Celebrating my birthday at Duke

Birthday Celebration at Duke

I spent a week in Durham visiting Michael for my birthday. I worked from his apartment while he was in class and we were able to spend the evenings together cooking, cheering on Duke at basketball games, meeting his friends, and seeing a couple movies.

Duke Campus

Michael took me for a tour of the undergraduate campus and the business school building.

I was called a church snob... The church on Duke's campus is pretty, but compared to the churches I have been in lately, nothing about it really stood out. When I wasn't very impressed, I earned the name "church snob".

There were oversized painted benches in front of the different undergrad dorms.

They burn the benches after the men's basketball game against UNC each year.

Undergrads camping out to get tickets to the men's basketball games. They will start camping out months before the UNC game. Crazy kids!

My first Duke game! We got to go to two games this week and I obviously loved both of them. We snuck into empty seats about 8 rows behind the Duke bench. AWESOME seats for a very intense game against NC State. It was supposed to be a blow out, but Duke had to fight their way through most of the game to pull off the win.

Student section bowing to Coach K who has just entered the stadium.

Coach K trying to motivate the team.

I spotted JJ Redick sitting right behind the bench (lower right corner) at the NC State game

Henderson is amazing. The crowd across the court from us is the Cameron Crazies (Undergrads). It was such a great atmosphere in such a small stadium. The cheers were hilarious and I think most of the time the people cheering the chants were the only ones that could understand what they were saying.

We took a break from cooking on Wednesday night and Michael took me out for a nice dinner for my birthday.

Game #2 vs. Maryland - Me with my Duke student ID and season pass. I didn't think I was going to pull off a very good short, blond, Ashley, but it worked!

The Blue Devil is surfing over band members that are rolling across the court and yes, that is a Maryland Terrapin on his pitchfork!

Surfing again against NC State. He surfs the entire length of the court. I am assuming these band members have a few bruises afterwards.

We had such a great time at the games! The Maryland ended up being a complete blowout, but it was fun to see how impressively Duke played.

Crazy Towel Guy! This guy is a longtime Duke fan and goes to every game. At each game the student sections cheer for him and he stands up to accept the applause and wave his towel in the air.

Other than the basketball games, we...

...did a lot of cooking

...had a delicious Polish dinner

...went to Fuqua Friday (a celebration every Friday at the Fuqua Business School at Duke)

...saw Lola Rennt (an odd German movie) and Slumdog Millionaire

...had the best vanilla chai tea I have ever tasted. I can't wait for another one.

We had a really great time in Durham this week. It was hard to leave, but I will be back for Easter!

Skiing in the Alps

I went skiing in the Austrian Alps for my first weekend in Europe in 2009!

A bus took us from Munich right to the ski resort in Zillertal, Austria. They even fed us breakfast on the way there. After only an hour and a half bus ride and a few minutes to get my skis, we were on our way up the mountain.

Our view at lunch. During lunch, I realized that I had already been to the town that we were looking down on to. Michael and I had driven through the town on our way back to Germany from Krimml.


Enjoying the view, but hungry!

Cathrina is a big fan of Zillertal

I joined my very fast skiing/boarding friends from Deloitte for a day in Zillertal

Me, finally catching up to the group

Another view from the top of one of the mountains. It was absolutely beautiful here! I could have just stood on top of the mountain all day and enjoyed the view.

Silvester in Texas!

After spending a week with my family in MN for Christmas, I headed to Houston to spend the week with Michael and his friends and family.



For most of the trip, I got to stay with the other two women in Michael's life, his mom Laura and his dog Heidi. Barrett, Laura's boyfriend, joined us for breakfast and then a trip to Shiner for my first day in Texas.

My first day in Texas was spent at a brewery, Shiner Brewery.

Everyone was lined up for their FREE delicious beer! They were quite generous with the free beer after the tour.

Michael and Barrett, in their "Beer Guy" shirts, looking like they are ready for work.

We met Michael's brother and sister, Mason and Alexis, and his dad, Shawn, for a TexMex dinner that night. We had a great time at dinner and went for ice cream afterwards. I miss ice cream in the US!

We spent the next day touring around the city of Houston and seeing some of Michael's favorite neighborhoods. I really like the city and am looking forward to spending more time there. We met his friend Luis for lunch. Luis had just returned from Costa Rica and I am convinced that he runs the entire airline industry. :) That evening we met his high school friends and their wives for dinner. They were a fun group.

Texas BBQ!

On our way to Austin for New Years, we stopped to enjoy some of Texas's finest barbeque.

While Michael was debating over which of the two famous places we should eat at, I suggested we do both! I think he realized at that moment how much we really are alike. As we were trying to figure out how to order, I heard someone shout my name. What? I am in Texas, must be someone else. Nope, it was Dr. Stollack, a professor from St. Norbert! How random! We enjoyed our delicious BBQ and then cleaned ourselves up to get ready for the next place.

Smitty's was stop #2 of the Texas BBQ adventure. Walking into these places was like going back in time. It was easy to pick out the locals from the tourist. Of course the meat was great here as well, but I liked the brisket at Kreuz's better.

The first that cooked all of the meat at Smitty's. The way these places work is you first order your meat by the weight. They wrap it up in butchers paper and then you order your sides (sweet pickels) and drinks. No forks provided, many napkins required! It was great!

We spent New Year's Eve with Michael's friends in Austin. We went to the Texas History museum and spent the evening at Peter's and Courtney's house. I definitely learned a lot about Texas history on this trip! This was only the first of two Texas history days.

We went for a hike on New Year's Day before heading out. It was beautiful weather, slightly warmer than MN at that time.

Rocking S Ranch is Barrett's family's ranch that we stayed at for a few days after New Years. It was so nice and relaxing to be out in the country again. Laura and Barrett took us to some of the small towns in the area and then we had some more Texas history lessons. :)



Heidi LOVES the pool! Maybe next time it will be warm enough for me to join her in the pool.

I had my first steak in Texas and it was also my first steak cooked rare - I was surprised how much I liked it. It was delicious!

Michael, me, Barrett, and Laura at the Brazow Belle

We took the 4 wheelers to checkout the ranch. We saw tons of deer on our drive, but no wild boar. The wild boar are tearing up a lot of the land so they have traps set all around the ranch.

The "tank" otherwise known as a pond has an automatic fish feeder at the end of the dock. Sounds like a new project for Papa on our pond at home...

Once we were back in Houston, we were able to spend more time with Michael's dad, brother, and sister before it was time to start packing up again to go home.

It was really a great trip to Houston to meet Michael's family and friends. I am looking forward to my next trip back!