Headed home

We had a fabulous extended weekend in Grand Junction, and now it's time to head home. We have a Captain, Commander and Lieutenant Commander, so we're set.

Random pictures round up!

I knit a scarf for my younger sister Rae for Christmas, and it turned out to be a really long project, but I was really proud of the results! I feel like it would have benefitted being about 1/3 longer than it was, but for once a scarf I made didn't suffer from being unwearably short!

I had a knee surgery that went very well!

I knit another scarf, this time for Lou, my first eternity scarf.

My dogs were concerned while I was recovering, and were my constant companions.

Had Christmas at my parents' house, Andrew bought me a beautiful dress for Christmas!

Had Second Christmas (like Second Breakfast but better) at the Waterhouse's, Lucy loved Jack!

Lots of playing in the snow...which means getting snow boots on!

This has been such a lovely holiday.

Our Election Night station! Baited breath!

Fancy s'mores

What does one do if one finds graham crackers made by such an esteemed bakery as Tulie? Well, fancy s'mores, of course! (All Andrew's idea)

Lovely weather

There was a certain nip to the air this morning--autumn is here! Andrew and I are going to head up the canyon to look at some fall leaves today, I haven't had the chance yet and don't want to miss them!

I was at the USEE conference this weekend and feel really fired up about my work and the contributions this form of education provides to kids. I went birding on one of the field trips and saw about 15 species, some really gorgeous birds, including two Sandhill cranes who were trumpeting while in flight.

We're getting breakfast at Finn's, as usual for a Sunday, and I'm ready for a great day!

Relaxing at home

I felt so productive today! Went to work this morning and did three back to back programs, booked a couple field trips and then left early to get my car looked at. Andrew and I got lunch at Cafe Rio, because I was craving Mexican and currently have an addiction to their pork barbacoa. Then we got the battery replaced in my car, took care of stuff at the bank and then came back home. Did some vacuuming, took a nice long shower (I LOVE Lush lotions) and sang with Andrew for a bit.

Andrew made an incredible dinner tonight as well--bone-in chicken, udon noodles with butter and brown sugar, and peas and pancetta. Totally blew my mind!

Sue and Will came to visit this weekend, it was so great seeing then. We went to dinner Friday night at a new favorite--Frida's Bistro. I think it was described as fusion Mexican cuisine, but whatever it was it was incredible. I had buffalo short ribs with some crazy potatoes and an incredibly vibrant pepper and kale salad. Everything was spot on, complex flavors, excellent and creative ingredients, gorgeous plating. They also have creepy baby dolls hanging from the ceiling...what's not to love?

We had a great visit to the Apple store, wonderful conversation and a lovely breakfast at Finn's Sunday morning. Really great weekend, even though mine was a bit short :)

My Warby Parker Prestons came in!

Oh my gosh, where did my paragraphs in my other post go?! I'll need to fix that!

I need some advice. I received an e-mail from a volunteer today complaining about the behavior of my boss (not realizing she is my boss) during one of our events. If it were an e-mail about anyone else, I would just forward it to their supervisor, but this person is MY supervisor, and if I forward it to HER supervisor it will absolutely get connected back to me. I doubt this will go well.

Should I just forward it to her directly? Should I never show it to her and placate the volunteer myself?

Time for an update! Feeling a bit glum today, so disregard if my descriptions sound a bit damp. It's been a busy summer! Now that it's September and my summer staff are gone and summer camps are over and we are moving into school-year type duties at work, I can officially say that this summer tested me a bit past what I was probably prepared for. I coordinated and prepped all of our summer camps and on-site programs (tours and stuff), managed two full-time summer staff and two full-time interns, trained and managed 15 or so education volunteers, along with helping with whatever the crisis of the day was. Many weeks were 45-50 hour weeks, and I felt a bit like I was just holding on for dear life and trying not to screw up too much. Which I didn't! Yay! I learned a lot, and have changes I'd like to make for next summer. But I'm incredibly grateful that summer is over. Andrew had summer school and took Physiology and its lab, and rocked it! It's neat to see how the classes he is taking really build upon one another. It's getting harder and harder to win debates with Andrew. This is becoming a problem. July 31st was our two year anniversary! Crazy! I made a scavenger hunt for Andrew (http://www.flickr.com/photos/49088378@N08/sets/72157630843057344/with/7686490580/) and we had a great dinner at Faustina's, a restaurant downtown that we hadn't been to before. A friend gave us a gift certificate to the restaurant a while ago, so we decided to give it a go. I had something called a 'braided salmon crown', which was in fact a long flank of salmon cut into three lengths, the lengths were braided and arranged into a circle and then the crown was poached in white wine. Incredible! Andrew had some lamb that was to die for. Dessert was creme brulee (awesome) and the most heavenly blueberry souffle. The end of my last super busy summer week came with a trip to Palo Alto for the wedding of a friend (the one I made the Bridal Shower for One video for). The wedding was absolutely gorgeous and it was a great celebration. I got lost in downtown San Fran Thursday night while trying to navigate to a bridesmaid dinner in the city, while Andrew took our stuff to our hotel in Palo Alto, because we had just landed in CA. Cell phone technology is amazing, but only works if the phone has battery, and I found myself with a dead phone shortly after getting off at a wrong bus stop and was nowhere near the restaurant. Found a bar, got a beer, sipped it to chill out (read: avoid full tilt panic) while the bartender charged my phone and chatted with me. Called Andrew when my phone had enough juice, flagged a taxi and got to the restaurant! Wedding stuff was Fri and Sat, I sang in the wedding (TERRIFYING!) and we got back to the hotel late, full of great food and happy/exhausted. Slept like stones, woke up the next morning and returned the rental car to the airport. Then went into San Fran! I have photos, but I'm still not done compiling them yet. Right now they are strewn between my little lap top, Andrew's cell phone, my cell phone and Andrew's computer. We got into San Francisco early afternoon, checked into an INCREDIBLE hotel that had a strong literature theme throughout (Hotel Rex, so cool, thank you Sue and Will!) and then got out into the city. We walked over to Coit Tower on Telegraph Hill, got lunch along the way, then walked around the city a bit more until we went to go see Beach Blanket Babylon (holy crap, there is nothing one can do to entirely prepare for that experience, it was hilarious and wonderful and flooring and bizarre). We then went to the pier, got some clam chowder, went to the Museum Mechanique, got some hot chocolate and walked back to the hotel. Unconscious in minutes! Next morning, got breakfast at a 50's themed diner with a hilariously grumpy hostess, which we went to when we came with Loni in college, and then went to the MOMA. Explored the entire thing, seriously enjoyed the Cindy Sherman exhibit. Found a little cafe for sandwiches on our way back to the hotel, and then hitched the BART to the airport. That's the short version, missing the cute little anecdotes, but it was a great trip. Much needed. I'm still feeling a bit starved for travel, Utah feels a bit stifling at the moment. Saturday was International Vulture Awareness Day at the Aviary--it went really well, lots of vulture celebrations. Yesterday Andrew and I went to do trivia at a pub with a few friends, and ended up getting 4th place. I expect we will only continue to improve as we go more. Ok, that's totally hodgepodge, SO poorly organized, but a huge mess of updates. Pictures will one day follow.

A Bridal Shower for One

I am in the wedding of one of my closest friends, named Kristine. She is getting married in California, because that's where her family lives there, and she is currently doing a summer internship out there for her business masters degree and so she can be over there for wedding planning. Unfortunately, this means that I can't get out there for her bridal shower...but that doesn't mean I can't celebrate!

Andrew and I made this short video for her, and are now presenting it to you for your general enjoyment.

So, without further ado, let us present... A Bridal Shower for One!

A Bridal Shower for One from J E on Vimeo.

This post is especially for Rachel! I did my first Warby Parker home try on a couple of weeks ago...I thought I took pictures of all of the glasses, but apparently not! Here is some photographic evidence. I am specifically looking for slightly nerdy-but-still-chic glasses with larger lenses. I want to play in this trendy kiddy pool for a while before it's not cool anymore. So here are my first two attempts:

These are the Owens. I thought I really liked these, but they ended up being a little big for my face.

These are the Huxleys, which are pretty popular, but again are a bit too thick and big for my face.

Ultimately, all of the glasses I chose had the general shape I wanted, but they were too thick or too big for my face. I realized that there is this magical number that shows how wide the bridge of the glasses is, and the next time around found glasses that had a bit narrower of a bridge. I actually only chose two pairs, and Warby Parker just so happened to fill in the last three slots with frames they thought I would like! Here's the results of that:

These are the Tenleys, which have GIGANTIC lenses but fit my face better than the last round of classes

These are the Webbs, which I really liked! But more on these later. 

The Prestons, also cute, slightly narrower frames.

The Coltons. Also cute, but the top of the glasses was a bit flat for me. 

These are the Owens again, which I still liked, but liked least out of this arrangement, I think.

Ultimately, the Webbs totally won out. I like that they are a bit larger than I'm used to, but I think they fit my face pretty well. I think I'm gonna get them!

Thanks for the Warby Parker reference, Rachel, now I'll have TWO pairs of glasses! A totally novel idea.

So, first week of being salaried, worked 7 hours today on my day off, trying to get everything ready for summer camp tomorrow and dealing with an alarm crisis at the end of the day today. Salaried people out there... I suddenly feel for you. OH MAN.

Tuesday night, my coworkers in my department held a little movie night at the Aviary. I was a little (unspoken...ly) irritated that it was a coworker only thing, no spouses allowed, but Andrew was really gracious and reassured me that he would have just as much fun with new Team Fortress things at home, which as far as I know he definitely did.

The movie night was really fun though! We brought our department projector and screen out onto the lawn and watched Jurassic Park, which I haven't seen since I was about 12. I saw it with totally new eyes-- I'd never really noticed the tear-filled awe the two main scientists have, that turns into gut wrenching fear. Awesome.

I grilled peaches and drizzled them with a honey-lime sauce...at least, I TRIED to grill peaches, and then covered them in honey-lime to try to salvage them. Turns out, apparently not all peaches have pits that pull away from the meat? I've always thought this was a ripeness issue, but I later learned from Andrew that in fact it is a special kind of peach that can pull away from the pit, called a freestone peach. It would seem that I have just gotten lucky in the past, with scattered moments of absolutely DECIMATING the wrong sort of peaches, trying to separate them into pitless halves to grill. It sort of worked out, but apparently being too polite to call a dish massacred is the best spice.

Week is almost over. I wish I could egg it on and make it end sooner. Alas, tomorrow I have two outreach programs that I REALLY would rather not do, but after tomorrow is over, it's weekend sweet weekend.

Ok, I'm about to trundle off to bed, but I wanted to give a short update!

Things have been going well. It has been really hot here--too hot for my tastes, but just right for Andrew's. Pretty consistently high 90's. It turns every conversation into small talk ("Oh my god, it's so hot out today!" , "I know, it wasn't this hot last year!" "Blablablaweatherweatherweather"), but it's all genuine and on everyone's minds.

We very nearly killed the grass in our backyard by forgetting the concept of watering a lawn in the heat, but I think we just barely saved it. We have been watering like mad men every morning and evening and I'm just starting to see little green shoots poking through the brittle yellow patches of grass.

(See what I mean?)

Andrew is taking Physiology at the moment and we both seem to find his subject matter fascinating. I really enjoy it when he comes home and tells me what he is learning about. I learned about a lot of this stuff in high school, but not with the same amount of depth, and I've forgotten nearly all of it anyway. He took a test recently and got a great grade on it, we are both very proud :)

In other news, I got a promotion! I am now Bird Programs Manager, and I'm really happy. It's a big jump and it makes me feel a little nervous, but I hope that I do a good job filling the role and growing within it. I don't think it's very different than what I'm already doing right now, really, I don't know how they could add more duties than I already have at the moment, but it involves managing staff more and I always feel like my skills haven't quite caught up with moves like this. Fingers crossed! It's a great thing for me, though, and I'm really grateful for the opportunity.

Consequently, I have been working my butt off this summer. I've been pulling 5-10 hours of overtime each week for the past three weeks, which is nice from a financial standpoint but I think it contributed to my getting sick this past weekend. Just a little overextended, though I am feeling really satisfied with all of the effort I am putting into things. We have had fabulous feedback for our summer camps and the staff I have this summer all seem really happy with things (I hope!).

This past Saturday we conducted a program that was one of the most important ones I've made thus far--we are the City Partners for a national program called Flying WILD, that is essentially an education program/guide that has activities to teach kids about conservation and nature through birds. Helen assisted a bit, but really for this whole process I was the one who coordinated with the national Flying WILD people, created the program, created and submitted the assurances document to the state for approval for credit from the State Office of Education for attendees, and I was the one who made all of the materials for the workshop itself. It went really well, I think, and we had 20 people attend, which is about 13 more than we were expecting! Teaching other teachers anything is incredibly intimidating and in so many ways I am not qualified to do it, but it was an honor to share my very small corner of expertise with other educators and hopefully spread my department's passion of nature education to them.

It really makes me want to pursue a Masters in Ed, too. I think I could put it to good use. I would really like to do one while still working, considering the position I now hold, but everything is really up in the air until Andrew gets to the point that he's applying for vet schools. This whole time I have really wanted him to get accepted to Fort Collins so we can move out there, but things at the Aviary are just getting good enough that I kind of want to stick around longer... so I'm leaning more toward hoping that the USU program is a good one and that Andrew gets accepted there. I don't know, there's a lot of give and take on either side-- I am really young for the position I have, I think, but I have a boss who has a lot of faith in me and a lot of programs that are running incredibly smoothly to back me up. I feel like I am growing a lot professionally, and would like the opportunity to pursue more education that would help me in my job, but I don't know that I want to fully leave my job. I don't know, it's a conundrum. Thankfully, we have time yet to solve these things.

This week we don't have summer camps, so it's all hands on deck, and I have another employee starting on Wednesday (my permanent full time educator, whose name is Anne...she's really nice!). I just hope I have enough for people to do! I need to make a long list of things to get them working on this week.

Anyway, beddie bye!

Shame, Avett Brothers

I've continued to practice my geetar! Andrew's a great teacher :)

Now, this is not actually Andrew posting, it's just Jenn masquerading as Andrew.

Andrew's in the middle of finals at the moment, springtime is picking up at the Aviary for me. I don't have anything very interesting to report, so here, have a cool picture of Roman:

Look what I'm learning!

Ok, I've been working for a week now, and look what I can do!

Untitled from J W on Vimeo.

Andrew is a great teacher :) Forgive the head cold, please!

Ok, it's taken me almost a week, but HERE are our photos from Costa Rica!

Me on the rainforest zipline:

Untitled from Jenn W on Vimeo.

Andrew on the rainforest zipline:

Untitled from Jenn W on Vimeo.

Woohoo!

More vacation stories to come, but until then, enjoy this!

Untitled from Jenn W on Vimeo.

Arrival Pt 2

What a cliffhanger, huh? Last we left off, Andrew and I were sitting in our quatro para quatro behind a long line of semis, trucks and cars. Our arrival time to Samasati loomed later and later. What were we to do?

What the locals do, clearly. I mentioned earlier that some rules of the road (most rules of the road?) seem to be somewhat negotiable here. Suddenly, cars started to pull out of their lane and drive forward in the oncoming lane. When an oncoming car came by, they swerved to the left bank of the road or ducked back into their proper lane, in between a semi or two, to let them pass. This bizarre leap frog seemed our only option, however. We had been seriously warned by all sources to expressly NOT drive at night, and if we waited in line that would become inevitable.

So into the oncoming lane we went! 

This was also terrifying/exhilarating. Terrilarating. We saved ourselves probably an hour on our trip, though even past the first section of blockage (the cause of which remains unknown but doubtlessly has something to do with the miles of semis all driving incredibly slowly and waving to their other semi friends) we continued to move slowly and hit other traffic blocks that were also responded to by driving in the oncoming lane.

The last 10 miles to Puerto Limon were the worst. The WORST. It took us nearly 30 minutes to complete it, thanks to the semi driver in front of us who made it impossible to pass and picked up and dropped off friends along the way. 

Still, we saw turkey vultures, a montezuma oropendola and a slew of brightly colored tanagers, and felt very much like we were getting top marks for Costa Rica, the road racing game ("I think I liked the jungle level better" Andrew remarked about the 'rural town level').

When we hit Limon, the sun was starting to set and we still had 30 miles to go. Bad news. But onward we went! We were now at the Caribbean coast, and the coastal road was much easier, particularly because it was less crowded at night. Despite all the warnings, I still submit that driving at night was much less stressful than driving during the day. We had to be careful not to hit giant crabs on the road, pedestrians and cyclists with no reflectors and deep pot holes, but hell is other people, they say, and I think that can be amended to hell is other drivers. 

At 6:45, an hour after sun set, we pulled up to the Samasati lower gate just as the rain started to fall. We were ushered in by the security guard and started the steep, rocky ascent to the retreat proper. After about 5 minutes, we pulled into the restaurant and reception area.

I didn't realize how much tension I has been holding until we stepped out of the car and walked into the warm, yellow glow of the restaurant lights. 

"my name is Molly, why don't you go have dinner and then go back to uour home? We'll check you in tomorrow morning."

Dinner. Home. The food, buffet style, was the best I've tasted in my whole life, well seasoned by what my mind experienced as a near death experience. We had rice, beans, a vegetable casserole, some amazing fried peppers and lots and lots of water. I ate to bursting, since we didn't stop for lunch in our driving frenzy (or to pee). When we got back to our bungalow, we collapsed into bed and slept 11 hours.

Well, we're here in lush, lovely Costa Rica! We were using our international data incredibly sparingly, when Andrew realized that we didn't need to be quite so judicious, and THEN we remembered that we needed to blog!

We were psyched when we left for the Salt Lake airport. Bags packed, Rae at our apartment tending to the dogs, we checked in... to find that we had a 2.5 hour delay due to thunderstorms in Texas. So we cheerfully sat at the airport, nearly boarded a flight to San Fran by accident and by the time our plane came around were overly grateful to be on our way. We landed in Houston at 10:30 and were in bed and sleeping by midnight...

...and up at 5:30am to get to the airport by 6. The check in process was a breeze. Houston International has the nicest TSA agents ever. Because of our delay the night before, United gave us food vouchers and we had a leisurely breakfast (egg muffin for me, breakfast burrito for Andrew) and then sauntered to our gate, where we waited and read books until boarding and takeoff. 

The flight was uneventful, and in a hop, skip and a jump we were landing in San Jose, COSTA RICA! We descended over red roofs and rolling hills, bumped gently onto the runway and disembarked the plane.

Immigration was slick and customs was the most laid back thing I've ever been through internationally. We literally loaded our own bags onto a scanner that was manned by one dude leaning back in his chair paying very little attention and we tossed our customs card into a pile of other cards, just like the people in line ahead of us, just like the people behind us. If we had anything we weren't supposed to, I have no idea how they could figure it out.

Our bags were already pulled off the baggage claim conveyer belt when we got there (all of them were), so we grabbed them and went out into the chaos that is the traveler pickup/ car rental shuttle area. It was hot and humid out, and the area was crowded. Still, the first ticos we met were incredibly nice. Andrew asked a security guard where we could find our car rental place and he called over a guy who could only be described as a very friendly, professional... shuttle wrangler? He ushered us to a less busy portion of the sidewalk, communicated with the shuttle (I assume) and kept us updated every few minutes as to the shuttle's progress (he shrugged expressively and said " Tico drivers, they say five, it take 20!"). Sooner than later the rental agency shuttle arrived, we tipped our guardian wrangler and rattled off to the rental agency. 

Now, it must be noted that Andrew and I chose to rent a car rather than hire a driver to the retreat. It was cheaper, worked better with our schedule and allowed us flexibility to go wherever we want. Good idea, right? Right?

We'll revisit that choice in a minute. 

The lady at the rental agency (also our shuttle driver) was also very friendly. It took a while, but eventually we were outfitted with a 4x4 car (quatro para quatro), a gps and two complimentary water bottles (non-bottled, clean drinking water is a bit scarce here). We were off!

Andrew was behind the wheel, I behind the GPS. It took us a few minutes to get our bearings. 

Now, there are a few things you should know about Costa Rican roads. First, only some have lines. Even when they do, they are more...suggestions than anything else. There are virtually no street signs. There are very few sidewalks, so the roads are for cars, bikes and often pedestrians alike. The roads are also very narrow, windy, sometimes one way and sometimes not, and potholes are often hard to see and very deep. Bridges are about 1.5 car lengths wide and are often crossed very quickly from either direction. Some cars drive well over the speed limit, which is often quite slow, and some cars drive very slowly and stop to talk to or wave to other drivers.

So, back to where we were. Andrew driving, me GPSing. The road set up in San Jose is very confusing. Near as we can tell, there is no main thoroughfare entirely through the city. The roads seem to have expanded through the city quite organically. Driving through them is terrifying and exhilarating.  We wound through the city, higher and higher, further west, dodging pedestrians and cyclists and bikers and other drivers, dogs, buses, bridges, branches... Until finally we were out of the city, on the 32 heading toward Limon. We entered a national park first and moved further into the cloud forests. 

Our first view of rainforest was magnificent. Cloud forests are at a high enough elevation that they are constantly shrouded in clouds, thus their name. They are moist, cool and impossibly green. There were leaves larger than my body, trees tipped with tiny, bright orange flowers, swinging vines. The road was a thin, grey, winding snake through the mountains. We were informed by the gps every now and again of dangerous areas of falling rocks, none of which we encountered thankfully, and got stuck behind a few trucks (foreshadowing of frustrations to come). 

We plunged into the next national park as quickly as we exited the first one. Every now and then we passed through a small town. Sometimes they had amenities, like a soda (Costa Rican equivalent to a family owned cafe) or a fast food joint, other times they were simply a cluster of houses with a church and a school. I frequently spotted turkey vultures soaring.

We drove about 2 or so hours when suddenly the truck driving in front of us slowed to a halt. This wasn't the first time traffic had stopped, but we realized this was different about three minutes in, when we were still stopped and realized that we were actually a part of a long line of cars and trucks. A line that became much longer behind us the longer we were stopped, and that stretched much further ahead than we knew at the time. 

We sat for about 5 minutes. I began to feel nervous about our arrival--the sun sets at about 5:45 here, and arriving in town at 5:30 was pushing it. The longer we waited, the later we would arrive. 

Whew, I'm feeling exhausted, I'll finish more in the morning :) Stay tuned!

Going to Costa Rica!

Well, we're waiting at the SLC airport for our derelict plane to arrive. Texas has some nasty weather right now that has delayed our plane by about 2 and a half hours, but it's nearly here and we're definitely ready to be on our way! For the time being, we are reading, napping and waiting... and in the morning we will be flying to Costa Rica.

We did another song!

I need to brag about Andrew for a sec: This man is unfairly talented. He did EVERYTHING here except for my voice. I was going to help with the tambourine, but it turns out I have awful rhythm.

Anyway, family, enjoy!

I can't bring myself to watch this, but you can!

Photographic evidence that we're alive (sort of?)

A couple of flight shots of our Andean Condor

View from my window at work this afternoon

An Andy walking with an Andy

Andrew has been busy with class recently and I have been busy with work. Life feels pretty great right now. We're settled into our apartment, which is beginning to actually feel like home, and our free time seems to be spent exploring things in Salt Lake, playing music together and watching Star Trek: Next Generation (new obsession for us).

I've been doing some photography at work recently, especially of our Andean Condor, Andy, while we're out on walks with him. It's been a good time :) 

We're waiting...

Additionally, I found a red-shafted flicker outside (two, actually! This is the male).

Experimenting with making a gif...

Andrew says hello!