The year I become a morning person

I've mentioned before how I feel about mornings (not fond) and how well Drew and I function in the early hours (not well). Every year Drew and I resolve to "be better in the morning." We will get up. We will be nice. We will read the news like civilized beings. We will! We will! We will! But then we don't. And we know we won't. Until this year. Yes, folks, 2008 is the year of the mornings. But we can't take all the credit, we have help. We have the Krups Grinder-Coffee Maker. And it is magical. Behold....


One of the nicer things in our kitchen, the coffee maker is making mornings a teeny bit easier. We've been morning functional for about a week now. We utilize the aroma feature and every morning we hear the faint sound of the grinder and smell a little bit of very fresh cocoa bean heaven float up the stairs. Yesterday at dinner Drew actually said he (get ready) liked the morning routine so far. Who can blame him? We begin the day like civilized adults. 2008 is one crazy year.

Friday Flicks

IMDB describes the plot of Away From Her in very simple terms--

A man coping with the institutionalization of his wife because of Alzheimer's disease faces an epiphany when she transfers her affections to another man, Aubrey, a wheel chair-bound mute who also is a patient at the nursing home.

That summary fails to capture everything that the movie really is, however. The movie features a wife with Alzheimer's but it is about marriage, memory, loss and sacrifice.

The breathtaking Julie Christie plays the suffering Fiona and she plays her beautifully. Not only is Christie physically stunning but the grace and complexity she brings to the character will continue to surprise you throughout the two hour movie. Her articulation of her disease and her resulting sadness will pierce you. You will sit on the edge of your seat and want to look away. But instead, you will stay fixed to the screen and feel your face flush with emotion you don't know how to process. Even more, her memories of the painful aspects of marriage will cut you even deeper. You'll start to hope that she'll lose those memories.--that no memory at all might be better than being plagued by the pain that she has clearly suffered throughout the 40 years with her husband. But in the end you may feel, as I did, that it is her pain that helps you understand the beauty and worth of a lengthy partnership.

This film is tragic and it is not to be handled lightly. It is dramatic and emotion laden--but it is fantastic and cathartic as well.

America At Home

I never considered myself a homebody. In high school, college and the first couple years of graduate school I loved going out. Meeting people. Spending weekends out and about. Traveling. Exploring. A night in was almost a punishment.

As I've gotten older, those tendencies have decreased. I still love going out and do it a good deal (as my shutterfly account will show). But now I also enjoy being home. Relish the weekends when Drew and I can enjoy our routine. A reward to me is staying in, reading in bed, and relaxing in our home. A movie in rather than out. Breakfast made in our own kitchen and eaten while in our pajamas. I'm not sure when the change started. Or exactly why.

But the theme of this project really resonates with me.

The co-creator of the best-selling A Day in the Life and America 24/7 book series invites you to participate in America at Home, a nationwide photo project, September 17 to 23, 2007. For seven days, everyone in America is invited to join 100 of the nation's leading photojournalists to capture "the emotions of home." The goal of the project is to capture the extraordinary diversity that makes up American family life, representing a broad range of economic, geographic, racial, political, and socially diverse lifestyles.

The Daily Assignments range from Bedtime Rituals and Your Sanctuary. There are some photos on the site and more to come in a book

Free time+marriage=cooking from scratch

Pyrohy: Ukrainian equivalent of ravioli; a dough pocket filled with potato

Drew and I both grew up eating pyrohy (only since I lived near Pittsburgh, I called them perogies). Since it is the beginning of our semester and a three day weekend, Drew and I had a little free time on our hands.* We decided to put our culinary artistry to the test and make our favorite food. We normally eat good ole Mrs. T's (in bulk) but figured we could at least attempt to make them from scratch.


I'm not really sure why...we don't make anything from scratch. Actually, we don't really make anything. Buuuuut it is 2007 and we are two crazy kids.

Step One: The dough

*skipping lots of boring steps in between*

Step Twenty: Complete Pyrohy (all stuffed and ready to be cooked)

To toot our own horn (may I do that?)....we did VERY well. Check it out!

Final Step: Sautee! Yummy!

*And by free time I mean we wanted to procrastinate.

**More pictures found at my shutterfly account on the right.

Some words about love

I love you so much that if I was on the Real World, I would hook up with you and then NOT hook up with your best friend in the house....

...I love you so much that I always warn you when I open the dishwasher door to let the dishes dry. I don't want you to trip like Zach Braff's mom on Garden State.

Santa's little helper

I only share this because (a) Drew took the time to make it and (b) it is ridiculously funny.

You should probably sit down...and not watch it at work.

You can play it twice. I don't mind.

If you want more things to keep you busy, check out Kos' analysis about 08. Someday when I'm not bogged down thinking about photos like THESE, I'm going to try and write about 08 as well. But I will say that I like his stuff about Edwards. I would love a Gore/Edwards ticket. I may drop out of school and work on that one...

A word about change

D: I'm really starting to like this Coke Zero...

K: Really? I don't trust it.

D: I know! I used to think it was the devil's drink. ...*big drink* apparently I am morally flexible!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Discomfort with flying and fear of failing out of graduate school grounded us in GA this holiday. And although we missed our families a great deal, we had a perfectly Drew and Kristen holiday. We decided that our first holiday as a married couple brought an opportunity to relax in our own home and invent new holiday traditions.

I welcome you to a very, merry Kristen and Drew Thanksgiving:


We have cranberries, too....with Prosecco!:

And lots of movie watching (reviews forthcoming):

And since pies are not to be trusted, Drew made CHEESECAKES! Yummy:

Happy Thanksgiving!