A Merry Little Christmas

It may have taken Christmas a while to get off the ground at our place, but by the time Christmas morning hit yesterday, we were in full celebratory mode. One of our own little Christmas traditions since we got married is to go to the theatre (clearly the tradition of a couple without children)--last year it was The Nutcracker at the Kennedy Center, a few years ago it was A Christmas Carol at Ford's Theatre, etc. So on Monday night we went out for a delicious dinner at Olive's, one of our favorite DC eateries, and then to see Twelfth Night at the Shakespeare Theatre--not so Christmassy, but still great fun.

The next day we loaded up the car and made it to Mount Vernon by dinnertime. We celebrated Christmas Eve at the skating rink, where Jason showed off his new moves, then went to the candlelight service, as is tradition in the Small house. I didn't grow up going to the candlelight service, and I have really loved singing "Silent Night" by candlelight on Christmas Eve when we've been able to celebrate Christmas here!

Christmas morning we had fun opening up gifts and all ate dinner together. Then we took up the other classic Small tradition--the annual viewing of Independence Day, complete with surround sound. It seems to be the Christmas for hats, and one of our favorite pictures is one of the Georges, Sr. and Jr., with Grandpa's Christmas hats!

Today we drove to Akron to visit Stan Hywet Hall, a Tudor-style manor house built in 1912 for the family that co-founded the Goodyear Tire Company (Jason's note: we learned that the company was named after Charles Goodyear, who discovered how to vulcanize rubber in 1839, but died before its use found wide application -- rubber for wagon and then car tires.) It was rainy and cold, but it was fun to see the fancy house (seriously, who says "Hmmm, I think I'll build a mansion for myself in the Tudor style, complete with authentic Tudor paneling shipped in from England"?) all lit up for Christmas!

We feel so blessed to be able to celebrate the birth of Christ and the newness He brings with our family--both here and afar. And tomorrow we will continue the celebration with a visit to friends in Harrisburg and a wedding we've been looking forward to!

Published on Christmas

So, Merry Christmas everyone. I (Jason) trust your morning of wrapping paper and turkey was all you hoped. In Mount Vernon, Mom received an unexpected Christmas gift -- a letter to the editor she wrote published today in the Columbus Dispatch. While we tend to keep our blog politically neutral, we couldn't help but brag a bit... enjoy!

A Perfect Moment

There are times amidst the chaos of our lives that everything seems to fall just perfectly into place, where you could hardly ask for things to be better and you are suddenly overwhelmed with gratitude, you know? Our evening was just such a perfect moment. Christmas has not come gracefully at our house this year. For some reason I thought that having most of the Christmas shopping done before Thanksgiving would make this season less stressful, and I imagined a blissful December of coming home from London and reading A Christmas Carol and delivering homemade fudge and peanut brittle wrapped up in pretty bows to the neighbors. Instead, we've given up all pretenses of putting lights on our house and we are feeling lucky that the Christmas tree has not fallen down this week.

So it was absolutely lovely to find ourselves sitting by said tree late this afternoon. In our cozy living room we could ignore the disaster of unwrapped gifts in the basement and pretend that we had not left the kitchen in a state of disarray after making muffins for a Christmas brunch with friends today. We just sat there quietly, the Christmas lights twinkling and the fire crackling, wrapped up in blankets and reading. Even when we got up and started doing stuff that magical feeling of peace and contentedness remained. From the kitchen where I was chopping up butternut squash and humming along to some Christmas music, I heard Jason call my mom to see how Baby Mason is doing, and it made me happy that we are now a part of each others' families. We ate dinner together and chatted comfortably about working for Congress and what we should make for our family for Christmas Eve dinner and whether Dick's would still be having a big sale on winter coats after we get back from Ohio. And tomorrow we get to go to church and sing, "O come let us adore him!" and then do it all over again (only hopefully with more gifts wrapped at the end of the day).

It is so pleasant to be in our lives sometimes, which is funny because I keep wracking my brain to figure out how we can simplify or slow down or just change the status quo. We are blessed to be warm and full and loved by each other and so many people around us, even when we are spinning around so fast we can hardly see straight. Maybe all that spinning makes me appreciate perfect moments when they come.

So Long, Sudan.

Yesterday was Jason's last day at the Sudan Programs Group at the State Department--after two weeks of vacation (during which he apparently means to sleep a lot), he is starting a one-year fellowship on Capitol Hill (during which we will have to become accustomed to sharing the same side of the city). Thursday afternoon his office held a really wonderful farewell party for him, which was attended by all sorts of people with whom he's worked on this issue for the past six years. People said wonderful things about him and his wife nodded in wholehearted agreement. He was lavished with awards and commemorative items, including a framed letter of appreciation from the Assistant Secretary for Africa and a really awesome scrapbook that his staff put together with notes from people who have worked with him--both here and abroad--and newsclips that mention him and his work on Sudan. It was a great way to end a good era of his career.

Jason has been doing Sudan almost as long as I've known him, and it seems strange that I'm no longer married to "that Sudan guy." Now maybe I'll be married to "that guy who works down the hall"...

Baby Mason

Wow, after a long blogging dry spell, four posts in three days! This is the latest pic of the Bucher boys. Here is Mom's email out to the extended fam, announcing the birth--both Jason and I laughed at loud: "When Denny told Cole we needed to get his coat on to go to the hospital because his mom had a baby, his response was, 'another one?' He is a proud brother, even though he's not completely clear on all the details."

Nephew Number Three!

This morning we got a text message that Mason Benjamin Bucher had arrived, in all his 8 lb. 7 oz, full-head-of-dark-hair glory! I love technology--by mid-morning Shaanti herself had sent a picture of him to my cell phone. He is sweet and gorgeous and looks an awful lot like his big brother Cole. We are definitely getting into this having nephews thing!

Seven Things I Love About London:

Tea Drinking: I am a tea drinker, and in a world of mochachinolatte drinkers, I feel a bit out of place ordering my usual cuppa with milk and sugar. But I fit right in in London, where tea drinking—and a lovely afternoon tea with scones and tea cakes—is as normal as bobbies and royalty. I’ve always liked tea, but when I was in England in college I decided to do as the British do and take milk with it. It is a habit that stuck, and when I met Jason and he took milk in his tea, too, well…

Buskers in the Underground: Navigating the tunnels of the Tube is so much nicer with someone playing “Silent Night” on the saxophone, even if you keep calling the Central Line the Red Line.

Book Shopping: The nice man who tried to help me get my suitcase out of the overhead compartment about threw his back out. I tried to warn him; my bag was full of books. Maybe it was the three months I spent in the library, but bookshops and London just go together…especially the iconic Blackwell’s, whose flagship store is across from the Sheldonian Theatre in Oxford. I stocked up on all the things that I can’t get in the U.S.—another volume for my Shakespeare collection, the British versions of Harry Potter, and a couple more adorable little Jane Austen editions that sell themselves as modern chick lit. Mmm… Just sitting among the stacks in Blackwell’s makes me happy.

Whirring around on the wrong side of the street: It’s sort of exhilarating to turn right in an iconic British taxi—it feels splendidly out of control for just one second. Actually, what’s really a treat is sitting in the top of a double-decker bus and spinning around the streets of London. Remember that scene in Harry Potter where the Knight Bus squeezes through London? Sometimes it almost feels like that. I also like looking right first when I cross the street. It makes me feel like a local—and, after all, I did sort of learn to cross streets in Oxford. It took a long time to learn to do it the American way when I moved to DC. (Yeah, this picture doesn't match. Go with it.)

British Money: No offense to U.S. currency, but there is nothing like a pound, sitting gold and weighty in your hand. Or like the five-sided 20p coin, that always looks worn and stable. Or like the little 5p coin, which is actually smaller than the 10p coin—imagine! Rational money! I like holding it and feeling it and being able to pick out the right change quickly. And I like spending it, especially when that uninspiring dollar is buying me more pence for the penny than I expected!

Pub Eating: You go to London for lots of reasons, but eating isn’t one of them. Pub food is warm and cozy—shepherd’s pie, stew, fish and chips, bacon sandwiches that I love—but nothing to write home about. It is the experience of eating in pubs that I like. It’s the names, like the Lamb and Flag or the Dog and Gun or the Eagle and Child. It’s the dark wood and the tiny, rickety tables with the numbers on the corner. It’s mastering the art of ordering your food in a pub, which is trickier than it seems. It’s the atmosphere that makes you laugh heartily and talk books and swagger just a bit more than you probably should. (Of course, it totally weirded me out that the pub we lunched in offered a choice of white or whole wheat bread. And they came and took our order, like a normal American restaurant. What the--?)

Christmas: We joined the mobs of people oooing and ahhing at the Selfridges Santa window displays on Oxford Street and listened to the Salvation Army band play "Joy to the World" on the street corner. We spent Saturday afternoon eating nutella covered waffles at a German Christmas market on the South Bank of the Thames. Nothing like London in December to get you into the spirit for a happy Christmas!

There are, of course, lots of other things I love about England, like the way the rows of stovepipe houses look when you fly by on the train or American candy bars with British chocolate (soooo much better) or the green parks where people walk their babies and dogs past palaces or words like “lovely” and “gorgeous” sprinkled throughout sentences in the most unexpected places. Really, it’s sort of amazing that I come home at all.

Thanksmus

On the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, Jason joked that Christmas would be at 10 the next day, Thanksgiving would be at 2, and New Year’s would be at midnight. He was almost right. The next morning we finished decorating the tree, put the turkey on the smoker, and then surrounded ourselves with piles of presents and had fun digging in. Opening presents with the Johnson clan always involves someone asking, “Does anyone have a knife?” and at least five people reaching into their pockets. This year it also involved easy clean-up, as Cole designated himself garbage man after opening his first present, urgently asking if I had any wrapping paper for him to throw away. This, of course, was my favorite picture. Apparently you DO start to look alike when you've been married for 33 years...


After Thanksgiving dinner, we all (except the McAfees, who had to work that night) went to the Boise Rescue Mission to serve dinner there. It was a great experience for all of us, but watching Gramps was the highlight—he is definitely in his element welcoming people in the door and thanking them for coming!

Despite our earlier assertions, we didn’t carve out much time in our week for relaxing. In fact, we were on the go most of the time! We loved having dinner with a group of my friends from college, and Black Friday shopping with Mom, Shaanti, and Kim was great fun.

We also had a fun little tea party for Shaanti to pamper her a bit before Baby Mason arrives (any day!), and Mom put together a fabulous blessing quilt for her, made up of squares from all of Mason’s aunts, uncles, grandparents, and great-grandparents (and cousin and brother!).

And, of course, we basked in nephew time. Cole gets funnier every time I see him, and he is so big and smart! We had a great time taking him out for ice cream (where he managed to eat both his cone AND mine!), and we loved chatting, playing, and baking with him. For a taste of the fun, just check out the video below. As Casey said, “This just never gets old.”

And Troy is such a smiley sweetie! I managed (but just barely!) to refrain from waking him up when I thought he had napped too long and needed to come out to play. We were commenting that next time we are all together for Christmas there will be three little boys running around—wow!

Done! (well, mostly)

I had a strong affinity for my college laptop. I'm not really a namer of things (Dawn is the one who named my car Beatrice), but if I was, my laptop would have been the first thing I named. We spent a lot of time together. We traveled overseas together. We mastered Shakespeare and footnotes and surfing the web together. I loved nagivating with its little green finger button (what were those called?). I willingly paid out the nose my senior year when the mouse needed fixed. And I was very sad when suddenly the "b" key stopped working...and then the "t"...and then, well, it's a good thing I met Jason, who knows how to take a hard drive out of an otherwise completely worthless laptop.

My new Dell (which is actually not new, it's two years old, which is, like, really old in computer years) is shiny and pretty and has a DVD player and wireless capabilities and a wide screen. But, like the pet you get to replace Fido when he dies, we've never really been close.

Until now.

After what feels like three solid weeks of doing homework during every waking minute, we have definitely bonded. I carried it to and from Idaho and started putting it in my car on the way to work, just in case. In fact, on Monday night we pulled an all-nighter...or as close to an all-nighter I can come at the ripe old age of almost-thirty-and-have-to-work-the-next-day...finishing my last paper. I seriously, seriously didn't think I would actually get it done. But the Dell and I pulled through, and I walked away from class at 10:00 last night, paper turned in and a small bounce in my step. I'm free. (Mostly. I still have a final in two weeks, but that is so not the same.)

Now I can decorate the Christmas tree that has been standing naked in our living room since Sunday and finally finish Breaking Dawn before Kaylyn sells it on e-bay. And read The Deathly Hallows again before Amazon delivers my Beedle the Bard. And, let's face it, go to bed early. So happy.

The First Snow (sort of) and Other Newsworthy Events

Remember when you were in college and you couldn't get started on your homework until your room was spotlessly clean? (What? Just me? Oh dear...) I think the same principle applies here, but instead of a little homework and a small dorm room, I've been battling between three major grad school projects and a modest-sized house. Not surprisingly, our house is currently in a state of supreme cleanliness it has never known. The homework? Not so much.

The blogging has been a bit boring these days, which seems sort of strange because our schedules have been anything but boring. Soon we'll have interesting pictures and stories to share, but for tonight it's just the wrap-up:

Boxes: We spent the day at work packing up our desks and boxing up our files to get ready to move to a different office building (seriously, didn't I just do this?). Here's my favorite part--we could be scheduled to move, with very little notice, any time between December 1 and January 4. Since Congress has yet to adjourn for the year (fuming inside), there is a very real possibility that I will need any number of files in the coming weeks that may or may not be in the bottom box of my 5-box-deep stack. Should be fun.

Flurries: It snowed today--just a few flakes, and just for a moment, but I happened to be walking to Cosi to order my obsessively favorite Roasted Turkey and Brie sandwich as the flurries started. Mmm... Love of snow is very strong.

Ice Cream: The season for frosty desserts is, obviously, over, but Cole and I have a date for ice cream when we go to Idaho next week. Shaanti said he was very excited. I'm not sure whether he is more excited to see me or to have ice cream, but I have a sneaking suspicion that if it really came down to it, he'd go with the ice cream. I mean, ice cream is really good.

Sleeping: It has been a fun fall, but we are ready for vacation. Early morning French, two grad school classes, and looming economic disaster have really worn us out! Luckily, we are packing up fun reading material and boarding a west-bound plane on Sunday. It will be "Thanksmas" at the Johnsons'--my mother, who on principle strongly opposes any opening of Christmas presents before December 25th, has decided that if we are going to do "Christmas" together when we're all home for Thanksgiving, she is going to make it official with the tree, all the Christmas decorations, and group viewings of "White Christmas."

Boys: There are a few other really good reasons we are looking forward to our trip--namely this and this. And, of course, lunch at Red Robin...

Veterans Day

We government employees get pretty used to having a Monday off every month or two for a federal holiday, but Veterans Day is always a bit weird, appearing exactly on the 11th of November instead of the second Monday or the fourth Thursday or whatever. Since the 11th was a Tuesday this year, we had a pretty random day off in the middle of the week. Weird, but nice. Especially since somehow last week all the balls I'd been precariously balancing in the air went a'tumbling.

It was a brilliantly sunny but freezing day, so I was delighted when I got back from my run to see Jason building the first fire of the season in our little fireplace. We brewed some tea and cooked up some breakfast, then promptly curled up in our little living room with books and stayed there for a while. Ahhhhhhh... And the best part is that all day today it felt like Monday, but in truth the week was half over. Hurrah!

Jason is reading The Historian now, and of course he is enthralled. One nice side effect of marriage is that our tastes seem to merge a bit as the years go by. Gone are the days when I was baffled by the idea that we didn't have anything in common. These days we both really like cashew chicken curry and watching "House" and singing "Victory in Jesus" when things get a little too Baptist on Sunday mornings. Perhaps I will win Jason over to country music eventually--I mean, we're going to be married a long time, after all.

Downward Facing Dog

So, this will be week three of the Missy Tries Yoga, Part Two, experiment. Missy Tries Yoga Part One (circa 2006) ended up with a bad headache that lasted, oh, two months. So far, Part Two has been much more successful. There was a time when I equated yoga with eating organic food (which I sometimes do) and voting Democrat (which I never do). But then my favorite sister-in-law turned out to be a pretty skilled yoga instructor, so I decided to reconsider my position.

Turns out that yoga is pretty great. As I described to a patient Jason last week, I can see why people are so into it. And it turns out that contorting my extremely inflexible body into strange poses like "cobra" and "pigeon" and some other dog pose is surprisingly relaxing. Who woulda thunk? Maybe I'll add yoga to my List of Things That Makes Missy Feel in Control, along with having my nails painted and writing lists on restaurant napkins and drinking tea with milk.

In other news, we've been flying along at an almost alarming pace this fall. Add to that the fact that my family is opening Christmas presents when we are together at Thanksgiving, which means that I'm actually really behind on my Christmas shopping, and my head is spinning! Our past two weekends have been full of all sorts of domestic-ish things, like:

• Yard Work: It has been getting downright chilly around here, but on Saturday the weather was absolutely gorgeous, so we headed outside to plant the tulip bulbs that we bought in Holland. What started out as a small project ended up as an all-day yard work fest, which included expanding the strawberry patch, cleaning and organizing the gardening stuff for winter, and mulching around our trees. Thanks to lessons from my dad and lots of practice, we are much better at yard work that we were two years ago, and I'm excited to see our pretty tulip bed in the spring!

• Baking: I love grilling in the summer, but I have to confess that I've really enjoyed getting to know my oven again. I've been experimenting with seasonal eating this year, so I've had to beef up on my squash recipes (turns out the delicious, sugary squash bake my mom makes for Thanksgiving is not the kind of thing you should eat every day). I found this amazing little number in the Williams-Sonoma catalog that arrive a couple of weeks ago. It is on the menu for Wednesday again this week. Also on the menu for sometime this week is pumpkin pie ala real pumpkin. We'll see if it's really worth the hassle.

• Church Stuff: Somehow, we have had some sort of church activity not just every weekend, but every night of every weekend for the past few weeks! Friday was the big Halloween festival at church, where I got the privilege of manning the bouncy-bounce when it deflated on five small children. Those suckers go down fast! It all ended okay, but it made for an eventful five minutes.

• Studying: Yesterday I got my first public library card in, like, 20 years. I'm pretty sure my last library card (for the Meridian City Library) was a paper one with that metal clip that they used to imprint your account number on the card in the front pocket of the book, and it's possible that my last library book was a Babysitters Club book. Turns out that these days they have fancy electronic key fob library cards and that the Arlington County Public Library is a pretty sweet place. And, for the record, it's not that I don't believe in libraries--it's just that the Library of Congress delivers to my office. That's a pretty hard system to beat.

• Knitting: Tonight I'm watching the Redskins (lurve the Skins) and knitting up a storm. There's Baby Mason's blanket to finish before he joins the family in a few weeks. Then I was planning to get a good head start on a blanket for Baby Crosson, who won't be making an appearance until summer...and then Dawn called to say that it is not Baby Crosson but BABIES Crosson! I wasn't kidding when I said that babies are overtaking the planet!

• Batwatching: Seriously, just try to read about Cole's Halloween without laughing out loud. (Troy was a hotdog. Still waiting for the pictures.)

The Cuteness that is Nephew Number Two

Troy and Jenny
Originally uploaded by jmsmall2005.

Jenny has been a bit wretched about sending pictures of Troy (love you, Jen!). After realizing that the most recent picture of him that I have is one that I took when I was there in early September--like, half of his life ago--I started pestering Mom. I have been well rewarded for my nagging.

Going Dutch

You know how you always say, "Hey, we don't have kids, we both have passports, we live on the East Coast, we (fill in the blank with your favorite "we're not tied down" line), so we can just hop on a plane and go to Europe any time we want."

Yeah, well, we did it.

Seriously, how spontaneous are we? A couple of weeks ago Jason found out he had to go to the Netherlands for a meeting, so, since Congress isn't in session, we scrounged up a ticket for me and spent the weekend in Amsterdam. I met Jason in the Hague on Thursday morning and

walked around the city/sat in a cafe with a book and goooood hot chocolate for the afternoon,

then we went with his colleague to a Rijsttafel--in Dutch it means "rice plates," and you basically start with a stack of rice and then add delicious Indonesian dishes around it for, as the menu put it, "variety of tastes in each bite." Apparently it dates back to the days of the Dutch West Indies Trading Company and is quite hip.

On Friday we took the train to Amsterdam, where we walked over lots of bridges and wished we had cool European bikes, like everyone else in the city. We took a canal ride, saw some Rembrandt and Van Gogh, checked out the Blomenmarkt, where they sell all kinds of tulips and bulbs, and took the tram to the edge of the city to see just one windmill.

The best two highlights of the trip were the Anne Frankhuis and the fantastic Dutch meal we had on Friday night. The former was...actually, I don't think I have good words to describe how it felt to walk through the small, dark rooms of the Secret Annex and imagine what it must have been like for Anne Frank and her family to hide there from the Nazis for two years. The whole time I felt my heart in my throat, hoping illogically (yes, I read the book) that the story would end happily when we got to the end of the tour.

Our Dutch dinner was more light-hearted. We tucked ourselves into a small table in a tiny restaurant on Leidseplein that served "traditional Dutch food" by candlelight and ordered pea soup and "hutspot." It turned out that the restaurant also served traditional Dutch singing--most of the other guests were with a loud and cheery group of Dutch folk, and halfway through the meal they burst into song, singing to what we assumed must be the time-honored tunes of Holland playing in the background. It was hilarious and loud and delicious. We brought a slice home for you to enjoy as well (at the bottom of this entry).

Amsterdam was lovely--the canal houses with their stepladder gables, the arching bridges, the bustling bicyclists, the changing leaves--and now we're home and the laundry is done and the Redskins won and we are oh so tired but happy.

Fall Food

We usually like to go apple picking in the fall, but this fall has been extraordinarily busy, so on Saturday I settled for the apple stand at the Arlington Farmers' Market. By the end of the day, these beauties had become this fall's batch of applesauce and the first apple pie of autumn. Mmm... We ate it with chili and Dawn and Brian while we watched the Redskins lose. At least the pie was tasty.

(Oh, and a new ww pie crust recipe, this time a real one from my Aunt Kathy, who is knowledgable in things like whole wheat crusts and apple pie. Waaaaaay better than my last try...and almost as easy as buying the frozen kind at Safeway!)

It was a long, lovely weekend, and until about noon on Monday we reveled in the long-weekendness of it (fall is delighful for a lot of reasons, and one of them is the regular sprinkling of federal holidays). By Monday afternoon, we started thinking of other things, like homework...work...Jason's meeting in the Netherlands, etc. But it was gooood while it lasted.

A Quick Trip

One of the nicest things about living in Washington, DC, is that people tend to come here for, you know, family vacations, eighth grade field trips, work conferences, etc. And then I get to see them! Such was the case this last week when Laura flew back east for a conference at a hospital in the area...then got to come over for dinner and stay the night! Yay! It's not every day one of my dearest friends can leave her two sweet kids at home and just hang out with me, so we made the most of our evening and morning together.

Wednesday night we just hung out at home for risotto and talked and talked, then Thursday morning we did a little sightseeing and snapped some pictures before Laura headed back home. It was a blessing to have a few hours together, and I love having her as a friend!

Rex and Christine's Wedding

Last weekend I visited Toronto to attend the wedding of a dear high school friend, Rex Lam. The wedding was beautiful and provided a good excuse to see old high school friends I had not seen in ten years (Bahi, Keith, Ray, Ken, and Karen). In keeping with Chinese tradition, Rex's bride (Christine) changed dresses frequently throughout the reception. I was told it was a tradition that demonstrated opulence. The bridesmaids also organized several games for the bride and groom during the reception, partly as entertainment during the 10 course Chinese feast. (I still maintain that a hired comedian would be an appropriate and novel addition to a wedding reception -- despite Missy's continued protests.) For the meal, I tried many delicacies, including shark fin soup!

I also had the chance to visit Diana Clark (my old Sunday school teacher) and attend Rosewood Nazarene Church with the Dookheran family to celebrate the denomination's 100th anniversary. All in all, a great weekend! Next stop, the Netherlands...

Saturday

Ahhhhhhhhhhhh. It is finally over. And, just for the record, if you already called your congressman last week, you shouldn't call again on Monday, even if you don't like the response that you (intentionally) received late on Friday night when it was too late to call back. You only get counted once, so you're just wasting both of our times.

I have been attached to my blackberry (or, rather, it has been attached to me) for 12 days straight now, and it was strange to leave it home when I went to the grocery store this morning. Strange and wonderful. And it is sunny and lovely to boot. I'm wearing a long-sleeved T and jeans and the leaves on our pretty dogwood are turning reddish and the chrysanthemum that has been the bane of my existence all summer because it swallowed up everything else I planted in the flower bed is redeeming itself by bursting into lovely maroon flowers and there is a pretty red cardinal right outside the window and last night I made oatmeal chocolate chip cookies and ate them all by myself. All is most certainly right with the world.

Jason is in Toronto at a wedding, and I was originally planning to spend the weekend in New York for more of this, but alas, work interrupted. And now, recovery. Homework. Playing with Dawn. Finding a place for the 20 paper towels from Tuesday's trip to Costco. Pulling out the fall table linens. Taking a bubble bath. Baby gifts (is everyone pregnant? I am so not in the cool club.). And maybe even reading something that's not for school...?

Last night I dreamed that my dad and I decided to expand the garden, but for some reason we cut grass out of the front of the yard instead of the side. I woke up and thought I should do some gardening (for the first time in weeks). We're getting close to the fall gardening season--planting more bulbs, trimming bushes, and, yes, expanding the garden for next year. I'm already planning what I'll plant--onions and spinach next time, and no arugula.

Our garden has settled into its matronly state of middle age--the zucchini and cucumber both died early deaths, but the herbs and tomatoes and even the strawberries have been a rousing success. In fact, I have not had to buy a single tomato since the beginning of August, and until last week we were tripping over ripe tomatoes. Then suddenly, nothing--we ate our last ripe tomato and looked out the window to see plants full of lovely green ones, but even now they are not even close to ripe. We've been eating tomatoes without a break for months now, and I feel confused now at their absence.

September Madness

So yes, for those of you who've asked, it's been a rough week and a half. Apparently I should have majored in finance, not English. Silly me. But I thought this was hilarious today. (I wonder if it's only funny if you've had your nose to the Wall Street Journal for the past three weeks...)

September Madness

What I do on a Saturday

Yard work is not my thing. But when you own a house, it is inevitable. Today I rented a chainsaw on a pole. Yes, that's right, a chainsaw stuck to the end of a pole that telescopes to 11 feet. I used it to chop down a myriad of dead branches on the tree in our front yard. I also borrowed the ladder from our neighbor to get up to the really high branches. It is quite precarious to ascend a 17' ladder and cut with an 11' pole.

So, anyway...

I like posting on our blog, and even more I like reading posts on other people's blogs. So it makes no sense that I have gone so long without a real post here. It's just that it's been so hot. And so busy. And so...okay, hot and busy.

Actually, we are finally getting our air conditioning fixed on Friday, and, right on cue, the beautifully cool fall weather just set in. I know it sounds like I'm complaining (just noting the irony!), but I'm so not--it is so worth living here just for fall. The humidity and the tourists both go away, the sun becomes friend instead of enemy, the leaves start to turn brilliant colors, I find time to bake... Mmmm, fall is delicious!

I realize, too, that fall posts seem to be a little more random than the ones, say, at Christmas, or over the summer. That's okay, too, we kind of like it when nothing happens around here. Right now:

* Parley Vou? This week Jason started French classes every day, first thing in the morning. He's been dusting off that junior high French from fifteen years ago. It aches him to be up and at work so early, but he sounds pretty sexy while he's doing his homework.

* Commas. So, I can't speak a lick of French, but while Jason is etudie, I'm mastering the art of the properly placed comma. I'm taking an editing class this semester, and it turns out that I should not be an editor. Even though I think sentence diagramming is a kick in the pants. Seriously.

* Hockey Skates. As if French wasn't enough, Jason is also learning to play hockey once a week. I think it's going to be awesome when I get to be the hockey wife. Fight, fight, fight...

* Stories. For the first time, this semester I'm taking two classes a week instead of just one. My second one is a folklore class on the art of the narrative. It turns out I have to start recording stories that people tell so that I can use them for papers, so don't be surprised if I pull out a mini-tape recorder in the middle of a conversation.

* Thursdays. Between grammar and French and hockey and folklore...and Sudan and lame ducks and long work days that go by too fast...the best thing that we will be doing all week is this. Yessssss...

The Big Two

Happy Birthday, Cole! We are sad to miss your big day at Chuck E. Cheese, but I have a feeling that you will have a darn good time anyway. Granny must be excited to have an excuse to go there again, since she loves the pizza. I hope that your cake tastes like watermelon, because then you will love it.

Hot.

So, during the hurricane last weekend, our air conditioner went out. While we are uber thankful that it is not still August, one of the unfortunate side effects of hurricane weather is oppressive humidity, the likes of which we did not see all summer. There was a time (before DC) when I thought that the purpose of an air conditioner was to cool a room, but it turns out that this is false. The real purpose of an air conditioner is to take away the humidity.

Needless to say, there have been a lot of cold showers in our house lately. Which made the fact that this morning we woke up to no water at all just a little worse than it might otherwise have been. There was a water main break on our street, so I bundled up my sweaty self and went to work, uber thankful for the gym in my building. Hopefully the water is back on soon, and hopefully we only have a few more days of sweatiness until we can get our air conditioner replaced...just in time for the cool, fall weather to set in.

On a happier note, I have more nephew pictures to share. Cole knows that Baby Troy is "so cute," but he doesn't usually have a lot of time for him between running and "ribbetting" and eating watermelon (a few of his favorite things). However, he got to hold him while I was there last week, and he told Troy that he would take him fishing. So adorable. There are suddenly going to be a lot of boys in our family in a few months. Casey will be so happy. My trip to Idaho last week was quick and filled with work days and events with my boss, so it didn't offer a whole lot of carefree social time. But Jenny and Troy came to stay with us while Chad worked, so I did get to spend my evenings getting to know Troy better and falling more in love with his gummy smile. He will be so big by the time I see him again!

Living Entirely For Pleasure

For the past few days we've had the pleasure of Patrick's company, as he came to spend the long weekend with us. Patrick is about the easiest, most pleasant guest in the world. For example, on Friday night he announced that if he had cable, he would quit his job, and then he decided that the flat-screen, hi-def television in the basement was the best feature of our house. It is nice to sit around on a weekend and watch TV, I decided after joining him for a few episodes of HGTV. Very nice.

I promise that we did more than just watch TV this weekend. Like eating at a Middle Eastern food festival at a Melike Greek Orthodox Church in McLean. And Jason and Patrick went to a Nats game. And today we spent the day at Mount Vernon.

And then we watched some more of the telly. Jason and Patrick like to work the phrase "living entirely for pleasure" into sentences whenever possible, and this weekend offered a few opportunities.

From Garden to Table

The tomatoes are rolling in, folks. Last weekend I had to do some serious pruning after almost three weeks of neglect, and the plants have thanked me with mounds of red beauties every other day or so. Fun. Our tomato plants are so tall that I had to pound a nail into the top of the fence to tie them up to it. I'm already trying to figure out a better way to arrange them next year.

We have also harvested quite a few cucumbers (lots of Greek salad these days!) and one more zucchini. After all the talk about our giant plants, I'm sad to say that they are not doing well. The fruits get about four inches long and then start to rot out. Suggestions, anyone?

Still, we did get a nice on on Thursday, so we had a home-grown dinner of feta crusted tomatoes (heavenly) and goat cheese-stuffed zucchini (also really yummy). I think tomatoes are going to have to be the whole main course for the next few weeks. We went to the farmers' market this morning and discovered that we aren't the only ones rolling in tomatoes, as they covered the tables of stand after stand. Makes all that spring work worth it!

Blackberries, Two Ways

Many moons ago, before we went on vacation and lost all track of time (literally, and now we are trying to go to bed at 10 tonight in order to get back in the swing of things), we went on a little blueberry/blackberry outing with friends from church. Into the freezer the berries went in their neatly labeled bags (of course). It was clear that the blueberries would be used to improve Missy's morning Smart Start and add the key touch to applesauce-blueberry muffins on a regular basis. But what, Jason asked, can you do with blackberries?

Clearly, at least two things. First, this weekend I made a blackberry pie to take to Dawn and Brian's, to welcome them back to Virginia after a long summer away from us. I have eaten a lot of blackberry pie in my day, as my grandparents' farm was full of them, but I had never made one before. To complicate things, I tried my hand at whole wheat pie crust. Shaanti made a delicious apricot pie a couple weeks ago with whole wheat (or, as we have taken to calling it, "ww") crust, so I used her recipe. For the record, she is way better at it than me. A few years back, I went through this "make it from scratch because I can" phase that included a stint in pie crust making. Oh, how I hated pies for a while there! Then I discovered the way my Grams made delicious pies...with the beautiful rollout pie crust from Safeway. So now I make my grandma's pies.

That being said, the pie wasn't terrible, and perhaps next time I'm home I'll have Shaanti give me a pastry lesson.

After the pie was more or less a success, I tried my hand at jam making. I am more in tune with jam, which simply requires mashing fruit, mixing sugar and pectin, and purchasing fun little kitchen accouterments like freezer jars. The jam is sweet and tasty and perfect on my ww English muffin. And I have sort of redeemed myself in my own eyes for my inability to be a competent pastry chef.

There are a few other uses for blackberries, of course, not the least of which is as a lantern. Okay, not really, but when I was young, my cousin Shanna and I (who still have a reputation for being extraordinarily...imaginative, shall we say?) would put blackberries in old milk jugs, shake them up, and pretend that they would light up so that we could see our way to the other house for bed at night. It always sort of surprised and disappointed me that they didn't.

Random Thoughts for Friday

1. We are so not over jet lag. I seriously thought I would have to peel my eyelids off my eyeballs in order to open them this morning. I deserve what I get, after having read until a quarter to one last night. I'm just not used to going to bed early anymore. Or, obviously, getting up early.

2. Is it pathetic that, now that they finally have some more dark chocolate Snickers bars in the convenience store downstairs again, I have been buying them up two or three at a time, in hopes that whoever stocks the shelves down there sees how popular they are and keeps them on hand at all times? (Don't worry, Kaylyn, I got you one!)

3. My coworker just went outside to eat her lunch. You have no idea how exciting this is. The fact that any sane, decent person would choose to be outside at noon in August in DC makes me want to dance a little dance. It is 81, sunny, and blissfully unhumid. Lurve it.

4. I have a small dilemma: school starts on Monday, which means that summer is officially over, but recess doesn't end until September 8, which means that summer is officially not at all over. The responsible side of me--the one that declared every year of school that I would start doing my homework in full and on time this year--says that I should gracefully accept the end of my freedom. But then I remembered that there was a reason I garnered a reputation in college for being able to write an 8-page paper in five minutes or less, and it certainly wasn't because I did my homework "in full and on time." Hey, I'm pushing 30, it's too late to teach an old dog new tricks. Summer it is.

5. Question: How much do I not want to respond to the phone call from the guy who "doesn't want a form letter." Answer: So much.

McCall

Considering we still have one more phase of vacation on which to report, it should feel like vacation lasted a blissful forever! We managed to fly back to Boise earlier than expected on Thursday and then drove up to McCall for the annual Bunn Family weekend. This was Jason's first official Bunn Family Event (for the significance of that, compare: Jason and Justin are the only grandkids on both sides, but I have at least 50 cousins--and more than a dozen aunts and uncles--on just my mom's side of the family!), and he came through with absolute flying colors!


It would have been hard to not have fun, though. Not only did we get serious quality time with the nephews (are you noticing a trend here?), but we got to hang out with my cousins and aunts and uncles, brothers and sisters and parents, all of which was wonderful. The weekend was full of glow-in-the-dark croquet, fishing (Jason caught his first fish on his new fly rod!), shooting, batmitton, hot-tubbing, a glorious Jane Austen movie marathon, and sitting around the table talking about what we had read most recently. We also got to view some old black-and-white silent home videos of my mom and her family growing up. I don't know which was better--watching them parade around in their 1950's and 60's outfits, or listening to them argue over who was whom!


On Monday, we headed back down the mountain and to the airport. I could fill an entire blog post with our horrendous, unanticipated red-eye flight back to Baltimore (the not-close airport), but Jason says I should stop complaining. Let's just say that we were flying the unfriendly skies and then be thankful that, as a result of being bounced around the country, we came home with many more frequent flier miles than we would have otherwise received. How is that for silver lining?

3.

Just three years ago yesterday, we were doing this. Yesterday, we celebrated with some Golden Gate biking and a delicious dinner of Istrian food at Albona Ristorante. Istrian cooking combines Italian traditions with Croatian flavors, which we found both appropriate (we spent our honeymoon in Croatia) and delicious. Both the intimate atmosphere and the unique and tasty food--and the annual viewing of the wedding slideshow--were a perfect tribute to three years together.

The San Francisco Work Out

Sometimes when we travel, I think maybe I should get up early and go to the hotel fitness center or go running or something. Ha. So hardly ever happens. And in San Francisco so unnecessary. Here is how we've been whipping ourselves into shape the past few days.

On Sunday, we hiked up and down San Francisco's hills, just for fun.

On Monday, we walked the length of a reeeeeally long Golden Gate Park, just to see the windmill at the other end.

On Tuesday, we biked across the foggy Golden Gate Bridge, just because, well, we'd never done it before.

We did a lot of other things, too, like riding on two cable cars that broke down, walking down the curvy part of Lombard Street, finally going to see the new Batman movie (mmm...), deciding that we don't really like Pier 39, strolling down the streets of Chinatown, and sitting in a stagecoach at the Wells Fargo Museum.

Phew! Legs: aching. Noses: sunburned. Selves: happy. And of course, after three days of such serious working out, we totally deserved this...

Deliciouso, San Francisco.

Happy Birthday, Jason!

For his last birthday in his twenties, Jason had his first experience with In-and-Out Burger. Not a bad way to celebrate 29! (The Ghiradelli's chocolate later in the day didn't hurt, either.)

Big Sur

Ah, vacation! We had this ideal plan for relaxing in Monterey for a few days before heading to San Francisco to explore the Bay City: sit by the pool with a book or two, drive the Pacific Coast Highway down to Big Sur, and sit by the pool some more. Oh, except it's freezing here. I actually had to buy a fleece jacket that says "Monterey, California," just to keep my teeth from chattering on Friday. Oh well, we've never been opposed to lounging in hotels and watching the Olympics.

Highlights of our time in Monterey include: our visit to the Monterey Bay Aquarium (loved the jellyfish);

A gorgeously sunny drive along Route 1 (complete with antipasto picnic and gi-normous vulture soaring right overhead)

...and, of course, eating strawberries while reading by the pool, once it finally warmed up a bit (I was reading this, but I should have been reading this).

It wasn't a warm, lazy beach visit, but it was a cozy beach visit. We ended the day yesterday with a visit to Carmel Mission and a good Italian dinner in Carmel-by-the-Sea. On to San Fran!