Guess Who's On The Road Now?

Amy in her stylin' new car!

*Apologies on the quality of the photo, I took a quick pic with Andrew's iPhone and clearly do not know how to get a good picture out of it! Or show most of the car in it. :)

Latest Etsy Find

During this whole wedding planning process, I've spent many an hour looking over all sorts of random stuff on Etsy. For those of you who have never heard of Etsy, it's a website (similar to Ebay but without the bidding) where people sell their handcrafted items and skills. You can find anything from graphic design service to jewelry to food to art, basically anything you can imagine.

My latest purchase was thank you cards for my bridal shower. I ended up going with simple white cards with a letterpressed "thank you" on top (I'm currently addicted to letterpressing):

This may seem a little boring for someone that loves color (lots of it and in bright shades!) but I literally searched two weeks for the right card before I settled on these.  The selling point? The envelopes!

The envelopes are recycled and made from pages of actual wedding magazines, which I thought was visually neat while being environmentally friendly. It was fun to see the assortment of ads (which appeared to come from an issue of Martha Stewart Weddings) that came in my order, and the envelopes themselves had been cut by a machine and formed into actual envelopes down to the glue on the flap.  A sign that this order was meant to be, one of the envelopes detailed a wedding with Korean bride (complete with pictures of hanboks, traditional Korean dresses) so that was the obviously the one I used for my sister's thank you note. 

I have a strong feeling this addiction to Etsy will continue after I'm married, although I hopefully won't be spending as much money on things (and not as frequently!)

Keeping My Fingers Crossed...

...that the fall foliage is going to change colors drastically within a month!

Andrew forwarded me an article from Boston.com that's predicting that the leaves will change a week sooner than they usually do due to the extremely hot summer.

What I'm hoping is that this area (picture taken Friday at our venue) will look less like summer and more like fall by the time our wedding takes place:

A glimmer of hope - while the trees look stubbornly green, there were signs of colored leaves on the ground:

Foliage and weather stalking have officially been added to my list of things to do for the month.

"Tri"-ing Your Hardest

Andrew's sister Amanda just completed her THIRD triathlon of the year this weekend at the Nation's Triathlon in Washington, D.C. (Picture swiped from Amanda's Facebook page):

While Andrew and I were unable to make it down to cheer her on, it did remind me that I had a long overdue post to get up regarding her second triathlon at the end of July. which we did have the pleasure of attending. I think it was one of the hottest weekends of the summer, and Andrew's parents, Andrew and I all traveled down to the Princeton, NJ area to watch Amanda compete in the New Jersey State Triathlon.

This is Amanda and Andrew posing before the start of the triathlon. Yes, Amanda looked that calm and collected while knowing that she was going to start an Olympic triathlon, which means swimming 1500 meters, biking 25.5 miles, and running 6.2 miles - YIKES!

This is the chaos that marks a triathlon, but I have to say that everything was well organized:

Amanda's group in the water, waiting for their start. Bonus points to anyone that can pick Amanda out in the picture (I have a rough sense for what area she's in, but all those gray caps look alike to me!):

I love this shot - I call this the "Brotherly Love" photo. Andrew proudly held that sign up high and was yelling his heart out, cheering Amanda on although I doubt she was able to see us or hear us while racing in the water:

And they're off! These ladies don't mess around in the water. In fact, Amanda's training groups all practiced swimming together in one lane so they would get used to the crowding/elbows everywhere/getting kicked sensation from a triathlon:

Out of the water and heading for the bikes, Amanda doesn't even look winded as she spots us on the sidelines:

In transition with her bike, she ready to start the almost 26 mile long cycling portion of the triathlon. This was the one part of the triathlon where we couldn't actually see her competing:

Final triathlon phase is the running portion. Let me tell you, it would be hard for me to run six miles on a normal day and yet Amanda is still smiling while running in extreme heat (we're talking mid-90's at least) and after swimming and biking. Triathletes are truly incredible!

It was incredibly exciting to watch Amanda cross the finish line and we were all cheering her on as she received her medal for completing the triathlon:

After a quick walk through the water tent (I don't know what these are really called but what a neat concept):

We posed for own shot with Amanda. It is one thing to see all the things that triathletes do in competition, and marvel over the distances but quite another to see a triathlon in action. Needless to say, we were incredibly proud of Amanda:

So while we didn't get to see her this weekend, and I heard that the triathletes competed in the rain, I have no doubts that Amanda did well. In fact, I've heard rumblings about Amanda beating her best personal time so major kudos to her!

One Step Closer

Andrew and I both took Friday afternoon off from work so we could go here:

And apply for our marriage license! The process was surprisingly simple and humorous at times, since we were required to raise our right hands and recite an oath together.

To commemorate the occasion, we were able to get a volunteer that was staffing the information desk to take a picture in the main lobby:

Hard to believe that in under a month, we'll be husband and wife!

Saying Goodbye to Summer

Free tickets to the Red Sox game on Labor Day? Yes, please!

It's the perfect way to end Labor Day weekend, say goobye to summer, hello to fall-like temperatures and most importantly, relax!  And hang out with two members of our wedding party, groomsman Matt (on the far left):

And my sister and maid of honor Amy:

Note to self: Must get more sleep since I don't know when those bags under my eyes became a permanent fixture!

Neponset River Walk

The best way for Andrew and I to burn off the extra calories from ingesting leftover bridal shower cake was to take a nice, long walk.

We selected the Neponset River Walk to explore in our new neighborhood.

The best thing about it is that many stretches are decorated with detailed and informative murals featuring the flora and fauna that can be found along the trail:

For some stetches of the walk, you can see the historic Mattapan trolley rolling by:

A shot of the historic Baker chocolate factory we walked by. Alas, no lovely smells of chocolate wafted our way since it's actually in the process of being converted into - you guessed it - luxury condos:

Finally, we hit a stretch of the trail that brought us out to open marsh and water! It was beautiful and you could easily forget how close you were to the city on the other side of the walkway:

Finally, a little sign on the trail I found amusing - a healthy trail indeed to walk on with the one you love!

The Neponset River Walk allowed us to walk at a brisk, uninterrupted pace for an hour and half while enjoying varied scenery and it seems to stretch on forever. I'm looking forward to exploring it further one day with a bike.