I have a really good excuse!

For having been away from blogging for almost a month!

Welcome little Erik Hjarding!
Born February 3, 2010

Andre Bauer...WTF Mate?

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Am I really from the same state as this idiot?

"My grandmother was not a highly educated woman, but she told me as a small child to quit feeding stray animals. You know why? Because they breed! You're facilitating the problem if you give an animal or a person ample food supply. They will reproduce, especially ones that don't think too much further than that."

Whaaaaa? This is a quote from the Lieutenant Governor of South Carolina, Andre Bauer, in reference to people who accept public assistance. Jerkface bastard. He is also running for Governor. Gods help us. Yet another shameful smudge on my home state. I swear not all of us are like him and Governor Sanford!

Link to story on MSNBC

New Biggest Loser

OMG I can't believe it is already time for season 9 of the Biggest Loser. Say what you want but I love this show and what it has done for so many people. Tonight is the 2 hour premier which means I get to watch it at some point tomorrow (if the gods of the internet are kind to me that is).

TART

One of my favorite expats and sisters, Tara Lewis, is an AMAZING artist and I decided that it was finally time a few of her paintings made their way into our home. Above are "Harold the Sheep" and "Cow in Red" which are now hanging in my living room. She also does commission pieces and Mark and I both want her to do paintings of our two crazy mutts at some point in the future.

You can find some of her work for sale on one of my favorite sites! TART Tara Lewis Art on Etsy. These are two of my other favorites (I really want to get the Nest!)

Happy New Year!

Me and the boys had a nice quiet celebration at home last night. Complete with bubbly apple juice and kransekage! It is commonly known as the "Danish Wedding Cake" though it is made and eaten throughout all of Scandinavia. One of the other traditions with Kransekage is to eat it at midnight with your champagne. Instead of buying one from the bakery this year I got brave and made it myself. Not bad for a first attempt because getting these right is tricky! I will post more about my kransekage adventures in the food blog at some point but this turned out too pretty not to share <3

2009 was a pretty amazing year for us. Cheers to 2010 and the year that will bring so many amazing changes for our family!!

Carson's Mind

My youngest cousin, Carson, has gotten into making Youtube videos. I have to admit he and his friends are quite amusing! My Uncle Luke has even gotten in on the action (see his Christmas/year end recap video) This is a video Carson did a week ago or so when he and Luke went to visit our grandma (Nini) for Christmas. This lady is too much but I dearly love her! Her language may be NSFW so just beware :)

Still...

32 weeks preggers

I am still.....
alive and very much pregnant.
However, I can still wear all of my normal shoes AND my wedding band at almost 9 months pregnant.
Even so I still hate being pregnant.
I still have my sanity (barely) after spending so much time with a cranky tantrum throwing toddler.
I still have managed not to get the flu though I have had at least 2 bouts with a cold in the last month.
I am still working my hiney off to finish up school stuff by the end of January.
And somehow I managed to survive having a sick Mark and a sick Twig home with me for 2 weeks this past month and still got 2 papers and a presentation done!

We had a great Christmas. Lots of food and lots of family time. I did lots of baking which made me very happy. I have started to post some of the recipes I used on my food blog, Black Eyed Peas and Cornbread. Mark and I agreed not to exchange gifts this year. It was one of the best decisions we have made. Instead we agreed to buy ourselves a Wii over the next month or so. We also agreed with his family to only buy stuff for Twig. Which also made us very happy. We now have lots of Brio train stuff and Duplos to play with. Yippee!!

Wee SNOW!

This southern girl is love love loving all this snow that got dumped on us last night. This is also Twig's first year of enjoying the fun. By tomorrow I am sure I will be tired of it but for today it is really beautiful!

Weeeee!

Far only thinks he is going to work today.

Even though I know he is staying home I might as well help.

And yes far did stay home today since the traffic reports were saying it could take him 2+ hours to get to work. At least that gave us a chance to go out and find us some proper snow boots!

Fat Sodas

New York City Health Dept. anti cola, juice and sports drink campaign. Heck all sugar drinks period. LOVE IT. They also did a video which I wanted to embed but youtube is being stupid. Drinking Fat Video.

Sure we indulge in some Coke Zero or Faxe Kondi (soda sweetened with grape sugar) when we have guests over but we treat it like beer or wine. Not for every day but fine for special occasions in moderation. And yes I know artificial sweeteners in Coke Zero are bad for us too but I am not blogging about that today!

Train Adventures

There has been some crazy weird train karma going around this week.

Little old lady who couldn't buy a ticket. I usually give myself 5 or so extra minutes at the train station to buy a ticket from the automatic machine (we don't have a manned ticket kiosk at my station). Yesterday I was there at 7:55 for an 8:04am train. There was an old lady trying to buy a ticket who I swear had never used the machine before. I tried to help her but she ignored me. She finally gets it after asking someone else (who still needed my help) and finishes as the train is pulling into the station. Who needs almost 10 minutes to buy 1 stupid train ticket!? I am panicking trying to buy my own ticket since the train stops for about 30 sec then is off again. I run across the track trying to get there in time. Luckily one of my fellow riders who watched the whole debacle stood in the door of the train so it couldn't close so I could make it. I didn't get it stamped and had to go find the conductor. He told me to run out at the next station to stamp it. Then later on yesterday...

Rock a bye Angel on top of the train. I started nodding off about 30 min before my stop. I briefly thought I should set the alarm on my phone in case I fell asleep. Then I forgot. I woke up, looked out the window and realized "HOLY SHIT" we are at my station!!! I rushed to grab my stuff and they locked the doors just as I was pushing the button to get out. UGH. I sheepishly find the conductor and explain I feel asleep and just missed my stop. He laughed and said it happens all the time. He said the train turns back around in about 45 minutes to head back from the last station and I was welcome to just stay on board and catch a ride back. I offered to buy a ticket and he laughed again and said don't worry about it. I was so happy I was getting home early only to get home an hour later. I have always feared that one day I would sleep through my stop and it finally happened. At least we live on the last stop before the end. Lesson learned and I don't think I will be napping on the train for a while.

&$*% Piece of Crap Ticket Machine is Broke..."Mr. Conductor Man, I couldn't buy a ticket since the machine was broken. Can you help me?" Not quite as traumatic as yesterday but this morning the ticket machine was broken. Grreat. Now what? As soon as the train comes in I run to the conductor and explain that I couldn't buy a ticket. He says well normally he has a machine and he can sell me one but his machine is broken. So I ask him well what do we do? He says to have a seat and enjoy the ride. Yippeee! Finally some good train Karma for me!

Chaos in a Tornado

Or at least that is what my life feels like right now. I was doing so well with blog posts then WHAMMO! School and life got in the way again dammit. Twig starting bornhavn then they only let him come for a couple of hours each day meant he got to be home with me. Which meant no blogging time for me (Hah never mind the no school work time either). Then Mark was home sick and got better. Then Twig was home sick and then Mark got sick again. Now both boys are sick still! At least mama ain't sick. Yet. Amongst all this chaos I have been desperately trying to put together a presentation for Wednesday.

And then COP15 (United Nations Climate Conference) started today! I plan to blog a good bit about my involvement with various parts of the conference though I fear a lot of my posts may have to come after the fact. Today I went to an academic/science seminar through KU which was mostly good. The morning session was a fabulous group of scientists from KU talking about their research and how it relates to climate change. However the afternoon session was a struggle. Economists + political scientists + overly hot room = nodding off during presentations me. Overall it was a good way to start the Climate Conference though.

I am planning to volunteer for several days with Klimaforum which is more public forum for the conference. I am very excited that they have put me in the event coordination group and I will be working with the speakers. I am glad I gave them as much info as I did about my skills and interests because I think this is the perfect spot for me. Right now I am signed up for 3 days but I think I will add on a few more next week. This is such a great opportunity for me both personally and career networking wise I want to make the most of it. In addition there are a few more things I am waiting to see if they come through or not. *fingers crossed*

Phew so that was my quick and rambling update. Now I need to try and do school work for a few while everyone sleeps and I have lots of peace and quiet.

Them Crooked Vultures

New Dave Grohl (Foo Fighters/Nirvana) and John Paul Jones (Led Zepplin) project, Them Crooked Vultures, released a CD last week. I am really digging it! There is one track in particular called "gunman" that I have grown quite fond of. Sadly that is not the track featured in the youtube promo (this is one called "new fang") but you can still get the gist of what they sound like from this. It is a bit dirty and grungy but to have Dave on drums is always such a nice treat.

I vaguely remember this being mentioned as in the works a year or so ago but promptly forgot about it. Then on my birthday I got a press release and was like "Whoa. Hell yea!"

Macy's Parade

Thanks to my friend Tara in the UK I ran across this article in the Examiner on how to watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade online. Passing this on for anyone that might be interested. I know it was always a tradition in my house!

More Red Bull Excitement

Look what I found in both MetroXpress and 24 Timer yesterday!
My sentiments exactly.

Private Arts

My cousin Josh, who I was very close (brother/sister close) with growing up, moved out to LA after finishing college to enjoy the surf and find his place in life. He quickly did just that. But this post isn't about Josh. It's about his amazingly talented wife Jeffeny.

For anyone that knows much about me, you know that I have about as much personal fashion sense as a pigeon. Yea sure I can put things together that look ok but I am so far from fashionably trendy I don't think you can get much farther. With that being said I can recognize and appreciate good stuff when I see it. Jeffeny and some friends are in the process of launching a line of amazing lingerie called Private Arts. Check out their stuff and if you like them join their myspace or facebook pages!