Here I go again...

Anyone else seeing a theme? Yes, that theme where I post once every 6 months or so? Yea, I'm guessing  you don't because...I'm not sure I have anyone that actually follows this blog. :)


So now, it's the middle of March and I have myself the sweetest almost-11-month-old baby on my hands these days. So, that is my #1 excuse for why I (most recently, at least), do not post on this blog!


Little Miss E has kept us smiling since day one. When I say she is the happiest baby you've ever met, you might think that every parent says something like that...but seriously, we've heard this from multiple people...including our daycare provider who says that in 15 years, this is the happiest baby she has ever had!


Anyways, I think I'll just kick this off with a series of pictures from the last ~10ish months...

E's first concert - Darius  Rucker aka Hootie

First beach trip to Ocean City, MD.

 

E's first 5K - Shelane's Run

E's first Halloween as a Unicorn, obviously.

Election Day 2016: I'm with Her.

Christmas 2016

First trip to St. Martin. She handled it well.

The shades lasted .5 seconds.

Looking at her Daddy before a Georgetown game!

First snowfall - Winter 2017.

Enjoying the swing at the park.

 

Props to me?

Well, well, well. I've got to give myself a pat on the back this time around because guess what -- it has been less than one year since my last post! Props for that because this has been quite a year!

Ok, why don't we start fresh from the start because let's be honest, I haven't exactly been good about keeping things up to date here.

So, let me begin with a little introduction. I am Lindsay. I am a wife to Brandon and a new mom to our sweet baby E. She is just over 10 weeks old and has brought so much joy to our lives already. We have two dogs, Lola, a Boxer, and Muppet, a Boston Terrier.

We live in Virginia where my husband works as a Lawyer and I've been working as a Special Education teacher for a year. We both love what we do and the time it affords us to be together as a family. Together, we enjoy traveling, watching sporting events, great music and relaxing together with a yummy meal and drink!

I'll keep this post short and sweet, but I hope to use this space to update our family and friends on our happenings and our new life as a family of 5 (2 four-legged furry ones), with some scatter bits about teaching and things that may be useful to others. I'm not promising too much, because from what you can see of this blog, this could be my last post for a year...

Until next time! Here are some pics to sign us off..

Ahh, my yearly post.

Well, here we are again, just over a year later and I'm re-discovering my little blog over here (which I don't know that I'd really say was a blog to begin with...).

Lots have happened in the last year -- Brandon moved to VA, I started my final year of graduate school, student taught in 2nd grade last fall, bought a house last January, moved into said house and dealt with first homeowners problems (leak from master shower...), student taught at a school for students with Autism, turned 30 (eek!), got offered a job teaching 1st grade students with Autism before I graduated (holler!), accepted said position, graduated with my masters, finished work and moved to VA! Yee haw.

So, that has been our last year in a nutshell, with a few other things here and there that I don't care to type up! And, here we are today. I am finally living in my house in VA, starting up with some professional development for school this summer and trying to get things in order around this place. We went to Key West last week as a little vacation -- much overdue! And now we're back here. I have a lot of "extra" stuff to get rid of and some painting to do, but I've taken this week for myself and will kick it into high gear next week and get some stuff done!

Anyways, I truly do hope to keep up with this spot in the future and share in our new adventure with a home and teaching. I'm looking forward to what's to come in this year!

Wowowow

So, I don't think I even need to point out that it's been almost one year since I even posted anything. There are a lot of updates that have gone on here in the last year, so I'll just give a few of the major ones...so, here goes!

• We traveled to the Outer Banks last August with the dogs -- amazing. We stayed in Duck in a great house that my parents rented. It was so nice to relax with them and have the dogs with us on vacation. Lola loved the beach and water. Muppet loved being with people, but not so much the water. I totally picture a future family trip there with a baby in tow because of the relaxing atmosphere and dog friendly location.

• Last September, I started graduate school at NYU, where I work. While I initially only applied to get a Masters in Childhood Education (Grades 1-6), we were encouraged to do the dual certification for Childhood and Special Education. I jumped right in on that because there was only a difference of 5 credits or so and from what I hear, you can get a job anywhere with a Masters in Special Education. I have loved my classes right from the start and as of July 2nd, I'll have completed 22 credits of a 46 credit program in one year while working full time. This fall, I hope to be able to continue to work full time while student teaching and working adjusted hours. We'll see what ends up happening!
• That brings me to the next big happening -- even better than me going back to school...wait for it...ok, let me build it up. Though I probably never made it public knowledge on the Sloane-Spot, we've been trying to move back down to Virginia just about since we moved to New York. While New York has been good to us for the most part, we came here for a job, that was it. We didn't come here because we had hopes and desires to be here. We came to New York because it was going to pay the bills. That being said, we started to take the necessary steps to get ourselves back to VA. The first being me getting my Masters, the second being Brandon taking the Virginia Bar. While he could have waived into VA in 2017, we just weren't willing to wait that long. So, last fall, we made some moves, spent a pretty penny and signed him up for the Virginia Bar this past February. Now, from what I know of Brandon, he's really, really smart. (i.e. I always tell the kids I hope they have his brains and my athleticism.) So, he took the bar in February and passed! Of course he did!
• So, that leads me to our final big happening! Over a 12 day span in mid-May, Brandon got a request for an updated resume, interviewed on a Monday, got called back on a Friday and got an offer the following Tuesday for a job in Virginia. As we had said all along, no matter where I was in my schooling, B would take the job. We would make it work. And so, he did! We cannot be more excited about it, despite the fact that we'll be living apart for a little under a year. He is so excited about his job and I haven't seen him as happy as he is about this job in a really long time. It is great to see. So, he starts on June 23rd. We'll keep our lease here through the end of July, when I'll move out to my parents place and commute from there. It will be a much longer commute but I'll have a lot of help with the dogs and it avoids us paying two rents!, So, that is that!

Phew! That was a lot of info. Now that classes are slowing down for the summer, I'm going to try to get posted here more often. This fall, I'll be attempting to work full time and school full time (13 credits), so we'll see what ends up going on. I would guess that I fall off the face of the earth around September, but we'll see what happens!

So long, for now!

L

Sunkissed VoxBox by Influenster!

Well, it's been quite some time since I wrote a little review, so here we go. I got a sweet little VoxBox from Influenster just over a month ago and must share the "ingredients" with you!

So, here is what I got! It was definitely one of the better VoxBoxes that I've gotten so far!

Alright people, let's start with my favorite item, the Olay Fresh Effects BB Cream.

I've never really been one to use face creams or moisturizers before I put my make up on in the morning, but with the summer here, I've started to put this on under my makeup and honestly, I LOVE it. For starters, it has SPF in it. I can't say I've always been the best about my SPF usage in the past, but that wisdom comes with age and now that I'm in my late 20s and obviously wise beyond my ears, SPF is key. Secondly, I think it really "preserves" my make up for the day. I feel that I look "fresher" longer throughout the day. So yea, go out and get it! Oh, and one last thing -- there has been a "heat wave" for like the last 3 weeks in NYC and I feel like using this, I don't feel like I look greasy when I arrive at work after a 1.5 mile walk to work in this damn humidity!

Second favorite item! Goody Ouchless Ribbon Elastics!

These things are great. I can put my hair up and walk to work with one of these in my hair and no joke, I can get to work, take my hair down and there is barely a crease in my hair, if one at all. Like I said, with the heat and humidity, there is NO way that I can stand to walk to work without my hair up or I'd look identical to a wet rat by the time I arrived. So yes, go out and get these. They're amazing and did I mention, they're cute too??

Ok, what is next. Ahh, my Dr. Scholl's Inserts.

Put these in a pair of heels at work and love them. They really do add some comfort and cushion to my walk and I have never used the full foot insert before. I've used the one that just comforts the ball of your foot, but I really enjoy this one. Also, it totally makes my shoe stay on better!

Final item!

Really loved the color of this polish (Mardi Gras) and it went on really nicely. I haven't bought any at the store, but rumor has it it's only $2.99! That's a steal compared to my usual Essie at $8 a pop! It comes in a ton of colors (I think somewhere around 36!) so go out and check it out!

So, that is this month's VoxBox! I honestly loved all of the items so it was really hard to choose what I reallllly liked the most. So, there you go. All of them!

Until next VoxBox!

xo!

L

Just a little disclaimer: I am not paid to review any of these products. I receive these items as a member of Influesnter.com. I highly recommend checking out the site!

Slacker City!

Wow. So, as of Saturday, it's been approximately one month since I have posted. Kinda sad. But, in my defense, we've been supa-dupa busy. Let's see.

• Last weekend in June I did a 5 mile PRIDE Run in Central Park. It was awesome and just after DOMA got voted down so it was amazing to see the love. 
• Then we attended the Summer Fancy Foods show at the Javits Center. Yea, we're really not that cool, but my boss knows someone who put our name in and before you know it we were eating $150 prosciutto and trying to act like we weren't hovering at their station.
• Hmm, what's next, 4th of July? (I'm literally looking at a calendar while I write this, so I'm really just pretending that I didn't know what weekend was next.) We hit up the Poconos with Kim and Kyle and had an awesome time. We fished, kayaked, Brandon golfed, I played tennis, drank, relaxed and over all it was a nice, relaxing, non-crazy, perfect long weekend.
• And that brings us to this last weekend. We went to visit Melissa and Dan at their new home in Hampton Bays. They are renovating most of the house and it is going to be amazing when they are done. It was just nice to see some friends, hang out, relax. Unfortunately, the weather was total crap on Saturday, but we had a great dinner with them, Kate and Steve and overall, it was really just about us all getting together.

So, that brings me to today, July 15. First of all, it's a Monday night and I'm about to start drinking my 3rd margarita of the night. It's #Bachelorette night here in the house and it's hometown dates. Brandon usually uses this as an excuse to drink, so tonight he came home with a few ingredients that I thought, hmm, what is he up to? Well, he says, "I'm making margarita's!" We cheers and I asked him what to, and he said, "Summer!" I didn't have the heart to tell him that summer actually started 1 month ago. But, c'est la vie. Who am I to rain on someones parade??

So this Friday, we head to the dirty dirty to check out Zac Brown Band at the PNC Bank Arts Center, after spending a day at the beach. Totes looking forward to a little beach time, a little date time and a little bit of country music time...because these days...I'm in a southern state of mind...

On that note, lemme finish this up and get to posting about the latest VoxBox!

xo!

L

Oh. Em. Gee.

You guys, if this blog was a baby, I'd be charged with a serious case of neglect right now. So it's been 17 days since I posted here? 2 weeks and 3 days? 408 hours? 28,800 minutes. How do you measure a life of neglect?

I digress. Rent songs really get me every time. Ok, so this is a seriously ADD post right now, so lemme round up what has been up since June stinking 2nd.

Ok, so I have been taking some online classes which are consuming a lot of my time. I am really enjoying them, but they are a lot of reading and a lot of writing. The classes I am taking are Science Fiction, surprisingly entertaining and I am enjoying it. The other class I am taking is Intro to Journalism. I also like this class, but I have to say, and this is going to sound awful: my classmates are dumb. I try to remind myself over and over again that they are about 10 years younger than me, but that's not really it...they don't read, they don't capitalize the letter "i" and when we need to post thing in the discussion area, like analyzing a news article, they end their posts with things like, "Right on, Star. Right on." -- This is a reference to a Star Jones quote in their article.

ANYWAYS. The real reason I bring this up is because it seems these students don't read anything thoroughly. I say this because of these two examples:

1. We had to analyze news sources and their credibility. While I am and avid New York Post reader and love the gossip it provides, I know it lacks real credibility, so when I read things on there, I explained that I often follow up with other sources if I am really interested in it. Well, before I could blink, about four students had responded to my post with, "WOW! I had no idea the New York Times was not a credible source!" I became irritable and responded to all of them with a simple, I said the POST, not the TIMES. Argh!
2. My real moment of insanity with them came today though. We're now on our third news article and we were instructed to do a "profile" about someone that we think is interesting or could have an interesting story. I chose my dad, the veterinarian. Here is what I posted to the class: 

I have several veterinarians in my family, mostly in lab animal practice. I'd like to reach out to one of them to discuss how they got into veterinary sciences, why they chose lab animal research over opening their own practice and about what their experience has been like. Lab animal science can also be controversial, especially with groups like PETA and I'd like to get some first hand experiences with what they've dealt with, backlash they may have faced and thoughts on PETA from the perspective of someone who uses animals to save human lives.

And here, are the two responses I got to my brainstorming session:

Interesting idea! I am a big meat eater just curious how are you going to bring the community into your story?

- Christopher

and

Lindsay!

I think that's a wonderful idea. I'm a vegetarian so it's always interesting to hear about other vegetarians reasons for going meatless!

Yup. They both thought I said VEGETARIAN, not VETERINARIAN. However, HOW HOW HOW did they get to that? I mean, I go into detail! I talk about veterinary sciences, PETA, lab animal research! So, HOW??? I just am baffled and I was so annoyed and did not want to flip my lid, so I simply responded to both of them: I actually said veterinarian, not vegetarian. That's it. One of my friends informed me that this is in fact why teachers drink -- situations like this. I can only wonder what my professor is thinking right now.

So, that is that. That is what I'm working with. Yup, enough to make you go brain dead in the middle of the day.

On that note, I'll wrap this up and keep it to this for tonight. We're attending a wedding tomorrow night and Mom and Nana are visiting on Saturday while Brandon is at a day long bachelor party in the city. So, toodles for now and hopefully for not as long as the last time I said that!

L