The Musical Xmas

It's always fun to visit Eddy's dad over Xmas.

This year was a particularly musical year with Eddy playing the Uk

and the whole crew playing Rock Band.

Eddy and I also took an excursion to a local park to get some fresh air.

How long has it been since you swung on a swing upside-down?

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Chicago Animalia

Predictably, we found time in Chicago to hit a few spots where we could stare at animals. We went to the Lincoln Park Zoo to see the penguins and the polar bear.

Sadly, when we got to the penguin house we learned that it is permanently closed.

When we got to the polar bear habitat, this is what we saw.

Not all was lost, though. Some of our old friends were there.

We also saw these guys.

Also this guy.

We also headed over to the Shedd Aquarium.

It just wouldn't be a trip without a visit to a zooquarium, would it?!

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More and more and more presents

In addition to those first exciting surprise presents we also had loads of fun opening presents with the Westbrook side of the family this year. In fact, we had a whole present bed designated in our hotel room.

Even Coco got to open presents.

When we got home, we opened presents from each other and from my parents.

Hope everyone had a lovely holiday break!

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Master of the Couch

So, my office is in the basement of the library. Well, recently, the basement flooded.

I am therefore working from the couch until the basement is back in shape.

Please forward any work-related questions to my assistant.

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The First Christmas Present

We went to Chicago this Christmas to visit Eddy's family. Before the Xmas festivities even officially started, we received a super sweet hotel-warming gift from Carol!

It contained all kinds of goodies.

Perhaps the hat and gloves meant for me were a little cuter than those meant for Eddy.

There were also cute little Xmas chocolates and tiny little liquor bottles. Let me tell you, both of those came in handy on this trip. Now, this was the first Xmas present from Eddy's family. What was the first Xmas present from my family?

Let's just say that my parents shipped my presents to our house and I opened one way before Xmas by accident.

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Free Like Kittens

In libraryland we say that open source software is free like kittens, not free like beer.  In the home improvement department, I hereby enter this buffet into the same category.

You see, when I was driving home from work one day, I passed this beauty on the curb. I says to myself, "It looks like it's got great bones and it's already painted white, so most of the work is done, right? It'll take me and Eddy maybe an hour or so of cleaning and then, hey! Free buffet!" Sure, it was dirty. And it came with some "artwork."

Little did we know we would have to scrub,

rip apart,

rebuild,

and paint.

After a mere month of weekends, we have a beautiful new bedroom piece!  And it was totally free-ish.  Here's the before:

And here's the after:

The gorgeous painting above the buffet is my mom's housewarming present to us!

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Office Remodel

My first office as a new librarian was a little blah. Smallish, no windows, only one real wall, basement, just a little blah ya know?

For my birthday this year, Eddy agreed to help me do a little remodel so that I could love my work space.

Over Xmas break, we had a little time to install all of my new pretties.

Behold!

The only thing missing is a crystal bar set, which Valerie totally promised to get me for Xmas...

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