A Chance to Change Your Vote

Mom posted a new photo of Jessica's baby bump. Holy cow has she popped out!! Quite a difference from the last post I did about her bump. I know some people predict gender based on what the bump looks like. So I made a new poll for you. You can vote to stick with your old vote, or change your mind. What do you think??

Not much for the pregnancy glow, huh, sissy?

(SMILE!)

Other clues...

* She's craving both sweet (Ben and Jerry's ice cream) and sour (sour Skittles)

* She was VERY sick early on

* The Chinese Gender Calendar says it's going to be a boy.

* Nana and Papa are pretty convinced it's a boy.

* Mommy doesn't have any strong feelings towards it being a boy or girl.

* She's 18 weeks and the baby is moving around like CRAZY. Mommy says you can see it. (Auntie can't wait to witness this!) But will not move when Nana puts her hand on the belly. (Probably not a clue... but hilarious anyways)

Okay guys... go ahead and vote!

Countdown to the Return of Glee, Part 4

UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE,

MY BLOG HAS BEEN TAKEN OVER WITH MY OBSESSION WITH GLEE!

deal with it

I seriously hope things all work out well for Quinn. I know she's supposed to be this terrible, mean person, but I see a sweet, scared little girl in her. And Im VERY glad that Terri Schuester won't be getting her baby!



10 weeks until the return of Glee!

I Need to Share This With You

So, we've discussed the fact that Danny and I are applying to go to Korea for a year to teach. We're really getting down to business with this. Making lists of everything we need for our application - transcripts, background checks, letters of reference, making plans to contact the recruiting agency to answer some questions for us, and... educating ourselves on Korean culture.
We've found the best way to do this is by reading a blog (and watching videos) by a couple currently living and teaching in Korea. Simon and Martina from EatYourKimchi.com.
Thanks to them, I have a new favorite song.











And a new favorite dance.

Build a fire, build a fire, build a fire, build a fire

Dropped the fire, dropped the fire, dropped the fire, dropped the fire
Pants on fire, pants on fire, pants on fire, pants on fire

And you're thinking....

What is she on?!?!

Watch Simon and Martina's videos. You'll get it.

Exhaustion, Graduation, Awardation

Awardation = Not a word, but ends in -tion. 
Whatever


Good lord I am tired today.
I originally planned on getting up about half an hour earlier today. I needed to run over to the Bangor City Hall to turn in my substitute teaching packet, so I can sub on Tuesday. Then I realized I needed to photocopy something and it would be rude and unprofessional to ask them to photocopy it for me. (Maybe?) Plus... half an hour of sleep is half an hour of sleep.
Honestly, I could have gone to be at like 9 last night. I was so tired. But I didnt. I laid down with Danny and watched a movie for awhile. If you follow me on twitter, you know that this movie was The Grudge. Yeaaaaahhh.... not the best bedtime movie. I've seen it, I love it, but just not for bedtime. Not when Danny always grabs me and goes "Oh my god, did you hear that? What was that noise?" at random, scary times before, during, and after scary movies. He's a jerk. So I made him turn it off about 20 minutes in and I watched Muppets from Space instead. Danny went out to do late night Danny things and I watched the movie for a bit, then turned it off and passed out. Only to wake up at 6 AM. BLAH. It took me 45 minutes at least to get back to sleep. I slept for MAYBE an hour and then had to get up... feeling MORE tired than I did at 6 AM. Gah. Should have just stayed up. BUT I figured I needed my sleep...
I student taught from 8:30 til 3:30, like always. I love my kids. They're so awesome. And I love my mentor teacher. She seems to think Im doing pretty well, I think. Im getting some written feedback from her on how I'm doing and on an assignment I did on Monday. I think she's one that would tell me right out if I wasnt doing as good of a job as she expected, but she's always very forgiving and understanding when I do make mistakes. Its a great placement, really.
(Oh! And one my students is the granddaughter of the secretary of the elementary school I went to! What a small world!!)

So, after student teaching, I had to go to work. Fridays suck, so much. But, I have to work sometime, and Im not going to never ever have a day off, so its one super long day a week, no work at all, or no days off. Meh. Work was kinda sucky, but not terrible. It's never TERRIBLE. It's just a few hours and they pay me well enough.

I made some yummy dinner with Danny. Chop Suey and Garlic Bread. Filled me up SO well too. I only ate half a bowl, and I have SO much leftovers. I need to learn how to cook for 2 people... But at least Im okay with leftovers. Leftovers = Not having to cook again. Though, I'll admit, being home between 4-5 every day makes me much more willing to cook. Not sure why. Time? Hunger? Who knows.

THEN
Something big happened.
I applied for graduation.
I am OFFICIALLY planning to graduate on May 8th of THIS YEAR.
I never thought this would come.
I'm so excited.
And yet, it doesnt feel real.
Although, not much of this year does yet.
Like that fact that I'm going to be an AUNTIE.
andacollegegraduateomg

Anyways

Two blog things. First, I joined the sisterhood of the blogosphere and got assigned my two sisters today - Aieshah and Darah. I hope theyre not disappointed by my boring name. I'll write more about my "sisters" later on, when we've done more with it.

The other...

Ahhhh! I love winning awards! Thank you Krysten!

All you have to do for this award is tag other lady bloggers that you love.

Kim @ Perfectly Cursed Life

Stevie @ Allow Me to Introduce... Myself

Heather @ Totally Heather

Ari @ Curiousillusion

Jane @ I Really Suck at This

Becky @ I'll Go Eat Worms

Amy @ Just a Titch

Steph @ Luxe Chandelier

Brandy @ More Than a Number

Erin @ State That I Am In

Betsy @ Tales of a Firedancer

Jodi @ Tales of a Dark Haired Princess

Hope you all have a great weekend. :)

Random Thoughts

I wasn't going to blog today. I posted on my facebook fan page for my blog that I was too tired to do it. BUT, I have blogged every day this month (and it's not even NaBloMoPo!) and I kind of want to keep up my streak. I should probably stop blogging MORE than a once a day though. I imagine thats kind of annoying. I'm sorry :(

Anyways, here's a list for you.

• I bought three tubes of Carmex awhile back, so I'd always have one around. Guess what? They're all basically gone. And I need some. Badly. I chew on my lips when they're dry, and that makes them painful. Sad.
• My bottom teeth HURT right now. They shouldn't. I had my wisdom teeth out a year and a half ago because they were pushing the rest of my teeth and making them crooked and painful. They shouldn't hurt anymore!!!
• I love the Dayquil commercial song. I don't know why.
• I need a haircut. I haven't cut my hair since May. Which isn't unusual for me.
• My second graders have a homophones poster, where they record homophones they discover. One of the pairs listed is we/Wii. 
• I was doing a read aloud the other day, and the word blackboard came up. I had a student raise her hand and ask "What's a blackboard?!"
• I was watching Simpsons the other day and chuckled at the Mac mocking episode that featured an "iCube" that glowed. Bart attempted to "use" it (not even knowing what it did! The salesman said "Dont ask what the iCube can do for you, ask what you can do for the iCube.") Anyways, the saleman said that the light meant it was off. Ridiculous? My DVD player has a light that means its off!!!!
• It's now one of my life goals to see Wicked. 
• My other life goal is to be a holiday drunk.
• Don't ask.
  

Boy or Girl?!?

My sister just announced that her next ultrasound in February 9th, and they'll be looking to see what gender little Baby Boo will be. Just three weeks away. :)
So... what do you guys think?

What sex will Baby Boo be?

• Girl
• Boy

View Results
Create a Blog Poll

13 Week Belly Pic! (Christmas Day) 

"Clues"
She's craving both sweet and sour. (Ben and Jerry's Brownie Batter ice cream and sour skittles)
She's been INCREDIBLY sick.
She doesn't have any maternal instinct as to whether its a boy or girl.

January 20th

Happy Three Year Anniversary, DannyBear.

I love you!

Amazingly enough, today ended up being a SNOW DAY for the public schools. (UMaine still held classes. Glad Im not really on campus anymore!) So, we get to spend the whole day together. Not that we're doing much. I'm still in my pajamas. I'm probably not getting dressed today. Did some homework. Thawing out chicken for fajitas for supper! (I've been cooking a lot more lately.) And we're watching Glee. It's getting really good right now. Just watched "Vitamin D" and now it's almost to the point where Will finds out that Terri is a lying psycho. And its still snowing. Such a good day. :)

Countdown to the Return of Glee, Part 3

UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE,

MY BLOG HAS BEEN TAKEN OVER WITH MY OBSESSION WITH GLEE!

deal with it

Even if you don't like Glee, you seriously, SERIOUSLY should watch this. Its pretty friggin hilarious.





Oh Kurt Hummel, I do love you.

11 weeks til the return of Glee!

New Signature

So... I made a new signature using GIMP and brushes from deviantart. What do you guys think?

Win an iPod Nano?!?!

Juliana, over at a Blonde Walked Into a Blog, is giving away a Silver iPod Nano. For realskies.

Lazy Sunday

Ugh. So so so lazy today. I seriously did not get out of bed until 11:30 today. I didnt even usually sleep that late during break! I was up from about 8:30ish on, but just stayed in bed and cuddled with Danny. After he got up around 10:30, I did doze off a bit. I just did not feel good this morning. I think I need to take some vitamins... kick myself back into shape. So, once I finally got up, we went to the bank to deposit some money. Can you believe it? My bank is actually open on Sundays now!! I imagine theyre the only place in the area. TDBank... they're awesome.
Uhm... what else did I even do today?! Not very much. We got pizza for lunch, from Orono House of Pizza. Usually they're great. They have a deal where you get a large pizza, cheese bread, and a 2 liter bottle of soda for less than $20. And they deliver. So we get that, and we get jalapenos and pepperoni. But for some effed up reason, they thought that meant I wanted pepperoni on side and jalapenos on the other. Boo! I need pepperoni on my pizza, so I from that side and Danny ate the pizza with just jalapenos. Maybe I think twice before I order from them again...
Also, I started up my flickr account again. I was using for Project 365, which I failed miserably at. Now Im just putting up photos. Whatever I feel like putting up. Eventually, I really want a pro account so I can just put up everything good. I put ALL of my photos from old CDs and such on my laptop last night, so right now my flickr account has old pictures from 2006 and 2007. And Ive used 86% of my uploads for the month. No fun. You should check out what I have and leave some comments though!!

About to head off to visit friends for awhile. We havent seen them since I first got sick with H1N1. We were actually at their house when my fever first spiked. So, should be pretty fun.

Yawn

Yesterday was the longest day EVER and yet... Im more tired to today than I was yesterday.
My Fridays are just going to be rough. I student teach all day (8:30 to 3:30) and then work from 4-7:30. That's a long day. And it's all spent with children, who are awesome, but exhausting. But last night we turned around and went out to eat as soon as I got home. Our anniversary is Wednesday. Three years! <3 and we decided we'd go to Yoshi, this Japanese restaurant in Brewer that we've not been to yet. We decided to on a weekend because they were SUPPOSED to be serving bubble tea on weekends. I didnt like bubble tea when I tried, but Danny loves it. So we went there, for bubble tea, which they didnt have. But the food was great. Danny tried the kind of sushi where its a chunk of rice with a big old slimy chunk of raw fish on top. We normally just have the roll kinds. Anyways, he ate those. I didnt touch them. I'll stick for my veggies and COOKED fish sushi, which was delightful. In my bento box. I love bento boxes.
(Wow this post is rambly... oh well)
So yeah, long day last night. And then I got up at 9 AM this morning (Yay sleeping in!) to work from 10-3. An hour longer than my old weekend shift, but we always have tons we can do on weekends. We actually had to decide not to do something we'd wanted to do because we didnt have enough time. I love those shifts with my client, where we have so many fun things to do. Slow downtimes suck. Then he gets bored and I get bored and things dont go as well. Today was fun though.
And then I came home and died on the couch. No naps, just laying around moaning and groaning. I pulled a muscle in my right thigh yesterday snow shoeing and then walked in my Reebok EasyTones all day... not a great idea. And I'm a bit nauseous today. Not surprising considering the time of the month. No cramps, surprisingly, just feel like I've been run over. Not sure which is worth. But, nothing some Cold Stone creamery can't fix. YUM! The dudes making my ice cream were funny/slightly annoying. They were going to have one of them cross the counter and then THROW MY ICE CREAM over and supposedly catch it. Had they dropped it, I would have just walked out. Don't play with my food. Just give it to me. Turned out that the ice cream was too sticky or something, so they just wasted my time. Oh well. At least my ice cream was awesome.
Sooooo... yeah. Also changed my photo on all of my stuff. That other one was from London, which is awesome, but it was well over a year old. I needed a new one. It's a Christmas one though, so I'll try to take a better one of myself soon.

Friday Fill Ins

1. The lesson I learned yesterday was one big, ongoing lesson about just how amazing children's minds are.
2. I don't really have one set place where friends and family meet.
3. All these years have been leading up to this.
4. I knew I was going to love student when I arrived.
5. The truth is I think I was always meant to be a teacher.
6. Teasing him about cake is what I remember most from that day.
7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to sleeping, and not having to get up really early, tomorrow my plans include working until 3, then hanging out with Danny until Dad gets here and Sunday, I want to RELAX! And spend some time with friends!

Stop Lurking!

I just read on Ari's blog that today (as well as a couple of days ago, apparently?) is Delurker Day!! That means that all of you who read my blog and don't comment need to SHOW YOURSELF. I know you're out there. I get WAY more hits than comments.
So even if you never comment again, say hi for once would you?!

Also, some lovely comments would really make my day. My boyfriend got laid off today. :( It's not HORRIBLY tragic... He hated the job, and tons of people got laid off so it's not really unexpected. And he got some severance pay, and can collect unemployment... but still... it sucks.
At least we'll actually get to SEE each other now. I was student teaching/working six days a week, until 3:30 or later, and was working night shifts. He'd leave just before I got home from work and get home after I'd gone to bed. And I left in the morning before he got up. SUCKED. I didnt expect to see him until 8PM tomorrow. Kinda nice to have him home, but the lack of money is going to SUCK.

Loving student teaching though.

Countdown to the Return of Glee, Part 2

UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE,

MY BLOG HAS BEEN TAKEN OVER WITH MY OBSESSION WITH GLEE!

deal with it

I can not deny, I love me some Kurt Hummel. I think he is the most adorable little gay boy on TV right now. (Come to think of it though, I can't think of another show that I watch that has a gay boy... But that does not take away from how much I love Kurt.) Also, he has an amazing voice. Listen to this... you just can't deny it!







12 week until the return of Glee!

I don't know why I find this so hilarious

But I can not stop giggling. I think its the "Dad said we could" part. So typical. Hahaha

I can't even remember when this picture was taken. Maybe almost 2 years ago? My sister looks SO different now!!

First Day of Student Teaching

So, I survived my first day of student teaching!! It went really well. This week and next I'm just observing. Getting the feel of the school, the class, and the students. Then gradually I will be taken over most classroom responsibilities and just about all of the teaching. But at least for these two weeks, I get to relax a bit. Today was so nice... just watching, doing random things, helping the kids... no concern for any assignment I need to be completing. That comes tomorrow afternoon. But I get to enjoy it again tomorrow.
Everyone at the school is SO nice. The staff was very welcoming. I met a lot of the other teachers, and they all said I was so lucky to be placed with the teacher I'm with. That makes me feel really good about this semester. Even though Im not sure how my work load will be, Im still feeling good about this semester. I've heard that its a lot of work, but a friend I had seminar with last semester said that we should be able to handle it because we handled the professor we had last semester and she made everything 10 times harder. Mostly because we never knew what the expectations were. If we know the expectations, it'll be a breeze. I like that theory.
My students are so awesome as well. Second graders are SO much more mature than kindergarteners. Especially the girls. They all want to be best friends with their cool new young student teacher. :) I went to library with them and helped some pick out books. I hope they enjoy what I helped them pick! Sucks because I only know what I read as a kid, not the new "cool" stuff. But I bet Beverly Cleary and American Girls are still just as good now.
Im also VERY excited that my mentor teacher is getting an interactive whiteboard!! I dont know how to spell the brand name of that one she's getting. Prometheus I believe. Something like that. Anyways, I cant wait to play with it and hopefully plan so cool lessons for the kids using it!!

The only thing that sucks is that Im VERY tired right now. Not ready for bed, but more tired than I normally would be at 7:30. Tried to go to bed before midnight last night, but was about 1 before I fell asleep. And then I woke up at 6 and couldnt get back to sleep. Stayed in bed until 7:15, when I needed to get up, but I didnt sleep. So I got about 5 hours. Yuck. I was fine all day though. I probably wouldnt have been had I sat and just observed. I was up moving around all day. Sometimes just standing, but I wandered about and helped the kids out and ran a few errands for the teacher. (Photocopying, etc.) The tiredness would have hit me sooner had I just sat. Hopefully my body adjusts to this schedule pretty quickly.

Obsessed

So, if you follow me on twitter, you all know that I did get the new laptop I mentioned last week. It took some finagling with my finances and borrowing money from my dad (twice!), but I was able to purchase my Macbook Pro on Friday. Its a good thing too, because they're closed on weekend and only open until 4:30 on weekdays, so with student teaching, it'd make it hard to find the time to get to the computer store on campus to buy it. I was so thrilled that they even had it in stock! When I bought my first MacBook back in '06, and when Dad bought his, we had to order them, wait a few days, and then pick them up at a warehouse across campus. I had my laptop within 5 minutes of walking into the store and was home and turning it on within 10.

Its AMAZING. I love it. Its everything Ive ever wanted in a laptop. The graphics are AMAZING. Just looking at my desktop background blows me away. LED man, I'm telling you, its great. It also has a NVIDIA graphics card, which doesnt mean a whole lot to me, because I know very little about technology, but it definitely makes everything look pretty! Especially Sims 3. I can play Sims 3 on it!!! And it runs SO well. No lags, no skipping, no pixelated looking images. AND I can hear everything on it. My Macbook had such terrible sound. I took an online class and had to listen to the videos with headphones in because the sound was so quiet and muffled. With this, I can play music on it and hear it clearly from the bathroom. (TMI? Haha)

Best part... Danny bought me Sims 3 World Adventures Friday night. Yay!!! I've been playing SO much. Im addicted. Again. Its probably the best expansion they've ever come out with. I read somewhere that it was more like a sequel than an expansion, and this is true. Its like a game within a game. After I got it, Heather decided that she needed it as well, so in true Ashes and Heather style, we've been BBMing our Sim adventures back and forth.
I've found it most interesting to play with one character. So I created Hannah Meyers and made her travel all over the "world", completing adventures and such. Then I decided to stir things up a bit. Oh Hannah Meyers, such a home wrecker. I had her start a thing with Serge Ruelle, in France. He had a girlfriend and 3 children with her. And now he's married to Hannah. Whoops. So, where I left off, he moved to "America" (? What else am I going to call it?) to live with Hannah, and they're expecting a baby. Im hoping I can get Hannah back to Egypt before her bump shows so she can complete an adventure for her French visa. As soon as she gets all 3 levels, Im going to buy them a house in France so they can be around Serge's three kids. (Wow, am I into this or what?? Haha)

ANYWAYS, I want to introduce all of you to a new blogger!! His name is Jared and we've been online friends FOREVER. Since I was 15 or 16 I think. He just started a new blog called JPark Avenue. (We did LiveJournal and made our own websites way been when.) Go give him so blog love!

Xoxoyvonne's Giveaway

Just found this new blog and decided to enter her giveaway. I dont normally post stuff like this on my blog, but this definitely look like something all my lady friends would enjoy!

There's TONS of goodies in this giveaway, like..

1.bumpits
2.the turbie twist
3.loreal hip duo in lively
4.urban decay quickie
5.revlon cream shadow in skinlights
6.nyx ultra pearl mania in baby pink
7.revlon colorstay mineral eyeshadow in midnight gambet
8.LA colors eyeshadow pallet in wildflowers
9.elf contouring blush/bronzer
10.mark juice gems in fig
11.mac frost lipstick in what a do
12.maybelline lipstick in nude blush {G123}
13.rimmel lipstick in alarm {170}
14.revlon colorstay lipstick in so blushious {255}
15.revlon colorstay lipstick in mocha silk {210}
16.mark lash plumping mascara 


You can enter the giveaway here.

Friday Fill Ins

 My first go at this... could be fun.

1. There are places that I want to go. A lot of them.
2. I wouldn't mind if I could just blow those clouds away.
3. Standing in the crossroads.
4. Lions and tigers and bears... oh boy. Is that right?
5. He went out tiger hunting (Ha! I didnt even read this line before writing the last, I swear) and only caught a snail.
6. It's pretty much impossible to my mind from wandering .
7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to getting a good night's sleep, tomorrow my plans include purchasing, or at least ordering my new laptop! and Sunday, I want to play with it all day!

Change of Plans

The original plans for last night:

• Dinner with Danny's mother after work. Danny was supposed to work until 7, and then go over to his parent's house to wait until I got done work at 7:30. Then we'd determine a place to eat and go.

The mid-day change of plans:

• My mom is in town for the night, and asks if she can take us out to dinner. I tell her that we're eating with Danny's mom, but that she would love to have her join. 
• Plan to pick mom up at her hotel after work and then go over to Danny's parents' house and meet up with them.

And then here's what really happened...

• Got out of work and noticed I had 6 texts messages from Danny. He has to stay and work until midnight, so he's not eating with us. Also, his car is dead.
• Go meet mom at her hotel. We're hungry, so we're still going to eat. Decide we'll still have Danny's mother come eat with us, because she's waited til late to eat. 
• Go pick up Danny's mom. My mom REALLY wants to go to the Japanese restaurant that I look her to before. Danny's mom agrees, even though she doesn't like Japanese.
• Order our food. Mom and I get the same thing we got last time (Spicy Tuna Tempura Rolls, Volcano Rolls, and Hibachi Scallops. - We share.) Also, Mom gets a Margarita and I get a Pina Colada.
• Danny's mom takes forever to order, changes her mind 50 times, and confuses the heck out our poor Asian waitress. I had to repeat everything she said to the waitress in a clear, straight-forward way. Poor girl.
• Eat our delicious meal. Bring a whole lot of it home. 
• Mothers argue over who's paying for the meal. My mom wins.
• Bring Danny's mom home. 
• Realize that we can't jumpstart Danny's car with mom's car, because it's HUGE and we don't where the battery terminals are, even. Also, can't jump from my car because I dont dare even TOUCH my battery terminals after I almost got stranded in Freeport. 
• Ask Danny's car-savvy brother for help.
• Take mom back to hotel, go back to Danny's house to meet his brother.
• Fill up gas cans, because there's a chance he just ran out of gas.
• Contemplate how I'm going to kill Danny because we discussed not driving the car around on empty. and I tried to give him gas money and he refused.
• Go up to where Danny works, get his keys, fill gas tank, jump start car, freeze asses off. (It was like 10pm at this point)
• Thank Danny's brother, go inside, yell at Danny.
• Get home after 11 pm.   

Today has been somewhat more relaxed. Got up and went to the mall with mom. Got my free Aerie "In Love" lotion and Mom bought a few more tops. Disappointed because refund check from school didn't come, but not bothered because I dont get my paycheck until tomorrow anyways. After lunch with mom, chilled out here. And then I got a call from mom. My refund check came... to her house. Which has never happened before. Also, its $60 less than my invoice said it would be. Crap. So I called the bursar's office to see if it was a mistake. NOPE. My lender is now charging a fee on my loans now. What the crap, thanks for telling me. I'm not going to complain (much) about it though. I should consider myself lucky that they're even willing to give me money so that I can go to school. Just sucks because 1) I was depending on that money to get my Macbook and 2) Im still going to have to pay them back that $60+interest. I would have liked to actually have seen that money. Oh well...

Im gonna go eat a whoopie pie.

My Mom Loves Me

Senior in college and I still get care packages.
Hungarian nut bread and whoopie pies. My favorites!!!

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Countdown to the Return of Glee

UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE,

MY BLOG HAS BEEN TAKEN OVER WITH MY OBSESSION WITH GLEE!

deal with it

It was hard enough after the pilot in May to wait til September to see new episodes of Glee. I've been a Gleek since Day 1 and I know I'm not alone here. So this 4 month hiatus is killing me and I'm sure it is some of you too. So, from now until April 13th, I'm continuing the love and joy that we all experienced every Glee Wednesday here on my blog. (I apologize if you happen to hate Glee. Maybe this will help convert you.) Also, I have determined that April 13th is a Tuesday. How dare they move the day! Until then, my blog still recognizes Glee Wednesday.

Without further ado, the song that started it all. :)

13 weeks until the return of Glee!

Apple Love

You and I are going to get along just fine.

Macbook Pro... coming to my lap sometime next week.

Isabeau

Some new photos of my Dad's hawk, Isabeau, that I took while I was home for Christmas.  She is just SO intense for the camera; it's amazing. She'll sit right there and stare too. No fidgeting or trying to move around. Just... intense.

She's terrifying, if you ask me.

She really is a beautiful creature though.

And in case you were wondering, I take all photos of Isabeau with a telephoto lens. I admire her from a distance.

formspring.me

Ask me anything http://formspring.me/justtheashes

On My Mind

 I've been lacking blog inspiration the last few days, so in order to just give you guys SOMETHING to read, I'm making a list. We all love lists, right?

• I just found out that they're going to do an episode of Glee featuring all original songs. Uhm... No thanks. That's not why I watch Glee, and to me, that's not what a glee club is all about. I love love love the way "New Directions" interprets and performs cover songs. I'm SURE that this is a money deal. Its cheaper to do original songs and not have to pay for royalties, but COME ON. Like they aren't making a fortune selling the soundtrack and series DVDs. Way to be greedy.

• I wish I didn't have to nag my boyfriend to get him to do stuff around the house. I mean, I get that he's only been out of his parents house for 4 months and his mother did EVERYTHING for him. (and I mean everything. He never had a lift a finger) so he's not used to it, but my word it gets annoying. He'll do chores, if I ask him to. I just hate having to ask. You should do something if you see it needs to get done.

• Speaking of cleaning, Danny and I watched Wife Swap all afternoon. I like it, and there was nothing else on, so we watched it. I assumed Danny would HATE it and complain about the people the whole time, but it wasnt too bad. I mean, yes, we complained about the people on the show, but sometimes Danny gets so disgusted that he makes me turn stuff off. The biggest thing that irritates me about the people on the show, is that it tends to be one "partner" doing ALL of the housework and the other just being completely lazy. That is not partnership to me. The house is shared so the upkeep of the house should be shared. Plain and simple. UNLESS one the people is unemployed, and then yes, he or she should be doing the majority of the housework, but the other should pitch in some too. I live by the ideology that if you make a mess, you clean it up. And I LOATHE people who think that ALL cooking and ALL cleaning is "woman's work" regardless of whether the woman has a job outside the home or not.

• It hit me today that in ONE week, I begin student teaching. GAH! I feel SO unprepared for it. I really wish I had seminar BEFORE being there 2 days. Its a good thing my first two weeks are basically just observation. Id be so overwhelmed if I were expected to teach all day the first day. I am really excited about meeting the kids though. Ive met my mentor teacher and seen her classroom. Its really amazing. Now to just meet my little second graders! I hope they like me!

• Im really nervous about being without a laptop for the first two weeks of student teaching. I SHOULD have all the money for the laptop on the last Friday of those two weeks. But then I have to order it and wait to get it. And not having my laptop has already caused an issue. My supervisor for student teacher just sent me an email, and I can't open the attachment on this computer. To be fair, I wouldnt be able to open it on my new laptop either, because she sent it as a .docx file, instead of the standard .doc file. No idea while people do that. It just irritates me.

• I can not wait to buy my PINK Speck case for my laptop. I have a purple one for my current laptop, but it was never what I wanted. I asked for one for Christmas last year, and they only had purple, orange, and white, so my mom just got the purple. I liked it, but it was never true Ashes style. Now, to decide whether to get the satin, soft touch case or the regular hard plastic one, like I have now.  Obviously, I have a lot of time to decide, because I'll be spending every penny I have on my laptop, with nothing left over for pretty accessories. *sad face*

• Hannaford was completely out of ALL non-diet Barq's AND Mug rootbeer last night. This boggles my mind.

• Also, they have Valentine's cards out now, but not the candy. I need me some conversation hearts ASAP.

• After getting ALL of that snow, it's 40 degrees out and melting like crazy. WTH Maine, what kind of weather is this?!?!

• I don't know if the weather, or what, but my allergies are in full force this weekend. GAH!
  

We're Pretty Hardcore

It snowed today. A lot. And by a lot, I mean... a lot. I'm a Mainer, so I know what a lot of snow looks like.
I guess even more impressive than the amount of snow is the way the wind blew it all over the place. There's some places where the snow is piled up, literally, to my waist. It's insane!
We've watched it snow all day long, and just a bit ago decided that we really needed to get some pictures. I originally planned to just step out onto my patio (that's covered by the balcony of the apartment above mine) in my pajamas and take a few minutes of this car in the parking lot that the snow had blown off of in a neat way. And then I realized that the snow had blown all the way up to my sliding glass window. So I put some boots on, and Danny made me put on my jacket, and took the following series of photos.

My foot made this hole. Tee hee

So, after seeing how much was out my front window, I decided to go upstairs (Im on the bottom floor of a split level, so my front window is kind of down in a ditch) and see how things looked from out there.

HOLY CRAP.

 

Apparently, the National Weather Service is saying my town has gotten 5" of snow. Uhm, yeah.. sure.

 Yup. That definitely looks like 5 inches of snow to me.

Pffft.

Hey, at least he doesn't have to clean off his windshield.

I'm hoping to be able to sled out my kitchen window by morning.

I love how you can see the layers of snow! So cool

So, after I came inside from my little solo adventure just out the front door, I showed Danny my pics and he decided that we needed to go back out and try setting up the tripod and taking some pictures with the shutter open. Now... I must confess. I'm not an expert with my Nikon. In all honesty, I don't know what half of the settings do. Someday, I will educate myself and I'm sure it will make me way better photographer. But for now, I just go with it.  However, Ive figured some stuff out and can take a halfway decent in-the-dark on-the-tripod photo. (Remember my photos from vacation)

So we bundled up and headed out. Except by bundled I mean boots and jackets. Nothing else. No hats (except Danny, but he always wears one), no mittens, no scarfs, no layers. I didnt even have proper pants on! Just PJs and a tshirt. This is where the hardcore part comes in. :)

I think the result was pretty cool though.

 

You can say whatever you want, but I just love taking photos like these.

We're amazing.