Ok... you can't... although I wish I could say that my chubby belly is in any way related to this little baby. At 4 weeks he or she is smaller than a grain of rice and definately not showing!

I haven't gone to the doctor yet (other than the clinic at school to verify my two postitive home tests) so I don't have a known due date yet - but we're figuring end of December.

Apparently four weeks is a little early to spread the good news but we're both SO EXCITED there was no way we could keep it to ourselves!

I'm inviting any and all advice because I'm clueless! A friend of mine (who is expecting her first baby in July) gave me a "What to Expect When You're Expecting" book that I'm already obsessed with.

Drink or Go Home!

After the Justice Thomas thing we went to the opera with some friends that Calder goes to school with. I've never been to an opera but have been trying to do some more 'grownup' things lately and wanted to give this a try. We saw The Barber of Seville at the Ordway Center. HOLY COW. I have never disliked anything more in my life. So.. definitely not an opera person. At intermission we were walking out and poor Calder thought we were done. His friend said something about how much he liked it and Calder was like, "Wait... is there something after." "This is intermission..." "OOHhhhhh....." We discussed for a minute and decided we needed to either start drinking (the drinks were expensive but since we haven't ever before it probably wouldn't take much) or get the deuce out of there. We went back in, explained to our friends that we just realized we really don't like the oprea, and left. Leaving something so expensive in the middle never felt so good! Here's a picture we took on our way out, it pretty much sums up our feelings on the opera. Never again but it was worth the try, now I know.

Since we were already in St. Paul I had Calder take me to Sonic. I'd been craving a Strawberry Limeade since I realized how close we were. It kinda made up for the lame hour and a half before :)

A Conversation with Justice Thomas

Finally something blogworthy! Sorry I've been so lame with updating but really, NOTHING has happened. I just can't bring myself to blog when all we do is go to school, work, come home and eat frozen pizza while watching Chuck, How I Met Your Mother, Big Bang Theory, 24,or Dollhouse (or whatever else our TiVo has ready for us!)

This week Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas was at the law school to visit with students, speak with some classes and give a presentation. I've been listening to his memoir in the car when I drive to work and really think he's a great guy. Calder got to meet and chat with him on Tuesday and I went over for his presentation on Wednesday. It was a question and answer format where the Dean of the Law School had gathered peoples questions on index cards and picked the best. Justice Thomas answered a few then started taking questions from the audience, which we thought was very commendable, especially at such a liberal school.

He was very interesting and VERY entertaining. I really enjoyed it! He made a lot of comments that I liked a lot. One of my favorites though, at the beginning he was asked what his hardest case was. He said that there wasn't one hardest but a category of hardest and those were the ones where his heart said one thing and the law said anther. The others where he wants to help the person but just doesn't have the authority.

I'd definitely recommend his book, My Grandfather's Son. I'm impressed at how he has become what he has having been born and raised in Savannah, Georgia during segregation. He is also against Affirmative Action because he believes that it is keeping blacks and minorities from really progressing, which I agree with.

You have to see the cake I made

I went a little crazy last week. It was Spring Break and even though I was sill working I felt like I had tons of time. Enrichment was on Tuesday and I decided to undertake baking a 12 layer cake.

The pictures went in backwards and I don't really want to fix it so enjoy... finish to start! Yum!

I got the idea from Bakerella who used this recipe. It was fun and I'd definitely do it again!

Look at My Cute Family!

Family pictures we took while we were in Las Vegas over Christmas! (Stolen from Mayce's blog since I haven't seen the rest yet!)

How can be be below zero on Tuesday and be this by the weekend? I have no idea but I'm super pumped! No snow this Easter!

Yummy!

We have a new favorite food.
Pesto Chicken Pasta
We love it because, well, it's delicious. And all of the ingredients are things we always have on hand (except pesto sauce, although now I keep it frozen for this) and it really only takes 20 minutes to make.

I don't follow the recipe at all - just throw it all in until it tastes right. A box of pasta, some chicken breasts (cooked with Italian season and red pepper flakes), lots of pesto, some garlic and lots of sun dried tomatoes. More red pepper because we like things to have a little kick!

Maybe someday I'll make it with homemade pesto... unlikely... but maybe.

Check Yes or No

(If you're reading this from Google Reader or similar - go check it out on my real blog - I've added some background music that's vital to the following story)

Here it goes

Thursday after my Probability Concepts in Civil Engineering class as I was getting up to leave, the guy sitting to my left handed me a note and said awkwardly "This is for you."

I become immediately curious, take the note and start reading.

"You probably think this is really weird but I think you're really cute..."
HOLD UP! This is the part I regret. I didn't read the rest of the note. My eyes skipped to the bottom and focused on three boxes.
Box 1: Yes let's get together sometime (or something to that effect)
Box 2: No, this is pathetic
Box 3: No for some other reason ___________

Why didn't I read the rest of the note - it was about four lines long. Hopefully it offered some information as to why he is doing this in a note and not talking to me like is the custom after third grade.

Meanwhile guy sitting next to me was standing there watching me read his heartfelt note that I was staring at with amazement.

Then he hands me a pencil. You know, to check a box.

I checked box three and wrote in the blank "MARRIED!"

I hand him the note, he looks at the response, nods, and says ok. Then he says, "Well, thanks for not putting that I'm pathetic."

Me: "...Sorry"

You probably have a lot of questions about this guy. Well, I can't answer them. I was so taken aback by the awkwardness of the situation that I didn't even get a good look at him. I can tell you however that he was normal looking, no mole, no abundance of pimples. He was also dressed normal.

So now I'm feeling pretty sorry for this guy. True, we all got a good laugh about it at work, then at home, but I can't help but feel a little embarrassed for him. Honestly? A note? With boxes?

I was sitting there before he got to class, so maybe this was all planned out ahead of time and he got lucky with there being an open seat by me. Maybe he even had the note prepared before class. Maybe he wrote the note during class (I really wasn't paying him any attention.)

So now he has to be in class with me, twice a week this year, probably more in later semesters, and will never forget that he wrote me a "check yes or no" note and will probably feel like an idiot for a good long time.

The sad part? I don't remember what he looks like and never knew his name. Maybe I'll never know who it was. Maybe I'll recognize him on Tuesday.

With any luck he'll write me another note.

Now let's hope he doesn't Google my name and find this awesome blog.

Look what I found in Minnesota!

I'm so excited! I started to get a little sad that I didn't have different flavors to choose from (I'm assuming it's just plain) but then I remembered - this is a miracle!

I also found some really tasty spicy sausage that I'm planning on making jambalaya with on Tuesday (the king cake isn't going to last that long). Does anyone have a good (easy) recipe?

I love everything about today!

I love Valentine's Day, I really get into the pink and the hearts. I love that there's a holiday about being in love. I love that the whole country can have a 'date night' on the same day.

I love everything about today.

We slept in.

Woke up and exchanged gifts. I gave Calder come cacti and a little bonsai tree decorated with things I love about him.


I had planned to get him an awesome little bonsai tree that was growing out of a lava rock. I waited to order it until this week because I didn't want it to get here early, then a I got a call from the store saying they wouldn't ship it because it's too cold here. I was SO bummed! Then I did the best I could with what I found at Home Depot.

He gave me Mamma Mia! on blu-ray and a pink water bottle (that I'm super excited about) filled with my favorite candy (sweethearts - yum!).

We ate lunch. I made my burger into a heart and drank water with heart shaped ice cubes. I get really into holidays.

We studied.

We left for our big date. We had planned to go to the Water Street Inn in Stillwater for dinner. Stillwater is a cute little town about 45 minutes away with fun antique shops. Most were closed when we got there, but we were able to get into one big store and did plenty of window shopping. We showed up to our dinner reservations an hour early (window shopping isn't very fun at 15 degrees) and were surprised to find that they had plenty of open tables (we had to get reservations for 9:15 because they were completely full). We sat down and they gave us the menu.

A special Valentine's Day menu with their special Valentine's Day 5-course meal, $50 per person menu. Yikes, not really what we had planned on!

We whispered about it for a few minutes and decided since they didn't have anything on their website to warn us that we'd be guilted into spending $40 more on dinner than planned, and they hadn't mentioned it when we made reservations, we didn't feel bad about walking out. Normally I'd leave a little money on the table, since they'd brought us water and they'd have to re-fold the napkin or whatever, but we didn't have any small bills. Oh well. If we ever go back we'll make the reservations under my name.

Given all the open tables I don't think we were the only ones who weren't thrilled by the surprise special menu.

We ended up at a pizza and ice cream joint down the street that had a sign out front for a $20 three course heart shaped pizza dinner (salad, pizza, dessert)! Talk about all dressed up and nowhere to go!



They had some delicious looking ice cream that I wanted but couldn't bring myself to eat it after they had just watched me eat blueberry cheesecake. We went to Cold Stone on our way home.

It was tasty, not what we had planned, but a fun and memorable night for sure. So we drove 45 minutes to get a heart shaped pizza? We laughed a lot then came home, snuggled on the couch and watched "How I Met Your Mother" while we ate our ice cream.

Did I mention that I'm so in love with this guy :)