2014 Wrap-Up

Okay here it is, my year-in-review post for 2014. Just a few days late, no biggie. I had a lot of fun sitting down last year (err, 2 years ago? err, Dec 2013) and thinking about all of the wonderful things that had happened to me, and that I had done over the year. I got married in 2013, so I figured that was going to be the highlight of my year, but when I sat down, I got a chance to review all of the other amazing things about the year.

So of course, I couldn't wait to do it again for 2014. I didn't get married this year, but it was still pretty damned fun. Let me tell you all about it.

In January, my husband and I got to go to Washington D.C. for a conference. We turned the whole thing into a mini-vacation that we both badly needed. We got to see the National Zoo, and more Smithsonians than you can shake a stick at. (Seriously, all of the Smithsonian museums have free admission, you're welcome). We also got to spend time with my aunt & uncle who the train up from Baltimore to spend an afternoon with us at the National Air & Space Museum.

The National Air & Space Museum, and yes, it was free!

In March I celebrated my 26th birthday (and my 1st as a married lady), and got my brand new Asus laptop (it has a touch-screen & a back-lit keyboard), that I love so so so much!

In May we went to New York to dance at my niece's wedding! It was so much fun, and so beautiful, and it was a wonderful chance to get to celebrate a happy occasion with my husband's side of the family. I also got to meet my sister-in-law (who lives in Israel) for the first time. It was a wonderful time, and I know that the "new" couple is happy because.... baby is on the way! She's due this March, and I've already got plans for a baby-blanket for her!

Of course we visited the New York Public Library!

May was also the month that I started graduate school. I'm working towards getting my Master's in Library and Information Science (yes, I want to be a librarian... shocking). This is by far the single biggest thing that happened to me in 2014. Graduate school was a big decision for me (historically, school and I have not gotten along all that well), and it took the rest of the year for me to figure out whether or not it was the right decision.
Even though it's still sucking up all of my free time, I'm 4 classes in (1/3 of the way through), and I finally know that I made the right choice. (Remind me of that in about 3.5 months when finals roll around again, will ya?)

In July we went to the 43rd Pennsic War, my second one ever. We had a blast, and got to spend time with some friends who I hadn't seen in over 5 years. I'm already making lots of plans for next Pennsic, and we'll have a lot of SCA-related projects coming up over the next few months, so keep an eye out for those.

The field battle

In August we celebrated our first anniversary. It was a very special day, and of course, we spent it at the zoo.

October brought a promotion at work. I went from being a page to being a Library Assistant. I'm working in the same department, with the same people, but more hours, more money and benefits! It's an amazing job, and I love it every single day. Even when I'm dealing with "Problem Patrons".

In November my mother and I made our own Thanksgiving for the second time ever! It was a little stressful since my in-laws were coming over, but it was a lot of fun and everything came out delicious, if I do say so myself.

These are just the leftovers!

And I think that's about for big events this year. I did a lot of crafting this year, and of course, made a lot of delicious food (I'm looking at you turkey), played some amazing video games, and over-all had a blast. I don't want to talk about every single awesome thing, 'cause that's what the last year of blogging was for! Go browse, take a look. I'll wait.

In the mean time, I'm going to go ahead and get started on making 2015 just as amazing (if not more so) than 2014 was! Bye!

Project Sunday 4-6-14

We had such an intense Project Sunday this week that I haven't even had a chance to write about it until now, but here we go!

Woo! Project Sunday! We started off the day with a trip to the Detroit Institute of Arts to see their amazing special exhibit Samurai: Beyond the Sword, which was amazing! And if you're interested in checking it out you can find all of the information right here! I don't have any photos (because you're not allowed to take any in the special exhibit space), so if you guys are curious, you'll just have to see the show for yourself! But I did get a few quick pix of the mummy, who's finally back on exhibit!

Horus

While the DIA was fun, it wasn't really much of a project, but don't worry we did plenty of that! After the museum we stopped at home to pick up our jig-saw and headed out to my parents house to do some chair-repair (doesn't that just sound cool?).

Lets see if you can spot the problem here:

Yeah... My parents have had the same kitchen table and chairs for over 15 years now. They've held up pretty well, but every once in a while, something needs to get fixed. This time it was one of the chairs that had broken, cracked in two places. But luckily, it was a pretty easy fix, only requiring a total of four trips to the local home-improvement store.... That was sarcasm.

No, I'm kidding. Well, we did take four trips (total) to Home Depot and Lowe's, but it really was an easy fix. We simply took the broken particle-board base out of the chair, and made a new one. All we needed was a jig-saw, a hammer-tacker and a pencil. And well, a drill didn't hurt.

Then we just put everything back together! Easy and quick. Well, maybe not so quick because we kept getting distracted by other little projects that needed doing around my parent's house. Like, re-stringing some blinds that had broken, and re-attaching some slats that had come off of the deck's built-in bench... When my husband and I show up with a box of tools, my parents can always find something that needs fixing or replacing. It's one of the things we love about them.

After the repair work, my parents treated us to dinner at our favorite pizza place. We were supposed to do some cleaning and straightening when we got home, but we were just too pooped. It was a busy day, with lots of running around, and lots of fun. And I got to use a jig-saw for the first time (it was fun!).

So that's it, our Project Sunday in a nutshell. Oh yeah, and apparently we've been hired to re-do the floor in my parent's garage? Stay tuned!



How about you guys? Did ya'll do anything fun and exciting for your Project Sunday? Or did you have a relaxing weekend? Tell me all about it in the comments!