Sunday, November 30, 2008

Decking our Halls

We decorated today and wanted to share with everyone.
Here's our beautiful purple tree and the traditional lava lamp! Even though I still need a few bows, I wanted you to see the awesome paper we found at the dollar tree today! I'm so loving it!Last but not least! Can you see the three stooges?
There are two sets of stooges in the pic, did you see them both??

Saturday, November 29, 2008

More from Maine

So, in reverse order . . .

Jessica and Josh tried Lobster ice-cream. They were . . . unimpressed.

We all stood on some rocks by a dock at Bar Harbor. Look at our winsome poses.

Jessica, of her own will, approached a bird. She was taken in by the seagulls' expertise with oyster cracking.

And last night, we all enjoyed one of Jessica's kitchen creations. We'll call it Chicken Parme-Jess. Quite good.
And the party is still rolling here. We're watching Nacho Libre tonight (it will be my first time), and Jessica is making her cookies. So I'm going to get back to it.

Thursday, November 27, 2008

maine-ly thankful.

here are a few pictures from today's festivities. i left out a lot of things, but i just wanted to give you a smathering of the events :)


matt and mandi at evan & kim's house.

josh playing with damon (the cat).
matt, josh and i. umm... everyone was playing video games and i kinda passed out. oops.
Bangor Chamber of Commerce!!! what?! i thought i should have my picture taken here in honor of my recent (huge) project for Small Biz Management and Entrepreneurship class.
haha. i don't even know. but i thought it was cool.
josh and i on a walk after thanksgiving dinner.
josh and i before thanksgiving dinner.
manda and her pre-thanksgiving dinner eggnog :)


so, there you have it. hope everyone had a GREAT thanksgiving. i know we did up here in Maine!
<3 love you all.
-jecca-

Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Thanksgiving Eve

Ah, 'tis Thanksgiving Eve. (Is it still 'eve' all day on the day before something spectacular, or does that just come about the night of the day before something spectacular? In any case...)

Today is the day before Thanksgiving and I'm very excited about this year's festivities. Last year was great too, don't get me wrong. We had a big potluck dinner with a bunch of grad students that stayed here over break, and it was nice to be able to hang out with friends on Thanksgiving. However, I pre-gamed Thanksgiving last year with work on an annotated bibliography for one of my courses. Then I finished that annotated bibliography on Friday. So, nice, yes. But I think this Thanksgiving is going to blow that Thanksgiving out of the water. Here are my reasons for thinking so:

1. My sister is here!

Instead of driving for 5+ hours to get from her school in PA to home in VA, Jessica decided to fly one hour from PA to ME. She found a cheap ticket and here she is. I've been planning for her 7 day stay for weeks now. She visited ME this summer, so the list of possible activities is greatly changed now in winter.

2. My brother is here!

Now, I was NOT planning for this. Yesterday, I giddily met up with my sister in the classic big-smile-wave-from-afar-followed-by-big-hug airport reunion. Arm in arm we took the escalator down to baggage claim and talked about carry-on bag size and the necessity of a checked bag. The conversation seems silly now, but it made sense at the time.

Then I felt a tap on my shoulder paired with a question about luggage or something ridiculous. Sure that some Mainer was asking me a stupid question, I wheeled around to see a young guy much taller than me standing rather close for a stranger. My first reaction?: "Why would one of my students approach me in the airport? Honestly?!" My second reaction?: OMGflurgyabnogyah, it's my brother!

And like Jessica reported from her surprised reaction in the PA airport, I said something along the lines of "How are you here?!"

Of course by this point I was crying. And I did not expect that either. So, I'm standing in the airport with my brother and sister, crying, and thinking how fully I have now turned into my mother, when the baggage claim track begins to move. In perfect Maine fashion, it produces maybe 7 or 8 pieces of luggage and stops, stranding those 7 or 8 pieces of luggage on the farthest bit of the carousel. As Jessica and Joshua walked around to claim their baggage, I stood, sniffling with Jessica's oversized Vera and composed myself.

This, I knew, was going to be the best Thanksgiving on record.

3. I am making Sweet Potato Casserole Cupcakes!

Now, it may seem silly to rank a cupcake with the presence of my brother and sister, but it you feel that way then you obviously have not been paying attention. If that is the case, I'll catch you up. I <3 baking cupcakes. I've been planning this particular cupcake for about two weeks. The recipe looks fantastic and I've made a very similar pumpkin cake that allows me to feel confident about the result of this recipe.


So there you have it. These are the three most readily available reasons why Thanksgiving is going to rock this year.

Now I have to compile a grocery list with my sister while brother takes full advantage of the rare opportunity to sleep in.

Happy Thanksgiving Eve everyone! <3

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

maine-ly surprised.

wow. i was extremely surprised to see a person that looked exactly like my brother in the philadelphia airport this morning at 6am on my way to visit mandi in maine. i started crying when i realized that it was actually hosh. i couldn't believe it. i was so confused.

josh told me that everyone around us was looking at us and smiling. there was lots of hugging and lots of crying (on my part). there was actually a lot of question-asking as well. josh told me that i said, "what?! what's going on here?!"

ok, fast forward a few hours to the bangor, maine airport. i went to meet amanda and we went to claim my luggage... and then some strange boy comes up behind amanda and asks if she's seen his luggage. then some more crying started, because it was HOSHHHHH!!!!!!!

i'm telling this story horribly. i'm sorry. the truth is i really can't explain it. great surprises. great reunions. wonderful, wonderful day.

here are some pics of the day, but only from amanda's camera (because her computer doesn't like josh's or my memory card):


purple wig :) ha!me and mambi <3
hosh (pounding chicken) and mambi (cutting onions) fixing dinner. it was yum!


hopefully there will be more pictures to come soon. love you all.
<3 jess

p.s.- mom, i can't believe you kept such a secret! you're sneaky :) thank you. so much.
i love you.

maine-ly awake.

i'm off to maine.
it's very early.
dear katie is taking me to the airport.
security will pick us up in 7 minutes to take us to her car.
i'm very excited, and very sleepy.
but very excited.
<3 see you soon, mambi!!!

Sunday, November 23, 2008

I thought the reference was pretty clear

but I guess not!

Here you are then. Enjoy. :)


'I woke up in love this morning' by the Partridge Family

Saturday, November 22, 2008

sNOw!

I woke up to snow this morning.
I woke up to snow this morning.
Went to sleep with sun on my mind.
I woke up to snow this morning.
I woke up to snow this morning.
Went to sleep with sun on my mind.


*If this song hasn't been written, it needs to be.*

Tuesday, November 18, 2008

this time next week...

i'll be in maine with mandi... woohoo!

Saturday, November 15, 2008

Stuff

Josh ready for a rideBike or Treating-the standing version

Bike or treating- the sitting version, this was more comfortable


Keven sleeping on the open waters


Bob, Keven and Ken before their deep sea fishing adventure. You can tell it's before because Ken isn't green.



Happy 95 Ione!!!!

These are in a weird order but fun anyway!





Friday, November 7, 2008

More British Humour

See that cute thing I did with the "u"? Aren't I just festive? And witty?

I know...

Anyway, this is quite possibly one of my favorite scenes from The Vicar of Dibley. It's a perfectly hilarious sitcom featuring Dawn French as, you guessed it, the controversially female vicar of Dibley. This scene shows a pretty characteristic conversation the vicar has with one of her best friends in the village. Just observe.


My favorite line:
"I have no idea what you're talking about, but I'm sure God does and He's intrigued by the whole thing."

Okay, I'll try to make sure this is the last Dawn French/Jennifer Saunders post for a while. :)

Wednesday, November 5, 2008

French & Saunders

So, I've been playing around online with French & Saunders videos and I thought you guys might get a kick out of this video. French & Saunders are a British comedy duo and they have tons and tons of sketches. I'd never seen these characters before, but these waiting room people are hilarious.

This sketch is called "I've Had That" and I think we all know these people...


When Ryan lived with me, we watched French & Saunders almost continuously. I think it was good for my sanity. I should really watch them more regularly. :)

Saturday, November 1, 2008

wowza...

wowza. it's been a big week on the PBU homefront. on tuesday, october 28th we had a freak snowstorm... for some reason i decided to wear flip flops on this day. great idea. it wasn't even that cold in the morning and then around 11am it started flurrying and then we lost power on campus and the roads were extremely slick... and these boys decided to peg everyone with snowballs as they came back to their apartments.

they even threw snowballs at me as i was watching them through my 3rd floor window. meanies.
then on wednesday the Phillies won the 2008 World Series. i wasn't too excited because i'm a red sox fan and tampa bay beat out the sox to play the phillies in the world series. so then i wanted tampa bay to win because i liked Iwamura... anyways! all of these things are irrelevant. the phillies won the world series and chaos ensued. an estimated $5million in damages were done to the city of philadelphia on wednesday night. evidently the fans get violent when they're excited. on friday there was a celebration parade. i didn't go but i did drive the shuttle for five hours that morning and got to see the line of hundreds of people waiting at the train station at the bottom of the hill for the septa trains into the city.
(*amanda... do you see this cute little commuter... she probably didn't know what to do about getting to work because of all the extra people... but she had a very cute outfit on.*)

that's right people... there were people in the road because the lot was overflowing with people waiting to get on the trains to central philly. needless to say this provided great entertainment for my shuttle shift.
this is the spirit rock on campus. someone painted a rock-o-lantern.
katie and i in front of our apartment on our way to laura's house! it was chilly so i wore my new *Minnetonka* boots to laura's and then changed into my slippers there.
Laura the Ladybug and Chris 'Chuck' Nerd Herd from that show 'Chuck' on NBC... i don't know. i don't watch it.
laura was waiting for the Pumpkin Parade to come by!!! she lives in yardley and they get a fire truck to come through their neighborhood each year with all its lights on and horns and sirens and such. we were very excited!
katie being regal in the dress from donna jean.


awe.
tiny dancer.

our family style photo. laura, katie, steph and me.
a little post party pictures. katie caught me on the 'down' of the jump but i thought it was cute. still stylin'. that tutu was crazy. i would walk by something and the little strips would like grab on to something i had just walked by. very funny.

alright... there you have it. lots of action this week. hope you liked it.

some of you will also like to know that i have dropped 9 hours from my work schedule for the remainder of the semester (or until Nov. 25th). don't worry. i still have 23 hours of work per week, but all my projects are due at the same time and i am anticipating a time crunch on the home stretch here so i decided to take preventative measures. tonight i'm working on a paper due nov. 17th, as well as studying for an exam on monday, and working on a cash flow statement due on monday night as well. interesting. all of these things are for the same professor. ha! i also have some accounting homework due on tuesday that i'll probably do tonight as well. geez louise!

i miss all of you. i wish i was home (or in maine) hanging out with you guys.
<3 jess