Habari Gani? (What's the news?)

Just returned from Carefree, Arizona, where I was presenting a poster at the American Association for Cancer Research's Science of Health Disparities conference. Yes, that's a mouthful.

We stayed in Carefree, about 30 miles outside of Phoenix. Ophelia came along, as well as Sam's mom, and we got to visit lots with my sis-in-law Erin who lives in Tempe.

I totally sucked at picture taking this trip. I forgot my camera often, but took a few photos with my phone, which I just figured out how to email to myself. We'll see how much that cost me...

Ophelia was great to travel with. We are so lucky to have such a ridiculously happy baby. But what was even better was her reaction when we got home. She was screaming with excitement when she saw the dogs, and we walked around the house as she cooed and talked to everything she had missed, including the shower curtain and her clothes. What can I say? She's easily amused, just like her mother. When Sam got home from work she was squealing and squeaking for an hour. Totally cool.

This was someone's sweet car at the place we ate breakfast.

Uh, this was O's sweet breakfast -- a menu. She's really into paper right now.

Aunt Erin and O -- so kindly letting me eat while I drooled over Erin's chocolate chip pancakes. Stupid gluten.

Grandma Cathy and O outside Erin's house.

"Yes, I'm stuck on the corner of Bloody Basin Road and Tranquil Trail. Which way would you suggest I go?" OR "My address? Sure, it's 134 Bloody Basin Road...yes..bloody...B-L-O-O..."
OR in the words of Liz Lemon, "I want to go to there!"

For some reason Erin's neighbor collects these Mark VIIIs, or whatever they are. No, not old Lincoln Mark Vs, which would be pretty cool and pimpin', but 90s Lincolns. This is ridiculous. This is a picture of four of the six that were sitting there.

Sam and I are competing in a triathlon with Team in Training to raise money for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. We're doing this to get fit, to meet the challenge of completing a triathlon (1000 meter swim -- almost a mile, 28 mile bike, 6 mile run), and to raise money for a good cause.

Some of you know that my Uncle Hap is fighting chronic lymphocytic leukemia right now, my brother H.R. defeated Hodgkin's lymphoma about 15 years ago, and my Dad's (and Uncle Hap's) mother passed away from blood cancer. We've had leukemia and lymphoma affect three generations of our family. Let's stop it from attacking a fourth.

You can donate online at my personal Team in Training site.

Sam's site will be online tomorrow, and I'll put a link up. I'll also be sending out an email as well as snail mail, so you'll be reminded in many ways! Know that every dollar counts, so please donate anything that you can. We'll also take offers of babysitting, as we have to train 6 days a week. More details to come.

Obamicon.me

Nina would be proud.

It truly is a new dawn, a new day...

And this old world
is a new world
And a bold world
For me

And I'm feeling good.

more music charts

RIP Ron Asheton, who put the fun in Funhouse, one of my all-time favorite albums. So much so, that when the complete Funhouse sessions boxset came out in 2001, I could listen to an entire CD of versions of "Loose."

Ahh, perfection.

It has become a New Year's Eve tradition for us to have a super-informal, BYO everything get-together amongst a small group of friends. We play Apples to Apples (and I kick ass, hands down. well, at least this year) and eat a lot of sugar. Last time we toasted chicken legs, this time it was pork.

But the best part is the Christmas tree burning. Anyone who wants to bring their tree does, and we burn them in the back yard. Yes, in the middle of the City. Everyone else shoots guns, and this doesn't involve stray bullets...

Dry pine + gasoline = AWESOMENESS.






After burning our trees, Sam and Tom trolled the alleys looking for more. And found more. Next year we're buying every tree on clearance just to have more fire.

I'm a little down. I always get bummed out after something really exciting is over, and this year has been exciting, indeed. I was also uber-stressed about doing the holidays with Ophelia after she had just gotten into a napping and sleeping schedule, and while she's teething and crabby. And I paid the price for it. But, now things can get back to normal, and she doesn't care. It's just that the only thing in the world that can really just kill a mom is feeling like you can't make your baby happy.

I'm also not looking forward to going back to work and school, and I have some work I need to get done before those things begin again in the next week or two.

But, we've had a wonderful year, and I couldn't be more grateful for our beautiful daughter, our wonderful family and friends, our home, our jobs, and the opportunities we've been given. I think '09 is gonna be a good one too.

Anyway, many exciting moments of the last week or so to share through photos:

Ophelia is starting to eat rice cereal and LOVES it. Tonight she kept grabbing the spoon and shoving it in her mouth. These photos are from her very first feeding!



These photos are from Christmas morning, and are probably my favorite photos of her yet. I absolutely refuse to use a flash (which is why so many of my photos are dark. And blurry. Though I like to think of them as "arty." :) ) but here the light was good. I priced some of the fancy digital SLR cameras at Best Buy this week but they are waaaaay out of my price league. I'd love to have one so that I could manually focus and take better photos without the flash. But I digress... Look how adorable she is!!!!



Lana made her a bunch of totally cool leg warmers from socks, and these snowflake ones are my favorites. She wore them three days in a row. Slept in 'em once too.

A first family Christmas self-portrait

Mutt tires of Christmas

Erin and Colleen getting their O fix

A totally rad Christmas gift from my mom was The Peekaru, a fleecy vest that goes over a baby carrier so I can keep O and I warm while we're outside. Bask in its awesomeness! Ophelia loved it, we were both toasty, and we got lots of attention on our walk to Bread Co.

And there ain't nuthin' cuter than a naked baby. I do have some with her toes in her mouth but they're from a little too revealing angle for the blogosphere...Maybe I'll crop them and post later.






I also haven't had a chance to talk about all the pork we have. We have lots of pork. A whole pig of pork, actually. This is one attempt to reduce our carbon footprint, to know the health and well-being of our food from cradle to our mouths, to buy locally, and to save money. But rather than me try to describe the how and why, I'll send you to Larissa's post about the hog harvest. She and Jason are our friends and local farmers, who raised Dagmar and Cocoa from piglet to plate. It's a darn good thing they're doin', and if it weren't for them, it would have been difficult for us to be so close to our meat. Our (half) cow comes next, in a few weeks. That will be a pro job, however. If this sounds at all appealing to you, read Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life. And thanks to Lindsay for not shutting up about that book when she first read it. :)