Monthly Archives: January 2012

Ice Skating

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This post is way overdue, considering we took these photos while in Colorado for Christmas! We went to the mountains for a few days of skiing and enjoying the fresh air and beautiful scenery and while we were there we found an outdoor skating rink!  It seemed like a very winter holiday activity… so we went ice skating in the mountains!

My brother’s girlfriend just happens to be a hockey player, so she pretty much skated circles around the rest of us.  Literally.  However, we held our own, laughed a lot, and had a great time!  Thank you Mom & Dad for sitting on a cold bench and taking photos for us!  You did a great job working the “big camera”.  You’re the best :)

Juice, Juice, Juice

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Today I am sick. Ugh. I have caught the head cold that has been slowly creeping its way around my office building, putting everyone on high alert, and causing new bottles of hand sanitizer to pop up everywhere! Apparently I didn’t sanitize enough, because it caught me.

 However I’m still at work. Why?  Partly because I have lots to do today (yes, blogging is how I choose to spend my lunch break :) ) but mostly because we now have PTO or “paid time off” rather than separate “sick” and “vacation” days.  I’ve pretty much decided that translates into “you have more vacation but no longer can take a sick day.” Might as well use all those extra days having fun! 

So, while sitting here wondering how I can help myself get better soon (I’m already taking Zicam, Emergen-C, and Dayquil) I started thinking about Mom’s advice of “drink lots and lots of juice!” So, I thought I’d do a quick Google search to see “what’s the best juice to drink when I’m sick?”  Low and behold this is what pops up: 

Really?  An organic green smoothie?  Do they really think I have the energy or motivation to make myself a complicated smoothie when I don’t feel good?  This is when I sometimes think the juice smoothie thing has gone way to far!  Don’t get me wrong, I love them when I have the time to actually make them… but today I was looking for a simple answer such as: apple, grape, or cranberry.  Not a I-contain-15-vegetables-so-I-must-be-good-for-you-smoothie.  Ok rant is over… I’m headed home to drink some cranberry juice and nap on my couch. 

And re-reading this, I apparently have a thing for quotations today…

New Exciting Plans!

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I’m so excited to tell you all about Dwyatt and my recent exciting plans… this year we will be making our first trip to Europe!  Neither one of us has ever been outside of North America and we decide that in 2012 it was time to change that! 

We started talking about taking a “big trip” a few months ago but we were really indecisive on where we should go.  I want to travel to pretty much everywhere on the map, so it was really just a matter of what we want to do this trip.  Luckily the decision was an easy one to make when my dear friend Charlotte announced that she is engaged and getting married in Scotland!  She and her fiancé live in Aberdeen, and are getting married in a castle in August.  Yes you read that right… they are getting married in a castle.  I think that’s about as romantic as it gets! 

Scotland has always been near the top of my list since my family is originally from there.  In fact I still have some extended cousins that live in Edinburgh that I’m hoping to meet up with while we’re there!  I’m so excited about this trip I can hardly stand it!  I already ordered a guide-book to help with the planning and now the adventure of planning when, where, and what to see begins!

We think we’ll probably be there about 2 weeks.  I don’t want to spend 14 hours traveling to be there for only 5 days… just doesn’t make sense to me.  SO… the big question…where do we go??  What do we see?  Do we fly into London and spend a few days there?  I would love to see that city, but at the same time there is a little event known as the Summer 2012 Olympics that happen to be taking place in London in August.  Does this mean it will be packed and not worth fighting the crowds??  Or is seeing London worth it? 

Other option would be to see other parts of England?  Or Ireland perhaps?  We know we want to spend at least 1 full week exploring Scotland.  I want to go hiking, tour castles, experience the culture, and take photos!  Dwyatt also says that visiting the beach (or beaches) is a must and visiting at least one whiskey distillery is pretty much non-negotiable on his list of “to-do’s”.  Oh, and I would really like to meet Princess Catherine.  I’m pretty sure we could be good friends…maybe even pen pals? That would be cool :)  

If anyone out there reads this and has been to any part of the UK and can offer advice, thoughts, things “not to miss”, things to avoid, or any other advice I would love to hear your advice!  Please speak up!  Until then it will just be me and my guidebook… planning and anxiously awaiting our next adventure! 

Sewing project… Finished!

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I finished my skirt project this weekend and was able to wear it to church yesterday!  I love how it turned out.  It’s a corduroy material, perfect for winter and maybe even early spring with some of the pastel colors!  It’s really fancy, but I’m so proud that I made it!  It’s comfortable, the zipper works, and happiest of all… it’ fits!  I didn’t make it too big or too small… which was my main worry.

Oh, and I also fixed Dwyatt’s button yesterday :)  Sewing success!  Next project?  I want to make a college t-shirt quilt with all my old Mines and Pi Phi shirts!  We’ll see how long that takes me…

My favorite athlete

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Being a native Colorado girl, I have always chosen to call the Denver Broncos “my team” when I’m cheering for someone in the NFL.  I’ve never been an avid football fan, but I remember having Bronco watch parties with my grandmother as a child, attending the victory parade after they won their first Superbowl, and always getting excited when they made it to the playoffs!

This year, we all had even more to be excited about with an athlete like Tim Tebow on our team!  I could not be more proud to be a Bronco fan.  I love how Tim wears his heart on his sleeve, is a gracious even in loss, and is first and foremost a follower of Christ.  He doesn’t let the criticism get to him, and he’s confident in who he is.  He lives his life for Christ and doesn’t let anything change that priority for him.  He is someone we could all learn from, and those lessons would have nothing do with football…

Tim Tebow Denver Broncos

Picture borrowed from article you can read here.

Can’t wait to see how they do next year!

A new hobby…

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It all started three years ago when Dwyatt asked me to sew a button back onto a shirt for him.  Well, upon inspection, this shirt also had a tear in the sleeve that was about an inch long.  I knew it needed to be fixed, but I didn’t have a sewing machine, and I knew that my hand sewing skills would leave the shirt with a rather ugly scar.

More recently I have been wanting to tackle some household projects like recovering some of the pillows in our living room with new fabric.  Again… no sewing machine.  This was starting to become a problem…  So, for Christmas this year I told my Mom that the #1 thing I wanted was a sewing machine.

Happily, on Christmas morning I opened a huge and heavy box and found my very own sewing machine!  Now, I had told my Mom, “I just want something basic, something I can do simple little projects on.”  What I got was the Singer Superb 2010, an amazing little machine that can do over 200 different stitches and monogram letters!  WOW!  My Mom’s exact words, “…but the simple ones were borrring!”  Ok, it looks like I’m learning to sew!

While in Colorado we had a girls day and went out to buy all the little notions I needed like cutters, bobbins, needles, a measuring tape, pins, and a sewing basket.  We also got some basic patterns and fabric for me to learn on.  First I made a summer time table runner which was easy and fun!  (I’ll share more pics of that in the spring when I actually display it on the dining room table!)

Now, I’m working on making a skirt.  It’s a fairly straightforward pattern from Simplicity, but I’m learning a lot.  This afternoon I tackled the zipper install.  A little tricky, but I was successful in the end!  I’m hoping to finish it up tomorrow so I can wear it to church on Sunday and share a picture with you!  For now, here is some photos of my work in progress…

Oh, and Dwyatt’s shirt?  Fixing his button is next on my list…

Better late than never…

Aside

So almost a month ago, Dwyatt and I attended our Devon Christmas party… and I was so excited to wear my sparkly dress!  What a great night full of good food, good company, fabulous red wine, lots of dancing, and sore feet! 

Well, in the midst of all that fun, I forgot to take any pictures, minus the one iPhone shot I took of the band… so we had to wait for the professional snapshots to appear online.  Ha ha… check them out, I feel like it’s prom for grown-ups!

My one shot of the dance floor and band (yes the decorations are over the top!)

Making Plans for 2012

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As I think about the near future and all that 2012 could mean, I decided I should share a few goals.  I am in the habit of writing down goals, I find that they get accomplished so much more often if they are written down!  I have been writing down New Year’s goals for about 6 years now, and even though I rarely accomplish all of them, I would say I fulfill an average of somewhere between 70-80% of them. 

Last year I actually decided to do a 101 in 1001 goals list… I had so many things I wanted to do!  So this was my way to capture a list of all I wanted to accomplish over the next 3ish years of my life (could also be viewed as my “pre-baby” goal list, but don’t tell Dwyatt I said that!).  I accomplished about 18 of these goals last year, definitely a good start!  However at this rate, it may take me more like 4 of 5 years to finish them all…  Here is a sampling of what I want to accomplish this year:

  1. Maintain a 3.5 or higher GPA in my graduate program.
  2. Hike the Grand Canyon with my husband.
  3. Visit Europe.
  4. Ride in NVRHA events & rope a cow!
  5. Pay off all my student loans.
  6. Visit Santa Fe, New Mexico.
  7. Babysit for friends.
  8. Do something that scares me.
  9. Sew a Christmas tree skirt!
  10. Take more personal photos and turn them into albums.
  11. Blog more consistently.
  12. Take a ballroom dancing class.
  13. Visit New England in the fall.
  14. Continue to workout and gain muscle… work toward being in the best shape of my life!
  15. Donate blood at least twice per year.
  16. Attend my brother’s college graduation.
  17. Host a wine tasting party for friends.
  18. Find an organization I’m passionate about, and volunteer at least once per month.
  19. Start and complete all three levels of Rosetta Stone Spanish.
  20. Redecorate my bedroom.
  21. Grow a successful strawberry patch.
  22. Send flowers to my grandmother, just because…
  23. Go on a mother/daughter trip with my Mom (just us girls!)
  24. Drink more tea.

Wish me luck!  I think I’m going to need it :)