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March 30, 2009

Beach Walk 1

One of my favorite things to do around town is to go for a walk around the beach. Brent and I have been going together a lot this winter, often accompanied by my dog Rocky. Here are the pictures from one of those trips.

Rocky sniffing around in the sand:

I wonder how long this sign has been there:

I'm a big fan of the concept of pictures of people taking pictures:

I love this picture:

Dogs will do anything for a tennis ball... even jump in icy cold water for a swim in the middle of winter:

When I say "dogs" I don't include Rocky, of course. Brent and I took Rocky off his leash to play fetch with a tennis ball with us the last time we went to the beach. He sauntered over to the ball lying in the sand, sniffed it, looked at us over his shoulder, and bolted top-speed down the beach leaving the Brent, Me, and the ball behind.

Brent:

These next two pictures are two of my favorites. That's the NYC skyline in the background:

Sometimes, people come to the beach and make these cool rock piles, possibly as an homage to Andy Goldsworthy and his famous nature art:

Scouting things out from atop a very large piece of driftwood:

I love the shell beach with no sand to be found:

Brent skipping stones:

Beach plant:

This should look familiar to my regular readers:

This past fall....

Brent decided to walk along the beach wall and Rocky couldn't resist walking behind his buddy:

Second Congregational Church of Greenwich, a local landmark for sailors out in the water:

My future beach house:

A big storm surge must have pushed all these shells onto one of the picnic areas:

Rocky investigating:

What is it that's just so wonderful about barnacles?

Stopping along the road around the beach so that Brent could get the sand out of his shoes:

What a handsome little dog:

And finally, after a three mile walk, Rocky put on his comfy clothes and took a nap on the couch:

-Lauren

Posted by lauren at 01:49 PM | Comments (4)

March 29, 2009

Another Miscellaneous Entry

All right, so I got excited and a little ahead of myself with the "New Camera" entry. I actually have a lot of pictures that I need to post before getting up to date. Here's another of my famous miscellaneous picture entries... trying, once again, to get caught up.

Let's start with Valentine's Day. Brent got me a beautiful bouquet of roses that he picked out himself. He got the prettiest one of every color that the florist had to offer:

I filled Brent's car with heart-shaped balloons:

We also got each other presents (mostly lots of books) that I don't have pictures of. For our Valentine's Day date, we went to Avenida, a Mexican restaurant on Greenwich Ave. where we live. Here we are on the way:

The only picture I have from inside the restaurant:

Ok now getting a little more random... Brent, Shadow and I like to watch Planet Earth together on DVD sometimes. It's Shadow's favorite show and she watches intently, sometimes jumping up to slap the birds on TV:

The cookies I made for Jocelyn's welcoming Dalton to NYC party:

My very first bread-baking experience, using this recipe:

Snow on Brent's car's sunroof that looked like clouds in the sky:

Our apartment building:

I think I may have mentioned this before, but Nicole, Brent and I worked on a Disney Imagineers project where you had to design your own resort or ride. We created The Arctic Lodge and are hoping to win and have it built someday!

Ok, there's still more to come as soon as I have time so keep checking back.

-Lauren

Posted by lauren at 08:56 PM | Comments (1)

March 27, 2009

New Camera

Posted by lauren at 09:02 PM | Comments (5)

March 24, 2009

Cat People

Sorry for my absence lately, but I have good reason. I got a job! Well, sort of. It's a temp-to-hire job so I have a job if they decide after some unspecified amount of time that they don't hate me. I work from 8:30am to 5:30pm every day, come home, have dinner, relax a little and go to bed, which hasn't left me nearly enough blogging time.

Anyway, I decided to devote an entire entry to Shadow and her utter disregard of my love for her. Shadow is, of course, a cat, and any "cat people" out there know that having a cat means accepting the daily scorn and disapproval coming from your beloved furry friend. Well, that's not the case for Brent, Shadow's person. I feed her, I give her water, I nurture her and care for her with all my heart, and she still hates me, but all Brent has to do is walk into the room and Shadow simply melts for him.

Example 1:

When Brent opens the refrigerator, Shadow purrs and figure-8s in between his legs, hoping to get a snack. When I open the fridge, Shadow jumps in, starts ripping things open, wraps her claws around the little bars in the shelves, and screams as I drag her out backwards and upside down, trying to take the entire shelf out with her. I wish I had a picture to demonstrate for you, but this is the best I've got:

Example 2:

Here's Shadow really hamming it up for her dad:

Pulling out all her best cat moves, like "upside down head" and "rub my fuzzy belly":

And here's the face she makes whenever I come near her. I was in particular trouble this day because I put her stuffed kitty on the wrong part of her arm chair and ottoman (which Brent and I have yet to sit in since moving):

Example 3:

Lounging with her favorite person again:

Giving me the "I'm the favorite, so deal with it" face:

Why do I continue to adore this little monster so much? Because she's just too adorable not to (she actually did this herself):

And last but not least, here's a picture of Shadow stalking a bird at the feeder outside that my mom gave her for Valentine's Day (yes, the cat gets Valentine's Day presents):

-Lauren

Posted by lauren at 10:13 PM | Comments (4)

March 15, 2009

Vote for Nicole!

Hey there blog readers of the world. My friend Nicole, who I went on my Road Trip Nation trip with, is currently applying for a job with STA Travel. She made the most amazing video application and I'm sure she'd love it if you'd all watch and then rate it and/or comment on YouTube! Check it out, it's very cool:

Posted by lauren at 03:44 PM | Comments (3)

March 14, 2009

Our New Apartment

If you want to see pictures of our new apartment, you can check out Jocelyn's blog. We've actually done quite a bit of decorating since she's last been here, but I'll be posting my own apartment pictures (or maybe a video walk-through?) soon. And by soon, I mean whenever I get everything cleaned up and put away... so maybe never.

I did take a few pictures with my iPhone, though, during the whole move-in process, and here they are.

Here's my Kitchen Aid that I am so in love with. It has its very own table because we have zero counter space:

Next to it is our food pantry. We were working on a "we're still unemployed" budget and couldn't afford a real one, so we bought a do-it-yourself closet organizer. Those are the shoe cubbies on top, filled with our food. I'm not complaining, though, I really like it!

Also in our kitchen is this very cool piece of art from Ikea. We think it spells out a secret message, but we can't figure out what it is:

Here is our Christmas Tree to Be. We bought it at Restoration Hardware (which Brent tells me is not a real hardware store, even though he's absolutely wrong) and we have planted it in a pot in our new apartment. Hopefully, thirty or so years from now, it will be Christmas tree sized and living in a yard in a real house somewhere:

The cat didn't help at all:

Here's our bed (headboard also from Ikea):

Shadow's bed with her stuffed kitty:

Shadow wanting desperately to live in the refrigerator:

One of the very first things Brent and I cooked in our apartment was a homemade from scratch pizza. We actually even made up the recipe ourselves. We used a basic pizza dough (that we made!!) and covered it in basil pesto, freshly sliced chunks of mozzarella cheese, diced tomatoes, and pine nuts. Yum! It was so good:

And now just a few random iPhone pictures taken out and about....

I don't remember this:

Pretty sky on the drive home from Ikea:

And last but not least, Shadow and Frisky co-existing peacefully:

What you can't tell from that picture is that Shadow had actually stealthily sneaked up behind my poor, sick Frisky and after I snapped that photo, she started reaching her phantom paw in front of Frisky's face, slapping her, and then disappearing before Frisky even knew what hit her... literally.

-Lauren

Posted by lauren at 02:59 PM | Comments (3)

March 13, 2009

New Year's Eve

Ok, So I'm only a few months late for New Year's Eve, right? Anyway, this year a big group of my friends went out to a party at a local bar, while a bunch of us stayed behind to have a low-key New Year's at Kristina's apartment, which was really a lot of fun. Here are the pictures.

Molly, Cathy, and Cathy's friend Joe:

Vanessa, Jason, and Erin:

Cathy, Molly, Hayley, Me, and Brent:

Brent and Jason:

What a flattering picture of everyone involved here:

Blurry Kristina and Jason getting the champagne ready:

Yum:

Brent and Me:

We all had blackberries in our champagne:

Kristina and Jason napping:

Brent napping:

Anyway, sorry I'm still so behind. Right now I'm making my first ever attempt at baking bread and it is NOT doing well. I'll post more on that later....

-Lauren

Posted by lauren at 12:40 AM | Comments (4)

March 10, 2009

Just For Fun...

Brent let me practice some portrait photography on him last night... at 4am. We really, really need jobs and a life:

-Lauren

Posted by lauren at 03:24 PM | Comments (2)

March 06, 2009

Christmas Cat

Just a few cute pictures from Shadow's visit over Christmas....

Playing with one of her Christmas presents:

Stealing potato chips and running off to hide with them:

Enjoying the Christmas tree:

This spot on top of the couch was "Shadow's spot" the whole time she was visiting:

Now that she's gone, this has become "Rocky's spot," just to show the cat who's boss. Of course, when Shadow comes to visit, it takes her under 30 seconds to reclaim all her spots and put our poor little Rocky in a permanent state of terror.

-Lauren

Posted by lauren at 02:47 PM | Comments (1)

March 04, 2009

Be My Friend?

Brent and I recently signed up for Netflix and if you want to be our "friend" (share ratings, reviews, etc.) click HERE.

Thanks!

Posted by lauren at 12:19 PM | Comments (0)

March 02, 2009

Family Part 2: Plano, Illinois

A few weeks after Brent's reunion with his biological family here in New York City and Connecticut, Brent and I got in the car to drive to Plano, Illinois to stay with Susan, Kristi, Brittany, and Cole. We left at 7pm from Connecticut and headed out westbound on the highway. Along the road, we hit some really bad snow in Pennsylvania and had to stop for a little while. The crazy thing about Pennsylvania is that it only takes about an hour to get there, but then five hours later you're still in it. Here we are on the map, as represented by a red push pin:

Brent in the snow outside the rest stop:

We stopped in many colorful roadside gas stations and shops, but the best was probably the Flying J; something we don't have here in Connecticut.

The Flying J is home to some of the world's greatest gas station consumer products. Brent and I began a "best things to buy at a gas station" hunt and all the winners were from the few Flying Js we stopped at. Some fine examples include, but are not limited to....

Lip balm vending machines:

Dressed up moose statues:

John Deere housewares:

A hot pink John Deere kitchen towel:

Back on the road we ran into some more snow in Ohio:

As you can see, we had nearly white-out conditions and had to pull off at the first rest stop we could find. While we were there, we decided to take a quick nap in the car. We were both awakened about an hour later by the crisp 12° air surrounding us. Yes, we forgot to leave the car on for the heat, but what better way to enjoy the sunrise than that teeth-chattering goodness of a snowy Ohio morning after sleeping in a rest stop parking lot?

This rest stop had another contender for the best gas station product competition -- an entire Inspirational Reading from the Amish bookcase:

Cool trees out the window in Ohio:

Statue of a chihuahua scratching his ear, yet another fantastic gas station offering:

And finally, nearly 20 hours later, Brent and I were in Illinois, getting off the highway and heading for Plano:

And we made it!

When we got to the house, we took much needed showers and got ready for the party that night. Susan had arranged for all the family to come over to their house to meet Brent for the very first time!

Here's Brittany giving Brent the cake she had baked him, using all three of his favorite colors - blue, green, and orange in the middle:

We all sang happy birthday to Brent to make up for 22 missed birthdays. Brent's birthday isn't until August, but it makes no difference. We said his name 22 times for 22 years:

Brent's cake:

Brent with Susan's older brother, also known as Uncle Big Rick:

Welcome Home Brent:

Cutting the cake:

From left to right, that's Grandpa Ron, Aunt Mary Kay, Uncle Big Rick, Kristi's friend Laura, Kristi, Aunt Joan, and Uncle Greg and his girlfriend on the right:

Uncle Big Rick gave Brent this Willie Nelson bandana from many, many years ago. He and Susan went to a Willie Nelson concert together and got matching red bandanas. Uncle Big Rick lost his a long time ago and took Susan's from her because it always meant a lot to him. He decided now, though, that he wanted Brent to have it:

Kristi holding Grandpa Ron's dog:

The next morning, we all got up early to have Susan's famous letter pancakes. Susan made us all pancakes in the shape of the first letter of our names, and they were even more delicious than circular pancakes. Here's Brent with his very first letter pancake:

We spent a lot of that day playing Guitar Hero and just hanging out. Here's Cole with his dog Buddy:

Brent playing Guitar Hero:

Buddy looking out the snowy window:

Unfortunately, that afternoon Kristi had to go back to school at Illinois State University a couple hours away :(

That night for dinner, Susan, Brittany, Cole, Brent, Aunt Joan and I went to a local pizza place called Uncle Lar's where we had the most amazing pizza cut into squares (out here in Connecticut, we usually have triangles):

After dinner, we all went out bowling where I lost by quite a bit. It's ok though, I don't usually bowl without bumpers so I wasn't really prepared.

Brittany:

Cole:

Susan:

Aunt Joan:

Brent:

Brittany:

The next morning, we all got in the car early in the morning and drove to Illinois State to pick Kristi up for breakfast at Bob Evan's. When we got to Kristi's apartment, Susan found an old Dr. Seuss book that she used to read to her kids all the time - "Are You My Mother?" We took a few minutes for Susan to read "Are You My Mother?" to Brent, the only one of the kids who had never heard it before:

Brent and Cole waiting at Bob Evan's:

While we were waiting for our breakfast to arrive, the balloon man came around making balloon hats for people. Here we all are with our balloon hats at breakfast.

Kristi's roommate Alison with a flamingo, Me with bunny ears, Brittany with Finding Nemo, Cole with "hot lips," and Brent with a viking hat:

Balloon hat shadows:

Brent started running down the hill to the car with Cole chasing after him:

The water tower for Normal, Illinois where Kristi goes to school:

The landscape in Illinois is absolutely amazing. It's not at all like it is here on the East Coast with all the hills and trees everywhere. This will probably sound weird, but out here in Connecticut there is hardly anywhere where you can see for any far distance. No matter where you turn, there's always a cluster of trees, a hill, a mountain, a house, etc. Out in Illinois, though, there are endless fields and farms. It's beautiful:

After driving back from Kristi's school, we went to Arlington Heights, where Brent was born. Here's the hospital where Brent took his very first breath:

Brent looking around the town where he was born:

Here's the apartment Susan lived in while she was pregnant with Brent:

After driving around Arlington Heights, we went to Grandpa Ron and Grandma Sue's for dinner. While we were there, Cole and the dogs climbed into the dog bed together and took a nap:

The next day, Susan had to work so Brent, Brittany, Cole, and I went to the movies. After the movie, Susan came to meet us at the theater so that we could all go out for ice cream. While we waited, Brent and Cole played arcade games together:

After getting ice cream, Brent, Cole, and Susan all drove home together and Brittany and I stopped for gas and then followed in her car. When we got home, Brent, Susan and Cole were all excitedly waiting inside with a large envelope addressed to Brittany. It turns out she got into her number one school, Arizona State University! Brent and I were both so excited to be there to share her moment with her:

The next day, Brent, Brittany and I went to Portillo's which has amazing food:

I know these pictures probably don't mean much to all of you, but I don't want to forget anywhere we went. Here's a picture from the next morning at 5am when we went for an early breakfast at the Main Street Diner before Brittany had to go to her nursing clinical:

That night was our last night in Illinois so we all went out for a special dinner at JuRin, a hibachi restaurant a few towns over. While we were there, Cole quadruple dog dared Brent to eat an entire ball of wasabi. Of course Brent had to take his first quadruple dog dare from his little brother, but I think he might have regretted it:

We also pretended it was Brent's birthday that night so he got a frozen tiramisu, a rose, and a polaroid picture of all of us:

Aunt Joan, Cole, Brittany, Susan, Brent, Me, and Jackie (Aunt Joan's daughter and Brent's new cousin):

That night we all laid around the house, sad that Brent and I had to leave in a few hours:

Saying goodbye to their beautiful home in Plano and heading back to Greenwich:

The drive home had no snow, but lots and lots of fog:

In this picture, you can actually see the fog hanging over the farm:

Brent on the road:

I love this picture:

On the drive home, Brent had another big first. The first time ever speaking to his biological father, Chris. With a lot of google searching and some information from Susan, Brent was able to find Chris and call him last Thursday:

Chris seems like a really nice guy and he and Brent got along very well. Brent looks a lot like him (based on some old pictures from Susan) and they both hope to be able to meet some day soon!

And last but not least... how could we end this amazing road trip without more great things to buy at gas stations?

Rocking horses:

Hair jewelry:

A really creepy swinging clown with prizes:

Extreme pickle-flavored Pringles:

Anything and everything you can imagine plugging into a car cigarette lighter (a stove, a crock pot, a wet/dry vacuum, etc.)

And the best of all, a turquoise plaid $5 vest that Brent just had to buy:

Who is this person I'm dating?

Anyway, we made it home safely and can't wait to see everyone again!!

-Lauren

Posted by lauren at 04:40 PM | Comments (8)

March 01, 2009

Family

As some of you may already know, Brent was adopted 22 years ago in Illinois and brought back here to Connecticut where he was raised by a wonderful, loving family. He has lived here ever since, never knowing much about where he came from other than that he was born in a Chicago suburb to a woman named Susan who chose to give him a better life than she could give him herself at the time.

In October of 2008, Brent and his parents climbed into a taxi in London, and it was this taxi that set off a chain of events that would change the lives of many people forever. Brent saw an ad in that taxi for a National Geographic DNA project, asking people to send away for DNA swabs and send them in to be a part of The Genographic Project. Participants would receive information back from National Geographic, telling them where their ancestors had come from. Being adopted, Brent had no idea what nationality he was, so he decided to look into it when he got home from London.

A few weeks and $200 later, Brent received his DNA kit. He swabbed the inside of his mouth twice, packaged his samples in little test tubes, and sent them off to be analyzed by National Geographic.

In January of 2009, Brent got his results back in the mail. His DNA was "inconclusive" and suggested that he might be a Gypsy, an Ashkenazi Jew... or basically anything else in Europe. Disappointed and still looking for answers, Brent went to his parents and asked if they had any sort of ethnic information for him that might have been lost in paperwork 22 years ago.

Brent's mom and dad searched through their old papers to try to find anything at all that might give Brent an idea of where he came from. That's when they found it -- Brent's last name at birth. Brent now had the first and last name of his birth mother and immediately typed them into Google to see what he could find. As it turns out, Susan had been looking for Brent for many, many years and had listed herself on all sorts of adoption sites so that Brent could one day find her.

That night, Brent sent an e-mail to Susan through the adoption website he had found, and excitedly awaited her reply. Days went by with no answer, but Brent didn't lose hope. In addition to the email (which we would later find out never arrived) Brent had Susan's cell phone number and address.

A little over a week after sending the email to Susan, Brent and I were getting settled in our apartment, cleaning and doing dishes, when Brent grabbed his phone and said "I'm calling."

Brent sat on the couch, dialing the number as I stood in the doorway, too excited to even think about dishes. The phone rang and rang and then went to a voicemail message. Brent hung up. Brent then started searching online directories for more phone numbers for Susan, and found two home lines. Brent tried both, with no answer. Almost ready to give up for the night, Brent called Susan's cell phone one more time and put the phone on speaker so that I could hear her voice in the voicemail message, but she picked up.

Three and a half hours later, Brent got off the phone with the most wonderful news in the world. He had another family. After Brent, Susan had three more children, Brent's siblings. Having been an only child all his life, Brent was thrilled to have two sisters (Kristi and Brittany) and a brother (Cole). Kristi is 20, Brittany is 19, and Cole is 12. Brent and I spent the rest of that night talking about Brent's biological family and looking at pictures of everyone. It was the first time in 22 years that Brent had seen anyone who looked like him.

Exactly one week later, Susan got on an airplane to New York City where Brent picked her up at the airport on a Friday night and didn't come home until 5am (having spent the entire night talking at the airport). Susan was staying in the city, and Brent and I were taking a train out the next morning. We arrived at Susan's hotel and went next door to a restaurant to get something to eat for lunch before coming back to Connecticut. What Brent didn't know was that his three siblings had flown out that morning and were standing right behind him.

Brent hugging Kristi, Brittany, and Cole for the very first time:

That's Brittany on the left and Kristi in the middle:

Susan, Brittany, Kristi, and Cole hidden behind Brent:

"Laur, did you know about this??" -- I did :)

Susan, Cole, Brent, Kristi, and Brittany:

After a lot of hugs and introductions, we all walked to Grand Central to get some lunch and head out to Connecticut.

Kristi, Brent, Cole, and Brittany at Grand Central:

Susan, Kristi, Brent, Cole, and Brittany:

After an evening in Connecticut seeing where Brent grew up, we all hopped back on the train to NYC to spend the night together.

Brent and Cole laughing on the train:

We got large coffees at Starbucks and headed back to the Waldorf-Astoria where their hotel room was. We all laid on the beds and stayed up all night laughing, talking, exchanging stories, and getting to know each other. It was like something straight out of the movies:

We got more coffee from room service (which, at the Waldorf-Astoria, costs $80!!) and after about thirty minutes of sleep in the wee hours of the morning, everyone had to head back to the airport to get on a plane back to Illinois. We waved to their cab as they drove off, knowing we'd see them all again soon.

Now do you all understand why I've been busy and distracted lately? I'll be posting pictures from Brent's and my recent trip to Plano, Illinois as soon as possible!

-Lauren

Posted by lauren at 11:06 AM | Comments (13)