Living in HD

Happy Holidays! There is a lot to update, but wanted to start with the totally awesome new HD set up we received for Christmas. We received the new TV and new speakers from our parents. Jim took down one of the shelves so that it would fit into the built in. The speakers are much smaller and now tucked up high and provide life-like sound. It's a pretty sweet set up. So far we've mostly been watching football (as shown in this photo). The holidays were good, went too fast though. We've got some pics to share from family visits and New Years party . . . . more to come.

Holy shit i'm full

Do you ever get the feeling like you will never be hungry again? If so, welcome to my Thanksgiving. I don't know exactly how much I ate in terms of poundage but over the course of the day it was probably a good 170-200% my normal intake.



But I did manage to learn few things about cooking this year. I learned that drinking hot cider all day can be hard on your teeth and I learned that brussel sprouts are not as bad as I had thought they were, but still nearly inedible. By far the most useful information, however, came from one of the many online recipe sites:
"Separate the skin over the breast to make little pockets. Put 3 tablespoons of the butter on both sides between the skin and breast meat. This makes for very juicy breast meat":



Everything was so delicious. Thanks to Brian, Britta, Matt and Laura for contributing to a fantastic meal.

New baby, new floors

Two weeks ago my mom came out for a visit and we went on a road trip to Missoula to see my best friend, Julie, and her new baby boy, Ian. While we were gone, Jim went to town on the rest of our flooring. We got back Sunday afternoon and he was only a few feet away from finishing. The floors look fantastic, and Ian is the sweetest baby.

I've known Julie since we were both 5 years old. We met on the bus on the first day of school.

Ian was such a sweetheart. My mom and I fell in love at first site.

I think Ian looks like Julie, but even while we were there he seemed to change and at certain angles you could see his dad, Clayton.

Beautiful floors!!

We also had new window blinds installed this week. They are fantastic! Especially in the front window.

Just in time for winter...

"At the age of six I wanted to be a cook. At seven I wanted to be Napoleon. And my ambition has been growing steadily ever since". -Salvador Dali


I think about this quote every time my home improvement ideas seem a little too far fetched. Saturday morning was one of those times.

When we moved into our house this spring the first thing that I recognized as needing improvement was the lack of access to our 3/16 of an acre of backyard (we were being forced to go through the garage). So in June, about a month after moving in, Sara and I ordered a new patio door from an acquaintance of mine in the window and door industry. It finally arrived from Germany via Chicago, Denver, Nova Scotia, etc, last week. If I had known there would be an 18 week lead time I probably would have gone domestic. Oh well, it is basically the Audi of patio doors, so the delay is mostly forgotten.

I enlisted the assistance of my friend Josh and we went to work making a huge hole in the back of the house where our lame bay window had been.

Before:


An hour or so later:


We then hit the store for lumber and caulk, made a quick stop at A&W and got back to work installing the door.


With the help of Pat and his multiple trips to his house for tools that I do not own we pressed on, getting the door level & plumb.



And as evening settled on Bozeman and the Wolverines were completing their fourth quarter comeback victory over the Spartans, Bill took his first look out from the house to his yard/toilet. He seems happy.

Bill’s Modeling Debut

Today at work we needed a dog model for a project we’re rushing to finish up. The email went out to the office, a few people offered, but we needed a dog fast and a good looking one too. Since I probably live the closest to our office and have the best looking dog in our entire company, I was told to “go get him.” He was a natural as the picture above proves. We have some concerns that he looks so good we may need to ask for some money . . . look for Bill in Murdoch’s advertising and branding in the future.

bride, groom, wedding, awesome

If you noticed out recent absence from blogging you will (hopefully) be pleased to know that we're ok and we have basically been partying our asses off for the last 2 months and, therefore, unable to post anything coherent. We've had lots of visitors and a few trips squeezed in, the most recent of which was in northern California for the wedding of our beloved friends AV and Sonia (below).


Congrats to the happy couple!
Sara and I were thrilled to be able to take a short vacation and spent our time eating, drinking, dancing, meeting new friends, catching up with old friends, making toasts, sitting in the hottub, playing horseshoes, eating, drinking, and basically smiling nonstop. What a blast!



Sara and Jim, mid-reception



Sara and the bride, looking lovely



Andrew Alt, John Volckens and Jim, post reception

Award Winner pt 2

This project is a little older but a project that I helped design and build while at Montana State just won an AIA Honor Award. Pretty exciting stuff...