bust breslin!!

There was a big crowd last night for the game but tonight was even crazier! The attendance record was broken with over 5,300 people at the game and MSU, without their best hitter, beat Michigan who was 13-0 coming in and ranked 21 in the nation!
This was one of the reasons there were so many people.... All these tents were filled with basketball fans. They loooove their Coach Izzo here (the basketball coach). They showed Izzo on the big screen at the volleyball game and everyone started cheering like crazy! After the game a bunch of students started walking towards Munn Field where there's a bunch of soccer fields so we followed them to see where everyone was going... this is what we saw:
All these people camping out are called the Izzone and it's the season ticket holding student section. They take attendance at this event, the "Izzone Campout" and all the games to determine how close they get to sit during the basketball games-- it sounds intense! People were out playing football and frisbee and barbecuing... the band was there with Sparty and the cheerleaders and the coach came by and talked to everyone after the volleyball game while we were taking pictures. I found all the information on this website.

volleyball at the Breslin Center

The volleyball team moved their games from Jenison Fieldhouse to the Breslin Events Center to start Big Ten play. They beat Ohio State in four and it was really fun! Tonight they are trying to break the attendance record for their match against Michigan and Michigan is ranked 21 in the nation!
This is the Breslin Center. The facility is mostly for basketball and events like concerts. Actually, sometime next month they are hosting a gymnastics showcase with a bunch of the Olympic gymnasts.
This is a statue of Magic Johnson who is a MSU alum and actually went to high school in Lansing. It's a cool statue although it doesn't look much like him!
Inside Breslin this was a cool idea... they had life-size images of tallest and shortest girls on the team, the girl with the longest wingspan and the biggest and smallest hands so people could go compare.
Mikel's slightly confused... wearing his Michigan State hat with Michigan colored t-shirt... we'll have to work on that!
There were about 3700 people in the crowd. Hopefully they break the record tonight, that would be really cool to see! The match was fun although the best outside hitter on the team went down with a knee injury that didn't look good and was on crutches after the game. It was a good thing she was hidden behind the ref stand so I didn't have to see it!!

MSU v Notre Dame tailgating

Dressed in our Michigan State gear, Mikel and I went down to campus to check out all the tailgating and festivities before the Notre Dame game on Saturday.
Anywhere there was a piece of grass, there were people tailgating on it. We saw lots of baggo, bocce ball, and this game in the picture above-- looks pretty fun. There are lots of different groups... some families, some students but everyone's in green and white and everyone's having fun.


Seeing people walking down the streets of campus with open containers of alcohol and 24 packs is quite different than Pocatello!!

MSU

These are some pictures from around campus (at least the small portion of campus where I spend my time).

This is the Sparty Statue; I walk by it every day on my way to teach my classes. All of the sport teams come by and touch it for good luck before they play or before they go on the road to travel. Also, before they play Michigan, they have people stay with the statue 24 hours a day so people don't mess with it! Pretty crazy!


This is the view of Spartan Stadium from the Sparty statue. It's hard to get a good picture of it because there are so many trees on campus.... that's also why I get lost a lot because you can't see very far!


The river that runs behind my building is really full after all the rain we got last week. Part of it has flooded over sidewalks in the botanical garden. The river runs between my office and Sparty.


There are black squirrels in Michigan! They look just the same but they are completely pitch black. Weird...


The library... looks pretty. I haven't been in there yet but I'm sure I'll spend plenty of time soon.


Just a bunch of pretty grass and trees on campus...

oh the rain....

It has been raining since Friday morning. It may not be crazy rain for some people, but compared to Idaho and California it's A LOT.

This is right outside our door... Mikel is waiting for it to start running over. Hopefully if (or when) it does, the drains outside our apartment work well! I guess we'll see!


A pond is starting outside our door where there should be grass and bark...
This is where there is going to be an ice skating rink in between our parking lot and our apartment. Something to look forward to this winter!

We realized the hard way there is a gutter drain directly outside our bedroom window (it's soooo loud!!)... That looks like bark on the ground but don't let it fool you, it's really it's bark floating in a pond.

That's what our weekend has consisted of... rain, rain, rain!!

volleyball

We went to our first MSU volleyball game yesterday; they played UConn and won. They are going to be fun to watch this year and we think we can get Mikel a spouse card so he can get in free-- good news!The facility they play in is called Jenison Fieldhouse and is the old basketball arena. We're pretty sure wrestling and gymnastics also happen in this facility which we're excited to see. You can see the media "box" up high above the bleachers-- scary! I also teach my KIN 121 and swimming classes in this building which is where I ran into the head volleyball coach.

We are excited to go to another game! I think the next game we may go to will be in the Breslin Student Events Center where the basketball team plays because they are trying to break the attendance record...it should be pretty cool!

Downtown Lansing

This is Downtown Lansing with the capitol building in the background.















The Grand River. It runs through the middle of Lansing and East Lansing.

Wild Turkeys

These are some turkeys we saw while driving just a few miles from our apartment.

Mikel's treasures

This is what Mikel found metal detecting today at a school in Lansing. It's solid silver!

There are so many cool barns out here and we can wait until the leaves change colors and we can get pictures with some beautiful backgrounds...

exploring...

These are a few of places we have visiting while exploring the area around us....
This is downtown Williamston. It was a cute town with lots of antique stores!



This is a cool barn we found on the way home from Williamston so we pulled over and took a picture!
These pictures are of Birchfield Park. Brett and Megan told us you can rent canoes and kayaks here and take them down the river which we want to try sometime.

This path goes around the whole lake...

We weren't sure we wanted to see the spider who made this huge web but we had to take a picture!

our new home

Here are some pictures of our new apartment. So far it's nice and quiet and all our stuff fits so it's a keeper! We are right off Grand River (the main road through East Lansing and Okemos) but the complex is spread out and quiet so we are liking it!