Holiday Tranquility

Do you ever feel the tranquility of Christmas? I'd say most believe this word combination to be an oxymoron... but this year I may just have discovered it's essence. It's in the moments before the house wakes up in the morning; those first moments the tree is lit, Amado is purring (happy he's just been fed and I'm awake to play with him), and the house is otherwise silent. Glimpsing through the curtains I can see the soft snow that's fallen overnight, and I feel the chill of the morning. Staring at the twinkle of our tree, smelling the hint of soft pine and cookies, It's magical... it's Christmas.

As many of you have read on twitter, we've had quite the active Holiday Season at my house this year... from the decorating and lights, to cookie making, and you saw the gingerbread house. A few of the shots from the week. Amidst the Chaos, I hope you're also stopping to enjoy your Christmas season.


Amado's form of holiday helping. The ribbon tantilizes him everyday, and the glitter on these pointsettas is just too much... it's a miracle the ribbon is still on the tree and strung throughout the house.
The tranquil (and somewhat tipping Christmas tree, it's really the star that makes the whole tree look like it's tipping).. it's my first tree, and took a lot of effort to get, get the necessary tree items, and was a lot of fun to decorate with Natalie.

We had a night of cookie making this week. We dont have any cookie cutters of course, so we got creative... first we decorated a whole bunch of circles... (we call them our ornament cut-outs)... And then we got fancy, rolling the dough into holiday shapes.

Our friends Kirsten and Amber even stopped by to help with the decorating (along with Binh, Lizzie and all the roommmates, the cookie decorating was a fun and successful night.

Happy Holidays!

Gingerbread Creation

My roommates have been really into this Christmas season, from the decorating, to the lights, to the advent calendars and lots of comparing of family traditions over cocoa... it's been a good season so far.

One of my favorite things we've done as a house so far has been to build this gingerbread house... it took lots of hands, lots of hours, lots of creativity, and lots of patience... We made lots of mistakes (you may notice the big hole in the roof), but we had lots of laughs and ate tons of candy.

Lizzie and Meg and lots of candy.

Elle and Natalie posing with their creations.

The creative crew: Natalie, Julie, Elle, Lizzie and Meg


Putting the walls together-- they were heavy, so they're being held up here with honey wheat pretzels.

Decorating the front yard.

So we learned today (after 3 days of construction) that the roof we decorated was actually the walls, and the walls are actually the roof. Oops... we hear this mistake happens all the time in the real world.

It still looks like a cool gingerbread house to us. Even with the big gap in the roof....

One Month In

Many of my extended family members have been asking to see photos of the new house, beyond the ones posted move-in week, in which admittedly it was very hard to tell what the house actually looks like. The house has come a long way, and I really love being here, as do the roommates I have with me now. We've enjoyed it's warmth, safety and it's larger spaces, and it's really beginning to feel like home now.

While I look around and still see projects that need to be finished up... curtain hanging, painting touch ups, a mirror to hang up, new lampshades to be found... a majority of the big projects are settling, and I'm glad the house feels so much like home and is so welcoming already, just a month in. We've also just begun to decorate for the holidays. Just wanted to share a few photos...

This is the cozy living room, it's been painted (if you remember it was a very bright green) and it's become the hang out place of the house. The fireplace has brought an amazing source of warmth to the house in so many ways.

The other side of the living room, with the big bay window that still needs curtains...

This is the dining room, that had all the crazy wallpaper and the Annie Oakley lamp. It's now been the place of a few birthday and celebratory dinners.


The dining room from the other side, when you walk into the house the dining room's on your left, and the kitchen is accessed through it. (Amado loves to have his photo taken and as you'll see has snuck his way into many of the shots)...
The kitchen still boasts the lime green color the rest of the house has begun to shed, and is up next on the list of things to paint. Though with four girls, we love it's size and it's community space.

Last night my parents were here for the game and a few house projects. It was nice for the first time to make and enjoy dinner for them in my new home. More photos to come soon as more projects wrap up.

MSG Win!

Last weekend was a great one in the history of Syracuse University sports, our football team upset Rutgers with some surprisingly impressive play, our women's basketball team is hott stuff and continued to dominate, our ice hockey team is turning their season around, and the cross country team had the highest finish at Nationals in school history. All that being said- the Men's Basketball team was playing at Madison Square Gardens for the coaches vs. cancer tournament. We were coming in ranked behind the other 3 teams competing, but by the second night, we were clearly dominant. We've jumped into the top ten in the polls (the highest jump of any of the teams this season) and our boys are looking good.

That being said, thanks to the iSchool and Jeff Rubin from Internet Consulting Services, who runs the SUAthletics website, Anthony and I, who were travelling for work, scored some tickets for the first SU game of the tournament against Cal. While we had to miss the Big Apple Orange happy hour for work, we were able to join a few minutes of the post party, and really enjoyed the game and the seats.

Thanks iSchool and Jeff!

We found Ann and Binh at the after party celebration!

Saranac

Each fall I try to take a weekend or two at Young Life's Camp at Saranac Lake, with other leaders/groups of friends or with students as a mentor, it's always a lot of fun and this past weekend was no exception.

The weather was warm enough to go without a jacket and the steam rose each morning from the lake, while the fog rolled in over the mountains each night. Beyond the beauty, we had a lot of fun. Check out some of the photos from the shaving cream fight...

Cali Love

On Monday, I flew from LA to San Francisco- one of my favorite cities. There's always something new to see, lots of great assets in the region, awesome people, food, views, culture... it's really just a fun place. While I spent most of my time working... visiting schools, hosting alumni events, and discovering new iSchool opportunities (sometimes haphazardly), I was able to sneak in a little fun, as you can see in the photos below.

SF from the ferry in the harbor:

Took the National Park Service ferry and tours of Alcatraz island early one morning.
Spent much of my time cautioning the iSchool's Social Media Strategist, Anthony not to harbor or assist in the escape of any prisoners...

Cant say he wasn't warned... this is the lockdown cell, when you close the door, complete darkness. There are four of these cells for the really terrible prisoners... scary scary places.

View down the hallway of the main cell area. The NPS really gave a great audio tour of the place.
There was some really cool old architecture...

Sea Lions on the pier at dinner one night...

We also toured Santa Clara University, which has a very beautiful campus.

Awesome visit. Great alumni. Very accomplishing week.

Nodding my head like yeah...

A quick weekend in LA...

Last week work sent me out to San Francisco for some alumni events, and in true Julie fashion I tacked on a few days in LA and managed to sneak in a few good hours of play in San Fran.

I stayed with my best friend from when I lived in Spain (during college), Kristen for the few days I was in LA and she showed me her favorite parts of the region... Kristen's not the biggest fan of living in the LA area, as she's from Portland, OR - which is much more Kristen's style, and she's proud to tell you all about home. Based on her enthusiasm, I for one, can't wait to experience Portland one day... but that's another entry.

Kristen and I went wine tasting Saturday in Temecula, camped that night just a bit beyond the vinyard region with a whole bunch of medical students from Western University (one being Kristen's boyfriend Matt) and then went on Sunday to watch the LA Galaxy play Las Chivas in the MLS playoffs. Dispite the working and the few extra days of traveling, the weekend was totally worth it as it was sooo nice to catch up with Kristen, and to see Christina.

Temecula - SoCal's wine country...

Julie, Kristen, Christina -reunited.
Our campsite...
Morning view from the campsite.
LA Galaxy playoff game... it was an exciting night, thanks to some great tickets from Adidas.

Row F, VIP parking, Beckham and Landon Donovan... it was such a cool treat.

LA TEASE... just a photo, more to come

Alcatraz Island

LA Galaxy Game