Emuzines

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!!

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 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!

Mandi came to visit this weekend, and we had a BLAST as usual. Our weekend was full of our seeking out adventures.

She was in later than expected on Friday, so we went out to have some tapas in downtown Davis. We came home and got snuggly in PJs and watched Friends episodes of our choosing until we fell asleep on the couch (”I want to see the one where Ross says, ‘It tastes like feet!’”)

On Saturday we headed out to the outlets in Vacaville, and did some Banana Republic, Fossil, Coach, etc. shopping and browsing. We both determined we don’t like most sweaters, but we ended up coming away with some good stuff. We justified short sleeves very well. Not surprising given we had given ourselves an out in  our rule (”Don’t let me buy any short sleeves UNLESS it’s a need”). On the way back, we stopped at a produce stand we had seen advertising pumpkin ice cream. We ended up with tons of snacks, including that ice cream. It has flecks of pumpkin in it. It’s delicious. Also on Saturday, we embarked upon our autumn meal extravaganza. We made corn chowder with buttermilk mashed potatoes (served in the same bowl with the chowder), bacon, and scallops. It was yummy. Then we took JoJo on a walk around the neighborhood and it rained on us a little. Again, into PJs and more Friends episodes until we fell asleep on the couch.

On Sunday we had a San Francisco adventure. Several, actually. We started off with brunch at Lime. Lime has a very nightclub atmosphere for 10:30 am, and the place was hopping. It serves unlimited mimosas which made for a very, very fun brunch. I ate a BAKED pancake with blueberries and powdered sugar, and Mandi had steak and eggs. They served the best biscuits in the world. And the best mimosas in the world–did I mention that?

After that, Mandi drove us to Union Square for some shopping. I came away with much more than I expected, sweaters included. Mandi bought some things, too, including a necklace from the street vendors. We then decided to check out Lombard Street, the crookedest street in the world. At the last minute I decided to drive it, rather than just look at it, and I turned onto it. It was fun and Mandi was a good photographer. After pulling over at the bottom for more pictures, we were pretty much out of time. We had to fight 49s traffic to get Mandi all the way to the Sacramento airport.

It was a fantastic weekend!

This was written a couple of nights ago. The summary isn’t complete, but I figured I should get it out before I slack off on my blog again. I won’t get to the rest this weekend beceuase Mandi is visiting right now! Yay! Last night was went out for tapas in town, and today we’re heading to the outlets for fall clothes shopping and then coming home to make an autumn meal.

Here is what I owe my blog:

Summer Summary, Part I

I sit here snuggled with Nik under a big soft blanket on an evening that feels very much like fall. The heat of the past months has subsided, and has been replaced with a cool(er), windy evening. The branches outside whip around, and the sky is turning a very Halloweeny orange. I was able to resist putting up my fall decorations under September 1 only, so the house has been covered with pumpkins and fall leaves for almost a month. I further resisted Halloween-specific decorations until tonight, and am now surrounded by witches’ hats and ghosts. Additionally, I have lit my Pumpkin Patch candle, so the house smells very fally.

I have completely neglected writing here all summer. It was a vicious cycle, missing a post on one event, and then not wanting to post on the next until I went back to that. This resulted in no posting, so here is my summer summary. I vow to try very, very hard not to lag on posts in the future.

Studying

This was my big summer activity. It hurts just to think about it even now. I had my preliminary exam for school last week. This was a three-day exam covering infancy/early childhood, middle childhood/adolescence, and adulthood/aging. Within these areas I needed to know details of biological, socioemotional, and cognitive development. In addition to the details, author names and article or chapter years. I had about 200 articles memorized, most with multiple author names. Hundreds—thousands—of facts floated and, luckily, solidified in my head through endless hours of studying. Ugh, enough on that. A painful experience, but worth it.

LA

I made three trips to LA over the summer. Always a great time. The first served as a break between the end of classes and the beginning of the previously-described activity. I fit in visits to my dad, Martha, and Justine (dinner and a night stroll in Long Beach), Mark (coffee in Redondo Beach), Kimberly, Zena, and Grady (incredible new dinner place in Long Beach), and spent lots of time with Mandi and my mom (and Logan!).

The second trip was for the Fourth of July. JoJo came on this trip, so there was lots of playful chaos. I went to a party at Danny’s, like last year, and played games and set off fireworks with them. We also went to what is my favorite Hollywood Bowl trip so far—to see John Fogarty. My mom, Mandi, and I go for this holiday every year, not caring who is playing. We didn’t even know who John Fogarty was before going, but almost every song was recognizable. He put on a fantastic show. Lots of good food again, as always, too.

The third trip was just last month. This was a whirlwind of activity: celebration of Mandi’s birthday at Café Sevilla, Maddy and Mike’s wedding, Foti and Sarah’s engagement party, a surprise visit to my dad, Justine, Martha, and her side of the family at my step-uncle and –aunt’s anniversary party, taco truck adventures at 2 am, and more. Many of these occurred in one night, leaving me hardly able to move the next day. Luckily, Nik just drove me home and Jo and I slept!

North Carolina

What can I say about North Carolina, my annual weekend of extreme fun?!? My NC trip deserves its very own summary.

-Raleigh Melting Pot (“1, 2, 3, FONDUUUUUUE!”)

-Games, games, games

-Boating

-Water skiing

-Tubing

-Driving the jet ski (“OH MY GOD, 52!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”)…that’s how fast I got. I screamed

-Table for 12 at hibachi

-Balls of rice in my eye

-Flashlight tag

-Pool

-Fried pickles

-Shopping

-Coffee and Apples to Apples break

-Microwaved s-mores

-Golden Cheesemuffs

Mandi and I always love, love, love our North Carolina trips. Sharon, Paul, and Sara (Ryan was out of town, but let me sleep in his room!) are always great hosts.I frequently look through my old NC pictures just for fun. I wish I could get out there more than once a year!

I love living in the house!  Spring has definitely arrived in Davis, and the neighborhood literally smells like flowers.  I got out of the car after work today and it smelled delicious.  My backyard also smells especially nice.  There’s a tree that we thought was some sort of fruit tree…but is suddenly blooming thousands of white flowers.  I’m pretty sure that’s what’s perfuming the backyard (and maybe the neighborhood…), but I also stuck my nose to all our other flowers and they smelled nice, too.  I can’t wait to have a BBQ and patio set back there.  I do spend as much time as I can out there, gardening or playing ball with Jo.  She LOVES being out there, although the other day is was very windy and she thought a rose was attacking her, and she was scared.  The rose now lays on the ground, bit in half.

Everything here is great.  We have purchased everything for the guest bedroom, and actually are having our first guest here Sunday night, just for the night.  Nik’s friend Liz from college.  But I don’t know if the bedroom stuff will be ready on time…  But then Mandi and my mom (and Logan) come on Friday!!  Yay!!!  It’ll definitely be ready by then!

Nik hung our pictures yesterday and it’s looking very homey.  Not much more to do to set up, except figure out where all of my smaller decorations go and do the guest stuff. 

I had a long day of many meetings at work and am pretty tired.  But I have to prepare for a presentation on Monday, so I better go get working on that…

I spent last weekend in L.A.  Technically Logan-sitting, I fit a ton of fun in with some of my favorite people.  Unfortunately, Mandi and my mom were in Amesbury, so I didn’t get to see them…but I had an activity-filled weekend, anyway.

I got in very late Friday night, after a horrible Super Shuttle experience which kept me driving around LAX for an hour after midnight.  On Saturday, I got my nails done (I only try to fit in the very important things), and then had some relaxation time with Logan.  When Noah was up from his nap, I met up with him and Mark at Polliwog park.  We fed some ducks and gigantic fish, and played with Noah on the playground.  We ran a lot and tired everybody out.  Seeking some quiet, more conversation-allowing sit-down time, we headed to Mama D’s for dinner #1.  After that, it was dinner #2 with Gabriela…unphotographed, but great as always.  I had my beloved Caprese salad at Lazy Dog, and we laughed and laughed and laughed. 

Sunday saw breakfast #1 with Melissa at Le Quotidian (the best coffee in the world…), with a surprise additional goodbye visit by Mark.  Breakfast #2 took place at Eat at Joe’s with my dad, Martha, and Justine, and the remainder of the afternoon was spent cuddling some more with Logan.

The weekend was over quickly, but wonderful.  It left me utterly exhausted but somehow refreshed, and thankful for the great people in my life (including my mom, who wasn’t there, but left me roses and all sorts of preferred foods and sweets and drinks, and a toy to give to Logs!).  Another weekend in paradise.

Similar to my List of Happenings post, here is a bulleted list of happenings.  I don’t feel like I can put into words the great fun and relaxation I have had during this winter break home, so here are some thoughts and happenings.

• Scrapbook catch-up!  Or, rather, scrapbook work-on, since I have completed a few pages, but made so many more memories since I’ve been here, that I’m sure I’ll go home needing to do more than I did.  But hopefully I’ll have completed all July, 2008 activities by the time I get back into school.
• I finished sorting all of my literature for my chapter.  In other words, I finished reading through all early intervention literature EVER DONE on kids who are blind, deaf, mentally retarded, or premature, or have Down Syndrome or cerebral palsy.  That’s a lot of studies.  I had to find them, first of all, which I’ve been doing since September.  Then I had to read through them all, determine their quality, and rate them.  Now I get to write on the highly rated ones!
• Gaby time.  Last night Gabs and I went to Cozymel’s for dinner and then to the movies.  We laughed so hard.  She’s the best.
• Logan cuddles.  Logan spends most part of most nights with me, and leaves in the mornings (or middle of the night, I can never tell).  In what *I* consider morning, I call him in, and he jumps on my bed for cuddles.  He is so cute.  SO CUTE.
• Again about Logan.  We played “Where’s the ball?” with him tonight, which is really hide-and-seek with a ball.  He’s great at this game and searches the house high and low for whatever particular toy we’re playing with–he always remembers.  He looks on every shelf, he checks the top of the table, he looks under and over furniture and between each pillow on the couch.  It’s great.  So today we hid it in his water bowl.  This was new, but he found it right away.  He just couldn’t bear to stick his nose deep enough to get it out.  He worked at picking it up by tennis ball fluff for a long while, while we sat and laughed until we couldn’t breathe, but that didn’t work.  Then, he drank all the water and got the ball!
• Tonight we had a Thanksgiving dinner, mostly since Mandi wasn’t able to join us in Amesbury for Thanksgiving.  My mom did a spectacular job with the food, as I selfishly perused the scrapbook store and worked on a Mark and Noah page while she cooked.  Yummy!
• Mandi, Danny, and I went ice skating, which was great fun.  We went to Seaside Lagoon.  Here we are:

• My mom treated Nik, Mandi, Danny, and myself to an incredible dinner at Fogo de Chao, a Brazilian restaurant in Beverly Hills.  It was quite the experience…SO much food!  We chatted and chatted and couldn’t stop chatting (and eating).  Here WE are:

• Tomorrow is sledding with Mandi and Justine.  It should be really fun.  I remember toppling over quite a bit last time Mandi and I went.  We’re sure to scream, and the most fun happens when it makes us scream (think dark San Francisco forest)!
• There’s so much more…  It’s just been a great break so far, and it’s been nice to see everyone who I’ve missed so much, and I hope I can squeeze everything in in my last remaining days!

I’m in LA!  Yay!  It was a difficult and slightly painful drive down.   I took the 80 to the 680 to the 101, because of the snow problem on the 5.  I had never driven the 101 all the way down, and I actually really enjoyed it.  It was really pretty, a very neat drive.  I thought it was funny that the scenery completely reminded me of Disney’s California Adventure, rather than the other way around.  With the trees hugging the highway, the tin agricultural buildings with “Asparagus” painted on the sides, the fields, the mountains covered in snow.  It was very pretty.  I was amazed at the great time I was making, and most of the time there was very few cars anywhere to be seen.  Then I hit Santa Barbara.  It took me two hours just to get through SB (rush hour), and from then on it was tough.  The valley and the 405 were horrible.  Even the radio DJ was late to his shift because of the 101/405 area traffic.

Anyway, I made it!  My mom had a yummy Greek dinner waiting for me.  Logan cried like a big baby and has been following me around and cuddling any chance he gets.  I went to bed pretty early to prepare myself for yesterday, which was our Christmas!  Mandi and I started the day with some shopping, and I wrapped and wrapped, and cooked (well, I mashed some sweet potatoes) all day until Christmas time!  Then gifts, fun, food, and a nice drive along the beach with Logan.

It’s nice to be home, and nice to know it’s for 2/3 weeks and not for 2/3 days!  I can’t wait to see everybody.  Let’s get together!!!

Hi All!

I have been trying to write a Mandi’s Visit post for quite awhile, but for some reason the picture uploading on the site is messed up, and we haven’t been able to fix it yet.  So, instead of posting pictures directly with a story for them all, like I wanted, I’ll post a link to my Facebook album, where you can see the pictures from Mandi’s visit: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2008978&l=2ec38&id=1262058331  We had a great time.  On Friday, which was Halloween, we baked pumpkin nut cups and dressed JoJo up in her spider costume (using lots of bribes), then went to eat in downtown Sacramento when Nik came home from work.  On Saturday, we explored San Francisco in the rain.  It was a fun and adventurous day, ending in a dark, rainy, and deserted forest, locked out of the car.  On Sunday, we went to Napa…went to an incredible lunch, a couple of wineries, the state park, and ended the day shopping at the outlets.  It was great having her here–we all had fun!  We’re already planning our next adventures which will include Alcatraz and the Redwood Forest!

So everything is going really well.  Schoolwork, while still busy, is getting easier to get through more quickly.  I think most of us feel that, as we’ve commented that we can finally stick our heads up for air.  In fact, our cohort had some fun at the world’s largest corn maze this weekend: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2009269&l=8c83c&id=1262058331  Out in about 45 minutes, muddy and laughing!

I am getting extremely excited for Thanksgiving.  It’ll be Nik’s first time in Amesbury.  Today we went November-in-Amesbury shopping, and were pretty successful…except for shirts, since wool makes us both itch…and all warm clothes are at least part wool!  Nevertheless, we both came away with too much to carry, which is a good sign.

Speaking of Nik, he’s got a job…has been working for maybe a month or so now.  I wish he would post more (!), but I think he’s pretty tired from working and spends his free time relaxing in other ways.  But…just to let anyone curious know, he has found a job.

Ok, time for me to get to relaxing…