New Things

Here are a few new things for February:

New Spring: It's not really spring, I know, but it's getting harder and harder to keep from pretending it is. Look at these lovely little signs of life. I love bulb flowers--they make you feel alive, even though it's very possible we could still get another snow storm. Delightfully warm day today. We opened our windows and went on a walk. So nice.


New Diploma: Finally arrived on Friday. I'd poo-poohed the idea of framing it, hanging it in house, etc., but then it turns out I'm sort of in awe of it--all pretty and official looking. Perhaps a frame is in order after all...

New Favorite Restaurant: We've been trying to go to Rasika for months--after multiple failures to get a table for the next night, we finalize realized that we'd have to make reservations weeks in advance, and then I ruined our last try by getting sick. We finally went last night, and it was soooo. worth. it. We both woke up thinking about the fried spinach appetizer and the black cod. Birthdays and anniversary? Check.

New Haircut: In cutting my hair, I have officially cut my morning routine in half. Huzzah. Am so a short hair person. Have no idea how I had let long hair sneak up on me again.

New Book: We're still very set in our winter books-in-the-living-room ways, in spite of not needing a fire today. Jason, who has uncharacteristically found himself reading about four books at once, finished Hamlet's Blackberry today, which he'd put down for Harry Potter, and I gobbled up 70 pages of One Thousand Gifts--utterly amazing. About becoming fluent in the language of thankfulness. Expect me to be talking about this one for a while.

New Fence: Our big project of the winter was getting a fence put in--something we've hemmed and hawed over for years and finally just did. We love it. It looks so much better than I thought it would--and we actually have a "back" yard (and a corner in which to pile all the branches from two weeks of wind storms)! Suddenly our house seems perfect. Of course, someone walking their dog yesterday asked expectantly if we were getting a dog. Um, no...


New Habit: I've taken to baking bread every weekend lately--just quick breads, don't get all freaked out on me. Missy tipped me off to Whole Wheat Molasses Bread, I made my Grams' banana bread one week, and the past two weeks have been cheesy breads from this delightful book (this week's is a tasty (and overly lemony) cheesy olive bread). Next week I'm determined to pry the recipe for the carrot cake bread Tilly made this weekend out of her hands...

Playoffs!

Tonight was a night of many firsts in my Kettler Capital Iceplex Lower C hockey playing career:

• My team - Redrum - finished first place (among 8 teams) in the regular season, giving us first place seed in the single-elimination playoffs.
  
  
• I played my first hockey playoff game (I always seemed to be traveling during playoffs in previous seasons, and of course there was the dreadful season-ending ankle injury of 2009).
  
  
• We won our first playoff game -- 9 to 1.
  
  
• I contributed to the win with a goal-- a first in my playoff history.
  
  
• My team advances to the second-round of the playoffs (next Friday, 9:30 pm) for the first-time ever. (Sorry, but due to league regulations, our games are not broadcast, you must come and watch in person!)

Long Weekend

It was 70 on Friday, and since the busy 60+ hour work week prevented me from going running (something I desperately wanted to do), Kaylyn and I walked around our building--twice--and ate Oreos with fro-yo, in spite of the fact that my feet were aching after three 14-hour days in high heels.

Tonight it is snowing. Or, rather, almost snowing--right now it is rainy and cold, and the temperature is inching its way down in order to pelt us with 4-5 inches of snow by morning. We had split pea soup for dinner in order to make the best of the situation. Have I mentioned that I dislike February?

In spite of the fact that, when I DID try to go running today, an icy wind turned me back home after only a few blocks, we've had a really nice weekend. It was a busy week--the kind of week where adrenaline kept me going through Thursday, when we were supposed to go out of session, and then dropped me completely when we stayed in session until the wee hours of Saturday morning. I got to go home by 10 each night, and by Friday night I laid in bed and felt like if I tried to move my legs or arms I would throw up. I can't imagine how my boss, who stayed until 2 or 4 am each night, felt.

So Saturday was a calm day. Sleeping in. Lazy breakfast with tea. Knitting with my friend Missy (although Kade has arrived, his baby blanket has not...). Going out for Italian. Sunday we had some people from church over for dinner and made this, which blew our socks off (for lunch today Jason and I spooned the sauce into bowls and dunked bread in it, just to keep ourselves from spooning it straight into our mouths). We went on a walk looking for all the tips of hyacinths and daffodils we could find, and we watched Harry Potter. Jason has finally finished book four, and we've been watching each movie as he finishes. I'm not sure why, actually, except maybe I want to participate in this process, and maybe we want to prove how much better the books are than the movies. Either way, we stayed up late last night, happy to sleep in again this morning and eat strawberry muffins all day.

Jason left for hockey practice about 45 minutes ago, and I still don't know how I should fill the rest of my night. I've been reading Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson, and within a chapter or so I felt instinctively like we share roots--so it was no surprise to find, on googling her, that she's from Idaho. Her novel smells like Idaho. It makes me a little homesick, so probably I need to move on to something else for a while. Like putting my laundry away or getting ready for work tomorrow. Something like that.

V-Day

Happy Valentine's Day. We celebrated in the classic way--by working late, eating dinner out of the crockpot, and checking Facebook on our separate computers. It was romantic.

Actually, Jason made me a delicious pork loin for dinner last night, complete with classy white dishes, flowers, and candles. And reading by the fire. And dark chocolate covered cherries, yum yum! And I made these cookies.

I am a big, big fan of Jason. He is awesome.

Booze Cruise

Okay, so we totally didn't go on a booze cruise, just a dessert cruise. I just wanted to call it that after one of my favorite classic "Office" episodes.


That being said, we had a good time. And we might have seemed somewhat inebriated, but that's just because we were laughing so hard. You know those annoying teen youth groups on planes that insist on singing songs and taking up too much space in the airport? Yeah, we were them.
At least we were old enough to know we were probably being annoying. But we were having so. much. fun. Well, except maybe all the guys, who couldn't stand up straight in the boat.


We got dressed up, went to Olive Garden for dinner, and watched the monuments cruise by, our faces sticky from chocolate fondue. It was good times. Even in February.

Hello, Kade.

Just when I think that I am totally used to nephews making their appearance in the world, another one shows up and takes my breath away for a moment, proving to be so unique and yet just as unexpectedly charming as the last. Kade Phillip Bucher made his appearance late last night, via text message and tiny little text picture. Am so happy he has a name and is some one now, and I can't wait to meet him. Or see pictures on a bigger screen than the one on my old, crappy phone (you know that Verizon commercial with the people counting down the seconds until the iPhone comes out? That is me).

And, can I just say, it is so easy to get overwhelmed by the rush of affection I feel for those boys? And this new one will have a special place in my heart, since he turned a bad day into a good one. He is in the NICU for a few days now (expected, but still not fun), so you can be praying for him and his mama, who is one of the most special people in the world.

Saturdays

I am still not over how delicious Saturdays are when there is no homework hanging over your head. I have spent the day drinking coffee and reading magazines, washing the sheets, putting things away, and having (more) coffee with friends. It's like my house and I know each other again. So good...

It's a nice, gloomy, rainy Saturday, and I like those every now and then--especially when I am full of sun and warmth after our cruise. I'm starting to check little "projects" off of my list, like putting together my book list for 2011--something I haven't done since I started grad school. I have been inspired both by Andrea's post-college five year reading plan (assigned at the end of our senior year) and her more recent"52 for 52" list, but I am not so ambitious...and I don't handle structure that well! It's one "assigned" book a month for me.

I hope to read more than 12 books this year (way more), but this list is sort of my "Just because I'm not in school any more doesn't mean I should only read Harry Potter and Bridget Jones" list. For those other non-assigned books, I'm focusing on books that I own this year--why not, for example, read some of Jason's books? And what about the stack of books that I just keep "picking up" at Costco or when I need free shipping on Amazon? Plus, there's that whole "Library of Congress delivers to my desk" thing...

So, anyway. Reading list for 2011 (minus January, my month to accomplish nothing, because I could), in case you're interested:

February: North and South, by Elizabeth Gaskell
Lynda gave me the movie years ago, and I loved it. Have been wanting to read the book ever since.

March: Confessions, by Augustine
Should have read in Oxford, of course (where I learned to pronounce it "AuGUSTin" instead of "AugustEEN"), but my atheist professor quoted Augustine during the semester and said, "You have to be careful reading Confessions, or you just might find yourself becoming a believer." Intriguing.

April: Mysteries of Udolpho by Anne Radcliffe/Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen
Northanger was my first Austen, so why not read the book over which Cathy obsesses throughout the novel with it?

May: Cat's Eye, by Margaret Atwood

June: The Common Reader, by Virginia Wolfe
Wolfe has been on my reading list since 2005. have yet to finish a book. Am afraid.

July: Too Much Happiness, by Alice Munro

August: Anna Karenina, by Leo Tolstoy
I now have two degrees in English and have never read Tolstoy. Am ashamed.

September: The Golden Bowl, by Henry James
Uncle Chuck left it in my room at the cabin for me.

October: In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote

November: Don Quixote, by Cervantes
See note on August. Also, should be able to weave the word "quixotian" into a sentence with ease.

December: The Jungle Book, by Rudyard Kipling

Exchanging Snow for Sun

Taking a trip (one of our favorite things to do) seemed like an appropriate celebration for completing grad school--both of us needed a vacation after all the work (and encouragement given) last fall, and what better way to spend a miserably cold and snowy week in February than to spend it somewhere warm and sunny? Thus, the Graduation Celebration Caribbean Cruise.

This was my first cruise, and I hope it will be the first of many. We did all the things we love to do while traveling: eating (have you been on a cruise lately?), sleeping (somehow we slept for 12 hours one night. I won't tell you what time we went to bed...), and lounging in beach chairs reading (Jason is now on the fourth Potter book, and I finally got a chance to read this, which has been sitting on my bookshelf for at least two (maybe three?) years). Heavenly.

What we do best

Our ship--"Navigator of the Seas"--together with another at the port of call

We did get off the boat at our two ports of call. First was George Town on Grand Cayman, where the water was bluer than I thought possible. We ventured away from the cruise boat spots and took a bus to Cemetery Beach, where we did some fun snorkeling and basked on the beach.

The blue waters of Grand Cayman

Second was Cozumel, where we decided to be a little more adventurous and did a dune-buggy trip around the island. We did some more snorkeling, ate some good Mexican food, and got to see some amazing views on our trip...and Jason got to drive the stick-shift dune buggy through downtown. He was a pro.

Mexican serenade in Cozumel

On the dune buggy

Para-surfers on Cozumel

We got home this afternoon and have spent the last few hours shaking the sand out of our shoes and trying to remember to put a coat on before we go outside. Oh, and going to the grocery store, so that when the next storm hits (tomorrow?), we can face it with more than two carrots and a carton of eggs to our names.