# 2 and 3

Photos #2 and #3 are from the last weekend of Christmas vacation.

#2 Money Tree

Went to a surprise 60th birthday for Andrea's mom and one of the gifts was a money tree. Very cute idea.

#3 Snow
So I'll always have snow...a Christmas gift snow globe!

Going to work on taking better pictures now that I have my actual camera since I'm back in the burg. Been using just my phone for the past three.

01-01-10

It's a new year and I've decided to start a project that you'll be able to watch as the year goes by. I'm going to do a photoblog for the entire 365 days of 2010. What's a photoblog? Well, basically I'm going to take a picture every day for the next year. Just to see what I see each day and remember the year a little better.

The idea came from Beth, one of my Jagernaut kickball team members. She's almost through 300 days of her project and it's really interesting. She got the idea from this site http://photojojo.com/content/tutorials/project-365-take-a-photo-a-day/ and one of her friends doing the project.

So here goes! I'm going to try and post most days but might do a posting for a week. Not sure yet. Going to use a mixture of whatever cameras I have close by whether that's my iphone, FinePix at home, or the Nikon at work. I'm excited for 2010!

Photo #1: Just me. Enjoying a lazy New Years Day at home.

Countdown to Christmas

Made this countdown to Christmas calendar last night out of all recycled materials (grocery bags and catalogs/magazines)! The ladies in the office are enjoying their piece of chocolate each day until the big day. :)

Sailing

One of the perks of attending a conference is getting to do a few fun things that the area has to offer that you might not have where you're from or that you just don't get to try. Today, since the conference doesn't technically start til tomorrow, and my meeting duties were over in the morning, I tried out sailing. The conference offered either sailing or kayaking trip and since I haven't EVER been on a sail boat I thought that should be my choice. Very fun and our instructor, a 14 year old very aware and impressive young lady, taught us how to tack and all that stuff. And the view of San Diego was gorgeous! Can't wait to explore with Andrea at the end of the week.

Wifi in the sky

Pretty crazy that the day has come that not only can you fly through the air to another city across the country in just a few hours, BUT now you can get WiFi on that flight for FREE. At least for first time users. Pretty cool. On my way to San Diego to spend a week living in luxury (I think) at the Loews Coronado Bay resort. I'll post pictures later. Unfortunately I'll be spending that week in meetings but will try and fit some fun times in there too like a trip to Tecate Mexico! :) Friday starts a very fun West Coast vacation though and Ms. Fabulous herself is flying out to share in the fun in San Diego and then when we become high rollers in Las Vegas. More to come...

Master Naturalist Class

I have been taking a class since September and am becoming a Master Naturalist. It's a really fun class and I enjoy being back in a class learning new things each week. We have had classes on all types of topics - trees, reptiles, mammals, birds, ecology, interpretive skills, etc. We are nearing the end of the class and I have to say I'm a little sad that it's ending. We had our last field trip this weekend and went over to the Eastern Shore for some birding. Stopped at Kiptopeke Park, Fisherman's Island Wildlife Refuge, and the dump (yes, the dump - there's a pond there that had a TON of birds).

The coolest thing we did was go to the bird banding station which I'm thinking I might try and volunteer there as part of my required 40 hours/year. They set up mist nets all day and count, measure, and band all the birds they catch. Here are the volunteers doing their thing.

And some bird bands - sizes dependent on the type of bird they catch.

And the size of bird that I got to hold and release!!! :) I release a Yellow Rumped Warbler - which was the most common bird we caught that day.

And then we got to see some hawks which was VERY cool.

New Craft Projects

Visited the Russo's in WV and got inspired to do some crafting. In fact, we visited Michael's THREE times in the week I was there. :)

Jes has been knitting for a while, and even Rob has given me a washcloth that he knitted, so Jes was trying to make a knitter out of me too. I have to say I can see her excitement when going to the yarn store. There are just so many colors and different kinds, all very organized also, and you can't help but imagine all the things you could make with them. So the first visit to the yarn store Jes bought some stuff and I just looked around. I felt like I needed a knitting lesson first. Well I got a refresher course - the first time she tried to teach me it just didn't work. But this time something clicked and it made more sense. That still meant that while knitting I had to seriously concentrate and couldn't talk to anyone or I would mess up! :) Hopefully I will get better at that as time goes on and I can join in on Jes's weekly knitting group again. Here are some pictures from the yarn store and of me learning and then my current project - a scarf.

We taught Jes how to decoupage (spelling?) that weekend too and she made a super cute canvas for Ellie. I can't wait to see what Rob will come up with for the matching canvas.

Lastly, I had seen this craft on a blog and wanted to try it. It turned out alright. Still not sure if I like it or not. It's super girly - which I'm sure part of it was my color choice. I was going for a spring time wreath since I already have a fall and christmas wreath. We'll see if I keep it or give it as a gift. :)