I got this e-mail from a friend last week and thought it would make for a fun blog post.
1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? I love wrapping paper. I have a book filled with wrapping paper designs from the 1960's. I used to work doing gift wrap one summer. Wrapping our family Christmas presents and making gift bags has been one of the most exciting things I did this week. That being said, Gerrit's present is in a gift bag because it was nearly impossible to wrap well.
2. Real tree or artificial? I'd rather have a real tree. We didn't actually have our own tree this year since we'll be visiting Gerrit's family for Christmas.
3. When do you put up the tree? Ummm...sometime two weeks or so before Christmas?
4. When do you take the tree down? Sometime after New Year's.
5. Do you like eggnog? I like the flavor better than the texture, so I greatly prefer it as ice cream or a milkshake.
6. Favorite gift received as a child? I remember being pretty excited about my American Girl doll and various games and bikes.
7. Hardest person to buy for? Either of our fathers.
8. Easiest person to buy for? I guess my brother James, because he always has a specific list of things he wants, and if not, he's fine with me giving him a different geography/travel trivia book every time.
9. Mail or e-mail Christmas cards? Err..this assumes I send Christmas cards. Someday!
10. Do you have a nativity scene? Not yet, but I really want one. I may either buy one with my parent's Christmas money or ask for one for my birthday next year.
11. Worst Christmas gift you ever received? I really can't think of any bad presents. I'm pretty easy to please, present-wise.
12. Favorite Christmas movie? Muppet Christmas Carol
13. When do you start shopping for Christmas? Usually around the end of November/start of December. This year, though, we didn't buy anything until two or three days ago.
14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? No...but we may have done that with certain duplicate/triplicate wedding presents.
15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? The Stuart family Christmas Eve tradition: Root beer floats and sugar cookies.
16. Lights on the tree? Definitely.
17. Favorite Christmas Song? Angels We Have Heard on High
18. Travel at Christmas or stay home? I've technically traveled for the past six Christmases, but always going to either my family's house or Gerrit's family's house. Maybe in the future we'll stay home, but for now it's nice to spend with our families. If only we could go to both in one holiday!
19. Can you name all of Santa's reindeer? Probably only if I start singing Rudolph, and then I make no guarantees. I could also probably do it with Google.
20. Angel on the tree-top or a star? I think my family has a star on top.
21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? We always open them in the morning. We wake up around 6, open presents, and then we make pancakes. Also, we always start with Santa presents, open our stockings, and then alternate presents under the tree.
22. Most annoying thing about this time of year? Right now, it would be the combination of traffic and slushy, icy roads.
23. Favorite ornament theme or color? We never had a themed tree, just a bunch of family ornaments and I think our tree is beautiful. There are a lot of memories involved with setting up the tree.
24. Favorite food for Christmas dinner? My family eats our big dinner on Christmas Eve, and it is delicious! Thanks to the beautiful California weather, my dad grills steak and we have it with blue cheese potatoes and my mom's super-wonderful crescent rolls.
25. What do you want for Christmas this year? A long break from schoolwork...hey, I get that! And I get to spend time with my husband and his family! Looks like a wonderful Christmas.
Saturday, December 20, 2008
The Count-Up
As an undergraduate, I would always count down until the end of my finals. Now, my finals tend to be papers with semi-flexible page requirements and take-home tests so I'm never really sure when I am going to be done. Instead of a count-down, I have a count-up of how many pages I've finished. This is what I've been up to these past two weeks. You can also see why there haven't really been blog posts during that time. I'm just glad that these are my last finals and final papers. Nothing but thesis credits from here!
The Last of the Bookbinding Projects
I haven't actually put any of the bookbinding projects up since mid-semester, mostly because some of my projects didn't really turn out so well. Here's the run-down on all the end-of-the-year projects.
Project #1: Paper-case book
This book uses only handmade paper on the cover (no board). It also involves a lot of very careful measuring and folding. I messed up this careful measuring and folding. Hence, the stitching you see is less a design element, more of an attempt to hide my major mistake. I'm not a big fan of how this one turned out.
Project #2: Clamshell box
These boxes are designed to protect books from wear and tear. I decided to make a box for my wedding sign-in book. My completed project looks best from a distance. I learned a few valuable lessons. A) Do not attempt to back heavy, slippery, only somewhat ironable fabric. If you do, realize it's about 3 times thicker than other cloth and adjust measurements accordingly. B) Be more careful with my scalpel. C) Watch where I put my stupid glue-covered fingers. Sooo...here's some not-too-close shots.
Project #3: Final (Japanese Stab Bindings)
For all my problems with the other two projects, I LOVED this project. I made four books with each one representing a different season. Picking out the paper and the fabric was a lot of fun and I also tried my hand at dying my own paper. The paper inside the summer book is dyed with three different flavors of Kool-Aid, and the paper inside the fall book is dyed with apple cinnamon herbal tea. They look cool and they still (2 weeks later) smell delicious! The other two books have printed paper interspersed with the plain paper. Stab bindings connect single sheets of paper with the covers and then they are tied together with thread or ribbon. Here's how they turned out:
Spring
Summer and the yummy Kool-Aid pages.
Fall
Winter
Project #1: Paper-case book
This book uses only handmade paper on the cover (no board). It also involves a lot of very careful measuring and folding. I messed up this careful measuring and folding. Hence, the stitching you see is less a design element, more of an attempt to hide my major mistake. I'm not a big fan of how this one turned out.
Project #2: Clamshell box
These boxes are designed to protect books from wear and tear. I decided to make a box for my wedding sign-in book. My completed project looks best from a distance. I learned a few valuable lessons. A) Do not attempt to back heavy, slippery, only somewhat ironable fabric. If you do, realize it's about 3 times thicker than other cloth and adjust measurements accordingly. B) Be more careful with my scalpel. C) Watch where I put my stupid glue-covered fingers. Sooo...here's some not-too-close shots.
Project #3: Final (Japanese Stab Bindings)
For all my problems with the other two projects, I LOVED this project. I made four books with each one representing a different season. Picking out the paper and the fabric was a lot of fun and I also tried my hand at dying my own paper. The paper inside the summer book is dyed with three different flavors of Kool-Aid, and the paper inside the fall book is dyed with apple cinnamon herbal tea. They look cool and they still (2 weeks later) smell delicious! The other two books have printed paper interspersed with the plain paper. Stab bindings connect single sheets of paper with the covers and then they are tied together with thread or ribbon. Here's how they turned out:
Spring
Summer and the yummy Kool-Aid pages.
Fall
Winter
Happy Birthday to Gerrit!
Earlier this month we celebrated Gerrit's birthday. It was a fairly relaxed celebration, but relaxing may be the best kind of celebration for us right now anyways. We started off the day by walking down to Great Harvest for breakfast bread and then continued talking our walk around the neighborhood and talking. We also played a lot of Monopoly, which was Gerrit's requested birthday present. Like any typical celebration, we mostly celebrated with food. We had a lot of fun making baked beef and potato empanadas, caesar salad, peanut-butter filled brownie cupcakes, and sparkling strawberry lemonade slush.
Peanut butter-filled brownie cupcakes. Yum!
Strawberry lemonade slush.
The empanadas are one of Gerrit's favorite foods from his mission to Argentina and the slush shows up at just about every special occasion dinner we have. In this birthday/holiday spirit, here's the recipe
Sparkling Strawberry Lemonade Slush
(from bettycrocker.com)
1 bag frozen strawberries, thawed (8 oz.)
1 can frozen lemonade concentrate, thawed
1 cup water
6 cups Sprite
Mix together strawberries, lemonade, water, and 1 cup Sprite in blender until smooth. Put in a freezer-safe plastic container and freeze at least 4 hours. If it freezes longer, it will need to sit at room temperature 15-30 minutes before serving until it reaches a slushy consistency. Mix equal portions slush and Sprite in cup; stir together. Enjoy!
You could probably switch up the fruits that you use or the frozen beverage mix...I really want to try it with limeade. I also like eating the frozen slush plain, but Gerrit wants me to warn people that it's very tart without the Sprite added.
Peanut butter-filled brownie cupcakes. Yum!
Strawberry lemonade slush.
The empanadas are one of Gerrit's favorite foods from his mission to Argentina and the slush shows up at just about every special occasion dinner we have. In this birthday/holiday spirit, here's the recipe
Sparkling Strawberry Lemonade Slush
(from bettycrocker.com)
1 bag frozen strawberries, thawed (8 oz.)
1 can frozen lemonade concentrate, thawed
1 cup water
6 cups Sprite
Mix together strawberries, lemonade, water, and 1 cup Sprite in blender until smooth. Put in a freezer-safe plastic container and freeze at least 4 hours. If it freezes longer, it will need to sit at room temperature 15-30 minutes before serving until it reaches a slushy consistency. Mix equal portions slush and Sprite in cup; stir together. Enjoy!
You could probably switch up the fruits that you use or the frozen beverage mix...I really want to try it with limeade. I also like eating the frozen slush plain, but Gerrit wants me to warn people that it's very tart without the Sprite added.
Sunday, December 7, 2008
First-Name Basis
For some reason, people get my name wrong a lot. When they do, they tend to call me Stephanie. Three years ago, I was working on a group project for a marketing class. The other girl in my group was convinced for about three weeks that my name was Stephanie. The first time she said it, I couldn't quite hear her so I didn't say anything. The next time, it was just really awkward. Finally, I think one of the other people in my group told her that my name was Elisabeth.
Currently, the only girls in my grad program cohort are me and my friend Stephanie. People tend to meet both of us at the same time, so they tend to confuse our names fairly often. I'm pretty sure this has to be the reason because otherwise we really don't look that much alike. We asked other people in our program if we look similar and the response we got was "Well, maybe if you ignore the hair, and the face, and the clothes, and pretty much everything else..." I can think of at least three professors (including one who did this on a practically weekly basis in class) and three other students who have done this. This name switching generally doesn't bother me, though. Stephanie is awesome, so why wouldn't I want to get mistaken for her?
This Monday, though, the whole "me being Stephanie" thing went a little bit further than usual. I received this letter from my doctor's office:
At first, I thought it might be for someone else, but it had my address and all of the correct insurance information. This is from people who for legal and insurance reasons should really know my name! I'm sure that Stephanie Larsen is the name right under Elisabeth Larsen on their patient list, but it was still kind of trippy. Maybe the universe is trying to send me some sort of message about my name...
Currently, the only girls in my grad program cohort are me and my friend Stephanie. People tend to meet both of us at the same time, so they tend to confuse our names fairly often. I'm pretty sure this has to be the reason because otherwise we really don't look that much alike. We asked other people in our program if we look similar and the response we got was "Well, maybe if you ignore the hair, and the face, and the clothes, and pretty much everything else..." I can think of at least three professors (including one who did this on a practically weekly basis in class) and three other students who have done this. This name switching generally doesn't bother me, though. Stephanie is awesome, so why wouldn't I want to get mistaken for her?
This Monday, though, the whole "me being Stephanie" thing went a little bit further than usual. I received this letter from my doctor's office:
At first, I thought it might be for someone else, but it had my address and all of the correct insurance information. This is from people who for legal and insurance reasons should really know my name! I'm sure that Stephanie Larsen is the name right under Elisabeth Larsen on their patient list, but it was still kind of trippy. Maybe the universe is trying to send me some sort of message about my name...
Happy Thanksgiving!
This Thanksgiving, Gerrit and I had the opportunity to visit my family in San Jose and we had a blast! This was the longest I've gone without being in California since my family has lived there, and it was nice to go back and enjoy the wonderful people and the warm, warm weather.
Some notable highlights of our trip:
-Seeing my family and being able to talk with them for a long time! Yay! I love my family!
-Tasty Thanksgiving dinner with our family and friends followed by the traditional game of Trivial Pursuit.
-Actually getting to relax and enjoy time together! That's not really too common with both of us working on a thesis, working part time, and all our other classes and responsibilities.
-Gerrit particularly enjoyed playing Super Mario Galaxy on the wii, although he's still a little sad that my little sister beat his record on Big Brain Academy.
-Making my own pie for the first time ever. The crust was not quite the tastiest, but the dutch apple part was yummy!
-Listening to the guy behind us on the airplane flirt with the girl sitting next to him the whole time. He got her number at the end of the flight, so he must have been at least somewhat successful.
-When I told the stewardess that Gerrit had been looking forward to the airline cookies all day (no joke), she gave him an extra pack of tasty cookies. Which he was also nice enough to share :)
-Now, for our big adventure:
The day after Thanksgiving, my family held our own kind of "Turkey Bowl." We had a photo scavenger hunt that pitted the guys against the girls and had you hunt across the area for various Thanksgiving-related objects. It was a really fun activity and great to get out and do something active. Some of our quests involved buying food for the local food bank, taking a picture of your team crossing a body of water (like the Pilgrims), taking a picture of something you are thankful for, finding people with Christmas decorations up, imitating turkeys, taking a picture of the longest line you could find, making leaf art, and finding a local restaurant with the most varieties of pie. The men tried to get extra credit by bringing home a pie, but sadly that pie was terrible. No one could finish a slice. If you live in the San Jose area, I do not recommend the pecan pie at the Flames. Try something else. Anything else.
The funny thing ended up being how many things are teams did exactly the same. We both made smiley faces out of leaves, took pictures of the local church for a "thankful for" picture, and went to the exact same local restaurant that sells 16 varieties of pie. I guess that whole "being related" thing leads you to think similarly.
Here are some of the pictures from the scavenger hunt:
We were supposed to get a team picture of everyone on your team on a slide. I think my dad took the picture instead.
This picture was kind of awkward to take because the people were out decorating while we took it.
Leaf art
Gerrit and my brothers imitating turkeys. Let's just say that the one of me and my sister is NOT going on the internet any time soon.
Happy Thanksgiving!
Some notable highlights of our trip:
-Seeing my family and being able to talk with them for a long time! Yay! I love my family!
-Tasty Thanksgiving dinner with our family and friends followed by the traditional game of Trivial Pursuit.
-Actually getting to relax and enjoy time together! That's not really too common with both of us working on a thesis, working part time, and all our other classes and responsibilities.
-Gerrit particularly enjoyed playing Super Mario Galaxy on the wii, although he's still a little sad that my little sister beat his record on Big Brain Academy.
-Making my own pie for the first time ever. The crust was not quite the tastiest, but the dutch apple part was yummy!
-Listening to the guy behind us on the airplane flirt with the girl sitting next to him the whole time. He got her number at the end of the flight, so he must have been at least somewhat successful.
-When I told the stewardess that Gerrit had been looking forward to the airline cookies all day (no joke), she gave him an extra pack of tasty cookies. Which he was also nice enough to share :)
-Now, for our big adventure:
The day after Thanksgiving, my family held our own kind of "Turkey Bowl." We had a photo scavenger hunt that pitted the guys against the girls and had you hunt across the area for various Thanksgiving-related objects. It was a really fun activity and great to get out and do something active. Some of our quests involved buying food for the local food bank, taking a picture of your team crossing a body of water (like the Pilgrims), taking a picture of something you are thankful for, finding people with Christmas decorations up, imitating turkeys, taking a picture of the longest line you could find, making leaf art, and finding a local restaurant with the most varieties of pie. The men tried to get extra credit by bringing home a pie, but sadly that pie was terrible. No one could finish a slice. If you live in the San Jose area, I do not recommend the pecan pie at the Flames. Try something else. Anything else.
The funny thing ended up being how many things are teams did exactly the same. We both made smiley faces out of leaves, took pictures of the local church for a "thankful for" picture, and went to the exact same local restaurant that sells 16 varieties of pie. I guess that whole "being related" thing leads you to think similarly.
Here are some of the pictures from the scavenger hunt:
We were supposed to get a team picture of everyone on your team on a slide. I think my dad took the picture instead.
This picture was kind of awkward to take because the people were out decorating while we took it.
Leaf art
Gerrit and my brothers imitating turkeys. Let's just say that the one of me and my sister is NOT going on the internet any time soon.
Happy Thanksgiving!
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