Turn and Face the Strange Ch-ch-changes...

Hello, everyone!

I realize it has been about a month or so since you've seen anything from me, and for that I apologize. To say that things have been crazy is pretty true, and a lot has changed in the last month.
First of all, Brandon and I spent 2 1/2 weeks on the road for the holidays. We split Christmas as best we could between his family in Central Wisconsin and mine in Northwest Lower Michigan. (We wound up driving 7 hours Christmas Eve night from his family's to mine, with him sick. Definitely a story we'll look back on and laugh.) From there, it was to Detroit for the Great Lakes Invitational to see his team play (and lose, twice. Ugh!) Then, back to my family's for New Year (which always has a theme, this time it was Neon New Year, which will explain the picture at the end of this post), and then we had to drive 11 hours to go apartment hunting.
Because, here's the first big change: Brandon got a job right out of school, so we have moved! As of 2 weeks ago, we live in Duluth, Minnesota.

It was not even 3 full days from when we got back from our Christmas adventure to when we officially moved, so our last few days as Yoopers were a crazy flurry of packing and tying up loose ends, all while getting at least 3 feet of snow dumped on us. I wish I was kidding--I wish I would have gotten a picture of us trying to clean off and dig out our cars to start packing them up, it was unreal.
Anyway, two days after we got here was the 2nd anniversary of our first date, the day we use as our default anniversary. Being that things were kinda tight and chaotic from having just relocated and all, our big celebration was making dinner at our apartment (and sitting at a table--a standing joke from when neither of us had real tables at our apartments, so for us to have dinner at a table in his apartment on our 1st anniversary was kind of a big deal) and going ice skating down in Canal Park.
He did have one surprise up his sleeve, though. After skating for about a half hour, I was ready to go. He decided to take one more lap while I headed back to the bench. As I'm untying my skates, I hear him come up, and he says "before we go..."
I look up, and he's down on one knee...
So, what I'm trying to say is the second big change is: we're engaged!

I can't even tell you how much I love this ring. It's a family heirloom--it belonged to both his grandmother and great-grandmother. It means so much more to me because it has history, and I keep catching myself staring at it.
So, here goes a new chapter of my life! Let the adventures begin!