Editing in progress

Dear Reader,

I am getting creative with this blog layout and trying out new things. After all, new year = new things. :) Please don't be alarmed with new and funky templates in the interim. I promise to give you a heads up when I'm done. Oh, and feel free to leave comments about whether or not you like the new layouts, you're getting whiplash, or if there is a particular widget you've been itching to see on pink turkey.

Blog on!

Happy Days!

Happy New Year! Merry Christmas! Happy Hanukkah! Happy Black Friday! Happy Thanksgiving! Happy Halloween! There have been a lot of holidays (or jolly days) since the last "official" post so I have some catching up to do. What? I missed a holiday? Oh yeah. Happy Guy Fawkes Day! Happy Bosses Day! Happy Boxing Day! And let's not forget...Happy Bouillabaisse Day! (December 14th, of course. But you knew that already, right?)

Anyway, somewhere between National Flashlight Day and Eggnog Day I received a gentle-ish reminder to blog, Blog, BLog, BLOg, BLOG! Apparently some pink turkey readers out there have been feeling a wee bit bereft with the absence of current posts. Sorry, my turkeys! Now that I know you are checking in I will try to do better in the posting department. Let's start now...

We are currently pet sitting for my sister and her brother-in-law while they are on a Caribbean cruise. The cat and hedgehog are here while sister and family are on a grand excursion. Yeah. They got the cruise and we got the pets. Can you say "short end of the stick?" They are due back in town today and, other than their pets, will be greeted with howling wind and temps in the teens. There has to be some sort of payback for a winter cruise and this is definitely it! But let's get back to the animals. The cat is sweet, gives us hugs, purrs freely and often, plays fetch (honest!), and likes to snuggle under blankets. The hedgehog is prickly, stinky, nocturnal and sounds like a coffee pot percolating when awoken. We might adopt a cat one day. 'Nuf said.

Ready for some updated pictures? (Hint. This is not the time to say "no.")


Drew and I went to separate New Year's Eve parties and we both took these 2010 glasses with us. Drew hung out with several friends and won the Who Stayed Up The Latest Contest by going to bed at 7:00 a.m.! The boys were playing video games, went outside to pop confetti guns at midnight and then they played more video games and more video games. On the other hand, I was at an adults-only dinner party and crawled in to bed around 5:00 a.m. We both had fun. We both also napped a lot on January 1st. And please note that picture above was taken well before I showered and got gussied up for the festivities!

Merry Christmas! This was taken as we were stepping out to attend the Christmas Eve service. We met my parents and sister and brother-in-law for church and it was a lovely time. My sister and I started out with a giggle when we saw the hymn It Came Upon A Midnight Clear printed in the bulletin. She reminded me that two years ago there was a misprint and it said HE Came Upon A Midnight Clear. Yup. So wrong but soooooo funny! This time, however, no typo. At least not there. Glory to God in the High Test was a different story. Hee hee.

Did you happen to notice that there was no mention of my brother in that paragraph above? He and his wife celebrated a quiet and travel-free Christmas this year, opting to stay home since their baby is due in the next two weeks. Yes, a baby! Exciting news, 'eh?! We missed them at Christmas but will see them soon when we head up to meet the newest member of the family.




On December 18th (National Roast Suckling Pig Day) we awoke to snow. Maybe I should say SNOW! It snowed for 22 hours straight and left us with 20 inches in the driveway. It was gorgeous but took a long time to dig out. The photos were taken from our front porch during the storm. And, yes, that is indeed a Christmas tree on our front porch. It looked much prettier with the [real] snow on its [fake] boughs. Oooh. Aaah. It was nice that the snow stayed around long enough for us to celebrate a white Christmas this year. Thanks, Mr. Snow! :-)

That gets you caught up on the last two weeks. We hope you had a terrific holiday season and are enjoying a grand start to 2010. See you here again soon!

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Another grand idea

Remember how I wanted (want) to use a grand piano as a dining room table? It turns out that I may not be the only crazy one. It might not be a dining room table, but it's cool none-the-less. Check it out:

The Voca People

A Presidential Day

Drew has shown great interest in his government class this semester. Kudos to his teacher who has succeeded engaging the nerd in current events and getting him excited about politics. Big, honking kudos! (This from the mother with a political science degree and a former job in the governor's office. Big, honking kudos indeed!)

So when the opportunity to see President Obama presented itself I knew my nerd would be excited to go even if it meant missing his favorite government class. We had 24 hours notice so Drew was able to clear it by Mr. Kudos-Carrying-Teacher who gave him the requisite fist bump and said something like "awesome," or another teenager approved phrase, before giving him instructions that he would need to brief the class on the experience upon his return. And with this endorsement and a healthy dose of excitement we set off to see the President yesterday morning.

We arrived at the University of Maryland around 7am and started walking to find the end of the line. And walking. And walking. And walking. At the end of the line we started taking pictures. Here is Drew's idea of passing the time in line:

Yep. Nose in a book. That's my boy! But within 90 minutes, roughly 8:45am, they had opened the doors and were starting to get people in the arena. We were almost there!

(Notice the jackets in mid-September? It was drizzling and a chilly 65 degrees. Umbrellas were not permitted in the arena so we dug out the raincoats and made the best of the weather.)

Here we are after getting through security and finding a seat:

From our seats on the front row of the upper deck we could clearly see the stage, the crowd, the press, and all the goings on in the arena. Drew was psyched! And notice the absence of things like headsets, clipboards, multiple cell phones and stress surrounding me? This is the first Presidential event at Maryland that I attended as a regular Joe Shmoe and not as the coordinator behind the scenes. It was nice being able to share the event with Drew for a change. Now if I could only get the red eye reduction feature to work on the camera! Hrumpf.

Red eyes or not, we had a great time. President Obama appeared on stage at 11:35am -- are you doing the math yet? we arrived at 7am in order to see the President at 11:35am, which means 4 and a half hours of waiting ... looooooong morning! -- and Drew declared the wait "so worth it." He was quite enthralled by the activity in the arena, the excitement in the crowd, and the fact that he was getting to see POTUS in person. The speech itself was good, dynamic, and full of audience participation whether or not it was planned. One dude was escorted out of the arena after shouting things at the President and another woman received an "I love you too" after loudly professing her love of the dude in the white shirt and red tie seen here at the podium:

What's that? Can't see him very well? Ah. Then check out these photos taken by people other than us. And here is the entire speech in case you haven't heard it before.

The speech ended at 12:15pm and we had a lovely chat with our seat neighbors. The guy was funny. He is a computer science major at Maryland and had a wickedly wry sense of humor. At one point the crowd was chanting "U.S.A." like we were at the Olympics or something. He looked up from his textbook and said, "Oh good. I was beginning to wonder where we were." (Oh crud. It loses something in translation. It was really funny at the time. Or maybe I was just bored and anything sounded funny right about then.) And on our way out of the seating bowl we joined the crowd at the windows to watch the motorcade depart:

Ta da! Drew got to see the gamut of Presidential movement yesterday. From crowd control, long lines, hecklers, security, the guy who puts the seal on the podium, the introduction of the state delegation, the speech itself, the crush of the press pool, enough flash bulbs to feel like you're at a concert, and then the motorcade. What a day. He left for school this morning still on Cloud 9 and

hoping to see his super cool Mr. Kudos-Carrying-Teacher to let him know all about the day. That's my boy!

Happy Birthday, Drew!

Happy birthday to my favorite 15-year-old! The Day was full of surprises from start to finish: frappuccino's in the fridge, chalk art in the driveway, presents when he got home from school, dinner at an amazing Turkish restaurant in Baltimore with a hefty side dish of reminiscing about last summer's trip to Turkey, more presents, a surprise birthday flight (with Drew as the PILOT, I might add), more presents and yet more presents. It was quite the day!