Off to Maryland!

At Ikea. Um, Yes, I will take this for my closet. Thank you!!

In front of the Terrapin football stadium. Huge, isn't it?!

I bought a shirt at the bookstore. I have to support the school that is helping my man to become a star!!

The recital hall. I know. Amazing. (ps-who is that famous singer standing on the stage?)

Walking into the School of Music. 4 Theatres of the first floor, music library to the left.

On Thursday night, I headed to Maryland to visit Joe for Labor Day weekend. I was very anxious to get there, because it had been almost a month and half since we have been able to spend time together! I was also very excited to see his new apartment, new school, and new friends. Thursday night was mainly spent relaxing, watching movies, and enjoying one another's company. It was so nice.

While Joe went to class on Friday morning, I took my time to get ready before meeting up with him for the day. He picked me up after his class to go back to campus for a tour. We started by driving around campus and eventually parked to enter the School of Music. It was AMAZING. Maryland has an excellent Opera Studio with nine theatres to house all of the School of Music activities. Yeah-that's right. NINE. The whole time I kept thinking....I did my senior recital in a choir rehearsal room?? The opera theatre is beautiful, the recital hall is equally as great, and the music library is amazingly exhaustive. After the tour and meeting the head of the opera studio, we walked around campus to the student union. Their student union was incredible-a bowling alley, a movie theatre, a bank, a bookstore, and somewhat of a food court (Subway, Sbarro, Sushi, Taco Bell, Chick-Fil-A...etc.) are all housed in this building. I was in awe!! It sure is a huge difference for two people who are accustomed to going to smaller colleges to walk around a campus of 40,000 students.

After getting a feel for the campus, we headed to IKEA for the night. It is the best place to buy furniture anywhere!!! Since Joe has his own apartment, he had a few more items he needed to get to become organized for the year. After walking around the huge store for about 3 hours, we finally left with some necessities and the housewarming gifts I bought him.

That night, we met up with the other grad students in his opera studio at Buffalo Wild Wings (there are 9 people in his class). It was a great atmosphere, and the wings were really good! We had a great time, but were definitely exhausted by the end of our busy day!