Museum by Moonlight.

If you read this blog with any regularity, you already know that I'm a giant child (and not just because I still eat cereal for dinner). I've been wanting to attend Museum by Moonlight, an adults-only fundraiser at the world-renowned Indianapolis Children's Museum, ever since I moved here. This year, I finally bit the bullet and bought the (expensive) tickets before they sold out and I can honestly say I'll try to go every year from now on.

The Children's Museum is rated one of the best in the country and it doesn't take long to figure out why. From 8:00 PM to midnight, we had free reign of all five floors...and that wasn't nearly enough time to explore. Throughout the night, we saw outer space from an international space station, flew to China, discovered Egyptian tombs, studied pop culture through the decades, and looked at dinosaur bones. My favorite regular exhibit was the Power of Children, which discussed the difficult subjects of the Holocaust, racism/segregation, and AIDS by telling the stories of Anne Frank, Ruby Bridges, and Ryan White, children who experienced them firsthand.

We rode a carousel, zoomed down the new Willy Wonka-inspired chocolate slide, and tried our hand at various circus acts, like tightrope walking and juggling. There was a silent disco in the dinosaur exhibit, so we spent quite a while grooving among the bones. There were DJs set up on every floor and lots of restaurants from the area were handing out free samples of delicious food, including Piada, Maggiano's, P.F. Chang's, and Jack's Donuts. Oh, Sub Zero was also there making multiple flavors of ice cream with blasts of nitrogen.

Characters from Ghostbusters and Star Wars were roaming around for pictures and I couldn't get over the amazing R2-D2 that was interacting with guests. An incredible breakdancing crew did several performances throughout the night and all of the local sports teams had booths with games and giveaways (I got a free Colts scarf!). Although we didn't have time to partake, Sun King Brewery was also there giving lessons on the brewing process. Speaking of drinks, there were bars set up on each floor. Our tickets came with two free drinks and soda and water were free all night. Heaven.

We closed the night with a Children's Museum tradition, a parade down all five floors led by the dinosaur mascot, Rex. Best of all, proceeds from the event went to the Children's Museum Fund, which helps children from lower-income families experience the museum. Any excuse to play with my partner-in-crime and perpetual man-child, right?

Until next year...

Three months in five minutes.

Hi, everyone. I'm Brittany and I have a blogging consistency problem.

Once upon a time, I actually blogged with regularity. It seems impossible to believe, given my track record the last couple years. Nevertheless, here I am and I've made it my personal goal to finish blogging about our trip to Spain. You know, before a year has elapsed since the trip...

Fun fact: I never even blogged about my own wedding. Oops.

First, I'll catch you up on life in general. Baby steps, folks.

Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year happened. My whole family celebrated Thanksgiving together a week early, but it was a welcome change to have all of us crowded around the dinner table. With my sister in Arizona and Wheat in Texas, Christmas was tamer than usual. Still, it was glorious to have a week at home in Ohio with family and friends. New Year was spent in our typical fashion, with me and Wheat staying in and making fun of the painfully awkward ball-dropping telecast.

Christmas REALLY happened. I didn't really mean to, but I went hard on the Christmas festivities this year. My mom and I explored the Christmas Ranch in Ohio. Wheat and I attended a friend's Christmas cocktail party. We admired the incredible displays and performers at the Chinese Lantern festival at the Indiana state fairgrounds, which I hope becomes a yearly tradition for us. We ate delicious raclettes (cheese melted onto a baguette with dijon mustard, pickles, and green onions), drank hot chocolate, and checked out the German vendors at the Carmel Christkindlmarkt. I organized our company Christmas party with bowling and lunch at Punch Bowl Social. We had our eighth annual Central Perk gift exchange and a few of us ventured to Columbus for a fun evening of bowling and bar hopping with some of my best friends. In other words, I could have used a break from my break.

I turned 30. Yikes. As I'm sure you can guess, it feels the same as 29, but man, it doesn't sound good, does it? Fortunately, my actual birthday celebrations were wonderful, thanks to my awesome friends and family. Wheat surprised me with tickets to watch the Bengals beat the Browns, 30-16. Several of my friends came to Indy to do an escape room with me for the first time (we didn't escape - hmph). I watched competitive eater Joey Chestnut defend his St. Elmo's shrimp cocktail eating title by downing 10 pounds, six ounces of it in eight minutes. I mean, if that doesn't make your birthday, I don't know what will.

...and lots of other things happened, too.

My sister and Denny got married in a small ceremony at a courthouse in Tucson. Denny was deployed to Iraq and my sister moved home to Ohio. My brother-in-law paid us a visit in Indy and my family continued our Christmas Eve fondue tradition. My mom's cancer has continued to evade her chemo and my brother got a ridiculously, almost impossibly cute puppy. I tailgated with Jenn, Paul, and LP before watching the Bengals beat the Lions, 26-17, on Christmas Eve. I drove to Toledo for CJ's baby shower, hosted Kate in Indy for a night, and explored the Boonshoft Museum of Discovery in Dayton.

I did my best teenybopper impression (which isn't very hard to do) while watching the Backstreet Boys, The Chainsmokers, Zedd, Hey Violet, and Maxx. We cooked some HelloFresh meals and realized that, with a little effort, we can cook, too. Wheat and I attended our second consecutive Indianapolis BaconFest and I regretted nothing, especially not the bacon s'mores and donuts. We made strides trying to watch all of the Oscar-nominated movies, binged Mindhunter on Netflix, and visited Veal's Ice Tree before it melted in unseasonably 60º weather. Wheat and I supported each other's alma maters when we traveled to Muncie to watch the Miami Redhawks play football and to Dayton to watch the Davidson Wildcats play basketball.

Mostly, I've felt overwhelmed - sometimes in good ways, sometimes in bad. Sometimes drowning in sadness, other times floating with joy. I suppose the benefit of getting older is realizing that that's life.

Coming at you with more Spanish goodness soon...

The Ups(ide Down)

Oh, hello there.

Did you think I'd forgotten about my little corner of the Internet? Or that so much time had passed since our trip to Spain that I couldn't possibly remember the details? Or that I'd gotten stuck in the upside down with Eleven and the gang?

Well, the truth is somewhere in the middle - I haven't forgotten about my blog, though I have lost a lot of details about our Spanish adventure, and yeah, I can't get enough Stranger Things.

A lot has happened in the past couple months and not all of it is good. Fortunately, I have editorial control over this here blog and today, I choose to focus on the awesome things. Things like:

---Being married to Wheat for two years. Our second anniversary came and went without much fanfare, but I have to say - being married to him is the easiest thing I've ever done. You know how people always talk about how difficult it is to have a happy, healthy marriage/relationship? Not for us. Not yet, anyway. Maybe we're still in the "honeymoon phase" and maybe things will be harder once we have kids running around, but man - loving and being loved by him just comes so naturally.

Wheat had a game on our actual anniversary, so we went to dinner at Fogo de Chao, a Brazilian steakhouse downtown, the day before. You can't go wrong with dressing up to eat unlimited meat, right?

---Winning a contest for haunted house tickets. Do317, my favorite Indianapolis event website, ran an Instagram contest asking users to write a scary story in 10 words or less. The winner of the contest won four tickets to two different haunted houses downtown - Nightmare on Edgewood and House of Trepidation. Guess who won. My story: "I woke up to someone knocking...on the closet door."

Although Wheat hates all things scary and haunted, he agreed to accompany me to the haunted trails. **see item above about how easy it is to love him** We had an absolute blast. House of Trepidation was a lot tamer than Nightmare on Edgewood (where the actors could actually touch and grab you), but we thoroughly enjoyed both. We attended Nightmare on Edgewood on "Lights Out" weekend, so we made our way through the trails with only a glow stick to light the way...and they definitely grabbed us. The highlight for me was the Midnight Double Feature section, where the props and sets were designed to look like memorable scary movie scenes and the actors were dressed as iconic villains (Michael Myers, Jason, Freddy Krueger, Jigsaw, Pennywise, the guy from Jeepers Creepers).

---All the Halloween things. Have I mentioned how much I love Halloween? Over the course of the last month, we have indulged in all things related to my favorite holiday. We picked a pumpkin and did a corn maze at Russell Farms. We sat on hay bales and listened to The Legend of Sleepy Hollow in Irvington (a neighborhood named after Washington Irving himself) before being visited by the Headless Horseman. We took a chilly haunted tour of downtown Indianapolis where the guide regaled us with stories of supernatural occurrences at the Soldiers and Sailors' Monument, Slippery Noodle Inn, Union Station, and more. Of course, I wouldn't let Halloween pass without making Wheat dress up in a couples costume. This year, we went with Tommy Pickles and Chuckie Finster from Rugrats.

We wore our costumes to Irvington's annual Halloween festival, which completely blew my mind with its cuteness. The main street was filled with vendors and food trucks. Every storefront had its windows painted with Halloween- and autumn-themed images. Bands played while a costume parade (that included toy soldiers, Beetlejuice, the Sanderson sisters, Hillary Clinton, and more) ambled by. For a small donation, we spun a prize wheel and walked away with an issue of The Walking Dead comic book. It was basically my very own Halloween dream world.

---A trip to Baltimore for my cousin's wedding. Over a month ago, Wheat and I traveled to Baltimore to watch my cousin Cody marry Alyssa in a gorgeous wedding at the Baltimore Museum of Industry. The views of the Inner Harbor were spectacular, little touches of Baltimore charm were everywhere (from the National Bohemian cake to the Orange Crush signature drink), and oh yeah - THE ORIOLES BIRD SHOWED UP! We spent the rest of the weekend relaxing with family and exploring Fells Point and Federal Hill. Did I mention ridiculous views?

---All the other happy odds and ends. Birthday celebrations at a cabin deep in the woods with friends, a fire pit, and lots of food. Warm chili with crackers and sour cream. Exploring new places in our city. Brilliant red, yellow, and orange leaves. A house in Greenwood that the owner decorated with mannequins and props to look like the set of The Walking Dead. Apple fritters and cinnamon cider donuts. Long-overdue lunch dates with a couple of my best friends. Oktoberfest celebrations in my Ohio hometown. Kisses and giggles from my niece. Cuddling on the couch, wrapped up in a blanket. And, of course, Stranger Things bingefests.

So yeah, it hasn't been all bad.