2009 in Pics

I wasn't much of a blogger last year so maybe a quick glimpse into last year will make up for months of absence.

January

We rang in the New Year in the big apple! We saw as much as many Christmas trees as we could and as many sites as our cold bodies would allow.

February

Took a quick trip down to Orlando, Morris attended a conference and we enjoyed seeing our friends the Craguns.

Was surprised by a surprise birthday breakfast with good friends.

March

Spent a weekend in Charleston, SC. Loved it there.

Had a chance to visit with the Henriods before they headed back to California.

Ran the Monument Ave. 10K with friends. Morris showed his support but volunteering and cheering me on along the course.

Met up with UCLA friends in DC for the Cherry Blossom festival.

Convinced the Shamos to spend a few more days with us in Richmond.

April

More time with UCLA friends, this year the AAO meeting was in Boston and we had fun seeing these faces.

We were lucky enough to see the Shamos again in Boston.

Janae and I at the library.

Boston Public Gardens

May

Had to go see what all the OBX fuss was all about. Spent the weekend in the Outer Banks of North Carolina and loved every second of it, even the brutal sun burn I returned home with.
And the friends who made it possible, thank you Hendrys for letting us crash your family vacation. We will happily invite ourselves on any future trips.

June

Had a visit from Papa Morris. We spent a Sunday afternoon visiting Civil War battlefields.

Morris had a conference at the Greenbrier in West Virginia. One of the most memorable "vacations" we have ever had. I know who knew in West Virginia?

We played many games of shuffle board and decided we will be putting a court in our backyard--one day.

In front of the Greenbrier. I want to go back.

July

Made it to Utah for the festivities. All of my sissies + Mamma came to the celebration at the Pooles.

And the Hendrys.

We were able to sneak up to Bear Lake for a few days to spend some time with the Pooles

And then up to Park City for some r & r with my side of the family.

I was also able to spend a girls weekend with some old roomies.

Celebrated our anniversary with a night at Coldplay.

August

Headed up to Hershey, PA to spend the weekend with Ben and Heidi. Went to Chocolate World

Learned about the Amish and took in some sites in Lancaster County, ate too many cider donuts and drank too much Amish Root Beer and not enough Hershey ice cream.

September

Spent another weekend in the city I love, New York City.

We helped the Lees move into a new place to get ready for Baby Boy and Baby Girl and enjoyed spending time in the city with good friends.

I got back in the chair and let Morris put braces on me. He put lingual braces on me (on the backside of my teeth) so I can avoid being called "brace face" for the next two years.

October

Went to Lake Gaston, NC for the weekend. It was unusually warm and on Sunday we weren't ready to come home so the girls decided to stay an extra day. Thanks again Joy and Ted.

It took a few seasons but he finally got it and has the T-shirt to prove it. At UCLA they always managed to get to the championship but just couldn't get the W. This year the VCU residents were able to take the all school championship in intermural football.

Dressed as Mary Poppins and Bert for our ward Halloween party.

November

We took advantage a warm day in November and visited the home of George Washington; Mount Vernon.

We attended a wedding near Pittsburgh, PA. I was really more interested in spending the weekend with Tiffany, a friend from high school who lives near Pburgh. The weekend went way too fast but it was so great to see Tiffany and her cute family.

December

We hosted a mustache and ugly sweater party for the ortho residents. There was a few classic outfits (and a few completely wrong) that will certainly not be forgotten.

My brother Ben had an interview at VCU for residency and he brought Heidi and Max along with him. We were so happy to have visitors and to see family at Christmas.

A huge snow storm hit while they were here so we were stuck inside for a few days and Ben couldn't get out of town so he missed an interview in Boston. I had no complaints about the extended stay and more cuddle time with this cute guy.

Our last Christmas spent away from family, thank goodness we have the Hendrys who invited us over for Christmas dinner and made us feel right at home.

And now a frest start for 2010!

Oh, by the way...

...this is my current physique
It's true, we are expecting!

A sweet little baby BOY due the end of April. Yeah, I know I am a bit late in my announcement. We have had a few bumps in the road on this journey that has made me a bit more than a nervous Nelly about sharing the good news.

Things are going very well and I am enjoying the little love taps I have started to feel from our little guy and the return of a mostly normal life.

We are so grateful for the many prayers that have been said on behalf of our little family and thank you for your concern and support.

Can't Wait!

9:43:21

Total time spent on the phone with Dell operators overseas attempting to fix my broken computer.

Lets cross our fingers I am not on the phone with Giriraj for a little while.

Off on a fun weekend vacation, I will finally update when I get back.

The Low Country

I don't think a lifetime would have been long enough to enjoy all the charm and history of this wonderful city. Morris and I made a quick trip down to Charleston, SC "The Low Country" this weekend and loved every minute of it.

We visited Middelton Place-one of the many gorgeous plantations in Charleston. The grounds and gardens were beautiful, we were a little to early to enjoy the azaleas but we did get to see the last remains of the camellias.
We were able to stay with our good friends, the Henriods, from UCLA. They were excellent hosts and tour guides.

This is the main house on the plantation, it is pretty amazing, especially the waterfront view of the Ashley River.

Side note: The Ashley River runs along one side of town and the Cooper River on the other (I think) well anyway pretty much everything in town is named Ashley something or other. I think that means I need to move there or at least visit time and time again.

One of my favorite things we did and a must do if you ever visit the city is take a horse drawn carriage ride.

The tour took us through historic downtown Charleston and gives you a little background on the homes and architecture. It really was great.

Another must do when in the south; eat something and everything fried (except for the peanuts, they boil those so they actually end up being more like beans, I was a fan-Morris not so much). So fried lunch is what we did. We had our first taste of Hush Puppies (fried cornmeal dough with jalapenos), actually they were pretty good. Fried baked potatoes, fried shrimp, fried fish, I think they even fried our coke. You get the point, basically a heart attack.

Charleston is a great walking city. We walked all over downtown and saw some other sites that were not included on our tour.

We saw Rainbow Row...

Waterfront Park, Mt. Pleasant Bridge, Fort Sumter (from a distance), The Battery area and shopped in The Market.

Oh lovely beach, how we have missed you.

The Carolina beaches were so pretty and such a welcomed site after a long winter. We walked around Folly beach and drove around dreaming about owning one of the many beautiful beach homes for sale.

We took a walk along the sand to the Morris Lighthouse, I really think we are meant to live here; a river and now a lighthouse just for us.

The whole weekend we were Gator hunting. We had heard rumors of gators in these parts but we didn't see any until Sunday afternoon. As soon as we went outside to get some proof he snuck back into his pond.

He really is there, just between Morris and Joel along the bank of the pond.

P.S. This is right in the Henriods backyard. Yes, this is correct they have gators in the backyard.

Oh and Morris had a little girlfriend the whole weekend. It was pretty cute to see the little crush Clara had on him and how excited she was to be near Morris, I think he secretly loved every minute of it.

Here is the close up of the alligator.

Thank you Henriods for the wonderful weekend, we loved it.

For Milah

She turned ONE and had this Very Hunry Caterpillar cake.

Rainy LAX Game

It rained and poured. Last week we went to Charlottesville, VA to watch the UVA Lacrosse team play Towson. UVA is ranked #1 in the country so Morris really wanted to make it to a game this season. We were hoping the weather would clear up but no such luck.
Look at all of these devoted fans. UVA came out on top and beat Towson by 9 points.

This is how passionate my husband is about Lacrosse and why we stood in the rain for hours watching the game.

Confession: I was freezing and finally gave into my numb fingers and toes and went and sat in the car for the 4th quarter and read my book in the nice warm car. Morris did however stick it out for the entire game.

Williamsburg

The weather was so beautiful this weekend so we decided to take advantage of the spring temps and spend some time enjoying Colonial Williamsburg. It felt so nice to be out minus all of our winter gear.

We had lunch at the yummy yummy Cheese Shop in Merchants Square. Seriously some delicious sandwiches. Morris was feeling patriotic so he had Virginia Ham (we are famous for our ham), I stuck to my regular turkey; not because I wasn't feeling patriotic, I am just a turkey.

I think it is a requirement to take this photo when you are in Williamsburg--so we did.

Um, I guess Williamsburg is a dog friendly city. Can you believe this?

Fun weekend with my fun husband. Love the warm weather, please come back and see us again soon.

Luv Notz

I spent a few weeks in Seattle in February with these cute kids. As a Christmas gift to the two oldest ones my brother and his wife asked me to fly out and help them decorate their rooms in their new place. They recently moved from Texas to Seattle and the long winter has got them all singing the Texas blues.

They do not have any of the furniture in the new house yet so these pictures don't show the final product but here is a sneak peak of what the kids and I came up with.

Clayton wanted a blue room with big maps on the wall. The blue is a bit darker than it looks in the photo. The bedding and window treatments are dark blue and of course huge maps on the wall. Clayton was a big help in getting the frames painted for the maps.


Hailey also wanted a blue room but with green as well. So her walls are a lighter blue with cute polka dots. You can't see the white dots that are there as well. Her bedding is green with white polka dots and cute sheer window treatments with green polka dots. She helped me pick out the paper and all the work on her name letters. Oh and she has a cute blue and green rug too.

Just after I got home, these cute "luv notz" showed up in the mail, I love these kids and the phonetic spelling of a kindergartner.

Thanks for the fun trip. Hope you are happy with your new rooms.

?

69 degrees in 5 days. Looks like we are getting out tomorrow. YEAH!

Why is it that...

I buy the greenest bananas I can find and less than 24 hours later they are covered in brown spots and too mushy to eat?

After 9 months of not having a job I still don't feel compelled to get one?

The best place for us to be right now is thousands of miles from family and friends and all I really need is to be near them?

I put on work out clothes every day but only manage to get in a work out in about every other day? (Isn't putting on the clothes the hardest part?)

They don't sell Girl Scout Cookies year round? (I picked mine up yesterday, mmmmm)

You can take a bus to NYC for only about $15 and I have only done this twice in the 9 months of living in Virginia?

I plan to go to bed about 10 pm each night, and actually start getting ready for bed at 9:30 but still am awake at midnight?

In nearly 4 years of marriage our family is still not +1?

Just a few thoughts for the day.

Who Dunit?

Not us. On Saturday night Morris and I went to a Murder Mystery party to celebrate Ted turning 30!

Who do you think looks the most guilty?
We had a great time at the party and loved our first MM party even though we were the only ones with ridiculous costumes on. I used my very armature sewing skills to make my apron and head piece thing. We borrowed Morris's chauffeur hat from my Dad, yes he still wears it but don't worry he has others.

Thanks Joy and Ted for being our friends and for inviting us to your fun party. We had a great night.

P.S. It was the cute girl in the Boa (Kim) and her accomplice happened to be her funny husband (Brad) the old crazy security guard.

But I already have Spring Fever

Not an ounce of snow until March 1st. It started snowing last night and has not stopped. It was nearly in the 70's last week and now snow.

The only car missing from the parking lot was Morris's. Everything in town is closed but Morris had a conference today (and he was not happy about it).

More Birthday

I think birthday festivities should last all month long and should get at least two posts on the blog--so here you go. My birthday fell on a Sunday so we did celebrate most of the weekend. I am still working on convincing my husband that month long birthday parties are the way to go.

On Saturday night we went to dinner at Maggiano's--I was really only interested in the Creme Brulee, it is a huge serving.
Sunday morning Morris surprised me with breakfast in bed, complete with strawberries and fresh whipped cream.

I love all of the surprise breakfasts, just wish cameras were not involved every time. The post is just not that exciting without them.

Thanks for the birthday wishes, cards, treats, breakfasts, gifts and love.