gingerbread house fail

They never turn out like the box. Really.

look what I got today!

Sufjan Stevens sings Christmas Carols! Yes, please!

Sometimes, I love my job.

Breaking in the new couch, table and chair no one is allowed to touch by a roaring fire on the High School Highlight Reel.

Apple Butter!

Mmmmmm....apple butter! I love family traditions that come back. Such good times I had when I was little everyone getting together and stirring a bubbling cauldron of apple butter-goodness, tasting all the time. Spending an entire day with the family, eating, talking, relaxing. Good times. I'm glad we got to do this again this year. Not only was I missing apple butter, but it's good to be with family! Although, I did get tired of hearing the story of when I was little and the cinnamon in the apple butter was really strong and burned around my mouth.

Hello America!

The long awaited day has finally arrived! Luis is now an American citizen! All the paperwork and applications and interviews are over! Yay!

how to make a thesaurus

For one of my grad school classes I have to construct a thesaurus on a specific topic that could be used for indexing. I chose sailing cause I love it. The terms have to be related hierarchically and so in order to keep track of them I wrote them on index cards and hung them up on the wall. Luis enjoyed them very much. And it made me feel smart, like the guys with their boards of equations in The Big Bang Theory. hahaha. Anyway, when I took them off of the wall to type them Luis was very upset. But I am almost finished with my project, I just have to type up the introduction, and I am very happy.

In a side note, I just watched like 4 Christmas related commercials....

More Apple Recipes

mmm......apple pie, how I love you. This was only my second try at making an apple pie, and it's only a little burnt. Still delicious though. I still have MORE apples that I need to try and do something with before they get soft.

apple cinnamon bread

My first attempt at baking something with the apples I picked on Sunday. I made apple cinnamon bread, it needs more cinnamon and maybe something else spice-wise, but overall it tastes pretty good. I may make some more. Luis is campaigning for an apple pie, so that will probably be next. And I'm getting better at peeling apples, but I still suck at it.

The recipe is here

apple picking!

Nothing says fall like a trip to the apple orchard/pumpkin patch. On Sunday, I got to go to Evans Apple Orchard with some friends from grad school. I haven't been apple picking in a long time, so it was good fun picking the apples off the tree. Unfortunately, for every apple I picked another one fell on the ground. Whoops! I also got some delicious apple cider and caramel apples. Man, I love fall. And the weather was amazingly beautiful the whole time. I ended up with almost a peck of apples, which I didn't realize until later--that's a lot of apples. There didn't seem to be a lot of apples on the trees, but we managed to find some good ones.

Weekend at Bingley's

Last weekend I dog-sat Brack's dog Bingley. It was a fun weekend, filled with watching the entire second season of The Big Bang Theory and playing with Bingley. It was fun to pretend I had a dog for the weekend, but am kinda glad that it is done with and I don't have a dog. One day when I have more time and patience, but that's not today. But isn't he so cute?

SOCCER!

Luis and I went to a MLS game on Saturday. This was my first ever soccer game (aside from an Emerson College one) and Luis' first in the States. Obv. we were both excited. I was mostly excited because I wanted to watch David Beckham play before he abandons us and flees back to Europe. But alas, it wasn't meant to be. Apparently he injured his ankle and didn't fly to Columbus with his team. Damn him. Anyway, after much debate about whether to make the three hour trek in the rain to watch a Beckham-less LA Galaxy play the Columbus Crew (who comes up with these names?) we decided to go and take our chances. And I must say, it was worth it. Luckily it didn't rain during the game! And the Crew won! so a good time was had by all. I never realized how intense soccer is, and how if you take your eyes off the game you'll probably miss something. So different from baseball. Good times, and I can truthfully say now, I enjoy soccer. And I'm already planning another game next summer.

Red Helmet

Who knew coal mining could be so intense? I just read this book, and it was quite good. It's about a woman from New York who ends up working in a coal mine. There's this whole romance there as well, but the coal mining part was really intense. Homer Hickam grew up in a coal mining town, and worked briefly in a coal mine so you can always count on his books to be true to the profession. This was interesting cause you really got an inside look of the life of a rookie coal miner. Very good!

Luis is amazed that I am still able to read for fun while taking classes, he keeps asking me how I have time for it. I told him I read in one of my textbooks that a good librarian is always reading a book, usually more than one. So I'm well on my way!

happy birthday to me!

mmmmm....the delicious cupcake made up for the terrible movie. don't see Adam, spare yourselves.

hello grad school

Welcome to grad school. Oh man, I've been so excited for this for so long and now that it's here I'm ready for it to be over. So much work. All the time. Luis keeps mentioning the massive amount of books I have to read for my Children's Lit class (this is most of them) and how he keeps finding books everywhere. But the good news is, a week into classes and I've read the 2000 Caldecott Winners! I also joined the ALA and the YALSA (Young Adult Library Services Association). Good times. But of my three classes this one, Children's Literature is definitely going to be my favorite. I'm also taking Information in Society (not too bad) and Information Representation and Access (blah). And crazy note, apparently when my mom got her Masters at UK she had the same proffesor as me for the Representation class (although it was called something different then).

Yuko-En

Luis and I went to Yuko-En, the Japanese Garden in Georgetown, KY. Last year one of our reporters did a segment about this place and made it look amazing! So we went and checked it out -- it's actually kinda lame. There was very little wildlife, and a koi pond that looked like a swamp. Also, it's right off the highway so it's incredibly loud. It justs goes to show that you can make anything look good with the power of video and editing. But I love this red bridge.

hello herbs

hello new blog. hopefully i will be able to update this one more often than the book one.

I love the end of summer, it finally starts to cool off, my birthday is close and we get to enjoy a surplus of our garden! We grew green peppers this year, and that's the first one. It was sweet and delicious. I made some end of summer pesto and am currently drying oregano and thyme to use throughout the year. I'm also getting ready to whip some herb butter using various herbs from our garden. I've decided next year we're going to try for tomatoes and whatever else I can think of between now and then. I can't wait!

Also, speaking of my birthday, this year will be the first time since high school I have had class on it. My first full day of classes is Sept. 1. Crazy.