Happy Halloween!

Greetings from my little vampire!

Laugh a little

Let me just say that I LOVE Tom Brokaw. Having said that, I did enjoy this video which pokes a little fun at him.

Thanks for sending it to me Dad.

High Point

At 1,803 feet above sea level, High Point State Park lives up to its name as the highest point in New Jersey. Earlier on this cold autumn day my parents, Leah and I drove up there to take in the beautiful views.

See that body of water in the upper right hand side of this picture? That is the Delaware Water Gap, which seperates New Jersey from Pennsylvania. OOPS! My Dad called to tell me that it isn't the water gap behind me, but the Delaware River. Sorry about the miss-information. Since you can see three states from on top of High Point the water gap has to be around there somewhere!
Like our hats? You can find out more about my knitting projects on my craft blog here.



Grandma and Leah collecting leaves


Leah and her Grandpa

Three Blogs?

Ok, now I have become one of those crazy blogging people you have heard of (you know the ones glued to their computer when they should be doing laundry/cleaning/sleeping)? It wasn't enough to have a blog chronicling my everyday life, then I had to start one all about reading. And now, for my third installment into the blogging world, I have put together Me So Crafty.

So this is how it works:

Want to know what is going on in the daily lives of Stephanie, Joe and Leah? Check out Forks and Chopsticks.

Interested in discussing books? Click on The Written Word.

What have I been knitting, cooking, sewing or scrapbooking lately. Stop by Me So Crafty to see.

Got it? Good. How long can I keep this up? I have no idea...

You're invited

Let's say you could invite eight bloggers over your house for the weekend. Who would you invite and why?

Kristin - Because really, what's a party without Kristin? Need a good laugh? Just read her blog.
Kim - I would really love to hear the story about her eating poop in Africa. I kid you not.
Johnny - So he can make us one of those HUGE steaks he is always posting pictures of. Oh, and I want to see if he really does dress like a slob.
Viv - First, she seems very cool. Second, she could show me how to use those darn circular knitting needles!
Iliana - Would love to get all her reading recommendations right from the source. How much can one girl read anyway?
Tammy & Katie - already met these two gals, but they were so much fun that I would love to hang with them again!
Joannah - well, she just seems so sweet (and I heard she can sing too).

Picking out just eight was way harder than I thought! Want to play along? Post about who you would invite over to your house. Just leave a comment with a link to your post so we can all read it.

The difference between you and me

My husband received a well deserved award at work today. He then logged onto the company rewards website to see what he had won. They had many different types of gifts to pick from including electronics, luggage, kitchen gadgets and so on.

ME: As my eyes glaze over "Oh, look you can get a gift certificate for an overnight stay at a bed and breakfast."

HIM: As his eyes glaze over "A new sawzall. Just what I've always wanted."

This, my friends, is the difference between the two of us.

Life with a teenager

Johnny asked that I blog about my experience with our foreign exchange student. First, let me tell you how this all came about. About five years ago I had read, in my church bulletin, a blurb about Japanese exchange students needing a place to stay for a month. At the time (before my daughter was born) I thought that it might be an interesting experience. Joe and I contacted the organization and made the arrangements for her arrival.Then September 11th happened and the program was put on hold. End of story.

Fast forward to August 2006. I received a phone call from the same organization telling me that they had a high school student from Japan, already here in New Jersey, who's host family had to back out of their obligation to have her stay with them. When asked if we would be interested in hosting this girl, my initial thought was something along the lines of NO WAY MAN! I already have a four year old at home, why would I want a teenager too?

Then, my conscience started working on me. Here is this girl, who just traveled all the way from Tokyo, and she doesn't even have a place to live. My husband, who is a foreigner himself (having come from Hong Kong when he was a college student) was very interested in having her stay with us, but left the decision pretty much up to me. Five days later a cute, shy, little wisp of a girl stood on my doorstep and we invited her in.

It has been almost two months since she has joined our family. For the most part, it has been a very positive experience. She is a very sweet girl, has a good sense of humor, enjoys watching movies, eats everything I put in front of her, reads Leah stories and is an excellent student (all A's so far, with the exception of a B in History).

Of course, having a complete stranger living at your house takes some getting used to. I now have one more mouth to feed, more laundry to do and I am in the car a whole lot more often than I would like to be. Then there are times like Saturday, when we were able bring her to her first Broadway show. She was so thrilled and appreciative that it makes all the extra laundry worth while.

To be honest, I can't imagine not having her at home with us. She will be staying here until the end of the school year in May and I already I know how much she will be missed. Would it do this again? It is hard to say. I feel that we have been spoiled with having such a nice young girl staying with us and possibly would have the same expectation for the next student. Fair, no - True, maybe.

As a side note, I do have to point out something a little selfish on my part. When deciding to have her stay with us, a little part of my decision was the fact that having someone else at home would help me fill up my time while we endure the long adoption wait. Maybe not the most noble of reasons, but there it is.

Live on Stage

I feel very fortunate to live in close proximity to New York City and take full advantage of it by visiting pretty often. Today was a first for both my daughter Leah and S., our foreign exchange student. No, not visiting the city, but actually enjoying a Broadway show.

Joe and I surprised them with tickets to see Disney's Beauty and the Beast today. It was the perfect fall day to visit the city (temps in the mid 60's) and we lucked out with orchestra seats only twelve rows from the stage. The show took almost three hours (including intermission) and the whole time Leah's eyes were glued to the stage. Donny Osmand was a guest performer playing Gaston and he was great (I also once saw him perform in Joseph and the Technicolor Dreamcoat). I have seen many Broadway shows over the years and found that this one is a perfect show to introduce a child to live theater.

Apple

I'm a sucker for apples. Not the mushy kind you buy at the supermarket, but the plump, juicy, wet from a recent rainstorm kind of apple that we picked this morning. Now THAT'S an apple! I just love autumn. Oh and I just love the macro setting on my digital camera - I certainly couldn't have taken a picture of that green apple with my old camera!

October 31st

Just in case you guys are looking for something a little creepy to read during this Halloween time, please grab a copy of The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield and then stop by my book blog. Discussion questions will be posted early November, so there is still time to join in!

Hope to see you there!

Blogging through the seasons

I just love some of the fun stuff other bloggers come up with!

Anyway, the WAYRN challenge asks us to show our blogging spaces. For the first seven years living in this house my husband and I used this room as our master bedroom. Since my daughter was born we felt a bit more comfortable to be in a room closer (and on the same level) as her. So, here is my office (or studio as we like to call it since this is where Leah works on art projects and I do my graphic design homework) I took this picture a few minutes ago.



Real clean, I know. The room is quite large, with a bench right smack in the middle for kids art projects, some new plastic containers for supplies and a soon to be refurbished desk where I can scrapbook (and maybe sew a little) till my heart's content.




Here is the same spot right after a little snowfall at the beginning of the year.



As you can see in the top photo, I got a new monitor over the summer so blogging is a lot easier on the eyes now. I especially love to sit here in the afternoon when the sunlight streams through the large windows. It really is a nice place to be.

Would you just STOP!

OK, I get that fertility, adoption and parenthood can be touchy subjects. I may chose (or choose - I never get that right) to adopt for different reasons than you do. The way I parent my daughter may be completely different than the way you parent your children. What I don't understand is why we all just can't get along.

I had a really nice e-mail conversation with a fellow blogger this morning. This person confided in me that she didn't want to blog about a particular issue because she was afraid of the backlash from people in the blogosphere. Why does she even have to ask this question?

I started blogging in January as a way to let my family and friends know what is going on in my life. Since then it has turned into so much more. I have enjoyed reading about your life. I love getting comments.I have even found (and met) some new friends through my blog.

But here's the deal. If I don't really like the subject matter of your blog I can do one of two things: Leave nasty comments and bash you on some YAHOO group or shut the friggin computer off. I turn mine off.

So my question is, can't we all play nicely in the sandbox children?

At the Farmers Market

Autumn is by far my most favorite time of year. A few days ago on a slightly cool, sunny afternoon I picked up Leah from her preschool and drove over to our local Farmer's market. We ate our bagged lunch at a picnic table and then had fun pulling around a wagon filled with all sorts of pumpkins. She had so much fun picking out the "perfect" pumpkins, pulling the wagon and feeding the farm animals some carrots. It was a great way to spend an afternoon in Autumn.

Get Human

Tired of calling some 800 number only to have to press thirty numbers just to find out the information that you are looking for? Check out Get Human. It's a database of companies and their telephone numbers and/or codes to get a real live human when calling for customer service. Pretty handy...