Return to the Blog

Two months and one cross country move later, I return to my blog. If you are on facebook, you've probably already seen these, but I thought I'd share Pancake Day here, too, since it was such a wonderful morning. Nora had literally been dreaming of Jason making pancakes so she decided that he would become the pancake chef, and he did. His first batch was pretty great and I'm looking forward to future pancake days. Part of Nora's decree included wearing these Daughter and Daddy matching Steak and Shake hats. It's Nora's favorite restaurant, but really, there's not much for Jason there.




This is the pantry, or what Nora calls the Little Kitchen, and right now it' s my favorite part of the house. That could have something to do with there being no boxes there.

Jason's reptilian like pattern on his arm is from Nora playing tattoo parlor. We've tried to discourage this since it is difficult to wash off (Crayola lies about the washable nature of their washable crayons).



We are settling in okay. Nora is having the hardest time, since we just want to unpack boxes and run to Ikea and do other boring things. She's seen a lot of TV the past couple of weeks. We have tried to get across the street to the park everyday (we didn't make it today) or out someplace at least. Unfortunately, the Dinosaur Footprints park was not as exciting as we hyped it to be. Fossilized dino footprints aren't that obvious to the untrained eye and there was no dinosaur recreation which would have made her happy. I think we've got to spend a day this week, doing everything she wants to do to balance it out. I'll let you know how it goes.

Oh have I mentioned that it's been hot here this week? 90+ degrees. And we have no AC.

Memphis Trip

Jason had a conference in Memphis last weekend and so Nora and I went along and met Jason's parents for a visit. It was a beautiful weekend. We hit the Memphis Zoo, Beale Street, the Bass Pro shop, the Riverfront and Central Bar-B-Que. Here's some photos of the trip:

Holiday Roundup

We survived the rush of Christmas week. Between Nora's Birthday and assorted family get-togethers it was a bit of a whirl. Here's a few photos to give you the gist:

A Few Days In the Frozen North

I had some extra vacation days saved up and so after Jason's final final and before Nora's birthday, we took a quick run up to Chicago to check out the Christmas Market, Santa at Macy's and a few sights. We had a great time, although Nora greatly preferred the luxurious Best Western with it's indoor pool to doing anything else in town. I found it amazing that we could find a hotel room in Chicago the week before Christmas cheaper than a cabin in the Carbondale vicinity but I'm glad we did because we had a great time. It was nice to get away for a few days before the craziness of a combined birthday/holiday set in.



Writing a letter to Santa at Macys.

In line to see Santa at Macys (she asked for gingerbread and candy).


Freezing at the Christmas market
Filling up the suitcase so we can't pack to go home.

Pumpkin Hunt

This weekend we visited the pumpkin patch at Eckards in Grafton to find the perfect pumpkin for the jack-o-lantern this Halloween. Nora wandered all over the hillside and it was a cold morning. Just when the wagon was about to return for us, Nora finally settled on the perfect one. 23 lbs!




Afterwards, the day turned really pretty and we took a hike a Pere Marquette State Park, had some excellent beer at the Rotten Apple, and then took the river road further north to get apple and gourds at Ringhausen Orchard at Hardin. It was a terrific day.

It's that Season

It's that time of year again, the leaves are turning and football is back in season. Not that football, the other one - what we call soccer here. Okay, soccer is always in season someplace, somewhere, but our house is now in full frenzy over the EPL, which is somewhat more frenzied than MLS season or the US women's season, and oh yeah, it is even more frenzied since there's this thing called the World Cup next year and everyone is trying to qualify for it. This means that for the next months I've been asked to avoid driving on streets named Arsenal and Manchester and we are supposed to wear lots of navy blue and white (with just a pinstripe of yellow), unless we're supporting Ireland, and then it's that flag, and all of our weekends have giant two hour holes in them. However, when we are not gazing across the pond at our teams over there, I thought I'd give you a heads up on a team right here in STL and a great player that is actually related to me. My cousin's son, Sito has been named a finalist in ESPN's National Soccer player of the Week! He's one of three boys (young men) chosen from across the country and here's his write up, in case you don't want to follow the link:

Sito Sasieta, Chaminade (St. Louis, Mo.): Sasieta, considered the top midfield prospect in the St. Louis area, assisted on both goals as Chaminade edged FAB 50-ranked Peoria Notre Dame (Peoria, Ill.) 2-1. Sasieta, a senior who has committed to St. Louis University, has one goal and five assists through three matches.

Yay Sito! Congratulations!

Double the Grandparents, Double the Fun

From the Arkansas Trip:


Nora's first fish

Under the waterfall at Garvin Gardens

On the boat
Driving the boat

Where Am I?

This month has been so absolutely crazy, as evidenced by my lack of posts all month. I was in East Prairie just after the 4th for a couple of days, then I had a Saturday training, then I went to DC for a conference/mandatory meeting and now we're all in Arkansas. DC was wonderful, when I wasn't in the hotel (which was terrifically located at 13 and Penn. Ave). In spare moments I checked out the Library of Congress, the National History Museum, the American History Museum and the Smithsonian Castle as well as Union Station, Capitol Hill, an evening cruise to Alexandria, VA, and oh yeah, a bunch of really boring meetings. I got back Friday night and then Saturday we were on the road again, my parents in tandem, visiting Jason's parents and his grandmother (mom and dad missed out on our side trip to Magnolia), and now we are at Queen Willhemina State Park literally in the clouds. This is Arkansas' second highest peak and it's been raining for days so we have zero visibility, but it's sort of cool to be all out in what seems like fog, but is actually the cloud cover. Mom and Dad are finding it rather trying up here, but right now, I'm sort of just relived to be here, since we had a pretty wet and long drive from Magnolia this afternoon (we drove down there this morning and then turned around and drove up here this afternoon) and this on top of three days with the in-laws. I might find it a bit boring by tomorrow though if it never clears off. While there is no cell phone coverage up here and the lightening earlier today cut out the land phones, it's sort of amazing that we have wireless up here, but we do. Unfortunately, we couldn't find the camera cable when we packed though, so I won't have any pictures until we get back in a couple of days. Hope we don't fall off the mountain!

In other news, Nora out-fished both of her grandfathers by hauling in 4 bream and they came up with zilch. They should use the Barbie fishing rod (yes, Nora has a Barbie fishing rod), I've learned just how reliant and simultaneously incapable of using cell phones my parents are (If you called either of them today, they can't call you back, but they sure are spending a lot of time talking about how they want to), and Jason is watching the MLS all-star team play Everton. This is the happiest he's been all trip. Nora's done a good job managing all of her relatives and putting up with a lot of car seat time. I broke down and added to her my pretty pony collection and while I think keeping up with the miniature hairbrush will be tiresome, it was sort of worth the time she spent extolling it's greatness instead of screaming her head off while driving through some heavy rainstorms.