Life Together We have known each other for 15 years and have been married since 1999. We met at a comedy club where a friend was performing. At the time we were both living in Chicago attending graduate school. Although we both enjoyed living in Chicago, it was too cold! After several cold winters, we moved to Northern California (where Dale grew up). We own our own consulting business, which Dale runs. The office is only six blocks from home so Dale can walk to work and looks forward to coming home for lunch with the family. Michaela has been at home full time for the last year and she is very excited to be a stay-at-home mom when the baby arrives! Our weekends are often spent doing small and large projects around our house and garden. We like to think of our house as an ongoing art project—we are always trying to find new ways to make it more interesting and beautiful. Art and creativity are important parts of our lives. Dale is a painter and Michaela designs and creates jewelry. We love music and listen to a wide variety of styles (Blues, Jazz, Rock, Reggae, Pop, R&B, Funk, Alternative, Classical). Sometimes the range of preferences makes for a funny mix. One night we might listen to Beethoven followed by Talking Heads, then move onto Green Day, and Ozomatli. We even turned a few heads at our wedding, when instead of “Here Come’s the Bride” we had an acoustic guitarist play “Over the Hills and Far Away” by Led Zeppelin. We are experienced travelers and look forward to incorporating that into our family life. There are dozens of amazing national and regional parks within a short drive of our home. We have extended family with vacation homes in Lake Tahoe and also on the Northern California coast so we vacation at the snow and the sand at least once each year.