Ann Arbor

     So Ann Arbor is a really nice place from what we have seen so far. There are literally trees everywhere! There are parts of Ann Arbor that don't have dense tree coverage but these areas are highly populated and are mostly paved with asphalt and concrete such as campus, the city and other shopping areas.



The main road that is close to our apartment.

     The University of Michigan's campus is really big compared to WSU's campus and much flatter. West of campus there are a lot of ethnic restaurants around campus including a Mongolian BBQ which we might try out soon. The campus is surrounded by a few large buildings and small shops that give it a college town feel. The campus is smoke-free, has three recreation buildings, a library that looks like it is from Harry Potter, and is so large that there are three sections which are North Campus, Central Campus, and South Campus.

     We live by North Campus which has the Motts Children's hospital (which is top rated), the engineering and computer science buildings and the old Pfizer research compound which UM just bought for research purposes. Not surprising we have an automotive engineering program.

     Central Campus has the majority of class buildings and libraries. The photo below has the Rackham graduate school in the background which Arielle and I are apart of. We have only walked on central campus once to get our ID cards and went through a few buildings.

    We have not been to South Campus yet but it is mainly the football stadium which seats 109,901 people but usual holds 110,000. The record attendance for the stadium is 113,090 people at the 2010 season opener. There are also other sporting areas on South Campus such as tennis courts, a golf course, and one of the three recreation buildings.

   This weekend we went to the Henry Ford Museum which was very interesting and had a lot of stuff including trains, cars, planes, machines, and much more.

A Wright brothers replica plane with some of the original fabric.

    After the ford museum we went to Detroit and went through the GM building and saw Canada across the water. After seeing the city center we drove through some of the city which was in terrible condition including buildings that were graffitied, burned, and/or windows broken out.

The GM Building

    Overall Ann Arbor is very different from Spokane including the shopping (Ikea, Whole Foods, and many others), weather which is like Spokane in temperature but is more humid and has more storms including tornadoes, and the animals. We have seen a wild turkey, road killed foxes, larger squirrels (that are grey on top and reddish orange on the bottom), a mom raccoon with two babies in a dumpster, cardinals, fireflies, marmots, and I am sure many more to come.

Road Trip to Michigan!

The Saturday before me moved to Michigan we had a going away party at my parents house with family/friends and I made some cupcakes for dessert : )

On June 13th (wed) we picked up our truck and trailer and loaded everything up. Luckily we did it early because it started to rain right after we finished.

We got up early on Thursday and were on the road by 6:40 or so.

Our first day of driving was pretty uneventful, we spent most of the day driving through Montana which SUCKED. There was a ton of road construction so we had to go 35 instead of 70. We were following mapquest direction and they sent us on a back highway instead of I-90 so we thought we were lost. In the end it took us about 15 hours to get from Spokane to Sturgis, SD, but it should have been only 13.

On Friday we were back on the road by 5:40 Spokane time. Driving across South Dakota was pretty uneventful, we were debating stopping by Mt Rushmore but it would have been an hour out of the way just driving, so we decided to skip it. As soon as we crossed the Minnesota border I swear there was life. Everything was green and there were people. We also crossed the headwaters (?) of the Mississippi River which is on the border between Minnesota and Wisconsin.

When we got into Illinois we used the GPS on Dimitri's phone to get us to our hotel because there was road construction on the freeway and we couldn't see our hotel. Day two was another 15 hour drive day, but it went by faster I think because we had scenecry to look at.

On Saturday we slept in a little bit and had breakfast with Dimitri's friend Alex King who works for Boeing in Chicago. After breakfast we hit the road and drove 4.5ish hours to Ann Arbor!! We checked into our apartment around 5 and started to unload the truck. Luckily one of our neighbors, Dan, helped us to unload the truck so it went A LOT faster.

We unpacked all day sunday and then made a Costco run so we had some food to eat. I'll post pictures of the apartment later and pictures of what the roads look like, there are trees everywhere.

Update

I had my last day of work at the Card Shop last week so the countdown to moving to Michigan has really begun. We will both be attending the University of Michigan for our Master's. Dimitri is getting his Master in Financial Engineering and I will be getting my Master in Kinesiology with a specialization in Motor Control and Development. We pick up our truck on June 13th and we're heading out early on June 14th. We're planning on driving to Sturgis, SD the first day, Chicago the second, and arriving in Ann Arbor on June 16th.

Dimitri is beginning boot camp (basically a summer school class for everyone in his program to make sure they start on the same page) on July 2 so we will have plenty of time to unpack and explore before then. I will probably be doing a whole lot of nothing during July unless my advisor wants me to work in a lab or something since I will be there so early.

Boot camp for Dimitri ends at the beginning of August so we will both have that time off before school starts on Sept. 4. Dimitri already has his fall schedule set up and he is taking 12.75 credits this fall. I will be signing up for classes this week and will probably be taking 9 credits unless I work in a lab in which case I will probably get more credits. We're hoping to finish school in a year and a half, it just depends on how the classes work out. Dimitri needs 39 credits to graduate and I only need 30.

We are really excited to move to Michigan and start a new chapter!

Arielle's 23rd Birthday

Arielle’s birthday was May 2^nd. I made her small chocolate cakes with a chocolate cylinder to hold the cake together. Inside the cylinder were four layers of cake with caramel layers between them. They were then topped with chocolate ganache and strawberry compote with fresh cut on top.

As many of you know we are moving to Michigan to go to the University of Michigan. I got her a UM Sherpa lined zip hoodie and some t-shirts. My parents got her a UM t-shirt and a UM sock monkey. Her parents got her a gift card to Pottery Barn which is really nice since we have been saving up for a nice bed from Pottery Barn. Overall I think her birthday went pretty well.

Happenings!!

So I know I haven't updated for months, but we have exciting news! Dimitri was accepted to the Master of Financial Engineering program at the University of Michigan!!!! He applied to seven different programs last fall and was accepted by UM and Claremont Graduate University. He chose UM because they are a better program overall than Claremont, have a summer bootcamp so everyone starts off on the same page (the bootcamp isn't graded, but it's required for all MFE students), and it is closer to where we want to end up (NYC). UM also has a Master in Kinesiology program that we learned about right after Dimitri was accepted, so I applied to that program (the due date was March 1) and I take the GRE's on March 9, so hopefully we'll both be in school this fall.

Dimitri's program starts July 2 so we'll be moving over to Michigan at the beginning of June. His bootcamp schedule is 6 days a week for 8 hours a day, so I'll be pretty bored during days when he is in class because my program (if I get in) doesn't start until September.

Halloween 2011

This year for Halloween Dimitri and I decided not to do the typical face pumpkin and tried something a little different. We decided to carve Mario and Princess Peach so we found patterns online and printed them off.

They took a lot of work because after cleaning out the pumpkins we had to lay the pattern on top and poke dots all around the lines which is harder than I thought because the pumpkin isn't flat so the paper doesn't stay lined up very well. Then we connected the dots on the pumpkin and finally shaved off the correct areas. We had to shave off more than we thought so the pumpkins would glow so I shaved from the inside with a spoon and Dimitri shaved off on the outside. Both worked well but they  took forever (I think it ended up being 4 hours!).

 Me shaving off the pumpkin skin.

 Dimitri connecting the dots.

 All done!!!

 Mine glowing.

Dimitri's outside on Halloween night! We had some rave reviews... I think we'll make pumpkins like this next year!

Cruise to Catalina and Ensenada

For our graduation from college this hear, my parents took Dimitri, me and my brother on a cruise! We left on Monday morning and got back Friday.  Our boat could hold over 2500 guests and 1100 staff!

Every night housekeeping would come and turn down the beds and fold our towels into animals (we got a monkey, frog, elephant and a seal). Our room had two portholes to see outside.

On Tuesday we went to Catalina Island. To get to the island we had to take tender boats from the cruise ship to the dock. My parents and my brother hung out around the town for a while and Dimitri and I decided to rent some bikes and explore. They gave us a map of the town and we decided to head up the canyon and go to the botanical gardens first. We almost got past the golf course when the chain on my bike fell off. Dimitri tried to fix it but we ended up having to go back to the bike shop and get another bike : ( Luckily it was all downhill so we just coasted down.

After we got the second bike we decided to head in a different direction and go look at the old casino and see the beach. After the beach we returned our bikes and just walked around the town for a little while and then returned to the ship.

On Wednesday we arrived in Ensenada and went to the beach. It was nice in the morning when we got there, but it got overcast and cooled off a little later so we didn't get in the water. We got some Mexican food from the resort we were ate and played cribbage with my brother and dad. There were coconut and fruit stands on the beach and a lot of people trying to sell us dresses, bracelets, hats, etc.

When we got back to the boat Dimitri and I tried to take some pictures of the city, but it was too dark and they didn't turn out.

Thursday was spent entirely on the boat. We slept in, played mini golf, sat in the hot tub, and watched the dolphins and a shark over the side of the boat. Thursday night Dimitri wasn't feeling so great so we went to lay down. He started throwing up around 11 o'clock. I tried to call the infirmary around 3 am but they didn't answer. Finally at 6 we were able to go to the infirmary with my mom and she told the guy what to give Dimitri (she's a nurse). He FINALLY stopped puking around 6 and we left the boat at 7 even though we were supposed to wait until 8:30. Dimitri was still feeling really sick so my parents got us an earlier flight home.

We think he got food poisoning because my mom got sick around 1 that night and my dad started getting sick at the airport on the way home. Somehow my brother and I avoided the food poisoning.