Ok so I've decided to stop playing my new Nintendo DS Lite long enough to blog about our Christmas vacation. :)
The theme of this year's Christmas was babies - for everyone playing along at home. Holy crap, there were a lot of babies. They were all well-behaved a majority of the time, except for a few freakouts brought on by over-stimulation. When they were being really sweet, my baby fever definitley got worse. Luckily, the spit-up and meltdowns tempered it pretty effectively. I also learned Nicholas and I are the perfect baby yin-yang. I prefer the little ones that sleep a lot. He prefers the bigger ones who need constant entertainment.
The first few days we finished up our shopping and got in all our favorite ATL food (Athens Pizza and the Varsity). Christmas Eve and Christmas Day we basically just sat around eating ourselves into a stuper - interrupted by spurts of present opening.
Plus, after only about six years, I'm really starting to get used to these in-laws of mine. I realized I think of them as my family now, instead of Nicholas's. IN FACT, I think I might even choose to hang out with a them if I wasn't required!
...
(At least of couple of them anyway) ;)
Saturday, December 30, 2006
Monday, December 25, 2006
Merry Christmas ya'll!!!
The very first day we got back from Thanksgiving I began decorating for Christmas. I would have started at midnight on Thanksgiving if possible so to soak every last second out of the holidays. For those of you who don't know me AT ALL, I (heart) Christmas.
For example, as I was decorating my tree, my friend Dylan expressed surprise at my multiple boxes of ornaments and the fact that I have so many decorations at such a young age. (I have two boxes and would guess around 70+ ornaments.)
As way of explaination, I thought I would offer pictures of my mother's house so that everyone can fully understand that I really have no choice. Christmas has always been a huge deal at my house. It's partly because I am an only child and partly because my parents love the holiday. (Although when I was little, my stepfather tried repeatedly to convince me Christmas was cancelled.)
It's not just that my mother decorates - its more of an explosion. No room or surface is left untouched. I used to say it looked like Santa Claus threw up all over our house.
We have two beautiful trees (not counting the one outside). A ton of nativity scenes. angels, lights, and Santa Claus's. She has THREE sets of everyday Christmas dishes and one set of fine Christmas china. The bathroom is covered. The extra bedrooms have themes. Even the phone stand is covered.
But you know what's really sad? The pictures from this year are low key. She has boxes and boxes left untouched.
Who am I kidding though? I love it. It makes every holiday so much more special. And what I've noticed from watching other people is that it's a lot easier to go with the Christmas tidal wave then to fight it :)
So Merry Christmas everyone - I hope your holiday is filled with friends, family, food and a crapload of decorations!
For example, as I was decorating my tree, my friend Dylan expressed surprise at my multiple boxes of ornaments and the fact that I have so many decorations at such a young age. (I have two boxes and would guess around 70+ ornaments.)
As way of explaination, I thought I would offer pictures of my mother's house so that everyone can fully understand that I really have no choice. Christmas has always been a huge deal at my house. It's partly because I am an only child and partly because my parents love the holiday. (Although when I was little, my stepfather tried repeatedly to convince me Christmas was cancelled.)
It's not just that my mother decorates - its more of an explosion. No room or surface is left untouched. I used to say it looked like Santa Claus threw up all over our house.
We have two beautiful trees (not counting the one outside). A ton of nativity scenes. angels, lights, and Santa Claus's. She has THREE sets of everyday Christmas dishes and one set of fine Christmas china. The bathroom is covered. The extra bedrooms have themes. Even the phone stand is covered.
But you know what's really sad? The pictures from this year are low key. She has boxes and boxes left untouched.
Who am I kidding though? I love it. It makes every holiday so much more special. And what I've noticed from watching other people is that it's a lot easier to go with the Christmas tidal wave then to fight it :)
So Merry Christmas everyone - I hope your holiday is filled with friends, family, food and a crapload of decorations!
New Spot
Remember when I was worried about Maggie not finding a new spot in the new house. Apparently that was misplaced...she found a new spot and a new friend ;)
Wednesday, December 20, 2006
You learn something new everyday
You learn something new everydayr on Vimeo
For instance, yesterday we learned that Maggie HATES yo-yos and wants to kill them.
Generations
I just got back from Kentucky. I flew into Louisville Wednesday night and spent the next two days visiting with my old roommate Erin and shopping for the rest of my Christmas presents.
On Friday, I drove to Paducah and spent the weekend with my family. It was really nice, especially Sunday afternoon after eating lunch (or supper in these parts) with my great aunts and uncle, my grandmother, and Ron. My great-aunt is without a doubt the family historian and where I get my photo-taking, scrapbooking, pack-ratting genes from.
Ever since putting the photo collage together for my dad's 50th birthday, I've wanted to get some photos from my mom's side of the famiy so I could put together a display. Well, I hit the jackpot with Carolyn. I got pictures, pictures, and more pictures.
Beautiful pictures of my grandmother when she graduated from high school. Pictures of my great-grandmother in what my grandmother informed me was a "go-to-hell" hat. A school picture my great-aunt had written a little love note to my great-uncle on.
However, the most amazing pictures are the ones of my great-great grandmother and her family. Her name was Ruby and she died when my great-grandmother was three or four. I've heard the story several times before because it is cited as the reason the women in my family aren't big nurturers. The theory goes that my great-grandmother was raised by her stepmother who took very good care of her but never treated her as her own child, and therefore she never had that super-nurturing model. I've always loved that my mother was the "walk it off - you'll be fine" mother. It made me the independent person I am today so it was pretty intense to look at the woman whose death shaped my life.
It got me thinking so much that when I got home I signed onto ancestry.com and started working on my family tree. Well, SIX hours later I'd gotten several generations back. The best part was when I was showing Erin what I had done once I got back to Louisville I did a search that plugged me into another tree people work on together. I was able to trace back to 1259 Scotland! Pretty crazy.
It's so fascinating to see who and where you came from. I know it sounds cheesy but both sides of my family have been in Kentucky for generations, which makes me feel slightly less crazy for feeling so connected to it.
I started working on Nicholas's tree last night. As I have suspected all along, he is a total imposter as a Southerner. Almost his entire family came from either Massachusetts or Pennsylvania... I can't believe I married a Yankee. So, anyway I guess not all the revelations have been positive ;)
On Friday, I drove to Paducah and spent the weekend with my family. It was really nice, especially Sunday afternoon after eating lunch (or supper in these parts) with my great aunts and uncle, my grandmother, and Ron. My great-aunt is without a doubt the family historian and where I get my photo-taking, scrapbooking, pack-ratting genes from.
Ever since putting the photo collage together for my dad's 50th birthday, I've wanted to get some photos from my mom's side of the famiy so I could put together a display. Well, I hit the jackpot with Carolyn. I got pictures, pictures, and more pictures.
Beautiful pictures of my grandmother when she graduated from high school. Pictures of my great-grandmother in what my grandmother informed me was a "go-to-hell" hat. A school picture my great-aunt had written a little love note to my great-uncle on.However, the most amazing pictures are the ones of my great-great grandmother and her family. Her name was Ruby and she died when my great-grandmother was three or four. I've heard the story several times before because it is cited as the reason the women in my family aren't big nurturers. The theory goes that my great-grandmother was raised by her stepmother who took very good care of her but never treated her as her own child, and therefore she never had that super-nurturing model. I've always loved that my mother was the "walk it off - you'll be fine" mother. It made me the independent person I am today so it was pretty intense to look at the woman whose death shaped my life.
It got me thinking so much that when I got home I signed onto ancestry.com and started working on my family tree. Well, SIX hours later I'd gotten several generations back. The best part was when I was showing Erin what I had done once I got back to Louisville I did a search that plugged me into another tree people work on together. I was able to trace back to 1259 Scotland! Pretty crazy.It's so fascinating to see who and where you came from. I know it sounds cheesy but both sides of my family have been in Kentucky for generations, which makes me feel slightly less crazy for feeling so connected to it.
I started working on Nicholas's tree last night. As I have suspected all along, he is a total imposter as a Southerner. Almost his entire family came from either Massachusetts or Pennsylvania... I can't believe I married a Yankee. So, anyway I guess not all the revelations have been positive ;)
Sunday, December 17, 2006
This story is true
Last year, my parents were having about their sixteenth thousand problem with their router. They'd had a cheap MSN Router that they'd always had problems with so I made them buy a Netgear router. If I recall, I spent almost an hour trying to set it up but it seemed to work fine for several months.
Then, when I came home this weekend it was down after a power outage. I immediately called Netgear because I couldn't pull up anything with the IP address listed on the router. I was informed by the customer service representative that the warranty for hardware failure on December 15, 2006. Only thing it WAS December 15. When I tried to explain this, I was informed that it was a -1 warranty and they could answer no other questions. Grrrrr....
SO we sent Ron to Best Buy to buy a Linksys Router, which one of our relatives had suggested. He came back with a box touting "One Step Setup." Needless to say, I was not hopeful. Two hours later, my cynicism proved accurate. After trying ourselves for a while, a representative informed us we had to install a firmware update to get it to work. Information that would have been helpful IN THE BEGINNING OF THE PROCESS.
We finally got it working for Ron's computer and his laptop. However, when I told the representative that I couldn't get the internet on my mac, she informed me "they don't support macs." After a couple of google searches, I realized that this Linksys router was all but completely incompatible with Macs. The only solution that began to address the problem was installing the firmware update on my Mac. Well, I was up till 3:30 in the morning trying to get that to work and after being frustrated to the point of tears several times, I finally got it to work.
The next morning it STILL worked...for about six or seven hours. Then, the entire network went down. Ron spent another hour on the phone with Linksys, setting up the entire network again (this time named "ronismadashell"). But it would only work for about fifteen minutes at a time.
SO, we went back to Best Buy and thought we'd give D Link a try (for those of you keeping score, that's Microsoft 0, Netgear 0, Linksys 0). Again, the "quick" setup was a big ole lie. This time it took about an hour on the phone with D Link AND BellSouth, Ron's ISP. This network was named "ThisBetterWork" and it did...for about THREE hours.
And here is where the story gets REALLY ridiculous (as if it wasn't already). I call D Link and they run a few test and it seems the DSL connection is down all together. So I call Bell South and they ask me to check the cords. I scoff and inform them the cord JUST came out of the box and was working fine for a couple of hours. But we try a few other things and nothing happens so I go ahead and switch back to the old Ethernet cord and IT STARS FRACKING WORKING AGAIN. After all that, it actually was a burned out cord.
UNFREAKING BELIEVABLE.
The network has now been up and running for almost 24 hours...we're all holding our breath. Because as fun as it is to spend the holidays with customer service representatives half a world away, I'm really hoping to spend it with my family. Or at least ignoring them, while I play on the internet. ;)
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
Monday, December 11, 2006
Crazy Weekend
Nicholas and I had a pretty amazing weekend - filled with one extreme to the next.
Friday night was his law firm's holiday party. Nothing too extreme about it actually, pretty much the same thing as the last two years. It was held at the Mandarin Oriental, which is really fantastic. There was a cocktail hour, followed by a dinner buffet. I had like four courses between the seafood bar, the soup, salad and sushi, and the main course. Then, everyone mingles back out into the main forrer for dessert. This year was a little more festive because all the desserts had a holiday theme - eggnog creme brulee, sugar cookies, etc. After dessert, we did a little dancing but the big draw is karoke. I did my standard, "Something to Talk About," to lots of praise. Of course, it wasn't hard to wow the crowd since the guy before me sang "O Come All Ye Faithful." Needless to say, this guys did NOT know his crowd. We went home a smidge earlier then we usually do because we had a very early morning the next day.
On Saturday, we woke up at 4:30am and took the train to New York for a little holiday shopping. Unfortunately, our train was about an hour late but we still arrived at 9:45. We had a quick breakfast by Penn Station and then took a cab down to Fifth Avenue. We started at Henri Bendel, which was crazy fabulous withthe price tag to match. It was probably reflective that the first purchase of the day was for me. ;) We then made our way up Fifth to see the windows and do a little shopping in Saks. The highlight was the hot chocolate we had on the sixth floor at Charbonel et Walker - delicious!
Of course, the big event was across the street at Rockafeller Center. The tree was really gorgeous but the people were the realy sight. Apparently there was a three hour wait to ice skate! We walked back up Avenue of the Americas to FAO Schwarz, which had a line down the block to get in. Luckily, it was really really fast and we made our way in within three minutes. It was such a scene inside but definitely fun. Kids playing the huge piano from BIG and stuffed animals as far as the eye could see. What made it even more fun was we have a niece and nephews to buy for this year - even if they are a bit small. ;)
After FAO, we took at cab to Soho for the Pearl River Market. Basically, its anything you can think of and then some. We got lots of awesome stocking stuffers. We then did some shopping at the Holiday Market at Union Square. Again, crazy crowded but we made a final dent in our list there. We took a small break for Mud Coffee (highly recommended by Rachel Ray) and relaxed while enjoying the view of the Empire State Building.
We met my friend Lindsey and her boyfriend for dinner at Elmo. Lindsey is a writer and is utterly fabulous - particularly because she featured me in her new book! We had a really great meal filled with even better conversation. By 9:15, we were back on the train home! It was quite a whirlwind but worth every second. I've always wanted to New York at the holidays so it was definitely a dream come true.
The extreme Saturday filled to the max with activity was followed by an extreme Sunday filled with absolutely freaking nothing (or as the Sweet Potato Queen's say "doing jackshit"). I didn't get out of bed till around 10:30 and didn't get out of my pajamas all day! I know what you're thinking "Sarah, staying in your pajamas all day is extreme!" (Well, you're thinking that unless you're my mother who has made the all-day-pajama-binge an art form - I learned from the best!) But the sad part is that is not the extremeness I'm referencing.
Here goes nothing...
Yesterday, Nicholas and I watched twelve hours of Battlestar Galactica...not counting the ten webisdoes online. That's right.
TWELVE HOURS
And I'm not ashamed either because that show is freaking amazing! I kept hearing all about how great it was, how smart it was, how it was the BEEEESSTTT. So finally i was like FINE I'll watch! So I put Season 1 on the Netflick list thinking I'd try it out. That was two weeks ago and we're already four shows away form being caught up with season 3! (Of course I sucked NIcholas in along the way - we only have one TV after all).
And really everything they say about that show is true. I mean I don't even like sci-fi that much (except Harry Potter and comic book movies and Lord of the Rings and...ok I'm stopping now) but this show is more political then anything else. It is very much post-9/11 and really asks important questions. How far are we willing to go to be safe? Or to get information from terrorists? Recently, they had a whole storyline about insurgency and occupations. Oh and they have their own version of the f-word! "Fracking toasters!" I mean it is truly amazing. Needless to say, I highly recommend it. Just set LOTS of time away if you start ;)
Friday night was his law firm's holiday party. Nothing too extreme about it actually, pretty much the same thing as the last two years. It was held at the Mandarin Oriental, which is really fantastic. There was a cocktail hour, followed by a dinner buffet. I had like four courses between the seafood bar, the soup, salad and sushi, and the main course. Then, everyone mingles back out into the main forrer for dessert. This year was a little more festive because all the desserts had a holiday theme - eggnog creme brulee, sugar cookies, etc. After dessert, we did a little dancing but the big draw is karoke. I did my standard, "Something to Talk About," to lots of praise. Of course, it wasn't hard to wow the crowd since the guy before me sang "O Come All Ye Faithful." Needless to say, this guys did NOT know his crowd. We went home a smidge earlier then we usually do because we had a very early morning the next day.
On Saturday, we woke up at 4:30am and took the train to New York for a little holiday shopping. Unfortunately, our train was about an hour late but we still arrived at 9:45. We had a quick breakfast by Penn Station and then took a cab down to Fifth Avenue. We started at Henri Bendel, which was crazy fabulous withthe price tag to match. It was probably reflective that the first purchase of the day was for me. ;) We then made our way up Fifth to see the windows and do a little shopping in Saks. The highlight was the hot chocolate we had on the sixth floor at Charbonel et Walker - delicious!
Of course, the big event was across the street at Rockafeller Center. The tree was really gorgeous but the people were the realy sight. Apparently there was a three hour wait to ice skate! We walked back up Avenue of the Americas to FAO Schwarz, which had a line down the block to get in. Luckily, it was really really fast and we made our way in within three minutes. It was such a scene inside but definitely fun. Kids playing the huge piano from BIG and stuffed animals as far as the eye could see. What made it even more fun was we have a niece and nephews to buy for this year - even if they are a bit small. ;)
After FAO, we took at cab to Soho for the Pearl River Market. Basically, its anything you can think of and then some. We got lots of awesome stocking stuffers. We then did some shopping at the Holiday Market at Union Square. Again, crazy crowded but we made a final dent in our list there. We took a small break for Mud Coffee (highly recommended by Rachel Ray) and relaxed while enjoying the view of the Empire State Building.
We met my friend Lindsey and her boyfriend for dinner at Elmo. Lindsey is a writer and is utterly fabulous - particularly because she featured me in her new book! We had a really great meal filled with even better conversation. By 9:15, we were back on the train home! It was quite a whirlwind but worth every second. I've always wanted to New York at the holidays so it was definitely a dream come true.
The extreme Saturday filled to the max with activity was followed by an extreme Sunday filled with absolutely freaking nothing (or as the Sweet Potato Queen's say "doing jackshit"). I didn't get out of bed till around 10:30 and didn't get out of my pajamas all day! I know what you're thinking "Sarah, staying in your pajamas all day is extreme!" (Well, you're thinking that unless you're my mother who has made the all-day-pajama-binge an art form - I learned from the best!) But the sad part is that is not the extremeness I'm referencing.
Here goes nothing...
Yesterday, Nicholas and I watched twelve hours of Battlestar Galactica...not counting the ten webisdoes online. That's right.
TWELVE HOURS
And I'm not ashamed either because that show is freaking amazing! I kept hearing all about how great it was, how smart it was, how it was the BEEEESSTTT. So finally i was like FINE I'll watch! So I put Season 1 on the Netflick list thinking I'd try it out. That was two weeks ago and we're already four shows away form being caught up with season 3! (Of course I sucked NIcholas in along the way - we only have one TV after all).
And really everything they say about that show is true. I mean I don't even like sci-fi that much (except Harry Potter and comic book movies and Lord of the Rings and...ok I'm stopping now) but this show is more political then anything else. It is very much post-9/11 and really asks important questions. How far are we willing to go to be safe? Or to get information from terrorists? Recently, they had a whole storyline about insurgency and occupations. Oh and they have their own version of the f-word! "Fracking toasters!" I mean it is truly amazing. Needless to say, I highly recommend it. Just set LOTS of time away if you start ;)
Friday, December 08, 2006
Maggie and her collar
Maggie and her collar on Vimeo
You have never met a dog that loves her collar more than this one. It borders on the weird. She freaks out when you take it off and acts like you are giving her chocolate covered snausages when you put it back on.
Thursday, December 07, 2006
Volunteering
Well, I went downstairs to our annual condo board meeting and came back as the newest board member...whoops.
I'm sure none of you are surprised that I volunteered, but it is just not in me to turn down an uncontested position. Considering one of the board members recently called a resident a "condescending fucking prick" across the entire listserv, it would seem I have no where to go but up. ;)
Sunday, December 03, 2006
Holiday Entertaining
We had a very busy weekend.
On Saturday evening, we had several friends over for a dinner party. Nicholas made a delicious menu of sausages with pickled onions, potato and apple gratin, salad, salmon on shallot toast, and warm olives. It was all a huge hit. Later in the evening, we played a rousing game of Dirty Santa. My friend Laura had never played before and she was very intent on other's stealing to make the game more interesting. Of course she was delighted when her gift was traded several times. :)
Later, we had cake and eggnog while everyone enjoyed a good laugh at some of my home movies. (It all started with a showing of "What My Church Means to Me" - see below.) All in all, I'd say it was a very successful evening considering it started at 7 and ended at midnight.
Today, we had a dessert reception for my friends from Chandler's office (and my friend from high school Dylan, he comes to every party so he can tell everyone he knew me first!). We had a beautiful spread as you can see. I was particularly proud of my cookie tree - unfortunately Nicholas's didn't make the cut ;) Again, it was a really lovely afternoon and I think everyone had a good time.
It was all a lot of work but it was really nice to have everyone over to see our apartment finally. Plus I got to bring out my china! :)
On Saturday evening, we had several friends over for a dinner party. Nicholas made a delicious menu of sausages with pickled onions, potato and apple gratin, salad, salmon on shallot toast, and warm olives. It was all a huge hit. Later in the evening, we played a rousing game of Dirty Santa. My friend Laura had never played before and she was very intent on other's stealing to make the game more interesting. Of course she was delighted when her gift was traded several times. :)
Later, we had cake and eggnog while everyone enjoyed a good laugh at some of my home movies. (It all started with a showing of "What My Church Means to Me" - see below.) All in all, I'd say it was a very successful evening considering it started at 7 and ended at midnight.
Today, we had a dessert reception for my friends from Chandler's office (and my friend from high school Dylan, he comes to every party so he can tell everyone he knew me first!). We had a beautiful spread as you can see. I was particularly proud of my cookie tree - unfortunately Nicholas's didn't make the cut ;) Again, it was a really lovely afternoon and I think everyone had a good time.
It was all a lot of work but it was really nice to have everyone over to see our apartment finally. Plus I got to bring out my china! :)
Saturday, December 02, 2006
What My Church Means to Me
What My Church Means to Me on Vimeo
There's a saying in the law "res ipsa loquitur." It translates "the thing speaks for itself." ... Yep ....
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