December 5, 2006
· By Megan · Filed under life
Today while walking across campus I noticed a couple of birds flitting about in the trees. Upon closer examination of the birds, I realized they were blue. Now I only know of three birds that are mostly-blue: blue jays, indigo buntings, and bluebirds. Jays are easy enough to figure out, and I’ve never known anyone who’s seen a bunting before. So my gut reaction was bluebird.
And lo and behold, after looking them up at Cornell University’s All About Birds site, I’m right. A new bird for me: the Eastern Bluebird. I’m happy.
Photo courtesy of Splinter Group at Flickr under a Creative Commons license. Thanks Splinter Group!
December 3, 2006
· By Megan · Filed under house, life
For the first time in many years, I’m actually decorating for Christmas. I suppose this is partly because Amy and I live together, and she hauled all the boxes upstairs yesterday. Decorating in past years has seemed a somewhat pointless activity - I’m never home for Christmas anyway, so why put the effort into it when I won’t be around to enjoy it?
This year, though, is different. It’s our first Christmas living in the same (single) house. It’s the first Christmas with intermingled ornaments and decorations. And it’s a Christmas where we’re scaling back our travel plans a bit so that we can actually enjoy the holidays rather than rush-rush-rush all over the country. I’m looking forward to it.
So what have we done?
- Amy put lights on the house and the shrubs along the driveway.
- Amy put up my little fake tree (!!!)
- I decorated the little fake tree.
- Amy put candle-lights into all the windows.
I’ve spent the bulk of today wrapping the gifts I’ve already purchased. They’re sitting on the floor below the little fake tree.
It’s nice to have decorated like this. Now all we have to do is figure out what Christmas cards we want to send to people and get those addressed, written, and mailed. Along with figuring out the rest of the present situation, the rest of the travel situation, and the dogs-in-kennel situation. Not too much to do in 18 days, is it? Along with working full-time (me), helping build a house (Amy), being on-call for childcare duty when Amy’s sister goes into labor (Amy), and playing hockey two night a week (both of us) and soccer one night a week (Amy). We’ve got it pretty easy, all things considered.
