2014 has been quite a year. There have been some big changes and an even bigger one coming, but we’ll get to that in a bit.
The year started slowly but picked up in February when I helped April at the CCIRA conference on literacy. I found out that The Fonz is a well-regarded children’s author. Also, we got to watch Temple Grandin stand by a shelf in the book store and sign about one hundred books for people saying hello to her. These were not people who were planning on buying her book but who now had no real choice. The first lady this happened to walked up to the counter with a confused look on her face and said, “I guess I have to buy this because she signed my name it.” We agreed and took her money. This went on for hours until we were sold out of the book. Turns out Temple Grandin is crafty as a fox. If you ever write a book, that is how you sell it.
In our continued effort to do everything backwards, we flew to Seattle in April so that my not-yet-fiancee could try on The Dress (I have not seen and don’t want to know anything about it until The Day). We went with Kellen, Lex, and Ruthie and there was most definitely an ulterior motive. April tried on a dress, we walked around sunny Seattle, saw a baseball game, drank a lot of coffee, and ate some great biscuits. Unbeknownst to April, Ruthie delivered the engagement ring to me and Kellen acted as my courier to get it back to Colorado.
One week after we returned, 6 months of planning came to fruition and I asked April to marry me. Sure, we had already booked the venue, caterer, photographer, florist, the cake lady, and April had picked out her dress before I proposed to her, but we are a backwards sort. Regarding the proposal, she said yes. That was nice. Now when she tells people we are getting married, she has a ring as proof.
Wedding planning intensified and we prepared for our summer trip to Michigan and Ohio. I would meet her father and she would meet my grandparents (along with a few dozen other relatives). Michigan was beautiful; we went sailing on Booma and didn’t win the race (I’m fairly certain it wasn’t my fault, but I can’t be sure). Ohio was also beautiful and I didn’t cost anyone a boat race.
The end of summer meant the return of April’s busy season and several months of 80 hour work weeks to keep her busy. I was able to join April again at the Mountains and Plains Bookseller’s Assocation in Denver. It’s a long weekend of great books, the authors of said books, and trivia. Not to toot our own horn but we won the prestigious MPIBA Trivia Award (and a year of bragging rights). Some might say we cheated since Arsen handpicked a team from other states to fill up the non-existent South Dakota contingent. I say that we all just channeled our inner South Dakotans and snatched victory away from the Texans.
We celebrated the end of the event season by spending a long weekend in Montana and enjoyed the below zero temperature by building a big fire, reading a lot, watching way too much Love it or List it, and trying to relax in the hot tub (we lasted about 15 minutes before the -20 wind chill drove us back inside).
Our third Thanksgiving together was held in Colorado at my mom’s house. It was great to have our families together for a holiday. We successfully juggled the various dietary restrictions and even managed to serve our from-scratch “pumpkin” pies. I put pumpkin in quotes because we use Hubbard squash for our pies. This year, we had a thirty pound squash that we drilled holes in, oven roasted for an hour and a half, sawed it into pieces, roasted for another hour and a half (with pans of water on the bottom rack to help steam the squash), separated meat from skin, pureed the steamed squash, strained it, and then let it sit suspended on cheesecloth overnight. I just heard recently that you can actually buy the pie filling at the store, which would have saved us a lot of time and effort. That said, we’ll probably do the same thing again next year.
Since our families are spread out, we have been alternating our Thanksgivings and Christmases. I’m actually finishing up this Christmas letter in rainy Knoxville by the Christmas tree. We’ll be heading back to very snowy Colorado in a day and, as always, there will be a piece of my heart that I leave in Knoxville.
2014 is almost over and so much of our attention is already in May of next year. What was so far away now sits on the horizon five months out. We have more work to do but I cannot express how excited I am. The wedding is going to be amazing and I am young-kid-on-Christmas-morning excited to share that with my friends and family. We won’t be doing much traveling this year but I hope we get to see you out in sunny Colorado.
I mentioned a big change coming this next year and it shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone; we will be getting married in May. The rest of this website is built around that fact, so feel free to peruse.