2009 in Review

I know it's not technically over yet (heck, we could even have a baby picture this year...), but I just love looking back over the pictures of the year so here are a few favorite memory-inducing pictures. It's kind of fun because it's our last childless year... next year all of our memories will involve Quiglet.

In January, I met Bill Clinton! IDK why it's not showing my edited and cleaned up pic, but you get the drift. He was *thisclose*. And I have a pic of me and him but it's not digital therefore doesn't exist on the blog bc I'm too lazy to figure out the scanner.


This is a funny one to me, we had a snow day for the Inauguration in NC. It was a great day of lounging around and watching history on our crappy old TV. And this picture will surely show how technology has changed in the years to come.
And then later that Spring...we became homeowners! (And later that year Scott took a chainsaw to the ivy on that tree... and then a mower to the ivy on the ground. lol!)

And then a month or so later, I did this! The Philly 10 miler

And then the next day, I did this.

Then Scott got his PhD a week later and I was a terrible, unsupportive wife and have NO pictures of him in his cap and gown or otherwise indicating his accomplishment pictorally. We do have a diploma on the wall, and he does make a point of having a fit when we receive mail that is NOT addressed to Dr. Scott. "Who's "MISTER" McQ????" So, consider this rambling paragraph my acknowledgement that he did it and it was a big deal.

Let's see... then Ashley and Rob got hitched! I was soooo wasted at their wedding (lol).

We don't have a ton of exciting pictures from later that year (mainly bc we just hung around), but we did make 2 trips to PA in the fall - the first was for Sophie's 1st birthday party! She's super cute these days, and they're all coming to visit in January!!!! Hooray! But that's 2010, which is not the focus of this post.
In October, we celebrated our 3 year anniversary :) We always take a pic of ourselves on our anny, so here it is!
Then, before we knew it, it was Christmas! And we got a REAL tree this year for the first time ever, which was so fun. I know the popular thing these days is going fake, but I've never had a real tree since I've been an independent grown-up so it was so fun to have the house smell like pine and vaccum every day. ;)

We'll see what else this year brings... we're hoping for calm and mild days of Jamie & Scott time! Though there's always the possibility of Monkey coming early, I'd love to have a 2010 baby. It just makes her age easier to calculate, you know?

Aimless/Update/Random

So, the semester's over! I'm officially done until August, when I have to take 1 class. And I'll finish up the following spring w/ my final project class and be the Master. I'm excited, it's a good arrangement that allows me lots of time to be w/ Monkey in the first year and a half and also keep my brain alive and functioning. :)

And I'm 36 weeks. I should get this out there right now, I'm not good at waiting. And there's also this trend in my family and among my friends where babies seems to take their good ole time (comfortable uteruses must run in the family), so I've been basically assuming that I'll also go late. I figure if I set the bar up there maybe it won't be as hard? IDK. But it's also difficult to look at the calendar this month and be like "Yes, any of those days could be her birth-day. Or none of those days." I don't do well w/ this uncertainty. Oh, the other thing that doesn't help is people telling me their "early labor" stories. Like "oh, I had my baby at 35 weeks!!!" Good for you.

My plan WAS to read all the Harry Potter series in my waiting month. I read the first two so far, and it's fine. I Loved them the first time, but you know, I didn't know what happened at the end. It's slightly less enthralling this time. I'll still get to the others, but it's not like I'm devouring them at the rate and intensity I'd hoped I would. I was hoping it'd be the magic bullet that kind of made December fly by and all the sudden - I'm in labor!? Oh, I was so naive when I thought up this plan.

So now I'm pretty aimless actually. I don't have a ton of energy to go out and do social things and things I *should* do (read: clean the bathroom) but don't really have a lot of fun things to fill the time and make not doing the above things okay. I need a good book. Oh, and I realize I should be enjoying this, and some days I am, I'm just kind of bored.

I don't have an updated belly pic... I don't really think much has changed since the last one. I am looking pregnant now, but I'm still amazed at how not-giant I am. It's a good thing, the past few weeks have been very uncomf and I can only imagine what ppl who look like I do now when they're like 6 months feel at the end. I'm even kind of hoping I don't get any bigger. We'll see about that (*cough* Christmas Cookies *cough*)

It's Fall in our 'hood

So, the leaves of our "mature landscaping" are coming down in earnest now. We knew it would suck... but it has eclipsed our wildest dreams :)

Scott spent all weekend outside doing manly things like raking, picking up pinecones (he counted 511 in our backyard) and blowing leaves with a wussy electric leaf blower (contrasted to the super manly gas-powered kind.) And now, it's raining... woohoo. That brings down more leaves. Not sure if this pic (out the window of our house) does it justice, but we have like a fortress of leaves along the curb. As does the entire neighborhood. There's a big leaf-sucker truck that comes twice in the next 2 months to remove them, I'm pretty excited to see that. Maybe I'm a 10-year old boy?

Yup, looks like we've done nothing. Awesome.

Also this weekend, Scott put up a clothesline for me! I feel so dorky and domestic getting SO excited about this, but it truly will save us on our power bill and will make our clothes & sheets smell lovely. I even figured out where to find clothespins... (at Target, by the Laundry drying racks & the like.) Bonus - $1.54 for 50! Oh, and since I mentioned it's raining, and probably will be for most of the week due to Ida, I don't think I'll get to test it out for a while.

See it, out there in the corner? It actually gets some sunlight too, so maybe I can bleach out stains. :)

30 Weeks and Workout Update

Welp, Happy 30 weeks to me. The Big 3-0! Whoa.

Oh, and BOO! :)


I totally love swimming - I must say that it is by far the superior exercise for preggos. I am no longer running - I did my last run around 25/26 weeks. I'm quite happy I made it so far. Why did I stop? I just felt like it was too hard. *shrug* All along I told myself I'd do it as long as it was fun and I felt like I was getting something positive out of it. The most difficult part was that every time I'd run I would HAVE to take a nap that day... logistically that is just a little inconvenient, right? Plus, I realized the pace I was going was no faster than a brisk walk and, well, walking is cool too! I do miss it a lot though, and am really excited to get my groove back in the spring :)

So swimming twice a week is my new favorite workout. The most beautiful thing about it is that I jump in and stretch out a little and honestly *forget I'm pregnant*! It's quite nice, actually, seeing how it feels like it's encroaching more and more on day to day life. Things like, you know, putting shoes on and picking something up off the floor... But in the pool not very much has changed. I can still swim at a pretty respectable clip and get my heartrate up to a good zone. And smoke people swimming in the lanes beside me (chumps.)

Oh, and also - go phillies! :)

The Baby Hats

Things are going really well with my little wannabe baby hat making business :) I'm updating the flickr album w/ all the ones I've made and sent out (well, unless someone ordered one that was *just like* another one I've made). It's a great thing for me. Because, seriously, no hate to the Phillies (bc I'd lose half of my Facebook friends an like all of my family probably) but baseball is actually more boring than football. I didn't always think that, but now I do. I want them to keep winning, I really do, but deep down I know that every win means they'll keep playing more. *Sigh*

So, though this isn't a commercial blog or anything, I'm still loving making the hats and if you want one, let me know.

I thought I'd share some pics of hats I've made for little Quiglet. I'm planning on taking a bunch to the hospital so we can figure out what looks good on her. I mean, the pink is gorgeous, and more than likely she'll look great in it, but it's not for everyone. (This is one of the perks of having a GIRL! I'm embracing accessories)

Random Updates with pictures

We were up in PA this past weekend for our niece Sophie's 1st birthday party and christening! She is too cute, and because of this overabundance of cuteness, we didn't take a picture of ANYTHING ELSE other than her. Oh well. you know kids. She's at such a cute age, so fun to be around. Though I will say, Scott and I came home exhausted. Note: all comments that read "Ohhhh, just wait" will be deleted. :) So, Happy Birthday (Tomorrow), Sophie Monster!


And this is me, mid 25 weeks. Fall has arrived in NC, and it's a freaking blast! It's almost noon and still not 70 degrees here. I'm LOVING it! So this morning I got all ambitious and decided to go for a little run, but remembered, oh yeah, it's cool out! What does one wear to run in 60 degree weather? And once I zipped up the jacket, I had to take a pic bc... my oh my, it was tight. Also, as soon as I went outside I ditched it and went with short sleeves and pants. And ran 1.5 miles. Cause I'm still a rock star.

Things are going well with the pregnancy, this past weekend was the first few days where I really *felt* pregnant... like I had a belly that was observable and I've started this thing where I can't get up out of a chair or sofa without saying "uuuuuuugh." It's adorable, really. Stuff like that. It just felt more real and different this weekend. (Again, comments saying "Just you wait, missy" will be deleted. I. Know.) :)

After a really long weekend, I was kind of irresponsible and put off a lot of schoolwork, which I'm catching up on this week. School is going pretty well, and surprisingly hard with only two classes this semester. I love what I'm studying though, I was just thinking this morning about what my *favorite* class has been within my program and I'm not really sure! I'd have to pick at least 4 or 5, and I've only taken 9. So yeah, good choice, good investment, good use of time.

I love this semester also because with two classes and no job, it does give me time to keep up with life... like keep the house generally cleaner than I've ever been able to do before, and read! I'm enjoying it while it lasts :) Cause, you know... juuuust wait. I just read The Hour I First Believed by Wally Lamb and, though it was long, I ended up LOVING it. Absolutely love and recommend it.

One more random thing - I am getting a seasonal flu shot on Friday and have already started dreaming/nightmaring about it. I'm such a shot wussy, I'm screwed.

Lookie what I made

Ummm... so I made a baby hat today. I used this pattern, and it turned out a little smaller than the measurements say, but it is very stretchy so I'm pretty sure it'll fit a newborn. And I can work w/ the yarn size and hook size. I'm so excited about it. I added a flower. (I put the hat on notebook paper to prove I also did homework today. Really, I did.)



And here's a pic of Scott in his birthday shirt from cool uncle Steve. Unfortch I don't know how to write all that in binary. For those blog readers who aren't tremendous geeks, it says DAD in zeros and ones. Which is Binary. Which is a computer thing. And Monkey's due date is 01-10 so I guess that means I'm giving birth to a big nerd (I mean, the DNA is in her favor there, right? Says the girl who crochets all afternoon with the husband in a binary tshirt.)

"Oh God, I remember this."

Not quite sure why, but I was inspired to get out my yarn and crochet things last night. I kinda forgot just how much I had. I kind of have this knack for getting projects *thisclose* to completion and then being all like "I don't feel like crocheting for a while." And a while turns into 2 years. As a result, I have one blanket that is one panel away from being a GREAT blanket. Only problem? The panels are super complicated, and last night as part of my re-entry exercise, I had to look up what exactly a single crochet stitch is. So yeah, way to go Jamie of a few years ago. You couldn't have just finished it when you knew what the heck a hdc and decreasing stitch was????

I had a good time getting all the different types of granny squares I have going. My favorite thing to do when making a granny square blanket is to lay them end to end to form the length or width of the blanket... helps me visualize the end product. And every time I look at Scott and say "Isn't that pretty????" And he unexcitedly replies, "Yes." And the title of the post comes from one such moment last night when he replied with an eye roll "Oh God, I remember this."

This is what I want to make - does anyone have any good online free pattern sites? I've been finding that all of the free sites are sadly lacking in the usability and visual graphics departments. But free is free, I suppose. And I get these ideas in my head - like why should I pay $18 for something I can make myself??? - and then they just have to be tried. So yeah... me and my stupid ideas.

I'm sorry but...

Really, journalist from the AP (or maybe Yahoo, I could see Yahoo doing this)? I read the article and to me, being "fed bad food" wasn't the most salient and horrific thing going on in the North Korean prison camps. This is the worst dumbing down I've seen in a while. Headline FAIL!

A Note To Self:

Dear Jamie from a few months ago,

NICE job on freezing a few servings of that baked spaghetti casserole. I think I recall you were "so sick of it" because it makes like 14 servings, but saving the last 2 in serving size containers in the freezer was a stroke of genius. It warmed up perfectly. Truly, you should do that more often. It was *worlds* better than my usual Smart Ones or Lean Cuisine meal.

I'm going to follow your lead on that here in the present.

You are awesome, Jamie from a few months ago,
Jamie from Now

House Progress & I *heart* Jersey Mike's

The first weekend in our home ridiculously tiring and long... yet wonderful. Scott and I made some definite headway in our ambitious first week plans on the new house. We still have a long week ahead of us until the movers show up 9am on Friday, but I actually feel like maybe we can get there?

Our goal is to do one room at a time, and to COMPLETE that room before moving on to other rooms... like do all of the little and big improvements at once.

So here's the list and our progress. I'm hoping to get pictures up this week sometime...because I'm really proud & happy w/ how it all turned out!

-Paint the master bedroom (check), replace light switches & outlets w/ white (tonight), replace doorknobs (check).
-Master Closet: Replace brass knobs on built-in stuff (check), replace light fixture (tonight?), replace doorknob (check).
-Office: paint one wall (check) and do the outlets & doorknob (this week)
-Guest Bedroom: paint walls (check) and trim (half done), do outlets & lightswitch. We also need to do SOMETHING about the ceiling fan in there bc OMG it's so ugly. :)

So, long week ahead of us, but I also do feel that the more we can get done before all of our stuff gets there, the happier we'll be.

One awesome discovery of the weekend: I love Jersey Mike's. And Scott is eating his heart out bc at random times over the past, oh, 6 months he'd be suggesting places we could go get dinner and say Jersey Mike's and I'd be like..."meh". I'd eaten there once and just thought it wasn't that special. Well, for some reason I agreed to go there Saturday and wouldn't shut UP about how good my sub was. I think the only thing I said the whole time we were eating it was some variation of "Oh man, this is so good." Just so you know, a #7, Mike's Way? Life changing. (Or maybe we were just really hungry!) We totally had the same thing for lunch the next day.

While searching for movers...

I found this little gem...

I'm checking out the form, browsing over the information they require to quote us for a move. I'm just curious about why the care what SIZE the RESIDENTS are? I mean, excuse me, I'm not going to just put my size out there. And upon scrolling down, it asks how many ROOMS we fill up? :) Oh education system, how could you not educate the movers of our society...

Well, it amused me.

Oh, also their slogan made me laugh, because they're concerned about my (plural) backs.

It is truly hard for me to look at these websites. Truly...

Add this to the list of things we're excited about in the new house:

Garage.

I wish I had snapped a pic before it was all scraped off... I had to use way more strength than I'd like to admit to open the iced-over door this morning to start the car. SERIOUS refreezing occurred last night.

But isn't Scott too sweet for scraping my car for me? :)

Spring Break!! Woohoo!

I was looking for the direct Friends quote there, but incidentally, a google search for "Friends Spring Break Woohoo" doesn't bring up Chandler's quote. And def no relevant IMAGES!

So, wow, it's almost Spring Break - how weird is it that it's still February? Just a mental thing... Spring does not occur in Feb...I guess my semester is over before May starts though, so NC State's calendar is just running a little early this year. So far, it's going well. It's most definitely hard, with 3 classes and working 20 hours a week, oh and the small matter of buying a home and all the hoop-jumping to get a loan. My classes are better this semester - though I'd say harder. I feel like most of my classes are giving me experiences that will better prepare me for a job in the field, a feeling I didn't have as much last semester when I was heavy into theory classes. This makes me feel better about busting my butt, forgoing small pleasures such as reading non-school books and "relaxing."

But next week, oh next week, will be different! No classes! This weekend, I have a mission to read this month's book club book (Crow Lake)! I actually started it this morning and can say that I don't think plowing through it at the rate circumstances demand will be a problem.

And who knows what other stuff I'll find to get into, most likely it'll be some sort of packing/organizing/cleaning. Since I've been fairly slack on all of those, and things are about to pick up majorly.

"Hey Jame, is this a skillet?"

At the moment, Scott is concocting something delicious for me in honor of Valentine's Day. I'm not allowed to know what it is until some point at the future, though hopefully he won't do one of those "now wear this blindfold and give it a try" scenarios. I'm excited, though I do feel it's worth including that before I moved myself & all my homework upstairs, he asked me "Hey Jame, is this a skillet?" I laughed and nodded, and he said "Shut up, it's gonna be good. " I hope he's right. :) At least we're clear on the skillet issue.

I'll post a recipe! You know, since I haven't posted one in months.

We'll probably watch Mad Men on DVD - we have that from Netflix right now and I highly recommend it. I especially think my parents & grandparents might enjoy it since it takes place in the 1950's. It's a largely neglected time frame for television. Sad. A lot of good things came out of the 50's!

P is for Perfect waste of time :)

So, I've been tagged - thanks Katie! The game is coming up w/ 10 things that start w/ that letter. I have homework to do, and will probably just be lazy & have leftovers tonight, but this is fun so I'm doing it. :)

10 Random things that start w/ P...

1. PhD. I'm married to one.
2. President - I have now shaken TWO president's hands - Obama & Clinton (today!) I shook Kerry's too, but we all know what became of him.
3. Pain in the butt... That's what I think of grocery shopping.
4. Privilege. I'm a little introspective today, after Clinton's speech yesterday about "the world today" and just how many people don't have food and other basic needs. It's making me be extra grateful that I have so much respective to so many in the world.
5. Pei Wei. I had lunch there yesterday w/ my dad, and the chick brought Dad the wrong food. She brought Kung Pao shrimp instead of chicken for my dad, and just threw away the shrimp they made. See #4, and understand why it upset me. 35 million people go to bed hungry, chickie, and we're throwing away perfectly good kung pao shrimp??
6. Philly - we're going to Philly (and the Dirty Jerz - for Ginty's wedding!) the first weekend in May and I'm already excited. I want to go see the Liberty Bell & Independence Hall, because even though I'm a Pennsylvanian by birth, I don't think I've ever seen these things.
7. Pansy. I am one, bc even though it's not *that* cold out, I think I'm going to cop out on running this afernoon.
8. Poor. Bc we're trying to buy a house. Which will be cool... but for now no $$ spending allowed.
9. Posting on my blog. I need to keep up w/ that more. I love reading blogs, so it's only fair that I contribute.
10. Punctuation. I'm reading Eats, Shoots & Leaves right now and it's a surprisingly funny book about commas, apostrophes and other misused and misunderstood punctuation. I know that sounds dorky, it is. But it's funny. (it's=it is. See? I'm learning)

Now to keep the game going I'm tagging Jackie with N , Heather with B and K-Fud with F(if she still does her blog! Ohhh, burn.) And I also won't be at all offended if they don't do it. I do feel powerful (P!) choosing everyone's letters though...

Blogs

So, at the moment I'm quite excited about blogs. I'm reading The Huffington Post's Complete Guide to Blogging and it's really, really interesting. It is a medium that has totally revolutionized the way we read, get news and the way traditional media has to cover news. In my opinion, for the better, as stories that traditional media might have let fall through the cracks get caught by bloggers and forced into the public discourse. Blogs give so many more people a pulpit and a voice - the natural order of certain voices having more power than others has been flattened (to throw in concepts from another book I'm reading - The World Is Flat). They throw around the term "democratizing technology," which though it sounds all uppity and high brow, actually kind of fits. The book lays out a lot of best practices for current bloggers and how to's for new bloggers... Though HuffPost is political in nature, the book isn't over the top w/ the lefty views.

If you can't tell by the way I'm talking about this, I'm quite taken with blogs and their power. And in today's technological climate (which is only getting moreso), it's almost an essential tool and skill for businesses to have to connect with their constituents. I'm not exactly sure the form it'll take just yet, but seeing as I'm about half way through my masters program and have a large capstone project looming next year, I'm thinking it'll have to do with blogs in some way. And perhaps even my life's work will have to do with blogs... wouldn't that be cool!

This is objectively awesome!

To quote Jack Donaghy from 30 Rock, one of my favorite characters.

Here's a story about how one Democrat and one Republican pulled together to help Jamie meet the former President...
First up - Casey the Dem! Woot woot! I'm volunteering at a fundraiser pre-speech and I have the very exciting job of manning the Photo Room. He was sweet enough to say I'm "helping him out," which is pretty funny bc this "favor" pretty much makes my year. I'm hoping there's time for a Jamie & Bill photo in there. I'm going to try to play it cool. You know. And not tip my hand that I never really was all that into a Hillary Clinton presidency and that I was in 5th grade when he got inaugurated. I will not say any of those things. Probably not.

Then, thanks to my awesome Republican dad I have 2 VIP tickets to the speech (did you ever think I'd put awesome and republican beside each other, without not preceeding awesome??? hahahahah, me neither...) My friend Kathleen was a doll and picked them up today and we're gonna be hooked up on Monday! And she's pregnant so $20 we get to go to the front of the VIP line. (haha, except maybe really!)

I am so psyched, I have the best guys looking out for me! I get to meet Bill Clinton on Monday!! Picture coming soon...

OH - and I have a student General Admission ticket printed. I'm willing to donate it to anyone who wants it, along with the borrowing of my student ID so you can pass as Jamie... Just email me.

Happy 2009!!

Omg, 2009... wow! 2008 was a great year, in our opinion. Scott and I were doing a recap of all of the wonderful things we did and changes that happened and we feel it was maybe our best year yet! So, in honor of that revelation, I did NOT eat pork and saurkraut (well, not the kraut, I did eat the pork), which is a PA tradition for good luck on New Years. Maybe I've suffered through sticking one nasty strand of saurkraut in my food for no good reason all these years! I definitely didn't do it to ring in 2008, since we were in NC last year. So, now that's my superstition :)

While I don't really have any resolutions this year, I can say there are a few things I'd kind of gotten less dedicated to or completely stopped doing at the end of last year. And with the craziness of the holidays over, I'm even more excited to dive back in and rededicate myself to the things that keep me centered: reading good books, cooking good healthy food (and trying new things), and running. Cheers to a healthy and happy 2009!

Bear with me!

I'm really coming down to "crunch time" on my first full time semester... it flew by all in all, and I can only hope that the next 2.5 weeks also fly by bc dude, then I have an entire month to do the college thing. Now that part - the one where you have a month off? Yeah, that's the good part!

So, we're headed up to PA for Thanksgiving next weekend (and we get to meet our niece! Finally!)

I'm hoping to do fun things with my time off... and surely I'll blog about it! :)