Thanks giving, Week 3

There are eight adults, one child, and two dogs in my house right now, so this will be brief.

I am thankful for family that visits, but also for family that goes home. I know it sounds horrible to say that aloud, but as much as I look forward to people coming to visit, oohing and aahing over our house and our child, I'm also really looking forward to a return to normalcy. I can't wait to vacuum the floors and see them stay clean for more than 30 minutes. I can't wait for my counter tops to be clear and clean. It's nice to have people to make the floors dirty and the counter tops full, but in the wax and wane of life, there must be both. Wes took the Christmas tree to the park today to have it mulched, so now I need to put away the decorations (including the singing cats and -- a new addition -- a moose in a rocking chair singing "Grandma Got Runover By a Reindeer -- what did I ever do to these people?). I look forward to spending tomorrow afternoon with boxes of books, arranging and rearranging them and other things on our new bookshelves, which Wes finished a few days ago. I have Monday off from work, then go back for a few hours each day for the rest of the week. I bought my books for next semester, and I'm looking forward to perusing them next week whilst brainstorming my capstone project. And also to not cooking for the next week, which I've been doing non-stop for the last three days.

I'm thankful that 2009, with all the blessings it brought, is behind us. 2010 is a year in which -- I assume -- we will not move homes or move jobs, something many others have had to do recently or will do soon. I'm thankful for stability, security, and much love in my home.

And now I'm going to enjoy one more evening with the crowd that's been keeping us company for the last few days, who have traveled from faraway states to have this time together. And I'm going to enjoy the warmth of the fire that Wes is building, and the glow in our little boy's gorgeous eyes.

Tests

I took another test today. It was an important test, of sorts. My GRE scores -- my great, great GRE scores, expired last month, and I had to retake the test to submit current scores with my PhD application. I did as much as I could to prepare. I actually taught for Kaplan Test Prep for more than a year since I last took the test, so I knew all the tools for different kinds of questions. I tried to review vocabulary, but I didn't keep up with it in the rush of end-of-semester assignments. I got a good score today, only thirty points lower than my old scores. My math was actually higher, my verbal unfortunately lower, and I think I did equally as well on the essays (but I won't get those scores until the printed results arrive). It's good enough to not be a problem in my application, probably high enough for a few professors to say, "Wow, she did really well," but even that won't be enough to get me in without many other merits in my application. Peabody (the ed school at Vanderbilt) gets around 600 applications to their PhD program and take 40.

It occurred to me as I was checking in today that I have taken a lot of tests -- you know, the kind you go to a Prometrics Center for (or, in the olden days, went to a local high school on a Saturday with your #2 pencils and graphing calculator). I took the PSAT and the SAT at least twice. I took the PRAXIS tests. I took a test for National Board Certification (which several people were there for today). And I've now taken the GRE three times. Plus I took all kinds of informal ACTs, GMATs, LSATs, and even verbal MCATs in order to teach them for Kaplan. I get standardized tests. So does Wes, who has taken many of these tests as well as three rounds of USMLE boards, tests that last hours and sometimes days and include hundreds of multiple choice questions with answers A-J.

I don't know if I'll get in to the PhD program, and I don't know if my test scores will make any difference. If nothing else, Wes and I should have kids who do great on standardized tests!

A real Tennessee Christmas

Wes and I hosted Christmas for the first time this year. My parents came up from Georgia -- or in this case, down from West Virginia, where they'd been visiting my grandparents. We had pretty warm weather the whole time they were here, which meant we could be out and even go to the park one day. We got our Christmas tree about two weeks ago, and my mom gave us some new ornaments and more crocheted snowflakes for my windows. I did a full Christmas meal -- turkey (breast), dressing, mashed sweet potatoes, Waldorf salad, and yeast rolls. Oliver got a little race car from my parents, like the one he pushed around at their house, plus a little pegboard with mallet (trouble...) and a puffy vest to wear to the park. We did the big meal on Christmas Eve since Wes worked Christmas day and my parents left around 1pm that day to head back south on their way to my brother and sister-in-law's place in Florida. It was nice staying home this holiday, though I am certainly more aware now of the work that goes into hosting. Having my parents here was only a warm-up, though, as we're expecting six of Wes's family members later this week over the New Year's!

House Tour, Day 7

And here, dear visitors, is the "guest suite." It's officially referred to as "above the garage" -- as in "I'm coming home around 5am, so I'll sleep above the garage." It's pretty funny when people who haven't seen it hear us say that. They're like -- "You make your husband sleep above the garage?" A staircase from the garage itself (which has its own washer/dryer -- old, but functional) leads up to a big open space with the bed, dresser, and kitchen table and sink area. We hope to eventually get proper linens for this bed and put up drapes. If we decide to invest some money up here, we really need to replace the carpet, which has an odd smell to it since the space is only temperature controlled when someone's staying up there, and paint the whole thing as it's currently about 5 different colors. There's a full bathroom with cute tiling but a horrible mirror, and a large walk-in closet, complete with drop-down ironing board. There's also two places to access eaves storage, should we need it. The couple who lived here before us evidently rented this place out, though it's not legally zoned for it, but Wes and I are happy to use it for visitors and a get-away for people (him) sleeping at odd hours or needing to do work without the din of the household.

House Tour, Day 6

Welcome to the boy's/s' room. I think we started calling it this (the apostrophe before the s for the moment) soon after we moved in. This is where Oliver where move to once he is deemed too big for the crib -- or someone else comes who needs it more, whichever comes first. The bunk beds and furniture all came from Wes's parents. Wes, in fact, slept in these bunk beds, which his father made, as a child. I love all the warm wood, but I do want to break it up with some color. I've picked out an earthy blue and sage green for the two comforters (after we get the second mattress, of course), and we'll eventually put a rug down to give it some life. Otherwise, though, it is decidedly a little boy's room. There's a picture of a boy and his dog above the fireplace, and Wes's collection of arrowheads and other random rocks are displayed on the rack above the desk. For now it's a guest room -- shortly to be inhabited by Wes's mother, who is coming to visit later this week.

Come fly with me

My dad joined the Air Force for one main reason -- to become a pilot. He grew up a farm boy amidst the corn fields on Ohio, and his escape -- quite literally -- was big blue sky up above them. He hasn't been an Air Force pilot for a few years now, but recently, he renewed his private pilot's license so he could go flying. There's a small airfield near his house in Georgia, and he can get small planes to take up family members or, on occasion, the ROTC cadets in his high school program.

Over Thanksgiving, I finally got a chance to go up. Oliver stayed at home to work out with Laura and play with mom and Reid while my older brother Jon and I went out to fly with my dad. It was cold but very clear, and the wind wasn't too bad. I've never been one to get nervous about flying -- probably in large part because of my dad -- and this was no different. As Jon said, this was one time my dad's OCD is a plus. He goes through the checklist carefully each time he flies and is very critical of the pilots involved in the plane crashes due to negligence in this area.

The take-off was easy, and pretty soon we were high above the trees, looking down on a spectacular view of surrounding farms, natural areas, neighborhoods, and even a peek at Atlanta's skyline in the distance. My dad left me fly for a bit, turning and inclining. I do love being up there, but I'd much prefer to leave the flying to him. He pulled his tricks -- inclining and then doing a steep descent, like on a roller coasters, and banking hard to the right or left. He's super vigilant while up there -- watching the smoke stacks to keep tabs on the wind gusts and checking his gauges and fuel levels. This is a tiny plane, and nothing is automatic.

It's fun to get to see people pursuing their passions, and this was no different. I've never seen my dad fly before. He so obviously loves it and enjoys being in his domain.