more of last weekend to kick off this weekend

pssst this horse is 24 feet tall.

happy friday!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

tons of exclamation points for this friday.  (just because.  don't exclamation points make you feel happier?  they make me feel very enthusiastic, personally). today feels like an extra good friday to me, for no reason in particular.  maybe this regular exercise thing actually IS what it's cracked up to be.  or maybe it is for one of the reasons at the bottom of this post.

hops!  i suppose grand rapids IS beer city USA after all.

you can't tell because i managed to snap this picture fast enough but i almost didn't get a shot of the real life goats because the little one in the green collar kept mounting his sister for a hump session.  shame on you goats... think of the children.

if i keep dawdling posting the rest of our meijer gardens photos you'll be looking at them every day next week so here's a huge camera dump with the rest of our excursion.  these were taken at the farm garden, but my real favorite part of meijer gardens is their sculpture park.  check out how amazing some of this art is.  they obviously have one hell of a curator.  like i said, i got pretty camera happy.

steve is rocking out with keith haring.

 

the two above were done by one of my favorite artists, jim dine.  i had to get a picture with one.

donnie darko?

love this shot of steve!!

my favorite sculpture in the park!  it's called "the neuron" by artist roxy paine.

isn't it cool???

another one of my favorites.

ok so now that i've finally gotten all the pictures of meijer gardens out i can start showing you guys all exciting stuff we have coming up!!  highlights of what we are looking forward to include:

1.  my mom's birthday is monday!  can't wait for yummy dinners and celebrating!

2.  our buddy erick is coming to town all they way from seattle next weekend!  hope you're ready, ann arbor!

3.  we are spending the following weekend on a private beach on lake michigan at the cottage my parents rent each year.  one of my favorite places in the world!!

4.  secret stuff i can't tell you, but i promise you'll hear soon(ish)!  shhh!

5.  we are moving in together in august!  did you forget?  we sure haven't!  we're so excited!

hope your weekend is full of as many exclamation points as this post!!!!

dear summer 2013, we like you a lot!!!

more from the weekend

here are a few more photos from our excursion to grand rapids last weekend.  there is a beautiful waterfall in the middle of the sculpture park where i naturally demanded we stop for a photo shoot.  i also took a couple pictures of the sky from our drive out because those clouds were doing some lovely lovely things!

they let you hold weddings in front of this waterfall.  just sayin'.

this sculpture is normally a water feature, but it was dry when we were there. sad steve.

the two photos above were taken in the glass enclosed tropical conservatory.  in the spring there are butterflies galore in the conservatory, but we must have just missed them.

it has been madly stressful over here the past few days between steve's new job, and varying obligations.  tonight we're catching up with an old college friend at pacific rim for restaurant week and hopefully we will have time to watch another episode of our new tv show addiction shameless (the UK version).

ok but seriously consider this my endorsement for at least the first season of the show.  it's hilarious, depressing, and includes a 25 year old, frequently naked, james mcavoy.  netflix it.

happy thursday everyone!

last weekend part one

once i finally got my photos from the weekend uploaded i realized i had taken hundreds of them.  literally.  so i'll show you our excursion in spurts for now.  as i've been telling you, last weekend we went to the frederick meijer gardens and sculpture park in grand rapids and we had the best time.

both of my parents are originally from grand rapids so i have been visiting the park for my entire life.  it's amazing to see the way it has grown and what used to be just botanical gardens and a butterfly conservatory has transformed into an enormous facility with an outdoor art museum, farm garden, hiking trails, chihuly chandeliers, amphitheater, traveling exhibits and so much more.  grizzly bear is coming to play there in a few months... maybe we'll be heading back for that!  if you are ever in the area and have time for a visit i highly recommend it!

what you won't see pictured is the newest addition to the gardens' permanent collection, an enormous buddha head sculpture by artist zhang huan.  the piece is currently on display at the gardens' indoor showcase gallery along with a traveling exhibit of more of huan's work.  

here are a few more of the photos from our excursion!

hopefully this gives you a little preview of our extremely cool visit.  more pictures will be sure to come soon!

hope everybody has a great second half to the week!