I love my nephew!

We were excited to visit the now officially blessed child, Reuben James Cummings, and his family! He even gave us some awesome grins!

He's a cutie!

We did it!

What do you think? I finally gave in and got Eliza little bangs and a trim by Belinda (Bro. and Sis. Black's daughter) while we were in Lexington. She was so sweet and patient with Eliza who we had to bribe with candy to stay in the chair. It's made it so much easier to do her hair though, and it still curls into ringlets in the back! Her hair's getting so long, I love it!

A time of celebration

Today is Steve and my anniversary! It's been 3 years now for us. Thanks to all of you who have congratulated us! Especially Grandpa Bob for the sweet card!

Our anniversary is a funny time of year. It's squooshed in between Christmas, dad's birthday, and New Years! We've usually used up all our money at this point and are pretty partied out, so we often reward ourselves with a relaxing evening.

However, we started off our anniversary fun! Last night when I got home from work around 12:30 am, Steve surprised me with some chocolate orange Creme Brule, all ready to be sprinkled with sugar and torched!

This has become somewhat of a tradition for us, since we did it last year too! A Tasty tradition.

Steve gave me racquetball rackets for Christmas so he and I could play at our gym, so we went this morning and had a blast slamming and bouncing balls off the walls. (It was especially fun since I beat Steve. The results were 4 wins (me) to Love (steve). But we're both not so great. But many laughs were had and only a few imprinted ball bruises on our bodies!

So tonight we're staying in and doing something we love to do together- cooking! I gave Steve The Best International Recipe book for Christmas, and we picked up the ingredients to make some Venezuelan Stuffed Corn Cakes or Arepas and we're going to stuff them with a Chicken and Avocado Corn Cake Filling. We're excited and we'll let you know how it goes!

We were able to actually go out on a date a few days after Steve's birthday to the bowling Alley a few weeks ago! It was great even though Steve beat me. :( I've been practicing on the Wii, though, so my skills should definitely be much improved.

I'm grateful for the kind man that Steve is and for what a loving and nurturing father he is to Eliza:

(Steve and Eliza cuddling on the couch on Steve's bday while I made Steve's favorite Morrison meal Wienerschnitzel, mashed potatoes, green beens and sliced lemons for zesting!)

And here's just a random, fun picture of Eliza playing with the new little kitchen we got her on Christmas for $25 bucks on Ebay (including shipping!).

Exclusive Footage.

I've been teaching myself how to do some video editing on our Mac lately. So I thought I'd share my most recent Eliza videos.

We did a LOT of driving this last week visiting family. Especially Steve. He thought being in the back with Eliza was too daunting and claustrophobic. So he drove. A lot.

And I tried to entertain Eliza. We had been in the car for about 7 hours at this point, but Eliza loves seeing videos of herself, so this is how I entertained her in the car for like 10 minutes.

Her verbal skills have really improved lately. It's been fun to hear what words she can pronounce.

Steve and I sometimes feel like we're translators. We're the only people who understand some of the stuff that comes out of Eliza's mouth or that she signs. Lots of times, her words, signs, phrases seem so commonplace to us that we forget it hardly sounds like "Mika, where are you?" and is more like, "Niiiinnaaa, mwwaarrruuuu!"

Did you catch Eliza's "I don't know" phrase in the previous video? If so, Congratulations! You're on your way to full fluency in Eliza-speak!

I didn't do as well on this video below. It was my first, but I think it's a cute one of Eliza and me just hanging out. This is a conversation we have pretty much every day:

And don't worry. My video editing will get better.

Merry Christmas from SC

Eliza's lovin life right now.

She loves the food, the dogs, the attention, the presents, the jingle bells, the toys, the books, and the OMA time. Oh my goodness! Eliza will take anything Oma! I offered her some bread at dinner tonight and she refused it. Then a minute later, my mom asked 'Liza if she wanted some bread and Eliza wanted it. She asks for Oma more than she asks for Elmo, which is big. So funny.

The rest of us have been enjoying the same stuff, but also the new Wii's been quite the hit too.

(I'm the boxing champion, FYI!)

Other Random Christmas Pics:

Eliza likes to share with her toys and is letting her doll take a ride in her new trike!

Tickle/cuddle time with Uncle Robby!

Oma's been convincing Eliza that bibs are neat to wear. Eliza apparently really took it to heart and wanted to wear all 8 of them. We finally pried them off her before we put her down to bed.(Eliza signing Thank You)

Dad got really sick and stayed sick all day today. It was really sad. Hopefully he'll feel 100% again by his birthday on Saturday.

Hope your Christmas has been as fun as ours! Happy Holidays.

12 Days of Christmas Music: CHRISTMAS DAY!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!
Michael Praetorius' "Mass for Christmas Morning."

12 Days of Christmas Music: Day 2

Day 2: Jakob Jan Ryba's "Czech Christmas Mass" is a staple of Czech celebration. For years it was defiantly sung by underground Christians under Communist rule and it's vigorous, folksy music.

12 Days of Christmas Music: Day 3

Day 3: More Messiaen! This is from his vast and intricate piano work, "Twenty Contemplations of the Christ-Child."

12 Days of Christmas Music: Day 4

Day 4: A segment from Heinrich Schutz's incredible "Christmas Story." Schutz's work is new to me and I really love this music.

12 Days of Christmas Music: Day 5

Day 5: John Adams is a contemporary composer living in California. This is from his great piece written for the new millennium, "El Nino." Adams calls it his meditation on the miraculous, and it tells the story of Christ's birth using Biblical texts as well as contemporary and ancient Latin American poetry. I find the music to be compelling and beautiful, though I can't say I'm a huge fan of the production in this video.

12 Days of Christmas Music: Day 6

Day 6: Back to Baroque. A movement from Arcangelo Corelli's "Christmas Concerto" for orchestra.

12 Days of Christmas Music: Day 7

Day 7: Olivier Messiaen was an incredible late-20th-century composer, and one of my personal favorites (we also share a birthday). He was devoutly religious and played the organ at church every week for his entire adult life. This is from his powerful cycle of organ pieces, "The Nativity of Our Lord."

Christmas Zombies

Charlottesville's roads and organization is bad. It's a very confusing town to get used to driving in for several reasons. I think it's mostly because it sprung up around the UVA campus and then everything else just kind of happened helter-skelter too.

Anywayz, I feel like the traffic here which is usually pretty bad has become UNBEARABLE with the Christmas season. Ever since Thanksgiving, I have wanted to pull my hair out.

I wish with the cheerful gift giving season, our traffic jams could look something like this:


Instead it reminds me of this:

Some of my co-workers invited me to a Christmas Zombie party on the 23rd. While I don't plan on attending, I thought it was very original and reminded me of the crazy Christmas traffic that's been going on here.

The Invite reads:

As yoinked from Urban Dictionary:

1. christmas zombie
Days before Christmas, people become blind and get tunnel vision, causing them to only see what is in front of them, putting them into a trance like state while looking for the perfect gift. This effect usually happens two days before christmas.

Guy: Dude, what was up with that chick driving the Esclade, she almost hit you.

Guy 2: Forget her, she was a christmas zombie.

Please join us in the celebration/degredation of this phenomenon in a much more enjoyable version:

What: Christmas Zombie Pub Crawl
When: Tuesday, December 23 (Christmas Eve Eve) at 8:30 PM
WTB: We will don the most hideous Christmas garb we can find (think puffy paint and bells on candy cane sweaters) and zombify ourselves. Then the gaggle of zombies will tour the Corner area in search of the brains of any lingering students. If all goes well, we may end up singing zombie karaoke at Baja Bean or going zombie carrolling around town. Practice up since some of us discovered that it's very difficult to sing like a zombie.

Don't get me wrong. I LOVE Christmas!!! Especially the part where I get to see my family!! I can't wait for next week. I'm just grateful that I've finished my Christmas shopping, and it only involved one actually store trip. The rest I did online! Yay for Ebay!

But for now, I'm scared to venture out from my neighborhood. It shouldn't be too hard since I'll be working 5 out of the next 6 days!

Happy Holidays! (for real)

12 Days of Christmas Music: Day 8

Day 8: Choral section from Hector Berlioz's richly-colored "Christ's Infancy."

Aww, Memories!

How BYU are you?

77 questions.

[x] You have been kissed at lease once
[_] Your first kiss was on campus
[x] You’ve had a boyfriend/girlfriend
[x] You lived in the dorms your freshman year
[x] You went to Homecoming or Preference
[_] You hiked the Y
[_] You’ve taken a social dance class
[x] You regularly attended FHE for at least a semester
[x] You’ve participated in Choose to Give
[_] You’ve been to Liberty Square for a party at least once
[x] You’ve driven around south of campus for at least 20 minutes trying to find a parking spot
[x] You know the cougar fight song
[x] You’ve crossed the crosswalk without using the flags or biked through a red light
[x] You’ve been to Friday Night Live
[_] You’ve performed or witnessed an act that made it onto Police Beat
[x] You’ve been on a “date” to the bell tower or duck pond (I helped build the duck pond!)
[_] You’ve been to the Bean Museum for FHE
[x] You’ve been to Divine Comedy
[x] You’ve been to International Cinema
[_] You are engaged
[x] You are married
[x] …in the temple
[_] You were previously engaged/married
[x] You have kids or are expecting kids
[x] Your birth parents are still married
[x] …in the temple
[x] You have at least three siblings
[x] You’ve taken a marriage prep or relations class
[x] You’ve taken at least one religion class that is not based on the scriptures
[x] You have slept on a couch in a restroom
[x] You have been to the BYU Creamery
[_] You have been in one of the BYU choirs
[_] You’ve been on a date to Fat Cats
[x] You have read Twilight
[x] …book 2
[x] …book 3
[x] …book 4
[x] …seen the movie
[_] …more than once
[_] You’ve waited in line at the Bookstore for the Harry Potter or Twilight book premiere
[x] You have seen The Singles Ward or Sons of Provo
[x] You have walked out of a movie you found morally reprehensible
[_] You know where the “chastity line” is
[x] You can finish the phrase “Nothing good happens after ______”
[x] You read the Daily Universe at least 3x a week
[_] …and it’s the only newspaper you read
[x] You’ve personally known someone who was reported to the Honor Code Office
[_] You’ve participated in or watched a Mr. BYU contest
[x] You’ve received personal revelation that he/she is “the one” (or been told this)
[x] …and told him/her about your revelation (or been told this)
[_] …and then they rejected you (or rejected them)
[x] You’ve been to the Nickelcade
[x] You’ve been to Classic Skating
[x] You’ve ignored your parents’ phone calls for at least 3 days
[_] …and then they called the University Police
[_] You’ve been pulled over by the University Police
[x] You watch The Office religiously
[_] You mostly wear jeans and t-shirts or plain fitted shirts
[_] You own at least 3 things from American Eagle or Hollister
[x] Your sacrament meeting is a fashion show/scam session
[_] You’ve been on a date to the Provo River

You’ve kissed in a…
[x] …campus parking lot
[x] …Provo Canyon or Squaw Peak
[x] …on temple grounds
[x] …on a couch as soon as your roommates left the room
[x] You think UVU is not a real university
[_] You hate U of U with a passion

FOR GIRLS (don’t answer if you’re a guy)
[x] You own knee-length shorts
[x] You regularly wear camisoles/undershirts for modesty reasons
[_] You are a MFHD, RMYL, Elementary Education, or Exercise Science Major
[_] Your major crush ended up dating a MFHD, RMYL, Elementary Education, or Exercise Science major
[x] You have had at least one roommate who is in hair or dental school
[x] You own The Italian Job or The Princess Bride
[x] You wear makeup at least 3x a week
[_] You do something with your hair (other than brush it/ponytail) at least 3x a week
[_] You went or plan on going on a mission
[_] …because you couldn’t get married

FOR GUYS (don’t answer if you’re a girl)
[_] You shave every (or almost every) morning
[_] You know when your hair is “too long”
[_] You know what the “divide by 2 and add 7″ dating rule is
[_] …and you follow it
[_] You’ve dated freshmen girls as a RM
[_] …when you already knew better
[_] You’ve used the phrase “On my mission…” to a girl
[_] At least 3 girls have baked cookies or meals for you
[_] You went or plan on going on a mission
[_] …because you wanted to get married

Total: 39

A: 68-77
B: 60-67
C: 53-66
D: 45-52
F: 44 or below

12 Days of Christmas Music: Day 9

Day 9: Arvo Part is a wonderful contemporary Polish composer. Here is his radiant "Magnificat."

12 Days of Christmas Music: Day 10

Day 10: Marc-Antoine Charpentier was a French Baroque composer who wrote lots of wonderful Christmas music. This is from his "Christmas Mass."

12 Days of Christmas Music: Day 11

Day 11: From Heinrich Biber's Mystery Sonatas for violin: Number I--"The Annunciation."

12 Days of Christmas Music: Day 12

I love Christmas music and classical music--fortunately, they often cross paths. There are wonderful pieces everyone associates with Christmas like Handel's incredible Messiah (of which only the first third is really about Christmas) and Tchaikovsky's delightful The Nutcracker (which has almost nothing to do with Christmas and was also the source of my childhood nightmares). Nothing against these--I especially love Messiah--but I wanted to share some other findings that may aid you in your quest to make sure Christmas doesn't get canceled.
So to kick it off on Day 12--Bach's jubilant Christmas Oratorio!




If you like this music, Bach also wrote lots of other Christmas cantatas (including numbers 1, 40, 63, 65, 110, 121, 191, and the joyous Magnificat).

Back to the Books

As many of you know, I graduated from Brigham Young University last year with my Bachelors of Science in Social Work. I've always wanted to get my masters, and I think it's time.

Luckily, if you have a BSW (Bachelors of Social Work), you can apply for a one year Masters of Social Work program and it's called the Advanced Standing Program! The undergraduate course work is viewed as the equivalent of the first year of the Masters Program, and the 33 credits of the BSW program are transferred into the MSW transcript.

So... I have been doing lots of research about different Advanced Standing programs here on the east coast. My list included...

Virginia Commonwealth University Fordham University George Mason University

Columbia University New York University Howard University

Brigham Young University University of South Carolina

Some of the factors of greatest concern for me (us) were COST, cost, cost of tuition, cost of living, cost of credits, Location, family, and the actual quality of the social work program... and how likely I would be to actually get in.

So for the purposes of limiting my application fee budget, I narrowed my list down to 3 schools! Which are... drum roll...

• University of South Carolina Columbia, SC
  
• Howard University Washington, DC
  
• Fordham University NYC

My senior year of high school I swore that I would move out of South Carolina and never come back. Who knew in just 6 years, I'd be deeply interested in the idea of renting the house next door to my parents!! Apparently it's for rent to own right now for only $900/mnth!

I'm thinking of opening the back door and saying, "'Liza! Can you find Oma? Where's Oma?" and letting her run free next door! Beautiful, right? Obviously, a grad school program will be intense, so it would be huge to have my family's support and extra baby-sitting options!USC also has a really good social work program. The recruiter told me that many BYU students like the diversity that USC offers them in comparison to UT. I thought that was funny. Their curriculum is a little bit more Research/Analytical heavy, but I think I should be able to take 3 waiver test to at least get out of a couple of them.
Fordham University is a really great social work school in NYC, and I would actually be going to class in Lincoln Center! So cool! Steve and I LOVE NYC and have always wanted to move back there someday. The cost of living is high, BUT there are great illustration opportunities for Steve (unlike SC). But luckily, with Steve's job, he could work from home doing basically the same thing he does now as a freelancer for his same company. I LOVE Fordham's curriculum and would also LOVE my field clinicals too working back in Harlem or the Bronx again.
Howard University is the most expensive but probably the best school on my list. The Meldau family ultimate plan is for us all to end up living somewhat close to eachother, so we've tentatively decided on Washington, DC. It has great illustration opportunities even though it's expensive, but it's also a little more family friendly than NYC.

So I thought I'd get things started off right, and instead of working on my personal statements and applications, I decided to procrastinate and write a blog post instead!

I think I already know what most people's opinions would be on which school they think I should go to... BUT just for fun, what would your vote be?

And anyone feel like being a generous, altruistic benefactor and sponsoring my grad school education??? Yeah, these are the days one wishes for a fairy godmother.

Eliza met Santa

Last night at Steve's work party for the kids, Santa made an appearance.

Eliza wasn't too interested in sitting in his lap.But she did love the part where she got a new book and some brownies.
(Oh, and we bought Eliza's dress last year after Christmas at Target for $3! Sweet! So now I don't really care that much that there are brownie remnants smeared on the front.) Oh, and much to the dismay of the present Nazi (steve's co-worker), Eliza managed to steal some other kids presents too out of santa's little sleigh. I thought Eliza and the Nazi were gonna have an all out brawl- hehe. Go 'Liza!

They also had a Christmas music Dance-off while waiting for Santa. I think Eliza won hands down. She's got made skills, yo. All thanks to yours truly- what. what.

First Hair Cut!

No, not Eliza's! She's still au naturale!!

(This is Eliza's favorite winter hat. She picked it out herself at Wal-mart a few weeks back, and we think it's HILARIOUS!! Can you imagine this cutey running around the neighborhood in this? It's awesome.)

Steve's the freshly cut victim!


Steve being the frugal guy he is, has for a while been asking me to try to cut his hair for him. Why would anyone entrust their hair to me? I DON'T KNOW....!


But today we picked out a 10 dollar electric clipper with 4 different sized trimmers at Marshall's,
And we used our Elmo video time to do this:

Before:

Then halfway there...

It was actually a lot easier than I thought it'd be. But you can be the judge of that:

After:

I think Steve looks great! I've always been very picky about Steve's haircuts and have tried to bring the hair stylists pictures and give them detailed descriptions, recommendations on clipper #'s to use but with only varying success and satisfaction with the end result. I always want it shorter than they do it too.

So this was my chance, and I like it! Steve's hair grows sooo fast, so I hope this will buy us some more time.

Steve likes it too- seriously, he said that! and not under any threats of injury either! ;) I was worried that he was going to look in the mirror and be like, "What'd you do with my hair?!"

But Steve's just most excited that this haircut was like $10 cheaper than a hair cuttery one, AND it'll keep saving us money over and over. Gotta remember the bottom line.