Save the Dates! Yay!

So I've decided that many many years from now, when I really want to torture the grandchildren with stories of my youth, I'll want to talk about our wedding. And I'll want the internet to stand as a witness that we actually did some pretty cool stuff (at least to me!). So tonight I'm going to share our Save the Dates.
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(If you'd rather be surprised about these details, no peeking!)
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I am SO excited that the vast majority are out of our hands and on their way to hopefully adorn the refrigerators of the people we love most in the world. We did them ourselves, which was something I was set on from the very beginning, and I'm very happy that we did!

First and foremost, I wanted to find a rubber stamp that would be the workhorse of our invitations and general wedding themeness (totally a word). After months of searching, I found one that I LOVED and it was totally on. Having never used stamps in a crafty way since elementary school, I had to gather all the needed supplies.



After making decisions about color, paper and font and gathering all the addresses we were ready to go. Until, of course, our printer decided to be a total pain in the ass and hate us and not want us to get married. I mean, what had we ever done to the printer to deserve hours of torture until Kyle had to hand feed every card while resisting every urge to through the thing out the window. Ugg.

Kyle, of course, has the patience of a saint and eventually we had a stack of beautifully printed cards.

Next came the stamping and embossing which were really fun! Every time the embossing powder melted and was all pretty I couldn't help but grin like an idiot. Yay!

As our very first DIY wedding project it was truly a learning experience. Having personally worked on every one of our Save the Dates made me feel like I was wonderfully invested in making our wedding just how we want it to be. Of course, it took three times longer than I had expected so next time I'll have to be sure to factor in all the "Murphy's Law" moments that are bound to pop up. Overall, though, I would do it again in a heartbeat!

Two Truths and a Lie

My second week of classes is done! Yay! Things are really shaping up to be very interesting this semester to say the very least. I def. came home several times ready to rant and rave about the totally insane things that people had said in class. Some of the things were unreal! So, instead of ranting and raving here, we'll play a little game. Can you tell which one is the lie?

1. 
   
   In a Politics class we were discussing a MA school that uses aversive therapy on severely autistic and mentally disabled children. The school uses negative reinforcement to alter behavior. Techniques include withholding food, sleep, and giving the children electric shocks. The question at hand was why the state legislature had been unable to stop what we essentially agreed was state funded child abuse. A fellow classmate then raised her had and said, "Um, I'm not sure I see the governments role in this. I mean, if parents choose to have their kids, like, abused or something, shouldn't we just let market forces act to get the school to close?" It took all my power not to punch her in the face.


2. 
   
   In an Epidemiology class, we were asked to complete a take home assignment. At the end of the class when the assignment was handed in, we broke into groups to go over the correct answers with a TA. One woman gave an answer that was very clearly incorrect and argued about it for ten minutes. It was painful, and I was embarrassed for her. It would be like if someone said that 2 x 2 = 6 and refused to accept that they were wrong. It was that basic of a concept. Ugg.


3. 
   
   This same crazy Epi girl decided that our TA was not up to snuff and stormed out of our room. She decided to join the group next door because our group was going too slowly. When that group was not giving her answers fast enough she yelled out, "I don't mean to be a bitch, but can't we go faster? I need to go."* When the TA didn't pick up the pace, she stormed out.

Now this is def. cheating because all three are true. And the most unbelievable thing of all is that I'M GETTING THE SAME DEGREE AS THESE PEOPLE.

On a lighter note, I finished knitting something this week!

It's pretty and pink and I kinda love it. I'm still not convinced I'm a hat person but with this I'm willing to give it a try!

Perfect Thursday Night

Homemade cookies, Starbucks and lots of knitting! Yay!!

First Week Recap

Despite a huge snowstorm Monday, my second semester of classes got underway. This semester the schedule is a bit different so I have two afternoon classes and some classes that are only half the semester long. So even though I'm taking 18 credits it should feel like much less. Now I know that first impressions aren't always the best, I'm going to share my snap judgements about this semester based on just a few hours of class time. ;)

Monday, Class 1: This is my management requirement and the class that I'm most worried about. Not because it seems particularly difficult but because it's a bit touchy-feely and way out of line with really anything I've studied before or am remotely interested in. It certainly doesn't help that the most irritating student program is in the class and is already making my crazy with her loud mouthed ass kissing? Sigh. But maybe this will be a real learning opportunity!

Monday, Class 2: I've had this professor before and am totally excited about this class! It's a little numbers heavy so I may have to reassess in a few weeks to see how I'm feeling about it then.

Tuesday: While this class is only 8 weeks long, it should be totally awesome! If the prof. can get herself together...She was a bit all over the place and even managed to insult a student or two with her assessment of the personal stories they shared in class. And our first guest speaker was all over the map and seemed to have had twelve too many redbulls before he arrived. Not too helpful. But the content has a lot of potential!

Wednesday: I have really high hopes for this class! It's all about obtaining the practical skills to work for health care reform which sounds amazing. I was a bit concerned, however, that our first assignment involved reading a transcript from Oprah. Oprah! Needless to say it was PAINFUL and we haven't even talked about its relevance yet. Maybe next time?

Thursday: This class is going to be awesome! The Prof. wore a jacket with leather elbows!! (Clearly a mark of academic excellence) It's my only non-policy centered class so I'm really looking forward to something a little different. Yay!

Books that make me happy...and not so much

Last week Kyle and I both got a few post-Christmas presents for ourselves. Kyle got a new video game to keep him company once my classes start and I got these.

The DIY Bride book is so awesome that I just keep looking through it and daydreaming about being crafty! And the pictures are so pretty! I didn't manage to do any non-school related reading last semester so I'm setting the goal of finishing Atonement by the end of finals. Sadly, I'll be really happy to make that goal!

Since classes start Monday, I've also had to get my books and readers for the semester.

Looking at this stack, my initial thought was that there is no way in hell that I'm going to be able to read every piece of very expensive paper in this pile before the end of the semester. When I was standing in from of the Kinkos counter buying them all, they were so expensive that I was actually sick to my stomach. So expensive, in fact, that two days later I was unable to use my bank card to get my morning cup of coffee because the bank had flagged the purchase as "suspicious card activity!" No no, just my nerdiness getting in the way of my buying groceries. ;)

Favorite 2007 Knitted Object

So I thought that as 2008 gets underway I would put up my favorite knitted things from 2007 as a way of chronicling my knitting accomplishments. Turns out, there wasn't a whole lot of substance to my knitting this year! There were several unsuccessful sweater attempts and some really fun socks, but there is a clear winner in terms of my favorite project of the year. My Jaywalker Socks!
I am a little bit in love!! They are my first pair of actual socks, since my first sock attempt ended with one completed sock and one that's still, two years later, sitting on the tiny needles.

These socks are so lovely I couldn't help but finish them! The yarn is awesome (Tofutsies) and the colors are super fun, all pinks and blues and greens.

I think I may wear them to my first night of classes next week because it's always fun to start the semester wearing something special. :)

Seriously? These are your health care reform proposals??

So now that the primaries are actually underway and we're not just talking about them anymore, I want to share my real disappointment with the health care reform proposals of the major Democratic candidates. I wrote an essay on the plans of Obama, Edwards and Clinton and while my first thought was, "Cool! I really get this stuff now!" my next thought was, "Wow. This is a bunch of the same old crap that doesn't actually get us anywhere. Sigh."

In many ways, the proposed reforms of all three are strikingly similar. They all focus on reforms to the current system of public and private insurance and embrace the “play or pay” mentality of mandating employers to provide health insurance for workers or pay taxes for failing to do so. Concurrently, they propose varying methods of increased insurer regulation, creation of public insurance programs and maintenance and expansion of current public insurance programs. Clinton and Edwards also include individual insurance coverage mandates in their proposals, much like the recently implemented system in Massachusetts. Finally, cost controls that are centralized to the federal government are generally lacking from all three proposals.

I find all of this really depressing. None of these proposals actually address the root causes of the health care crisis and by focusing on getting everyone covered we'll probably miss the boat in terms of getting everyone care. The individual mandates experiment in MA is very young and it seems insane to me to try something on a national scale that has no evidence of success. Most distressing is the fact that none of the candidates really address controlling costs in meaningful ways, and individual and employer mandates will really only mean a lot more of the same and even more astronomical health costs. Why doesn't anyone have the gall to address the clinical and administrative wastes that arise from the dysfunctional relationship between doctors that charge fees that are too high and insurance companies and the government (Medicare being, by far, the worst offender in my opinion) that reimburse at rates so low it's almost comical. And the fact that pharmaceutical companies make the majority of their worldwide profits in the U.S. because we have no way (or desire, it would sometimes seem) to set and negotiate drug prices on a national scale. Grrr!

I think the thing that is most frustrating for me is that if one of these candidates is elected president there is going to be a lot self-congratulation in terms of health care reform. But in order to give every American a little card that says "I'm insured!" we'll end up passing out policies with huge premiums and high co-pays and many will still be unable to actually access care! I guess I don't have to worry that my degree will be useless when I graduate. There seems to be no exhaustion of opportunities to fight for care for all in the near future.

My First Bridezilla Moment

It finally happened...like I knew it would. I have promised myself at every step of the wedding planning process that I will not get stressed or crazy and I'll enjoy every moment. I've repeated with mantra consistency to myself and anyone within earshot that everything will be funfunfun! and there will be no bridezilla behavior out of me. Well, this evening I had my first brush with the totally awful she-beast and it was completely terrifying.
Actually, it was a bit like an out of body experience. One moment I was talking to my mom on the phone about ordering my aunt's bridesmaid dress from the 100 year old grandma running the local dress shop and the next I was looking down at my body as I wound myself to near hysterics about the possibility that the dress was ordered in the wrong fabric and oh my gosh that would totally be the end of the world!
For context, picking out bridesmaid dresses has been pretty stressful. And now that it's time to order them, the stress hasn't really diminished. While I was home over Christmas, I took my aunt and my little cousin (The cutest flower girl alive. Seriously.) to a shop pretty close to our house that had the dress at a reasonable price. As soon as we walked in, the trouble began. The proprietor immediately told me that I wouldn't be able to change the fabric of the dress from the incredibly intimidating iridescent taffeta to a much more acceptable satin backed crepe in a really beautiful raspberry color. In all her 40 years in business this had never happened! Having spoken to the company that makes the dress only a week before, I knew she was wrong but I was of course as nice as could be and she agreed to call and check.
The call came in today that I was right and that the dresses could be changed to any damn thing I wanted for a nominal fee (which the charming proprietor suggested they increase because I had quoted the manufacturers price and clearly she wouldn't be making an even greater profit if she didn't charge for the extra work it took to write down three more words!).
So obviously my faith in this woman's ability to navigate us safely through the dress buying process if nonexistent. (As if there is any excuse for the panic I'm about to describe) When I heard that my aunt had placed her order for the dress in crepe. Just crepe? PLAIN crepe? Not satin backed crepe? A fabric that is completely different than what we decided on and that will be gross and terrible and the most hideous thing in the whole world and who cares if we're getting married because the dress will be in the wrong f*ing fabric CREPE??? So after having my mom read the order slip to me 10 times I pulled myself together enough to call the shop just to check that everything was ok.
And, as expected, the charming proprietor of this charming shop once again made me feel like a total idiot. "Yes, of course we know what you want and ordered that. We just wrote down crepe so she'd know not to expect taffeta. You are so damn demanding I don't get paid nearly enough implied."
In retrospect, I think I held it together pretty well. Even if there were several seconds where the thought of a bridal party is mismatched fabrics was nearly enough to make my brain ooze out of my ear.
So long as I can keep all of my freak outs mostly internal, this whole thing will be funfunfun and I won't ever be a bridezilla again!

What's in a Name?

When I first started toying with the idea of blogging, I wanted to find a name that would really reflect me and not be totally cheesy or weird. I’ve always loved this poem, particularly when I’ve felt stressed or overwhelmed.

My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends--
It gives a lovely light!
Edna St. Vincent Millay

Wanting to capture the fact that at the start of grad school this would probably be a good reflection of my life, Kyle helped me set up a site with the charming title Both Ends Burning*
I was still too shy to post, but I went to bed that night happy that I had at least taken one step in the right direction…and then sat bolt upright in bed, struck with the fact that a website called Both Ends Burning might be more fitting for a site dedicated to gastrointestinal ailments. Was this a blog of girl with IBS and a touch of the acid reflux? Or just some pathetic losers attempt at sounding not like a pathetic loser? The title would have to be changed immediately.
And since I was feeling nervous/shy about starting this in the first place, this embarrassing little realization scared me off of the idea for a good long time.
I’m now going to go with something inspired by Billy Joel. I heart him.

*Kyle would like me to clarify that he did not at any time endorse the use of a title which implied anterior and posterior inflammation.

As 2008 gets underway, it seems like the perfect time to take stock of all the major life changes going on around here and find a way to catalog all the new and exciting things this year will bring. In 2008 I will get married (!!!), finish grad school (!!), hopefully become a puppy owner, knit a perfectly fitting sweater, and spend more time with the people that matter to me. I’ve found that the days and weeks are flying by and I want to slow down time, or at least find a way to keep track of all of these amazing things. Another major motivator behind this little project is the fact that I have so many wonderful people in my life that I miss and wish that I was in more regular contact with. If this can help me reconnect with any of them, it will have served its greatest purpose for me.
Finally, with school, work and wedding thoughts constantly on my mind, I’ve found that I need a bit of an outlet. I’m going to start doing some sharing of my thoughts here so that Kyle will still be able to live with me. ;) So there will definitely wedding planning and knitting on this site, but my thoughts on politics, sports and pretty much anything else might find their way here too.
Happy New Year! Let’s see how this little experiment goes!