Indoor soccer team

This is the amazing (and very winning!) Team Sanchez III from our winter indoor season.

Back row, L-R: Kevin, Charlie, Emily, Banji, me and Jason

Front row, L-R: Ben, Blaine, Emanuel and Andy

Christmas with Jason and Cary

Here we are in front of a giant Christmas tree at the Smith Anderson Holiday Party. It was held at the North Carolina Museum of History! After dinner we were even able to go and explore some of the exhibits.
I wanted to put a few pictures up of our decorations at home. Jason and I now have (almost) matching stockings and we tried to scatter vases of ornaments throughout the house to add a little Christmas cheer.
This is a view of our Christmas tree from our dining room. I put up some of my nutcrackers and hung the stars that my friend brought back for me from Estonia.
My sister and I made this wreath using ribbon and items from "nature" outside our house. We spraypainted pine cones, leaves and holly and glittered away!

Picture from Army/Navy Football Game

Charlottesville in the Fall

Jason and I had the opportunity to pop back up to Charlottesville recently to see some old friends and reminisce about our former home. We also got a chance to meet Grant (left) and Lilly (right), the newest addition to Danton and Allison's family. Here I am with the twins on the Lawn, in front of the famed Rotunda.
And here's a picture of the happy mom with her two 5 month old angels. Well, they're pretty close, anyhow! :-)

My First Brush with a Presidential Candidate

I couldn't pass up the opportunity to see Barack Obama speak at NCCU, so I showed up last Thursday for his address. The marching band kept the crowd's energy level high before Obama arrived.

I was actually in the second row of people standing (there were others seated behind us). Here's a shot from my camera without any zoom. This is really how close I was to him for the entire speech. What you can't see is all of the Secret Service people with binoculars and concealed weapons. I have a much greater appreciation for the security required for presidential candidates after watching "Bobby," the movie about RFK's assassination. I have included several close-up shots below that I took during the speech.


I actually did get to shake Barack's hand! Here he is working his way down the line.

Cary's Visit to the Land of Old People and Endless Sunshine

Turns out all of Florida isn't like this house we drove by. But it did make for a great shot as we got lost in the Everglades.

The whole reason for the trip was to visit my cousin Peter. We had a fantastic time catching up, exploring the Everglades, spending time with the dogs and visiting local parks.

Here is Jenna (person), Nala (dog on left), Peter (person) and Rowdy (dog on right).

Peter makes a new friend (thankfully, not still alive).

We rode around the Everglades in an air boat like this (which Peter insisted on calling a "fan boat"). Ours was a little bigger but tons of fun. We only sank down 1 inch into the water so we could go straight through most of the marshy areas.

From what I saw, the Everglades are chock-full of mangrove trees.

This was one of the marshy-ier parts we passed through. The water is only 1.5 feet deep in most of the Everglades.

Our guide caught some blue crabs in a trap and took them out to show us. I was amazed to see how truly blue they are!

This is another of my favorite shots from the Everglades.

Here is some native wildlife. Unfortunately, I can't for the life of me remember whether it's a heron or an egret. Still so pretty!

Fun times at the State Fair

Jason and I had a fantastic time at the State Fair on Wednesday night. We played games, gorged ourselves on Wisconsin fried cheese and funnel cakes, and had the chance to see a BMX bike show and some races (pigs, goats and ducks). Yes, I'm serious about the ducks.

It was neat being at the Fair at night. The lights on the rides really added to the exciting environment. We'll definitely be back next year!

Here is the pig race I alluded to above. They were surprisingly fast and the announcer was really into the race. They even played a recording of the bugle call from the Kentucky Derby before they released the pigs out of their shoots. Each pig had on racing colors and numbers that coordinated with real NASCAR drivers (i.e., #24 was "Piggy Gordon").

Here's a goat striding out towards the finish line. The pigs and goats raced for cheese and I think the ducks raced just for the pure fun of it.

Turns out that two-legged animals can't run very quickly. I thought this was the funniest race of all!

Here I am with the "medal" I won for my pitiful performance at a remote control car racing game. I think they just gave out medals to the absolute worst drivers--they only other one in our race to receive one was a kid who couldn't have been more than 7 years old. That's okay, I'm always happy to win medals, even for ridiculous and embarrassing reasons!
Look ma, no hands! It was pretty crazy to see these guys doing their tricks and jumps on the bikes. It was definitely all real--actually, several of the guys busted pretty badly landing their jumps. The crew rushed out and thankfully, every rider was fine and (eventually) finished the show. But it sure was exciting to see in person!

Here's another move. This guy is swinging the bike around under his body and getting it back in place to be able to land the jump. Craziness!