Just finished my last exam of the semester, so normal life may now resume!

We've done a lot in the oh, three months or so since our last blog post. So here's a brief photo summary of some significant fall events:

My parents came to visit and my mom made me a birthday cake. (You may not be able to tell from my expression, but I. Love. Cake.)















On Thanksgiving, Jason held a baby (not ours. Sorry.)




















I baked cookies with some women from our Sunday school class (there's that cute baby again).















We went to California! Here's proof: Jason with a palm tree.















Here's me dipping my feet in the nasty Pacific ocean:

Schmucker's Restaurant on TV

I'm about a month behind here, but I figure late is better than never.

So here's the story: Schmucker's Restaurant was on national television! There's a little show called Sky Dives where the show's host flies his plane from Chicago to a city nearby and eats at some local restaurant. Well, they picked Schmucker's and Tony Packo's for Toledo. There are three one-minute clips about the restaurant. They aired on WGN (a cable channel based in Chicago) on August 14th and 15th all across the country. My dad told me they aired in 73 million homes. Nuts!

Click here to check it out! (Well, the link isn't working for me right now, but I'm posting this anyway in case it's just my internet connection being wonky. Update 9/27: WGN's website was actually broken. I've updated the link if you didn't get a chance to watch it before.)

Cancun Vacation!

Mel and I had the fantastic opportunity to go on vacation with my family in Cancun for an entire week. From August 14-21, we soaked in the tropical Mexican paradise. It was very relaxing, but we also got to do a lot of fun things. We went swimming in the ocean, read books by the pool, went kayaking and sailing, explored the Mayan ruins at Tulum, saw a Mexican dance show, feasted on all sorts of Mexican cuisine, went to a market in downtown Cancun, played ping-pong, walked the beach, went scuba diving, played games, did water aerobics, painted some pottery, visited Playa del Carmen where Natalie introduced us to tacos al pastor, saw sea turtles laying eggs in the sand, and just generally had an awesome week. So without any further ado, here are links to some pictures from the week.

• The long version of the week. About 120 pictures.
• The short version of the week. About 30 pictures (a subset of the long version).
• Scuba diving with my dad. 

Oh, and a quick FYI: Mel's face is bruised in these photos because she got hit in the cheek by a softball four days before we left for vacation.

Here's a quick sample of the pictures in the albums.

Vacation Pictures

Hey everybody. I'm going to chime in here and post a few pictures from our trip to Indiana to spend the weekend with Mel's family.


The full album

Busy summer

Many apologies for our blog silence. The last month has been especially busy for us as we are both in full-blown nerd mode - Jason is deep in the middle of research and I am frantically trying to keep afloat in three grad classes.

The end of June we flew out to southern Indiana for a reunion with my extended family. We had a great time hiking, playing volleyball, participating in a Euchre tournament (Jason and I started out strong but finished up with a disappointing record of 2-3), and just generally catching up with everyone and stuffing ourselves with great food.

Also in June we celebrated our third wedding anniversary with a very hot and humid camping trip followed by various fun activities for Jason's 27th(!) birthday. It just can't be possible that we are really that old...

Jason is currently in sports heaven trying to keep up with World Cup soccer, the Tour de France, and various tennis tournaments. I'm lucky if I get a 5-minute conversation out of him. ;)

All in all, life is definitely keeping us on our toes these days .

I'd love to post some pictures from the reunion but that's Jason's department.

What we've been up to lately

We went to the Houston Zoo with friends from Sunday school class. Go to this link to see more pictures.

We hung out with our friends on the eve of their twins' birth...

...and got to hold their brand new baby girls!

I hope I'm ready to do this whole school thing again...

Easter in KC!

This past weekend I took a solo trip to Kansas City to see my baby sister! She was a very charming host and showed me all around. We visited a WWI memorial, took in First Friday in the downtown area, went to a Farmer's Market (where we were less-than-tempted to try the octopus salad - see picture below), did some shopping, ate some authentic KC BBQ, and even got to spend some time with our aunt and uncle and adorable 3-year-old cousin in Topeka. And my ears were treated to some good ol' Mennonite four-part harmony at church on Sunday.

Jason stayed behind in College Station but from what I hear he had almost as much fun as I had. Hopefully he'll hop on the blog to tell about it.

Octopus, anyone?

We dyed Easter eggs! Haven't done that in years!

Opera Neighbors

We have a female neighbor. She is currently practicing a singing technique that sounds like opera. We can hear her through the walls. It is not pleasant. Just thought you should know.

Two blogs in two days!

Just wanted to show everyone what I have to compete with for my husband's attention:

His computers. Four, to be exact.

Our dog, the cuddle monster.

And on a completely unrelated note, here's a picture of our favorite meal at our favorite restaurant (that I most recently was able to enjoy while Cynthia and Bob were in town):


Imagine all that yummy goodness wrapped up in a homemade flour tortilla. Nothing can compare.

We're so boring.

That's the reason we don't blog more often. We're not pregnant, we're not in the process of buying a house, we're not getting another dog, we're not starting new jobs or moving or traveling or a million other blog-worthy things. Our lives are really rather dull. But in an effort to satisfy all you visitors who visit our blog and find the same old stuff here, we'll try to think of something to write about.

Let's see...the GRE is over and done, glory hallelujah. Now everyone send positive Mel thoughts to Texas Woman's University so that they decide to accept me into the MLS program.

It was great to see Bob and Cynthia (Jason's aunt and uncle) this weekend as they passed through Texas on their way to Mexico. We showed them around the city and where each of us work. We love visitors, mostly because then we have an excuse to go to our favorite restaurant.

I'm running out of things to write...so here's an embarrassing story from work: I was at the Circulation desk and ready to help the next patron so I said, "Can I help you Mom?" instead of "Can I help you ma'am?" Awkward.

Alright, I'll see if my curlier half has anything to add.

(an interval of time later)

He doesn't :(

'Night all.

First post of 2010!

Perhaps 2010 will be a better year in terms of blogging regularly. We'll see...

Had a fabulous time in the frozen North for Christmas...once again we spent 40-ish hours in the car driving there and back again. We enjoyed snow, freezing temperatures, tons of quality time with family and friends, and delicious home cooking. Coming back to Texas is always a bit disheartening because we both REALLY love our families. And we don't get to see them that often.

Some highlights of the holiday season:

• eating the traditional Schmucker Christmas foods: red cake, egg casserole, cinnamon rolls, french onion soup; my mom's Christmas cookies; and pretty much everything else we ate
• opening presents at the Schmucker house with Natalie via webcam (she's currently in Mexico)
• playing Mario Kart with my brother and sister
• spending time with friends we don't get to see enough
• playing board games with my family
• accidentally throwing Juno's frisbee on the frozen pond and being terrified she would plunge into the icy water as she retrieved it (ok so that wasn't a highlight, but it was memorable)
• welcoming the New Year with the Schmucker family friends
• eating at Schmucker's restaurant! Twice! Plus carryout another night!
• all the wonderful, funny, crazy, sometimes annoying moments of being with family

We came back to Texas in time to experience the coldest week of weather this area has seen in over a decade. It's always fun to see how Texans react to snow/ice/temperatures less than 65 degrees.

So it's a new semester for Jason and same old job for me. The biggest news of the year so far is my decision to go back to school to become a real librarian (Master's in Library Science). I'm hoping to start this summer and do an online program part-time while I continue working full-time. If all goes well, I should be done in less than two years. I always thought I wanted to wait to go back to school until Jason was done--so that there would only be one stressed-out student in the household at a time--but frankly, I'm getting impatient. :) I'm actually somewhat enjoying studying for the GRE - it's been a looooooooong time since my brain's had to work this hard and the challenge is welcome.

That's about all from me...maybe Jason will have something to add. We'll sure try to post again soon!