We wrote an article about of adventures in Europe last summer, discovering our ancestral roots in Italy and Croatia, and about meeting online pen pals in Ulm, Germany. The Orange County Register will be running the article along with photos we took in this Sunday’s Travel section. You can check it out here!

We spent the weekend housesitting for Megan’s aunt in Hollywood. Megan was feeling a little under the weather but we managed to have an excellent meal at Osteria Mozza and took a trip to the Getty Villa in Malibu.

Megan is sleeping while she packs

It is 2:32 AM and we are almost ready to embark on our second trip to the European motherland this year. Our flight leaves in less than 4 hours, and we are doing another all-nighter. We have developed a special technique the night before big trips that involves staying up all night with the intention to sleep on the plane (which never happens). Somehow the lack of sleep seems to counteract the jet-lag in the same vein as multiplying two negative numbers makes a positive, whatever the case we hope it works this time.

June 10th was Bryan’s 25th birthday and I had a whole day of excitement planned. We were going to go to lunch before rock climbing and then to cooking classes. Well Bryan had too much work to do so we were not able to go rock climbing. Instead we went to Fashion Island for about an hour and bought some clothes before the cooking “lessons” at Sur La Table in Newport. Bryan was not excited about the cooking class when he found out where it was taking place. He thought it was going to be a bunch of “Newport moms” and not a professional chef training class. Unfortunately he was right, and it was totally lame. My bad! It was basically a private promotional night for the store to intimately hawk their products. It was not so much a lesson, but a photocopy of recipes and pre-bought ingredients out on a table. We basically rented a kitchen that we had to share with irritating Newport moms (the lady in the middle was especially irritating) and didn’t really learn anything. It was very overpriced for what it was and I suggest that you DO NOT take a class there.

Oh yeah, the class was on the cuisine of Southern France, in case you cared. Sorry Bryan! I love you!

We went down to San Diego with our friends Drew and Allison to watch some of the Tour De California. Drew and Bryan had the pleasure to run with Lance as he was going up a climb. In the process Bryan accidentally clobbered another spectator in the midst of all the excitement. The sheer force of Bryan’s impact disoriented the man forcing him to miss his one opportunity of getting Lance’s photo. Needless to say, he was not happy about it, and his frustration turned into something amusing for us when his wife asked, “Honey, did you get your photo of Lance?” He emotionally replied, “No! These bozos ruined it, and I could not see anything!”

On December 30th, 2004, surrounded by close family and friends we were married in an intimate ceremony in a historic chapel in Megan’s hometown of Lake Forest, CA. The wedding coincided with our 3rd anniversary of being together. Afterward we headed over to the Meyer’s home to dine and say our goodbyes before we headed off to our honeymoon in New York and our 5 month long studies in Italy. At 20 years old, many believed we were too young to marry, but we knew what we were doing was not only the right timing but also incredibly romantic! We are very happy and excited to spending the rest of our lives as husband and wife.