Emuzines

Happiness is…

…spending a night playing games with Nik and some of our oldest friends, in the birthplace of our relationship (the Rhoades household).

…devouring a meal of some of the best Mexican food LA has to offer (Pachanga), balanced on my lap while cruising down PCH and rocking out to KLOS.

…spending a relaxing day knitting with Martha, chatting with Justine, Dad, Nana, and Nonno.

…spontaneously remembering favorite LA food and drink spots, then going to them right away.

…see above…drinking a Coffee Bean vanilla latte during said games.

…coming home to a happy and sleepy Logan greeting me at the door, and following me within an inch of my body around the house until bed.

…knowing that I get to spend the next week and a half with some of my best friends and my family.

…also knowing that I get to go home to Nik, JoJo, and some incredible people who have quickly become the most wonderful friends a girl could ask for.

The holiday season has officially begun (in David’s and my opinion, the Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday seasons begin on November 1)! The next few weeks hold a lot of excitement–a lot of celebrating.

Nik and I head to Amesbury on Wednesday for Thanksgiving. We are SO excited, and have been so for weeks and weeks. It will be Nik’s second time to New England. Seeing as how he was swayed enough by the area last time to hint at wanting a house out there, I know he’ll have a good time again. He also gets to be reunited with my cousin Billy, who he gets along really well with. Good thing Billy is bringing his girlfriend so I’ll still get some Nik time in! And I always have a great time there. It always feels like home. I get to see everybody, relax in Memere and Pepere’s house, and eat Memere’s wonderful food!

The week after we get back to California will be hectic, but with a lot of fun things. Class wraps up that week as well. On Friday, my friends and I are going out to Bistro 33 for our thrice yearly quarter-end celebration. We have developed a tradition of going out–always to Bistro, it seems–at the end of every quarter to celebrate. It’s even more welcome now since we’ve dispersed a bit in terms of classes. I only have classes this quarter with David, Abby, and Kyle. Not enough time to see Maciel, April, and Natalie. Here we are at one of our old quarter end celebrations. This is actually at the end of our first quarter–the bootcamp of the program. We had shots this night. We earned them.

As you can maybe see, the fall quarter quarter end happens to be our gift exchange too. Last year we did a White Elephant, and exchanged and “stole” the gifts. This year, since we know each other so much better, I organized a Secret Santa, and we’re shopping for a specific person. Nik drew names and passed them around.

The next day is our second monthly First Saturday Dinner and a Movie. This one will be chili in bread bowls, cornbread, and apple turnovers made with Memere’s homemade apple jam. We’ll probably watch a holiday movie, but votes on which one are pretty spread around, so I have to tie-break.

Lots of other things are planned–drinks with our stats professor, the Mind Institute Thank You party, etc. Can’t wait!

My dad, Martha, Mandi, and Justine came up to visit us this weekend. It was a short visit, but we packed it in and it was really nice. It was their first visit up here since we moved–with the exception of Mandi–so it was fun to show them the house and neighborhood. Yesterday we went out to lunch in downtown Davis, then hung around at home, watched some Friends, talked, and relaxed until it was time to go to dinner in Sacramento–Lucca, yummmmm. Last night we stayed up baking pumpkin chocolate chip cookies, watching more Friends (pastey pants!), and talking. JoJo fell in love with Justine and slept with her part of the night–it’s rare that Jo will even leave my side, so that was big–and she face rubbed and cuddled all over her.

This morning Martha made us all a gigantic and delicious breakfast, and we lazied around in our PJs for most of the morning. We had the football game on in the background–a very Sunday type of morning. Then Mandi, Martha, and I ran over to the Pedrick Produce Stand and bought all kinds of snacks–chocolate toffee almonds, chilli pistacios, chocolate peanut brittle, dried apricots, etc. They just took off and it’s lazy and quiet.

Thanks for everything–the company, dinner, breakfast, and the beautiful gifts!!

Last night was the prelim-passing celebration at our old professor’s house. She threw us a very elegant dinner party. We were all so excited to see her house! It was very, very eclectic, but really neat! There were surprises at every turn. Here are a few shots from the night.

This is Maciel in Brenda’s living room, admiring the (ceramic) sheep:

David and I:

The prelim-passers (L to R-Abby, Maciel, me, and David):

Had to include a doggy picture! Here I am with Paris:

Finally, a group dinner shot (L to R-April, David, Kyle, Me, Brenda, Abby, and Maciel):

We had a great time and it was an appreciated celebration. Now…tomorrow is my own dinner party! Wish us luck!

Today is a relaxing day for me, and a productive one. I had class in the morning, but get to spend the afternoon working from home, writing. I love to be in the office–the M.I.N.D. Institute is still magical to me–and I love to be out in the field doing intervention with our babies and kiddos, but I always feel so relaxed when I get a whole afternoon to write. I punctuate my writing with errands or cleaning tasks, so I get double the amount done.

Tonight one of our professors is throwing a dinner party for us to celebrate passing prelims. I just swung by the market to pick up sparkling lemonade and French berry lemonade to bring, as well as a frozen pizza for Nik since he is being abandoned tonight.

Tomorrow will be another class-errand-writing type of day, and then Saturday is the first monthly First Saturday Dinner and a Movie. I’m so excited about it. I have a whole meal planned and the movie…should be…arriving in the mail today.

Now time for lunch!

Quick post. I received a very, very good grade on my statistics midterm and I am so proud of myself. It was a tough one. Let’s just say that if there were A+++s, I would have one!

Things are also going really well at work. Finishing up an article draft, and finalizing my coding scheme for my own project. Sally and I ran through some videos using it today and it went really well. We also have an analysis plan in the works thanks to an incredible research scientist who helps me out a lot, Greg.

I’m heading to LA tomorrow and I am super excited. Lots of good plans, and I’ll get to spend some quality time with my mom, Mandi, Logan, Danny, Melissa (a frequent reader–hi!), and Mark. Happy!

I have spent most of the weekend studying for my statistics midterm on Tuesday. It is so different from what I normally do/study/think about, so it has taken some getting used to…but I am understanding it and think I will do well on Tuesday. Now I just need to incorporate this knowledge into my research project and actually use it for the analysis…

I have also been walking almost every day. Usually I take JoJo, but not if I am going at a peak dog-walking time. She just pulls too much and I spend more time tugging back at her than relaxing. But sometimes she can be great, and she sniffs all around and doesn’t pull. There are all kinds of trails around here, and creatures and windy paths. The fall leaves crunch under our feet and the trees are getting very orange. It’s easy to get turned around and lost in the neighborhoods here, because they wind all around and loop back on themselves. I like getting lost in the neighborhoods and checking out everybody’s Halloween decorations and gardening. I have been learning a lot more about the neighborhood, too, and we get lost less…

Nik and I had a “night out on the town” Friday and last night. This is in quotes because Davis is such a small little town, and the downtown consists of a grid with streets 1-4 and A-G. On Friday we went out to Pasta?, an Italian restaurant, for dinner, and last night we went to the movies and then to a late-night dinner at Pluto’s. Both nights we spent some time walking the grid, people-watching, looking in the bookstore and shop windows. Nice fall evenings.

Off I go to help finish making chicken parm for dinner…

Last night’s party was a huge success!! About 30-35 people showed up, and I think everybody had a really great time. It was a welcome party for the first year students in my department, traditionally hosted by us second year students. Traditionally there is some sort of scavenger hunt or activity–while we didn’t do it last year as the guests, we developed an elaborate activity this year as the hosts. After the first years completed their activity, they joined the party at our house. We had some really great appetizers, food, desserts, and drinks. The house was perfect for the party, and lots of people complemented our fall decorations and the adorable house. Lots of burning candles, lit fire pit, and smells of fall.

The beginning part of the night was pretty low-key with networking, eating, and chatting–a lot of the guests hadn’t yet met. After the first year students left, though, things got a little more interesting. There was a core group of about 10-12 of us who played all sorts of games late into the night. We’re all exhausted today…but we had such a good time that Nik and I are thinking of instituting a monthly dinner and movie at our house. We’ll cook for everyone–David, Abby, April, Natalie, Maciel, and Kyle (our core friend group)–maybe the first Saturday of each month and hang out, have some drinks, and watch a movie. There was a great response to the idea, so now for the arranging. I’ve found that I love to host. Nik was also great at decorating, cleaning, and hosting. Even JoJo was a good girl and gently and calmly accepted pets from everybody. (She did lick the pumpkin pie and steal a piece of cheese, but that’s all she did that was bad!)

Nik and I hadn’t any plans for today. So this morning after coffee we headed out to Vacaville for some lunch and shopping. Then we came home and I got a good chunk of statistics homework out of the way, and we took Jo for a walk. It is so fall-y here, moreso than it ever seems to be in LA. I’m not used to it and I LOVE IT. The sky is gray and the trees are orange, and it’s windy with leaves billowing all around. There are lots of meerkats and ground-burrowing owls on our trail, hunkered down and adorable. We have gone with the feel of the season and the house shows–pumpkins, mulled cider, etc. We finished the night at Pasta downtown, stuffing ourselves with gnocci and fettucini. Now WE are hunkered down in bed and about to watch some Friends episodes.

Tomorrow, we are hosting a big party at our house. It is the traditional welcome party hosted by the second year students in my program, to welcome the first year students. My friends and I had a party to plan the party, and we did some big planning! We are going to have a ton of food, activities, and…drinks. Today I am working from home, and on my breaks I am baking pumpkin pies and pumpkin cookies for the party. The house smells very pumpkiny!

Nik has also been working on the backyard and we have a new firepit, lights, etc. It looks really nice out there and the firepit is great (we tested it last week…). I think that everyone will have a great time–we’re expecting about 30 people. I can’t wait!

So–a nice day. I had class this morning. David, Abby, Kyle and I enjoy ourselves quite a bit for statistics at 8 am. Then I met one of the first year students, Caitlyn, for coffee downtown. I am her peer mentor, but she didn’t need me to mentor much! Just to chat as friends! I’ve also gotten a lot of work done on my own research project. The coding scheme should be ready for action within the next couple of weeks. Off I go to finalize this draft of it, and check on those pies…

I passed my preliminary exams! YAYYY! I just got the news tonight. I am so relieved and can finally BREATHE!

And…Mandi and I can book our tickets to Italy! We were waiting for this good news to book, otherwise we would have had to put the trip off another year.

WHEW!