the holidays

so we spent a good couple of days in tomball. it's nice that both of our families live there, that way we're able to see both sides. i don't know what we'll do when one clan decides to move!

christmas eve was spent at ed's parent's house. they always have a christmas eve dinner and gift opening session the night before. ed and i have also taken on the "open one gift on christmas eve" tradition...and i like it :) i dont know how to put in to words what it's like to open gifts with the buck boys..they could absolutly care less what is under the wrapper..as long as they get to tear something open. putting a gift in a bag is absolutly blasphemous. even now they get giddy and excited and tear the wrapping paper into the absolutle smallest pieces. it's a bit ridiculous, but hilarious to watch.

all of the brothers and their wives participated in a white elephant exchange. little campbell received the rubber ducky of the new century...an electric one that lights up, quacks, AND shoots water out of its head like a fountain. theresa bought it when she was with my mom..who also bought one, for her unborn grandchild. sigh. campbell is very timid, though, and looked very confused and then began to cry as she struggled to fit this obnoxious thing into her rubber ducky schema.

proud uncle ed and beautiful ms. campbell

the next morning we did christmas with my family, and then headed to his grandparents to see the entiiiiire group of bucks. there are so many little kids now (one of ed's cousins has 4 kids..LOUDEST MOST UNDISCIPLINED CHILDREN ON THE PLANET) so things were a bit crazy, and i'm not sure his poor grandparents were able to take it all in.

campbell can now say mommy, daddy, puppy, stu dee (studley, ed's parent's dog), no, tan you (thank you), and HEY! She yells this to get your attention :) she is also one for the dramatics, and rolls her eyes and sighs dramatically when she doesn't get her way. Her dad, Chris, stood in her way as she tried to get to a pile of wrapping paper, and she looked up at him, rolled her eyes, and sighed. it was hilarious, as if to say, "oh dad." and then she just walked away. i'd really like to see more of her.

showing dad that she is much more flexible than he is. he has to take his heels off the ground to squat.

the face she made when uncle ed took some of her cereal.

you can see more pictures at our website. www.apriled.shutterfly.com. It's under 'Our Life' in the Holidays 2008 folder. She's cute, you should look.

tagged.

So Ivylicious tagged me in her last post.



This is the fourth photo from my fourth photo album, "Campbell"

This is my niece, Campbell Layne. It was taken at Thanksgiving by her mama's sister..so, her other aunt, Heather! We did not get to spend Thanksgiving with them, so they shared the photos instead.

I think she is absolutely precious, and can't wait to see her at christmas. She is the main and absolute reason I would love to go to UofH. She started walking on Halloween (14 months..kinda late?) and is a little miss sassy-pants. SO like her mother and father :)

I tag Heather! To tag the fourth picture in the fourth album on your computer. Don't cheat! And don't forget to tell us what it's about! I only blog with you ladies, so I have no other people to tag!

applications..ugh.

Not much going on in Buckland..just working and trying to finish up our applications! I have currently finished my applications to:
Univ. of Minnesota, UC Santa Barbara, Rochester, Stony Brook, and UC Irvine.
I am working on my applications to:
UT Austin Psychology, UT Austin HDFS, Univ of Houston, and Univ of Massachusetts

Notice there is no Northwestern in the mix. That is because I am an IDIOT and wrote down that the due date was December 31. It was definitely the 1st. I have mixed feelings about the mix-up..it was my own personal #2 choice. I would love to work under Eli Finkel there. HOWEVER, he said he might not take a student this coming year unless they were exceptional (years of experiences, GRE in the 1500s-1600s..what a prick, right?), plus there is nothing for Ed in Chicago. It was one of my..I'm applying anyway in case the worst happens and you don't get in anywhere, dear..schools. BAH. Ed is rolling through his applications too. We should both be done come mid-January, and then as Ivy said, it's the waiting game!

We went to my grandfather's house for the day for Thanksgiving (pictures on fb) which was an alright trip. No one told us it was a lunch instead of dinner, so we got there after everyone else had already eaten. It was alright though...we came back to Austin shortly after and watched the game together. Good evening.

I put up my christmas decorations! The night of Thanksgiving!! Ed insisted that I wait until the next day, but I was done waiting.

We're pretty much almost done with christmas shopping..we're going to be cutting it close just to cover everyday things after we pay off our credit card with all of our grad school stuff on it, so we're going light this year. Wedding scrapbooks for the parentals, new hoodie for the bro, books for Campbell, and sipping chocolate for the sis. Ed's family is doing a white elephant gift exchange, but that should be easy.

Monday is Lonestars formal..weird to not be going, right?? It's also the last girl's night that Catherine will probably be able to attend before she moves to Dallas to start her grad school career..SO SAD!! We met in ASL and she has been such a fantastic friend. Now who will watch Grease 2 with me? This is also the time of year that most of you lovely ladies packed up and moved on to bigger things..I love the holidays, but it all seems so dreary.

I am also starting a second job tomorrow. Alissa Sherry (professor at UT) needs someone to help her in her private practice, so I'll be helping her to get and stay organized as she transitions to a new office. I've pretty much got this sort of thing nailed by now, so it should be easy-breezy.

Juli comes home on the 19th..should be interesting. Things have been a bit easier with her overseas, but it will be nice to hear her laugh again. Maybe she'll watch Grease 2 with me!

I hope you are all doing well. Ivy- I still need to hear the rest of the engagement story! Call me when you're done with finals! Laura- How the world are you?!? Shivonne- thanks for posting love! I'm super excited for all of the things you have coming up in the next couple of months! Heather- see you tomorrow!

you will not stop my jingle bell ROCK

Because I'm a holiday rock star.

I will admit that I was one of the many who became slightly irritated at Hobby Lobby when they began putting their christmas decorations up in JULY. However. It is November, and even if Thanksgiving has not come and gone, I still say we should spread the Holiday cheer :)

My mom has always been a big fan of holiday decorations. It's one of my favorite parts about going home each year..to see what new little houses she has added to her holiday village, or to see if she got her LIFE SIZE dancing Santa a new wifey friend yet. I love the holidays, and with holidays comes lots of food, cheer, and decorations.

Ed will not let me put up my decorations until Thanksgiving is over. Hmph. This is my silent retaliation against him...he can't change my blog :)

Ed and I still aren't sure where we will be spending TG this year..my family always goes to Seguin to see my grandparents..which has since become grandfather. It's pretty depressing..especially seeing as how I now think he's a bit of an a-hole. There's no real cheer there. My mom goes because it's her dad, and my dad goes to support my mom. Juli is still abroad, so no sibling support from her this go round, and who knows where David will be..I doubt he even realizes that TG is coming up.

Ed's family always goes to his grandparents house..who happen to live on the street over from my parents. Holidays there are far less depressing than those at my grandfather's, but his grandma isn't doing so hot these days. I'm pretty sure she's stuck in time, about 10 years ago. She still knows who she is and who we are, but the stories she tells as if they were yesterday all happened a good 10, 15 years ago.

Hmmph. This will not stop my jingle bell rock. Ed and I are a new family now, and we will celebrate the hell out of these holidays. Of course it might end up in me celebrating them enough for the both of us. He's a bit of a scrooooge.

I hope you all are getting excited for food and football! HOOK 'EM!

Happy Halloween!

Nothing major to report really...Ed suggested a new title for the blog..it's fitting.

Right now we're both still working and trying to get grad school apps ready. I was able to send out packets to all of my recommendation letter people this past week, which is definitely a weight off. I can handle doing my own things last minute, but it looks a bit unprofessional to ask them to do the same.

Ed has almost finished a story that he's been working on for the past couple of months. He's a little frustrated and is trying to make all of the pieces come together so people can review it, but I'm excited! He's worked really hard on it and I can't wait for him to hear from other people (besides his ever-loving, always-impressed wife) that it's good.

This past week for ladies night we had pumpkin carving! I have only carved a pumpkin once before (my mom was always real big on the holiday decorations, so we never really needed to carve our own pumpkin) so it was quite the experience. I bought a fairytale pumpkin because I thought it looked whimsical, but apparently it is not ideal for pumpkin carving. The walls were so thick, I ended up having to use a steak knife to carve the whole thing! I carved a Bevo, and I think I did him justice. I also made special Halloween treats for the occassion! -dirt cake (pudding, really) complete with worms in little Halloween containers :)

Ed and I haven't made any plans for the festive evening..I've always wanted to try downtown, but I know I'll hate how crowded it is. Ed has had to work on Halloween before and I've had to pick him up...it is the most ridiculous time for downtown! I hope you all have fun whatever your plans are!

PS Miss Dudney! I had to tell you that I finished my first mexican martini all by myself! It reminded me of you and the many martinis you had to help me finish :) I love you! Call me soon!

GRAD SCHOOL

DUN DUN DUN!!!!

Ever since my last post, Ed and I have been GRAD SCHOOL go go go go go!

Turns out, we suck. They didn't allow you to sign up for the GRE subject tests until September, so when we were finally able to, we both did. Without ever double checking our schools to make sure they still require them. Ugh. Turns out, every school except ONE (UCLA) dropped that requirement. NONE OF OUR OTHER SCHOOLS REQUIRE IT. Talk about a waste of money, not to mention TIME invested in studying for that stupid thing. It's so super frustrating, I cannot even articulate. Not only frustration with the schools, who realize now how stupid it is to think a test like that is any true reflection of your knowledge (they should take the hint on the general GRE too!) but frustration with ourselves, for not double checking.

Other than that, the process has been going great! We each have a list of about 15 schools now (the number has gone up as we've been forced to realize that the likelihood of BOTH of us getting in to the same school is not so great). We both have our rec letters secured and only need now to get our materials to them. Ed is finally almost finished with the rough draft of the story he wants to submit. After that it's workshop, workshop, workshop! I don't have anything like that, but need to update my personal statement from last year (add in all my super-cool lab tricks that i've learned!) and essays for each institution.

We're super confident that the application process this year will go much more smoothly than last year. We pulled out papers from our grad school planning sessions last year, and they were covered in wedding notes! What were we thinking.

And we've been super great lately. Our schedules work out really well and we've been making a lot of time for each other. CRAZIEST THING! Turns out, he thought Sleeping Beauty and Snow White were the same fairy tale!!!! He had no idea there were separate stories. BLASPHEMY, I KNOW. How can he be married to such a romantic and not know these things? Never fear though ladies, thanks to Disney and I, he is now educated. "You know, your Enchanted movie didn't help," ...I guess he never caught on that it was supposed to be a combination of fairy tales. Oh my.

The family is good! Campbell is still not walking..which I think is odd, since she turned 1 in August. Ed's dad was in town for a conference this week, so we went out to dinner last night and we made dinner tonight. He brought me a bottle of wine (which I drank..by myself:)). I like him. He's a very relaxed, likable guy that likes to laugh.

Ed works a double on Friday and then we're driving up to Dallas Saturday morning for the game! We're going to spend a lot of time with Zac, an all-time favorite of both of ours that has been begging us to come see him in Dallas for the longest time. Zac was Ed's roommate for 2.5 years, played the guitar at the wedding, and obnoxiously caught the garter.

The Peacock is still here! Turns out, the thing climbs up into the trees to sleep at night! My grandparents raised peacocks when I was younger, so I know that they're mean little things that make a lot of racket..but I like this one. He gives off sort of a Fonzie vibe :)

Not sure if you guys can see it, but that's it up in a tree. In the center of the picture.

Another note on animals. The Dr. I work for decided the office didn't have enough "life" in it. And since we are a place of healing, we should have life. Somehow, that translated into her putting frogs in our waiting room. Creepy.



This is the fat guy. He likes to sneak up near the lid...hoping we'll open it and he can escape to freedom. You should see him attack a cricket.

on that note, love you all!

a lot of going ons

Writer David Foster Wallace found dead

Ed read DFW's Infinite Jest his junior year of college..and it changed his life. Before that, he had been frantically struggling with who he was, where he wanted to go and what he wanted to do with his life. After he read Infinite Jest, his entire world view changed. He spent all of his free time reading his novels, essays and short stories. He wants to be a writer, now, because of Wallace. No one has had a greater impact on his life than DFW (and I don't say that lightly).

When he heard the news, he spent hours pouring over every article he could find online. He was distraught..in shock. The person who inspired him to be what he is and do what he is doing today has taken his own life. Horribly, taken his own life. He thought and spoke frantically for several days, trying desperatley to figure it out. He thinks it means big changes for him, for his own life. His world seems like a dimmer place, less valuable, less worthwhile.

I was at a loss for words for a long time. He is doing much better now, though, and has used it as a way to push himself to write more. He has been speaking to a writing professor he had, who has helped him a great, great deal.

“Think of the old cliché about quote the mind being an excellent servant but a terrible master. This, like many clichés, so lame and unexciting on the surface, actually expresses a great and terrible truth,” he said. “It is not the least bit coincidental that adults who commit suicide with firearms almost always shoot themselves in: the head. They shoot the terrible master. And the truth is that most of these suicides are actually dead long before they pull the trigger."

-DFW, 2005

Hurricane Ike

Austin never saw a drop. Not even a cloud, a little wind, but nothing that even resembles a light shower. Tomball, like most of south Texas, did not escape so unscathed. My dad sleeps with ear plugs in, so was completely unaware when the storm rolled in. My mom, however, a worry-wort and light sleeper, said it sounded like a war zone. They had lost power that night before the storm even arrived, so were sleeping with their windows open. My mom finally woke my dad up around 3am so they could move away from the windows and into the safety area under the stairs.

They woke the next morning and told me over the phone that only a few branches had fallen. LIARS. We have pine trees all throughout our yard, 10 stories tall at least. SIX of these snapped in half, one falling on our neighbors garage, ruining the carport and fence. Another tree landed less than a foot away from our own garage. If it had fallen the other way, it would have landed on my sister's bedroom, with my parents' bedroom below it. And they just redid the bathrooms!

A tree cutter was there THAT day handing out his card, and my mom called him that afternoon. They were afraid the trees that had snapped might fall and cause more damage, so they went ahead and cut them all down. THAT day, a tree stump remover was handing out HIS card. So the yard now looks perfectly normal, minus a lot of trees and branches. It took 14 empty dump trucks just to haul away the stuff from my parents' house.

My parents STILL do not have power. They lost everything in the storage freezer (my dad is a deer hunter, a lot of meat was wasted). My dad was unable to go to work for about a week, because all of the windows on one side of his building were blown out. Thank GOODNESS his office was spared. It was a crazy time for him though..he does risk assessment for the entire Chase bank company, and did not have access to the internet, cell phone (charged it in his car) or land phone for days..all during the stock market ups and downs of last week. He drove in to work at the end of last week anyway, and was able to get some work done. Good for him.

My mom refused to let me have her camera to post pictures..she wants to keep it around in case the insurance people ever actually show up. She stood in line for 3 hours yesterday to wash clothes at the washateria. She is really bored.

Happy Graduation to Me!

Even with all of their own drama, my parents were still able to get me a new car for graduation! We've been on a waiting list since July, and it finally arrived last weekend! Ed and I made a trip home to pick up it, and help my parents finish up some of the yard work. It was sorda like a camp out :) The car is a 2009 honda fit. I absolutely love it!

Peacock?

Random, I know, by there is a peacock roaming our apartment complex! Ed thinks it's all rather mysterous, I think it's just a bird looking to snack on all of our neighbors' plants.

Grad School Applications

Are due beginning Dec 1. Ed and I have both signed up to take our respective GRE subject test (mine is Nov 8!). We're both excited about applying and where it might take us. I think we're both secretly hoping for Houston, so cross your fingers!

Married Life

Is fabulous :) I love him and love every day we have together. He's still my all-time favorite person. I love life.