Big 'D'!

On Monday for work, I travelled to Dallas to visit the city and it's facilities to see if it is a potential fit for my 2013 event. The weather was surprisingly cooler than Austin (who knew 3.5 hours south could make such a difference!) and the city has changed so much since I was there last. After a day of running around the city, it was time for the evening's entertainment: Monday night football at the new Cowboy's stadium!! We were in a suite on the field level no less and got all access passes. As we were walking to our suite, I looked up and nearly ran straight into Tony Romo (the quarterback and former Jessica Simpson beau) as he was heading out to the field for pre-game practice. So crazy!

The stadium itself was just breathtaking. I couldn't believe how huge everything was: from the shear site of the stadium driving up to the seating and standing room only sections. Even the drinks they were serving were HUGE! Here are a few pics that I took with my phone. Sorry for the poor quality!

Outside the stadium:

The view from our suite:

Inside the stadium:

Happy Fall!

This week in Austin we had our first glemce of cooler temperatures. Of course this only lasted a day or two (we are back in the 90's again now), but it was enough to prompt me to get out the spiced scented candles and pumpkins. I am waiting on the local pumkin patch to open to get actual pumkins, but these will have to work for now.


We also received in our sidebard for our dining room. John and I oragnzied all of our china and crystal as well as serving peices into the sideboard which had been stored in a closet. We can't wait to host our first dinner - Thanksgiving!

Stella at 4 Weeks!

Here are the latest pictures of our sweet Stella. She is getting her shots today.

Huskie's Win!

This past weekend we traveled to Chicago and West Lafeyette, Indiana to watch John's alumni, Northern Illinois University, play John's father, Bob's, alumni, Purdue University.

We were on the first, earliest flight out of Austin on Friday morning (are we surprised by that given that John books our travel!?) and headed to Naperville. We made a stop at the famous Portillo's eatery to get a hot dog and fry fix - yum! Interesting that the buns have poppy seeds on them, however. Then we drove all around the town, checking out all of John's childhood memories - schools, house, swimming pool and even his teenage dance club (he says they just made it to the parking lot, but I am not so sure). We spent the afternoon shopping around all of the fantastic shops downtown before meeting up with the Palmer's, the Plackett's and the Skroch's. Fall was in the air in Naperville and it was such a treat to enjoy the cool weather.

We headed over to the Palmer's house for a pre-game cocktail or two (or case of beer) and on our way saw the shipping warehouse for Crate & Barrel. I couldn't believe how HUGE this place was.

After catching up with the Palmer's, we headed to the Plackett's to carpool to John's high school football game. Adam, Jeff and John all played together in highschool and Mike (who played baseball) spent time catching up with their old coaches on the field. We also meet up with both Adam's and Jeff's parents and family who joined us for the game.

The next morning we had another early morning start as we drove 2.5 hours to West Lafeyette, Indiana for the Purdue/NIU game that had a 12PM start time. John's family drove in from Paduach (a 6 hour drive!) to join us for the rivarly. We stayed at the fabulous student union/alumni hotel which was in the heart of the campus. Bob, John's father, actually had to write in a letter for reservations 6 months in advance. His efforts were grately appreciated especially by me who is still on the mend from both my foot and my appendix surgeries. We walked to the stadium after we check-in (again a fantastic fall day) and stopped in at Bob's old fraternity house. There we meet Bob's best college mate, Joe and his wife Laura, who drove down from Michigan for the game. The Huskie's beat the Boilermakers 28-21.
After the game we walked the campus with our own personal tour guide and learned a few tid-bits of history. We even visited the library that Bob said he had never even been into, but I am not so sure he is telling the truth there ;)We had a fantastic weekend, all bet very fast. Thank you to all for the great hospitality!

She is such a poser!

Here are some new pics of Stella. Born August 20th, she is growing so fast. Can't wait to see her in person soon!

Ouch ...again!

Never a dull moment in the Pedersen Pad! I woke up very early Wednesday morning with a knot in the middle of my tummy. I hadn't heard from John from the night before (he was in Houston, traveling to Louisiana) and was worried that something had happened to him on his way home from dinner. After getting in touch that morning (turns out his phone service was having issues) I went on with my day, but still continued to have sharp pains. I developed a mild temperature and had trouble sitting straight up at my desk. I left work a bit early and immediately got in bed where the pain in my stomach continued to get worse with sharper and deeper pains. I managed to make it through the night with a few calls to John for moral support.

The next morning, I knew something was seriously wrong as the pain has isolated itself on the right side of my body and was not subsiding. After attending my physical therapy session for my foot (yes - I am still learning how to walk again), I headed into work and looked for a doctor that could see me ASAP. I was able to get into a physician close to my office and after 20 minutes from arriving, I was being rushed to the local emergency room for surgery.

It turns out it was my appendix and it needed to be removed ASAP. Everything happened so fast from there. I called John to tell him I was going into surgery and he was 7 hours away, as well as my parents (thank God they are retired) were able to meet me at the hospital before I went under. My co-worker, Stormi, closed down my computer and packed up all of my files for me and filled out all of my paperwork to get my admitted in the ER, while I tried to get comfortable in one of those super sexy gowns. You know - the ones that open to the back.

I spent the night in the hospital and the majority of the next day. Poor John was stuck with a 3 1/2 foot long couch for the night as well as the sound of all of the machines right next to his head. This picture shows the stages of the removal from left to right. I had 3 small incisions made. One in my belly button, one over the appendix and one on my pubic bone. The sugeon went in, sliced it out, put it in a baggy, dropped a couple rows of staples and took it out through one of the incisions. The surgeon said mine was pretty bad and definitely wanted to come out. There is no reason for an appendix nor is there a clearly defined reason why they get infected and need to be removed other than straight bad luck. Go figure!

I am at home now recovering and have a good two weeks to go before I am back to "normal". So happy birthday weekend to John (this would be the second one in a row that had to be rescheduled; last year was hurricane Ike) and happy two months to the day from my foot surgery was this surgery. I guess this year is the year of hospital tours for me!

Meet Stella!

On our way to Labor Day weekend celebrations in Houston, we took a detour to Centerville, Texas to pick out Stella. There had been really bad weather in the area the night before and several other families that were also coming to pick out their puppies decided to forgo the drive until Monday. However, John insisted that we give it a try and boy am I glad we did. We got to pick first! We took a look at all of the females and decided on the smallest one, most quiet one. She was perfectly still why others crawled and yelped all over the place. She was a girl after my heart - a sleeper! I hope she can teach her dad to do that because I can't seem to do so. We should get her permanently at the end of October. Any ideas for a Halloween costume for her?

Happy Birthday Leanne!

We spent the long labor day weekend in Houston visiting my best friend, Leanne and her husband Jerome. Our college friends, Nicole and Amanda, and new friends also joined us to celebrate Leanne's 30th birthday! Click here to see a video of her taking the "plunge" or at least attempting one!