Christmas Decorations

I enjoyed seeing the decorations in Staunton and Bruce on everyone else's blog so decided to post ours.

An overview of the tree with the presents so far. I say so far because none of these are for me so I'm hoping some more are added before its time to open gifts!

A detail of the new golden glass bird ornaments I bought myself as a present this year:

Also new this year - a garland with lights I added to the top of the book case to display Christmas cards received.

And our stockings - Azra's is also new this year as she wasn't able to go to Bosnia this year and will be with us for Christmas, her birthday and New Years! I know she'd rather be home, but I'm excited she's here!

Miran, the Actor!

Miran and I went to a holiday play at the Actors' Theatre of Charlotte. Miran ended up being the star of the show after being pulled up on stage. He was absolutely thrilled and on the drive home suggested we should go again and sit in the same seats because he wanted to do it again and felt he could do better if he was prepared.

Thanksgiving!

Here are a few pictures from our company last week for Thanksgiving. I seem to disproportionately feature Maggie this time, but I didn't take too many pictures so this is what I've got.

Vancouver New York Trip

Two weeks ago I went to conferences in Vancouver and then New York. Here are some pictures from that trip.

The conference was at the Museum of Vancouver, which was a fun space age building:

I walked around the city a lot, and checked out Canada Place - a big convention center on a pier near the port. 

Here is me reflected in the glass facade of Canada Place with the amazing bay and mountains behind me.

Apparently the War of 1812 is a big deal in Canada, here is a little anti-american propaganda about when we attacked them and tried to incorporate Canada into the United States!

The conference in New York was at Columbia, so I had fun exploring my old hunting grounds. Here is a campus view:

And my 1st and 2nd apartments in New York:

I also went to check out the World Trade Center memorial (the building behind is the museum, which is still under construction):

Here is me in front of the memorial reflected in the glass of the museum's facade:

And I also walked the high line - which was pretty amazing:

Topsail Beach

Thanks to my parents, last week we spent a wonderful five days on Topsail Island on the North Carolina coast. In addition to my parents and us, Aunt Maggie and the Anderson family were also there. We were sorry that Aunt Lee, Uncle Jim, Megan and John couldn't be there - especially because the reason was Mrs. DeRoche's passing.

But we had a good time celebrating mom's birthday and escaping from real life for awhile. We were supposed to come home Tuesday, but then stayed until Wednesday, and then decided to stay until Thursday. Miran had a lot of fun playing with the girls and they seem to really enjoy Uncle Miran.

And a couple of videos of beach fun (sorry the surf is so loud, just turn the sound down, you can't hear anyone talking on any of these).

The Andersons were looking so cute and like a perfect family during their bedtime ritual story time that I had to take a picture.

Renaissance Festival

A couple of pictures of everyone having fun at the Renaissance Festival two week-ends ago.

Maggie looking sweet in a flower crown.

Miran and Harald throwing knives.

Miran shooting a bow and arrow.

The assistants who handed out the arrows when needed.

Even Azra through some softballs!

Cecilia and the girls on a ship ride.

And a short video of that ride.

Central Europe Installation

Here are two images from the sculpture / memorial installation the students from my Jewish Heritage class created for the annual study abroad exhibition at the College of Arts + Architecture. It involves a mapping of deportation routes of specific individuals from the cities we visited to the camps we visited mapped against our bus route on the trip. In the background on the wall you can see the work of the students who took digital photography / photoshop as their second class on the trip.

Picture Rearranging / Mom and Dad Visit

Mom and Dad were here a couple of week-ends ago. The point of the trip was to see Obama speak, but we lost our seats for that event when it moved from the outdoor football stadium to the indoor basketball arena because of rain.

But they did bring with them a painting that is on loan to us from Cecilia and Harald, which I hung over the fireplace in the family room. I definitely think the white looks great against the gray brick wall. However, its a little big for that spot. When I find something that goes with it well to put in that spot, I think I'll move it to the right and hang it where there is more space above and below.

The picture that was there, the lovely layered photo Miran took of trees reflected in water in Sarajevo, got moved up to our bedroom. I'm really happy with this. In addition to filling what had been a blank spot for years, I think the muted colors of this picture look much better and it really pops against the bright green wall and in a room that gets more light.

And we also moved a bookcase from IKEA that was in my office at work home and installed it behind the couch in the family room. That area was kind of dead space so now it feels much more useful. I still haven't put anything on it, but my plan is to combine fiction and art objects.

Virginia Visit

I haven't posted in awhile so I'm going to post about a couple of things that have happened in the past month - starting with the trip to Virginia. These pictures are all borrowed from everyone else's blogs so will be familiar to my family, but new to Miran's family.

Uncle Miran with Maggie, Michael, and Ingrid:

Sisters 1 - Mommy, Lee, and Maggie:

Sisters 2: The Next Generation - Cecilia, Me, Margaret:

Cousins - Margaret, Cecilia and her husband Harald, Miran and I, my cousins Patrick and Megan, and Patrick's wife Haley:

Congratulations Azra!

Today we got an exciting piece of mail - Azra's Associates Degree! Yeah! Congrats! Two years, one degree down - and next week she'll be back to start on the next two years and the Bachelor's degree at UNC Charlotte.

And here is just a lovely picture of Azra from earlier this summer in Bosnia.

Ice Cream !

For his birthday, mom and dad sent Miran the ice cream maker attachment for our kitchenaid mixer. So far I've made three batches of ice cream and I'm 1 for 3. The first attempt was supposed to be lemon, but we could only taste the vanilla, and it had a weird texture because I used stevia. The second batch (pictured) was a second try at lemon with a whole lot more lemon juice and lemon zest and real sugar. It was perfect.

The mint chocolate chip never churned into ice cream and we still don't know why. And here is Miran taking a picture of himself and of me while I make ice cream ... which he has very much enjoyed eating.

Bahamas

As everyone knows by now, for Miran's birthday and our 8th Anniversary we took a spontaneous trip to the Bahamas. As I mentioned, we forgot our camera, so just have a couple of pictures from our cell phones to share.

Our hotel:

The view from our room:

Me at our anniversary dinner at an Italian restaurant:

Miran in the stocks at the pirate museum:

Miran collapsed in the lobby when we arrived at the hotel after not sleeping the night before and we had to wait a few hours to get into our room:

Me changing from nice sandals into flip flops because of the pouring rain that same first afternoon when we decided to check out downtown Nassau to waste time while waiting for our room:

But most of the time it was beautiful. Here is Miran enjoying the ocean from the boardwalk in front of our hotel.