The Exploits and Adventures of the Ever Expanding Morris Family in Jacksonville

Mobile Blogging

2011-11-27T21:10:00.002-05:00

I downloaded an iPhone app that allows me to blog from my fone. I am yet to decide if this is a good thing or not, but at least I have fewer excuses now. It may take me longer to tap out these mobile posts, but I will try.

We took the girls back to the library for Mother Goose Story Time again. Because we borrowed books we had to return them and the girls brought them back in their backpacks.

They were waiting by the door when their mum came home from running and then we walked out to the car and went to the library.

Look At What We Can Do!

2011-11-19T16:27:00.008-05:00

I am the worst Dad blogger ever. I had a whole post written with a video starring Matilda and then tacked on a cute foto of Olivia so she wouldn’t feel left out. Then I realized that Olivia was doing new fun things too and I would have to rewrite the whole thing.

The girls are growing up really fast and seem to be learning new things every day. When asked “Where is your nose?” Matilda will touch her nose. She learned that from Nana. Of course Dad had to try and get in on the action as well and started asking “Where is your tummy button?” She quickly figured out where her tummy button was. Now this request results in both girls lifting their shirts and pointing to their tummy buttons. I think I had help with this because Matilda is always bringing over the Belly Button book for us to read. Of course we were wondering what new thing we could have them point to. Caroline decided that Matilda was smart enough to recognize other things in the playroom and asked “Where’s Kanga?” I’m not sure what we were expecting her to do but she walked over and picked up the kangaroo her Australian grandparents sent and brought it back to us. This has now evolved into this -

Olivia, while able to find her belly button, doesn’t seem too interested in much else when it comes to listening to adults and performing tasks. She does enjoy pushing her little sister down for no reason, and has yet to connect that with Mum and Dad scolding her. She likes to climb on everything, the couch, the chairs and the stairs. She even tries to climb the tent we have set up in the playroom. I keep telling her that she can’t climb the tent but she keeps trying and getting her leg stuck. They are just tall enough now to get down anything on the shelf in the playroom which means everything has to be moved up a level. The bottom two shelves of books in the hall have already been moved so that they don’t destroy them.

We bought a wooden tower for the girl’s birthday and until recently the only interest they had in it was racing to pull it apart after I put it together. The other day I noticed that while it had been mostly taken apart there were still a couple of rings left on it which don’t normally go together. I assumed that one of the other adults had put the rings on there. Then later in the day I saw Olivia lifting rings off and putting them back on. I had to try and capture this so I put the tower together and showed it to Olivia.

I think I may have stopped recording a little too soon because this was the final result of all her work.

Each night when I have to stay at school late Caroline sends me fotos of the girls playing and we say goodnight over the fone. I like to be the last person to tuck them in and give them goodnight kisses.

“See you in the morning girls”

Race for the Cure

2011-10-22T13:00:00.001-04:00

We made our annual trip to the Pumpkin patch, but I will let Caroline write about that, mostly because she was the one who started the tradition and I don't think I will do it right. I will however tell about what we did in the morning preceding the trip to the Pumpkin patch. Once again I volunteered to be the Team Captain for the KE Race for the Cure team. There is not too much to do for this other than recruiting and then organizing everyone to meet before the race. We only had 4 team members this year which was a little disappointing, but I recruited some junior runners to go with me. The girls were very excited because they were able to wear their new pink tracksuits that Mum got them on sale (i.e. very cheap).The pig and monkey were gifts from Nana's trip to West Virginia and have been constant companions. We arrived at the fairgrounds and collected our race number and then waited for the rest of the team to arrive. Olivia was very eager to start (you might notice she was taking Monkey with her).

I managed to corral her and get her back into her seat before the race started. All the waiting around proved to be a little much, but I decided we needed to hydrate before the start and that calmed the nerves a little. Monkey was hiding on top of the stroller.We started at the back of the group because we didn’t want to slow anyone down. This wasn’t the best plan as there were a large number of participants who just wanted to walk. We spent the first mile slowly trying to navigate through the crowd to be able to run properly. Once the pack thinned out some we were able to speed up and the race was much more enjoyable. We slowed to a walk at the second drink station to rehydrate and then Matilda decided she was ready to be done at about the 4.5 km mark. We “sprinted” across the line in 41 minutes and then took a ‘finish line’ foto over on the grass away from the crowd.

Of course Olivia was still in running mode.

Then we drove home for a nap before the Pumpkin patch adventure.

New Clothes

2011-10-02T20:52:00.005-04:00

I am trying to do better at blogging and so two posts in two days is pretty impressive. I have decided to change my posting picture to an actual photo of me. I had bought a jumper at Target and after washing it the first time I dried it. What I didn’t realize was that the jumper was Dry-Clean only. Caroline was kind enough to take a foto of me wearing the jumper after it had shrunk. This was taken a couple of years ago but I like it. That is not the main point of the blog though.

While she was away at her conference Caroline bought presents for everyone. I got this t-shirt

I’m not sure if the quote refers to something in particular, but it is a good description of me. I like tomato sauce (ketchup) on everything. She also got presents for her parents, but I’m not sure of the specifics. What I do know is the present she bought for the girls. She got them t-shirts and jeans. One pink t-shirt with an elephant, and a blue t-shirt with a pair of birds on it. Then yesterday while I was at school studying all the girls went down to the Outlet Mall at St Augustine and did some shopping. The girls got a pair of pink Crocs and some running shoes because now they are running (see the video of them at the track). So today the girls got dressed in their new clothes and we went to the supermarket. Matilda helped me pick out sweet potatoes. I would pick up a sweet potato and ask “Do you like this one?” and if she smiled I would put it in the bag. I think she chose four and rejected two, Olivia might have picked one as well. All of this leads up to the whole reason I am writing the blog, an excuse to post another video. When we got home from the supermarket, I let Olivia walk to the house like a big girl and she did pretty well.

What happens on Saturday Mornings?

2011-10-01T12:52:00.005-04:00

I know I am the worst blogger ever and I really should try to do better. That being said this post is mainly an excuse to put up a video I took this morning. I tried sending it via text message and email but it was too large. It is a minute and forty five seconds long and I think its the best. The sound is what makes it so fun. Enjoy

Coupons

2011-05-23T11:21:00.002-04:00

So ever since money has been tighter with the addition of O and M, I've started clipping coupons. People laughed at me at first - but I've got the last laugh! Now, don't expect to see me on Extreme Couponing or anything...I'm certainly not building a stockpile...but getting things for cheap/free is nice - especially when it's stuff you'd buy anyway.

Example:

CVS today I bought

4 Axe Deoderants - $5.49 each (on sale at 3/$13) - I had two buy one get one free coupons and there was a promotion to get $3 Extra Care Bucks when you bought 3.

4 Suave Bodywashes - $2.77 each on sale for $2 - I had two BOGO coupons and there was an extra care bucks promotion for $4 ECB when you bought $10 of Suave stuff

2 Suave deoderant - $1.37 each on sale for $1 Also had a $.50 off coupon

So what WOULD have cost $35.78 cost $14.11, plus $7 ECB leaving a total cost of $7.11.

Now THAT is savings...

Matilda's Big Adventure

2011-05-12T10:01:00.000-04:00

So...my first mother's day was certainly not the way I planned it. But let me preface this post by saying that I am so happy I even had children to celebrate mother's day, no matter how we celebrated.

Thursday night, May 5th, Matilda threw up after her dinner...and felt warm. So we gave her a temp check and she did have a low grade fever. Concerned, we gave her a fever reducer and put her to bed. The next day, her fever got higher, and she got fussier...and wasn't eating much.

Saturday she got a higher fever and ate worse. We had been calling the doctor every day, and finally they let us take her in. The dr. looked at her and saw no strep, no ear infection, etc and said to give her 48 hours then bring her back if her fever didn't break. Her fever was up to 105 so we were REALLY worried. We had her in the car ready to go to the ER When the doctor called back and said no, just give her a tepid bath and "upgrade" to IBUPROFIN.

Sunday, was the worst. Matilda had 105.2 fever. She was throwing up EVERYTHING, including her medecine. She was completely listless just laying on Stewart's lap and not responding to any of us. It was the scariest feeling I've had yet with children. Finally the pediatrician's office said to go to the ER. and we did.

The ER for an 8month old is pitiful. They had to take a urine sample via a catheter, put an IV in, give her shots...poor little thing kept looking at me like, "Why is everybody picking on me momma?" See how sad?

The only thing more pitiful was the hospital for an 8month old. The crib looked like a jail cell...

They gave her a little hospital gown...and put a splint on her arm so she wouldn't take the IV out. Within about an hour they told us that she had a TON of puss in her urine and high white blood cell count - so it was a UTI. She also had to get an ultrasound to see if her kidney's were infected and they were...so it was a doozy.

Long story short, we spent two nights in the hospital. There was very little sleep, lots of tears (both baby and mom), and some scary moments (including more vomiting and more high high temps). She did feel better at times...and got lots of snuggles from both mom and dad...but I'm sure she would have rather had those from the comfort of her own home.

Poor Olivia who was home without her sister didn't know WHAT to think. When I was home I spent some special one-on-one time with her to make sure she didn't get sad. We took a trip to the grocery store where I let her sit in the big girl seat. she LOVED it and had a blast looking all around and feeling everything I put in the cart.

Finally on Tuesday afternoon we were given the go-ahead to take Matilda home. Now, on Thursday a week later she has been eating great, taking her medecine, had an infection free urine culture and has been fever free for 24 hours. On the upswing!!!! It was an adventure, but one I hope she never has to go through again.

The Baptism

2011-02-28T11:21:00.003-05:00

So this post is so long overdue, but to say we've been busy is an understatement. So I will give a brief overview of what's been going on in these parts.

Last Sunday was the girl's baptism. They were baptised at Southside United Methodist Church, which was the church that I grew up in. I was baptised and confirmed there and spent a large part of my youth there as well - so it was important to me to have it done at THAT church.

The day went off pretty much without a hitch, thanks in large part, to all of the help that we have. I had a schedule in mind for the day and was HOPING that the girls would stick to that and they pretty much did. We were supposed to be at the church at 10:45 so getting two babies up, fed, well-rested, dressed and ready to go was no small feat. I think we did a pretty good job:

The baptism itself was pretty uneventful, except that minutes before the ceremony, Olivia had a messy diaper and then proceeded to cry throughout most of the talking bit. Once the pastor took her, she was fine. Then one pastor took Olivia and the other took Matilda and they walked them down the aisle so that everyone could see how adorable they were! At that point both babies were fine! They were looking all around and loving the attention: especially Olivia! All in all it was a nice day. Then the babies were quickly escorted out of the church by dad and my brother. All the adults went to bruch after the service while the girls took naps. It was perfect.

Other than that the girls continue to grow and develop at lightening speed. They LOVE the jumparoo and love to exercise. They are also loving solids. We've found a new brand called Ella's organics that they adore. It's blends of things like squash, apples, and carrots. They also LOVE sweet potatos, apples and carrots. They'll tolerate peas and beans but those are NOT a favorite for them. They have both found their feet and love to grab at their toes. They are such amazing children! More pics and videos soon!

2011-01-16T15:29:00.003-05:00

We are getting so big.... See? We're just growing and growing.

We've always had a lot of formula - but now we're eating big girl food. We think that has something to do with it! See?

Matilda loves it...

Olivia loves it....

And then we all get scrubbed down!!!

Coming soon? Vegetables!! Better get out the hose!

Happy New Year

2011-01-05T09:10:00.003-05:00

We had such a great Holiday - with all of our family in the same place! It was sad to see everyone go, but we know we'll see everyone again soon. The girls had a great first Christmas!

As for me, I've set some New Year's Resolutions:

- Take photos and/or video of the girls every week.

- Work out 5 times a week (tennis, walking, gym, whatever)

That's it. I'm trying to keep it simple this year!!

Merry Christmas to all...

2010-12-19T11:09:00.002-05:00

Countdown...

2010-12-13T09:56:00.002-05:00

To Grandma and Grandpa from Australia!!!

We're very excited...

Gobble Gobble

2010-12-01T09:09:00.008-05:00

I love Thanksgiving. Many reasons are the same for Halloween - but it's also a great time to see family. This year was no exception - and it was also exciting because we got to spend it with our amazing daughters for the first time. They, as with most things, weren't as excited as we were. When I think about Holidays, I get excited as to what they will wear. I was one of those twin moms that was so against dressing them alike...until I saw matching outfits. It took one look to change my mind completely...and now I LOVE dressing them alike. It's so darn cute. So the search began for Thanksgiving dresses.

It didn't go well.

Everywhere we looked the dresses either a) weren't cute b) weren't in their size or c) didn't have TWO in the right size. I was getting frustrated until we went to a local store and she had the idea to have them made! Brilliant. So we talked to the dress maker and conceptualized the dresses. When I went to pick them up - I was thrilled! I rushed home immediately and Olivia got to be the guinea pig. We excitedly put the dress on her to see how it looked....She was less thrilled than we were.

Ok, but seriously look how cute these dresses are. It's a jumper made of orange gingham. The turkey is furry and it's feathers are ribbons! And look at the bows on the shoulders! This dress was adorable. A bit snug on Olivia, but adorable all the same.

We got to have a test run on the dresses that weekend when we went to Mattie's TUTU party. She was turning two! Get it? We were so excited to get dressed up. The vision I had was a long sleeve turtleneck, white tights and little mary janes. Getting the girls dressed was a WORK OUT. I wanted pictures of me with both of them - but that wasn't going to happen. Olivia was mad again that I had put her BACK in the dress....Matilda took a different approach. (oh and yeah, the tights didn't work out - too big. I improvised with socks!)

At the party, every girl got a tutu to decorate and my girls were no exception....While the turkey dress wasn't an issue, Matilda was not thrilled with the tutu as we later found out.

Anyway, that was the week before Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving day was busy busy. We started out by running the now "annual" Outback distance classic. It is a half marathon, or a 6K. We walked the 6K. It was their first race ever! They were the cutest twins there!

At lunch, the girls had fun - but were a bit fussy the whole day. We even tried to give them a nap, but that didn't take well. My whole goal was to get a "family" photo of Stew and I with the girls. Fussiness and food got in the way and when we got home, this was the best I could do.

Notice I completely abandonned the tights and shirt and shoes... Anyway it was a long day so the next morning we slept in and played :)

The good/bad news is - those dresses are reversable for Christmas....to be continued.

Halloween

2010-11-02T14:50:00.006-04:00

Halloween is one of my favorite times of year. Not only is it sort of getting cooler, but it's the start of Fall for me. Usually it's when I start coaching soccer...candy corn hits the shelves...College football is in full swing....and I love the concept of Trick or Treating. This was Stewart's first REAL Halloween. Sure, he's been here for more than one, but we never did anything for the event until this year.

From about the day they were born, I started getting excited about taking the girls to the pumpkin patch. Sure they are too young to know what's going on - but I love the idea of taking them to pick out their pumpkin. It's a tradition that I couldn't wait to start - so I started in on the pumpkin patch idea early on. After much nagging and reminding, we went! Obviously the girls were less enthusiastic about than I was!

There were tons of pumpkins to choose from!

The girls even had some pupkins their size, but they were still unmoved.

We couldn't wake them up!

We chose an excellent pumpkin!

Then we got invited to go trick or treating with some of the girls friends. The other girls were a bit older, but O and M watched to find out what they needed to do in a few years. We had adorable costumes and had a blast until the girls got too hungry to trick or treat anymore. Sadly, mommy decided to wait until the END of the evening for the family photo - so grumpy babies are pictured. They were the cutest ladybugs I've ever seen!

Not to be outdone....

2010-11-01T13:21:00.002-04:00

Matilda is lifting her head - but not as much as Olivia. Not to be outdone, however, Matilda has decided to smile first!!

Olivia is lifting her head....

2010-10-29T11:05:00.003-04:00

Granted it's only about 2 cm off the floor - but I'm proud of her. It takes a lot of effort (As you can see!)

First Bath

2010-10-09T12:04:00.004-04:00

Ok, ok...so this really wasn't their FIRST bath. Technically the first bath was at the hospital. Apparantly they screamed their way through it? I wasn't there to see - but that's what I hear. I was surprised to hear that because it's been a different story here at home. The first week we gave both of them a sponge bath (which you have to do until the cord falls off). We were ready for screaming mayhem...but neither girl even CRIED.

Fast forward to these pictures. The cord was off and it was full on bath time...no sponge baths anymore. Now, surely, we thought the screaming would commence.

Clearly Matilda is VERY concerned....she was so relaxed she dipped her arm in the water to test it out!

Olivia also didn't make a peep! They didn't even cry for a second. This makes me think that they are going to be water babies!!!

Awake and Alert!

2010-10-09T11:55:00.003-04:00

So my friend Meg gave us a really neat infant gym type thing. You lay the baby on the floor, and then, above their heads, are lots of fun, bright, colorful toys and rattles to look at and play with. Right now the girls are a little young for most of it - but we thought we'd try it out yesterday. Turns out - they LOVED it. I think it was the bright colors...but they just kept looking around and loving it!

Wide awake and looking all around! It's amazing how much more alert they both are after only a month!!!

Maybe even getting to be aware of eachother?

Loving all the fun colors!!! We kept shaking the rattles, but they wanted to look at other things

Playing together.

The good news was, this playing EXHAUSTED them and they slept the best overnight that they have yet. Granted it's still only about 3 hours at a time...but they did go straight to sleep after each feeding. This new toy was a hit!

Personalities

2010-10-02T18:10:00.006-04:00

It's amazing how at only three weeks, the girls have such distinct personalities. They are honestly such good babies. They aren't fussy much, they don't cry a lot, and they are sweet as can be.

.Olivia, the older sister, is a little bigger still. She is a total cuddle bug. She loves to be held - and usually won't go to sleep unless you do hold her. I'm sure we're encouraging bad habits by doing it - but when you see those dimples...how can you not? She is a bit more fussy the Matilda too - but not bad at all. When she sleeps, she constantly murmurs, or coos. She is the "loud" baby. Definitely a bit needy, but we need her too so that works out.

Matilda is younger by a minute - and a bit smaller than her big sis. She is such a sweet girl - not fussy at all. She is MUCH quieter than Olivia. You put her down and she just looks so sweet and goes to sleep. She's eating more and more every day and is catching up in weight to Olivia...and has already surpassed her in length. She so precious when she sleeps too!

Life is good with the girls! No one is getting much sleep, but it's worth it!! Hopefully we'll get them sleeping for 4 hours at night. That will be a start!

Twins Take Over

2010-09-13T10:33:00.003-04:00

I am sure Caroline will correct me with the details as I am writing this while I am tired and sickly. I am going to try and take you through the last several days as best I can. Caroline had finally scheduled her C-Section for the 21st of September so we were looking forward to the girls coming then. For some reason Caroline was concerned with her Blood Pressure (Added by Caroline: becaue my BP at my last appt was way higher than normal - like 20-30 points above my usual). She called the doctor to check and they told her to come in and have some tests done. We arrived at the hospital Wednesday night for the tests expecting it to go quickly. I only brought a magazine becasue i thought it would be a quick in and out exercise. They actually checked her into the maternity ward and we spent a couple of hours with Caroline hooked up to monitors to check on her and the babies.

After the doctor came to see us we were sent home with instructions to rest and collect urine for 24hrs and then come back. This was to check the amount of protein being spilled into her urine. That, combined with the increased BP is a sign of pre-eclampsia. Caroline was not excited about collecting urine but did her best and we headed back to the hospital Thursday night. They took our big jug of urine away for tests and we settled in to wait for the doctor again. i had learnt somewhat fromthe night before and brought more school work but still ran out before anything happened. The urine test revealed elevated protein so they told Caroline she would have to stay the night and see the specialists in the morning.

I went home and I think at that stage we both thought this was just the doctors being cautious and we would be back on schedule for the 21st soon enough. I returned in the morning and found they had switched Caroline to another room because there was a hole in the wall of the original room? I had brought all my school work and was trying to work on my ICS presentation. The high risk specialist came in and ran the ultra sound over Carolines stomach. He decided that becasue of the protein and high BP that we should do the C-section that day!

The nurse was telling us that there was already a C-Section scheduled for noon and being that it was already 10:30 we would probably be after that. Caroline talked to her Mum and told her she had plenty of time to get to the hospital and I was thinking of heading to school to hand in my Dose Op homework then coming back. About 10 minutes later the nurse was back to tell us we were going to surgery NOW!

"Now ,Now?" we replied

"Now, Now" was the response

I changed into my scrubs (provided by the hospital) and they whisked Caroline away to prep her for surgery. I then wandered out to the nurses station and asked about faxing my homework.

Stewart hasn't exactly had any free time to finish this: but basically...the girls are here. We are so happy, proud, excited and completely smitten with both of them. We're also exhuasted, tired, overwhelmed, etc!!!

September 10th, 2010

11:29 am: Olivia Delaney

11:30 am: Matilda Jean

More to come once we get some sort of routine going!!!

Long Awaited Nursery Update

2010-08-07T17:51:00.012-04:00

Ok - so while the nursery isn't FINISHED - we're pretty close. My mom has ordered some sort of decorative thing to go above the cribs, but besides that - we're done. I have finally takensome pictures from my iphone, so there is no guarantee how good they are...and I can now give you all (4 people who read this blog) a photo tour of the Morris Girls first bedroom. I have to say I'm pretty enamored with it.

This is what you see when you first walk in (you can see the door in the picture). The framed picture has been there since I was a baby (see previous nursery post about this room). The glider was given to me by a friend of a friend, and I am eternally grateful. The quilt is just one of my old quilts

draped over it, and a hand knitted blanket from a colleague

over the top. You can see the two boppy's locked and loaded and for the moment, Scruffy Puppy is using them. I love the

boppy covers I received!!!

Next is the changing station. I love it. The dresser is one of my childhood dressers in white wicker, which is my favorite. The shelf above is from Land of Nod, and installed, expertly, by Stewart. Right now it holds the video monitor (which won't be there), diaper rash cream, two

Essendon Piggy Banks and a picture frame that I think I'm going to move. Close up of the changing station in the next

picture.

Just a changing pad, and a little diaper holder (already stocked with newborn diapers and

wipes) and as you can see, Diaper Genie loaded up and ready to go as well.

Crib one and Crib two - with a view of the insides.

Last but not least- the girl's first closet...stocked thanks to my AMAZING friends and

family.

That's all for now :) Maybe some scary belly pictures soon?

Pregnant or Fat - 6.5 months edition...

2010-07-01T14:28:00.002-04:00

My favorite game! High tech iphone photography in the bathroom at work...

The Nursery....

2010-06-25T09:23:00.008-04:00

So...the nursery. I feel like I have to get the nursery done sooner than most people because of the "bed rest" situation. Originally I was to quit work at 28 weeks, July 19, and then work from home for a few weeks. The work from home thing didn't appear that it was going to work out...

So I asked my doctor, keeping the girls' safety in mind, could I extend my work just by two weeks. My "sub," as I like to call him, is coming in on August 1, so I didn't think it'd be right to pay two people for the same job...so I thought that July 30th would work just fine. The doctor said as long as things are still going fine, that he was ok with it. Each visit now, I'm given a test called a fetal fibronectin (link included for those of you who want a detailed explanation). Basically as long as I passed that, and continue to pass, it's fine. I just can't imagine wanting to work past 30 weeks considering how big I already feel and look!

SO - having explained all that I feel like I'd like to have the nursery ready by early August. The room that is going to be our nursery, was my nursery. I love it. It's just the right size, with hardword floors, a huge closet, and big shuttered windows overlooking the river! Trust me, the girls want this room. The wallpaper is the same wallpaper that was in MY nursery 32 years ago. I think my parents were shocked that I wanted to keep it - but I love it because:

It's "vintage"
It's atypical - it's not pinky pinky
It was mine!
It's got lots of fun colors in it!

BUT matching all those fun colors was challenging. It's hard to explain the color (I'll take a picture tonight), but basically it's a dark-ish blue with stripes of green, reddish orange, pink, etc. The best I can do right now is this picture of Stewart putting the cribs together. You can kind of see it in the background - but again better pics soon.

So, I knew I would need simple bedding that wouldn't clash too much with the wallpaper. Enter Meg who is the master at online baby shopping! She found EXACTLY what I was looking for, and amazingly, the color was perfect.
The bedding is from Serena and Lilly.

So. Bedding? Check. Walls? Check.

On to - CRIBS!! We chose these from the Land of Nod.

Next we needed a rug (I had a glider given to me, and we are using a wicker dresser as a changing table...) We went to Pottery Barn Kids and found two that are in contention. Here they are next to the (wrinkled) finished bedding AND TWO finished cribs because Stewart is a putting-stuff-together genius!! I like the one on the right better, but it gets worse reviews...Oh well!! Sacrifices :)

The Morris Girls

2010-06-17T09:11:00.003-04:00

So I know this isn't news to many people who actually read this blog...but we are officially having two little girls! This is the last ultrasound we had. I have another one on Tuesday, the 22nd, but I'm not sure if I'll be able to get another video. I'll get pics no matter what. I was just looking back at my gummy bear post...and I cannot BELIEVE how big the girls have gotten. I know that on Tuesday they'll be even bigger. The movement has picked up - and I feel them throughout the day. Stewart can't wait until he can feel it from the outside - which I'm thinking isn't THAT far away. I'll update the blog on Tuesday (promise) but here's the last u/s in the meantime. XO, Caroline, Stewart, Olivia and Matilda

Living Vicariously

2010-04-14T05:40:00.003-04:00

Anyone who knows me, knows that I am obsessed with tennis. I love every single thing about the sport. Being a lifelong soccer player, tennis has now taken over. After the babies, I might not even play soccer anymore (although I do always seem to get sucked back in). Anyway, being pregnant and not being able to play tennis has been very hard.

Despite appearances, I love being active. Before we got pregnant, I was training for a half marathon, playing on two soccer teams and about 4 tennis teams. It was really really hard to drop my level of activity to only swimming or walking. I don’t mind those two things, but for me to really get into an exercise, it needs to be a game. To me, there is no game in walking, which until recently when the weather warmed up, was my only option. Although if I'm being honest, the idea of getting into a bathing suit right now isn't top of my list...

Either way, the bottom line is that I miss tennis. As long as I can remember, the Jacksonville area has hosted a women's tennis tournament. It used to be out in Amelia Island, but last year it moved closer to us at the beach. It's called the MPS Group Championships and can be found here:

www.mpsgroupchamps.net

Last year I volunteered there in player services and had the best time, so I did it again this year. I am so glad I did! While the draw is smaller than most tournaments, and not a lot of the "big name" players come, I love it. I love getting to see the up and comers...and even the girls who are ranked in the 200's in the world are amazing players. So this year, I again volunteered in player services, watched a ton of tennis and had a blast.

I wonder if next year I'll be able to volunteer with two little ones at home?

Ultrasound on Thursday!! Stewart and I are ready to see the babies again!

April Fools COP Style

2010-04-01T23:27:00.004-04:00

I had stayed up late last night studying for our PTX exam today. I slept in a little and then eventually went back to school this morning to continue studying. There was nothing else going on at school today so when I arrived in the lab there was no one there. I sat down in the same place I had occupied for most of the night an proceeded to continue reading the review I had downloaded from the message board. I got a text message from Andrew telling me the PBD grades from last week were up. I thought about it for a little while and decided that I wouldn’t look at it. I was not confident of what grade I would get. After reading some more of the review I responded to Andrew by asking what he got on the exam. He said he did well and got a mid nineties score. Figuring that was his usual effort and I would be okay I checked my score - 41.

I have not done that badly in any test in Pharmacy school. I immediately freaked out. I was not sure what I would tell Caroline or whether I could in fact pass the class with that low a score on an exam. The coming exam next Thursday is apparently the most difficult and if I couldn’t get through this then how would I improve? I felt like I did the few times I did talks in high school when I thought I was going to pass out. I texted Andrew and told him I had failed badly, his response was April Fools 41 is a joke.
“What” was my response

“They fooled us Everyone has a 41” he replied
to which I texted "

"Where is the real grade?" not realising that he had made up the fact he got a ninety something

“Not up yet” was his reply

“That is messed up.
How did you know this” I didn't actually use the word messed but you get the idea of what i was conveying

“EVERYONE has a 41” I don't think he realised I had figured it out at this point

“Yeah I am reading the message board now” Which I was finding that everyone had panicked to some degree and I was not the only one that got caught out.

I am not sure that i recovered by this afternoon when we took the PTX exam but lucky for me there were 15 Brand/Generic medicine questions and I got all them right to make up somewhat for the mess I made of the multiple choice.

Gummy Bears

2010-03-15T13:47:00.001-04:00

That's what our babies look like! This morning we had our 10 week ultrasound. The babies have grown so much. What started as little blobs now have heads, arms and legs! They were bouncing around this morning - moving their little arms and legs. Here is the picture:
Twin one is clearly visible...but twin two is harder to see - he looks like a blur! But they're both there, and we even got to hear the heartbeats!!!

Pretty amazing stuff, huh?

Half Marathon Report

2010-03-08T22:53:00.004-05:00

I should have written this right after the race, but I was busy with school type stuff so it had to wait for Spring Break (WOOHOO). By The Way expect lots more entries in the summer when I am not in school and just trying to juggle a job (fingers crossed a pharmacy internship) and a pregnant wife.

So the Donna Half Marathon we were training for was held on the 21st of February. Caroline had to stop training for medical reasons which are obvious now, but at the time were mystifying to the other people training. I had done all the group training runs properly using the Galloway walk-run technique. My group was running four minutes and walking one minute. Two weeks before the race I had run fourteen miles in 2:01 so my goal for the actual half-marathon was to run under two hours. I had not been running the twice weekly sessions at home because it was so cold.

The morning of the race I drove to the parking garage and caught the shuttle. We drove out to the start line and when I got off the bus I just followed the crowd towards the “Runners Village”. It was a bunch of vendors tents which I was not interested in. I heard a guy calling groups of numbers by their colour and I realized he was almost at my colour (I think it was light blue-just checked the website fotos and I am correct). I joined that group of people and we were soon led out to the start line. I think one more group was put in front of us then the elite runners. I was freezing which didn’t help and they had to play the national anthem and talk about how great it was that we were all out there.

The race finally started and I followed the Galloway advice of not running too fast to start off. I got to one mile in about 10 minutes and started my timer. I proceeded to run/walk for the rest of the way along JTB. When we got to the beach and the roads narrowed I had trouble hearing my timer so I had to switch it to my wrist so that I didn’t spend 3 minutes walking like I did at one point. The supporters on the edges of the road were everywhere and I really didn’t like it. By the time I got to run on the actual beach I was worrying about the time I was taking but continued with the run/walk system that I had trained with. By the time we got back to JTB I was very tired and getting increasingly concerned about my time. I latched onto a runner going past me and followed him for the last 2 miles with no walk breaks managing to sneak in under the 2 hour limit I had set for myself.

I am glad I did the race and now I can say that I have done a half marathon but at the same time I was not happy with the time and how I felt throughout the race. Caroline tried to convince me that the reason I didn’t feel good was because I had stopped with the training runs during the week and that may well have been the case, but I did run the Gate River Run three weeks later (running the whole way) with no ill effects and no sore legs the next day?

Changes

2010-03-02T10:08:00.001-05:00

New heading added!! Pictures and updates to follow.

New Heading

2010-03-01T15:27:00.003-05:00

It looks like we will have to retire this old introduction to the blog "This morning Stewart received a blog post from a co-worker and we finally realized that we are among the last few who do NOT have a blog. So here it is. I'm a bit apprehensive because our friends who have blogs either: a) Are traveling the world b) Are pregnant or c) have children d) Lead marvelous and exciting lives We fall into NONE of these categories. We do have a weird and precocious cat and a mischievous puppy ... we'll see how interesting we can be." Caroline wrote this one so I will encourage her to write the new one. Excited

The Ronson Hangup

2010-01-04T15:29:00.002-05:00

The Ronson Hangup are former Anyones Steve and Mal Pinkerton, Even frontman Ash Naylor, the Pictures' bassist Luke Thomas and drummer Dave Mudie. The group is named for the late Mick Ronson, who made his name as one of David Bowie's Spiders From Mars. I somehow stumbled on their debut album on iTunes. It seemed a little strange because there are all sorts of other Aussie bands that I can’t find on iTunes (USA). That aside I put it on my wish list because of the Even connection and then bought it when I found out it was an Even/Anyones collaboration. It is an interesting album, I don’t have the liner notes so I don’t know who the exact songwriters are. I am also interested to know who they recruited to sing the female part on the song Sally Melo. While waiting for the new Even album this is just what I need.

Running

2009-11-28T08:44:00.001-05:00

I want to run a marathon. Seems a simple enough goal, but I am smart enough to know that I can’t use my usual show up and run philosophy. I think that I top out at 15 km with this method which luckily for me is exactly the length of the River Run here in Jacksonville. Caroline and I have decided to start off with a half marathon to test the waters and see how we go. Caroline started a training program to get into shape and the goal at the end was to run a 5k race. I went with her on race day and we finished together. The next step was to extend it to the half marathon in February. Because I know I need to train too, we both joined her training program. It is called Galloway Training and is based on a walk run method. Depending on how fast you go you run for different intervals, but everyone has to walk at some stage. I was skeptical at first because the first couple of weeks were a little disorganised and I wasn’t happy with the pace of my group. Before Caroline went to Arizona for tennis we had to do what they called a magic mile which helps to put you in the right pace groups. I ran Carolines with her then did mine and emailed it to the guy in charge. He said that instead of running in the third group I should move to the second group so that is my plan for next week. This morning there was no official run because there was a 5k race that they wanted people to run. We didn’t do that because it was $50 to enter. This entry fee included a ticket to the Players Golf tournament but we were not at all interested in that. Instead we went out to Jacksonville Running Company for what they called a Renegade Run. Basically it was just like a normal group run but with less people. I ran with a couple of people and a dog we didn’t take walk breaks like we were supposed to but that was fine with me. It was 6 miles and we ran a 7:30 pace which is fast for me but I felt pretty good about it (we will see how I feel tomorrow at soccer). After I was done I ran back and met Caroline and ran to the finish with her at her pace which I know has improved since she started. I am actually enjoying running again we run with the group every Saturday and then by ourselves Tuesday and Thursday.

Knitting

2009-11-02T09:37:00.011-05:00

I am not sure when Caroline started knitting but it was at least a year ago. I think she started because she wanted to give a friend who was having a baby a present. Of course things snowballed from there with more babies and more knitting. I don't mind the knitting that is fine, its the trading and stockpiling of wool that seems a little over the top to me. She started with just a couple of balls of wool for the project she was working on, but then she discovered the Ravelry website (facebook for knitters is how she describes it) and then things really took off. Through the website she found others selling wool or for trading wool with other people. There is even one, based in Germany , that has super rare wool that they sell once a week and people stalk it online. She managed to get a couple of those which she then traded away. We currently have wool, needles and patterns stashed everywhere around our house. That is not the point of this blog though. Just after she started knitting Caroline said she wanted to knit me a scarf. Since I already had a black and red Essendon scarf it was decided that a green and white Celtic scarf was in order. And thus began the saga of the scarf, about a month after she started and a couple of stripes in she wanted to restart it because it was too thick, I disagreed and negotiated a continuance. The scarf knitting went on for the next year almost, in between other projects - most of which were baby related. Finally last night she decided that she wasn't going to bed until the scarf was finished, at around 9pm the last tassel was put on and official photos were taken (available in the gift shop on your way out). I love my new scarf and hope the weather only gets colder so I can wear it every day. Thank you Caroline. Now I can't complain about our house full of wool ever again.

Pharmacy School

2009-10-21T16:29:00.005-04:00

While it may be true that I have fallen off the blogging bandwagon because of Pharmacy School, it is also true that I really gave up on it after we got back from Australia. Because as you see there are no pictures from that trip, no posts about visits to various relatives or friends. We had a great time visiting just haven’t managed to document it at all. That was July and I started school at the end of August so I should have at least been able to get something done within that time. But no!

School is going well, I may have mentioned to some people that I think I have studied more in the last eight weeks than I did the whole time I was at the University of Melbourne. My class is about 300 students split between the main campus in Gainesville (150), Orlando (50), St. Pete (50) and us in Jacksonville (50). I have managed to find a group to study with which is very helpful and much more useful than me sitting at home by myself watching TV, then trying to read over material 20 minutes before an exam and thinking I will pass like that. I have actually finished one class already and got an A in it, you got the text message I am sure. It is a lot of work and it’s not really hard but just the volume of information is huge and it will only get worse.

Picking up the slack...

2009-10-12T10:36:00.002-04:00

Our poor blog. Pharmacy school is the worst thing to happen to our blog - but the best thing for our family. Stewart was the SOLE updater of this blog and now he's too busy to do it, so I must pick up the slack. So far, so bad as I've only done so once.

This past weekend I spent in Daytona playing in the 6.0 Mixed Doubles USTA Sectional tournament. Basically, I play tennis. This league in particular is mixed doubles, meaning I play with a man. Because our level is 6.0, my rating and my partner's rating cannot exceed 6.0. So I am 3.0, meaning I must play with another 3.0. My partner is REALLY GOOD, but I was still nervous because as good as he is, I still have to carry my weight. On Friday and Saturday we did group play, meaning we were in a draw with four other teams. We basically had to play every team and win to make it to the finals. Well, we did. We then played the final on Sunday against Pensacola....and we won, making us the sectional champions. We are the only 6.0 team from Florida to go to Nationals...which is in Tucson Arizona! Very exciting.

I have also set some new goals for myself. The first one is that I want to cook more. Stewart needs better meals prepared for him...or really ANY meals prepared for him. I've been looking at a lot of cookbooks and online recipes and as soon as I have more time, that's my plan. The thing that's putting a kink in my new goal is the fact that Soccer coaching starts today. From this day on, I will not get home before 6:15 pm every night....so cooking dinner looks dim. Poor Stewart :(

Yay! New things.

2009-10-01T12:28:00.002-04:00

So it's been a few months of new things in the Morris household.

1. Stewart got a new IPhone for school. I find this hilarious. When I first got one he was DEAD set against them....and now...he can't put it down. He said he needed it for school, but all I've seen him do on it is play games and check baseball scores.
2. Stewart also got a new laptop...which he has used for school every day. He really needed this, and it's a cool computer. It's red, of course, and has lots of cool features. Sadly he never gets to use the cool features because he's constantly watching lectures, writing presentations, and checking school stuff.
3. Melanie Oudin shoes. Yes, I'm a sucker. I got so taken in with her whole US Open run, that I had to have them. I needed new shoes anyway...and these just seemed perfect. They even say BELIEVE on them. Do I believe they'll make me play like Melanie? No.

How awesome are these?

4. Finally - I got my new car. Well, it's a used car, but it is so great. It's a 2007 CRV EX-L. It's glacier blue metallic. and did I mention it's PIMPED OUT? Leather seats, nav system, back up camera, heated seats, XM radio. It's so sweet. I'll get pics up soon.

Brazil vs South Africa Confederations Cup

2009-06-25T16:15:00.005-04:00

I was a work while this game was played so I couldn’t watch it and so this commentary may be accurate and worthwhile. However I wonder where this commentator is from and why he is wasting our time with this. I copied some of the comments directly from the ESPN gamecast.
61' I know I bigged him up, but Melo has been nonsense tonight.
This is ok I guess but nothing about what is happening in the game
71' Brazil's passing tonight has been as erratic as Amy Winehouse's heartrate.
Strange analogy, however as I said it may be true I wasn’t watching the game
72' Tshabalala really is a first class name. Apparently he has brother called Po and Tinky Winky.
This is a terrible joke is it a teletubby thing?, does he think the guy is gay? A joke like this wouldn’t work on the teletvision or radio so any chance of it working in print is gone.
77' Booth - who has one of the longest necks I've seen and looks like one of hammerheads from Return to Oz - knocks the ball out of play, but is awarded the throw anyhow, much to Fabiano's consternation.
At least this is somewhat related to the game but really it is just an insult.
81' Alves is rolling down his girly poloneck in preparation for his imminent introduction. He replaces Santos.
Another insult it seems the commentator doesn’t even like soccer.
83' Melo is robbed by Modise and Lucio is then adjudged to have fouled Pienaar, which elicits a tantrum. It's been bothering me all night, and I'm pleased to say I've at last realised who Lucio reminds me of - it's Ivan Lendl.
83' Luisao has really quite a magnificent nose
Or maybe he just likes some of the players more than others, a lot.
85' And another thing I've just noticed. The very front of Dunga's hair hides the baldness that lies behind it. Good effort, but not good enough.

Now he is insulting the coach. I had to Google a picture of the coach to check out this statement and I have to disagree. He may be balding, but the short spikey hair is fine, I have seen plenty of worse attempts at hiding it
86' At last Brazil show something. Kaka drives at the defence, feeds it into Ramires, and he's fouled on the edge of area, to the left hand side.
And about here is where Brazil scored the only goal of the game.
90' I know I've slated him tonight, but I do like Dunga's velvet jacket, although I wouldn't wear it.
This is a very backhanded compliment. I also don’t know what the jacket looked like so I can neither defend the jacket or the comment
93' Well I'm glad that's over. A miserable game and a miserable performance from Brazil. South Africa did well, but you can't help but feel if they'd been a little less cautious, they might have managed to win. They'll also be rueing Mokoena's miss in the first half.
And the true feeling s about the game come out at the end.

The Worst Blogger Ever.

2009-06-22T15:33:00.003-04:00

Ok Ok, I know that I am the worst blogger ever. I think I've blogged once. Maybe. But this past weekend I had the best time and I decided this was the perfect blog post idea.

So one of my best friends in the entire world (Since college) had a gorgeous baby girl about 7 months ago. She is truly one of the cutest babies I've seen in a long time and her name is Mattie. She's perfect in every way! Much to my surprise, Meg asked me to be Mattie's godmother. I was beyond excited. I mean, I've never been a godmother before, but knowing how close Meg and I are, I was ecstatic. Up until this point, being a godmother was more a title than anything else - but on Sunday, Mattie was baptized.

Believe it or not, Baptism requires rehearsal - so we did on Saturday. Meg and her husband Jon showed up with Mattie and Jon's brother David, the godfather. We spent about an hour walking through the ceremony and learning the meaning behind the ritual, etc, etc. Then, on Sunday, Stewart and I showed up at Meg's house at 9:30 to help set up for the post-ceremony luncheon. We all arrived at the church by 10 am.

The ceremony was great. There were four babies getting baptized that morning, and alphabetically, Mattie was last. She was so well behaved! She's only about 7 months old - so to be that behaved was shocking to me. Even as the water was being poured over her head, she was great. As godmother I had a few rolls. I had to speak out loud in response to the priest, take care of a candle, and a banner. Between David and I, we did a great job! Then it was home for the luncheon.

I got Mattie a gorgeous pearl necklace called an add-a-pearl necklace. Each year, at Christmas, I am going to get her another pearl for the necklace!! Meg loved it and I hope that when Mattie is old enough, she will too. I am so excited to be a godparent for the first time!

Other than that - the only thing going on is knitting and a countdown to Australia. (currently knitting socks for me, socks for mom for her birthday, and three weeks to Oz!) I can't wait. Ok that's it for me. Look for another blog post in about 6 months!! :)

The Internet is Wonderful

2009-06-01T15:46:00.004-04:00

We were waiting for the computer program we use at work to be fixed to allow us to continue working, I was looking at various things on Wikipedia. For some reason I wanted to know about the Violent Femmes and really the wikipedia entry didn't tell me much I didnt already know. At the bottom of the "Blister in the Sun" page was a link to an outside page which read Second Hand Songs - Song: Blister in the Sun - Indigo Girls wondering what it was about I clicked on it to discover that www.secondhandsongs.com was a database to tell you the original artist and other artists who have covered songs. for some reason I think this is fantastic and a great resorcue to have to settle arguments about who sang what song when.

Kevin T. Jackson

2009-05-17T12:37:00.001-04:00

This is about something that happened this week but really it happened in February 2008. I arrived at work and found out that the previous night one of my friends and coworkers had been shot and killed. The version of events I heard was that Kevin was arguing with his girlfriend who called this guy and then he showed up argued with Kevin, returned to his car to get a gun and came back to the apartment where Kevin was leaving and shot him in the back. We all went to the funeral and I was a mess, crying through most of the part where people get up and tell there memories of the deceased. The good news that followed was that they caught the guy who did it soon after. He was on parole for some other gun related offence, so it was good to know he had easy access to a firearm. Things got back to normal or as much as possible. Last week Kevin's mum let us know that the trial was going ahead and by Friday, he was found guilty. Sentencing is this week and we were asked to write letters to the judge to help. Below is the letter I wrote

"The Honorable Judge Senterfitt

My name is Stewart Morris and I am a friend and co-worker of Kevin Jackson. I was born and raised in Geelong Australia and moved to Jacksonville three years ago when I married my wife. I started working at the Ambulatory Pharmacy at Shands Hospital soon after. When Kevin began working at the pharmacy I helped to train him and we quickly became friends. He was always smiling. We talked everyday about the latest sports news and what our respective teams need to do to win. It didn’t make sense that we would bond over this with me being a Red Sox / Celtics fan and him being a Yankees / Knicks fan but it worked. We even made a bet over the Yankees getting into the playoffs, which I lost, however the Red Sox did win the World Series, so in a way I won. Kevin was the baby in the pharmacy and everybody loved him. He was always willing to help anybody who asked and even if you didn’t. He never had a bad word to say to anybody and was planning to return to school. Even now I expect him to show up and make some comment about the Yankees beating the Red Sox. I really thought that we would be friends for a long time.
I ask that you sentence the man who shot my friend to the maximum penalty.
Thank you

Stewart Morris"

I thought it would be easier than it turned out. I didn't end up putting much of anything. I feel like my communication ability was limited I didn't say things that I should have included, but I know that most of the people in the pharmacy wrote letters so hopefully they will help to get the maximum sentence.

April 30th

2009-04-30T07:30:00.000-04:00

The last picture and i had to get Cat in somewhere. She is a good girl constantly being hassled by Fenway and hiding away. She spends most of her time sleeping and avoiding the other family members, but on occasion she will climb up on the bed to get pats and socialize, This shot was taken by the front door notice the vacuum cleaner in the background.

April 29th

2009-04-29T07:28:00.003-04:00

The sunset which had something to do with this whole project. I kept driving past this bridge and seeing the view out to the St. Johns River thinking that would make an excellent foto. So when I started this project I knew that one of my shots would be sunset at this spot. So on my second to last day I rode my bike over and waited for sunset. It doesnt seem as good as what I had seen previously and what I thought it could be but I still like it and if a better shot shows up down the line, that is what i was going for.

April 28th

2009-04-28T07:27:00.000-04:00

I tried to take a foto of the entire tree, but it would fit with the buildings either side. So I took a close up of the hole in the middle of the tree in an effort to be arty or something like that. Instead it just looks like a hole in a tree. See what happens when I start to run out of ideas.

April 27th

2009-04-27T07:25:00.002-04:00

While we were in Raleigh I bought a red NC State Block S for my car. I had to rinse off the dirt before applying it. It looks really good and is actually shiny enough that you can see my reflection taking the foto.

April 26th

2009-04-26T19:52:00.005-04:00

Caroline and I came home and Fenway greeted us. I thought this would make a great foto and told Caroline to repeat it when I had grabbed the camera. Very Cute!

April 25th

2009-04-25T19:51:00.000-04:00

We had game night at our house. I had taken some fotos earlier in the day, but replaced it with this one. Travis and Diana brought me a cake to celebrate me getting into pharmacy school and I loved it. Travis put the decorations on himself and in case you are wondering the "pills" are really Tic Tacs. I thought it was a very thoughtful gesture and it tasted great too.

April 24th

2009-04-24T19:50:00.002-04:00

Caroline talked me into playing 6.0 mixed doubles last year which was not fun. I practised a whole bunch with the team but the woman who was supposed to be my partner was playing on another team as well and never practised with me or played with me. So I did get to play one and a half games before the captain decided that I wasn't good enough to play anymore. Here is what happened I played one match with a woman who is a 3.0 and I am a 2.5 so we had already given up 0.5 to the other team and it was the first time I had played competitive tennis and we lost pretty bad. The second game I was supposed to play the other team forfeited my line because they didn't have enough players. After driving out to the middle of nowhere to play I got to play a game that didn't count against the captain and my partner while I played with an extra person the other team had found. I was pissed off and the captain had said that because of the amount of people on the team we were only guaranteed two games and that was my 'second' game. So i got to watch Caroline play every week and in sectionals and then go to nationals. So this year Caroline was trying to get me to play again but I refused to play for the same captain again. One of her friends was having trouble finding guys to play on her 6.0 team so she asked if I would play on that team. I agreed not really wanting to go back to mixed doubles, but at our first match tonight I had heaps of fun and I am looking forward to the rest of the matches. This was the score when we had to stop because it got dark and the lights didn't come on. We finished the game at Epping on Monday night and Kristy and I won! I managed to hit a drop shot that bounced on their side of the net and then spun back over the net to our side, the perfect shot.

April 23rd

2009-04-23T19:48:00.001-04:00

We play Team Trivia every Thursday at Players Grille in San Marco. We are quite good. Well let me qualify that, we have people on our team that are good. the core team is myself, Caroline and our friends Dom, Travis and Diana. I am there every week unless I am sick, although I have been several times when I was sick. I didn't make it the week I was battling the stomach problem and we had been to Epping Forest trivia beforehand. This foto is of the top of the score sheet and it is super fun especially when you win, which we do frequently. I think our longest streak was four weeks in a row. The prize for winning is Players Grille House cash, so we usually have a reduced bill when we go.

April 22nd

2009-04-22T07:39:00.000-04:00

The rascal Puppy. This was the day we got home so he was 'allowed' to play with my sock. I was also encouraging him so I could take a better foto, which I shouldn't do if I want my work socks to remain intact. He has since had a hair cut and is not as furry.

April 21st

2009-04-21T07:38:00.002-04:00

Caroline organised for me to go with her on a tour of the N.C. State campus on the final day of the conference. It was not only fun, but educational as well. I was way more interested than some of the other tourees, but I didn't have any questions which slowed things down endlessly. The Campus is much bigger than I had expected and they have a number of partnerships with real companies that provide students with real world experience. We walked through the Brickyard, which is the center of campus activities. There were a couple of guys there trying to get people to donate money to buy a real bell for the bell tower. I wanted to donate, but thought it might look bad to duck out of the tour to do so. After the tour we went to the bookstore so I could buy some cool NC State merch. We walked past Reynolds Coliseum, so I took this picture which was the only one for the day so I barely made my requirement. I also ran back to the Brickyard but the bell guys were gone.

April 20th

2009-04-20T07:36:00.000-04:00

I could see this mural from the window of our hotel room. While Caroline was at her conference again, I went exploring and discovered it was the Lincoln Theatre. It seemed like a cool place to go see live music, Snoop Dogg was coming up in May. I wandered around downtown the rest of the day and found a couple of stores selling bowler hats. i tried one on but it looked cheap and I ended up with no new hat.

April 19th

2009-04-19T07:35:00.002-04:00

I was not planning on taking a foto of myself, but I had to. This was taken moments after I read my email telling me that I had got into UF Pharmacy school. I texted everyone and called Caroline and left a message, as she was in her conference. It was an exciting day which included me getting a foul ball at the baseball game later that afternoon, although the team was smashed by FSU 13-2.

April 18th

2009-04-18T07:34:00.000-04:00

Saturday in Raleigh was super fun. I slept in and then walked around a little and had lunch at the Flying Saucer. Then Caroline returned from her conference stuff in time to drive me out to the NC State Red and White Game. For a practice game which essentially means nothing, I was surprised to see such a big crowd. They announced at halftime it was 21075. I think that part of that was the entry fee donation going to the Kay Yow Cancer Fund. I was pretty proud of the support until I read that Ohio State got 90000 plus to their spring game which is a little ridiculous, I guess there is nothing else to do in Ohio. After the game the fans were allowed down onto the field and after much waiting I finally got down there. It was a little strange walking around, I was not sure what to do. I didn't have anything for players to sign, plus I don't really know players names or importance. So instead I wandered around the field taking fotos and admiring a view I probably won't ever get to see again. As I was climbing the stands to leave I turned around a took this foto. I had thought that people were crowded around to take foto's with the wolf statue but really it was because Coach Tom O'Brien was standing right by the goal post.

April 17th

2009-04-17T07:32:00.001-04:00

This is our traditional pose for holidays. One of us (usually Caroline, but me this time for obvious reasons), holds the camera at arms length to take a foto of us smiling at whatever event we are at. This is us in the hotel room in Raleigh. We have similar shots from weddings and holidays. We managed to survive a delay in Jacksonville and a tower fire in Charlotte, while we were on the runway about to take off. After those delays we finally arrived at our destination and got to the hotel around ten PM. Then we wandered the streets trying to find somewhere to eat, before finally falling into bed sometime later.

April 16th

2009-04-16T19:53:00.001-04:00

I am not sure if I took this on the 16th, but it is the closest I can come. When I was talking to Caroline at lunch time she mentioned that a tree had fallen on her parents garage. I had thought that it went straight through the middle to the ground. When I arrived for a stickybeak I discovered the tree at the back had fallen and leaned on the back of the garage, pushing it off square. The workmen were in the process of removing it. I didn't have the camera so I used my mobile fone camera. The memory was almost full and I could only take two shots before it refused to take any more, then I had to email it to myself to be able to get it to the blog.

April 15th

2009-04-15T07:31:00.001-04:00

Another discovery of mine while walking Fenway was these berries. I actully found a blackberry along the back fence which I tried to feed to Fenway, but he was not interested. The next day I needed something to fotograf and decided to see if i could find another blackberry. I actually found a whole range of berries in different places around the outside fence. This was, in my opinion, the best picture.

April 14th

2009-04-14T07:29:00.000-04:00

This strange foto is of a flower stuck to Fenway. This happens occasionally when I take him out for a walk. He gets too close to a plant and the flower sticks in his fur. Of course it is always just a solitary flower which makes it even weirder when I see it. Upon arrival home I tell Caroline that Fenway brought it for her.

April 13th

2009-04-13T19:38:00.005-04:00

Another of the wonderful trees around our condo complex that I love so much. This actually turned out pretty good. It is a matter of deciding which angle to shoot from because other shots i tried had strange backgrounds. I walk past this tree every day when I take Fenway out and it makes me happy.
(Disclaimer: I tried to write this the other night and it didn't work, so this is the second attempt)

April 12th

2009-04-12T19:37:00.002-04:00

AS you can tell some days I struggle for somehting to fotograf. I was also not feeling well due to whatever my ailment of the week was. I took this shot of the screen that is in our lounge room. It hides the Guitar Hero equipment when Caroline is not using it to rock out. It is an attempt ot be all arty and not a very good one.

April 11th

2009-04-11T19:35:00.002-04:00

Fenway chewing on his bone. I was trying to do something that day so I gave him a bone to keep him occupied and out of trouble. It was rather effective as he gnawed on the thing most of the day and didn't hassle me or the cat which is a minor miracle in itself.

April 10th

2009-04-10T19:34:00.005-04:00

This is another one of the trees that surround our condo complex. It is the one tree that got me thinking I could fill the holes in my picture schedule with tree shots. It is in an awkward spot because the background is not good. The sun shining through was an issue and I want to re shoot it, but a different angle gives a terrible background so I may have to think about it some more before I do that.

April 9th

2009-04-09T18:28:00.006-04:00

This is my new baseball hat. It is the same one the Australian team wore at the 2009 World Baseball Classic.

April 8th Foto

2009-04-08T18:26:00.006-04:00

We went out to the beach to the MPS tennis tournement (formerly the Bausch and Lomb). So you would expect a shot of the ladies playing right. Well I did take some fotos of the tennis but I also took this one of the sunset over the stadium and I liked it better so it was the daily winner.

April 7th Foto

2009-04-07T23:19:00.005-04:00

I wanted to start a bottle collection of different beers I drink but due to space and hygiene issues (beer bottles stinks if they are not cleaned out right), I came up with a 21th century solution. If i take fotos of the different bottles I still have a collection which only takes up computer space and doesn't reek. I also avoid having to move them around and dust them. This is the first in my collection, I know its a can not a bottle which is another reason to use fotos. Empty cans are hard to store and I am not saving full cans it is a waste. I have seen the OLD CHUB at the Freshmarket and finally decided to try it. I guess it is a pretty good replication of a Scottish ale because it has that ale taste which I don't particularly like but I would drink on occasion if I had to.

April 6th Foto

2009-04-06T23:21:00.003-04:00

I agree this should have been my foto for the day of my interview but I didn't get around to it and then today I ran out of time and ideas so I used this as a stopgap to get me to the next foto. It is possibly the worst of the fotos I have taken so far.

April 5th Foto

2009-04-05T23:17:00.001-04:00

I am the type of nerd who would take a foto of a frozen food box just because of the name. I also have fotos of signs from two stores next to each other on the road to Rosman in North Carolina. Stewart Upholstery and Dave's Market seemed too good to pass up. Ian is my dad's name so I figured I would try his Buffalo chicken fingers which were pretty average.

Pharmacy School Interview

2009-04-05T14:14:00.006-04:00

I had my interview on Friday which was the last step of the application process. I have been looking forward to this ever since i got my letter telling me that i had to have an interview. I wore my suit and my new tie, looking pretty sharp even if I do say so myself. I was planning on fotographing this for my foto project but Caroline had taken the camera while I was talking to my parents on the fone. If I had of planned better I could have got that done. When I arrived I parked in my usual spot and walked over to the Towers. It was interesting to see the students waiting around for all the interviewees to arrive I am sure they outnumbered us 2-1. I checked in and spent 20 minutes or so talking to one of the students about traveling and such. I also signed some sort of confidentiality agreement which I didn't read properly. I was then ushered into the office to the second waiting room, with a couple of other students and interviewees. I waited there and talked about Jacksonville with the students. I was then taken into one of the interview rooms by Dr Moorman and met with my other interviewer Melissa Hanbury (Student Affairs Coordinator). It was a fairly quick 5-10 minute interview with only three questions and then I asked "What can I do to help me prepare before class starts?", which Robin answered for me. Mostly it is just keep learning generic and brand names and make sure I manage my time when classes actually start, which may be the harder part. I found a box of Brand/Generic flash cards a coworker gave me when i first started so I plan to work through them as much as possible. Now I am just waiting for the letter in the mail telling me one way or another what I am doing next year....

4th Foto

2009-04-04T23:25:00.002-04:00

I was driving home from dropping off Caroline at the tennis tournament when I noticed the paw prints on the bonnet of my car. When I got home i took Fenway for a walk then went back outside and snopped this picture. It wasn't until I showed it to Caroline that night that I realised it was also a shot of the sky reflected on the bonnet.

3rd foto

2009-04-03T23:23:00.005-04:00

I actually took a bunch of foto's today. More trees which I like taking fotos of, a couple of Fenway and a yellow corvette that is parked at the back of our condo complex. This foto was actually an accident. I was trying to put the camera back in its case while I was walking Fenway and I hit the button. Looking through the days fotos I figured I could always get another tree foto or Fenway not looking at the camera but an accidental shot that actually looks good is a rarity.

April Fotos 2nd

2009-04-02T19:29:00.004-04:00

The website dealing with Project 365 suggests uploading fotos every couple of days so that the thoughts and ideas you had when taking them are fresh and you can accompany the image with some decent text. If you have been reading this blog you will already know i don't have any idea what constitutes decent text so here is my second foto. It is of the tree that is outside our front door. I had taken a different foto at work but when I got home and was walking Fenway I looked back and saw the gray sky and the tree and thought it would make a better foto. I am not sure the point and click camera we have is designed to help with things like this. They sky didn't come out as impressively as it was when I first looked at it, however this is a learning process and I will continue.

April Fotos

2009-04-01T18:03:00.007-04:00

Caroline was telling me that one of her favourite kids is a photographer and he had completed something called Project 365. The premise of this is to take a photograph every day for one year and put it on a blog or website. I was intrigued by this so I decided that I would try it, but on a smaller scale. For the month of April I will be taking a foto everyday and posting it on the blog. Today with the rain I was reduced to starting with a foto of my hand.

Back To The Grind

2009-03-29T22:39:00.004-04:00

After using up my spare blog ideas I am back to writing about what has been going on in Jacksonville. Caroline was gone last week for a spring break vacation to New York. SPRING BREAK WOHOO! she went with her mum and got to see some of the best bead stores and wool stores in the big city. She also caught up with some old friends and had a really fun time. She saw the filming of some new fashion show on Bravo and an episode of Late Night with Jimmy Fallon (guests include Mike Meyers and Anna Kournikova, Musical guests All American Rejects). while she was gone I tried to tidy up the condo with little success. We had a soccer game on Wednesday at 900 pm. We had tried to get it switched to an earlier time but apparently the other team didn't want their star player to miss the game. So the game was played as scheduled and we managed to get our asses kicked. With our one sub to their sixish we were getting worked from the beginning to the end. We had a couple of chances but nothing stuck and it ended up 11-0. We had another game this afternoon and despite our extra players it was a similar result. I started the game but was running on empty from the start. I started on the bench for the second half and when I came on I was actually playing decently in defense but the game was well gone by that point. We ended losing 8-0, I believe, or something to that degree. The other team actually had the gall to complain that we were taking to long retrieving the ball after they kicked it over the goal for the umpteenth time. They had one of their subs kick over an extra ball and were telling us to put on one of our subs to get the game going. We waited for our player to return with the ball and then kicked it in.

My interview for pharmacy school is this Friday and I am both excited and nervous. I called last week to set up my specific time, and left a message for the secretary to call me back.. When she did I set my time for 930 am. After the phone call I returned to my window at the front of the pharmacy and finished with the patient I was entering prescriptions for. I then thought I should email Caroline to let her know what was happening. When I opened my email I already had an email from Robin (my former boss who now works full time at the College of Pharmacy) telling me she would see me at 930 on the 3rd. I called my parents a couple of weeks ago and asked them to buy a University of Melbourne tie and send it to me. You would think that something like that I could just order on my own from their website. Truth is I could, but they wanted $30 in postage which I considered excessive. So the call was made and then relayed to Dave who was staying in St Kilda at the time. He went to the Bookstore and purchased said tie for me and then sent it over with the latest Triple J Hottest 100 CD, which was much appreciated. Postage on those two items was $28, so maybe I was wrong. Anyway I have the tie and my suit is just back from the dry cleaners, so Friday is the big day.....

Miss One

2009-03-22T15:49:00.003-04:00

I missed last week not by accident but just because I couldn't get it together enough to write anything. I did however have something to write about. I ran the Gate River Run last Saturday. I think it was the third time I have run the 15km race through Jacksonville. The website has a feature where you can search previous years results, so after I looked up my official finish this year i had to go back and check on my previous attempts. This year I arrived early and got to the start line moments before the 5K charity run began. I waited behind the barrier and watched those runners take off before we were allowed to move up. The start chute was roped off with the top 200 seeded runners in the front and then a second group before the general entrants. I managed to squeeze into the front couple of rows of the general entrants. When the cannon went off to start i was able to cross the line within 30 seconds which was much better than the couple of minutes that it has taken me the last couple of years. I got through the first mile in 8:35 which I thought was a little slow but a decent beginning. My training had tailed off over the previous two weeks because of sickness. My whole goal was to just get through the run. As I passed the 5K mark at European St Cafe in San Marco, I was somewhere around 25 minutes which is a little slow, but with 10K to go it is understandable. I rounded the corner to run up River Rd where our friends Travis and Diana live. I wasn't sure if they would be out watching at 9am on a Saturday morning. They had set up chairs and were cheering on the runners with their neighbors. I waved as I passed and got an enormous cheer. The resulting surge of adrenaline kept me going for the rest of the race. Soon after that I heard another runner near me ask his friend if they were on pace to break eighty minutes. The positive response made me make sure that I stuck with these guys for the remainder of the race. We passed through San Marco and continued past Bishop Kenny High School. I ran through 10K at about 52 minutes which is pretty fast for me, I think. The best 10k time i remember running was 46 minutes something in the Barwon Banks Fun Run. It was also the only time I managed to beat my Dad in a race (note he had been sick before the race and whatever time he managed to run was probably his worst). My pacers kept my going up to the Hart bridge. As we ran up the bridge I slipped back from the one guy i was still with, the others were behind us. Coming off the bridge I was still trying to catch him but didn't want to blow it all out on the descent. As we rounded the corner to turn toward the stadium I was still holding back for the finish thinking we were going to turn into the stadium again. I saw the big screen and was trying to watch a little to see where that last turn was. Then I realised there was no final turn and the big screen was the finish line. I turned it on and managed to finish in 79 minutes, breaking the 80 that my pacers were worried about. I missed out on the top 10% finisher caps that they were handing out but i was very happy with the time. Of course this means that I will need to put in some training and finish faster next year.

Google

2009-03-05T14:16:00.004-05:00

I have been using up all my ideas for random posts to fill in for when nothing exciting has happened. Unfortunately I have to use another one because I have been sick this week and don't feel like writing anything. As a result this post is not so much a this is what happened this week as it is a list of what i have been looking up on GOOGLE. It is not necessarily a definitive list because sometimes I am not logged in to google when I look things up, but it is a good representation of what a broad range of information I have needed.

can cats eat peanut butter? - We had to give the cat some pills and this worked with Fenway but we wanted to check it was okay for Cat too. We ended up force feeding it to her anyway
sun herald melbourne
hussey - I saw an article on Yahoo about Mike Hussey. Unfortunately at work I can't get those articles so I googled him to find it
cartoon soda can - Our trivia team (and old soccer team) are named the Stubby Holders so I was looking for a picture that i could adapt into an emblem for the team. No luck so far.
cartoon can - This search didn't give me any good pictures.
axes - I watched a show on the history channel about swords and axes so i was looking for pictures and info.
Gate River Run - Just trying to find out some extra info for the race next week.
Caloosahatchee - This is the site of a triathlon but it is in South Florida, too far away.
Xterra races - This is the triathlon race held at Hanna Park last year. After I got my bike for my birthday last year I earmarked this as my first triathlon. I figured it was in July so I would have plenty of time to train. Alas the race is not on the schedule this year.
Triathlon Jacksonville - I was looking for other races to replace the Xterra but as of yet I haven't found one. I may go up to Jekyll Island for the sprint version of the Turtle Crawl triathlon.

New Soccer Team

2009-03-02T20:24:00.006-05:00

We played our first game with our new soccer team on Sunday. It was a lot of fun. We won 4-2, so that always makes it easier to enjoy. What happened was that Caroline was not happy with the BASL team she was playing on (or not as was the case). After talking to a couple of team mates she agreed to start a new team, even with me it didn't seem like we had enough people but another team was struggling to get numbers as well and we merged to form a complete team. It is seven a side with a minimum of three girls playing. We now have five girls and eight guys on our team and our second game is on Wednesday at 9 pm against the Wolfson tema which interestingly enough has four or five Shands doctors playing on it. I particularly want to beat them because they added one player from our corperate games team who I think is not a good player and yet they didn't ask me if I was interested in playing.

We played for our other team later on Sunday. It was not the disaster i was anticipating but we still lost, 2-0. We actually played really well but the other team has three or four subs and we had none. I was planning to stay back on defense but ended up playing forward. I had a couple of good chances at the beginning of the second half but shot straight at the keeper. With almost a whole mihute left of the game I took a ball to the face from about a meter away which was the perfect way to end the game. We only have one game left in that league and then I dont know if we will be playing there again.

Tuesday 3rd March update: The soccer ball to the face has given me my first ever black eye. Before you get all excited and expect to see a cool looking foto, let me explain. The ball was coming up and snapped my head back so the bruise has formed on the top of my eye not the bottom. So if I raise my eyebrows you can see it, but otherwise it is hidden.

Not Cheating

2009-02-22T21:40:00.009-05:00

Last week the focus was Fenway and my sad excuse for a blog post. This time I am once again putting up a bunch of pet fotos. This time it is Cat. Unlike Fenway, Cat has the run of the house when we go out so you would expect her to get up to mischief and ruin things. But she is a good girl and spends most of her time sleeping. It is actually when we are at home that things get a little strange. After I got home from work last Wednesday I was watching TV and Caroline called me to meet her and some friends for dinner. I walked into the bedroom to change and discovered Cat in the bathroom.

Additionally I find that when Caroline goes to bed Cat will go with her and the only place she likes to sleep is on my side of the bed.
(Disclaimer the pretty girls in this fotos did not authorise its publication and do not in any way endorse the content of this postt)

Then on Thursday I had taken Fenway out for his walk and returned to to the house. I had to put Fenway back in his crate which he never likes. His preferred method of escaping this is to run into the bedroom looking for Caroline or to chase cat around the house. Of course if I get him a bone he will gladly run straight into the crate, but only if he hears the box or sees the bone beforehand. When I led him into the study this was what greeted us.

And I believe Fenway's reaction was "WTF mate!"

(Note the box of bones permenantly housed on top of the crate for easy access. They are an essential tool for luring puppies into the crate)

Cheating

2009-02-14T20:26:00.008-05:00

I know I am supposed to write something more than this, but both Caroline and I are sickly and tired. So instead I offer these fotos and video of Fenway I took using my mobile at Caroline's parents house.

Birthday blog

2009-02-12T08:42:00.002-05:00

Seeing Stewart work so hard on the blog has made me feel guilty…so I write yet another entry (only my 2nd?). This was actually an exciting week for me because it was my 31st birthday. Woo. (sense the excitement…) Actually I’m not at all worried about being 31 because I’m in a really good place right now with my life. I have a husband with whom I couldn’t be more in love with if I tried, and a job that makes me very happy. My friends and family are all happy and healthy so things are good.

That said, I had a great birthday as well. My actual birthday was on Saturday, which was nice. Saturday I woke Stewart up early to make him give me my present. (He had talked it up all week…)

Let me interject here that Stewart is the BEST present giver in the world. Ever since we first met way back in 2001, he has always given very thoughtful, and appropriate gifts. For example: When we first met, I was OBSESSED with Lance Bass from *NSync. Apparently I was the LAST to know he was gay, but oh well. The very first present Stewart ever gave me (other than mix tapes) was the Lance Bass “Barbie” doll. Oh yes. Stewart actually went into a store and PURCHASED this item for me. Anyone who knows me knows I LOVED it, but that’s how far he’s willing to go! Example #2: One of my favorite books of all time is A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers. Stewart and I never really talked about this, but I had mentioned it once, and he LISTENS! For my birthday one year he was living abroad but saw that Dave Eggers was there signing his new book. He went, waited in line, and got me a PERSONALLY autographed copy of the book. See? Thoughtful and amazing. Last year Stewart set the bar VERY high for himself for my 30th. The Amazing Race is my all-time favorite show. Accordingly, Stewart set up a WHOLE day-long amazing race for me. It came with clues, challenges, obstacles and surprises. Suffice to say it was the best day, but knowing how much time, thought and care went into planning it made it even better. Trust me, Stewart has gift giving down to a science.

So this year, as usually, he nailed it. I love the show True Blood on HBO, and had casually mentioned that I was dying to read the books that the show is based on. Well, Stewart went and bought me the whole box set. He just that good. It must run in the family, however. Stew’s parents not only sent me an AWESOME gift, but got it to me, from Australia, with weeks to spare!!! I also got a text from my in-laws, and a call from my brother-in-law from Australia to wish me a happy birthday in person. It totally made me day J I have the best family.

After gift giving I got birthday breakfast at my favorite breakfast place the Metro Diner. Then we lounged around the house as I proceeded to read almost the entire first book of my new series. Then I had to play tennis, which I love. I was supposed to take bananas to the match but ran out of time (that book is a page turner), so Stewart volunteered to bring them up to the match. We were about to start when he showed up – so everyone from both teams was standing there. He handed me the bananas and announced, “You all know it’s her birthday today, right?” So of course people proceeded by making a big deal out of it, and then I won my match. All was well.

Tennis was followed by a brief bit of shopping (a new $40 dress to wear to dinner), followed by dinner at my all-time favorite restaurant Ruth’s Chris, followed by a grown-up cocktail at Bistro-Aix and then home to bed, as I was exhausted. A great day.

Caroline's Birthday

2009-02-07T15:12:00.010-05:00

I will let Caroline write about her birthday, presents and crazy activities. I would like to comment on my other New Year’s Resolution which started in earnest on Monday. I have decided that I need to get back into shape and now is the time. I started by running on Monday and Wednesday, riding the stationary bike Tuesday and riding my mountain bike today. I know it is a long way from a serious fitness regime, but it is a good start. I have a couple of goals I am working towards.

First is the Gate River Run in March. Held yearly in Jacksonville, it is a 15km (10 mile for anyone who wants the conversion) road race through the town. This year will be my fourth time running it. I am trying to train somewhat beforehand as I have not done this in the past. I am also trying to lower my expectations as far as results go. I have managed to finish in about an hour and half each time and considering I am not training that is a decent time. However I always think I can do better when I cross the finish line. This year my goal is to finish in 1:30 and not to get trapped at the start. I guess running with the cross country club in Geelong I got use to one or two person starts so the mass slow start frustrates me and causes part of the problem. It is impressive that at least once a year 10,000 odd people are willing to run 15km though.

My second goal was to try and complete the Xterra First Coast triathlon held at Hanna Park. After I got my bike I went out to Hanna Park and rode around on some of the trails that were part of the course from last year and was feeling pretty good about it. That was also part of the reason I am incorporating riding into my get fit program. However I just tried to look it up to find out the exact date and discovered it is not on the schedule for this year. In fact the only two triathlons that are part of that series are being held in South Florida which I feel is too far to travel for a first attempt. So I will continue with my bike riding, but I don't have a goal to work towards.

Superbowl Sunday

2009-02-02T18:12:00.005-05:00

I blame the Superbowl for making this entry late. Not specifically the game, but the fact that we went over to Meg and Jon's to watch it. It was not their fault, I had a fun time even if Pittsburgh won eventually. I just didn't have any time to type anything. That is all I care to say about the day and game.
I did get some great news on Saturday. An envelope arrived from the University of Florida and i opened it straight away even though I was walking Fenway. It was an invitation to an interview in April. According to the letter if I am accepted i will be studying at the Jacksonville campus which was my first choice. I immediately called Caroline and she was super excited. I also shared the news with everyone at work today and they were very congratulatory and had advice about the interview and pharmacy school. Listening to them talk about resident applicants and job applicants and how they performed in pharmacy school and their attitude, makes me realise that getting in is only half of the battle and I need to study hard and perform at a high level for the entire time I am back in school in order to possibly get a Shands residency or a position in the Ambulatory Pharmacy.

Late, wouldn't you know it...

2009-01-28T18:17:00.005-05:00

So my prediction has come true only three weeks in. I am already behind and I blame Australia Day. I took the day off work so I figured I would be fine to update and get this done. However I was stuck running around town and trying to get to all my appointments (7 AM dentist, 10 AM doctor, 1 PM dog haircut and 3 PM car service) that by the time I got home at 6 PM I was so exhausted I didn't do anything.

Some of the other blogs I read have multiple authors and I was looking at the settings today and figured out that I could do that on ours too. So I added myself as an author and gave myself admin privileges so I can reedit my old posts. This means in addition to the picture at the start of all my posts it will have my “name” on the end of it too. I retook the PCAT on Saturday the 24th, and I will find out how I did in approximately six weeks. I concentrated on studying the biology section as this was my weakest area the first time I took the test. I am not sure it paid off though. I felt like I didn't do as well this time. The upside is that only the best score is considered and my first attempt was reasonable.

Sunday was our third soccer game of the season. At this stage after losing our first two games we were second bottom of the league and we were playing the bottom team. I told Caroline before she left for Alabama that it was likely our best chance to win a game for the season. So with our best girl player in another state we did our best. After a scoreless first half with a couple of good chances I switched from defense to attack and we had a few shots that barely missed or were stopped by the keeper. It seemed like we were doing a better job of keeping them out of our half. Against the run of play they had a free kick which they crossed into the box and got a head on opening the scoring. We countered by throwing more people forward and managed to equalise soon after. The score remained 1-1 until the final whistle. With that result we climbed from second bottom to third bottom as another team lost their third straight game.

My 1st serve season has started and I was waiting for the PCAT to finish before I organised and games. One of my opponents called me on Saturday and we arranged to play Tuesday night. I was not optimistic about my chances as I had not played since our last doubles match. We warmed up and I knew it was going to be trouble when we were taking practice serves and I was struggling to get them in. My opponent had a unique serving style which was more about spin and placement than power. The first set raced by and I lost 3-6. The second set was headed the same way getting to 2-5 before I staged a comeback levelling it at 5-5. I then proceeded to lose the next two games and the match 3-6, 5-7. It was a decent start for my first game and hopefully I will have better news.

New Jacket

2009-01-15T18:25:00.010-05:00

I got a brand new snowboard jacket this week. I know what you are thinking what do I need a snowboard Jacket for in Florida? This is what Caroline asked me when I said I wanted one. I probably could have used it for the trip we took to Snowshoe, West Virginia, last year but we didn’t have the money at the time. We still don’t have the money now, but I got my new jacket anyway. The way I managed this was through a program we have at work called Virgin Health Miles. How it works is your wear a pedometer which counts your steps each day if you get over 7000 steps you get 60 miles, 12000 steps 80 miles and over 20000 steps you get 100 miles which is the most you can receive in one day. There is a machine at the hospital which measures your blood pressure, weight and body fat and using this once a month gives you extra miles. As you accumulate miles you receive money with the maximum for the year being $500. I managed to max out in October and had the money sitting in my account waiting to be used. I wanted to get a new jacket but I wanted to get Caroline something too. In November there was a challenge for the Shands employees and the first place prize was $150. The challenge rules capped the maximum steps per day at 30000 so by the end of the month there were eight or nine people tied for first place. To resolve this they held a random drawing and I managed to win. So I got extra money, which worked out perfectly. I used the competition winnings to get massage vouchers for Caroline as a Christmas gift and then last week I put some of the money into amazon.com vouchers and bought myself the jacket. When I first tried it on I thought it was a little small and was worried that I would have to return it to get a larger size, but that is how it is supposed to be and I love it.

On January 11th my account rolled over and I started again trying to accumulate steps to get more money. The goal this year is to max out before I go to pharmacy school and buy a big screen TV with the money.

So much has happened...

2009-01-11T22:17:00.003-05:00

Like i said this will probably come to a screeching halt sometime soon especially if all my interesting news manages to happen in one week which was the case this week. First and most importantly Immigration approved my application for permanent residency and they sent my new Green Card. It is not that different to the old one just a more recent picture and an expiry date of 01/02/2019. Next up after submitting all my pharmacy school application requirements over Christmas I got a confirmation email telling me that they had sent it in to the actual school(s). After learning this I checked online and found I had managed to secure a 3.86 GPA, which is really good. I'm sorry most important was the fact that Caroline booked our trip to Australia in July. We were able to use her dad’s frequent flyer miles so it was two tickets at a cost of $300 for taxes. I am not sure who is more excited Caroline (because of the Australian Sheep and Wool Show in Bendigo) or me (footy at the G, Essendon vs Richmond). We are planning to visit the family in Geelong and Mildura and hopefully get to Adelaide to expand our travels around Australia.

Our mixed doubles league finished up on Friday, Caroline (and partner Ted) won their match easily. In my match we got off to a slow start and lost the first set 6-4. We got behind to start the second set then battled back and were in a position to win the second set before we allowed the other team back in and it went to a tiebreaker. Before it started we asked the spectators if they had checked the lights and were assured that they were fine. We managed to get to a lead of 5-2 before the lights went out. We rescheduled for this morning and managed to win the tiebreaker. This set up another 10 point tiebreaker for the third set, which we folded up on losing 5-10.
That loss leads into co-ed soccer, which has just started a new season. We signed up as free agents and met our new team-mates tonight 5 minutes before the game started. We played one of the more competitive teams and got smashed. I don't even know what the final score was but we didn't score unless you count the own goal. It is going to be a long season.

January

2009-01-04T09:45:00.000-05:00

My New Years resolution this year was to write more in our blog. It is strange only because it is the first time I have made a new years resolution, that I can remember. Last year Caroline asked what my new years resolution was and when I replied i didn't do that she got mad at me because she thought I was saying that to be difficult. However this year i asked her and she was the one with no resolution. So expect an update every Sunday night at least if not before. If you get to Monday morning (American Eastern Standard Time for the nitpickers) and I have not put up a new post feel free to call or email until it is done. I expect to start off fairly strong and then peter out somewhere around May although if I do manage to get to August I'm sure it will stop there if I get into pharmacy school.

Update 12/14/2008

2008-12-15T21:32:00.000-05:00

I have been asked to update the blog. I’m so bad about writing for it, because I can’t do it from work. Work is really the only time when I’m on the internet (especially now that I can check my e-mail from my phone). So – Stewart informed me I can write my blog from work in WORD and then cut and paste and here I am, writing my blog from work, in word, and I will cut and paste.

It was a very busy weekend. Friday afternoon, after soccer practice, I scurried over to the tennis courts for my match. In every match, each set of people playing is called a “Line” and it starts at Line 1, being the toughest (allegedly) and Line 5 being the easiest (again, allegedly). Well, every week I get asked to play Line 1. This is not because I’m really good, but because I’m a lower ranked woman, I can play with a higher ranked man and that’s usually the best combination for the position. So Line 1 it is usually. Friday night I pitched a fit and got moved to Line 2. Line 1, of course, ended up being the easiest line to play, and my team won in straight sets (6-1, 6-1). I, on the other hand, did not win at Line 2. Serves me right for being a tennis prima donna and whinging about line changes. Hmmph.

Saturday morning, I ran some errands and then Stewart and I piled in the car and headed down to Tampa for the Colbie Caillat concert. I LOVE her music. Love it. What I love about it, is that it’s folky, mellow and she has a gorgeous voice. I was envisioning a laid back atmosphere, with her in jeans and just her and the guitar on stage…I couldn’t wait. Well, we get there and the opening act had just started. It turns out it was someone who I was planning on seeing in Jacksonville in January, and his performance reaffirmed that I wanted to see him. He was AWESOME! His name is Jon McLaughlin and I highly recommend him live. Then, we begin with the main event. Colbie comes out in TIGHTER than tight black pants and a slinky black tank top, and proceeds to give her best Mariah Carey imitation. It was more American Idol than Austin City Limits, and for that I was a bit disappointed. The music was good, and her singing was gorgeous, but it just wasn’t what I was expecting: and not in a good way.

We had to get up early early Sunday morning as my soccer team had made it to the finals of our league (this is the league in which I play, not coach). This was actually very surprising as we NEVER had any subs and actually played short almost every game. Let me back up. Last year I re-entered the league with a team of a friend and hated it. The team was fine, but some of the people on the team were terrible…I mean, real attitudes. And if you put everything into perspective, it’s adult rec soccer – so really, who cares. But anyway, we hated the team and my friend and I ceded! We started our own team (apparently I was kicked off the team – so she was mad and wanted to show them that she and I WERE their whole team. She was the leading scorer and I was the leading assister…so really, we were). All we wanted was to beat them, and have fun. So back to Sunday morning…oh, and that old team of ours? Didn’t even make the playoffs. Hee! So as usual, not only did we not have subs, but we were short a player and had to play a man down. But, we prevailed and WON! So all of our goals were accomplished. Huzzah.

Speaking of concerts, and the best and worst shows ever – it’s inspired me to make a list of my top ten concerts I’ve ever been to:

John Mayer in Asheville, NC
Barenaked Ladies in Madison Square Garden
Coldplay in Orlando
John Mayer in Gainseville, FL
Tegan and Sara in Central Park
Gavin DeGraw and Maroon Five in Orlando @ House of Blues
Keith Urban the FIRST time I saw him Jacksonville
George Strait in Jacksonville, FL
Harry Connick Jr in Wolftrap, Vienna, VA
NSync in Jacksonville (Ok, it was a long time ago…and hey, they’re good performers…leave me alone!)

Vikings vs Jaguars

2008-11-23T20:16:00.000-05:00

I have been looking forward to this game since the schedule came out and I found out the Vikings were coming to Jacksonville. Caroline managed to get some pretty decent tickets despite the fact she can no longer get a discount. I picked her up at the airport at 10am and then stopped by home and left for the game. we took the shuttle bus, which is the cheapest best option $7 each to get to and from the game. We arrived well before kickoff and settled into our seats. It was not in the opposing fans section like the Pittsburgh game, however there were a good number of Minnesota fans around. First off I wanted a Viking helmet with horns on the sides so I made a bet with Caroline. If the Vikings won I got a helmet, if the Jaguars won I would get her a massage. The game started and before I knew what was going on we had scored twice. There was a fumble on the first offensive possession and then on the second kickoff the Jags fumbled the return setting up a first and goal which we converted. Jacksonville quickly convened a team meeting before the third kickoff and then managed to hold onto the ball and put together a decent drive. One of the Jacksonville defenders managed to hit a running back as he went by and then fell to the ground motionless. After watching the replay and the medical team do their job the player stood up and walked off. After all that there was still 7 minutes left in the first quarter. The Vikings offense was not firing at all, but luckily neither was the Jags. Jacksonville missed at least two field goal attempts and the Vikings eventually won 30-12. So now I am looking for my helmet.

Also we got our Nielsen TV diary and are currently filling in the shows that we watch. I am still really excited about the fact that we are part of this.

Zack and Miri

2008-10-31T22:36:00.000-04:00

We went to see "Zack and Miri make a Porno" on Halloween night which turned out to be the best time to go see a movie. The theatre was practically empty and there were no kids or teenagers to ruin it for anyone. Caroline wanted to see it because of Seth Rogan and Elizabeth Banks and i was interested because it was written and directed by Kevin Smith. It turned out to be a cross between a Kevin Smith movie and a Seth Rogan movie it was hilarious.

Additionally we keep getting a bunch of junk mail which is addressed to us (me mostly). I can't figure out where they get our information from. A couple of weeks ago we got a card in the mail from Nielsen, yes TV ratings Nielsen, saying they would call us to see if we could help them with ratings info. Because we are never home i figured they had called and we missed them. but when i was at home waiting for Caroline to call from soccer or tennis (which one i forget) they called. I normally look at the call i.d. on the phone at let it go to the machine but this was one call i had to answer. I did a short survey and they are sending us a booklet to fill out for a week of TV watching. I AM EXCITED

Why I Haven't Posted Yet

2008-10-28T07:17:00.000-04:00

by Caroline.

I used to have a blog. Then I had another one. Then I was really excited about this one. So why haven't I posted yet?

One word...Knitting.

I'm completely obsessed. It's sad really. Poor Stewart. There is wool EVERYWHERE in this house. There are huge skeins of it on the table, in the corner and in the bedroom. There are scrap bits of it all over the floor, the table and bed. Fenway had a scrap bit on his mouth the other day and he didn't know it was there. And then he couldn't get it off. I have let this house be taken over by wool.

What's ironic is that my mom's house is completely taken over by beads. I always thought it was somewhat funny - always stepping on beads anywhere in the house. Having nowhere to eat dinner because of beads all over the table. I no longer have any room to talk.

That being said, recently I took part in a "Swap." (I know it sounds terrible.) Basically I paired up with another knitter and sent her a package, while someone else sent me one. The swap was October themed, so we could pick either Halloween or Oktoberfest. Guess which one I picked. Then it actually worked out perfectly because the woman sending me a package was from Germany! How appropriate. Her package was fun - it included German sweets and candy, yarn, a German CD of Oktoberfest songs (which has since been stolen by Stewart), stitch markers and hand-knitted mittens. I love them! My partner received a ton of Halloween stuff - in fact I might have gone a bit overboard. She loves gross, spooky things - so I included nasty looking candy and scary stuff. I also gave her nice yarn and stitch markers. She loved her package so it all worked out.

Speaking of mittens, I decided to tackle knitting a pair. But, I chickened out and just did fingerless mittens. I am so happy with how they turned out.

I have no idea who wears fingerless gloves...but who really needs full gloves in Florida?

Look - a - like

2008-10-26T21:40:00.000-04:00

I am making no comment. Over the last two and half years people at work have alternatively told me I look like

Linguini from Ratatouie (hence the foto at the start of each entry)

Pau Gasol

Abraham Lincoln

No News Is Good News

2008-10-26T21:23:00.000-04:00

Although I say there is no news I do have a few things to write about, Tennis Soccer and Home. Firstly tennis I finally won a first serve match in the new season. I moved up to 3.5 this season I have played 3 matches so far. I lost the first one 6-1, 6-4 which is fairly convincing but the first set all the first four games went to deuce and I made the mistake of scheduling it on a Saturday morning after I played mixed doubles Friday night, and lost, and then went to a party that night. My second match was closer and finished 7-6, 6-2, it was a lot of fun though. The third one I learned from my first match and we played on a Saturday afternoon. I lost the first set 6-2 but then came back to win the second 6-3 going in to the third set I knew I just had to keep putting the ball back and I would have a chance. I finally won it 7-5. Coupled with this I finally won a mixed doubles match I played Line 3 with Dee Stoudimire and we crushed the other team 6-0, 6-0.

The soccer season is finishing up we have one more game next week. We got beat tonight by the Yellow Cards. We finished the season 6-2 losing to the La Nopolera Crew and Not City teams. We did beat the Yellow Cards 3-1 during the regular season, but I don't think they had all their players that week. Unfortunately the reverse was true this time for the quarterfinals. Our two top goal scorers were absent, and another of our best players showed up at half time. By that stage we were already 3-0 down. They managed to push forward and pressure us forcing goals. After the second I moved from defense to midfield and forward. I did get one nice cross from Julio right onto my head which I smashed into the outside net of the goal. I actually played a really good game in my opinion. I had a couple of good forward passes that we failed to capitalize on. So we have our consolation game next week then we will see what happens for next season I know we are not going to pay for the entire team again.

I have been trying to work around the house to make sure the place doesn’t fall down around us. The trip arm on the toilet broke so I had the top tank open so we could at least pull the chain to make it flush but that is a little dodgy even for me. So I headed to Ace Hardwar e to see if they had the required implements to try and fix the toilet. I found the plumbing aisle had all kinds of toilet repair items and selected the required piece - a flush lever. Returning home I emptied the tank and turned the tap off so it wouldn’t refill. Then I took out what remained of the old lever and put in the new one, all up it took me 12 minutes 6 of which I spent looking for tools. A week later Caroline mentioned that the bathroom sink was draining slowly and she had put drain cleaner in it and nothing had changed. I told her I would take a look at it this past weekend. On Saturday I took apart the pipe and discovered the blockage was right at the top near the drain so I looked online at a video on clearing blocked drains and discovered how to take out the plug attachment. Once I had done this the accumulated gunk was easy to clear out and I reassembled the plug. So now we have a toilet that flushes and a sink that drains, Stewart 2 - Bathroom 0. My next job is to work on the shower....

Politics = 2% milk

2008-10-20T23:24:00.000-04:00

I have this idea that politics is like the choice between real milk and 2% milk. One choice is tasty but bad for you in the long run. The other choice is watery and tasteless but ultimately good for you. So there is no real choice both of them are wrong. I am sure this made more sense when i thought of it. Hopefully this election will turn out okay and no matter who wins there won't be any negative aftermath from supporters of the losing candidate.

The Family

2008-10-14T22:59:00.001-04:00

I came home from work today and took Fenway out to the store and got him a harness. I was worried about him because he was always straining at the lead and choking himself on his collar when I walked him. Of course when I walked him tonight with the harness he was perfect which is not like him at all but the harness was a success, huzzah!

Of course saying all that, I have not introduced the members of the family. So for anyone that is not familiar I will make the introductions. First of course is Fenway. He is our black Pomeranian that we have had for about six months. We rescued him from a place outside of Orlando. His old owner died and he was in Animal Rescue before the adoption people found him and took him out of there. Caroline spotted him on their website moments after I relented and told her we could get a dog. Once she had seen him the deal was done and we drove down to pick him up. He is a good boy most of the time his favourite passtime is eating cat food or cat poop whichever is available. After that he loves chewing holes in my socks. He has a toy rubber frog which I call New Frog. He did have a soft frog (Ramon) which he chewed the eyes off and pulled out the stuffing. I felt sorry for him and found him a new soft frog which he then proceeded to chew the eyes off in about 5 minutes, not even enough time to name the poor thing. So that is how he got New Frog.

Next is Cat. Her real name is Snow Angel but when Caroline adopted her she didn't like that name but couldn't think of a new one and after a while Cat was the one that stuck. Cat enjoys sleeping and avoiding Fenway. At first we tried to keep them apart to help Cat adjust but now we let them play and she seems to hold her own. The failsafe is to run away if Fenway gets too rough, but she will swipe him good if she needs to.

I was trying to get a photo of both of them sitting on the chair together but as soon as the camera was ready they both ran.

First Serve Summer

2008-10-02T08:24:00.000-04:00

I am a winner! I finished the first serve season with a 4-6 6-2 6-1 victory in the final. It was tough, because I hadn’t played singles in over a month. With only 4 players in the division we were supposed to play each other twice. I got my first four matches played pretty quickly and then tried to get in touch with the other guy to schedule our games but he never responded to me. So I won those games by forfeit . The finals were supposed to be played over a three week span. I was the leader at the end of the regular season so I was supposed to play my semifinal against the guy who I hadn’t played in the regular season. After checking with the league I got a pass through that round straight to the final. I was waiting for the other two guys to play their semi and wondering about the inclement weather we had been experiencing. Three days after the deadline for the semis they played and I got word that I had to play Ben. It was not a surprise he finished second in the regular season, losing to me but beating Don twice. We tried to play before the final deadline but were rained out twice in a row. The match was finally played at Epping on Thursday 25th September.
After warming up, Ben elected to let me serve first and I opened up winning the first game. I followed that by breaking his serve and jumping out to a 2-0 lead. I am not sure if it was fatigue, my crappy first serve (I may have put one in all set) or just relaxing too much but Ben came back to win the next 5 games and lead 5-2. I responded winning two more games before he closed out the set 6-4. I had missed several easy shots just swinging the racquet through and not even touching the ball. After a bathroom break we started the second set. I aced Ben with my first serve wondering where that had come from. I jumped out to another two game lead before he evened it up. Resolving not to let this set get away from me I stopped pressing so much and just got the ball back waiting for him to make mistakes. I stretched out to a lead again and served out the set 6-2. Caroline arrived just as I won the second set which was a great help.

I won the first game of the third and deciding set and then Ben equalised. At that point Caroline decided she had to go to get her knitting project finished for the baby shower on Saturday. It was fine i figured this was going to take a while anyway. After she left i managed to power through the remaining games and win 6-1. It was a relief having not played for so long and especially after winning all the regular season games. I also found myself a lucky ball which I carried in my pocket during the second and third sets.

This blogging thing....

2008-09-17T10:13:00.000-04:00

This morning Stewart received a blog post from a co-worker and we finally realized that we are among the last few who do NOT have a blog. So here it is. I'm a bit apprehensive because our friends who have blogs either:

a) Are traveling the world

b) Are pregnant or

c) have children

d) Lead marvelous and exciting lives

We fall into NONE of these categories. We do have a weird and precocious cat and a michevious puppy ... we'll see how interesting we can be.