Market Basket

I love these market baskets! I totally laughed when Andrew's mom showed up with one. I thought that I would never use one, and now, I'm hooked! I have a small one in pink, but I have my eye on a large one. I just got the small one, so for now it's the most amazing lunch basket ever! Okay, in all honestly, I gave the small basket to my mom and now her basket is the most amazing lunch basket ever; mine is being used to hold my knitting. Wow, carrying my knitting around in a picnic basket, you're jealous of my coolness, I knew it.


In all seriousness though, if you have a chance you should give one of these babies a try!

Vaccinated

I have been getting all of my shots for the nursing program. And being the genius that I am I decided that it would be a good idea to get an H1N1 shot just in case, why not?? Well, today I got a second TB test, apparently they don't trust just one, and swung on over for my H1N1 shot. Woo!
I felt really crappy after my seasonal flu shot but somehow thought this would be different. Hmmm.
Now I am sitting at my desk wishing I could go and take a nap, anywhere.
Did I mention the outrageous amont of chocolate I'm eating? There are just some times when other things hurt that I assume that eating gobs of comfort food will help. Not today.
Bummer.

Photo Class

In an attempt to learn more about my camera and to take better pictures I decided to take some tips from a class that Andrew's Aunt Jody is taking. She has passed some of the "assignments" on to me in order to challenge me. The first task was to take a picture of each of the following:

1. Someone you love

2. Two people you love

3. Your favorite food

4. A flower, tree or plant in your yard or nearby park

5. A landscape picture

6. A person or pet in action (i.e. a child riding a bike, someone running, etc.)

7. A candid photo (try not to let your subject know you're photographing them!)

8. A self-portrait (you can hold the camera out in front of you, take a photo of yourself in the mirror, or use a self-timer)

9. A favorite object in your home

10. A group portrait

Let it Snow!

Next week Andrew and I will be heading up to the mountains for a few days with his family. I am so looking forward to the first runs of the season! The ski report couldn't be better. As they say, we are truly being blessed by beautiful weather! Now it just has to last a few more days. I can't wait to ski fresh snow!

I love being called "Auntie Caitlin"

I love being "auntie" to my little Kira. We had a lot of fun together. And, look at those big, blue eyes!

I got to spend the last two days with the most beautiful little baby girl, my niece, Kira. She gives me so much joy! I went over on Monday and picked up Mom and Dad from the airport and then we met Josh and Kira for lunch and Claimjumper. Yum! Kira wasn't feeling it however. She gets really irritated when she gets hot, she prefers to be nice and cool. She let us know that she was not happy so Josh had said to take her outside, so of course I snatched her up and out we went. Literally the second I stepped outside she went from screaming to silence, even laughing. Silly baby! She knows what she wants! Mom and Dad took Kira for the rest of the afternoon so that Josh and I could do some Christmas shopping. What a blessing it is to be able to have time to spend with my brother, just the two of us, just hanging out! We didn't end up buying a lot but had a lot of fun none the less.

Hours later, after we finished shopping we went and picked up Kira from Mom and Dad at Aunt Cyn's house. It was very cool to see one of my aunts getting to coo over my niece. I can now relate to that feeling and really understand how special I am to my aunts and uncles. Anyway, Josh and I took off and stopped for some Starbucks on the way back to his house. I ran in to get the coffee and he stayed in the car with the baby. When I got back Josh had stripped down to his undershirt and was outside of the car cleaning the spit up off his messy daughter. It is moments like these that catch me off guard; seeing him be such a dad! He is such a wonderful dad! I just never imagined Josh getting down to the nitty gritty of laughing as he cleans up a messy little girl. I ended up sitting in the backseat of Josh's truck with her the whole way back to his house. It's funny how a little baby like that will just stare at you. So there she say, with hiccups, unable to take her eyes off of me. Melts my heart!!

The next morning we spent the day playing, dancing, feeding, picture taking and altogether just drooling over Kira! Josh and I had a very relaxing morning just being able to hang out together. We do not get time like that very often. We literally just HUNG OUT. Kira was in such a good mood and was totally smiley the whole time. One of the things that I love the most is the look she gets on her face when she sees her mom or dad. If I were holding her on Monday night she was cool with it, but then she would spot either Shawna or Josh and she would just break into smiles! Then the next day when she was familiar with me, she would bust into the same smiles when she saw me! What a beautiful little girl, what a gift!! Mom would hold her and she would look around for me until she found me and then flash me a huge, fall-in-love-with-me smile.

Playing with Dad. They are dancing here. It cracks me up because he holds her up and she likes to move her hips back and forth.

I am so lucky to be her aunt. My brother and Shawna have given me the most amazing gift in Kira.

Partners

I have the best fiance ever! Really, truly, he spoils me!! It is super cool to be in the period of our relationship where we are really just coming into the partnership in everything. It is so cool to have been given this guy that just steps in to help me out when I crumble. I have a tendency to get stressed out a little more than he does. Just a little. Maybe that's an understatement, but either way, he stays calm when I am bite-your-head-off crabby. This morning was a little rough, I was running around trying to get out of the door, the roads were icy, I made it part way to work and realized that I was driving Andrew's car because he had let me use it to take over the pass and I had gotten home late and hadn't had a chance to drive over to his house to switch our cars back. That meant that my car was with at work, and with my car, were my car keys, and with my car keys were my work keys, and no one else was going to be at the office! ERg! So I turned around and drove out to Andrew's office on the other side of town, got my car and my keys and headed to work. When I arrived at work one of our maintenance crew guys reminded me that the office Christmas party was tonight, TONIGHT?!?!? I thought it was tomorrow, in fact I was SURE it was tomorrow! I had not made the dip that I had offered to bring and I hadn't gotten any white elephant gifts to exchange. Wow I was really 0 for 3 this morning! BUT Andrew, calm as can be gives me a huge hug when I show up to get my keys, about as crabby as can be, then when I told him about the party he offered to go and pick up white elephant gifts for both of us. Did I mention that while I was gone in Seattle he stayed at my parents house to watch the cats, which he is allergic too??


I am just so thankful, today especially, that I have been given such a good partner! I am so excited to marry him!

Seattle Half Marathon

After Thanksgiving Andrew and I headed to the west side to run the Seattle Half Marathon. We met Naomi there and Lauren and Garrett were kind enough to host all of us. Lauren even decided to sign up the night before! She's such a tough gal! She totally went for it and kicked butt!

We look fierce, don't we? Ready to conquer those 13.1 miles!

Not so fierce, but fun!

After the race, back and L and G's place. We were blessed with perfect weather: 50 degrees and no rain! It was such a nice day to be running and such a gorgeous course. Starting at the Space Needle was a great kick-off. Lots of hills to this course, but nothing the four of us couldn't handle. It was fun to see everyone's reaction to the race afterwards. I am so proud of Andrew, Lauren and Naomi for doing such a good job and having such a good race!

Thanksgiving Weekend

I had a very fun filled Thanksgiving weekend! It was filled with lots of friends and fun. Many, many things to be thankful for. Here is what I was up to:

Got to spend two days with Naomi and Lauren. We (well mostly Garrett, but we shopped) made an awesome dinner from Whole Foods, my favorite grocery store. I think that I would be really poor if I lived any closer to one! I might be poor, but I would be WELL fed.

Andrew and Naomi and I shopped our way through Pike Place Market.

Mom and I spent Thanksgiving morning just the two of us. Dad was visiting him Mom and Andrew was golfing. I watched the parade, went for a run, and helped Mom cook dinner. It was SO relaxing and very enjoyable! I made her take this picture with me. She wasn't happy about taking pictures in jammies with no showers, but these are memories!

Lauren and Garrett spent some time on our side of the mountains, fun to meet up with them!

Getting Crafty

I am learning how to sew. Mom is a good teacher, but she's much more of a perfectionist than I am. Project pictures to come.