St. Augustine

In August, Matt and I headed down to St. Augustine, FL with my family. My mom grew up in St. Augustine, and that is where we always vacationed when I was a kid. It is fun to be able to continue that tradition and see my nieces enjoy the beach like I did. All of my cousins and 3 aunts and 1 uncle live there too, so it's always a blast to be able to spend time with them! We also went down to Disney World for a day, so that was also a blast! It was Matt's first time as well as my nieces first time in the Magic Kingdom. It was so fun to watch my sweet nieces stare with awe and wonder at everything there!

Fun feeding popcorn to the birds with Grandaddy!

Molly Ryan took some good naps on the beach!

Caroline and Abby were doing awesome on the boogie board!! This is Caroline riding a wave in.

My three nieces by the bay in downtown.

Matt and my dad inside Space Mountain at Disney

Matt and I on a ride.

Caroline and Abby watching the parade, you can see Cinderella's Castle in the background.

Mom and Dad Branen came to visit

Sorry for the delay in posting. The following pictures all from my parent's visit back in June. We had such a great time with them and got to experience even more of New England!!

This is my dad at the Sam Adam's Brewery tour. Matt and I have been on this tour many times, and each time you get one of these 7 oz glasses to keep! It is a very fun thing to do while in Boston!

These are my parents on a sailing cruise we went on in Newport, RI. It was so much fun, and so beautiful!!! It was our first time in a true sailboat.

This is the four of us in back of the mansion from the movie The Great Gatsby. It's hard to see in this picture, but the awning behind us is red and white striped, and I immediately recognized it from watching that movie in school. This was also in Newport.

We took a little day trip to see Lexington and Concord Mass. It was neat to see so much history! Lots of battles were fought here, as were books written. This picture is from a small boathouse behind a historic home. Not pictured, but another place we saw was Walden Pond, where Ralph Waldo Emerson did much of his writing.

Louisa May Alcott wrote her books in the house (also not pictured). I love the book Little Women and was so excited to see the home that inspired her!

Molly Ryan

On March 30th, my precious niece Molly Ryan Goforth was born! I had to wait a couple of weeks to see her, but was so glad to head down south to meet my precious niece and see everyone else. My sister lives in Asheville, NC, so I flew down to Atlanta and spent the night with my parents, and then my mom and I drove up to Asheville. It was so great to spend time with family, play with my 4 year old nieces, and hold precious Molly Ryan. I loved every minute of being there and miss her so much already! One of my favorite moments of the trip was when I took Abby and Caroline to Sam's Club. We got into the car and a Taylor Swift song was on the radio and those sweet girls belted out every word!!! It was cute and fun to hear them sing! They are getting so smart and growing up so much! What a joy they are to be around! Enjoy the pictures!

My beautiful mama holding sweet Molly Ryan.

My three beautiful nieces and me!

Abby and Caroline showing me how they swing by themselves!

Lion King and more visitors

At the end of February, Matt took me to see the Lion King broadway play at the Boston Opera House. We saw Dirty Dancing there last February! He got me the tickets for my birthday and the show was absolutely amazing!!! The most incredible part (a surprise to both of us) was that our seats were on the front row!!! If anyone has a chance to see this play, you will not regret going!!! Then in March, we had a last minute visit from my good friend Anna. We went to college together, but I moved to Boston and she moved to Denver so we hadn't seen eachother since my wedding day almost 2 years ago! It was so great to catch up with her. We had a wonderful time. We toured the city, went on a Sam Adams Brewery Tour and ate some delicious food! Unfortunately I only took picture from her visit. Then Easter weekend, Matt's good friend John and his wife Ali came to visit! We last saw them at their wedding in October in San Diego. And on top of that, they are expecting their first daughter! It was so fun to spend time with them! We of course toured them around the city, and then we took a trip north up to Portland, ME. We made a few stops on the way. The funniest thing that happened from that trip is that there was a topless march in Portland! Apparently it is not illegal for women to go topless in Maine and every now and again some really unattractive women like to flaunt this fact. I read that they call it "equal opportunity toplessness" and say that it should draw no more attention than a man with his shirt off. I'll tell you what, everyone that I saw was trying their best NOT to notice. We only had the misfortune of accidentally eyeing one of these "marchers". Gross and don't worry there are no pictures of that!!! As you can see from the last picture, spring was in full bloom for Easter!

Colorado

In February, we took a big trip to the west! It was my first time ever going to Colorado! We went with our friends, Josh and Jenny to ski at Copper Mountain. We had a really good time. The first day, the snow was pretty icy, but then we got dumped on for the next few days so I really got to experience my first real powdery skiing! It was great, and the best part was that it didn't hurt when you fell! We always have so much fun with Josh and Jenny and were so thankful that they wanted to come on this trip with us! One day my friends from college, Curt and Jerica, came to ski with us for a few hours It was fun to see them. Curt helped me down a black diamond that he took me on accidentally. I still can't believe I survived that! One day, Matt and I drove over to Aspen for lunch. It was neat to see another little ski village. It was very picturesque with all the mountains. The last pictures are from the Red Rocks Amphitheatre in Denver. Matt and I had some time to kill after dropping Josh and Jenny off at the airport, so we went to check it out. We would love to see a concert there some day!

Skiing, Simpsons, and Skiing

We had a busy January! At the beginning of the month, Matt's brother Jonathan came for a weekend. We took him skiing up in New Hampshire. As you can see from the first pictures that the mountains were beautiful! It hadn't snowed a whole lot, so it was still a little icy, but we had a great time! Then MLK Jr. weekend, Matt's good friend Brian and his lovely wife Lauren came to town! It was so fun as usual showing them around the city! We actually had a semi warm weekend for the month of January so that was nice and unexpected! And then at the end of the month, we went up to our landlord's mountain house again and went skiing at Mount Washington. It was absolutely beautiful, but really freezing out!

Christmas and New Years 2009

This year we spent Christmas with my family at my sister's house in Asheville, NC. We had a blast!!! What fun to see the Christmas morning "magic" through the eyes of 2 four year olds! We went to church Christmas Eve and it was adorable hearing my nieces singing along to the hymns. And then we just enjoyed eachother's company and wrapped "Santa" presents for my nieces. On Christmas day we drove back down to Atlanta and spent the weekend with my family. Then for the week before New Years, we drove up to St. Louis to hang out with Matt's family. We also had a great time there and are so thankful that everyone was in town! Here are a few pictures from our holiday adventures!

I caught Caroline with her mouth full!

Abby digging in to some yummy ribs that my dad cooked!

Matt and his two big brothers.


We actually spent New Years Eve with our good friends Josh and Jenny.

Thanksgiving 2009

Our good friend's Chris and Bonnie came to spend Thanksgiving with us this year! We were so glad to have them up to Boston. We toured around the city and had a great time! We spent Thanksgiving Day at our pastor's house, who also knew Chris and Bonnie in Georgia. And then we went for a walk after dinner and got a tour of where Jonathan and Jordan Knight from NKOTB grew up. I unfortunately did not bring my camera, but it is a very cool house in the neighborhood that we live in. It is now owned by the Salvation Army.

Quick recap of our life

Hi my faithful few readers. I just wanted to take the time to apologize for the lack of posting. My computer crashed (I think), but I have not yet taken it in for diagnostics. However, I haven't uploaded any pictures from my camera since this happened with hopes that my computer is fixable. So I am sorry for the lack of pictures. This will be a timeline of sorts, and hopefully soon I can do a picture timeline post so you all can see the fun we have had!

September 2009---Matt and I moved into a new house!!! It is so cute and we absolutely love living here! It's a first floor apartment of a three family home. It was built in the 1930s and has so much character. The best part is that we can walk to lots of places including church!

October 2009---like the last post said, we went to San Diego to celebrate Johnny and Ali's wedding! Then at the end of the month we had a great time passing out candy to the neighborhood kids.

November 2009---For Matt's birthday, we went up to North Conway, NH. Our landlord owns a house there and has graciously offered it to us to use when he isn't up there. We had a great low key weekend in the mountains! Then for Thanksgiving our good friends Chris and Bonnie came to town! We had such a great time showing them around Boston and enjoying Thanksgiving dinner at our pastor's house. It was so fun to be with friends!!!

December 2009---My sweet nieces Abby and Caroline turned 4 at the beginning of December, and I was very sad to miss their party for the second year in a row. I am so amazed how big they are getting and so smart too! This month I also quit my job!!! I was offered a new job at Boston Medical Center and so my last day at Joslin was the day before our long Christmas vacation! We were so lucky to have a week and a half off to be with family and friend's in both Atlanta and St. Louis. On Christmas Eve we drove up to Asheville, NC to spend the day and Christmas morning with my sister's family. We had so much fun! I have missed spending time with my sister, brother-in-law and nieces so much! Of course I had a great time with my parents, brother, and his girlfriend as well. We then spent the weekend with family in Atlanta, and then drove to St. Louis for the following week. We had an awesome time with Matt's family! Luckily everyone was still in town and so we got to spend time with the whole family. We even took a little side trip to Columbia to watch a Mizzou basketball game! We rang in the new year with some of Matt's best friends and his little brother Micheal. We love our family and miss them so much so it was a great ending to 2009!!

January 2010---Matt's brother Jonathan came to town for a work meeting, but hung out with us for the weekend. We went up to New Hampshire to go skiing one day and we had a great time! I also started my new job, which has been going great!!! I am actually only working 20 hours a week at the hospital and then 10 hours a week I am keeping my friend Amy's baby while she works in her studio (she makes jewelry www.olariastudio.com ). I am really enjoying my new schedule and have been able to cook more and get more done at the house during the week! We also spent another weekend up at our landlord's house and he actually joined us for a day of skiing. It was beautiful, but very very cold!! We were in northern New Hampshire at the base of Mount Washington. I turned 27 on the 21st and Matt surprised me with tickets to the broadway show, The Lion King! The tickets were for February so it gave something very fun to look forward to!!! Matt took me to a great dinner the friday night after my birthday.

February 2010---Over Valentine's weekend, we went to Colorado!! We went with Matt's best friend Josh and his wife Jenny. We stayed in a friend's condo and had a great time!! The condo was at Copper Mountain and so got to ski a lot! It was very snowy so I missed the awesome views that I hear you get on the top of the Rockies, but it was beautiful for sure! It was my first time in CO and I thought it was awesome! My good friends from college, Curt and Jerica, came out to ski one day, and I accidentally survived my first (and perhaps only!) black diamond run. We also got lunch in Vail, CO one day with Matt's good friend Justin. We really had a great time! Then at the end of the month we went to see The Lion King! It far surpassed my expectations and was truly amazing!!! The craziest thing was that we got front row seats and Matt didn't even know when he ordered them! The costumes and music were outstanding! It was such a fun date night for us!

And all of that brings us to March. Nothing has really happened yet, but my sister is having a new baby girl at the end of the month. I am so excited for little Molly Ryan to come into this world! Hopefully it won't take me very long to update this blog again.