Spring BREAK!

Just to make a blog- some updates!



1. First and foremost! IJ baby:
I'm getting behind on taking photos! I hadn't taken any over the past few weeks but I took a few today. There are also videos, but I've been slow to getting them organized, in part because I've had some issues with copying them onto the computer. It's on my to-do list. Once I get them on here though, I'll post the good ones on youtube. http://www.youtube.com/user/jalviek We went to the doctor for IJ's 2 month checkup last Wednesday and he weighs 15 lb 1 oz and that puts him beyond the 95th percentile! He is a little chub chub. He is 24 and a quarter inches long which is 75 - 90 percentile. He is precious, and has so much personality. He loves to make faces, smile, and stick out his tongue. He soaks up everything wherever he is and is not shy at all or uncomfortable with strangers. He was an angel at his christening, which was no surprise because he had plenty of new things and people to look at. He is on a great schedule, going to bed between 9 and 10, waking up to eat around 4, then waking up for good between 8 and 9. His hunger and napping patterns are predictable, and he'll play with toys or do tummy time around 1-2 hours a day.



2. Spring Break plans
The only place we plan to go is to Madisonville to ride dirt bikes this Sunday and Monday. IJ will be coming with us, which will be interesting. I'm a little hesitant about it, but we don't have any other options if we want to go. They'll be a lot of things to bring, including a mosquito net we have for his carrier...better buy baby sunscreen too...
Otherwise, I've made myself a huge to-do list of all of the little things and projects that I think about doing every now and then. These include fixing up the outside of our house, largely for the purpose of making it more attractive to potential buyers this summer. I'm trying to get dad's confidence up for selling it. The biggest part of the cleaning up will be washing down the side paneling, which will make a huge difference. Indoors I'd like to do the "nit-picky" cleaning I usually don't worry about like window cleaning and dusting. Then I'd like to do some junk sorting and organizing. I guess you could say I'm in the mood for Spring cleaning and I hope the weather is up to my ambitions :). Schoolwise, I would like to read a few chapters of Biochem.



3. School and Med school
I officially pleaded senioritis as of a few weeks ago. However, I've also been feeling sick of being #5 in my Chem classes. With this feeling, I managed to do some of the best test studying I've done in a while for a test I had in Bio-Organic last week. It was lucky I was able to do it because IJ's temperment and napping allowed it. So I tied three people for second instead :-/. It's a start I suppose. I realize a part of my problem with studying this semester is an inability to sit down for blocks longer than an hour and a half, during a time of the day I can focus on something like reading Biochem.

I've been waitlisted at Columbia and Vandy med schools.
I'm pretty honored that Columbia even did that. The letter even makes it sound like I'm way up on the list too, which is crazy. They could definitely say that to everyone, though. I'm not surprised because I thought my interview went bad (it didn't, although it was strange), I'm surprised because they just didn't seem like they would want somebody unless they were going to be famous someday. I accepted my waitlist position. When I interviewed, the med student that gave the school tour told us that everyone who got in started out on the waitlist. He said he talked the school into accepting him by telling them how serious he was about going there, and recommended to all of us interviewees to do the same in that situation. I'm thinking I got waitlisted at Vandy at least in part because of my late application completion and interview.

I've been saying for a while that I think I should stick to the best financial situation, mostly in the hopes of getting a full ride somewhere. Vandy said they would tell me what my financial package would be once a FAFSA gets filed (which I plan to do during the break). I looked up financial aid at Columbia and feel very different about their 62K/year tuition+living cost, after reading about their deal with loans and scholarships. It turns out that all students have to take a set amount of loans (27K this year), then the rest of the cost is made up by what the student+parents should be able to pay (based on FAFSA), and scholarships/grants. This is totally reasonable. At UofL I expect to have to take out around 20-25K a year.

So WashU is the only school I still haven't heard from. I really enjoyed my stay there, but am not surprised I haven't heard back after the way the interview went (I was stiff and nervous for that one). They said they review applicants in no particular order, so I may still be wrong. I know from Student Doc that people have been getting in already. I wish the schools that I'm obviously not getting into would just deny me already. Northwestern and Penn's status pages act like my application is still sitting around just in case everyone they accept deny them or something.

I need to go ahead and tell UK soon that I won't be considering them. I actually feel kind of bad, they were really nice people and were very welcoming...


4. Lastly, BBall
Totally watched all six overtimes of the Syracuse-UConn game last night. Had to stay up to do homework anyway. I think Jenn and Darren are super lucky to be going to NY tomorrow, but hope they found some reasonably priced tickets. Syracuse just started overtime with WV, and I'm not up for waiting to see who wins... probably do not want to play the superhuman Syracuse tomorrow though.

I really hope we get to be somewhere in the NCAA that we can GO!!! Who needs school when UofL could get their first title of my lifetime?!

One month old, Snow, and Med schools

Wow, three months since my last post...! I didn't realize just how long its been! Well obviously, a million things have happened but oh well.

Isaiah turned 1 month yesterday. I got back in town after a couple days in Philly/NY and gosh I could swear I can tell a difference after just a few days- he's developing so fast. He's finally eating a little less frequently: more like every 4 hours instead of 2.5 hours. He's also reacting more to visual stimuli- staring at things longer and showing more interest in facial expressions, shapes, lights and colors. I really look forward to him liking toys.



Nature is celebrating his month bday by giving us lots of pretty snow and ice, and thus keeping me from having to go to school for a couple more days. I took the opportunity yesterday to do a lot of housecleaning and today I'm writing this blog, watching October Sky and look forward (really) to reading up some Biochem for a quiz I'll be taking Friday morning. Of course Isaiah is hanging out with us in the meantime. Jeff is still sleeping, he was gone from 3:30 to 8 this morning and only did half of his paper route which would usually take him about an hour. There's a bball game tonight at 7 v. USF- we might be taking Isaiah with us because mom and dad are thinking about staying home.


So the snow is pretty- and I'd like to go out in it but its trapped everyone in pretty well. Mom and Dad don't have power.



I interviewed at Vandy and Columbia over the past week and a half. Both schools that I've been really interested in at one point or another- Columbia was my top choice for a while before the baby news because of its location and curriculum opps and Vanderbilt has always been really attractive to me because of scholarship opportunity and the friendly impression I've gotten of it. At the interviews, my impression of Vandy was really nice and my impression of Columbia was so-so. Being in New York was a lot less exciting for me this time around- I think having Isaiah and Jeff make the possibility of going there feel much more distant than it used to.

...Next time maybe I'll make an update that only has one subject for me to focus on.

Happy Halloween

I don't see how anybody can grow out of halloween. Like mom and dad, all they do these days is pull out a plug-in pumpkin every year now. Old farts. And same goes for their slacking on Christmas lights at Christmas. Shoo, I plan on decorating and liking arts and crafts my whole life.


Pumpkins: All of them are mine except for the cyclops looking one. I did the girl for REACH at school, but I'm kind of disappointed because I don't think I managed to make a place in a contest- I apparently lost to a pirate pumpkin, a ninja pumpkin, and some other pumpkin. Oh well, she turned out better than I imagined she would. Skully turned out OK, and the Mr. potato head one has been popular. Jeff did the cyclops looking one. He did not used to be a cyclops- we seem to have had a mysterious animal the past few years who likes to gnaw on the pumpkins after we carve them. Hm. It was either rats or opposums (gross).

Note that in the single of me, the Phillies fan skull in the background. Yay Phillies.

Looking forward to seeing Sarah Palin and her husband. We had maybe 30 trick -or-treaters (about what I expected for our street), and everybody liked my costume. =) Jeff and I got the idea from a Subway worker at UofL who asked what we were having and was like "Yep, you've definitely got yourself a basketball there." Which apparently basketball = boy.

It's ma Birthday!

So I started this blog then of course didn't actually have time to make it, but I pretty much just planned to put up some pictures from the past few months (on the request of Jen). If you'd like to see even more pictures from lots of random times, visit my fb page. I think Jen just wants to see my belly (even though I'll be seeing her later today), so fine, I'll put some huge belly pics up. *boohoo*. I've gotten to the I'm feeling too big stage. Don't mind Jeff's hairy-chested, blue-boxered cuteness.

I also want to put up pictures of my new fish- which I also planned to spotlight on FB. Right now I've still got only 3, but I was expecting to get half a dozen or so for my bday but haven't yet and probably won't until next week unless Jeff gets them while I'm gone this weekend. If you hadn't already heard, we are making the fish tank into "the office." We have two Toby's, a Stanley, and have already had and lost our first Phyllis. Toby is a type of starter fish I forget the name of, Phyllis was a rainbow guami (?) we think died from stress bacteria, and Stanley is a black shark. We plan on getting a loach for Creed for sure, than the other ones won't be too hard to pick out. Is 15 too many fish for a 20 gallon tank? We also plan on gradually changing the scenery of the tank. Thus far, we have a plastic miniature fish tank for our fish. We want to find miniature plastic computers and desks, a plstic conference table, perhaps redo the rocks with blue to make for carpet. And then our backdrop? We'll probably have to makeshift one.

Well anyways... It's a Boy!

Not that I've known for like 3-4 weeks or anything! Haha. It's still up to Jeff to pick a name and I can't say we've made much progress on that since my last post. I personally am getting used to the Jimmy name the more I hear it from Mom and Dad, and Jeff says he likes Dad's middle name, Matthew. Oh who knows. If we look at a baby name list maybe Jeff will see something completely different that he likes. I finished painting the baby room/dining room early this week- it's a very nice, calming pastel yellow. I've set up Jenn's fish tank she let me have in it- but still need to scrub it down a bit, and fill it with water and fish... I also found a fantastic white shag rug for the room, thats so soft. I can't decide when to open it- I don't want the cats to claim it as their own so soon. Well, to keep the post about the baby, I thought I'd go ahead and put up pictures of all the ultrasounds.


April 21; 5 weeks gestational- see spot ! This really freaked me out at the time!


May 8; almost 8 weeks- His heart was beating- that freaked me out too at the time!


June 19; almost 14 weeks - Finally past the freaking out stage- he was moving incredibly a lot already! Bending his neck, waving his arms, kicking- And looking so cute already!

face


footprint

July 28 ; about 18 weeks - I could feel him moving a little by this point and of course the ultrasound once again showed he was moving all over the place! We meant to make this trip our first baby video, but alas, we forgot and won't be getting any more free ultrasounds... But Hey, It's a Boy! We wanted a boy. Or Jeff did- I liked the sound of either! But whatever, "boys are easier," right...?
He's a thumb sucker already.


face
a thinker
BOY

My next appointment is actually Monday. I don't think I'll be doing anymore ultrasounds, so I'm not sure what I'm doing other than being weighed and checked for blood pressure....

School starts Monday too. I've got most of what I needed to do done, of course, except finish my applications for med school. I finished 4 out of 8. I've got to finish them this weekend or they'll never get done. UK called and begged me to finish theirs (haha). Obviously not really begged but Oh they want me.

Jeff and I decided to keep the 75/100 number for our rewedding thing next summer. We need to book ourselves a honeymoon. Someone please give us advice on where to go in early July.

Adrianne/Aprille or Greg/Jeff Jr?

So I'm sitting around waiting for Jeff to get home so we can go to my ultrasound appointment.... =D. And in the meantime I'm making myself an 80s playlist. I can't figure out a way to embed so I'm just giving the link and I'll embed one song. And he might take a little while so I think I'll work on some of my easy-to-complete applications to pass the time.

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=12989A3CA706B5CB






I'll be letting everyone know by phone after the appointment. I haven't been this excited about something ...I don't know since I was a little kid at Christmas. What do I want? Goodness, I can't decide. Both =D

Yes I know The police was late 70s but whatever its close enough

My pre-law fling gone bad

This is an old and out of date story but since I haven't posted in a while I'll go ahead and tell it. So to summarize, I got a citation and was towed back in January for 'parking in a crosswalk', and spent $135 on impounding and citation feeds. I appealed and after my hearing I got a letter in the mail of denial.

I appealed because when I parked there, I felt uneasy about how close I was to the intersection, but took specific note that I was not blocking the cross walk (I knew I needed to do that much). When I came back out that afternoon, my car was gone and I walked home. I was upset and flustered and rather clueless for what offense I had occured to get towed, so I spent an hour studying the parking regulation laws here: http://www.louisvilleky.gov/PARC/Parking+Regulations.htm

Eventually, I found the law that I was suspecting may have been a problem: I violated

http://www.louisvilleky.gov/PARC/parkinggenerally.htm#72.035

72.035N, "No parking within 30 feet of an intersection." But boo! Everyone parks within 10-15 feet of an intersection. It was stupid but I had definitely broken that law. It was still interesting looking up all of this because I learned about many ambiguous parking laws that not only are unheard of but unenforced as well.

When I went to go get my car, I found out that I'd gotten a citation for parking in a cross walk, violation of ordinance 72.035F. Dad came out with me to the impound lot and I told him my story of innocence and he supported me in an attempt to appeal. When I got home, I drove back to the spot where I was towed and alas, it was still there (which is strange but perhaps they towed more than one car from that spot that day). I parked my car and got out to take photos for my hearing.
















I also printed out the list of ordinances that included my real offense and the tried offense. If I would have gotten a ticket for the 30 ft law, I wouldn't have gotten towed. That was a lot of the motive, getting back at least $120 in a time where I was already pretty broke being after Christmas and all.

At the hearing, I only needed to talk to one person, and the officer who wrote the ticket was not present. We compared my pictures to the pictures taken by the officer (which were angled very poorly almost to make a perspective illusion that I may have been in the cross walk). Sure, the officer would have to take my word that my reproduction of my parking job was legit, but she didn't say anything about that. My main argument was that I felt I deserved a reimbursement mostly for the sake that I got written a false citation. She tried to argue with me a bit but ended the hearing at one of my comments saying, "well, remember in the future not to park so close." I thought I had won, I felt like my argument was legit, and sure I don't know if I put it forth as organized as I should have, but she gave me the impression that I had done the job.

Dad called me a few days later to let me know I'd received a letter of my denied appeal. He says that the government just doesn't make financial room for reimbursing citations after appeals, or something. It was too bad. I thought it was fun looking up all the ordinances and feeling like I was some pre-law type trying to get a go at fighting a case. Whatever I guess. As for me and political sciences, I'll be taking the closest thing I'll get to it next semester in an honors seminar called Environmental Law. Ooh.