually had a real reason to go to the playground!

On an absolutely gorgeous walk by the sea. Elisabeth's son was in the mood all weekend to wear an old tiger suit of his, which I thought was pretty much the most adorable thing ever.

As the token American, and therefore most accustomed to Halloween, I was given the task of carving the pumpkin. And also apparently threatening Florian. Pretty scary, eh?

The finished jack-o'-lantern. 

It was a wonderful trip, and even the storm that forced me to stay in Copenhagen an extra night (without even being able to see more of Florian due to the fact that the bridge between countries was closed due to the weather!) couldn't dampen my spirits! Hopefully next time Chad and I will both be able to visit!

My last Ariadne performance went well, and as sad as I am to say goodbye to the show for 6 weeks, I was very excited to come and spend some time in America! I have a lot of music to learn, so even though Chad is busy studying, I'm filling my time with studying as well! It works out well! 

Have a wonderful week!

The happy reunited couple. The scary look on my face is due to the very bright flash, nothing more!

Happy Halloween!

Hey All! I'm taking a break from studying legal ethics to fill you in on what we've been up to lately. FYI, if I fail my ethics exam on Saturday I'm going to blame it all on you because I should have been spending this time studying. The ethics exam has a reputation for being easy (cue lawyer joke) so, on the off chance that I fail, I'd like to be able to blame someone other than myself.

Brenda is back in Frankfurt after her trip to Denmark/Sweden. She had a great time, and I think she's planning on telling you about it and posting some pictures in a future post. You may have seen that there was a big storm in northern Europe yesterday. Brenda's flight ended up being cancelled, but she was rebooked onto a flight that left this morning.

Things have been busy for me lately, but that's to be expected. This is week 10 of 15 of the semester (not that I'm counting), and I'm feeling on top of things for the most part. Brenda arrives on Saturday and will be stateside for the rest of my semester. It will be great to have her here, and I'm confident that she'll be a great study buddy.

I hope you all have a great week, and we'll talk to you next Tuesday!

B is for "Best"

Hello all! Since Chad has a midterm to study for, and I actually did some traveling this week, I thought it wouldn't be a bad idea to take over the blog duties. I'm currently on my way back from visiting my friend Juliane in Bremen, which is in northern Germany. Juliane was an exchange student when we were in high school and she and I have stayed close since. She had a baby two months ago, so it seemed like a good time to visit her again! Her baby is beautiful and amazing and it was so cool to see my old friend as a mother! I also got a little peek into how much work it is! You mommies and daddies out there are pretty impressive. I don't think I should ever complain about not getting enough sleep, because I don't think it can ever compare!

One of the many ways Jaro likes being held.

I just... the cute.... Ahhh!!!

Over the weekend I visited my friend Andreas in his hometown of Biedenkopf. His family still lives there, so we all enjoyed a meal together at the restaurant where his sister got married, and walked around a little bit in the lovely surrounding country.

Apparently this sort of thing has become popular in Germany. Is it in America? It looks like a big obstacle course set up among the trees. I think it looks super fun. I would bet Chad doesn't.

Andreas and I on top of the castle tower in Biedenkopf. Because you know, every town deserves a castle...

In the evening, I got to experience opera in a way I never had! Andreas and his sister are both musical, but their way of performing opera is slightly different than mine! They are marionette puppeteers! They performed The Marriage of Figaro to a recording, and all the action was played by the puppets. For the encore, the curtain was lifted, and they played the final scene, but this time we could see what they were doing! It was incredible! The amount of concentration and coordination of fitting 5 people into that tiny space was really impressive. The whole experience was so charming, and I'm so glad I got to see it!

Other than that, I had a performance last Friday, which was fun as usual, and I'm looking forward to our next one on Friday! The day after that, I go to Copenhagen to visit our friend Florian, so I'm sure I'll have more to write about next week! And THEN, the week after that, Chad and I will be together again! All this traveling helps the time go by faster! Hope you all had a wonderful week!

Tune in tomorrow

Hey all! Brenda has been doing a lot of traveling around Germany recently. As a side note, I just realized that she's only been going to towns that start with the letter B - Berlin, Biedenkopf and Bremen. What does she have against all the other letters of the alphabet? Anyway, she has been taking some pictures on her travels and wants to share those with you as well as tell you about her trips, but she isn't able to do that today because she's still traveling. She will, however, write a post tomorrow after she gets back to Frankfurt. I am spending the evening studying for a midterm exam in a town that starts with the letter "I". I'm not a letter "B" purist like some people I know.

I hope you all have a wonderful evening!