Dear Friends and Family,
We hope this letter finds you filled with holiday cheer and cozied up with your family staying warm! 2010 has been a wonderful year filled with many blessings. While 2009 was all about our wedding, new house, and new puppy; 2010 has been a year of travel and breaking in our new home.
In April, Mike accompanied his good friend Cameron, a photographer, to a UFC fight in California and was asked by Universal Magazine out of Sydney, Australia, to write about the event. (This is the same publication Cameron shoots for.) Mike is as passionate about MMA as he is about food, football, and fishing, so when they asked him to cover another fight in August and write a piece on Anderson Silva, Mike was stoked. The next event he is covering with Cameron is this February in Vegas.
In May, Sara turned the big 3-0. We hosted seven of our crazy fun college and high school friends at our house to ensure Sara kicked off her 30s the right way! We had a blast, though Cuda couldn’t figure out why there were always – day and night – people playing in his favorite toy (the pool). Sara’s dad and step-mom came to visit the next weekend to round out a perfect entrance to a new decade.
As part of Sara’s 30th birthday celebration and as an official honeymoon (Yes, we got married in Mexico, but never had a real honeymoon with just the two of us!), we spent almost two weeks in Vietnam the end of June/early July. We backpacked the trip and saw Hanoi (Vietnam’s capital city and a foody’s Mecca), Halong Bay (2000+ limestone creations in a turquoise bay which we sailed through on an overnight cruise), Sapa, (a Hmong tribal village amidst the Tonkinese Alps – boasting the highest mountain in Southeast Asia), Nha Trang (a beautiful beach town on the South Sea of China), and Ho Chi Minh City (the cosmopolitan center of Vietnam loaded with war history). It was an amazing experience, but very HOT there during the summer. Mike ate his way through the country, of course, in search of the best pho – he sampled over 17 different bowls during the trip!
In July, Cuda turned one, so we had a big birthday BBQ bash for him. He loved playing with the other doggies and kids. Smushes and Callie have warmed up to Cuda a bit over the year, and they all keep Sara good company while working from home.
In August, Sara completed her 200-hour certified yoga teacher training at Bala Vinyasa Yoga. The certification program consisted of one intensive weekend of training a month for six months, and was one of the most challenging – and rewarding – things Sara has ever done. She now shares her passion for yoga by teaching at the studio a few times a week on evenings and weekends.
In October we traveled to Italy to celebrate Mike’s parent’s 25th wedding anniversary with them. We conquered Rome (hitting a dance club in a 2000 year old cave ‘til the wee hours of the morning our first night there), Venice (a magical city with lots of great meals), Florence (to have our breath taken away by Michelangelo’s David), and Camiore (a charming little town in the hills of Tuscany where we celebrated our good friends’ honeymoon with them) – and took in lots of fresh truffles, porcini mushrooms, pasta, pizza, and of course, vino! Back in FL, Sara’s mom graciously took care of our “children.”
Amidst all this, we squeezed in work and play trips to Key West, Miami, CA, NY, OH, and MN (experiencing the awesome new Twins stadium, and a Vikings game… womp… womp…), and created great new memories with you! For those of you we haven’t seen in awhile, we miss you and hope our paths cross soon!
Wishing you unending joy, love, and blessings in 2011,
Mike, Sara, Smush, Callie, and Cuda Mueller
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