Jilly Bean

It has been snowing all day.  I’m not that thrilled about it- I don’t ski or snowboard, I hate driving when its wet, and I hate being cold.  We bought a heat dish a few days ago, and I move it from space to space so that it is aimed right at me.  Feeling the temperature drop in the last few days has me missing the fresh produce and sunshine from the community garden only 1 block away.  Here are some pictures I took while weeding.

It doesn’t look like much now- but this place truly is a little refuge from the noise and traffic of downtown.  I love it.

Last night we carved pumpkins with our friends the Deiberts.  Here are the finished products:

Isn’t this peeping tom pumpkin just amazing?  It reminds me of two years ago when we carved our first pumpkin together:

By the end of the night, all of our tools had broken, and Amber had resorted to using vise grips to finish carving.

Well, looks like Adam had a lot of fun.  At least James was able to get out some of his tools.

Last weekend James and I drove up to Brigham City and Logan to continue our new tradition of going up North in the fall.  It was a lot of fun and reminded us a lot of when we were dating, and my years up there in general.  First we stopped at a neat market in Brigham City to pick up some funky gourds and squash.  I was happy to get 4 giant butternut squash at $1/piece (yumm, soup!) and some fall decor.

In Logan we stopped at a pumpkin patch.

I love tractors and farms so much!  I have an entire photo file deticated to farm animals and equipment. Example:

Anway, we visited some old friends and then walked around campus. 

At the new library.

Old Main

At the ugliest modern art sculpture in the world.  They look like giant french fries.

A good example of USU’s landscaping.  Very cool.

What a great weekend!

I called my mom on Tuesday and when told her I had some great news.  Her response,”Did you skip your period?” Ah, No, mom, sorry, but other great news!

James has been working so hard the last year on his research and we just found out that his first paper has been accepted for publication in Bio-Materials.  This is the best bioengineering journal he could have hoped for- It is like being published in the New England Journal of Medicine for doctors!  Also, his paper was accepted “without revision”  which James has never heard of.  They usually send back your paper and ask for more experiments, info, etc, but not his!

To celebrate…he stayed at home and he took care of his very sick wife.  However, he did get this addition to the family for submitting the paper two months ago (plus better components, apparently.  I don’t know much about bikes, but after riding it even I know it is an upgrade from our last Target brand bike).  I can hardly keep him off of it!  His longest ride so far on this was from downtown to his parent’s home in Sandy.

So, now we wait, for several months before his status can be changed from “Accepted for Publication” to “Published.”  I am so proud of him!  This also means he is roughly 1/3 through his Ph.D.  Hooray!