The Merry Adventures of Miss Willow

Update, post-the events of 2011

2012-01-10T20:55:00.004-06:00

Hello lovely readers,

I know it's been, quite literally, months since I've actually let you into my life and told you anything of what's been happening up in the Frozen Tundra. There are a multitude of reasons for that, but I won't go into them or try to excuse my absence. I have been absent...it happened, and for that I am sorry, but I am going to try to remedy that now.

I'm going to do this in a sort of timeline manner to try to paint a little picture of the close of my summer, the entirety of my fall, and the beginnings of my winter. (Sorry the actual pictures included are poor quality...yay, iPhone pictures!!)

Here we go:

August

After returning from my amazing time in Arizona things picked up rather quickly.
I am still processing the remainder of my material from AZ...I'm not sure if that will ever actually get done...ok, ok, it will eveeeentually get done, but it's going to be quite the slow and long process.
We did indeed get all moved into the house, though we are still quite far from being settled. Just as the moving-in process was beginning, one of my roommates lost their father to a heart attack. That event kind of set the tone for the remainder of our fall. We ended up spending a lot of time out in Wisconsin helping Justin and his family with the aftermath of the sudden loss. We helped them clean up and sort through the items in the house in preparation for an estate sale that took place in October. We are still working on the house and land, getting it all ready to go on the market in the spring. But, all that aside, we are no longer homeless and very much enjoy our new digs...I'll try to post some pictures later this week or early next week...emphasis on try.

September

I finally experienced the Minnesota State Fair...though I failed horribly and didn't take a single picture...that I can recall. I know...I fail...I'll try to do better next time. But, it was a pretty ridiculous experience. I went to the milk station where you can get all the milk you can drink for a buck! Yup, unlimited milk for $1. I also got various fried foods on sticks...like bacon...dipped in chocolate!! Sounds gross, but it was amazing, for serious. Saw lots of neat things, like lamb-ikins being born and little, just-born piggies nursing away - so stinking cute! I can't wait to finally grow up so I can have a pig or two again.
We also welcomed a new cohort of grad students into the department. I think there were 11 or so new students and we are big fans of them. Super fun people and all of them are real go-getters. Win!
On a similar note I took up the responsibilities of co-secretary of our grad student organization, Frenatae...yes, co-secretary...we have a lot of stuff to do, y'all! It's been...an experience. I'd forgotten how much drama can arise from officership. Ah well...it's still fun.
September also included a very fun and tasty BBQ hosted by my small group leader and his family. It was nice to get everyone together again, after the busy summer, for some good food and fellowship.
Towards the end of the month I played hookie with my sweet lab mate, R, for about a half a day. We took a little trip downtown so she could get her registration packet for the Twin Cities Marathon, which she survived like a champ, got some free stuff from the vendors and then took a little road trip out to Stillwater. This was one of the best days ever. We started out by getting the most outstanding grilled cheese sandwiches you could ever imagine at the co-op and popped next door to Northern Vineyards Winery for a glass of wine to go with our lovely sandwiches. We ate up on their deck, overlooking the St. Croix River. It was lovely, to say the least. We then strolled down Main Street perusing and spending much monies at shops like Tremblay's Sweet Shop (saltwater taffy!!), Stillwater Olive Oil Co. (nearly died in there...soooo much goodness!), St. Croix Antiquarian Booksellers (so much win!), and a number of other fun spots. After our adventures in Stillwater we weren't quite done having our girls' day. We made our way down to Saint Croix Vineyards for a wine tasting and some perusing around the apple orchard and country shop. The wine tasting was soooo good. We even got our own little score cards and everything to rate the wines we liked, didn't like, etc... Such a simple, fun, grownup thing to do :) I was a big fan of their summer red and the raspberry infusion dessert wine - so delish. But! We were not finished with our day! An afternoon's worth of good food and spirits in our bellies and jars of heavenly honey butter and a number of other goodies in-hand, we made our way back to the cities to pick up some yummies for our lab sushi night at RH's lovely home. We have a pretty great advisor...I must say. Closing the night off with our co-workers and RH's wonderful family made an already outstanding day even better. It was one for the books, to be sure.

October

October got off to a decent start with Frenatae Pig's Eyes and scarf dying and shrunken head (made out of apples...not people...don't freak out) making as we started gearing up for the honey sale in December and the annual Ento Department Halloween Party, of course.
Unfortunately, while the beginning of October was full of fun, it also brought much sadness and loss. On October 5th, my Grandpa Jack left this world on earth and went to be with the Father in perfection.
This was very unexpected for all of us and has thus been extremely difficult to process...even today. I think having lost Grandma just a year and half or so before made Grandpa's death all the more difficult - they are both gone. And I miss them tremendously. It isn't uncommon for me to find myself bursting into tears of loss and pain, even today, 3 months later. I miss them both terribly, and while I can rejoice and have comfort in knowing that they are with the Father, my human nature wants them here with me. Somehow the world is more empty to me. It's quite strange. I want them to be there when I get my next degree...when I get married...when I have children... I want to share my life with them, but that isn't an option anymore. I struggle continuously with curbing my bitterness towards this loss. I so often find myself saying, "This isn't fair!! Why did they have to be taken so early?! Wasn't one enough?? Why both??" And then I think of my father...while I have lost my beloved grandparents, he has lost his parents...I can't even imagine that loss. It breaks my heart to think of it and to think of the pain and emptiness he must experience with this. We didn't talk about Grandma and Grandpa all that much at Christmas, but I think it was evident to all of us that they were on our minds the whole time. You are incredibly loved and painfully missed, Grandpa.

With mourning comes the comfort of family, though. Grandpa's funeral was held in Sacramento on the 22nd and with that we were able to see a lot of family and old friends from California we had not seen in a long time. How interesting it is that we can find joy even in such sad reunions.
Immediately following the funeral I made my first museum trip. I hopped down to LA to work in the L.A. County Museum of Natural History for a few days to look at the material they have there that pertains to my research. It was a fast few days and I wished I had more time to spend there, but I was able to get everything done, though I was working down to the wire. And, it was an incredible learning experience.
As soon as I got back to the Tundra from CA I went and saw The PhD Movie with R and another grad student friend of ours - oh that movie was so sad and yet so true!! It was a dorky, fun evening of free movie-ing and popcorn-ing.
A day later was the Halloween Party, which was also fun, though I must admit that I wasn't exactly in the mood for a party, given the events of the month...but I was glad I went and it was fun to see everyone again after having been away in CA.
There were a number of parties being hosted that weekend by friends of mine that I had initially resigned to not attend...as was tired and still very much in mourning, and just didn't want to be around a lot of hoopla and hollering that comes along with high energy parties that include costumes... But, of course, as I am often a sucker for the pleas of my friends I agreed at the last minute to attend. My costume? A black t-shirt that painted the words, "Go Ceiling!!" on...complete with crepe paper pom-poms. What was I? A Ceiling Fan. Yup, you read that correctly. And, I actually have a picture for you!

And that closed out October.

November

Was another busy, busy month as we were all preparing our presentations and posters for the Annual Meeting of the Entomological Society of America held in Reno, NV.
But! Before the month got too far underway, R and I had a baking, "knitting", music, movie night. I say "knitting" because we never actually got around to that part of our evening...we did go to the craft store and get supplies...we just got a little too caught up in our bacon biscuits and movie watching and music listening... It was a fabulous evening of goodness, though. R takes such good care of me - whatever am I going to do without her for the next 9mo?! She got a fellowship to go work on her research at the Smithsonian for 9mo and heads out east in just a few days...I'm going to miss her something fierce!
The next week, R and myself, and a few other of our fellow grad students made our way down to St. Olaf's in Northfield to talk to a class of undergrads about our research and life as grad students. It was pretty spectacular. I love working with students and seeing them excited about new things to learn about and options for their futures, etc. I actually had a girl contact me later about potential advisors down at A&M! Gig'em, Ags!
That weekend a slew of us headed off to Reno for the ESA meeting. What a week that was. I took my fancy poster and notebooks and notes, etc... and was ready to network and learn me some stuffs. Well...while both of those things happend...the meeting was kind of lame this year. That was mostly the case because I was somewhat ill the entire time I was in Reno. If you've ever been to Reno and enjoy it there...I'm sorry, I do not share that sentiment. From the moment I set foot in that town I didn't feel well at all. I think it had much to do with the fact that every inch of that town is completely saturated with cigarette smoke. Normally smoke doesn't bother me so much, but when it saturates everything and the air is stale with it...it's awful. It's also incredibly dry there and my nose was bleeding pretty regularly by the end of the meeting...lamez! Other than that, the meeting was pretty successful. Made lots of contacts, reconnected with old friends, like Wharton and a number of other awesomes from A&M and other places. It was good.
As soon as the meeting was over, my sweet sister-in-law, Shyla drove 3hrs from Chico to collect me and take me across those lovely mountains to the California side for some much needed R&R and Big Brother and Big Sister time. I don't know that I would have survived last semester without that short respite. We did lots of lounging and good eating, lots of Game of Thrones watching (epic!) and YouTubing, saw some good musics, tromped around their fabulous farmers market and got me some of my favorite soap ever, and, of course, did some trekking around that beautiful CA landscape. We took an awesome day hike on Table Mountain and found some waterfalls, and pretty trees, and cows, and lichens, and, and, and...awesome. The visit was, as always, all too short, but wonderful, nonetheless.

Honey Run Covered Bridge - 1894

Cows! Or giant beasties as Sean would say...

How gorgeous is all of this?!

That's definitely a waterfall! :)

Sean & Shyla on our trek back from the waterfall

As soon as I got back to MN I went into overdrive on my mater's thesis proposal seminar. What on earth is that, you might ask?? That is the equivalent of 45min of me standing in front of my entire department, presenting a lecture on my research topic and what I have done/found so far, along with 15 or so min of them all asking me whatever question(s) they want...oh, not to mention the fact that each and every one of them has a grading sheet in front of them and they score me as they see fit.... A couple months ago I would have said, "Shoot me." to that description, but now that it's all done and over and I passed with flying colors, and I can say with a shrug, "Meh...it's not so bad." Once I got going it was actually kind of fun...crazy, I know. But, here's the thing: it was me teaching a room full of scientists who have (I should now say had) no idea what I'm talking about and actually want to learn about what I have to say, even though the majority of them were dreading my talk because they find taxonomy and systematics to be boring and useless (they are so wrong...and have since been educated otherwise, whoop!). It was awesome. And, having those people, professors included, who were dreading sitting in that lecture room for an hour listening to me talk about taxonomy and systematics come up to me afterwards or comment at the opener of their question that they actually really enjoyed my talk and were fascinated to learn about how I do what it is that I do is one of the best feelings in the world. Like, woah - speechless.
Following my proposal seminar was the honey filling party - in prep for our annual honey sale - it was a nice close to a hectic day, followed by a couple rounds and the watching the World Series at Grumpy's.

December

The weekend following my seminar I was a judge at the annual Insect Fair, put on by Monarchs in the Classroom each year. This is, essentially, a giant science fair dedicated to...bugs!! So awesome. It was an exhausting but wonderful experience. I love talking with kids about science and getting them to think critically about their projects and what could account for their results or if there are more questions they can ask to learn even more about what their project focused on, etc. Yay, science! I also got to see my sweet friend, Christine, that weekend, as she was back in town for a few days. Love her!
After the Insect Fair it was Honey Sale prep ALL THE WAY. Not to mention getting ready for my trip to the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History...wait...what?! Yeah...I'll get to that :) The Honey Sale went pretty well (honey shortage and all!), with only a few minor hiccups along the way - now we know some things to account for with our new items (insect dyed scarves, etc...) in preparation for next year's sale. Done and done. Whew!
Now, on to the Smithsonian. Remember how I went to the LA County Museum of Natural History for a few days to work in the collection and do research?? Well, my dear ones, I got to do the same thing at the Smithsonian!! Yeah, I got my own security access badge/key and EVRYthing! It. Was. Awesome. It was like Christmas everyday in there. I was continuously finding little gems and things in the collection and working with the curators there, Don Harvey especially, was incredible. I would have lost without Don. By the end of my week there he and I hardly to speak to one another in order to communicate - we would look around for something and the other would hand that misplaced or overlooked item to the other...kind of awesome. Being able to look at the type specimens in the collection was incredible, too, and so so helpful for my research. Type specimens are the original specimens that a species or genus is described from - the very specimens that the author looked at when he/she described the organism!! Pinch me! What amazing pieces of history that I was afforded the opportunity to look at, handle, and admire. It was a blitz of a trip, but such an incredible learning experience.
Upon my return from DC I just enough time to get a few errands taken care of, make one last trip out to help Justin in Menominee before the holidays and take a little trip to the lovely Betty Ann's nursery to collect some very special violets for my Mamma - Betty Ann was such a delight and I've already promised her that I'll be back in the spring to see her gardens all in bloom. Can't wait! After all of that it was time to head home to my Texas...finally.
I made it down to Arlington the day before my Pop's birthday, which also happened to be C-fizzle's Eagle Scout Court of Honor. That's right, my littles bro is a baller...it's fine, you can be jealous. Look at this good lookin' kid!

Sean and Shyla's flight got uuuber delayed so they weren't able to make in time for the court of honor, but they made it a little afterwards. It was so wonderful to have everyone together this Christmas, especially after the trials the summer and fall had brought for all of us.

Christmas was wonderfully low-key and full of much family time and laughter and simply enjoying one another's company. Who could have asked for more?? We were also able to get the whole of my mom's side of the family ALL together for the first time ever. It was an awesome time with aunts and uncles and cousins we haven't seen in ages...and one little new one most of us had yet to meet.
I was also able to catch up with a number of lovely friends while I was home for the holidays and my sweet Miss Susie, oh how I love her...It has come to my attention that she and I never take pictures when we go for our now traditional Chuy's lunches...hmmm...next time, Miss Susie!!!

My sweet high school loves - how I love our reunions.

My precious Buntes made a stop in A-Town!!

January (Plus the last couple days of December...)

New Year's held a trip to the wonderful Austin to stay with my sweet Ponders and see even more lovelies from college. Whoop! I also got to visit with my wonderful cousins and Aunt June again, which was so wonderful. I got my bridesmaid dress all ordered for precious Kristen's wedding and got to have a woooonderful lunch at Kerbey Lane with all of my Austin gals + Kristen (she's still in our sweet, sweet Aggieland...lucky duck!). New Year's eve was a nice low-key get together at the Ponder's, complete with Apples to Apples and The Nelson Game - college favorites. After all of the "old people" turned in for the night JP and B and I closed out our shenanigans with some Mario Kart and Call of Duty (the latter I simply watched...it's much more enjoyable for everyone that way). I got start off 2012 with a lovely time of worship with the Ponders and B, followed by some tasty Texas BBQ and time with precious friends before I made the trip back to the Metroplex.

My sweet bestie Elaine and Josh - it wouldn't be a reunion without a

goofy picture of the 3 of us like this one

My all too precious Tara B...nuff said .

Darling Alyssa Wonderful, wonderful Kristen

Before I left my Texas-land I got to visit more with Catia and her Elaine - which was a wonderful time of chatting, munching, and Spinal Tapping it up. I also got to see Mission Impossible with the Mamma!!! Yup - it's tradition that she and I see these amaaaazing films in the theaters and we managed to squeeze it in the day that I left! Whew! That was a close one!
I was quite sad to leave Texas, but must admit that I was looking forward to going...home...where my life is now. Although, I was only afforded a day in the Tundra before I had to pick up and hit the road again...story of my life!!! I am now in FL, at the McGuire Center in Gainesville...doing, you guessed it, research! This is my last museum trip for a while, though. The next one is a bit of a secret and you won't get to find out where I'm going until this summer...sorry kids, I just can't tell you yet! I get to go home tomorrow, though! I canNOT wait. I miss my bed...I miss my Tundra peeps...I miss my critters!!!!

Well, I hope you have all enjoyed the run-down...sorry it's taken so long to get this update out. And, no, I have not forgotten that I still owe you pictures from AZ...working on it...

Hope you all had a wonderfully blessed holiday season.

Shalom & Blessings,

~MW

P.S. - My Big Bro just started up a new blogitty for this year. Check it!

Pretty much sums it up...!

2011-12-08T12:10:00.000-06:00

Ok...so...I know I haven't posted at all this semester. I. Am. Sorry.

Christmas break is nearing and I hope to update you all at that time.

Until then, I want to give you a little explanation for some of my lack of existence in the blogger world this semester.

Go check out this blog post and you just might catch a little glimpse of my life this semester ;)

ENJOY!

Love and miss you all,
~MW

Lep Course, Final Update

2011-08-28T11:42:00.000-05:00

A very late final Arizona update… My apologies! The Tundra is just so busy!!

OK, so I left off on Thursday of last week. I’m so sorry I didn’t update y’all right after we got back from collecting in the desert!! Why?? Because, it. was. awesome!!! We all got some really great moths for our collections among other things (I found a bristle tail! Baller!! I’ve never seen one in real life and those things are triiiicky to catch – so jumpy!). I must say, that the highlight of my night, and nearly of the week, happened back at the station, though.

Once we got back to the station we all started processing some of the goodies we picked up in the desert and I decided to “just go check” and see what the station sheets brought in, since we had decided to let those run while we were in the desert. As I was walking up the hill to check one of my favorite sites I started to realize something: “I’m an idiot! There are mountain lions out here and I’m going by myself to look at a stupid sheet hung between two trees with a light to try to find some moths…I’ve lost my marbles, officially…” So, upon that realization you would have thought I would have turned around, right? One would think, but no I had already committed and was a little over halfway to the sheet so I just flashed my head lamp around a whole lot as I walked and quickened my pace a little bit…as did my heart rate ;) I felt much better once I got to the sheet, for some reason the light of the mercury vapor lamp was comforting and made me feel safe (don’t ask why…I was crazy that night…blame it on the lack of sleep??). I started on the front side of the sheet and got a few cuties then moseyed around to the back side of the sheet and grabbed a few more goodies. While I was checking out the back of the sheet I saw something rather large land on the front side – all I could see was its silhouette, and I had no idea what it could have been. The only things we had been seeing of that size were sphinx moths and knew without a doubt that it was not a sphinx. So…naturally, I walked around to the other side of the sheet to see the beast. Y’all…again, I nearly peed my pants. It was a Dysschema howardi!!! This beauty is the largest tiger moth member in North America! And it is goooorgeous. Typically moths of this size (same goes for most sphinx moths and a few others) aren’t killed using a kill jar…it takes them too long to settle down and they end up shredding their wings and just beating themselves to death instead of passing out first like the little guys. So, for the sake of the moth and the preservation of the specimen we inject them to speed up the process. I, however, of course, did not have a syringe on me…neeeeat. So, what did I do?? Well, I couldn’t just leave it there! It was the only one we had seen the entire week and the only one anyone had seen the entire summer – it, at the very least, needed to be documented. So I plucked that pretty off the sheet with my fingers, gathered up my kill jars, and ran (yes, ran) down the hill back to the labs to find someone with more knowledge who could help me decide what to do with my gem.

When I got to the bottom of the hill I ran passed a number of my favorite mothers chillaxing at one of the picnic tables – I so wanted to stop but I was on a mission and I had to take care of the moth first :) When I got inside the lab room I saw that Hugh was in there – excellent! Hugh was our course curator and he, like all of the instructors, has a wealth of knowledge about preserving specimens. I ran over to him, held out my hand and said, “Hugh! Help!” He looked up from his scope and just about fell out of his chair, looked at me with the biggest grin and said, “You’ve got to be kidding me!” All I could do was shake my head in response. He stands up and says, “To the lab!” We ran down to his curation lab where he had all of his supplies stored and he did the deed for me, preserving my beauty in perfect condition. Hugh injects with ammonia, instead of ethanol, because it works immediately (seriously, the thing was out in about half a second) and keeps the specimen pliable for longer – allowing for a smoother mounting and spreading process (mounting: placing the specimen on a pin; spreading: spreading the wings into a position that reveals the color patterns and morphological characters…also makes them pretty to look at). **sigh** My moth was taken care of and after asking Hugh if he needed her for the station’s synoptic collection and him assuring me that the male-female pair in the collection would suffice and that the moth was all mine and if anyone tried to take her away from that he would set them straight we marked back to the course labs and we showed her off to everyone. It was pretty humorous…people started coming out from the woodwork it seemed! From that moment on one of three things happened pre-collecting each night: (1) people threatened to hog-tie me so that I couldn’t get the good ones before them (there were a few other beauties I had in my possession that people were jealous of…), (2) people wanted to rub some of my luck onto them, (3) people wanted to make sure that I was at their sheet while we were collecting. It was pretty funny.

OK, enough ogling over my moth collection… ;)

The rest of the trip was just as incredible as the first half was. It was such a blessing to be able to be in the presence of and build relationships with the lep gurus of today. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t star-struck the entire week. I now have some remarkable friends and connections to help me along as I continue in the field…at least for the next two years. Again, I’d be lying if I said that this last week didn’t make me want to reconsider the idea of finishing my master’s and moving forward to get a PhD in the field…I really do enjoy research. And the collaboration that goes along with the community is so fun and allows for a broadening of knowledge that is priceless. I think I’d be much happier in a museum position than I would be in a professorship, though. But, I still have at least 2 years to figure out all of that, for now I am enjoying my time in the community and enjoying my project. I got a lot of pointers and clues about my group while I was I AZ, as well. Like I said, priceless.

Our last official night of the course (there was a scheduling faux pas and all of the instructors headed out a day before the students were told to leave…woops!) was an absolute blast (surprised, much?). After dinner we all piled into vans and trucks and made our way over to New Mexico for some non-collecting fun at the Rodeo Tavern. The instructors had been talking this place up all week, so by the time Saturday night arrived we were all beyond excited to finally make our way to the little hole-in-the-wall.

This place was a hoot! We upped the customer count by about 5 times…and so probably doubled their weekly earnings! It was fun watching the locals watch us – a few of those cowboys tried to play it smooth on the dance floor, too, it was too funny. But those locals sure knew how to play pool! I don’t think our people (and we actually had some really good players) won but one match against those cowboys. We all took a couple turns around the dance floor – I even got out there a couple times. I tried to tell Jim that just because I’m from Texas does not mean that I know how to two-step…he laughed and pulled me out onto the floor anyways. We decided to blame my lack of dancing skills on the fact that I was wearing chacos – that’s right, two-stepping in chacos. How’s that for a mental image?? Gotta love entomologists, am I right? We closed the tavern down (at about midnight…who closes that early??) and headed back to the station to continue our final hoorah before a good chunk of people left the next day. I think we finally called it a night around 2 or 3am…so just about right on time for most of us!

Sunday consisted of clean-up, packing, and farewells…talk about depressing. It was like being at summer camp and leaving all those awesome new friends and counselors who had been your life for that last week. Isn’t it amazing how quickly people can get to know each other and build relationships when you’re surrounded by each other 24-7? I just love that about people. Oh! I almost forgot! I got up extra early Sunday morning to hit the road with Hugh. He had set up a few extra light traps out and about the desert and other areas Saturday night and I told him I would help him take them down. So we headed out around 6am and started collecting traps. We had a great time driving around on empty, gathering the traps, and chatting the early morning away. We got back just in time to catch the tail-end of breakfast and then set to sorting the traps with everyone for one final moth search before we got the clean-up and farewells. In those traps is where I found my second Euchaetes zella!! It was my last once-over on a whim at one of the traps I hadn’t picked through yet and caught the corner of a wing out of the corner of my eye and thought, “No way that’s a zella…” I picked it out from under a couple other moths, flipped it over and, sure enough, it was indeed a zella! It was rather thrilling, to say the least.

Sigh…I still can’t believe that week is over and I’m back in the Tundra getting back to the old grind… I so wanted to stay in that hidden-away oasis. It was so refreshing to be unplugged for that week with some internet access here and there…when it decided to behave. I never carried my phone on me…that never happens. It’s practically glued to my pocket here. I’m going to work on making it less of an appendage of my body. I’ll still have it on and around, but I’m going to work on not having it a finger’s length away so much. Aside from being unplugged that week in AZ was just what the doctor ordered for my mental and physical health. It’s been a rather stressful summer on my front and I’m convinced that is why I’ve been feeling so poorly the last few months (headaches, body aches, migraines, etc…). By the second day-in in those gorgeous mountains I was feeling so good, even though I wasn’t sleeping, that it was a no-brainer…stress = bad news bears! Everyone needs to really stop and leave the stressors for some amount of time – even if it’s only a day or two. I also need to be better about eating full meals…it didn’t matter how tired and run-down I was going into a meal at the station, by the time I left the mess hall I was feeling completely re-energized and ready to tackle some more moths! Lesson learned…I need to rest and I need to eat (better).

Well, now that I’m back home I’ve been processing my specimens from AZ (once they are all spread I'll show y'all the goods!) and trying to get back into the swing of life in the city. The moving process has also begun. We got most of Megan and Justin’s things moved yesterday and today we are taking the bulk of my stuff. We can’t move into the house until Thursday, but we have access to the garage for now, so we’ve been piling as much into that as we can while we have access to Justin’s parents’ truck and trailer.

And, with that, dear ones, I’m off to get back to the packing! Can’t wait to give y’all a “tour” of the new place once we are all settled in,

Praying your Sunday is a blessed one.

Lots of love,

~MW

Lep Course, Day 5

2011-08-19T15:44:00.000-05:00

18 Aug 2011

Why helloooo, there!

Ummm…wow…I canNOT believe that it is already Thursday!!! How did this happen?!?! Time is so fleeting, per usual.

Mercy it’s been a long week, though.

So, remember that time we were supposed to have lectures and such until 2am? Well, that plan changed a little bit, but not in my favor. The lectures got moved around and so we were left to collecting circa midnight. At this point, I decided that I was going to grab a couple hours of sleep and get up at 2am to go hunt down some moths for a couple hours and then head back to bed. And, that my dear ones is exactly what I did…well, sort of…

I got up at 2am, sans alam clock even! How that happened, I have no idea. Anyways, I went off hunting and actually happened across a fair bit of stuff that I hadn’t seen/collected yet, so that was super exciting. But…haha….here’s where my plan changed…I ended up staying out until 6am. Yep…6am, folks. Dedication? Maybe…probably more insanity ;) I was looking super intensely for some of my moths, but, alas, I did not find a single one. I found a member of one of my outgroups…but no Euchaetes. Booo…. I was not happy. Especially when I realized it was 6am and was just going to bed – yeah, breakfast is at 7:30, ha!

Needless to say, that made yesterday an incredibly long day. I had to duck out during one of our wetlabs (it was dissecting…I’m solid there, but seeing other techniques would have been nice, nonetheless) to catch a couple hours of sleep. Even after that I was a total zombie.

Overall yesterday was a good day – lots of talk about morphology (my favorite!) and all that jazz, so it was fun for me. It was also nice to have a little bit of a leg up to help out some of the other people here who haven’t done dissections or gone through the morphology all that much yet. Yay, teaching!

Collecting last night was slow, but OUTSTANDING!!

Y’all, I caught a Euchaetes!!!!!!!!!!!! Just one, and it’s the only one I’ve seen the entire time I’ve been here (5 days already!), but it’s a Euchaetes!! Euchaetes zella, to be exact. It’s one of my favorite species in the genus. It’s a little more petite than most and has the super distinctive whit darts on the forewings which are a dusty deep chocolatey-almost-black-brown (I know, I need to come up with a more solid color description…it’ll get there), and pale white-cream hindwings. The abdomen on these critters is gorgeous – it’s a strikingly vivid orange-ish red with the tell-tale-Euchaetes black spots running down the midline and the sides of the abdomen. Ahhh…I saw that beauty fly up to the sheet and I just about peed my pants! It is now safely pinned and stored away in my insect box. The only sad thing about this story is that zella is a species that I have a fair number of representatives of already, but, fresh material is always exciting and it proves, in real time, that my guys are here…it’s just a matter of finding them :) I stumbled across a number of other pretty little things last night as well. So overall, the diversity was up, though the numbers were low.

We all called it a fairly early night and was thrilled to jump in bed at midnight clean and satisfied with a good night of collecting.

Today has been a pretty easy day. We had a few lectures this morning and then went on a butterfly walk and I was lucky enough to come home with a couple beauties to add to my collection and family representation count (we’re supposed to have a minimum of 25 families in our collections by the end of the course, I’m up to about 18-20, almost there!). More lectures took up the rest of the day and now it’s just about dinner time (yay, food!!!) After dinner we are heading out to the desert for collecting and then might close the night at the Rodeo Bar that is near the site we are collecting at.

Here’s to another night of good collecting and finding more Euchaetes!!

Hope all is well in your realms!

‘Til next time,

~MW

Lep Course, Day 3

2011-08-16T19:31:00.001-05:00

16 Aug 2011

Whew! What a couple of days this has been! The half day we had at the station on Sunday was pretty chill (and by pretty I mean extremely…) in comparison to Monday and today. Heavens, all I want is sleep, but there simply isn’t time for that here.

We start our days bright and early. Breakfast is at 7:30, so I’ve been getting up around 6 to look over some notes and things and mentally prepare for the bombardment of information that will accost my brain come 8am. ***I’m going to have to start getting up earlier, though…I’ll need to start going around to the sheets and traps in the eeeearly, daaark mornings to hunt down the moths that don’t come out until later in the night.*** We have been doing a lecture or two in the mornings and then heading out for some good hours of field collecting (3-4hrs has been the norm thus far) outside of the research station grounds. It’s been a lot of fun to drive even 20min and see an incredible difference in fauna and flora, not to mention terrain. We eat lunch somewhere in there and then hit the lectures or field again. Then there’s dinner and then maybe another lecture and, of course, the highlight of our day: major collecting!!

Since the majority of Lepidoptera are nocturnal moths (though there are a number of diurnal or day-flying moths) the best collecting (unless you are hunting butterflies specifically) is at night at a light. We use various different bulbs with white sheets set up behind them to help attract our moths…and of course anything else that sees our wondrous orbs and simply can’t stay away ;) There actually has been a fair bit of insect diversity which has been a lot of fun for those of us who don’t consider every order outside of Lepidoptera as “trash.” I’ve seen a fair number of scarab beetles and tons of other beetle, ichneumonid wasps, caddisflies, mantid flies (!!), true flies, stink bugs and other hemiptera, leafhoppers and other homoptera/heteroptera, antlion adults (!!), and much, much more. And, yes, I have most definitely snagged a few of those lovely specimens :) I even got a solifuge (I’ve never seen one alive – I totally let the cutie feed on a couple moths before I tossed it in some EtOH) and held a wicked awesome whip scorpion (this thing was as big as my hand – so sweet!)!!! It’s been quite the exciting trip even outside of all of the lep awesomeness. I’ve been able to collect a few members of my subfamily of moth, but none of my actual critters yet…it’s OK, I still have 4 more days after today to snatch some up!

We have been focusing more on caterpillars today which has been great fun – they’re such cuties. It’s always remarkable to me how these creatures can often times go from a super showy caterpillar to a severely drab moth and vice-versa. Not to mention the changes various caterpillars go through! It’s like looking at a completely different animal at each instar (molt) for so many of these guys! If any of y’all are interested in looking at some way pretty pictures of caterpillars check out Dave Wagner’s Caterpillars of Eastern North America. It’s an incredible field guide…worth every penny. And! I now get to say that I have collected caterpillars with Dave Wagner (living the dream!!!)!!! I feel super privileged to be able to say that. He knows so much! I’ve been blown away.

It’s been an intense day of lectures and collecting…and when I think about what else we have lined up for today I’m realizing that today (even though it’s 5:30pm here) is really just beginning. After dinner, at 7:30, we go back to the drawing boards and embark on an all-nighter of lectures and collecting. Meaning, we don’t even have the option of going to bed until 2am. Yeeeeowzas! Tomorrow is definitely going to be a loooong day, haha. It’ll be worth it, but I’m definitely going to need to take a day or two to recover once I get back to the Tundra. I’ve been crawling into bed between midnight and 1am the last two nights, but that extra hour of brain use pre-shower, pre-bed is going to be rough, y’all. For knowledge!! Haha.

Alrighty, kids, I’m off to snag a quick nap so I can study and begin processing the onslaught of info that has been the last 2.5 days before it’s rock’n’roll time again :)

I’ll keep the updates coming as long as time and the internet allows.

Praying all is well!

Shalom,
~MW

Helloooooooo, AZ!!!

2011-08-14T21:04:00.000-05:00

Hello, my happy readers :)

Praying this Sunday finds you well and enjoying your weekend.

As you might remember from a previous post (I’m typing in the airport and internet access is lame…so links and such probably won’t be happening for this post.) I had a trip planned for this month - a trip to Arizona for field work and a course on Lepidoptera. Well, I’m off! Got the critters carted off to their respective caretakers (Thanks so much Amy & Tony; Matt and Judy & Dex!) for the week and I was carted off to the airport bright and early (Thanks Christine!).

The first leg of the trip went without a hitch. Flight was smooth and on time and now I’m sitting in DFW waiting for my 12:45p flight to Tucson. Once I arrive in Tucson there’s supposed to be an airport pick-up waiting to take me, and anyone else arriving today, to the Southwestern Research Station in Portal. Who I am supposed to be looking for, however, I have no clue. It’ll be an adventure!

It’s pretty depressing being in DFW and not being able to walk out that exit door or catch a flight to somewhere else in TX…cruel…just plain cruel. I’m hoping that the return trip on the 22^nd will afford me the opportunity to see some Texas loves who might make the trek to the airport to see me since I have a 3hr layover =) **hint, hint**

I’m not too certain as to what this trip will entail as we haven’t really received any info regarding what we will be doing…just a, “Don’t forget sunscreen” message. So…we shall see!

I am excited to meet other people working on leps and make connections with them that might help me with my project or undertakings in the future – plus, it’s just fun to meet people you share some sort of interest with.

Things have been busy, busy, busy on the Tundra front, but all is definitely well. It’s very bitter-sweet to start thinking about moving in a few weeks. While I’m super excited about the new place and adventuring the year with my new roommates, I’m quite sad to leave my current abode. I just love that it’s my space. It’s all decorated the way I like things and it just feels like home. I’ll miss routine there as well. But! All good things do come to an end, and generally something else steps up and fills their place just fine. I am quite excited to build a new routine at the new house and to collaborate with Meg about decorating, etc…we highly doubt Justin will have anything to say about anything we do. As long as he has his projector room he’ll be happy as a lark :) It will also be especially nice for Jake to have more space and not have to worry about running into other doggies in the play pen. Plus, the place is simply beautiful…I mean really, really beautiful. Yay newness!

OK, all, laptop is about to die and I don’t feel like packing everything up to go find an outlet…

Until Arizona!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I have arrived! Found the airport pick-up meeting place after using my resourcefulness and looking up the number for the research station to find out (Apparently an email went out with loooads of info…I never got it. But! At least my name was on the airport pickup list!) who/where we were supposed to meet. Got the info and made it to the meeting place just fine. From there we all piled into a 15-passeneger van and made the 2-2.5ish hour (Maybe more? I was too busy oogling over the mountains and beautiful nature through my window) trek to the research station from Tucson. We actually ended up passing through New Mexico for about 30min (ish?) since the shortcut road was all washed out from the rains. 4 states in one day (MN, TX, AZ, NM)!!

The research station is beautiful. I mean, beeeeautiful. It doesn’t look or feel like anything I would ever imagine for Arizona, other than all of the rocky mountains. Gah! I so wish I had a camera!!! Im hoping I can get some of the people here to share some of their snapshots with me so I can show all y’all eventually.

Once at the station I had a little time to unpack my gear and toss it all neatly into some under-the-bed drawers (it’s like being at summer camp!) and chatted with my bunkmates for a little bit. I actually know two of the girls and they happen to be collaborators on the overarching project that my project is a part of. They’re grad students of one of my committee members, JZ, over in Wisconsin. It was nice to see some familiar faces. I also got to visit with JZ for a good spell and then we went to set up a trap before dinner. Dinner was pretty tasty – complete with brownie sundaes! Deeelish.

We have a little bit of downtime now and then we’ll head off for a big info meeting type deal and from the sounds of it, collecting!!

Internet is pretty spotty here, so blog posts, answers to emails, etc. will be posted when possible. There is absolutely NO cell reception however…so, if any of you beautiful people need me at all this week, your best bet will be to email/facebook/etc. me.

Happy Sunday, loves!

Shalom!
~MW

HOME, SWEET HOME!!!!!!!!!!

2011-08-09T20:26:00.000-05:00

We found it!!!!

OK, OK, I know I need to back up.

So...my latest housing update was a little less than cheery, though hopeful.

After finding out that Panda wasn't going to be able to make the great trek north, I was rather disheartened, but knew that there was something else in store for my next year here...sadly, it just wouldn't involve my little brother adventuring with me.

A couple days later I was presented with an opportunity to get a place with two of my friends: Megan and Justin. After considering that option and weighing the pros and cons of having roommates again, I decided that the pros far outweighed the cons.

Some of the big pluses:
1) CHEAPER RENT!!
2) Option to have a nicer/more spacious place...with still cheaper rent
3) More outside space for Jakers (a huge deciding factor for me)!

Some of the bummers:
1) Sharing my living space (I have loved this year of just having to worry about me and my critters)
2) Sharing my living space
3) Sharing my living space...

Yeah...I really couldn't say no.

So! We embarked on the adventure of finding "the perfect place" that satisfied the desires/needs of all 3 of us. Well...after less than a week of searching, we pretty much found it! Justin really gets the raw end of the deal - he's farther away from his campus and core group of friends he's been within walking distance of for the last 4yrs...that will be an adjustment, for him, but Meg and I are willing to cart him over to the East Bank from time to time.

We are all super stoked about making this place "home" for at least the next year. Meg will most likely be finishing her degree in the next year and a half or so, so we aren't quite sure how long this living arrangement will last. Either way, this next year will be a fun one.

Meg and I already have visions of dinner parties galore... It's going to be awesome.

It's a 3 story house that has been converted into a duplex, and we get the top two floors - baller. There are so many nooks and crannies in this place...not to mention a few Narnia closets (as I like to call them - Meg and Justin are now referring to them as such as well...it's a beautiful thing)!

Our official move-in date is September 1, but our lovely landlady said it will be no problem to start moving things in a little early. Yay!

I can't wait to take lots of pictures of the pre-move-in unit and then show y'all what we do with it to make it "ours." Meg and I have lots of ideas...lots :)

SO! The Lord is so good! He provided above and beyond, as usual. How fleeting faith can be in the midst of uncertainty. This is something He's been trying to teach me about for a long time now: He is in control and He will never leave me hanging, even when a solution seems impossible...even when it seems impossible.

Praying this post finds you all well and immensely blessed.

Much love!

Shalom,
~MW

P.S. - No, it is not snowing here, but it certainly feels like summer is fleeting (high of 72F today, what is this?!) :( The picture of the house is the one posted in the ad...happened to have been taken during the winter.

She's here!

2011-08-01T09:05:00.000-05:00

OK...so she's been here since Saturday...but, obviously, I've been too busy enjoying my sweet, precious Elaine to take time out to update...sowy!

But, here you have an update! No pictures of us yet...she has a couple on her real camera, but I don't have any on my phone, boo...need to adjust that problem :) And, since she's still fast asleep (this never happens! she's always up before I am), I'm not going to wake her to figure out how to steal some pictures from her phoney-phone. So...y'all will simply have to wait ;)

Anywho, we've been having a lovely time. And, the time is flying too quickly - Lord, please don't make me send her back to sweet Texas! Please!

She made her debut in the 'Sota Saturday afternoon and I was SO excited to see her. I just whipped into the first curbside spot I could find and jumped out of my car as soon as I saw her and nearly accosted her with a monstrous hug. I SO MISS HER!! We threw her little bag in the car and, of course, made our way to the Mall of America. We strolled around for a couple hours and Elaine just took in the "ooooo" and "aaaaaah" of a mall that has a theme park, mini-golf, and an aquarium inside of it...not to mention an American Girl store, a Lego store, and a few other wonders. Haha, but at the end of the day when some friends of mine asked her what she thought of the mall her response was, "I mean, really, it's just a really big mall...with some crazy stuff added to it" (<--paraphrase, but you get the idea.).

Saturday evening we met up with a few of my good friends here and had some burgers and fries at Snuffy's Malt Shop and then made our way out to Lake Elmo (the town, not the lake...we'll hit up some lakes today) for a drive-in movie. We saw Cowboys & Aliens....have to admit that we weren't super impressed, but that might have had to do with the insanely stormy weather...like major thunder/lightning (super awesome storm...just wasn't conducive to watching a movie...).

Sunday morning we did our usual farmers market and breakfast run with my gang up here, and it was a lovely morning...thought it started to get way crazy humid by the time we were about ready to leave the market...good thing we were leaving!!

We pretty much just hung out the rest of the day and had lovely convos about life, love, God, everything (it was wonderful) until it was churchy time. I loved getting to show her off to my church family here. It was especially great because a ton of people asked, immediately, if she was my sister. Nope...just my bestest friend...and we just happen to resemble each other fairly significantly.

And now my sleeping beauty is awake so I'm off to soak up more time with here.

Much love!
~MW

Housing Update #3

2011-07-28T20:46:00.001-05:00

jforjamie.com

OK, kids...this update isn't as cheery as the others have been, sadly.

The J-Man found out today that he did not receive any financial aid from the U, so, unfortunately, that means he will be staying home.

My Dad called me to break the news and initially I was OK, saddened that I wasn't going to get to tackle next year's adventures with my kid brother, but OK. And, then...the attention got turned to me. My dad asked, "So, what does this mean for you?" Cue uncontrollable tear flowage. I could hardly get words out to answer him. I was thrown back to this near exact situation last year and simply felt over-whelmingly lost.

What does this mean for me?

Well...I have a few options, I reckon.

1) I can bite the bullet and move on the duplex in the hopes of finding another roommate (yeah, craigslist...!)

2) I can start over looking for 1 bedrooms again.

I had to "chuckle" almost immediately when Dad called and told me, because just this morning I put in my notice to vacate...haha, awesome. Fortunately, I do still have my current apartment until the end of September.

So...here we are again: square one.

Continued prayers in this area would be much appreciated. I will keep you posted as things develop.

Please also continue to keep Joshua in your prayers...it wasn't an easy decision for him to stay. Now he has the task of finding a place of his own back home and re-adjusting his mindset to make the most of his current situation. He will also need the Lord's provision regarding a job for this coming year.

Thanks so much for praying along with us with all of this.

Hope this post finds you well =)

Shalom,

~MW

P.S. - on a brighter note: 1.5ish days 'til my BFF gets here!!

Housing update - post duplex viewing

2011-07-27T17:09:00.001-05:00

http://jforjamie.com/

Went to look at the duplex yesterday, and guess what!!

It's looking it will be a good fit!

- The landlord seems to be a very nice older gent' and we got along quite nicely.
- He dropped the monthly rent $30! (prayer answered!)
- He also allowed for a Sept 15 move-in! (another prayer answered!)
- Decent living space...bedrooms are a touch on the small side, but really...I just sleep in my room right now, so that's no biggie.
- Location is awesome...did I mention that??
- No fee at all for my critters...unheard of!
- OUR "OWN" WASHER AND DRYER!!!
- A yard....
- A garage space...
- Storage in the basement...

So, the unit is a go...but...one thing has moving forward on-hold: J-Man. He's still wrestling with some things. I'll be OK if he doesn't make it up here, but it would be helpful for me to know if he isn't coming so that I can switch back to only looking for 1bdrm places or else looking for a roommate to help with this duplex.

Please continue to pray with me as J-Man continues to weigh out things and make his decision.

Thanks so much for your prayers thus far - keep 'em comin', please!

Shalom,
~MW

Housing Update!

2011-07-25T09:11:00.002-05:00

maybe...!

Happy Monday, all!

I haven't officially blogged about the housing situation...like, why I'm moving, what I'm looking for and all that jazz, but I have talked to a number of you about it and I am so thankful for all of your prayers up 'til now - please keep 'em comin'!

Some quick updates on the situ:
- It is pretty much certain that my little bro J-Man will be moving up here in August!
- That said, it's pretty much certain that he and I will be living together this year!
- I'm locked-in at my current apartment until the end of September

OK, so I've been contacting some places here-and-there and I heard back from a seemingly awesome duplex (downstairs of a house that has been converted into a duplex - these types of places are all over up here, and they're pretty sweet).
- fairly affordable rent (I'm going to see if there's any chance they could drop the price $30-40 a month)
- landlord and wife are pet-lovers...so my critters are more than welcome!
- NO PET DEPOSIT/RENT!!
- super close to both the East Bank Campus (where Josh will most likely spend the majority of his time) and St. Paul Campus (where I "live")...we're talking biking distance for me, even walking distance for J-Man!
- would allow us to use the Minneapolis internet provider which is more than $30 cheaper than the internet providers in St. Paul!!

The list continues a bit.

Anywho, I'm taking a gander at the place tomorrow evening. The only potential hitch in the plan is that the unit is available September 1...that's a month before I can move out of my current place...

Will you pray with me about this?

So, how can you pray? A few ways:
1. That the landlord would be willing to allow a Sept. 30 (or Oct. 1) move-in date, or at the very least a Sept. 15 move-in.
2. That he would also be willing to drop the monthly rent a little bit.
3. That the Lord would move in this circumstance and make decisions clear.

Please also pray for Josh as he continues to work through the logistics of moving up to the Tundra from good ol' Tejas.

Alrighty, have to get back to work. Y'all are awesome. I'll keep you updated, fo sho!

Shalom!
~MW

ONE MORE WEEK.....

2011-07-23T12:10:00.004-05:00

....UNTIL I GET TO SEE THIS GORGEOUS GIRL!!!

I absolutely cannot wait to see my sweet, sweet Elaine. She emailed me a few weeks ago and pitched the idea of coming to see me the end of July/beginning of August...with a possibility like that I could hardly contain my excitement! A few days later she sent me her flight itinerary!!! I nearly peed my pants...like for serious. Ok, so not really, but I think the imagery helps to get the extent of my excitement across ;)

Elaine and I have been besties since college and I don't get to see her enough. The above picture was made possible by Mak and Wes getting hitched (you can see some pictures from that trip to Texas here and you can read allllll about it here.) - thanks, kids!!

This lady and I began our friendship at the very tail-end of my sophomore year at A&M.

Yeah, Phi Lamb Frush! I'm pretty sure this was the first time

we actually met each other

We were blessed to have a little time together before she went off and graduated and moved off to Baylor for her grad program. Fortunately for us, Baylor is about the half-way point on the trip to/from the Dallas area (home!) to Aggieland (second home!), so I got to see her just about every time I took a weekend trip home from Aggieland - blessings!!!! Our friendship grew tremendously during that time apart and I loved my pit-stops on that 3.5hr drive. During our friendship we have encouraged and prayed each other through numerous trials, "suffered" a spring break road trip to Colorado (from which I returned with a fractured arm...baller.)

survived (quite literally) some awesome New Year's Eve parties,

"endured" her engagement party (so fun!),

"survived" her wedding day (gooorgeous bride! I so loved being your moh, lovely, such a privilege.),

made it through not seeing each other and having super conflicting schedules that disallowed frequent communication, and so, so much more.

This girl is truly a for-life-friend. I am so blessed by her. She is an incredible daughter of the King, and her encouragement is something I cannot even begin to describe.

I can't wait to show her around the not-so-Frozen Tundra and introduce her to my life here. Hopefully someday we'll be able to do life together from not so far away :)

See you soon, lovely!
~MW

Sweet Summer Time

2011-07-18T21:33:00.002-05:00

I can't wait to have kids so that I can make one of these with them:

Courtesy of whatever...

I came across this beauty a few weeks ago in my perusings and fell in love with it. While I haven't drawn up my own summer list, I have had quite the summer thus far:

- Trip to Tejas for a wedding, complete with lots of visits with my Texas loves, and LOTS of Tex-Mex!
- Cirque du Soliel - Ovo
- Went to a high school graduation and helped with the graduation party (all for SW's oldest kiddo who now works in the insect museum with me!)
- Helped run a successful, though chilly, BioBlitz
- Hosted an eggroll making party (AWESOME fun!)
- Played a departmental game of kickball, complete with bbq!!
- Big bday bbq bash for all of our June bday peoples, complete with fire!!!
- Went to a comedy club - haven't laughed that hard in a long time
- Canoed around the lake with my McQueen's and Meg...Jakers had a blast doggy-paddling around...it took him some getting used to, though ;)
- 4th of July parade and picnic!!! It was very Pollyana :)
- Rockin' 4th of July bbq over in Uptown and got to watch all of the fireworks shows all around town, sooo amazing
- Went on a canoe trip over in Wisconsin. Saw so many bald eagles!! It was incredible.
- Lab bbq at RH's awesome home...I could sit in that backyard forever, I'm pretty sure
- Strolled around one evening with one of my sweet friends and her sweet baby
- Made my way a little ways west to hang over at Kreutter's grandma's place on the lake. Had an absolute blast hanging out with her fam and Jakers looooved swimming and playing outside all day
- Have so loved hitting up the farmers market each week with Callie and anyone else who can make it

And, the summer isn't quite over yet!! Woohoo!

~-~-~-~-~-~-~

Sunday was way fun, because Kreutter spent the day with me and I got to introduce her to a few of my FT bugdorks. Everyone met up over at my place bright and early and we made our way downtown for some breakfast at a sweet little place just down from the market. Check out what was hanging from the ceiling!!!

That's right...that's totally a griffon skeleton!!! Baller.

The gang - they so make me happy :)

I love the market...it makes me incredibly happy and the produce is outstanding. Here's a little (un-edited) taste of what one visit will give you in the way of fresh, local, organic produce+ for just $10:

Left to Right, Top to Bottom: Lettuce ($2)! Half of a $5 bouquet! Decorative cabbage

(from the $5 bouquet) in a globe bowl! The other half of the $5 bouquet!

$1 worth of basil plants! A dozen golden potatoes ($2) that I baked up

with olive oil, pepper, cumin, and Parmesan cheese - yum!

Ahhh, the farmers market...I just love it :)

Ahem...for an example of just how much joy it gives me....I am going to allow you feast your eyes on this....as I cover my eyes in shame...I just get so excited!!

OK, so, in my defense...there was another picture being taken from above at this

point in time... See? Look at Mark, sitting next to me, he's making a goofy

face, too! ;) We were all sitting on the horse-drawn wagon riding back to

the parking lot. How much more fun could a trip to the market get?!

I have another treat for y'all!

A video of Jakers out at the lake!!

All-in-all, we had an absolute blast this weekend :)

And, this upcoming weekend should be just as stellar - Saints game tailgate party!

And then, the weekend after that Elaine comes to visit!!!!

This summer, while it's had its low points, for sure, just keeps getting better and better and I can't wait to see how the rest of it turns out.

Alrighty kids, I'm outty for now.

Lots of love!

Shalom,

~MW

Oh death...

2011-07-07T22:15:00.001-05:00

I so needed this:

Watch the full version here.

I had a whole blog post I was going to write-up tonight for y'all...but in playing catch-up with some of the blogs I follow I came across the above video over at The Blair Affairs and all of my plans went out the window. I've loved getting to know Jennifer through her blog the last month or so, after she stumbled upon my little bloggy and so, naturally...as we bloggers do...I ventured over to her lovely page and fell in love with her heart for the Lord and pure honesty in her postings. Take a few minutes and check her out if you aren't familiar with her already. {Plug: she's going to Ethiopia! Help her out by purchasing one of her super adorable headbands.}

Anywho, back to the high-jacked post. I was talking about my plans for this post just totally readjusting.

Last week was...well...hellacious, to put it lightly.

It started out with general life stresses regarding moving. Where will I call home come the end of September? How am I going to cut rent and still have enough room for my critters. How am I going to find a place that will be affordable enough to allow me to take on some other financial weights as the fall approaches (ahem...like buying a car...and a new computer...)? OK, so stressful, but normal. Everyone downsizes and cuts budgets at some point. Everyone moves at some point. It's always a little stressful, but God has never failed me and has always, always, always provided for me in an incredible way. Sometimes I just forget His faithfulness...how fickle we humans are...

Then came the torrent of emotional heartache as I watched a friend go through a very difficult hurtle in his life. He's coping well, but it was extremely difficult upon first hearing the news. I'd share more, but what I've said already will suffice.

OK...so, life is stressful and friends go through hard times. We've all been there. We've all survived it.

Remember how they say "things come in 3's"? Or, "everything happens all at once"? Well...call it coincidence, or whatever you want to call it, but it held true for last week.

I got news Friday that a friend of mine high school was on a 50 day trip through the Middle East and he passed away last week while over seas. I was speechless when I found out. Thankfully my dear friend Skate (she takes such good care of me) called me so that I didn't have to see it on facebook first, but could hear it from a loving friend - I love her. When I got the news I didn't know how to react, how to respond, what to think...or to even believe it, initially. Justin was one of those people who you could have met only once, but would have been forever impacted by. He was such a vibrant, outgoing, brilliant, fun, loving, person. I didn't really start processing his death until about an hour after I found out. I was talking with my lab mate, and she had suffered through my multiple break downs last week, and told her what had happened and she dropped everything and dragged me out of the lab to go get some frozen yogurt (Robin, you're the absolute best, just for the record!). Robin is excellent. She has a remarkable way of calming people. As we were making the trek down the hill to her car we were chatting about death and loss in general and then she says to me, "So, tell me about Justin." It was nice to be able to think back on some of the fun we'd had in high school...from football games to knitting, to random shenanigans. It was good to remember him. To remember the life and zeal he had - to remember his faith. We didn't do a great job of keeping up with each other after high school, but he had still been a part of my life. Robin made the comment, too, that it's sometimes the most difficult to grieve for those we might not have known as well, or have fallen out of touch with. I couldn't have agreed more. I almost felt like I didn't have the right to mourn him, or to feel loss in his death. But, at the same time I couldn't stop thinking about it and found myself falling into tears much of the weekend.

Needless to say, I spent much of the weekend thinking about loss and death. Thinking about Justin. Thinking that it isn't fair that he was taken so early. Feeling angry. Feeling confused...simply wondering, "why?"

But then my thoughts began to shift.

While I was (and am) still feeling the loss of Justin, and grieving that, I was comforted. I was reminded of his zeal for the Lord. I was reminded that I should be rejoicing that he is with the Father - I should be borderline jealous of that! I should want that! I shouldn't be thinking about how it's unfair that the collective "we" of earth were "robbed" of him. I should be rejoicing that he is walking in glory - that he had fulfilled his time on earth to the Father's satisfaction and that He saw fit to call Justin home. I should be rejoicing, in the midst of death.

And then, because God is so good and works in such wonderful and mysterious ways, He directed me to Jen's blog and where she had previously posted the video at the opening of this post. What a mighty and awesome God He is. He never ceases to amaze me in the way that He cares for His children. That video was just the spiritual reminder that I needed to fully remember what death in Christ means - VICTORY!

Christ is risen from the dead

Trampling over death by death

Come awake, come awake!

Come and rise up from the grave!

Christ is risen from the dead!

We are one with Him again!

Come awake, come awake!

Come and rise up from the grave!

Oh death, where is your sting?

Oh hell, where is your victory?

Oh church, come stand in the light!

The glory of God has defeated the night!

Matt Maher

Oh death...where is your sting? Oh grave...where is your victory? These are the questions I should have been asking from the beginning. We are the risen church...Our God is not dead...He's alive. And we live in Him - forever. Glory!

What a blessing it is to be able to find comfort and joy in death.

And with that I'm going to close. The week is nearly up and I'm off to WI on Saturday for a canoeing trip with friends! Can't wait to get out on the water and take in my Daddy's beautiful creation.

Shalom, loves.

~MW

A placed called Rainbow...

2011-06-22T19:38:00.000-05:00

...for those of you who've been following since I made the trek to the Frozen Tundra, you know what that means...

I went grocery shopping!!

OK, y'all, I have to confess something: I way do not like grocery shopping. Stores are never set-up in a way that is intuitive (or makes sense on any level in some cases), they are always crowded, and well...food (good food) is expensive. That's 3 strikes...that usually means, "you're out!!!" But, alas...we must eat.

So, I did it. I sucked it up and finally went grocery shopping. I hadn't been, but to get a loaf of bread and carton of milk, since my return from TX...shameful, I know...but, don't you worry, I ate...my cupboards were officially empty this morning, hence the need for a shopping trip.

But, my shopping trip did allow me to get some things for a little lemonade recipe I've been wanting to try.

Fresh lemonade.....

Fresh blueberry mint lemonade...!!!

How pretty is that glass of drink?? B-e-a-utiful! You know what else...? It's deeeelish!
And, guess what else! It's easy peasy...lemon squeezey! Bah-hahahaha! I couldn't resist...and I apologize.

Here's what you'll need:
1c lemon juice (about 2 large lemons)
3/4c sugar (I used white this go round, but I'll be trying it with cane sugar next - I think it will make it pop even more!)
4c water
1c blueberries (a good sized handful or two should do the trick)
1/3c mint (I just used a sprig of mint with something like 8-9 leaves on it. I didn't use the stem, but I suppose you could chop it up and throw it in the mix?)

Juice your lemons. I used my Magic Bullet Juicer adapter and was able to get over 1c of juice from two large lemons.
Add sugar and water to lemon juice. Shake/mix vigorously, ensuring that the sugar is dissolved.
Add in blueberries and mint.
Chill for however long and enjoy!
recipe adapted from La Petite Coquin

The original recipe recommends letting it sit for a few hours to allow the flavors to mix and infuse more, but after letting mine sit for even just 30min it was wonderfully delicious. I'll let you know how it tastes after sitting over night, though!

It has been a good night in the kitchen, to say the least.

It's amazing what having food on hand to cook with will allow for, eh?

My dinner consisted of this:

My variation of J Ponder's (from Ponder This) fried rice...what I wouldn't give for some of that goodness...and some Ponder company on top of that - to die for!

I've mentioned it on the blog before, but I like my picture from tonight better than the other one I snapped before. No carrots this time, though.

It was fabulous, and the spicy went excellently with the refreshing lemonade. Yum!!

And now, I'm going to settle down for the night with a movie, some chocolate, and another glass of that there lemonade ;)

Nighty-night.

Shalom!
~MW

Ho-Hum...it's Monday...

2011-06-20T21:35:00.000-05:00

Greetings, all.

So...as I am certain most of you have figured out...today is Monday. Monday, Monday, Monday...you always come too quickly and last far too long. Just sayin'.

Anywho, I have a ton of things I've been needing to blog about: the close of my second semester of grad school, summer, some things I've learned in the last year or so...the list goes on. But, tonight, as it will most definitely be after 9 by the time I finish this post and I would like to get to bed a reasonable hour tonight, I think I'm just going to make this a short and sweet update.

Last week was hectic, but good.

Wrapping up the loose ends from BioBlitz, curating all of the specimens we collected in those 24hrs (with some help from the Chanimal - thanks, yo!), and undertaking the task of rearing moths after finding myself with a large amount of moth eggs on my hands kept me buuuusy!

Aside from all of that I wrestled with Biota2 as I attempted the supposedly simple task of transferring my PC files to our lab MAC. This used to be a simple, painless task...back in 2002...but, of course, the converter hasn't been updated since then and is no longer supported on Leopard or Snow Leopard. Neat. Thanks 4D for not staying on top of that...sigh. So, after an ordeal of uninstalling and re-installing the software on my laptop (just in case something got messed up during the initial installation...it didn't), RW came to the realization that he had lost his license number for the program...awesome. So, I called up the distributor to see if maybe, just maybe they could look it up for us - they could! And they did!! Whoop!

They sent us the codes late Friday so I was able to get everything rolling again this morning. But, I still have the issue of needing to take my database files between a PC and MAC. So, first thing (OK, maybe 2nd or 3rd thing) tomorrow I'm calling them up again to see if there is a new way around this issue, if not...SW said she'd buy "me" a new MAC for the lab!!! Holla! Can I just stumble upon a ridiculously large amount of discarded cash so I can buy my own MAC??? Maybe? Not likely? Dang...worth a shot. So, I'll let you know what happens there, because if the company says there's no solution SW said she'll purchase the new comp before the week is up. {I kind of really want this latter option to happen...I know...I'm a terrible person.}

The caterpillars are...well...not fairing so well :( I walked in this morning to find large amounts of them...shriveled up and dead, dead, dead...depressing first thing on a Monday morning. I talked to SW about it and she exclaimed in apology for not mentioning that they should have been transferred to a tupperware container to ensure that they didn't suffer from dessication. Even though there were moist maple leaves and a damp paper towel in the net-cage...the air inside the building was still to dry. Blast! Ah well, learning experience. There are a few survivors who are now nestled safely in a tupperware container...so we'll see how they look in the morning. Fingers crossed!

Backing up a few days now.

Friday was the day I the majority of the fighting with Biota, but I was (pleasantly and humorously) interrupted from that battle by a text from SW that read something along the lines of:

I may need some salad

and photo board help. Do

you have time today?

Headed home with the fixings

and will call when I get there.

Thanks life preserver!

Haha...OK, so here's some background on that text. Her oldest graduated from high school a week or two ago (it was actually a pretty fun graduation ceremony!!). The graduation party was scheduled for Saturday the 18th. SW was out of town through Wednesday of that week...talk about a brave mom! Anywho, the 3 "men" of the house neglected to get any of the to-do list she had left from them to do for the week that she was gone so that she could focus on the actual party details once she came back in town. Panic ensued on Thursday (I got a text that day saying she would see me Friday if she weren't jailed for killing offspring first! Ha! Gotta love it.). I offered to help her with anything between Thursday and Saturday...and so came the text on Friday.

After I got home from the lab I ran Jakers around for a bit and then packed up my crafting supplies and headed out to her place. I had hardly made it through the door when her husband exclaimed, "Oh thank goodness you're here! You're co-advisor is about to go insane!!!!!" Hahahahaha...yes, I laughed outloud and saw the agreement mixed with furry in SW's eyes...poor woman - she was spent and still had dinner to make...for her family and 3 guests (they had two ornithologists (her hubs is an ornithologist) staying with them that night and then there was me). I ushered her out of the kitchen and into the dinning room where there were mounds of photographs and poster board strewn about. I told her as long as she gave me an idea of what she was going for I would do my best to finish the photo boards and then move on to whatever other task she needed done. I thought she was going to cry out of sheer gratitude! She set to making dinner and I put the photo boards together. And then...we all sat down to a lovely dinner of grilled venison steaks with grilled veggies and potatoes...complete with a glass of wine - perfection. Once dinner was over the boys all headed to the den and SW and I hung out in the kitchen and had girl time. It was positively delightful.

Saturday was another full day! It started with an egg roll making party at my place (Ummm...so awesome...and no...I didn't take any pictures. I know! I'm sorry!!!) which took a good part of the day and then we stuffed our faces with a ton of egg rolls. We made somewhere in the range of 70-80...there were 12 left...There were about 8 of us altogether...ha. After that ordeal came to a close a number of us made the trek over to SW's for the graduation party, complete with much more food....and....CAKE POPS!!!! We all slept well that night.

Sunday was another day, but a blessed one at that. I got to visit with Skate and talk to my pops and see all of my loves at church. Win, win, win!

There's the latest and greatest...how's that for short? Ha...I just kept remembering more and more things that I felt were blog worthy!!

OK, for reals, I'm closing this post with a farewell and good night.

Praying blessings upon you.

Shalm,

~MW

To my Daddy

2011-06-19T15:30:00.001-05:00

Happy Father's Day, Daddy!

What a blessing it is to know the love of a father. This is a blessing I hope I never, ever take for granted. My Daddy Dearest is the absolute best father a girl could ask for. No, really...I'm not kidding.

Things I love about my Faja:

1) He loves me unconditionally

2) He teaches me about God, life, loving others, having wisdom, and so much more all the time

3) He lets me make mistakes but is always there to help me pick up the pieces and learn from whatever has just caused me to fall on my face and break a limb...

4) He's pretty much always a phone call away...even when he's too busy, he always makes time.

5) He's pretty darn funny...sometimes ;)

6) I can geek-out with him about things like Star Wars, anything Tolkien/C.S. Lewis, and so much more

7) He does more than he has to/needs to if it means making something a little bit easier on my end...even when he's, you guess it, too busy...like driving across the country with me to move me into my little apartment in the Frozen Tundra.

8) He loves, loves, loves the Lord and isn't afraid to show it.

9) He's incredibly wise.

10) He loves our family in an incredible way.

11) He...is...patient. Something I am trying to learn myself...he's an amazing model of this.

12) He enjoys the outdoors and nature like me...and I love that we can share in those things...even if at times I make him help me with trapping insects, resulting in him suffering severely from poison ivy...but, we don't talk about that... ;)

13) He let's me cry in front of him and doesn't feel awkward or uncomfortable when I do, but, rather, extends the most wonderful comfort, care, and love in just the right way for whatever the moment calls for...whether it's simply sitting by my side and hugging me, speaking words of Truth/Wisdom, etc...

14) He never let's me do the dishes after cooking our Thanksgiving Feast...though I don't get to do this anymore, now that I've moved out of TX, he would never let me touch a dirty dish after cooking/baking all day...

15) He's my dad.

Not the best of pictures, but this is him and me after my

graduation from A&M - it was a chilly December night, and,

of course, I wasn't willing to sacrifice cuteness for warmth...but,

Faja was there, wool coat and all, to keep me warm :)

You're the best, Dad.

Love you dearly, talk to you soon!

All my love,

~Heather

I was going to blog tonight, but....

2011-06-18T22:23:00.001-05:00

....I got lost playing on this neat little thing called...

...Pinterest...

'nuff said.

And, with that I bid you all goodnight.

Shalom!

~H.

What weekend...?

2011-06-12T22:02:00.002-05:00

Happy Sunday, lovely readers.

Praying the Lord has blessed you on His day and that your weekend has been filled to the brim with R&R and maybe some productivity...maybe? ;)

My weekend has been...looong...but good!

Friday
Friday got off to an early start as I finished my 3rd (and hopefully final) prelim exam for my program. Once that bad boy was finished it was time to kick it into hyperdrive to finish getting everything ready for BioBlitz which kicked off at 5pm that night.

All of my gear, before heading up to campus to get the

nets, kill jars, etc... {minus my magazine basket, of course...}

What on earth is BioBlitz?!

BioBlitz is a 24hr survey of the biodiversity of a given area. It's something I got involved with at A&M and I was very pleased to discover that SW is one of the big participants here in the Frozen Tundra - win! Aside from trying to document all the different plants, fungi, birds, toads/lizzards/snakes, insects, mammals, etc...BioBlitz aims to involve the community in discovering and learning about the natural history of the area. <-- This is one of my favorite parts of BioBlitz - the community outreach. Love it!

A bunch of us packed up and headed on out to the Katharine Ordway Natural History Study Area (try saying that one 10 times fast!) to get light traps and overnight traps set-up before taking to the woods and fields to try to collect any insects we came across while it was still daylight/dusk. Sadly, we had a cold front blow through this weekend, and Friday night proved to be pretty poor collecting conditions...the pickins were slim, to say the least. We DID, however, find a gorgeous mating pair of Spilosoma virginica (a tiger moth - arctiid) and closed the night around 11pm with the capture (With my bare hand! I'd already packed up my gear for the night!) of a handsome male Ctenucha virginica (another type of tiger moth) - such a gorgeous guy. It was very exciting and made getting drenched while collecting in the rain well worth it :)

Saturday
Started the day with another early morning and headed back out to the Ordway Area. We had much more success collecting insects on Saturday than we did on Friday. This was great, except that we had to spend a good portion of our day collecting so we didn't have as much time to ID and curate...made for a bit of a time crunch as 5pm approached quickly. STRESS! And, since I still haven't recovered from the trip to TX (no time to sleep!) my body was fading fast...and I quickly lose nearly all patience when I'm tired...no bueno, friends, no bueno. Fortunately, Corey the Dynamo was there to help keep me sane :)

There were a few kiddos who came out and wanted to know lots of things about bugs and wanted to show us all of the insects they had collected. So great! There was one little boy who was probably about 4 and he kept bringing me all these little rocks and mosses along with insects...it was so fun. Another little girl, maybe 8 or 9, brought a lady beetle (ladybug) and a mirid (plant bug) and wanted us to ID them for her. The bug was one we hadn't collected yet so she let us keep it. I showed her how we put the insects in our special jars (kill jars...glass jars with plaster paris in the base that is charged with ethyl acetate...basically euthanizes them) that put them to sleep and then they die so that we can put them on pins...if we put them on pins when they are still awake it doesn't feel very nice and their little legs will move all around. So I walked her through that process and she was so excited to see the art of insect pinning and thought her little bug looked very nice on its new pin, all set to go into the collection. Before she left she surprised me with the biggest hug...I nearly died. It was just what I needed - I was starving at that point and wanted nothing more than to go home, eat, shower, and sleep...she granted me a pleasant distraction from ID'ing and pinning at record speeds to teach...and blessed me with a hug. So precious!

The rest of the day was non-stop pinning and ID'ing and....databasing...my faaaaavorite thing eeeeeever....not. But, we got it done, with about 105 morphospecies to report! Which was good, considering the weather conditions!

After cleaning everything up and loading up the cars and trucks and things everyone cleared out and my crew and I embarked on our "roadtrip" back home (OK, so it was only a 30min drive...) so we could drop everything back off at campus and actually go home. (We found out a little secret about our building, too!! BONUS!)

I ran by the Rainbow and grabbed some essentials...yes, cut flowers are essential from time to time =) Popped by RedBox, grabbed True Grit and headed home to settle in for the evening.

Dynamo and CashSmock came over and joined me for the rest of True Grit and Corey had fun riling Jakers up every time he had settled down...he thought it was fun ;) Then it was BED TIME.

Sunday
Woke up with quite the migraine that I've been fighting all day...I reckon that's a testament to my exhaustion and need to stop. If you won't find the time to stop when you need to...your body will force you to stop. OK, body, OK. So I took today easy and didn't do much of anything - it was nice and much needed.

Finally decided I should make a real meal of sorts around dinner time...but since I only picked up the bare essentials from Rainbow I had to use my throbbing noggin to figure something out. So, what did I come up with??

Chickpeas + diced tomatoes + onions + a bunch of spices

+ a side of rice = quite a tasty dish

(and pretty good for you, too!)

I tossed my onions in the pan first with some sesame oil, once they went translucent I added in my tomatoes, chickpeas, spices, and covered it in water and set it to boil. Then I simmered it all until the liquid evaporated off some and thickened some.
For spices I used ground cumin, cloves, nutmeg, ginger, chili powder, ground red pepper, and salt and black pepper.
Spooned some of the chickpea mixture and sauce over a bowl of rice and voila! you have a cheap, easy, tasty (filling!) dinner.

I was hoping that eating something substantial would help kick the headache, but no such luck :-/ It's starting to dull now, though.

So, my dears, with that, I am going to leave you and am calling it a night.

Blessings upon you as you tackle another Monday!!

Shalom,
~MW

P.S. - GO MAVS!!!

Need a Break from Databasing...

2011-06-08T16:04:00.000-05:00

It's just one of those days...and I need a break from fighting with this databasing program and you all get an extra post out of it!! Lucky, lucky duckies! I can't in good conscience take too long of a break, so I'm stealing Katy's latest "right now."

watching: Corey work on a paper (really, listening and occasionally glancing up at his comments and rants about methods and mustaches and things) as I peruse the interwebs on this little coffee break.

eating: PopChips, salt & pepper - I think I have a new addiction. Soooo tasty!

drinking: coffee - yuuuummy!

wearing: Union Bay bermuda shorts and a BYX winter formal 2007 t-shirt.

doing: nothing...resting my brain for a spell.

feeling: sleeepy, ADD (like way badly today), like I'm wasting this beautiful 76 degree weather (it was 104 yesterday!!!) by sitting inside :-/

missing: Texas, family, friends - Christmas break will be hear before we know it, loves!

thinking: I am incredibly, incredibly blessed to be where I am, doing what I am doing, and to have the friends and family I have been granted...I'm in awe...all the time.

weather: gorgeous

praying: for restful sleep.

wanting: to visit the Big Bro and Big Sis post ESA in November!! {Maybe?!?!}

thankful: i am Supremely loved. <-- Katy hit it on the nose, her response stays =)

dreaming: of "my" undergrad coming back to help me this summer SO I DON'T HAVE TO DO THE DATABSING ANYMORE!!!! Haha...yes, you may call me spoiled...but, really, "my" undergrad is awesomely legit and gets to partake in lots of awesome opportunities this summer, so I reckon I can grant him his leave :)

loving: the beautiful world around me (seriously...it is SO green here!), this experience that is grad school, the people who grant me their friendship and love, God's gracious love and provision...life.

Ok...chips are gone, coffee mug is nearly depleted...coffee break is coming to a close...

Lots of love, readers. Happy Hump Day!

Shalom,
~MW

P.S. - if you want to get your hands on some pretties for cheap...check out Yellow Songbird's Blog Sale!!!

Thoughts on Memorial Day {late}

2011-06-05T12:29:00.000-05:00

Happy Sunday, all.

As I mentioned in my post recounting my adventures in Texas I wanted to share some thoughts on Memorial Day with you...even if it is a bit late.

Days like Memorial Day are always important to me for a number of reasons:

1) Whether I agree with a given war or US presence in other countries or not, the men and women who leave their families, homes, and the safety of our borders are making incredible sacrifices not only for their own families, but for yours and mine...even though they may never know us face to face.

2) I truly love our country. While our nation is far from perfect, I think we often forget how good we have it here in the States. We are truly blessed with the freedoms and privileges generation after generation of our fellow Americans have so valiantly fought to preserve.

3) I know soldiers. I know families of soldiers. I know friends of soldiers. While I will never ask those who have served what they have experienced during their time of service (but will always listen if they want/need to share), it is often written on their faces: the trouble they have seen and the heartache they have experienced...whether it be locked away in memories or visible to everyone in wounds they suffered. But no matter what it is they have gone through, I always see humility, courage, and pride in our country and what they have/are fighting for.

On my flight leaving Austin this Tuesday, I had the honor and privilege of sitting next to a tall, quiet soldier.

This man had been home on leave for 15 days to spend time with his family before returning to his tour. The pain he was experiencing in leaving his family, yet again, was clear as he sat with his head in his hands, elbows resting on his knees, or resting his head on the back of his seat, eyes closed, hands clasped together with thumbs rolling. It was evident to me that he believes in what he does for our country, but that doesn't wash away the fact that he was again leaving his family and that the possibility of not returning was again very real.

We didn't talk much... I would have loved to have had more conversation with him, but with his mind so obviously processing what was happening, I kept my silence for the short flight to DFW and allowed him his solitude. Once we landed we had to sit on the landing strip for a bit before we could proceed to the gate - this afforded me the opportunity to thank him for his sacrifice and service.

When I looked into this soldier's eyes as I thanked him, I saw incredible gratitude mixed with the sadness of leaving. DFW is where they ship out from, he told me. In that moment I saw a hint of tears welling in his eyes. I wanted to ask him about his family, if he and his wife had children, and so much more. But decided to spare him. This leg of his tour will be for 6 months, he told me. 6 months is a long time to be away from the comforts of home and the love of family, but he was grateful for the shortness of this time away from home.

As we parted ways in the terminal I thanked him again, told him to be safe, and sent him with the Lord's blessing. The awe in his face was heart-wrenching and I had to work hard to hold my own tears back. He thanked me and told me to be sure to take care of myself. I spent the remainder of my day and much of this week praying for this man and his fellow soldiers.

How easy it is to go-on with our day-to-day life and not think twice about the men and women who make this life possible.

How easy it is for us to forget the ones who leave home so that we don't have to.
...So that we don't have to live in fear.
...So that we can freely worship our God.

Don't forget them.
Don't forget the ones who have served before we were even a thought in our mothers' minds.
Don't forget the ones who have served while we have grown up in comfort and safety.
Don't forget the ones who are serving now to preserve that comfort and safety we have grown so accustomed to.
Don't forget the ones who have given their lives for ours.
Don't forget the families who sacrifice their sons and daughters so that we don't have to.

Remember how and why our country exists and persists.

I am certain that I will never forget this soldier. The short time I spent sitting next to him has impacted me in a way I will never forget.

I have sometimes forgotten what it was like to have my cousin serving so far away and in harms way, now that he is home and safe, though still serving our country...though still in harms way. Somehow it is less frightening knowing that he is in America where we have excellent doctors and facilities that could help save him, should the unthinkable happen. But, he is still serving and putting his life on the line for the safety of others.

It's easy to forget. This is one of the reasons days like Memorial Day are so important - they force us to remember and recognize what we have and why we have it.

I cannot fully express the gratitude I have for the sacrifice of those serving in our armed forces, but I do thank you and your friends and families for their sacrifice.

Remember.

Shalom,
~MW

Texas Time!

2011-06-03T10:24:00.005-05:00

{{Interwebs broke last night, so this post had to wait until today. Oh, and the comments have moved to the top of the blog posts...weird, I know...but, I kinda like it...}}

OK, readers!

So, I promised you more updates this week and here is the first installment: Texas!

{I'm going to do my catch-up updates in reverse order, so that I don't leave any of the awesome that was this precious time in the land I have come to love so, so dearly.}

TEXAS!!!!

Let me start....at the beginning!

Saturday, May 21
Let's just say that the trip got off to a weeeeee bit of a rocky start...This gal slept through her alarm, only to be awakened by the highly offensive **buzz** that is the door buzzer of my building. And, let me tell you, I am so thankful that the **buzz** is indeed highly offensive...otherwise I might not have made it! My sweet friend Christine had graciously agreed not only to pick me up at the ungodly hour of 5am to take me to the airport, but also to be the live-in "mom" to my critters while I was away...she's the best, y'all. Anyways, back to getting to the airport... Christine had called me when she left her place to come pick me up...but, of course, I didn't hear the call, nor did I wake up to any of my 5 alarms...neeeeat. So, I woke up when I was supposed to be leaving. Yep, talk about freak-out. I wasn't entirely packed as I had a few things I was still debating on taking, so the decision was made by shoving everything without a thought into my trusty, rolly, red duffel bag. I then splashed some water on my face, threw the hair in a pony tail, kissed the critter goodbye, and flew out the door with Christine's **chuckling** help. We made it to the airport with plenty of time for me to check my bag, make it through the one open check-point, and spend a little time in the bathroom making myself look a little more presentable. I got to chat with another lady doing the same thing - this gal was impressively curling her hair! Props to her! Then I got to chat with my pops as I waited...yay, weather delays...silly tornadoes... Sadly, the delay stole a chunk of time that I was going to spend with the fam at DFW, but we were still able to get in an hour and a half or so (complete with a dead battery in the 'rent's car at the airport...there's a free service for that at DFW, though!!), and it was wonderful - they brought me Taco Bueno (judge me all you want, it still screams Texas!)! It was great to be able to see my Momma on her bday - love you so much! From DFW I caught my next flight down to ATX where I was very pleasantly greeted by two of my absolute best friends, the Ponders. Man, I miss them!! I was able to spend the rest of Saturday and all of Sunday with them, and Josh even serenaded me and Elaine with some guitar playing and singing - thanks for sacrificing your fingertips for us, JP! (*snap! snap! snap! snap! snappity! snap! snap!*)

Monday, May 23
My sweet Tara friend came and snatched me from the Ponder house Monday morning and we went to Kerbey Lane where we had one of the most excellent breakfasts ever...deeeelish! We spent the day running around, catching up, and hanging out - it was wonderful. Later that evening our wonderful Kristen friend came to join the party and we got ready for a superb Mexican feast, I am Number 4 showing, and slumber party with a couple of Tara's friends from grad school (thanks so much for all of your hard work and letting us crash in your living room, Noel!!). It was awesome.

Tuesday, May 24
FUN IN THE SUN! SUN! SUN! SUN! Y'all...my skin hasn't seen sun since I moved up here...it was awesome to get to lounge out by the pool...even if I did get some funny streaky lines...no worries, everything evened out before the wedding :) It's still a bit too chilly up here to go swimming, too, so splashing around in the pool was delightful. Later on we went to Gloria's (the BEST tamales I have ever had state side...I'd venture to say they were as good as the Panamanian tamales, family...seriously...I thought I had died and gone to heaven) for happy hour, where I got to see my lovely Alyssa K!! It was awesome to catch up with her and have good old fashioned girl time.

Wednesday, May 25
Kerbey Lane, round 2! Kristen and Tara and I decided we needed to go get breakfast there again...just because we could, and we all wanted to dig-in to some lemon poppy-seed pancakes (to die for!). It was fantastic. After breakfast the girls dropped me off at the casa de Reed where I got to spend some wodnerfully precious time with my cousins and the little Z-Man...I can't believe he's going to be 4 soon! So hard to believe. But we had a ton of fun - oh how I miss them!!

Thursday, May 26
The after getting some Whataburger for lunch, the cousin drove me to meet up with Mak and her other gals so that we could get to work on bachelorette/pre-wedding fun. While P and I waited for Mak we ran around with Z-Man at a little playground and had a ton of fun with him there...don't worry, he survived the face-plant following his trip down the big-kid slide just fine ;) Once Mak arrived I transferred all of my junk into her car and we headed for Buda-land to get to prepping. We had a fun night out strolling around 6th street and got so not enough sleep...but it was still a blast, and Mak was an absolute trooper at the piano bar :)

Friday, May 27
THE DAY BEFORE THE WEDDING!!!! Us bridesmaids got to work finishing the guest favors and helping to make sure Mak had everything she needed for the wedding and honeymoon. We all made it to the rehearsal where Butch did an excellent job of making sure we didn't forget to take care of our sweet bride during the ceremony the next day - what a blessing to have such an amazing man of God join you in marriage. After the seamless rehearsal was complete we headed to Lake Travis for the rehearsal dinner - awesome Mexican food and fun with friends. We finally had our fill of food and people and made our way back to the hotel where we got to hang out with Mak's extended family for a bit before calling it a night. Man, they are a fun bunch of people.

Saturday, May 28
WEDDING DAY!!! We got the day off to an early 7am start to make sure that Mak had plenty of time to get prepped and not suffer too much stress in the way of time crunching. Her mom treated us to a lovely breakfast at the house and we all set to work prepping for the 2pm ceremony. We made it to the church around 11:30/12 and did our final preps before it was time for the pre-ceremony pictures. Once those were done it was a short wait and then it was show time! The wedding itself was beautiful, intimate, and God-centered...perfection. I'm pretty sure we all let a few tears fall as we watched Wes as he saw his bride walking down that aisle toward a lifetime with him. She was stunning and he was so obviously in awe of her beauty, inside and out, that tears were inevitable. The reception was a fun time with friends and family and I was so happy I got to see the Ponders one last time. It was incredibly difficult for me to say goodbye to Mak and Wes as we ushered them off to Jamaica...I miss them!!! And, saying goodbye to my sweet Josh and Elaine was equally difficult. But, saying goodbye to those sweet people transitioned me into the next leg of my trip. My dear Bolwerk was gracious enough to come pick me up from Buda, even though he was too sick to attend the wedding with me - what a champ, eh? He drove his sick self 2hrs just to pick me up so that I could spend some time in College Station.

{Have I ever mentioned how much I absolutely love my friends?? Mmk, well, I adore them...there are simply no words to express how much I love them and how much they have absolutely become my family.}

B and I made a little stop back at Tara's for dinner and some general hangout-age...such a blessing. After that he and I made a stop at the convenience store for some Blue Bell (Texas, I love you!), Sour S'ghetti, Vanilla Coke, and Cherry Dr. Pepper. That my friends, is a recipe for success! We had a really great drive to CS, brimming with sugar-highs, laughter, good tunes, and excellent conversation. He granted me the pleasure of driving me through campus and stopping at the giant Aggie Ring so that I could actually see and touch it, as I hadn't been able to see it since it was placed. I love Texas A&M...there is simply no place like it.

Sunday, May 29
Church! B and I went to Grace Southwood for service Sunday morning and then met up with Poarchy-Poarch and Powell at Fuego for lunch - oooohm gahhhhh how I have missed Texas food! We had an excellent lunch and then made our way over to the 'doons for some coffee and face time with Cam - man I love that kid...he's so freaking tall! While there I got to have some sweet time with Poarchy as well as my sweet Powell girl. I've missed those kiddos so much! There was another lovely, lovely surprise I got at Muldoons: Katy!! I'm sure most of you are familiar with my sweet sister in the Lord, Katy, who has been in Africa with her husband Kahler this last year. Well, she and I finally go to make our friendship "real-life" official! She was so sweet to make time to come visit with me for a little bit and it was such a blessing to finally meet her face to face and give her a real hug. But...as she and I were discussing earlier today...we both failed to document our meeting with a picture. And we call ourselves bloggers...shame on us. BUT! We'll remedy that come the Christmas holidays, don't you worry your pretty little heads :) After coffee time B, Poarch, Powell, and I made our way back to B's house to watch a movie while I waited for for my sweet Kacy and Justin friends to pick me up for dinner. Once they arrived we made our way to Blue Baker for some pizza...ah, it brought back memories. We had such a sweet time together - I was so happy they were able to make the trek up from Houston. From there we went over to the Humphrey's House for dessert, where Miss Powell joined us as well. After sending Kacy and Justin off...and ushering in the tears that would not completely stop flowing for the next two days, the Humphrey House settled down for some Kung Fu Panda before calling it a night.

Monday, May 30
Happy Memorial Day!!

{I'll have another post to share some things about Memorial Day a little later on this week or next}

A bunch of us started the day off with some precious time out at the Freeman House...it will always feel like home :) and then made our way to Layne's (oh how I wish I could have brought you with me!!) where we met up with Pauler and my sweet Metz bug dorks!! It was sooo, so wonderful to see Pauler and visit with him about his upcoming move for seminary and to see his excitement about what the Lord is doing as he prepares for this new stage in his life. And, seeing the Metzs was super great on so many levels: they're awesome, they're like my big brother and sister, THEY'RE PREGGERS!!!! I was so excited to find out that they are expecting this fall - I'll get to see the baby at Christmas! WHOOP! After some good time at Layne's I said my goodbyes and ran to the car before I had time to start crying...I could have hugged Bolwerk, Poarch, Powell, Pauler, and the Metz crew forever, I think...but, I knew that if I stayed much longer and continued to hold on to them I would never leave and I would just cry and cry...so, I hopped in Powell's car and she took me back to the Humphrey's so they could cart me back to Austin. I loved the time I got to spend with the Humphreys on our trip to Austin...I. MISS. THEM! Once in Austin I met back up with Tara and she and I completely vegged the afternoon/evening away...and, I cried some more.

Tuesday, May 31
I so didn't want to leave Texas, but that flight was calling my name, and it was time to go. Tara took me to the airport and once I got all checked in and made my way over to the checkpoint line I told her that she was going to have to leave otherwise I was going to bawl my eyes out...and she was gracious enough to spare my eyes and head that sufferance. Once I was comfortable in the line I called my Pops and chatted with him about the trip and not wanting to leave Texas and I was hardly able to keep my tears from falling. But, I got on that plane, thanked a precious soldier, caught my connecting flight in DFW, and arrived safely back here in the Melted Tundra.

The trip was incredible and I wish I hadn't left, but leaving means there's another trip to be had with more memories and more time with my Texas loves later on down the road.

For now, all is well up in the Tundra and I am happy to be back in my own little home with my critters.

Research is getting back underway and the summer will be a buzzy one full of research and sunshine. Y'all, it is so lush here right now, I can hardly believe it. I'll try to snag some pictures before it all fades back to white!

Well, that's all for now, my dears. I'm off to bed.

Love y'all dearly.
Shalom!
~MW

Oh my word, it's summer....

2011-05-31T23:30:00.000-05:00

Yes, the crazy bug dork is indeed still alive!

This post will be short, but there will be more coming this week - I promise :)

As the semester came to a close I took the opportunity to take a little trip to Texas to see friends and family and marry off two of my favorite people. Don't you just love it when your friends marry each other? I think it's pretty flipping sweet :)

The wedding was beautiful and the trip was jam-packed with visits and completely lacking in sleep...in other words, it was awesome.

Here are some picturas to keep you smiling until I can give you a legitimate update on the end of the semester and my Texas time:

So blessed by this lady.

Beautiful, beautiful bride!

Wouldn't be Texas without bugs and coffee :)

Missed this fluffy mess while I was away...love coming home to his cuddliness.

Praying all is well with you, sweet readers!

Shalom,

~MW

Just another winter storm....IN APRIL!

2011-04-20T21:05:00.002-05:00

So....this is what we woke up to today....

Yuuuup. No joke.

But, on a less snowy note, I brought home some new additions to my houseplant collection :)

YAY, PLANTS!!

That's all for now...back to that thing called grad school :]

Shalom,

~MW

Say whaaaa????

2011-04-16T22:39:00.000-05:00

IT SNOWED AGAIN THIS WEEKEND....

HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE?!

Ok, freakout is over. But, seriously...it is the middle of April and it is still snowing up here...thankfully it wasn't much of a dumping, just enough to make us all break out at least a few layers if we just couldn't make ourselves bust out the coats again.

I know...I know...I know............I...know... I'm way over due for a posting. I do apologize. TIGS, y'all, TIGS.

BUT! I found out this week that I received a little fellowship/grant that I had applied for earlier in the semester, which means that my trip to the Southwestern Research Station this summer is definitely a go (which is a good thing, since they already accepted me for a two week course, yippee!!!)!

Things on the grad school front have been, more than cRaZy...wow, how does one even describe...?

I definitely don't have the mental power to try and put it eloquently, so, here's the reader's digest version:

It's crazy
I often wonder why I ever thought this was a good idea
It is no longer unusual for me to be in the lab until 10pm or later...
Dinner? What's that?
Sleep? I don't think you know how to speak English...
Showers? Overrated...definitely
What? You find it odd that the majority of us have taken up long distance running and do this at least every other day? I told you things are crazy here...that includes the people
Wait...you mean to tell me that you do not often tell someone about something that happened to you this morning only to realize a few minutes later that you just told them about yesterday's morning...? Hmmm...you must not be from around here.
What's a weekend? Again, I'm not so positive we're speaking the same language.

Yeah...TIGS, 'nuff said.

Anywho, things really are going well, just beyond busy.

My church is such an incredible blessing - solid teaching, solid people who truly try to live out their faith and hold one another accountable in love, beautiful small groups (mine's the best, of course...!) - the Father is definitely glorified here :)

OK, kiddies...now that you all know that I am still alive and breathing, I'm off to bed. Tomorrow is a running day! =)

Shalom!
~MW

JOYS!

2011-03-20T11:51:00.000-05:00

Happy Sunday, lovelies.

"The LORD lives, and blessed be my rock, and exalted be the God of my salvation"

Ps. 18:46

What a beautiful promise: The LORD lives. How awesome is that?! That right there is enough to make any day a joyful one.

It's a wonderfully dreary, drizzly, overcast day here in the Soggy Tundra. That's right...it's finally beginning to melt, which makes for quite a soggy time right now. But, I love it! Momma, it feels more and more like I'm living in a Beatrix Potter story every day - and I absolutely love it! I don't love the 5-10min it takes me to wipe down Jakers after we come in from a stroll outside, but I can deal with that :) I'm really enjoying the unveiling of spring here. It's so refreshing and beautiful. Don't get me wrong, we still have mountains of snow all over the place, but they are beginning to melt and there are patches of green grass and green mosses all over the place right now. And, the chickadees...they are everywhere! I've even heard a few gaggles of geese flying overhead the last week. SPRING IS IN THE AIR! Glory!

OK, clearly I love this season change and could talk about it forever, so I will digress :)

How about some joys? Sound like a plan? Grood :)

Monday, 7 March 2011 - RH lectured about Hymenoptera...seriously made my day.

Tuesday, 8 March 2011 - Free lunch for the grad students!! Hooray! for guest seminar speakers :)

Wednesday, 9 March 2011 - Had a hilarious conversations with the Markster all via email subject lines...seriously made my day...we are that kind of nerdy up here, haha.

Thursday, 10 March 2011 - One final go 'round with the Linnaean Games team before NCB...we always have a blast at our practices...man, I'm a nerd ;)

Friday, 11 March 2011 - Took a nap!! And it was glorious.

Saturday, 12 March 2011 - Spring cleaning! Dusted, swept, mopped, cleaned windows, the whole shebang...always makes me happy as a lark. And, HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MARKSTER!

Sunday, 13 March 2011 - Day one of NCB!! It was super fun to see some old, familiar faces and all the new ones filling up the conference center. Even though we got totally served at the Linnaean Games that was still a blast, as well.

Monday, 14 March 2011 - Poster presentation? Check! It went really well and I had a blast talking about my long lost wasps...you can think I'm crazy, it's fine ;)

Tuesday, 15 March 2011 - UMN took home 5 awards at the awards ceremony! Two for some 10min talks, and three for posters. Represent!

Wednesday, 16 March 2011 - Phone date with Dr. Wharton. He always brightens my day :)

Thursday, 17 March 2011 - St. Paddy's Day!!! Making meals with friends is always wonderful.

Friday, 18 March 2011 - Stroll through the woods with the pup and good friends.

Saturday, 19 March 2011 - Coffee date with Christine. Oh how I do love my German :)

And there you have it, lovelies. Two weeks of joy!

What's been bringing joy to your life lately?

Be blessed in the Lord!
~MW

Death by Bug Conferences!

2011-03-19T13:07:00.001-05:00

Greetings and salutations, my lovely, lovely readers.

So, as I mentioned in my last post, this week was yet another busy one. My department had the task of hosting the Entomological Society of America's North Central Branch Meeting (ESA-NCB, or NCB) this year. Wow. Hosting a meeting is quite the task. But, oh so fun!

I've attended meetings like this before and that in and of itself is exhausting, but hosting really takes it out of you! Things got going each day circa 7:30am and quite often didn't shut down until well after midnight...welcome to partying with entomologists! It was great fun, though. I got to meet up with the moth gals who are on the grant with me, so that was fun to finally have faces to go with the voices from our Skype conference calls. We got to sit and talk logistics and moths and just visit a number of times throughout the conference, which was great. I also got to network with some parasitoid people which made my heart happy as I do miss working with my little wasps, quite a bit - here's to hoping I made Wharton proud! I think the 2nd place ribbon that found its way onto my poster presentation just might have done the trick as far as making Wharton proud goes :) I actually got to have a lovely chat with him over the phone on the last day of the conference - oh how I do miss that man.

Ok, y'all, so here's a little bit of insight into ESA: student mixers are always...always...lame. Like...oh man, I can't even describe it to y'all. BUT! UMN knows how to plan a party! A group of my fellow grad students an alum and one of our rockin profs put a little band together and did they ever rock that party!! We had a blast! A few of us even woke up a bit sore the next morning from dancing so hard! We loved our Ephemeropterals so much that when the night came to a close the ballroom was filled with shouts of, "ONE MORE SONG! ONE MORE SONG!!" Oh, it was awesome - and they were awesome to appease us. There was even some crowd surfing!! Yeah, we're pretty good at planning parties up here...it's whatevs ;)

All-in-all, the conference was a smash hit. Lots of networking, visiting, talks, food, COFFEE, fun, dancing...super successful week :)

But...that said...we are all DEAD right now. I don't know that anyone has recovered fully yet. Worth it? I think yes.

However, our exhaustion was not a good enough excuse to simply allow St. Paddy's Day to pass us by without doing something! So, after dealing with the set-back of a flat tire (yay, screws!) we all piled into my place with a big hunk of corned beef, a sac of potatoes, carrots, a massive head of cabbage, and a number of other ingredients to start about a 5hr-long ordeal in the kitchen. Y'all, this was by far one of the best St. Patty's Days I've had to date. I think I've discovered one of my favorite things to do: cook for hours on end with your favorite peoples, complete with lots of laughs and a jolly good time. It was one of those days that cause you to sit down at it's close and simply smile with joy and appreciation as you say, "I absolutely love my life here." What blessings those days are!

So, just what had us in the kitchen for so long? Well, if you've never made corned beef and cabbage, it's quite a lengthy dish to prepare - the meat was in the pot from about 5:30/6-10pm. But, oh so worth the wait! While that was simmering away on the stove Callie and I set to work on the Irish soda bread with some help from Meg. Once that was in the oven it was time to get to work on the chocolate Guinness cupcakes (yeah...they taste as awesome as the sound!) complete with GREEN cream cheese icing. We also tossed up a rather large salad for good measure ;) We had some green beers mixed in there as well, and, of course, the Guinness was around...if anyone can figure out how to turn that stuff green, let me know - we didn't even attempt it. We didn't stop to think about taking pictures of everything until well after we had consumed most/all of it...but, here's what's left of the soda bread - so, so tasty!

Yesterday was a bit of a recovery day as we didn't call it a night on Friday until after midnight - and another late night piled on top of a week of no sleep made for quite a groggy crew. Meg and Mark and I did take Jakers out for a nice walk yesterday, though - it was in the high 30s/low 40s!! Lovely springtime weather :) And then we decided some Chinese takeout complete with a movie and ice cream drumsticks was all in order - made for a great afternoon of vegging :)

Today is a make up for lost time day...studying, still cleaning the kitchen (haha - sooo worth it), etc.

This has been a really good week...though we are all wishing we had a bit more of a break for spring break...ah well, such is life :)

What's new with you?!

I'll do a joy post tomorrow, making up for not posting last week's and I'll do this week's as well.

Hope y'all are finding joy in your everyday!

Shalom,
~MW

ESA-NCB

2011-03-13T09:10:00.000-05:00

Happy Sunday, all.

Just wanted to give y'all a quick heads up before the weekend is up and the week gets rolling.

Today starts the Entomological Society of America - North Central Branch Meeting that my department has been preparing for these last few months...so...it's going to be a busy start to the week! But a fun one, no doubt.

I'm going to try to update y'all tonight after I get home from all of the events today holds and also post my weekly joys, but if not...well, you know the drill here: I'll get to it ASAP :)

Hope your week has been incredibly blessed.

Loving you in our Savior,
~MW

..::Midterms::..

2011-03-06T22:42:00.000-06:00

Eesh...

Yep, that's the general consensus 'round these parts.

This will be super short and sweet...due to the above title =]

Here's some joys!

Sunday, 27 Feb 2011 - extremely blessed by my brothers and sisters at Christ Redeemer...amazing message, amazing worship, amazing fellowship

Monday, 28 Feb 2011 - had a really nice visit with Robin, I'm super glad we work together :)

Tuesday, 1 Mar 2011 - had a really productive Linnaean games practice and a really good visit with SW

Wednesday, 2 Mar 2011 - had an awesome chat with RW; got a wonderful email from SW; got some good insight into methods of education (got me pumped about teaching again); wonderful small group meeting...I mean, really wonderful

Thursday, 3 Mar 2011 - had a lovely early morning visit/study session with Meg and Linnaean games practice was way good again, too

Friday, 4 Mar 2011 - another good day with SW, complete with visiting with an up an coming 8-year-old entomologist who came to visit us at the insect collection; PIG'S EYE!!

Saturday, 5 Mar 2011 - got to play "big sister" to SW's youngest - I haven't been to an 8th grade basketball tournament in ages, it was an absolute blast and they won all 3 of their games! Way to go Zephyrs!

Sunday, 6 Mar 2011 - productive mornings always make me happy; got to Skype with the boyfriend and close out the day with amazing Jesus time and some time with the fam via tele; and heard from an old friend in TX! It was a day full of joys =)

Oh, I forgot to mention this last week, but for those of y'all who missed this on facebook, some of my artwork and some from my classmates from last semester made it "big" in the blog world! Check it out: Frenatae Calendar

And, with that, I am outty.

Love y'all!
~MW

Happy, Happy. Joy, Joy.

2011-02-27T12:52:00.001-06:00

Ah, Sunday. How I do love you.

I absolutely love taking the pup out to play on our Sunday morning stroll/run around the dog park (as does he...all behavior goes out the window once he realizes that we are going to the dog park to....PLAY!!!). This preceding or following my morning cup of coffee that is paired with scrolling through the weekly Post Secret - wonderful. Then some general maintenance/clean-up around the apartment that got neglected or I simply didn't get to on Saturday...pretty wonderful, indeed. All of that followed by Skype dates, homework, work, and church...makes for a pretty decent day.

So, I've been neglecting to post my joys for each week...but I most certainly have not been neglecting finding my joys in each day. But, in an attempt to re-establish some accountability in the blogger world, here is this week's bundle of joy :)

Saturday, 19 Feb 2011 - dinner at Kieran's Irish Pub, followed by an evening at Shout House Piano Bar with the gang in celebration of Trisha's bday!

Sunday, 20 Feb 2011 - truly enjoyed a relaxing snowy day...even though I was sad to see the green grass disappear again.

Monday, 21 Feb 2011 - I picked up my birthday present from the 'rents (more on that later!), followed by coffee & lunch with Megan on our way into campus (after having the morning off for a half snow day - happy bday, Trisha!!); new shipment of moths arrived at the lab!

Tuesday, 22 Feb 2011 - wonderful breakfast at Baker's Square with Megan and saw Christine for the first time since she had "abandoned" us to go back home to Germany for a week!

Wednesday, 23 Feb 2011 - was surprised by a little snowman awaiting me out on the Taurus, after a long...looong day (thanks, Fraser!).

Thursday, 24 Feb 2011 - super productive day (complete with a lovely little surprise of deeelish potato salad!) followed by Smash Burgers and Quest for the Holy Grail at Corey & Callies...we were all in serious need of some mindless humor.

Friday, 25 Feb 2011 - TURNED IN MY MINI GRANT PROPOSAL!!! Whew! And...found some pretties on sale at Jo-Anns :)

Saturday, 26 Feb 2011 - went to the first hockey game I've attended since about 7th grade (way to rock it, Katy!), followed by breakfast for dinner, potluck style, at Megan's...mmm, mmm, gooood!

This week was beyond insane. We were all on edge as the majority of us had numerous deadlines to meet this week and none of us felt like we were going to make all of them and stay on top of course work...well, we were right...we really didn't get much done in the way of course work, but we did meet our deadlines! It was one of those weeks where you have to force yourself to stop and go do something (breakfast...watch a movie...) other than the pile of things awaiting you...or else madness will undoubtedly ensue! We were able to curb the madness for the most part, though there were a few days that simply were too much...even profs were going a little crazy this week. As RH put it early in the week: We've entered the vortex...it's going to be a long week. Sooooo true. But, the week is well over and after recouping a bit yesterday, most of us are back to normalcy, or so it seems, today. We still have too much to do and so NOT enough time to do it in, but it will get done, don't you worry your pretty little heads :)

Something I wanted to tell y'all about is what Spring is like here. As I mentioned in my last post, we got a little taste of spring a few weeks ago. Y'all, I am so excited for spring to finally get here - for real this time. Momma, do you remember the beginning of the Beatrix Potter videos - how they start off with spring-time water trickles as she hikes off with her paint set? That is what it is like here. Everything melting (feet upon feet, upon feet of snow) as the sun starts to peek out from behind the clouds, so it's still a touch overcast. Trickles of water running continuously (so it's always perfect for taking a little cat nap). Green peeking through the melting white snow (really ice, at this point). Birds chirping. Insects humming. It's lovely. I saw a darling little chickadee yesterday with its tell-tale call of, "chickadee-dee-dee-dee-dee," and I just had to smile thinking about how awesome spring is going to be here. I absolutely cannot wait! Though, waterproof shoes are definitely a necessity - it's quite...squishy with all of that snow melting!

Ok, I told y'all I'd tell you more about my bday present from my parents, so here you go! As many of you know, I've been in the market for a sewing machine for the last few years. I've been looking at used ones, new ones, way old ones, etc...and just haven't really found something affordable that actually works...so, I've been holding out for that steal to come along. Well...much to my surprise (I seriously could not believe my eyes), that is the very thing that my Momma and Daddy sent my way for my bday! I love them...have I mentioned that before?? :) They showered me with a brother xr-7700. It. Is. AWESOME!!! Ok...so I haven't used it quite yet, but dang, it can do SO much and it came with so many little extras! So legit. Look!!

That's some of the fabric I found at Jo-Ann's - super on sale!! Wouldn't you all like to know what my plans are for it...? Well...you'll just have to wait, it's a surprise ;)

Here are some more sights from this week: the little snowman and deeelish potato salad, courtesy of Fraser - props on the potato salad, yo - you'd do well in Texas!

It's still quite snowy and frosty here.

Jakers got a new toy!!! And he loooooves it!!

And now...after running around outside this morning and then playing with his new toy...he is one tuckered, pup :) Did I mention that he's spoiled...? ;)

Well, I do believe that's all for now, kids. Praying blessings on your Sunday and the week to come.

Shalom!
~MW

P.S. - it just started snowing again...

Campus Closed 'Til Noon Due to Winter Storm...

2011-02-20T23:38:00.000-06:00

...HULLABALOO, CANECK! CANECK!!!

This calls for a blog update, 'cause even getting half of a snow day is completely off the heezy!

We had this huge random winter storm blow through today that covered up all of the green grass that has peeking through the melting snow this last week...it was depressing to see it all covered up again...but it was (mmm, is...it's definitely still snowing...it's been snowing since about 4 or 5am) a good snow and now we get a half of a snow day!!! Whoop! Thank you Mother Nature for making your winter storm worth it :)

I feel like I need to clarify something from the last post, real quick, before I forget :) I am not miserable and the world is not raining down on me...life is simply busy, in so many wonderful ways. Unfortunately, the research world doesn't allow for too much saying, "no" to things, and being a grad student still requires you to be a functioning human being in society... Like I was talking with Jake today, we keep ourselves busy as we are expected to work on our research full-time, be full-time students, and still be contributing members of society (i.e. - maintain a healthy social life...seriously, profs ask us about that stuff and always tell us to make sure we do things that aren't research or homework, too.). So, we all kind of have three full-time jobs. Neat ;)

But life really is pretty darn legit here. I really can't complain, other than being far away from a lot of people I love. But...such is life...we aren't all called to live in or around the same city we grew up (or to even grow up in just one city, for that matter), so, for those of us who get to move around from time to time, we learn to roll with the punches. And, really, moving is a blast. I mean, the process is crumby, but the results are generally awesome - you at the very least learn incredible amounts about a lot of things.

Anywho, I am tired after a pretty solid weekend, and so I will leave you with some picturas of life here :)

ICE FISHING!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!!

Megan made me some AWESOME red velvet cupcakes!

Jake sent me some absolutely gorgeous orchids =)

Everyone got together and threw me a surprise bday dinner party!!

Haha...oh man, this one gets me every time.

And this one.

It was an awesome night - thanks so much, kids!

And now, I am off to bed.

Shalom!

~MW

All that I know is I'm breathing....

2011-02-13T12:49:00.002-06:00

**Deeeeep breath**

What a crazy couple of months or so it has been up here in the FT.

Sometimes I feel like my life is moving so fast that I wake up some mornings and I can't remember the day before or what day it is or what I have on the docket for that day.

Sometimes I feel like I'm simply going through the motions and that I have forgotten why I am where I am, and why I'm doing what I am doing.

Sometimes I have so much to do, that I just can't sleep. I can't turn off my brain.

Sometimes I just want to disappear into the North Woods and simply be and be with my God...I haven't been the best daughter of late.

Sometimes I think I forget to breathe...

But I do know that I am still breathing...and right now that's about all I feel that I can do.

This semester is proving to be busier than I could have ever imagined. Courses are proving to be heavier than expected (by myself and SW...she's just as surprised as I am, thankfully); the to-do list regarding my research seems to be growing daily; I have loan specimens coming in from all over North America on just about a weekly basis - and, processing them is extremely time consuming; forming a committee is turning out to be quite trying; getting prepped for my first committee meeting means I have to have a bunch of stuff written up about myself, my research, etc.; the whole department is getting ready for the ESA-NCB meeting in March - which means we have to get our abstracts written and submitted by then end of this week, and then actually preparing our posters/talks, a number of us students are busy studying and practicing for the Linnaean Games (kind of like an ento quiz bowl), and then there's always the general prep that comes with hosting a meeting (yay...); we are about to be busy getting ready for the prospective student "Welcome Weekend" the end of March; there are number of outreach opportunities coming up that we students will be busy with; oh, and fellowship/grant applications are all due here in a couple of weeks; oh, and that thing called a social life...trying to keep that one going too; and church is getting busy in the best possible way (we start small groups this week!!). Whew! As a result of all of that, I feel like I have been a neglectful daughter, sister, student, friend, girlfriend, etc. The days leave me so incredibly exhausted that all I want to do is fall into bed and sleep, but I simply do not have the time to do that, and even when I do finally let myself fall into that dreamy bed of mine I find no rest. I'm tired. I'm spent. As Bilbo Baggins would put it, " I feel... thin. Sort of stretched, like... butter scraped over too much bread." I'm ready for this semester to be over. Even though I am so incredibly happy and blessed here - so incredibly blessed, I cannot even begin to explain. I am simply ready for the "lazy" summer (haha...funny joke) to arrive so that I can go home for Mak and Wes's hitching day, play with my moths and actually get research done, make another trip home for when Jake and the Stones come home from Africa, head back up to the FT to do MORE research (!!!), go to Arizona to learn about collecting and prepping leps for a couple of weeks (!!!), help Panda get settled in (he's been accepted here at the U!!!) and hopefully do the same with Jake, maybe take a few museum trips with SW to look at type specimens, aaaand go camping and collecting (!!!) with RH and Frenatae amongst and between the other events of the summer. I'm just ready to be done with classes, really.

But! My God is not tired, He is not spent, and I can find rest, comfort, and peace in that promise. He is never failing. Even when I feel like I simply cannot keep moving, He carries me along. How beautiful it is to know that being a daughter of the King means that even when I fall down (which is quite often) He is always there and ready to pick me back up again and help me dust off my hands and knees, pour peroxide and rub ointment on the scrapes, and bandage them up for me.

I love my God and I love that He loves me unconditionally...scrapes, bruises, scars, and all :)

Speaking of scars, I've been dealing with some of those lately...old experiences/memories/heartaches have been floating above my head and lingering there. It's frustrating at times, but forces me to stop and remember how much I have learned and grown through those experiences and how blessed I am to now have that wisdom and knowledge that I probably would not posses otherwise.

What funny things scars are. I don't think you can really ever forget where one came from. It's interesting to me how different scars are from bruises. You can find a bruise and have no clue how it got there, but the deep wounds that result in scars are incredibly difficult to miss. I find it funny, too, that scars don't have to be, necessarily, tied to a bad experience. Some of my scars remind me of awesome runs on the mountain bike trails, or running around llama farms as a kid, or some of the best performances from my ballet days; while others remind me of running into things or wrestling with kittens at the vet clinic (kittens are eeeeevil!!! Cute...but eeeeeevil!!!). Now, those are all physical scars of the flesh, but I think the same can be true for emotional/spiritual scars. I have scars from mission trips where I saw such unbelievable poverty that pieces of my heart were tugged away, but the experience was so beautiful in seeing people abandon themselves recklessly at the feet of Christ, and seeing myself and the other people on the trips with me grow in their faith and relationship with the Lord, that those scars remind of beautiful things along with the heartbreak. And, of course, other scars are simply reminders of heartbreak. Can't be helped. But, I digress.

Things really have been exhaustingly (it's a word...promise...thank you, English language for being absurdly ridiculous so as to allow us to pretty much make any word we want into a "real word"!) wonderful here. I had one of the best birthday weeks I have ever had - it's definitely going down in the record books as one of the best. I was surprised by many of you with little cards and messages and gifts throughout all of that week (THANK YOU!!), and a few are still trickling in! Y'all are awesome. I received some of the most breathtakingly beautiful orchids from Jake...RH made me go pick them up from the office and bring them to class with me, haha...everyone was quite impressed. And, I am very pleased to say, that they are still alive and well in their little vase in the Insect Museum - everyone gets to enjoy them on a daily basis. I really want to try and sprout one or two of the spikes...I need to look into that or run by Linder's and talk to the plant people to get their thoughts and suggestions on that undertaking. Anyways, I was also surprised by the Bug Dork crew up here with a fantastic dinner part at Chino-Latino! I don't think that I have ever been so surprised before. Megan did an awesome job of pulling it all together, and everyone here was amazing at keeping me totally and completely clueless, well done, kids, well done :) Once those pictures get forwarded to me I'll throw some up. We had a blast...though we all paid for it a bit the next morning...it was definitely worth the mid-week late night. That Saturday RH and a number of us Bug Dorks took on the frozen waters of Lake Owasso and went ICE FISHING! We had a great time, despite not catching a thing. So fun. Really...haha. And then, Sunday, of course, we had a rockin' Super Bowl party. SO MUCH GOOD FOOD! It was glorious.

This weekend everyone seems to be catching up from last weekend, haha. We were all rather unproductive on the school/research front.

So things have been busy, stressful, crazy, but wonderful all at the same time. I'll try to post some pictures later on, but for now I need to get back to work. I have grant drafts and abstracts to finish by tomorrow.

Praying all is wonderfully with you, my lovelies.

Shalom!
~MW

P.S. - I promise I haven't forgotten about finishing the new blog layout...it was either work on the layout or write a post this weekend - I figured you would all rather have an update :) I'll get to it...eventually, promise!

P.P.S. - I almost forgot to share this little gem with y'all! This little article about 20 Obsolete English Words that Should Make a Comeback is pretty amazing - and, I vote we start using these words again :) Also, MY BIG BROTHER IS FAMOUS! Check out this little article talking about his new band Shivaree (it talks about some other bands, as well, but Shivaree is the best...of course!). Check out some of their songs - they are way fun...raw recordings, but still awesome :)

..::Hardhat Area::..

2011-01-23T16:44:00.002-06:00

So, in case you can't tell, the blog is currently under construction. I'm fiddling around with a few ideas here and there and so it will probably be changing lots over the next week...two weeks...month...we shall see ;) So, please bear with me. Thanks very much!

Happy Sunday, all!

Shalom,
~MW

Joy, Joy, Joy!

2011-01-21T22:38:00.000-06:00

Hello, all.

I know it's been forever, or so it seems, since I last updated, but...well, you know the next line: TIGS! Even when classes aren't in session, there is SOOOO much to do!

Last week was wonderful in that respect, though - I didn't have any classes to worry about and I got to just work in the lab and meet with SW and figure out where we are going just what I am doing over the next 2.5yrs (yes, that sounds like a long time...but when you have the to-do list that I have, it seems like that is absolutely NO way I will get all of it done - I will, don't you fret..). I've decided! I'm doing a monograph for my thesis work!! I'll do a post a little later on about what a monograph treatment is. It's the part of taxonomy/systematics that I love, I'll just say that for now. All in all, it was a great week. And I closed it feeling satisfied and accomplished...it's been a while since I've felt like that at the end of a work week.

The 3-day weekend that followed that productive week was pretty grand, as well. The first half of Saturday was full of Skyping and relaxing, the second half consisted of a ton of fun with Meg and Markster. Markster picked me up and we grabbed Meg. We grabbed some lunch at the Mall of America (seriously, there's like a bazillion restaurants in there...and we had some stuff to return and some gift cards to try to spend). While at the MoA we saw this epicness:

The WHOLE ENTIRE thing was made of LEGOs...I. Want. One!

After running around MoA we continued on our path to REI so The Markster and I could procure our new parkas followed by the 3 of us trying on the most ridiculous winter hats in the clearance bin...oh man...we should have taken pictures. It. Was. Epic. And! We all came away with a new hat that made each of us rather cheery. After running home to let Jakers out the three of us went back to Meg's to work on....drum rooooooolllllll.....A GINGERBREAD HOUSE!!! SO FUN! The house had been constructed a few days earlier and the decorating had begun, but the bug dorks tricked that house oooooout!

Markster working hard on the roof.

Meg and Markster working hard on adding our Harmonia infestation...that's right we are true dorks and added the tell-tale sign of fall/winter to the lovely little gingerbread house by adding and infestation of ladybird beetles - epic.

Ta-da!! I was in charge of the icicles and filling in the gaps on the roof - I'm not gonna lie, I'm way impressed with my icicles...like, considered for a split second that I should change careers and be a gingerbread house decorator or something :)

See all those little pink clusters? Those are our little Harmonia!!! It looks just like a real infestation! Little aggregations and all!

We didn't finish the backside of the house, the front and sides look pretty darn awesome, we think!

Sunday was a nice chill day...Skypage, church...it was a pretty good day. I was especially blessed at church Sunday night, and it was wonderful.

Monday was awesome!! We bug dorks plus a few other friends made brunch and had an absolutely lovely time together. Everyone brought something to share with the group and we all just sat around with some nice folksy music in the background while we chatted, ate some delish food, sipped on coffee/tea/mimosas...mmmmmhmm! We closed out our brunch time with some Strong Bad and Teen Girl Squad. It was glorious.

Post brunch, was positively delightful, as well. The Markster, Meg, Christine and myself went back to REI so I could exchange my parka for a different size - the sleeves were like half-way up my arms when I put the hood up on the first one...that's something I definitely should have checked at the store. Oh well, REI makes it super easy for co-op members to make returns/exchanges. We next ventured to a Starbucks for some coffee (we were all spent) and freaking awesome conversation. Man, I love these kids so much! After a couple hours there we went to TJMaxx so Meg could make a return and decided to kickoff our semester with a steakhouse dinner at Timber Lodge. Oh my goodness, y'all, it was amazingly delicious. And! They messed up my order so they brought us a ginormous piece of whipped cheesecake. Ummm...amazingly tasty. Soooo grood :) We really had an awesome Martin Luther King, Jr. Day...it was incredible. I can't wait to continue building and strengthening my relationships with my bug dorks here...seriously, such blessings to my life.

Week one (or rather, the first 4 days) of semester two was pretty decent, all-in-all. Nothing went wrong or poorly...always a nice way to start a semester. I made some more headway on my semester docket as far as what I need to do for my research/thesis stuffs - I still have a lot to do for this semester yet, but I'll get there. Classes will be quite enjoyable, I think...just a lot of work...and I mean a LOT of work. My museum studies - practices course will be especially heavy on the work load. Yikes...papers and projects due every week! Most of which require going to museums and writing papers and things about exhibits, pieces, etc...time consuming, to say the least. Not hard or tedious, just time consuming...busy work. I am excited to have an excuse to get out and see the museums around the area, though, that will be nice. Time is just so lacking...oi vey...I so need more hours in the day or another day in the week...something, anything!

I'm trying to remember if there was anything super important that happened this week, or if it everything was just same ol' same ol' in the land of grad school...hmmm. Well, I'll let you know later if I forgot anything. Oh, we had our first Pig's Eye of the semester tonight. I left pretty early, I'm just beat - I've fallen into another bought with insomnia...yay, no sleep! No worries, though. This happens from time to time, and it always passes with time..sometimes it takes a few months, but it hasn't killed me yet!

Ok, enough about school and work. I'm sure you're all familiar with my friend Katy, over in Africa, who I've mentioned a number of times. Well, if you aren't pay her a visit - her blogging is honest, fun, colorful, exciting, broken for the Lord, encouraging, pretty much just all around awesome. One of her resolutions was to find joy in every day, whether it be in the little things or in big things. I really like this idea - I think it will serve to help keep each day in perspective; so, even though I'm a few weeks behind, it's never too late to start, right? I'll start with last Saturday.

Saturday, 15 Jan 2011: (<-- it's still really weird for me to write 2011) Fun adventures around town with a couple of my favorite bug dorks.

Sunday, 16 Jan 2011: Made some new friends at church - a lovely young family with two little boys. Such a blessing!!

Monday, 17 Jan 2011: Beautiful, real conversation with 3 of my absolute favorite bug dorks. SUCH A BLESSING!!

Tuesday, 18 Jan 2011: Meg and I trying to keep our snickers below audibility during insect behavior...it's going to be a gooooood semester ;)

Wednesday, 19 Jan 2011: DAY ONE OF INSECT TAXONOMY!!!!!!!!!! This class = me. Oh! And lunch with some of the bug dorks I hadn't seen since being back. Oh!! And surviving the campus connector bus! (I totally felt like a freshman all over again...)

Thursday, 20 Jan 2011: First Frenatae meeting of the semester = seeing just about eeeeveryone I hadn't connected with since the break. I love them :) Plus, departmental potluck lunch day...so grood.

Friday, 21 Jan 2011: Catch up chat on the phone with SW...I am so blessed with two incredibly amazing advisors. Like, really. SW + RH = advisors extraordinaire :)

So, yeah...it was a super blessed week, full of joy, joy, joy :)

And now, my loves, I am off to bed. Lots to do tomorrow before Meg's big start of the semester potluck bash tomorrow night. And so, I will leave you with this:

My sleepy, super, super spoiled Jakers dog :)

Praying all is well in your worlds.

Much love!

Shalom!

~MW

P.S. - it is officially cold, y'all. This morning it was -18 degrees F...without wind chill...neeeeeeat!

Texas, Our Texas! So Wonderful, So Great!

2011-01-09T19:53:00.002-06:00

courtesy of flickr

Ah, hello my reader loves!

It's been a while, and for that I apologize, but the last three weeks have been jam-packed with the pure awesomeness that is Christmas, Family, Friends, and, of course, TEXAS.

Wow, I so did not want that time to end. It was wonderful being home in that great state, and being surrounded by my wonderful family and my dear, dear friends was the best Christmas present ever. I certainly missed my FT friends, though - y'all are definitely dear to my heart...sorry, can't be helped :)

The break got off to a wonderful start in Arlington with the fam, Jake, friends, and some good ol' music - Hamilton style. I love music nights with the Hamiltons - so great.

It was a huge blessing to get to spend some time with a few of my girls from BSLC - I miss those precious daughters, and it was wonderful to get to sit and spend some one-on-one time with them, simply listening to what life has looked like for them over the last semester. Having that time and listening to everything that's been going on with them did make me a touch bitter that I can't be around to walk this part of life with them. I want so badly to be there to pour into their precious hearts in person...it's just not the same from this far away. But they are growing up into beautiful daughters of the King - I only hope I get to continue to be a small part of their lives.

Spending time with a few of my ladies from high school was incredible as well - I so miss those girls, and I'm sad I didn't get to spend more time with them and that I didn't get to make it around to everyone there in Arlington - time is SO fleeting!

Christmas was small and quiet, but it was such a huge blessing to get to have Momma home for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day!! It's been a while since we've been afforded that privilege. Christmas dinner was chill, but it was nice to be able to spend it with Mr. Teasley - he's been such a blessing to our family and we were blessed to be able to share the day with him.

From there it was on to the Great Texas Tour - December 2010!! Jake and I hit the road from Arlington to Lufkin to spend some awesome time with Kristen and B - those three taught me how to shoot, y'all! I shot Kristen's shotgun and pistol and B's pistol as well. Jake had a revolver (I think..?) that kinda terrified me...I'll work my way up to that one ;) I didn't hit any of the clay disks with the shotgun, but I did hit the target with the pistol! I'll get those clays next time!

After Lufkin we hit up Huntsville to spend some time with Jake's sweet parents - Mom and Pop Pry, thank you SO much for welcoming me so warmly into your home. I had so much fun just sitting and visiting with y'all and I can't wait to see your sweet faces again!! Pop - that fire was epic and I can't wait to sit around more of those chatting with you and listening to your stories and the latest celebrity news ;) Mom - can't wait to play in that kitchen with you!!

From Huntsville we stopped in CS to hit up Fuego, and coffee shops - super lame that all the good ones were closed for the break, though. It was nice to get to visit with the Humphrey and Freeman families, too - I so miss y'all! Girl time with Ricci and Alyssa was such a blessing...I miss that. Jake and I had a blast hanging out with Kristen and Aaron before making our way down to Houston. Fuego round 2 and then hitting up Christmas in the Park was sooo so fun. I was amazed that after 5 winters in CS I had never managed to make it to Christmas in the Park...I feel gypped, just sayin'. But, it was way fun to experience it with a few of my absolute favorite peoples :)

Christmas in the Park was a lovely send-off as Jake and I undertook the next leg of our tour: Houston! We were incredibly blessed to be able to spend time with Chris and Jennah at their rockin' new house - well done, you two! Can't wait to see how y'all continue to make it into your own. We had so much fun there, and watching Jake and Chris together, oh man...so fun. They are definitely brothers who love each other a whole, whole lot. Love it!

We rang in the New Year with Kacy and Justin, complete with some Just Dance 2, of course! I should have known that Kacy, the dancing queen, was going to force us to dance with her - I'll admit that it was pretty fun...quite a workout, too! I was suuuuper sore the next day...a touch pathetic. It was nice to close the night with some fireworks watching around the neighborhood - well done, Cypress :) We started 2011 off marvelously with lunch with Chris & Jennah and Kacy & Justin, followed by some girl time with Kacy (Barnes & Noble + Target...of course!) and the guys crashed at the house. It was so, so great to spend that time with you, Kacy, love. I miss your face!!

From Houston we made our way to the Austin-Round Rock Area to see Patrick & Sarah and little Zach, who isn't quite so little anymore! I canNOT believe how much that munchkin has grown since August!! I'm gonna need him to slow them horses down! We also got to visit with Miss Awyssa for a bit which was way fun...her parents loved talking to Jake about Africa...we admittedly abandoned him to go chat outside while they asked him question after question...in our defense we did tell him we were going outside... To close Austin we made our way over to the Ponder home for a lovely dinner and some Mexican Train and all-around wonderful hangout time. They certainly have done a wonderful job of pulling that home together so quickly - I. Am. Impressed! We definitely loved our time in the Austin are - miss y'all so, so much!

After that we stopped back in CS for some final rounds at SRPH, the Heep, and BioControl...Jake had to see his A&M peeps and I had to see mine - it was super awesome meeting his old crew and introducing him to some of my favorite people from the ENTO world. We closed out the day with some Fuego (are you noticing a trend here?) with the Stanfields and a quick visit with Kristen and Aaron before making our way back to Huntsville for some more time with Jake's fam.

I was so glad that I was able to go back to Huntsville to visit with the Pry family some more before Jake and I had to begrudgingly go our separate ways at the close of our break. I love being around his family. It's fun and feels like home. I miss y'all!!

Then it was time to head to the IAH and send Jake back to Africa...one of the most difficult things I've ever had to do. Standing there completely helpless as we watched him disappear as he turned the corner to head to his gate was awful. That's a kind of helplessness that I can't really explain, other than: it was horrible and I never want to experience that again. Sadly, life is full of goodbyes, and I reckon I should be grateful for the ones that, God willing, aren't forever. While knowing that we won't see each other for a good 7 months feels like an eternity we are resting in faith that God will bring us safely together again come summer time. I will say this, though: it was an incredible blessing to be able to stand next to Jake's family at the airport (we missed you, Jennah!) and having B, Kristen, and T there to help distract me was wonderful.

After sending Jake off and drying the tears B, Kristen, and T and I met up with Brandon for some way fun times...Chuy's + hangin' around a park with pretty skies, swings, and cameras = a pretty awesome day. We got to snag a quick visit with Kelly at the Outlet Mall on our way back to CS, as well. It ended up being a bearable day :)

I spent my last day in CS wonderfully (though I missed far too many of you): lunch with the Wharton's and my Ginger girl, hanging at the Health Sci Center with T, B, and Kristen, complete with a brief, yet wonderful visit with my bestie Ricci (miss you so much, lovely!!), dinner at Layne's with Mak, and finally a mini road trip to Waco with B, T, Kirsten, and Bean. Before the J-Man and his buddies picked me up to make the rest of the trek up to Arlington we roadtrippers from CS dined at the Claypot there in Waco and were blessed to be joined by the wonderful Mal (great catching up with you, lady!!). Good food, great state, even better company! Finally said farewell to my loves and hopped in the car with Panda, Harrison, and Jimmy. We had a rather...eventful trip home...I'm just sayin', if you have to pee around Grandview...wait until you get to the Grandy's in Alvarado...it will save you from banging on gas station doors, Subway doors, and finally running off to a field only to be followed by a state trooper car that will appear from out of no where and will definitely proceed to run it's lights and shine the spotlight on you as you do your business...BUT! If you just so happen to be an Eagle Scout and have your card on (along with your license) you just might get off with a stern talking to and the advice that the Grandy's up the way is open 'til 4am or so. Yeps, that happened...thank you Jimmy for providing us with our entertainment for the night :)

I got to spend the last two days at home with Momma and the boys (Faja is still in Cali with the fam out there). Sadly, we had to send Fariz off to Chicago for his Cavaliers audition thingy - he should be back home now - and Mom had to work on Saturday and Josh had a zombie party dealio, bummer :( But I loved getting to spend Friday with Momma talking about fun things and telling her about my post-Christmas adventures.

I so love my family!! I miss y'all terribly, terribly!

For those of you who I wasn't able to catch during my time over the holidays: (1) Please forgive me, (2) COME VISIT ME!!!! :)

Well, I head back to the lab starting tomorrow. I took today to recoup and settle back into living in the Frozen Tundra and putting my apartment back in order. BigBoy decided to lay claim to a number of things while I was gone...including the couch...both cushions, neeeeeat. Oh how lucky that cat is that I fell in love with him in 7th grade ;) I will say that I hadn't realized how much I miss having him curl up next to me at night until not having him there for 3 weeks...it was nice to have a snuggle buddy again.

Praying you all had a wonderfully blessed Christmas and New Year celebration.

I'll keep y'all posted on how grad school semester 2 goes!

Shalom, love, blessings!
~MW

P.S. - it came to my attention during our travels that there are quite a few of you who read the blog but have never made your presence known! I'd love to hear from y'all on here! Let me know when you're around the site :)

Whew! Home for the holidays!

2010-12-23T23:07:00.000-06:00

Heavens what a whirlwind of a week it has been (ok...an almost week)!

My lovely friend Judy took me to the airport circa 5:30am Saturday morning, and my was I glad I asked that she pick me up around 5! Checking my bag was no trouble at all...but TSA...eesh, that took ages. It really wasn't that bad, and surprisingly everyone was rather cheery - even with it being so ridiculously early in the morning. I was one of the *lucky* travelers to get to go through one of those fancy new scanning machines...I don't really know how I feel about them. It's quick and painless so it's not all that awkward during the actual scanning process. And, if the example images TSA puts up are accurate, then I really don't think there's any issue with them. But...who knows, really? Well, enough about TSA. I made it to my gate in plenty of time and even got to do a little leisurely reading! Say, what?! Got on the plane and took a snooze on the very smooth little flight - we made way good time! I actually sat next to a Minnesotan who had never been on a plane before! It was fun to get to chat with him and get his take on flying. His general consensus: It's kinda fun...but doesn't feel as fast as I thought it would.

Setting foot on sweet DFW ground was wonderful, wonderful, wonderful. It was absolutely wonderful to get picked up by my faja and to head home to my sweet, sweet family. Oh how I have missed them!

We've been having a pretty wonderful time thus far. Lots of hang time, movies, CHUY'S!!, birthday celebrations, churching, and, sadly, finishing up final projects for the semester...but it is all done now!

****HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DADDY!!!! So sorry I didn't get to put up a birthday blog for you...but, I loved spending the day with you! LOOOOOVE YOU!!*****

I've loved getting to visit with my family and so many wonderful, wonderful people. Oh how blessed I am. And I can't wait to see more and more of you as the next week or so unfolds!!

I have lots of fun updates to share, but for now I am going to close. It. is. time. for. bed!!

Praying you all have a wonderfully blessed Christmas remembering the birth of our precious, precious Savior.

Shalom, and blessings to you!
~MW

..::Remade::..

2010-12-17T02:00:00.000-06:00

Sometimes I forget Who has made me, Who loves me, and who I am...and why...

Sometimes I wonder why God still loves me when I think about all of the ungodly things I think, do, say, etc...

Sometimes I wonder why God still loves me when I choose to not do godly things - when I chose to not love, to not exercise mercy, to not be thankful, to not give of myself, etc...

Sometimes I forget that I have been remade, and that God isn't finished with me - that He is continuously refining me in and through His pure and perfect love.

Sometimes I forget that the scars I have acquired along the way don't have to be ugly, but that they can be a beautiful reminder of God's amazing faithfulness and absolutely unconditional love. Even when they hurt from time to time. Even when I allow myself to question everything because I am reminded of the past.

But I do know this: God never forgets why He loves me, why He sent His precious Son to die for me - to die for everyone - why He will always be there even when I lose my way and lose sight of Him and His love. And, what a reason to rejoice that is! Even when I fail - mmmmm, which is pretty much all the time - He is right there to pick me up and love me...even when I try to push Him away.

For those of you who might not know me as well as others, one of my absolute favorite bands is Tenth Avenue North. This band writes amazingly honest and broken songs. I know I can always be pointed towards Christ by working through their songs. Two of their songs that really serve as a reminder of God's perfect love -even when it absolutely hurts- are You Are More and Any Other Way. This first video below is the music video for You Are More and the second video is the video journal talking about Any Other Way. They are both really outstanding videos.

God is always there, even when He seems far away. He is always in control, even when it seems like everything is falling apart. We are always going to mess up, but He will always be right there waiting for us to run back into His healing arms...always.

Praying everyone getting ready to travel around to see friends and family has safe, safe travels and wonderfully blessed times with loved ones.

I'll be home soon, family! Just one more full day and I'll be in your arms! Oh, sweet Texas, I cannot wait to be back on your solid, unfrozen ground.

All my love, always,
~MW

Happy Birthday to....

2010-12-13T14:27:00.000-06:00

This handsome 19 year old boy!

You used to be SOOOO little....when did you stop being this small??

Panda Bear, you have grown up so, so much - I can hardly believe it sometimes...but, I will never forget running around the woods with you and Fariz, going "collecting," camping in the tree house, making our base camps in the back yard, cooking our whatever they were concoctions, wakey-wakey-click-click, pokemon-ing it, yugi-oh-ing it, watching Oswald, making up our own games and adventures inside of Zelda, listening to musics together, watching LOTR, Star Wars, Firefly, etc...etc...etc...our list of insanity can go on.

I hope and pray that no matter how crazy life gets for you, my outstanding actor of a baby brother, that you will never ever forget the little things. Remember the crazy random crap we did as kids and try to throw some new crazy and some new random into each new chapter of your life. Remember it. Live it.

And, never ever forget to remember this: I. Love. You.

Cannot wait to see you this weekend and play with you and the Fariz over Christmas.

HAPPY, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!!!

LOVE YOU!

~Heath

snow... Snow.... SNOW... SNOW... SNOOOOOOW!!!

2010-12-12T15:44:00.004-06:00

So...things have been pretty crazy here...like...a whole TON of snow got dropped on us within the last 24hrs or so.

Let me just give you a little introduction, before getting to the Blizzard of 2010, though. Here's a snippet of our first snow...video is a little rough...I got tired of messing with it, but I think you'll get the general idea :)

And now...here is our RECORD BREAKING SNOW STORM. The most snow "we've" seen in 19 years. We got about 16.5 inches here in the Twin Cities, and the snow drifts have been ranging from 3 to about 7 feet deep. Yuh...it's intense. Like way. So....without further ado...enjoy!

[EDIT: I just realized that I misspelled bury...but I could always try to play that extra "f" off as being due to the cold....brrrrr...maybe...?]

So, yeah.....we have a lot of snow hangin' out here. Yup...just a little. And with that, I am off. Those videos took forever and uploading them was a nightmare...why did Microsoft have to go and change Video Maker..whyyyy??? Ah, well, I'll survive, I suppose...or just suck it up and buy Adobe...maybe...some day...

Shalom!

~MW

My First 10 on 10!

2010-12-11T15:27:00.004-06:00

So, a few of y'all might have found your way over to my lovely blogger-friend and sister in Christ, Katy. I've mentioned her and linked up with her a few times before. And she is way more blog savvy than I am, just sayin' - so love you, Katy! Anywho, she's does all these fun bloggery things and then I jump on her bandwagons...mmhmm, I am that person. Maybe someday I'll have enough time to be as awesome of a blogger as Katy is :)

So, Katy is a big participant in this neat little thing called "10 on 10" where you take a picture every hour for 10hrs on the 10th of each month. FUN? I. THINK. YES!! So, here goes my first 10 on 10! (I'll be honest, I missed a few hours here and there, so there's a touch of a gap in some of my pictures...TIGS, need I say more?)

So, here's my first 10 on 10 - December!

9 AM

This is what I wake up to every morning - MOM! FEEEEED MEEEEE!

10 AM

Coffee + Gihrardelli Peppermint Bark in

Christmas mug = most legit homemade peppermint mocha EVER!

11 AM

Decided to wear earrings for the first time in about 2 months.

12 AM

Walkin' into Hodson...sorry for the mitten in the picture...they're kind of fluffy.

1 PM

Worked on my cerambycid illustration for a bit

2 PM

Took a break from the bug and worked on some manuscript stuff for the Wharton.

3 PM

ENTO vs EEB dodge ball - pretty epic.

6 PM

Went home to take Jakers out before heading back out

7 PM

Decided to lite the tree for Jakers before I left.

1 AM

Called it a night after hangin' with the bugdorks in celebration of

being done with Insect Ecology!!!!

***Sorry for the major lags: dodge ball lasted forever and then my phone memory filled up after I left the house for the evening...

I'm going to try and remember to do it again next month - anyone care to join in??

Shalom!
~MW

Avoiding finishing an assignment?

2010-12-08T21:53:00.002-06:00

I invite you to enter the wonderful world of Blogger :)

Yes...I am indeed procrastinating. It's so hard to be motivated when something isn't due until 3:30pm and the actual class is no longer meeting...yuuuup, I am there. Is it possible to have "senioritis" in grad school? Maybe it's just a case of "holidayitis" or "homesickitis." Stay tuned for the diagnosis.

But, for now I am going to prove to all y'all that I am indeed still alive and that I am still a contributing part of the blogverse...even if 90% of my contribution of late has merely been in the way of comments...MY APOLOGIES. As my lovelies in Africa say TIA (This Is Africa), so I shall say TIGS - This. IS. Grad. School!! I have come to accept the sad but unavoidable truth that grad school will indeed keep me from gracing your monitors and screens from time to time.

So, how goes life in the FT of late?

snow...Snow...SNOOOW!!! (<-- White Christmas style, Daddy!) We've had quite a bit of snow here, along with single digit and negative degree days, daylight that disappears circa 4:30pm, and...wind. So, the snow I love, the single digit and negative degree days I really don't mind...like my property manager said the other day, "It's so cold it's like it actually makes you warm." I know y'all probably can't understand that, but it's true! It's so cold that it's like our endothermic capabilities actually finally kick into action and boom! - you're warm and toasty...well, if you have a decent coat...and some good socks...aaand a hat...and maybe some long underwear...yup, that aught to do it :)

The ever so essential base layer....does this not remind you of Peter Pan's shadow??
Right about the time he gets ready to stitch it back on..?

Definitely one of my best investments since the move up here.

Oh...do NOT forget your gloves or a scarf - those are key as well, especially the glovies. Man. My finger tips get SOOO cold!! I need to invest in a legit set of glovies, I think. My layered knit gloves just don't seem to be cutting it anymore *sad*

BUT! All that to say, it's really not so bad until the wind gets to blowing. Even a little breeze can feel like a million little ice daggers slicing right through you...yuh, it's pretty brutal. Sometimes I'm convinced that by the time I make my trek through the snow to/from my car that the wind will have successfully taken thousands of little nicks out of my face - the only part of my body that is not layerfully covered as I brave the winter weather. So far the wind has not won, although I can't seem to get enough fluids into my body to keep my lips from cracking/peeling (gross, I know...welcome to my life.). Ah well, hopefully I can recover for a spell in my beloved TX before making my return to brave another 3-4 months of winter...neat.

Now that you have some sort of an idea what winter is like here allow me to share some of my favorite things with you.
* The snow. I've already mentioned it, but my goodness is it gorgeous! There are a number of fields around the "Cow Campus" (Ags, it's somewhat equivalent to West Campus) and they are all currently blanketed in a beautiful white, glistening, sparkly layer of powdery snow. Every time I walk past one of the fields all I want to do is get a running start and leap into the middle of the field (what? It's totally humanly possible to do...) and just land in the foot or so of snow that is resting around town right now...I think I'll wait until there's another foot or two, though.
* The sound my boots make walking on packed snow. It's this fun little squeaking, compressing sound...I don't know, it's weird, but I just like it. Probably because it's still novel...but hey, I'll take it for now.
* Footprints in the snow. I love seeing all of the animal tracks that have started turning the fields into puzzle pieces. I have to admit that they are starting to tease my imagination...I want to know where they lead and who they belong to!!! I totally have Beatrix Potter scenes running through my head...hmmm...maybe I can work on finishing that little story of mine over the holidays! Hey J-Hump, shall we play around with some illustrations over the break? Yes? Mmmk, great :)
* Wintery Christmas spirit. It's been super fun to ring in the season with snow on the ground...seriously fun. Ups the awesome by a good 50%.
* Driving in the snow. I know it terrifies some of y'all, but I seriously love it! Especially when it's actually snowing while I drive. Mmmmmhmm. Perrrrrfection. Ice, however, is a different story - I don't really want to talk about it.

Ok...so pretty much everything I love revolves around snow right now...it's just that awesome.

Last week was pretty insane...I really don't remember all that much of it. A number of us attempted our first preliminary exam (one of the requirements of our program) - we'll find out how we did in about 2 weeks. We also had a number of final projects, papers, etc. due...TIGS. There were a few nights I definitely did not sleep. We hardly saw each other...I think that was the weirdest and most difficult part of last week...being pretty much cut off from everyone, even here. But we survived it!

Well, I've also been a little busy around my little apartment! With...what? If any of you know even a little about me I'm sure you could guess this one pretty easily...CHRISTMAS!

Me Mum sent quite the goody-filled box of love last week...complete with ornaments to fill my tree which, at the time, only had 4 sad, lonely ornaments...It is now pleasantly full :)

Only a small number of fatalities.

Jakers helped me decorate the tree...looks rather enthused, doesn't he? ;)

Haha, I could NOT resist giving this one to y'all...doesn't he look like he's
singing Christmas songs??

Nonna sent this to me via Aunt June earlier in the year...I love these things!

Snowman nutcracker, mini nativity, and seasonal candles...perfection :)

Hope chest Christmas style. A Christmasy runner, Christmas
traditions calendar, nativity, snowman plate...sparkly garland...I'll take it.

I tried to get a little creative with some Christmas "orbs" and spiralling the garland in the
tree dish I would have filled it with candies, but Jake would clean it out...meh, it'll do.

Stockings! Had to hang them somewhere! My very empty wall seemed like as good a
place as any...One for me and one for the kids...Jake and BigBoy can totally share.

NUTCRACKERS!!! I miss our big collection back home :(

I've had this little tree since my junior year of high school...I felt it fit in nicely
in my whimsy corner.

My very own Advent wreath!!! Thanks parentals :)

And finally......

THE TREE!!!

I'm pretty proud of it :) I won't lie. A HUGE thanks to Momma for sending me all the little balls and the extra ornaments...especially the Aggie and Texas ones :) I think my favorite part is my Aggie Santa hat...I've had that thing since freshman year at A&M and it has made it's appearance ever Christmas since. Gotta love it.

Well, kiddies, I'm signing off for the night. Hope all is well with each of you. Praying blessings on you, my sweet readers. Love to you all!

This is what happens when you don't sleep for a good 2-3days...at least BigBoy
and Philly were there to keep me company =]

Sleepily Yours,
~MW

O, Give Thanks to the Lord, for He is Good...

2010-11-26T14:27:00.000-06:00

...and His Steadfast Love Endures Forever. ~Ps. 118:1

Thanksgiving. What is it?
* A time to remember
* A time to share
* A time for family and friends - old and new
* A time to feel closer to the people you love, even if they are far away
* A time to give thanks and praise to our Heavenly Daddy for all that He has so graciously blessed our lives with.

That list can go on and on, but I think it sums up Thanksgiving pretty well, at least for the nutshell version.

I was a little nervous about how I would handle this Thanksgiving, being in a new place and incredibly far away from my family and closest friends. I initially thought I would have to spend it alone, and that made me sad, as I am used to spending the day with my Daddy and little brothers.

The boys and I always start the day off with our "Turkey Day Tiff" over watching football or the Macy's Parade as I'm getting things started in the kitchen. I looove, love, LOVE the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and since I have been in charge of running the kitchen on Thanksgiving for as long as I can remember I always win ("Do you want your Thanksgiving Feast or do you want to watch football in the den?? Your choice!") and the punks begrudgingly trot off to the formal living room to watch their football games between 9 and noon (and then I try to convince them to let me watch the dog show...that one doesn't always work...we often come to an agreement to flip back and forth and they usually let me watch the groups that I am particularly interested in...like the sporting groups and herding groups - all the fun ones! Those are usually the ones they secretly want to watch too, so I think that's why they "let" me watch those ones all the way through...shhhh, don't tell!)...Pops usually makes rounds - 'cause he's awesome and likes football AND the parade and loves all of his kiddos, 'cause he's the best dad ever - yep, sorry, my dad is the best and there's no changing my mind on this one :)

I did miss spending my day in the kitchen this year, even though by the time everything is ready I am usually beyond exhausted, have a killer headache, feel like my back is going to explode, and want my feet to be cut off (yay, tile floors...)...yes, inspite of all of that I still missed it. Quite a bit. I did get to make a dessert for Thanksgiving this year and help out with my Minnesota family's kitchen adventures, though - so my kitchen time wasn't totally in the red. Whew!

So...what did I do for Thanksgiving this year?? I was beyond blessed to spend the day with SW and her beautiful, beautiful family. Oh man, they are so great. I am actually taking her husband's (BZ) class this semester, so it was fun to get to interact with him outside of class. He and their two boys are pretty big hunters so we had lots of fun meats to nibble on AND BZ sent me and some of his grad students (who also joined us for the day) home with some gorgeous venison steaks - WIN! AND, SW sent me home with a pumpkin bread loaf!!! DE-LISH!

We really had a lovely day. I got to their lovely home around 1pm with Jakers in-tow. We did some doggy introductions upon our arrival. Jake and Chip got along pretty well, but Zeke wasn't too thrilled with Jake. I think they would have done well running around the back yard together to get the pecking orders established, but we opted to just do crate rotations with the pups. Chip lucked out and got to hangout with whomever of the other two dogs got to run free - so he had a grrrrreat day. Jake really enjoyed all the love he got from the 16 or so people who were there for the day. I did learn, however, that I really need to work on his jumping...oh man, he was trying to steal everyone's food out of their hands! Fortunately they were pretty much all dog people so it didn't really phase them any. But, I now have another project to work on with him. It was great fun to watch him and Chip run around together in the back yard, too - I love watching him play with other dogs. So fun!

It was a lot of fun hanging out with BZ's grad students. My TA for BZ's class was with us too, which was a lot of fun - I've enjoyed chatting with him after classes and such, so it was nice to visit with him outside of class as well. SW and BZ's family was pretty fun as well, and my sopapilla cheesecake was a huge hit! I definitely had to share the recipe before they all left. Yay, Texas desserts making it to the Frozen Tundra!! :)

After everyone left I hung out with SW and BZ's two boys for a little bit. Hanging out with them really made me miss my little bros, but it was huge blessing to get to visit with them. They are super kids. One is a senior in high school, the other is in junior high, so they are just a touch younger than my baby brothers, respectively. I really hope I get to know them better as the school year progresses - I'm hoping to be able to go to some of their extra curricular events and such too...I way miss getting to do go to my brothers' events.

I finally decided to pack up my pup and head home around 9:30 last night. They helped me cart Jake's humongo crate (it's the one we used for Joshua's sweet golden retriever before she passed...so it's a bit large for my stumpy cow dog, but it works) out to my car and SW sent me off with a great hug and kiss on the cheek. I seriously almost started crying on my way home last night, my heart was so full.

I have been so incredibly blessed this Thanksgiving, by the people here in the FT and by all of you back home who have made sure to remind me that you care and that I am still a part of your lives. Thank you all so much for that.

It was hard being away from family, but it was great being a part of a different kind of family up here. And having snow on the ground for Thanksgiving is something I can't even begin to remember the last time I experienced - it was pretty awesome.

Basically, God is good and hasn't let me forget how much He loves me and has shown me how He knows exactly how to take care of me when I need a little extra help here and there.

I pray you all had a truly blessed Thanksgiving, and I can't wait to see all of my Texans in less than a month!

Shalom!
~MW

P.S. - Way to BTHO t.u. yesterday, Ags! So, so proud to be an Aggie - I. love. my. school!

Wind chill of...

2010-11-22T22:01:00.000-06:00

...5 DEGREES!!!!

Yuuuup....that was my today...it. was. chill-Y!

Sooo....I realize I am way behind on the blogging-front, and for that I must apologize. But, I am running on pretty much empty these days. All is quite well, rest assured...I am just more than overwhelmed, a bit over-worked, completely spent, and beyond ready for semester one to come to a close. It's good - it's just a lot right now. BUT! Classes are almost over!! And the break will be fantastical :)

I must say that I really am loving it up here, though. Don't worry, I haven't forgotten about my beloved Texas, and I canNOT wait to come back to all of your lovely faces and that Lone Star State - soon! My cohort is becoming quite the close-knit group and we are developing stellar relationships with members of the other cohorts, as well. Entomologists really are wonderful people, in general. I am so blessed to be a part of this scientific community that truly acts as a family.

Things are going very well with my two outstanding advisors. RH is has been wonderful in making sure I know that I can go to him at anytime with anything, especially since SW is unreachable a good bit of the time...that woman, she's just too good at too many things! RH has also discovered that I'm a sucker for Taco Bell...and once his recent PhD student/post-doc heads out to be an associate professor at her new school I've been told that I am taking over her spot as RH Taco Bell buddy...yay!! Haha. It's pretty fun, but I am nervous that he'll get me back into the habit of eating there multiple times throughout the week...sigh...

Another example of how awesome my advisors are: SW and RH both invited me to spend Thanksgiving with them and their families!! Unfortunately I cannot be in two places at once so I had to decline RH's invite, since SW asked first, but I assured him that I still have another two Thanksgivings here...at least, so he can nab me for at least one of them. He laughed and said he'll try to be first in line to invite me for next year. Haha. So, so great. I'm excited to go to SW for Thanksgiving - she even invited Jakers to come along!! He gets to make two more doggy friends! SW and her hubs have two pups of their own, so we're hoping the three of them get along...if not, we'll just separate them somehow. But how awesome is she for inviting my pup to come with?! I. am. blessed.

I'm still loving RH's illustration class - working in the digital medium has been an adjustment, but I'm starting to slowly get the hang of it, and I love how forgiving it is - you can erase for free!!!! BO-NUS! I'll have to scan in some of my illustrations for y'all at some point so you can see how we have progressed throughout the course of the semester. I can't wait to start doing this stuff for my thesis!! Yay, science + art!! =]

What else do y'all need to know before I head back to the studying... Hmm...hmmm...hmmm...

Oh! Some my ento gals and I started running together! It's been good to have people to do it with - there's no way I would do it myself. Meg and I actually "ran" inside tonight, since it was so cold...we resorted to the ellipticals...those machines are SO mean the way they change incline and resistance on you with nothing more than a beep's notice...punks. But...they do force a decent little workout if you really power through it. At the rec here they have the ellipticals and bikes set-up to face the racquetball/handball courts so we get some entertainment while run in place. It's prudy good!

Frenatae has been pretty busy this month. We had our honey-filling party for our honey sale a few weeks ago - that was a blast. And we had another Pig's Eye on Friday, following some grad student dodgeball (the Ento dorks vs the Evolution, Ecology, & Biology buffs). I didn't make it for dodgeball, but PE was a blast. We made it a game night. Catch phrase all night long with bug dorks = epic.

This weekend a bunch of us went out to the Mall of America to help Markster find a gifty for his wifey - it was way fun. I am so in love with these people!!

Ok, kids, I'm outty. Off I go to finish-up some reading for ecology.

Love and miss y'all!!
~MW

P.S. - I'll try to post some pictures here in the next few days - I don't have too many, but I do have a few that y'all might enjoy :)

Pizza and Honey and Screams...Oh My!

2010-10-31T22:05:00.000-05:00

Happy Halloween/Happy Reformation!

Weekends like this one make me beyond happy. Why? They involve people. Not just people, but people who I thoroughly enjoy! Weekends like this one also involve food! And adventures! And memories! And, and, and...just plain awesome!

Friday we had our departmental Halloween Party down at the honey house (a house where we used to process our "honey harvest"), and I must say it was quite fun. But, anytime there's free pizza + free sodas + free beers + free candy + entomologists it's bound to be a night full o' fun. There was even a pumpkin carving contest! I didn't carve one, but it was way fun to see the creativity of the department shine :) I think my favorite part, aside from all the free stuff and mingling, just might have been this neato little ghost guy who kept going back and forth along a wire in a very zombie-esque fashion...complete with some cow-esque moaning...glorious! I wish I had a picture of this thing. It was awesome. There was also a roaming foot. Yuuup, a foot...that was roaming... We deemed it Thing's (from the Addams Family) cousin ;) But, the best thing EVER, in my humble opinion was the acquisition of this beautiful bucket of golden, yummy goodness:

This my fabulous readers is about 2lbs of beautiful, fresh Minnesota honey!!!
I love honey :)

After the departmental party a number of us decided to mosey on over to Matt and Judy's for a low-key continuation of the hanging out. Meg and I ran back to my apartment to grab Jakers so he and Dex could play while us peoples palyed. The pups were a touch overstimulated with all the peoples, but they did fine overall. We had a great night sprinkled with periodic shouts of, "What song is this?" or, "Who sings this?" from behind Matt's laptop...not to mention the occasional blasting of Beyonce - priceless. The random bursting into song from anyone of us at any given time was pretty great, too.

Saturday consisted of sleeping in, some cleaning, a touch of studying, Skyping (of course!), hangin', and then...screaming...and lots of it. A bunch of us from the department decided to go to Scream Town (gulp!). While there was a great amount of screaming and pushing and pulling through haunted woods and haunted corn mazes and the like...eeps! Let's just say we all bonded quite a bit that night...quite a bit. Oh man, I don't know if the near incessant screaming or the incessant laughing resulted in more soreness for us all. I will say that my throat is rather scratchy today :) We had a blast though (the blast more followed the events of the night...unless your name is Matt or Corey...then you just had fun scaring everyone else all night...punks).

And here we all are!! Fun times in the FT :)

Everyone headed back to my place after we had sufficiently screamed our lungs out and gathered up some foods to partake in. We had a nice close to the night...just hangin' out and settling our somewhat frazzled nerves :) It was really fun having everyone over - I love having people in my home. Definitely one of my favorite things ever :)

Today was another good day. Skyping + homework + laundry + church + recuperating = GROOD (Great & Good!)!

So what did YOU do for YOUR Halloween/Reformation weekend??

Hope you all had a blessed Sunday.

Lots of love from the FT.
Shalom!
~MW

Can't focus? And, so I blog :]

2010-10-25T23:06:00.001-05:00

It's going to be a long night...I absolutely cannot focus tonight.

Lots o' stuff running through my head:
--I miss my family
--I miss my friends
--I miss Texas
--How long 'til Christmas break? {~9wks!!!}
--Why can't I focus? {no clue}
--I need to drink more water {y'all, it is SO dry here - I feel like I'm turning into a human raisin}
--How on earth am I going to get everything done this week?
--Music is the best
--Jesus is better - SO MUCH BETTER
--When can I go to Africa? {waiting is the pits}
--Can I survive another 34mo in the FT?
--Care packages are the best {Jesus is still better!}

I got a care package from my parents today!! Well, technically it came on Friday, but I wasn't able to pick it up until this morning...oh the joys of leaving before your apartment complex office opens and coming home after it closes...

BUT! My parents rock - thank yas, Momma and Daddy! They sent me some stuffs I inadvertently left in the TX, along with some extra goodies :)

Jake's water bowl!!! I somehow left it in TX, so poor Jakers has been eating and drinking out of the same bowl... Now he has two bowls!!

Some of my movies!! Still missing a number of them, but these will get me
through 'til I can collect the rest at Christmas!!

A TON O' MOLESKINES!!! Best parents ever? I think yes.
Just behold the beauty before your eyes!

MA BOOTS!!!! Ok, I have missed these SO much...
Ah, my sweet hiking boots...I cannot wait to introduce you to the Frozen Tundra :)

Bonuses! My mommy knows me all too well - I now have something like
4 honey bears...you can never have too much honey :]

Oh, hai!

This is some of what I did last night and today
(along with some sketches...always sketches):

Hi there, pretty! May I dissect you?

Why thanks :)

How about you? Sweet, looking forward to it.

Ok, loves, that's all for now - I'm going to try and finish up my assignments for tomorrow morning's class...morning will be here all too soon...

Shalom!
~MW

[Insert Catchy Title Here]

2010-10-23T19:17:00.000-05:00

Ah, we meet again!

Alright y'all, I know I've been incredibly inconsistent with the blogging, but heavens to Betsy it is insane up here! It just never ends. Sometimes I hardly feel like I'm living things move so quickly here. It's like living in a constant state of warp speed, for seri. But...even though things are beyond ridiculous and I have real rough days...er, weeks from time to time (hello, current week: I am so glad you are over), I am happy that I am here - I do enjoy what I am doing, where I am in the now, and the people I get to hang around with. I still wish (multiple times a day) that I could transplant the U to TX and just integrate my groups of peeps all into one big happy group of awesome, but, alas, no can do. So, I guess I'll stick around here for the next few years...

Man, this week was a doosie, to say the least. It started off real weepy as I sent Miss Ricci home to C-Stat (sooo wish I could have gone with her). I knew I really missed her and all my Texans, but I didn't quite realize just how much I miss everyone until I had her here beside me. Absence does indeed make the heart grow fonder, in this case. So that lead to a rather weepy week for me, but I wouldn't trade her visit for the world. Such sweet time and memories that we get to cherish forever. Speaking of which! I didn't upload any pictures last time, and I really don't have too many to share, but below are a couple shots from Mickey's Dining Car (You can read about that, the rest of my weekend with Ricci, and the beginning of my week here). You can see some of Ricci's pictures riiiiight.....here! And she played around with a few of them and made some awesome masterpieces here. (Plug: if any of y'all need picturas taken and you are in the C-Stat area check out my sweet friend and see if she has an open slot to fit you in for a shoot!!)

Come Tuesday I spent about 2.5-3hrs at the bank...with a personal banker...initiating the fraud response process. Yuuuup, I had my identity stolen. Great fun, eh? Not so much. So, now that we have canceled the card that got compromised and got me set-up with all new accounts (with some extra benefits compared to the accounts I had previously) I'm waiting for the affidavit to arrive so I can sign it and get the money back that the jerks stole. From there, the fraud research team keeps doing what they do in an attempt to catch the punks. And here I sit...frustrated, annoyed, but ok.

If you haven't guessed yet, Friday couldn't come quick enough this week...oh, it was a long one. But, Friday did indeed come! Glory! Friday closed with a departmental cruise on Lake Minnetonka. Translation: BOOZE CRUISE. Mmmhmm, it happened, and it was...interesting. Saw some interesting sides of people, to say the least. But it was fun to get to hang out on a boat and visit with peoples. It was a gorgeously clear night and the moon was breath-takingly bright. The music was a bit loud and obnoxious, but it's whatevs.

So now that my week is over, I figured I would share some fun stuff with y'all - in the form of picturas!

Geeses! I way love seeing the geese migrating through. Seriously, one of my absolute favorite parts of living here. I really enjoy hearing them as they fly overhead (just don't look up with your mouth open...eeps, that would not be good.), I love watching their formations, watching these magnificent creatures take off is such a sight - if I ever get the chance I'll snap a video of them for yas. I just think they are fun. Huge poo...but what do you expect from HUGE birds??

Honey from our very own honey house! We got these little honey bears at the departmental welcome party earlier in the semester. I feel very privileged to have one of these, as it's been a tough year for honey - no one has any. The bees are taking quite the hit right now. It's pretty depressing and, to be honest, if we don't figure out how to help our little buzzy friends, it's pretty terrifying to think about honey bees hoping on the endangered list (I can't think about the other "e" word yet...)...we'd be pretty sorely out of luck in the food department.

Care packages from some of the sweet members of my congregation back in A-town. Thank you Miss Susie and sweet Hannah! This made my week when I got it. The cookies were delicious and the teas, oh so lovely. Thank you!!!

Awesome signs on random vehicles driving through town. "Stay back....Stay alive"
Love it.

Jakers on the porch. He way likes it when there are days that I can open my sliding door and he gets to hang out outside and watch the birds and our neighbors as they come and go. These days are fast fleeting, though.

Moths!!! Ok, these are not very nice specimens (we "stole" them from the teaching collection...so they take a beating) and these are not my Euchaetes friends. These guys are relatives that I got to start out with on dissections about a month ago. I have some new ones to run through (starting tomorrow!!), and I am way excited about them. They are newer material and in much better shape than these poor little loves. YAY, DISSECTIONS!!!

Oh!! A lot of you have been asking to see my cubbie in the lab. So, just for you, here are some photos of my little nook. It's nothing fancy, but it works :] Enjoy!

You can find me at:

Where you will probably find me bent over some moth literature here:

Or digging through stacks of lit/books...or digging in desperation for snacks or tea here:

Or else checking or writing another something to do on my calendar here:

There you go, sweet readers. There's my little cubbie, where I spend a good 70-80% of my time each week, certainly each day.

Tomorrow should be a good day of dissections and studying, followed by a good night of sweet worship and fellowship at Christ Redeemer. Hooray for worshiping at the same place 3 weeks in a row! Glory!!

Praying you all have a wonderfully blessed Sunday.

Love in Christ to you all.
Shalom!
~MW

P.S. - If any of you have been thinking about adoption or even if you haven't or aren't super sold on it, may I encourage you to take a gander at this post? If you know me at all you know that things like hitting the mission field and adopting the precious ones who have no one are very near and dear to my heart. J-Hump and Ricci do an excellent job of putting our hearts on the issues into writing. I implore you all to prayerfully consider their entry on adoption. And, I'm done ;]

And so another week begins...

2010-10-18T22:24:00.000-05:00

Well my happy readers, how are ya? I know it's been a bit of a spell since I last updated and left y'all hangin' quite a bit by not updating while my darling Ricci was here, but, I'm sorry, we were just having too much fun for me to stop and update :)

We had SO, so much fun, though. I cannot even begin to express to you how wonderful it was to have her bright smiling face here, next to me, in the the FT. It was absolutely wonderful. But seeing her definitely made me miss her, my other Texas loves, and Texas in general, even more. Just a little sting of a reminder that I am missing out on so much being here. But it was totally worth it, even though I lost it Saturday night. I couldn't help it, y'all, I just miss her like none other.

We had a blast though. Here's what we did!

Thursday:
- Collected her from the airport, complete with screams...yup, just like in the movies, it does happen in real life ;)
- Spent some time resting at home...did some laundry
- Went to lunch at Princess Garden Chinese Restaurant (pretty good!!)
- Went to campus...I had class, she played in my cubbie!
- Ran some errands
- Cooked a Mexican Feast!!! Even if it was just Spanish rice and enchiladas...it was still epic
- Shared a lovely evening together on the couch

Friday:
- Went to campus for a lab conference call that didn't happen...sad day.
- Went to Target to make sure there wasn't anything we needed for our event of the afternoon
- Met SW for lunch and went to Mim's. YUM!!
- Ran home to gather our stuffs and hit the road for our mini roadtrip!
- Made it to our destination and met....drum roll, please....MCKMAMA!!!!!! So surreal.
- Hung out with her and her camera for about an hour (I feel like enough of you have stumbled upon these now that I can share them with you here - we had a BLAST!)
- Made the hour or so trek back to the Twin Cities, had some leftover enchiladas and rice, and settled into the couch for another evening of awesome...just chillin' and munchin' on yummies :)

Saturday:
- Went to see Desi at her garage sale...test drove her Subaru...no big deal (<---y'all can start praying about that if you please...)
- Met Miss Megan for lunch at Mickey's Dining Car. Umm, probably one of the most fun experiences ever. I loved watching my best friend here in the FT meet my bestie from TX...so great!
- Miss Ricci and I stopped off at home for a few and made our way to Pine Tree Apple Orchard. I think our discovery of Caribou Coffee and the scenic drive itself were our favorite parts...oh, and the people watching, of course!
- After that we hit up the Mall of America...yuuuup, two weekends in a row for me, kids. Trust me, I am not making this a habit. We had a fun time strolling around. I way enjoyed watching Ricci geek about about the William Sonoma store...priceless.
- We then went home...where she packed, I cried, we ate good food, we enjoyed each others company, and just soaked in the last few hours we had together before I had to send her on home to J-Hump and TX.

Sunday:
- Got up early...got dressed...piled into the car
- Drove to the airport
- Said a quick goodbye so as to not start crying right there on the curb
- She walked to security...I drove home, where I cried some more

Sunday was a rough day for me...I cried a lot that day. I wasn't expecting that at all. I've been extra weepy, in general, since then. I just miss home.

Today marks 2 months of my being here...and not in TX. Really? It's only been two months?? I have 34 more to go?? Oh geesh. Mmmk, time to buckle up and take a deep breath and dive-in to this, I reckon.

On a brighter note, though, I think I have found a church home!!! I think I mentioned it last weekend...I hope I did, but I can't remember right now. Anywho, I went to the same church two weeks in a row! And. It. Was. Awesome! Last night I met a sweet, sweet family who invited me over for dinner - I went tonight!! It was so wonderful! Such a sweet time of fellowship. They sent me home with leftovers!!! I just love their sweet daughter...I'm thinking I may have just adopted a little sister - YAY! She's in 8th grade, and just the sweetest girl. I really enjoyed them and they made me feel right at home. Thank you Jesus for granting me sweet fellowship and renewal through this body of believers.

And with that, my loves, I'm going to close. I need to go finish a reading for class tomorrow and hit the hay.

Love and miss you all. Praying you are growing in the Lord and His love.
Shalom!
~MW

P.S. - B introduced me to this band yesterday: Gungor...they are way good. I highly recommend you check them out.
P.P.S. - I feel like y'all need to see this...it's a little taste of my life here. This is a real commercial that they play on TV here:

Ricci is coming!

2010-10-14T01:04:00.000-05:00

Ricci is coming!!!

Oooooh, I am SOOO excited! I can't sleep...I feel like tomorrow (err...today...) is Christmas!

Insect Ecology is going to seem like an eternity to me, as Ricci arrives at the airport about halfway through class...eeps!

Hooray for besties coming to visit me allllll the way in the Frozen Tundra!!!

Don't you worry, dear readers, there will be at least one epic update to come from this soon to be weekend of awesome!

Shalom!
~MW

I'm Alive!!

2010-10-10T11:19:00.000-05:00

Promise :)

But heavens has it been busy up here in the FT!! This week, I don't even know...it just happened so quickly. One day it was Monday, then I was out sick for a day (still getting over the blasted cold), then it was all of a sudden Friday! How. Did. This. Happen?! I had projects and papers and readings and dissections and inking (more on that in a moment) to do...and it just sucked up every last ounce of my week, apparently.

So, how was your week??

I can't believe it's already Sunday...this weekend happened in a flash, too. I can't handle this warp speed passage of time. If it could just slow down even a teeny tiny bit, that would be just stellar.

Other than catching a lame cold and flying by, this week has been a pretty good one. My illustration class was way fun this week - we started inking!! Crow quill pen + nibs + black India ink = SO FUN. I also have some technical pens that are pretty fun to use, too. Inking your line drawing makes it look so much more awesome! And, it's just plain fun. I like it a lot. We have to turn in our inked drawing on Thursday - I've redone mine twice already...I think I'm almost ready to create my final product and turn it in.

I fiiiinally got to meet up with SW and sit at the scope with her. I love dissections...like, really love them. They are so fun. This is what made me fall in love with studying Entomology, other than the fact that bugs are just plain awesome. I love looking at structures and learning their names and what they do (or don't do - yay ornaments!). And then if there is any way to find homologies/analogies between organisms, it's even more fun. Yes...I'm a huge nerd/dork/geek, and I accept those labels proudly :) But it was very helpful for me to sit with SW and ask her if I had labeled things correctly on my sketches and to just work through the moths together. Loved it!!

Friday night Frenatae got together for a Pig's Eye. What on earth is a Pig's Eye?! Pig's Eye is when we grad students (no profs allowed for this one) get together on a Friday night in the Refuge (aka: the basement of Hodson) and have a few beers/some wine and munch on goodies and just hang out. It's the perfect opportunity to talk about everything that's gone down in our respective labs lately and just tell stories and enjoy each others company without having to be in class or working on homework or researching, etc. So fun. There are few characters who had me rolling. Oh wow, so great.

I pet sat for Judy and Matt (the bee kids) this weekend, while they were away at the North Dakota Bee Keepers Meeting. Their pup Dexter (German short-haired pointer) is one of Jake's favorite doggie friends, so that was fun for Jake. My goodness, Dex is a handful, though. But, he's so fun. I took the pups to the really big dog park, along with Megan, Fraser, and Steven (aka:Non-Profit Guy) and his pups Gunner and Siah. We ended up losing Siah, Jake, and Dexter at one point. Like, seriously could not find them. I ended up getting a phone call from a super sweet couple who had found Jake up by the entrance gate just sitting there waiting and trying to leave, probably thinking I had gone to the car - poor baby. I am so glad that I got his new doggy tag last weekend, and that I decided to put my phone number on the tag. Whew! We ran and got Jakers, and then headed out to one of the clearings...and there we found Siah and Dex. Ahem...Siah...had gone into heat. Oooooh joy...! And, Dex...well, he was just having a blast with that. Yup. You get the idea. I was kind of mortified, haha. I got SOOO awkwarded out by all of the doggy, umm...stuff, going down. Come on kids, keep it PG!! Hahaha, ooooh, what an experience. Needless to say, I was pretty beat after that...I think we all were. Megan and I came back to my apartment and visited for the rest of the afternoon while the pups crashed on the floor - too cute. After Meg left I got to Skype with some cool cats before hittin' the hay - I was in need of that. I'm loving getting to know my new friends here, but I SO miss all of y'all "old" friends.

Today we Ento gals are going to go shopping for fall/winter clothes!! So excited. It will be nice to get to hang out with just the ladies. Here's hoping for some killer deals on some way cute clothes...maybe some boots?!

I have church over at Christ Redeemer, tonight. I'm way excited. I think it's going to be awesome. I'll let y'all know how it goes, fo sho.

And with that, my dear ones, I need to get a move on. The Ento Gals will be here in about an hour and I need to get a few thins done before they get here...like fold my laundry...and put it away ;)

Love and miss you all!
Shalom!
~MW

Welcome home, Yoshi!

2010-10-04T22:04:00.001-05:00

Well, my loves, this will be short (I still have a good 2-3hrs of homework to finish and it's 10pm...gross.), but I just wanted to you let you all know that Yoshi made it home safe and sound this afternoon. He arrived on my doorstep at 1:33pm, according to the UPS tracking updater. So awesome. This is where I really enjoy having a secured entry apartment building...and being all the way down in the corner of my floor where it looks like there couldn't possibly be an entire apartment :) I spent a good portion of my evening getting him all re-configured to my liking. I still have some work to do in that area, but that will have to wait until another day...the essentials are in place: Mozilla, iTunes, Microsoft Office, Skype...the big ones. I have so missed being able to run my Pandora stations whilst studying, working around my little home, etc...so that's a HUGE bonus. I've been rockin' the iPod the last couple of weeks without my little laptop buddy.

I currently cannot breathe, yay cold and flu season. It hits early up here...awesome. It was recommended to me today by SW that I get my flu shot...I hate getting flu shots. I just don't like it. I don't think I'm going to get one. I generally don't come down with the flu...I get colds here and there, but the flu I usually bypass. So, I think I'm going to stick to my no-vax rituals. Momma, what do you think??

Finally got to meet up with SW and talk moths today! SOOOOO good. I'll have to share more about that tomorrow or Wednesday or something (Tuesdays are way long days...).

This weekend was amazing: dog parks, errands with the pup, Skype (at the lab!!), church, homework, friends (old and new) - it was just plain good. Exhausting, but in the best possible way imaginable :)

Nighty-night, loves. I'm off to finish the homework and hopefully hit the hay in the not too distant future.

Shalom!
~MW

P.S. - the weather has been phenomenal the last week or so...gorgeous, and, Momma, the colors are starting to turn!!!!!

Repair In-Progress!!

2010-09-27T18:48:00.000-05:00

Reeeal quick, as it is just about 7 and I need to get on home to let Jakers out and feed him and maybe squeeze in a walk, etc.:

Yoshi is officially at the Toshiba hospital and is most likely getting prepped for surgery (Repair in-progress as of 5pm or so...and he's in Kentucky, so whatever time it is there...I could have looked it up, but yeah, well...I didn't, sorry kids!). I'm like a nervous mom over here!! Ok, not really at all, but it is way fun to hop onto the Toshiba site and type in a slew of numbers and find out almost exactly what they are doing with good ol' Yosh.

Today has been a pretty solid Monday, in a good way. Got into the lab a little early (love it) and got some stuffs done before class. Then headed off to evolution for the good ol' Hardy-Weinberg lecture...9th grade bio, anyone?? It was a nice review, none-the-less.

After class I met up with SW and we FINALLY got to sit down and chat. We went to Mim's, this awesome Mediterranean place just across the street from campus, and grabbed some lunch and just visited. Nothing too official, at this visit, just us catching up and getting to know each other more. I've missed having her around...she's lovely, and I just enjoy her. We'll get together again Friday morning for our conference call with the other research labs working on this grant with us and hopefully sit down and talk about some of the questions and issues I've run across in her absence.

Well, reader loves, that's about all I can give you for now. Love yas lots.

I way miss talking to y'all Skypers...SOON!

Shalom!
~MW

Welp...this is it...

2010-09-22T20:33:00.000-05:00

Yoshi's box arrived the other day, but I wasn't able to pick it up until today, as I generally leave before our complex office opens (which is where the UPS guy deposited Yoshi's cardboard ambulance) and get home after it closes...this is an issue. So, since I don't have class 'til 10:40 on Wednesdays, I stayed home a bit later than usual so I could go pick up my package from the office. It was nice to see Mike again - it's been a while - and we had a nice little chat for a few minutes. He cracks me up...he definitely has my back if I need him - very good to know :)

So, now that I have the box, I have to get it off in the mail. I was going to wait until Monday, but upon opening the box and reading the shipping instructions, I discovered that I have to get the box (with Yoshi inside) back to them within a certain amount of time, or else my case number will expire and that would create quite the suckfest. So...I'm sending him away tomorrow. Which means, oh how it pains me to say it, I won't have him for the rest of this week, the weekend, and probably most, if not all, of next week. Depressing, to say the very least. This is going to make for some LONG days/nights up at the lab...I'm probably going to have to come home in the evenings, spend some quality time with Jakers, grab some grub, and then head back to the lab to finish homeworks and the like. Lame.

But, this week is going pretty well, all things considered. It's a touch lonely as of yet, but I deeply enjoy visiting with MC. She's wonderful and we just "click." Such a blessing. We had one of the sweetest visits Tuesday morning after class. We went off and found a little table we could sit at under some lovely trees and visited for probably a good hour and a half. I've missed having chats like that with all of you back home. Phone and Skype dates are one thing...but that personal, one-on-one interaction is just something that can't be substituted.

There isn't much else to report, to be honest. Oh! Except that I got new baby locks for my cabinets: Tot Loks ROCK! I came home today and my cabinets were not open and there was no trash strewn around my kitchen. Lovely :)

Well, I know this is short, but I need to get back to the homework...I still have a good 60 pages of reading to do for class tomorrow. Neat.

Lots of love!

Shalom!
~MW

A fresh week!

2010-09-20T20:31:00.001-05:00

Salutations! (Charlotte's Web, anyone??)

This week is seeming to be off to a better start (yes, I am well aware that it is only Monday...)! Yesterday, other than the botched attempt at trying a new church (all I'm saying is that the street I was supposed to turn onto does not exist...it's just not there...I drove around for 20min trying to find it and it simply was not there...stupid FT streets...hmph!), was a rather productive day!

I ran a ton of errands (including grocery shopping - best experience yet!) and did a ton of cleaning around the apartment - my desk is no longer a heaping pile of...well...crap. Everything has now been filed away and has it's very own appropriate place in my new home (all of the, "hmmm...not sure what to do with you - I'll deal with you later" things ended up on top of my desk - it was more than awful.). So, that was quite the accomplishment! I cooked some stuffs for my dinners and such after all of the errands (we'll get to all of that in a moment) and cleaned my crazy trashed kitchen that followed that project. I love my kitchen right now - it's gorgeous, I'm just sayin'.

But, errands! Oh the adventures running errands brings. Though not completely successful, they went pretty well. I am still in serious search of Moleskines...my life kind of depends on them. Yes, I am well aware that I can simply purchase these little life essentials online from Moleskine directly...but the I have to wait. Y'all, I'm down to like 4pages in my last cahier!!! I just might die. I'll try not to, but I make no promises. Anywho, aside from my Moleskine search being a bust I got a lot of other stuff done that I needed to!

I went to Target and got the drain baskets I've been needing to get so that I no longer am looking down gaping holes when I take a shower or brush my teeth...I no longer have to fear dropping my Aggie ring or my earrings or something, either. Whew! I also picked up a few things I'd been needing to get for my cubbie in the lab so I can actually settle-into it. Like school supplies!!!!!!!!!!

I got a trashcan and a board and some peg-board peg/hook thingys so I can store some stuffs in my cubbie - like my ladybug from Mika, my butterflies from Momma, pictures of my peeps, verses to keep me sane in the world of evolutionists/athiests/agnostics/etc...you know, the stuff of life :)

I got a lovely new pot (and some potting soil, or course) for my ground orchid, so I could re-pot her and hopefully be rid of those blast scale insects!! Ugh, they gross me out...yes, I just said that a bug grosses me out. These little buggers are just plain mean, though! They infest my beautiful, beautiful orchid, that I've had for over a year now and has given me two absolutely lovely blooming events, and they suck the life out of her!! How incredibly rude!! She does, however, have a lovely new shoot growing - gives me hope that she'll pull through alright.

Picked up a little something "for" Jakers...CHILDPROOFING LOCKS FOR MY CABINET DOORS! In case you haven't heard, he's taken to opening the cabinet under my sink and pulling out my trash can and throwing my trash around everywhere...lovely. So, to remedy the situation I decided I'd childproof my cabinets. With some help from the neighbor I got them all installed last night.

I was so proud of my defeating the war. I left for campus this morning with an extra spring in my step, as I was 100% certain that I was going to come home to a kitchen that did not have trash thrown around it. I walked through my door all excited to see my "well behaved" puppy dog and not have to scold him, and what do I find, but a cowering puppy dog. I'm thinking, "what on earth could you have done that you know you are in trouble??" I make the turn out from my entry way into the kitchen and see the cabinet door open, the trashcan on the floor, my trash bag across the kitchen...and the childproof lock? Totally and completely snapped off. He was so determined to make a mess that he actually broke the lock. As frustrated as I was/am, I gotta hand it to him, that's some serious determination, and I mean, ok, in all honesty, it's pretty funny...CRAZY DOG! So...all you parents out there: what childproofing ticks do you have for those, errr..., way strong chil'ins you have/had running around..??? I'm thinking the magnetized ones, where you have to use the magnet to unlock the door?? Thoughts?

Ok, I had probably the best grocery shopping experience, yet. I went...to...TRADER JOE'S!!! And, my dear readers, it was positively glorious. Ten times more exciting than the day I first set foot in Rainbow. Oh, my heavens, it was just beautiful. I can't do all of my shopping there (it's just too expensive for some things, and they don't have absolutely everything...), but it's nice to have, none-the-less. I may or may not have splurged a bit...I got way good meats (including, but not limited to lovelies like prosciutto!!) , and eggs, and cheese, and yogurt, and umm...jasmine rice, and, and, and!!! And, then I went to Rainbow to get things like PopTarts...convenience still wins on some days...I did get my real coffee from Rainbow, though...Organic Coffee Co., how I have missed you :)

I think I found my new favorite thing to substitute for ice cream...soooo good, and it doesn't make me want to die!!

Ok, so what all did I make as far as dinners and things go?? I made some more jambalaya for last night's dinner and I'll probably make the rest of the week on it, if I can control myself and not keep eating the chicken spaghetti I made....it's just so good! And, I haven't made it in forever, and I like it. And it's cheesy, and it has Rotel in it so it reminds me of home, and it has Rotel in it...did I mention the Rotel??? K, as long as we are clear on that ;)

JAMBALAYA!!!

CHICKEN SPAG!! Pre set stage.

Well, my loves, here I sit with my vanilla honey chamomile tea, and I am thinking it is about time I get to getting ready to settle-down for the evening. I love you all, and I hope you've enjoyed this more up-beat post :)

Shalom & Blessings!
~MW