(Belated!)Ladies Night Out in Brooklyn

Can you think back to the middle of December? Where you were? What you were doing? Good. Because that's when this post was actually written - enjoy!

I am writing this perched on Liz's big-girl bed in the Ditmas Park area of Brooklyn. She and her lovely roommate Julia have just moved in a couple weeks ago, so the whole apartment right now looks much like Liz's room - boxes, clothes, appliances galore! Even in their semi-unpacked state, the two of them have already managed to make things homey. The kitchen is probably the most complete with a new microwave that looks like a spaceship, the spices lined up over the stove, Julia's German espresso cups peeping from the top of the fridge, and a creative storage system that gives a fun minimalist-like, ladies'-in-the-city vibe to the decor.

Hey Tiz - hope you don't mind I snapped a few pictures while you were at work!

Some other nice tidbits of Lizzie's new apartment:

- the bathroom is nicely long with a heating pipe right next to the toilet to keep your knees warm on cold December mornings (a definite bonus in my book!)

- being located on the 3rd floor, it is a nice daily climb for a bit of exercise but not too grueling for the stagger home from the pub (tho Liz never staggers - she's been known to waltz!)

I'll leave the rest for Liz to reveal. Nally and I had a nice time with her and Julia out at the Grill. Johnny was behind the bar, making us giggle, making us drinks. I don't miss the close quarters and noise of Brooklyn, but I do miss being near my favorite people, living with family. I think Jesse and I occillate back and forth between enjoying playing 'House' on our own and wanting to live in a big old house with all our sisters and roomies :) Who knows what the future will bring? Syracuse probably won't be forever - tho if the past few months are any indication, I do believe we will be enjoying Upstate for the next couple years.

Don't know if we'll be posting before we get back up into Syracuse after the holidays - we'll see, we may be inspired.

Have a wonderful holiday season everyone. We love you!

Caitlin and Jesse

If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?

On this shortest day of the year, I lay in bed watching a blizzard blanket Hawthorne Street of Syracuse, wondering at what point do I begin the shoveling. You clear the sidewalk at the end of the storm, not in the middle. I've shoveled more snow in the past month than I have in the previous 10 years combined, even having lived in the northeast that whole time.

We'll get exactly 9 hours of sunlight today. Not including the dim visibility of dawn and dusk, we'll have 9 hours for outdoor daylight activities. Our schedules have adapted so they don't rely on the sun to tell us when to wake up and when to go to sleep. But my poor indoor plants that I move around the house to get as much light as possible will be starved today with only 9 hours to feed them.

They don't like this frigid cold either. Syracuse lies just southeast of Lake Ontario, and winds from the northwest bring cold Canadian air across the lake, picking up its water, and dumping it in snow form in the Onondaga Valley. We average about 12 feet of snow each season and just below the freezing point for well over the next month. Tonight those winds are supposed to reach gusts of 50 mph.

When Percy Shelly wrote his Ode to the West Wind he was embracing seasonal changes.

Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;
Destroyer and Preserver; hear, O hear!"

We loved our open air farmer's markets of October and November; choosing between 8 varieties of local tomatoes rocks! But on this first day of winter, I'm looking forward to pulling on my winter boots and gloves. I can't wait to get a really good snow tube to try out in Thornden Park.

I'm also excited about the return of the sun, as on Thursday my plants will have 1 more minute of light than they do today.

Happy Winter Solstice everyone!

Sunday Funday

Howdy folks - we're glad Sunday Funday has come 'round again. Jesse has managed to roll his way into the semi's (Lebowski shout-out) of our fantasy football league - as have Damian, Lauren's boyfriend Dan's boss Dean, and - to everyone's consternation - Nally. May the best motley crew of hand-picked NFL players and teams win!

And yes, if you were wondering, Plaxico Burress (who shot himself in the leg with his own gun at a nightclub a few weeks ago), was on MY fantasy team.

I am COMPLETELY shocked that my team - HungryHungryHippos/Maude - has put-putted sadly into 8th place in our league. My players did, however, give a stunning performance on their way out last week - 120 points! Ironically, the most my team has gotten all season and one of the highest league scores as well. So, I went out with a bang (no pun intended) and had the satisfaction of crushing Jesse. Once, just once.

We had a decent covering of snow this past Friday (sorry to everyone else who got ice!) and I couldn't help but go out and take some pretty pictures of the winter wonderland scene. My LLBean boots have been serving me well - I've been wearing them in pretty nicely on the tramp back and forth between my finals! 6 Down - one to go! They will ALL BE DONE as of tomorrow at noon - and I will be rejoicing in the streets. Seriously, there may be some jigging and some high-stepping.

Also! I recently visited Food Democracy Now and signed a petition asking President-Elect Obama to appoint a Secretary of Agriculture who would be committed to moving our nation's food and agriculture policy towards more sustainable practices, ie less harmful pesticides, local/regional food, supporting CSA's (community supported agriculture) and small-business farmers.

Lots of Americans (not to mention farmers and consumers around the world) have jumped onto the local/organic/slow food bandwagon - but it shouldn't be a luxury reserved for the few who can afford to farm in safer, healthier ways or to keep up with organic prices at the supermarket. Jesse and I are fortunate enough to be living in a region of Upstate New York that boasts lots of small, family-owned and run farms, markets, stands, orchards, and vineyards. There's a lot going on up here and in other rural and urban settings - hopefully this focus on good quality, healthy, DE-licious food can spread to the rest of the nation!

Can't wait to see a lot of you during this Holiday Season! For those that we'll be missing this year, I refer you to the wise words of Buddy, The Elf:


The best way to spread Christmas cheer, is singing loud for all to hear.


(by the way, this advice works for the holiday season in general - not just christmas!)

Lotsa love everyone,
Caitlin

Addendum to Previous Post

Ok, ok - so I promise this is the last post today. I just couldn't help myself - I am completely running with the idea that you are all positively fascinated, need-to-know riled up about what we are eating on a regular basis, sooooo . . .

a big beautiful bowl of chili! This is what my desk looks like right now:

We actually made the chili a couple weeks ago - we've been freezing a good amount to dole out in small batches for those nights (like last night) when neither of us has the energy or mental focus to prepare anything other than left over chili or maybe mac and cheese. We wanted to make a turkey chili but at the groccers we ran into a lovely, lonely little package of beautiful "all natural" ground lamb. So the chili turned out 2lbs turkey and 1lb lamb - the perfect proportion to get that lamb flavor in the backround without totally overwhelming that good chili taste. Success!

And now, really this time guys, BACK TO WORK!

-the student DPT

Christmas Bells are Ringing . . . .

Well, in my head at least!

So here is the (long awaited, I'm sure) promised procrastination post. I've got my coffee cup refilled, the heat is cranked up in the apartment, and I've desperately tried to find things around the house to take pictures of for this post! The first of which you see here:

Your mission is: can you find the first 203 Hawthorne ornament of Christmas? We put it up before heading to Massachusetts this past weekend - I've been nagging the boys in my life to get into the Xmas spirit this year which I think must be working because it was Jesse who got out our tiny single box ornaments! So . . .that means that all nagging will work in the future, right?

Found it? So now that you have - here is the second piece of Christmas Joy! I've never been one for smelly candles (I guarantee you will never catch me walking into a Yankee Candle factory) but all that goes out the window during the Holiday season! I LOVE the smell of the trees, all with their piney goodness. I'm the crazy lady leaping from the sidewalks to go hug three at once, piney pokey needles be damned! So, this year we got a nice big smelly "Christmas Tree" candle. It is the appropriate shade of green and not even from Yankee Candle - it is in fact a "Village Candle" candle. Knock-off gi-normous candle = several bucks in savings.

Next up I want to get a bitty tree to put somewhere in the apartment - something to hang our small but growing pile of ornaments on so that I don't have to pathetically hang them on old nails, window sashes, and thumbtacks about the living room like I did last year in Brooklyn.

So far, I think, excellent procrastination has been accomplished. I'm due for it though! I'm half-way through finals - only 3 left to go with the last one on Monday. After that, I am planning some serious decompression time. We're talking baking, sleeping, movies, XC skiing, annoying Jesse with my 3 weeks off while he still has to work (sorry babe!), reading an actual book, writing letters . . . it's going to be a busy vacation ;)

Alright folks, while I'm still motivated to plow ahead, I shall return to my studies. I figure I get a solid couple hours done now, I can reward myself with 'The Office' tonight! You know what I'm talking about Nals . . . :)

Love you all - keep warm!

Caitlin

Family to the Rescue!!

Well, Wally will soon be snug as a bug in a rug.

We had some significant Wally wobblage on the way from Jesse's Dad's house and Warwick over Turkey Day Weekend - turned out we had two tires that were inappropriately lumpy - not flat, per se, but lumpy and concave where they should have been convex! We can't blame Wally - those tires were the originals from 1985!

Aunts and Uncles to the rescue!! We were lucky to be close by the Stovers that night, who graciously took a look at all of Wally's underbelly parts and let us crash for the night. As fate would have it, the Jan and Don C. also happened to have 2 new Wally-sized tires in Uncle Don's garage (aka Car and Motorcycle Paradise) and with a little help from our friends we got Wally fixed up for the drive home to Syracuse.

Thank you thank you Aunts and Uncles for feeding us and providing a large dose of automobile TLC. It actually ended up being a nice sojourn for us - we got to spend some more time with you guys (and got a look at Jan and Don's lovely new countertops and appliances! Whoo hoo! Next up: the flooring!) over what had been a busy holiday weekend.

So our next step will be to get a pair of snowtires to put on the back of Wally - then he will be snug as a bug in a rug for the Syracuse Winter.

Lots of love to you all - it may be a little while before we post again as I've got finals coming up on Monday. Then again, I may be desperately looking to take a break from studying, so you may hear from me after all!

Caitlin