Merry Christmas!

Doesn't the house look great this year?






OK, I should probably mention that this isn't my house. It's my parents' house. But I can always pretend it's mine. (The snow kind of gives it away - they've had over two feet in the past few days, while it's 50˚ here.)

We've had a wonderfully peaceful Christmas. We went to a lovely church service with my sister and her family yesterday and then rushed home so I could make our big Christmas Eve dinner: standing rib roast with a horseradish/crème fraîche sauce, smashed potatoes, steamed French green beans, and my mom's famous rolls. For dessert I made my dad's ice cream pie (Ben and Jerry's New York Super Fudge Chunk in a chocolate cookie crust) and a gingerbread cake with spiced crème anglaise - but after dinner we were so tired and full that we never got around to eating either one. This morning we all slept in until 8:00 then went downstairs to open gifts. Sawyer got way too many presents from his grandparents and aunts and uncles (and some from us too) including a tricycle, Backyardigans dolls, an authentic looking pirate chest, the Fisher Price Little People airport, a Leapster 2 with games, Backyardigans DVDs, a Hot Wheels racetrack, and LOTS of books. Eric gave me a KitchenAid Professional 600 mixer, which I have been coveting for a long time, so no dog house for him this year! I gave him the Matrix trilogy on Blu-ray and a new Playstation game he asked for. We had a big breakfast of my mom's Christmas Morning Casserole (too much food!!) and spent the rest of the day playing with toys. It's been really nice to be home with just our little family - no stressful travel or family drama. We love being with our extended families, but it's also nice to experience the holidays in our own home together. We've had a lot of opportunities to contemplate our blessings and the foundation of our spiritual lives.

Merry Christmas everyone!

The Dog House

This video has been making the e-mail rounds. Just in case you haven't seen it:


I sent it to Eric a few days ago, and he reported back that after showing it to one of his friends at work, the friend was reconsidering his plan to give his wife a body fat monitor for Christmas. My work is done!

It reminds me of when my father-in-law gave my mother-in-law a Red Hat Society sweater for her birthday. She's in her 40s. And then when she went to return it, she found out he had bought it at Cracker Barrel. Classy!

Oasis and (not) Ryan Adams

Going to concerts is one of my favorite things to do, so I often ask for tickets for my birthday or Christmas. For my last birthday we went to see Matchbox 20. The first Christmas after we got married Eric took me to see Tori Amos. I love getting an experience as a gift, rather than more things. I have too many things. For my big Christmas present this year, I got to see these guys.


But sadly, not this one.



When I saw that Ryan Adams and the Cardinals were opening for Oasis at a venue near us, I couldn't pass it up. Oasis was my favorite band all through high school and college, and Ryan Adams has been my favorite for the past several years. But due to a series of unfortunate events, we were late to the show and walked in right after Ryan and the Cardinals had finished. It wasn't meant to be. Here's what I imagine it would have been like if I had seen them play one of my favorite songs, "Let It Ride." (This was during his scruffy stage, he looks better now. Not that it's about the looks. It's all about the music. Just the music. Ahem.)

Luckily though I'm told he comes to our area a lot so I should get another chance to see him live. And my awesome sister-in-law loves him too so we can go together and spare Eric all my screaming. He lucked out during Oasis since I'm sick and didn't have the energy to get *too* wild. The show was great, although I will say that I would have enjoyed it a lot more had they left out all their new songs and played only songs from "Definitely Maybe" and "Morning Glory." The highlight for me was "Masterplan." Their new stuff just doesn't do it for me. I must be getting old.

Bret and Jemaine are back!

Season 2 Online Premiere - Flight of the Conchords (US Only) - watch more funny videos

Words cannot describe how much I love this show.

Best lines:

(At 10:03, Answering the question: what do women like?)
Jemaine: Women love weaving. They love to weave.
Bret: Nah. Weaving is a man's game.
Jemaine: Bret. You put a woman in front of a weaving machine, and just watch her go.
Bret: No, honestly. My dad weaves, my grandfather was a weaver.
Jemaine: I thought your dad was a sheep lawyer.
Bret: Yeah, during the day, but at night he weaves a lot. I come from a family of weavers.
Jemaine: I've never seen a man weave.
Bret: I love weaving. I'm weaving at the moment. Making a pair of trousers.

(Later)
Bret: Women's rights.
Jemaine: No, that's more a man's thing, isn't it?
Bret: No, definitely a woman's thing.
Jemaine: Nah, my father's a women's rights activist.
Bret: Your dad?
Jemaine: Yeah.
Bret: What about your mum?
Jemaine: No, my mum? No. Dad wouldn't allow that. No way.

Holiday Deliciousness

I've found a new favorite holiday treat: Ghirardelli Peppermint Bark Squares. I think they've actually replaced Cadbury's Chocolate Balls on my list - that's how good they are. The chocolate is so smooth it rivals any European chocolate I've had. The best part is that Eric doesn't like the mint/chocolate combo, so he never steals them. They're all for me!

Watch Football!

Last night when Eric turned on the TV to sports highlights, Sawyer threw up his arms and yelled "Yay! Watch FOOTBALL!" Like father, like son. (I guarantee he didn't learn that from me!)

We had a nice Thanksgiving at the beach with the Watts/Buchanan clan. We went for walks and bike rides, ate too much, caught up with family, and yes, watched football. We came home on Saturday morning rather than Sunday to beat the traffic and it was nice to be home together for a bit before going back to life as usual again on Monday.

I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving!

Did I really just say that?

To Sawyer, currently sitting in the Naughty Chair: "No, you were naughty so you may not help Mommy clean up."

Oh, the "punishments" that work on a 3-year-old...

Breastfeeding at the Office

I'm pretty liberal when it comes to public breastfeeding (I've done it just about everywhere) but this might just cross the line - even for me.


Speaking of Jan, did you know her candle company Serenity By Jan has a website? You can actually order candles from it. Check out the scent descriptions and testimonials, they're pretty funny.

Nothing cohesive today

Some random thoughts today:

My mystery allergy is mysteriously back. My lips are itching like crazy.

I hope and pray for the day when Prop 8 won't come up in Relief Society anymore, and I can once again be fairly sure my head won't explode at church.

I'm thinking of compiling a comprehensive list of Backyardigans episodes Sawyer likes, and having Eric verify how he says them so I can tell what he's asking for. It took me two whole days to figure out that "Squaw Picture" actually means "Swamp Creature" in Sawyer-speak. Some others:
"Spud-a-doo"="What Bugging You?"
"Mermaids"="Into the Deep"
"Tission"="Secret Mission"
"Catch a Penny"="To the Center of the Earth"
"Crazy Day" or "Wordle"="Race Around the World"

There's been a mini baby-boom among our friends. Katy and Aaron had their baby Reuben, Kevin and Mindy had baby Lindsay, and Jen and Dave had baby Chloe (no pictures yet!) Congratulations all around!

I'm excited to go to New York on Wednesday with my dad. Megan and Ryan are meeting us there and we're going to see "A Man For All Seasons," and to celebrate Megan's birthday. The only downside is that Eric can't come.

Some funny ChaCha questions I've answered lately:
Did Adam and Eve have belly buttons?
Can you get pregnant from climbing a tree?
What were ALL the causes of the Industrial Revolution? (this one's funny because the answer can only be 130 characters long)
How do you say "You're my dirty little secret" in French?

About 90% of my questions lately are French translations, which is fun. The rest are about movies and religion. Yay for the specialist program!

I have to go shopping today - here's what's on my list:
vertical blind clips
silicone sealant
pepper spray

Sawyer woke me up from a nap yesterday by whispering "Sticky." I still have no idea what he was talking about.

Just a couple of months to go...

Thank you, LOST, for giving me something to look forward to in January!

Do the ChaCha!

I haven't been spending much time blogging lately because I just started working for ChaCha. I took the test to become a guide (someone who receives texts online and researches and answers questions) on Monday and got my acceptance on Wednesday. It's a fun job, and perfect for my schedule since I can work whenever I want to and if something comes up (like, I don't know, a 3 year old dumping out an entire box of Cheerios into the shoe box) I can go take care of it and come right back and keep working. The pay varies a lot depending on how fast you can answer questions, and I'm still pretty slow so I'm not making much yet, but I'm hoping it will become a nice source of a little extra cash. Mostly to fund my soap habit. And my book habit. And all my other habits. So far I'm having a good time with it and learning a lot of (mostly useless) information at the same time. People ask some bizarre things. Stay tuned for reports of crazy questions and answers!

Welcome baby Wes!

While I'm giving out congratulations...I just realized I forgot to officially congratulate Andrea and Rick. Their little boy, Wesley Charles was born in August. Congratulations, Andrea and Rick! He's a cutie and they have the pictures to prove it!

Congratulations Samm and Spencer!

Last weekend we traveled to Harrisonburg, Virginia to see Eric's brother Spencer get married. We had a great time visiting with family and sharing in the happy event. Sawyer did really well during the ceremony - although he did poop in his diaper 5 minutes before it started, when I didn't have time to run out to the car to get a diaper and change him. I'm more motivated than ever to get him potty trained! Here are some pictures from the weekend.

St Francis of Assisi church in Staunton, Virginia.

Eric and Sawyer

Saywer and his Grandad

Sawyer during the ceremony.


Spencer and Samm

The wedding party. Notice anything strange?

Sawyer and me at the reception.

Spencer and his mom.

You can see more pictures in my Facebook album. Congratulations Spencer and Samm! We're so happy for you and we had a fantastic time.

Marketing FAIL

This is what came in the box from Amazon.



Looks like they should have read the book first!

The best-laid plans...

Remember how I was talking about stepping up my workouts? Like a week ago? Well, it hasn't happened. Between several days of rain and Sawyer and me both being sick, it's been the worst workout week ever. Yesterday morning I was determined to get my five miles in, come hell or high water, and I did it. I felt like I was going to die after two miles and just about had to crawl the last mile (OK, I'm exaggerating, but it was a lot harder than normal.) So today I'm home and resting on the couch. Am I being smart to listen to my body, or should I just power through? I don't know. But I do know it feels really, really good to lie down.

I've been bumped down to #6 on Fitify, and the #5 person is 12 miles ahead of me. Crap. (The #1 person has 214 miles! That's 7 miles a day, 7 days a week! How cool is that?) Here's hoping next week will be better...

Engrish Funny

From the creators of Fail Blog comes.... Engrish Funny! I have been looking at these and cracking up for the past few days. (Just a warning that some of them require a crass sense of humor and tolerance for unintentional profanity.) Here are a few of the less offensive ones.

(Actually a pretty good name for the whole Disney Princess phenomenon.)

I'm like the pioneer children, without the singing...

...because they too walked and walked and walked...and walked. I just noticed that I'm in the top 10 for walkers on Facebook's Fitify application. Number 5. Yeah, baby! I've walked 73 miles in the past 30 days. I'm planning to step things up in the next couple of weeks, so watch out Number 4!

My goal is to walk 5 miles a day, 5 days a week (Monday-Friday), but so far life has gotten in the way of that happening. I have yet to do 5 consecutive days because something always comes up. I am determined to make it happen next week! This one's already screwed because I couldn't go this morning due to some intestinal issues I'm not willing to blog about. Feel free to thank me for that.

Additional goals: Eric and I are joining a gym together. I doubt we'll ever go at the same time, but it is nice that we're both becoming more fitness conscious at the same time. I also want to get in the habit of doing yoga every night before I go to bed. This is hard since by the end of the day I'm so tired and all my favorite TV shows are just getting started up again (Heroes tonight! The Office on Thursday!) Thank goodness for the DVR. I just need to have the discipline to schedule that time and stick with it. The healthiest I've ever felt was when I was practicing consistently and I want to get back to that level again.

I am really enjoying the walking. It's my favorite part of the day, being outside and having quiet time - although now that I think about it it's not entirely quiet since I'm listening to podcasts and trying to placate Sawyer, who starts whining "Playground, playground" around mile 3. Still. I enjoy it. It's something I know I can stick with, unlike running, which every time I've tried it is just painful, painful, and more painful. I had asthma as a child and I still associate running with the yearly torture of "running the mile" in PE class, which always involved a horrible attack and subsequent vomiting. (Looking back, I don't know why I never got a doctor's note to skip it.) In college I was in a car accident that left me with a back injury and I still have pain from that, which makes running even less fun. Walking is low impact enough to feel great and still get a good workout.

Any other walkers out there? Runners (masochists)? What else do you do to keep in shape?

Dentist Trauma

On Monday Sawyer had his first ever dental procedure - getting cavities filled. Nothing makes you feel like a horrible mother faster than learning that your child has a mouth full of cavities (I don't know what the final count was, but before they started drilling it was at least seven.) The dentist says it's from drinking juice from a sippy cup - although virtually every toddler I know drinks juice or milk from a sippy cup and none of them have a million cavities. We brush his teeth twice a day and he rarely has sweets. I'm blaming Eric's genes, since I've never had a cavity myself.

Since he's so young and needed so many fillings we decided to have him go under IV sedation during the procedure. We had to get to the office early in the morning, which was good because that meant Eric could be there for moral support for me. Also since Sawyer couldn't eat anything after midnight the night before, it was good that we didn't have to keep him hungry for too long. They had me hold him in my lap while he was given an injection which we were told would make him fall asleep, and then they'd start an IV (which I later found out was in his ankle - yikes!) After they gave him the shot I expected him to fall asleep in my arms, and I was totally unprepared for his reaction - he got all stiff, with his hands balled into fists, his pupils dilated and he started shaking. The anesthesiologist was quick to assure us that it was normal and that in some people their body fights the medication at first. When I laid him down in the dentist's chair he was so stiff that he almost rolled right off onto the floor. The most disturbing part was that his eyes were wide open but it was clear that he didn't see us there. I just about lost it. I'm so glad Eric was there with me in the waiting room.

After about an hour and a half the drilling, filling and sealing was done and they called me back (Eric had to step out for a conference call) so I could hold him while he woke up. He was very groggy for a while and had a dry, sore mouth but otherwise seemed to feel fine. His first words were about Kai-lan. A couple of hours after we got home he was dancing around and asking for chicken and fries (he got yogurt instead). All in all it was much more traumatic for me than it was for him. Still, I hope this is the last major dental procedure he'll need for a long time.

Go Mama!

The other day I was vacuuming the stairs (something I end up doing a lot because we have a three level townhouse) and looked up to see Sawyer at the top, clapping his hands and cheering "Go Mama! You can do it! Great job!" He kept the verbal encouragement going the whole time I was cleaning. And you know what? I did do a good job. Thanks for noticing, Sawyer.

Colbert

The other night before bed, Sawyer started asking for "Colbert". Since we're big fans of The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, I assumed he was in the mood for some jaunty political humor. But even after a few Bush jokes, he kept saying "Colbert, Colbert, Colbert!" As it turns out, this is what he was referring to:


It all makes sense: Colbert = polar bear! He's been playing with it non-stop for the past several days and asks for it at bed and nap time. He goes through phases with his stuffed animals where he'll be attached to one for a while and then move on, but this is the first time he's ever named one - albeit unintentionally. Welcome to the family, Colbert!

Information that would have been useful to me YESTERDAY

Eric and I were in Nordstrom yesterday and, like the fragrance ho that I am, I stopped to sample the essential oil perfumes from L'Occitane. I particularly liked the Lavender Eau de la Recolte Bleue and had Eric come over to smell it on my wrist. "Doesn't that smell great?" I said. "Hmmm," he replied, "I really don't like vanilla perfumes." Turns out he was smelling a little higher up on my arm, where I had applied my perfume. Which I've been wearing daily for a good 6 months. Which is Aquolina's Pink Sugar, a vanilla based perfume. So he's been hating how I smell for the past 6 months and never said anything. That's a considerate man for you - if I don't like his aftershave/cologne I protest loudly and then buy him something *I* like. So I guess I'm in the market for a new signature fragrance - something not vanilla based. Any suggestions?

Flickr Fun

Michelle did this on her blog a while back and I decided to emulate (i.e. copy) her. Here's how to play:

a. Type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr Search.
b. Using only the first page, pick an image.
c. Copy and paste each of the URLs for the images into fd’s mosaic maker.


The Questions:
1. What is your first name? Chelsea
2. What is your favorite food? peaches (it's a moving target, but this is my current seasonal fave)
3. What high school did you go to? Loudoun Valley
4. What is your favorite color? blue
5. Who is your celebrity crush? Christian Bale
6. Favorite drink? Vanilla Coke
7. Dream vacation? Florence, Italy
8. Favorite dessert? chocolate
9. What you want to be when you grow up? fulfilled
10. What do you love most in life? truth
11. One Word to describe you? thinker (my favorite photo result by far)
12. Your flickr name? afarsea

1. Chelsea Bridge, 2. Walking on the Beaches, Looking at the Peaches, 3. Cows at Loudoun Valley Vineyards, 4. wham:a different corner, 5. Forearm, 6. Addicted, 7. Insieme al tramonto .., 8. coffee and chocolate mousse cake, 9. "i love my bike", 10. zero gravity, 11. The Thinker..., 12. IMG_3989

Superheroine

You Are Trinity

"Touch me and that hand will never touch anything again."

What Superheroine Are You?

This explains a lot about Eric's choice in marrying me - he is a Matrix junkie. Now if only I could fit back into my pre-baby pleather jumpsuit again...

Weird Pastime #23

I like to look through the Pottery Barn Kids catalog and see what baby names are inscribed on things, and therefore trendy enough to cross off my list for future children. (Not that there's anything wrong with having a trendy name, I just don't want to give my kids one.) I look at the furniture too, but let's face it, I'm way too cheap to actually order anything from there. We got our current bed* on Craigslist. And it was originally from Ikea.

Here are some of the names in the most recent edition:

Dylan
Brooke
Aaron
Laura
Oliver (a name I can't hear without thinking "Well 'ello guvnah!")
Taylor (for a boy)
Hannah
Callie
Matt
Caroline and Mary (these two were on the same page, which is funny since those are my nieces' names)
Nathan
Andrew
Avery
Carson
Randy (really? Randy?)
Allie
Madison
Devon (for a girl)
Cody
Stella
Gavin
Marissa
Sadie
Chase
Tristan
Claire
Meghan

I really like some of those names, despite their apparent trendiness. But I'm glad there are no Sawyers. I have met two different little Sawyers at Target (thankfully both boys) in the past few months, so I'm afraid it's becoming more popular. But as long as he's not one of 4 Sawyers in his kindergarten class, I don't really care that much. There is such a thing as having a name that is TOO unique. If our only requirement was that he never meet someone else with his name we would have dubbed him Dweezil or Moon Unit (except, oops, both of those are already taken.)

*Just the bed itself, not the mattress. I'm not that cheap.

Living the Dream

"I'll tell you one thing, I am not going to be one of those women schlepping her kids around in a minivan. I want an SUV... with three rows of seats."
-Kelly Kapoor, The Office




Until recently, I had been driving our Honda Accord that we bought soon after Sawyer was born. We picked it out just for me and I was very happy with it. Comfortable, easy to clean leather seats, XM radio. But with Eric's new office being a bit farther away and gas prices being so high, we figured out that we could save over $300 a month just by switching cars. So now he's driving the Accord, which means I get his car: a big manly Dodge Durango. Not the car I would have chosen for myself, but I'm finding that it is nice to have all that room for strollers, toys, groceries, etc. in the back. And that third row of seats has gotten a lot more use than I thought it would - you know, considering that I only have one child. The gas mileage is truly horrible, but I so rarely drive more than a few miles at a time that it isn't too much of an issue. Of course, I had to personalize it immediately by putting my LOST sticker on the back, and before long I'll have it decorated to the point that Eric will be embarrassed to drive it from now on (I think something along the lines of "Breast is Best!" or "Soapers do it with bubbles" would probably do the trick.) Yep, I'm living the dream!

Walking

This week I started a new exercise routine: walking on a nearby bike trail. I've been doing three miles a day, which for me is a lot (all you serious runners, please don't laugh at me!) It takes me about an hour, so I'm not going super fast either - but since prior to this week I was doing almost nothing, I feel good about it. I'm footsore and muscle sore, and it feels great. Today I went the extra mile - literally - and did four. It hasn't been hard to get up and go because the weather this whole week has been fantastic. Cool in the mornings and evenings, breezy, and never too hot. Virginia in August is usually so hot and humid that you get drenched in sweat just cracking open the front door, so this is unseasonably temperate. Nature must approve of my attempts at exercising.

I brought the camera along today so I could capture some of the beauty of the trail. For some reason everything came out a bit overexposed (I'm the epitome of "amateur enthusiast" when it comes to photography and generally have no idea what I'm doing) but I got some good shots of some flowers and critters along the way. And one near miss that could have been a great photo, but isn't.

The trail.


Ready to hit the road in my new shoes.


The underbrush is so dense this time of year. It's no wonder Sawyer always says "It's a rainforest!"


Part of the trail goes past a quarry. Sawyer loves to stop and see the huge trucks.


Goose Creek. Sorry about the chain link. For some reason they want to make sure the bikers don't fall off the bridge. By the way, you should know that it was a personal triumph for me to actually stop in the middle of the bridge to take this picture because of my crippling fear of heights. I was white-knuckling the camera the whole time.


Virginia countryside. I love the color of the grass at the end of summer, all bleached out by the sun.


Sawyer squinting into the sun and showing me his flower. He held onto it until it wilted away completely.


I wish I could tell you the names of all these flowers, but I have no idea what most of them are. Maybe a Virginian naturalist could step in and enlighten me (Katy??)



With Sawyer's help, I saw a lot of animals today.

A little groundhog that ran off as soon as we got too close and dived into his hole.



A moth that was fluttering around the wildflowers.






A large bird (how's that for descriptive?)



A heron and some Canada geese (I know what those are!)



Circling birds.


And the worst, which could have been the best:


Can you see it? Me either. I had stopped to photograph a bird that was perched on a branch, was just zooming in and focusing when I heard a crash in the brush close by. I jumped about a mile and looked up to see a male whitetail deer with a huge rack of antlers about 10 feet away from me. I was so startled that it took me a few seconds to get the camera pointed at him, and by that time he was completely covered by the bushes. Too bad I'm not Dwight Schrute.

Beach 2008

I learned something this year during our beach trip. One week at the beach is not enough. You spend the entire first week just learning how to live the vacation lifestyle, and by the time the week is over you're just starting to get in the groove of sitting on the beach all day, reading, and eating whatever you want. It doesn't make any sense to go home at that point. Two weeks is infinitely better. Obviously, three would be even better than two. But I'll take two. Two is great.

The trip down was much better than I expected. Sawyer watched his Dora the Explorer DVDs almost the whole way. And it's a 7 hour drive. On the way home I stopped and bought another DVD player (you'll find out why in a minute) and he did pretty much the same thing, even though the drive home took 9 hours because we hit traffic. I've often wondered at home how long he would keep watching TV were I to let him just sit there and keep watching, and now I have my answer: pretty much forever! I'm not complaining though since it made driving without another adult a whole lot easier than it could have been. Especially since the little bugger seems to be immune to the sleepy side effects of Dramamine.

This year our first week was with my mom's family, the annual Stell reunion, full of all the usual subtle and not-so-subtle tensions that a family reunion always brings, and a lot of watching The Office in the evening. My cousins are spread out over Virginia and the US so the beach week is the one time during the year when we all get together and catch up.

The second week we spent in a sound side house with my parents and siblings who could make it (Rob had to go back to work in Miami and Erin was in the midst of moving to New Zealand.) It was nice to all be in one house (the Stell reunion is so big now that we need two) and a bit less chaotic since there were fewer of us. The weather got much better that week too, cooler and less humid. We spent almost every day out on the beach or by the pool. There were a few minor problems - like getting multiple mosquito bites every time we left the house (they were worse this year than they've been in a long time - this T-shirt would have been very appropriate) and having our cars broken into during the first week (mysteriously, my cheapo portable DVD player got stolen, but the punk left my $400+ GPS system right where it was on the windshield.) And it really sucked that Eric was only able to come for a short weekend; he drove down Friday night and left Sunday morning. Next year I hope he'll be able to take more time off. I'm already counting the days.

Another benefit of staying two weeks was that it gave Sawyer time to learn to love the ocean. The first week he hated going to the beach. I literally had to drag him kicking and screaming across the dunes. He hated the way the sand would shift under his feet ("It's slippery! It's slippery!") and was scared of the waves. But by week two, he loved it and it was all I could do to get him to come out of the water and go home for lunch. I had to watch him like a hawk because he would try to get into the water by himself. His favorite was going into the ocean with his Grandad - they'd jump up over the waves and Sawyer would yell "Arriba!" and "Abajo!" and "Don't drink the agua!" (Thank you again, Dora!)



One of the highlights of our yearly beach vacation is our trip to Ocracoke. It's on a small island south of Cape Hatteras and is a quirky little village with lots of restaurants, shops, local music and aging hippies. This year we went twice. We had a great time eating at the Jolly Roger (hush puppies=deliciousness!), browsing at the Hemp Shop, touring the lighthouse, and splashing in puddles on the day it rained.

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year...

...because it's beach time! Sawyer and I leave tomorrow for a whole two weeks at the Outer Banks. My whole family (minus my sister Erin who's in the midst of moving to New Zealand) and my mom's family will be there. I can't wait to see everyone. Eric can't come this year because 1) he doesn't have much vacation time yet since starting his new job a couple of months ago, and 2) Verizon is going on strike next week and he has to be there to pick up the pieces (he doesn't get to go on strike because he's not a Verizon employee.) He's planning to come down next weekend, and I'm hoping he can extend his stay for at least a few days beyond that. We'll see.

I'm a little nervous about driving down by myself tomorrow, mostly because Sawyer has been a complete terror the last few days. Whiney, fussy and tantrum-y. Whoever said the Terrible Twos were the worst phase never met a three year old. Or at least they never met Sawyer. I think I'm prepared - portable DVD player with Dora the Explorer DVDs, check. Huge box of fruit snacks, check. Leaving in the evening in hopes he'll fall asleep, check. Dramamine in case he doesn't fall asleep soon enough, check (thanks for the suggestion Jen!) Not stopping at mean grandma's on the way, double check! So I think I'll be OK. I think.

No Grad School For Me

Movie Reviews

So I guess when I get a postgrad degree I'll have to start using fancier words on my blog. I'll probably have to stop writing about Etsy finds and celebrity crushes too. Worth it? Maybe, maybe not.