Goodbye Party for Michelle...Thank you Mike!

If you all didn't know... Mike is the best ever! He is always there to celebrate my accomplishments. He took it upon himself to plan and coordinate my going away party. Here are a few pictures from the party. Claudia, thank you for doing such a great job on the decorations. Kathryn the cake was amazing and tasted great! Thank you!

I now look official... I have earings, sticker for the check and a jersey all in support of my new school OU! Thank you Mike, now when I go to the football games I can fit right in with all the fans... Go Sooners!

Sofia and I are OU sticker fans.

Julia made me the beautiful necklace... Thank you Julia!

Mason kissing my nose.... he thought it was so funny

Thank you for all of your love and support!

Tour of Michelle's new home in Oklahoma

It is official Michelle has moved to Oklahoma to go to grad school! Here are a few pictures to walk you through my new home, inside and out.

Outside my home!

My front door

Looking at the living room from my front door

living room looking from the fireplace towards the front room

My dining room from the living room

Kitchen (the door at the end goes to the laundry room and then on to the garage)

Other side of the kitchen - it has an opening that looks into the living room and front door

The hallway to my room (the door on the left is a closet and the door on the right is the guest bathroom) the door that is open is my room (if you turn right before my room you will go into Rachel, my roommates, room)

My room - while unpacking - it looks so much better than in this picture

My Bathroom - the door at the end goes into my walk-in closet and there is a door to the left that has the toilet and shower.

And for all those doubter out there... Yes the truck fits in the garage...

Just barely but it fits!

I hope you all enjoyed the tour of my new home. I hope one day to have a few visitors to show you in person.

Site Seeing OK - OK Memorial plus (Aug 13, 2011)

On August 13th we did some more site seeing.  First we went to the Oklahoma City National Museum and Memorial - this is a memorial for the Bombing in OKC on April 19, 1995.  We were there for about 5 hours.  They did a beautiful job with this memorial.  Here are a few pictures from our visit...

We are in front of the "Survivor Tree" - It was the only plant the survived the bombing.

 

 Looking at the reflection pool and "The Field of Empty Chairs"

 This is us standing by the reflection pool... across is "The Field of Empty Chairs" 

(I will talk more about that in a minute.)

 

  On each side of the reflection pool There is what is called the "Gates of Time" on each one there is a time stamp... it signifies the time when the bomb went off and many people that died.

 "The Field of Empty Chairs" - each chair is a symbol of a person that died.  The placement signifies the floor the person worked.  There was a child daycare in the building so there were children that died as well.  There are small chairs for children and large chairs for the adults that died.  

There are a total of 168 chairs.

 

 A couple pictures of one of the buildings that was damaged.  Besides making sure it was stable they kept this part of the build as is after the bombing.

 This was written on the outside of the building.

These are tiles on the outside of the entry way to the memorial museum... The tiles are of cards children all across the USA drew and wrote for OKC.  They were very touching and creative.  I loved this part.  People coming together to support each other in their time of need.

That concludes our visit to the Memorial Museum.  After this we went to eat lunch.  Mike used to come to OK every year for the National Championship Show - for Reining.  He won two 2 national championship first place meddles here when he was a kid.  One place he remembers eating is a place called "City Bites."  So we decided to look it up and go there for lunch.  The reason he remembers this place is because when you go into the bathroom there are one way mirrors... So while you are doing your business you can watch people eat their meal!  Can you say AWKWARD!  Well we went and this is what we found...

 I am sitting on the toilet (for the picture)... Mom is taking the picture and Mike is peaking in the window... can you see him?  Creepy!  In the picture it looks darker than what it really is.  You can clearly see people... even though they can't look in it still gives you this feeling that people are watching you.  It was fun to go to a place that Mike would go to as a kid!  Thank you Mike for taking us!

Site Seeing in OK - Brick Town (Aug 12, 2011)

Mom was anxious to visit OK and see the area I would be living at for at least the next 5 years.  The evening of August 12th Mom, Mike and I went to down town OKC (Oklahoma City) aka Brick Town.

This place is always very busy!  There are many restaurants and bars in this area.  On our way to the restaurant to eat dinner we took a few pictures...

There is this river that runs through Brick Town

 Mike and I posing on the bridge

 Mom and I on the bridge










While we were on the bridge we say this boat go underneath us... You can pay to ride the boat through Brick Town instead of walking (parking is a pain!)

We at a BBQ place... Mike and finishing out meal.  Oh and in the background you can see Fireworks.  One of the ball fields is right behind that building.



Mom thank you for taking so many of the pictures!  Also thank you for helping me get settled into my new house!

Another way to get from your parking spot to your desired destination is to take one of these horse drawn carriages!  Doesn't it remind you of Cinderella's pumpkin carriage?  These sorts of carriages and others that looked just as fun were all over Brick Town!