Drum Roll, Please....

He's Here!!!!! Introducing to the world, my best friend Rachel's baby boy, little Tycho Thompson!

He looks a lot like Rachel already.

It is so awesome, yet so strange that my friends are starting on their own new kinds of adventures. Life is great that way, because everyone creates their own path and I love being able to watch each of my friends grow and change and create such wonderful lives for themselves. I look up to each and every one of them. They are all so very different and yet they are all so strong, intelligent, and daring in their own ways that I cherish being able to be around them and learn something from them everyday. I have the greatest friends in the world, perhaps we don't always talk to each other as much as we should or see each other as often as we would like to but I know that they will always be around when I need them the most and likewise I hope that they all know that I will be around when they need me.

Congratulations Rachel and Aaron. Your baby boy is beautiful and I am sure that he will bring nothing but joy and laughter into your lives. He is after all, pieces of you and this is what you do for others.

Preparations

Ok so here's the thing. When you live on a limited budget in any country, not to mention a foreign one, you must learn to improvise when you don't have the necessary equipment to preform certain tasks. Exhibit A: I have made a makeshift rolling pin, out of nothing less than tin foil and an empty wine bottle! Worked perfectly.

The other thing that one must learn is things don't always come in the

same sizes as we are accustom to. Exhibit B: Evaporate (not condensed milk, and yes mom they are very different things) only comes in 6oz

cans, which don't say "oz" it say 170g. I measure it just to make sure that I was using the correct amount.

Also important to note that if you cannot find what you are looking for you can usually make it out of what you have. The Internet is

wonderful and I found that if you double the amount of evaporated milk that you are going to need, use regular milk and simmer it until half of it is gone then you have just made evaporate milk! GENIUS!!

So here are some pictures of my Thanksgiving Pumpkin Pie. Perhaps not the most elegant Pumpkin pie ever but I am sure that it will still taste amazing!

New Life

HURRAY!!! and congratulations!! My best friend Rachel just gave birth to her first child yesterday! It's a little boy named Tycho Thompson, after some famous Norwegian philosopher or something =p

(http://nysj.org/s/316/images/legacyCMS/ftp/E-86%20New%20Baby.jpg)

Field Trip Photos

If you would like to see any larger images of these just e-mail me and I will send them to you. There are two locations the first one is labeled the second kept messing up but its the Cardiff National Museum. It starts with a picture of Leanne and me.

Gloucestershire

Holy textbooks Batman!

So I know that I have really fallen down on keeping up with blogging and what not, but to be fair it is nearly the end of my first term as a graduate student, which means loads more work and less time out messing about. Since I wrote you last we have our friends Josh back in classes after a months absence, having 2 surgeries on his appendix. I am almost well again lol I caught a cold last week and so have been trying to work my way through that. I received some lovely packages from home, with a new pair of Chucks in one, which I would wear but its been raining a lot and Chucks and rain don't really do well together. Customs stole my Mac 'n Cheese, because they said it was a milk and cheese product. I beg to differer. I don't believe that it has either real milk or real cheese in it, which would give it some nutritional value. I am quite sure that Mac 'n Cheese from a box cannot have anything good inside. Oh yeah and Customs also opened most of my Christmas presents, jerks, but were kind enough to leave my Birthday presents alone, "thanks guys that's really sweet of you. That way you only ruin one of my special days."

The archaeology crowd (plus about 18 others) are having a Thanksgiving celebration on Sunday, organized by me of course. We were going to have on Thursday, but my MAASM group had our film shoot that day. We were then going to have it today, Saturday, but Leanne's MAASM group had their film shoot today so that was right out as well. Thus, our Thanksgiving is four days late but at least we are having one. Something tells me though it is going to be less like Thanksgiving and more like a huge party that gets well out of hand and that I am going to have to clean up from...of course lol. Anyways, I will post pictures of that sometime next weekend. I would do it sooner but next week is ridiculous. See below

Next week, the second to last week of the term looks like this

Monday: Materialities (10-1 then 2-5)

Tuesday: Film (9 to whenever)

Wednesday: Materialities (2-4)

Thursday: Materialities Presentation (9-12), Film Editing (until we just can't stand it anymore)

Friday: Film Editing (8-1), Documentary Histories (2-4:30) Sleep

Saturday: Bath Chocolate Festival

Sunday:....... ZzZzZzZz.......

Then the following week is really not much better:

Monday: Materialites (10-1) (2-5)

Tuesday: Film Editing (until our eyes fall out)

Wednesday: Field trip to Glastonbury (ALL DAY)

Thursday: Last day of Film Editing (until I loose my mind)

Friday: Drama end of term party

Saturday: Arch end of term party (also I told Lisa that I would attend the Sociology end of term party this same night ouch!)

Sunday: Pods and Mine Early Birthday Celebration (once again ouch!)

Then rest and write three essays and package our film to turn in in Janurary. So I wont be sleeping much for then next few weeks and now you see why it might take awhile until I post anything again.

I will put up a post right after this one that has pictures of our field trips to Cardiff, Gloucestershire (pronounced GlAUster, why? I just blame it on the French. And can someone please "esplain to me" why you would pronounce (Spelled) "BERKeley" as "BARKeley." Really where did they come up with that pronunciation. It is a wonder that anyone can learn English at all.) and wherever else we have been since last I wrote to you. Hope that you all are doing wonderfully and had a fabulous Thanksgiving. Miss you lots!

Katie

(picture: http://www.whokilledbambi.co.uk/public/2008/05/bliumis.jpg)

Another crazy week. I know I have promised to update about last week but I just haven't had the time. I have had two huge presentations due this week, one on Tuesday and one today. Next week I have to have the outline for our shoot done and have a firm idea what I am doing for my Materialities presentation on Dec.3rd along with picking out paper topics for my final papers for my three courses. OY! lol but don't worry, with the Archaeology crowd it is never all work and no fun. I have been finding little corners of time to go out and have fun with the crew, and our friend Josh is back up and mobile which is really great! (He was the one that had is appendix out). Anyway, I will, one of these days, get things posted up so that you can see what I have been up to over the past few weeks, but currently I have to go do some shopping and pick a package that my mommy sent me :0)

(as an aside all definition photos, like the one above, that I put on my blog are not taken by me...I know disappointing right? This one came from [http://acopsthoughts.com/wp-content/uploads/pd_speeding_car_070629_ms.jpg])

Tired, don't be silly!

It has been and will continue to be one heck of a busy week back. I will tell about it in all its detail soon. For those of you who don't already know, I was very very sick last week and missed all but one of my classes, although I didn't have class on Monday, so I got lucky on that front. I ended up at the doctors I think a grand total of 6 times, which is more than I normally go in a 2 year period. I am much improved this week, though not quite 100%, hopefully I will be back to my regular crazy self soon. This week in a snapshot:

Monday: Mark Horton Field Trip (couldn't find my camera so no pictures and was still not feeling great, so it wasn't as exciting as all the other field trips)

Tuesday: My friend Ellie's birthday, so we took her out to a pub called 1-5-5 and they had an open mic night which was pretty good)

Wednesday: Field trip to a WWII blockade made here in the English countryside in case the Germans decided to invade. Then BAARS (went to the lecture and then went home. No jaunting to The Hawthorns (pub) or Hivery Volts (also pub) tonight)

Thursday: Guy Fawkes Day (Mark Horton invited us all to his manor house in Glouster for a party, so that aught to be "a whale of a time," as my friend Ros says)

Friday: Ellie's Birthday Party, and Lisa's friends from Norway arrive.

Saturday: Leanne and I work on our Exmoor project. Lisa and I are taking her friends to the Smugglers Inn for dinner then to The Old Duke for Jazz music...

Sunday: I am sleeping and working on my Exmoor project. It's due on Tuesday oy.

Mind you I have been very good this week so far (today is Wednesday) because I have copped out and gone home early every night this week to sleep.

......and I wondered how I got the flu....31hrs of class a week, homework and week nights like this, shocking that I fell sick, shocking ;0)