Roomie Date Night

Last night, Kyle, Janet and I decided we wanted an adventure (i.e. Kyle and I didn't want to be couch lumps yet again) so we headed out to Route 1. This stretch of road is seriously weird with huge themed resturants with even bigger neon signs. We settled on Kowloon, a massive Asian-Polynesian-Thai-American place with seriously kick-ass decor.

In addition to this charming fountain, the dining room also features a giant ship and several murals depicting easy beach living and erupting volcanoes. Fun fun!

To help pass the hour until we could eat, we sipped yummy cocktails and took silly pictures, like this

And this!

For dinner we were very adventurous, sharing several dished including this unbelievable concoction of deep fried shrimp donuts served with pineapples and maraschino cherries in a FLAMING PINEAPPLE! The picture doesn't do the fire justice.

Overall, it was a perfect evening!

A Confession...And Cupcakes!

The weather here is totally gross and has been for days. I've also just survived an crazy week at school and am now feeling totally drained. But this is no excuse for what I'm about to confess.

I have started recording Martha Stewart's tv show...and loving it. Sure, the woman might be some kind of robot, but she's so crafty! I know I should be ashamed, but I'm not. I mean, look at this stuff!

Images from MarthaStewart.com

Maybe it's because she seems to be obsessed with order and putting things into tiny packages? This is something I can get behind!

Blame it on Martha, but I was inspired to do a bit of baking for Valentine's day!

With lots of help from Janet and Jess, these little cupcakes were super cute! I wish I had had more food coloring because I really wanted them to be red, not pink, but they'll do.

Happy Valentine's Day!!

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.
*****************************************************
(If you'd rather be surprised about these details, no peeking!)
*****************************************************

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. ;)