Well, after over 6 months of schooling I finally know how to administer acupuncture needles. Carl, of course, is and will continue to be my pin cushion. Here he is acting scared when I gave him his first treatment. He's such a great sport. If you look closely you can see one needle in each hand. I gave him a very simple treatment that consisted of one needle in each hand and one in each foot. My teachers call these the "American points". They are the best combination for stress, and apparently they are used with much more frequency in America than anywhere else. Carl is definitely a good candidate for such a treatment.

Carl and I took the boat out for its maiden voyage this weekend. We went to Copano and Charles Bays around Rockport. We had such a great time, and I can't wait to go back. Hopefully we'll go this weekend again. As you can probably tell, the weather was not very conducive for fishing. I had on two pairs of pants, three long-sleeved shirts, wool socks, and a jacket, and I was still freezing! But it was definitely worth it.

Carl fished from the tower all day. I decided that because of my unexplained tendency to fall, drop things, and stumble, I'd wait until the weather was a little warmer to try fishing up there. Even Carl lost his balance once, so I think I made a good decision.
Here's the view from the tower.

This is what Carl's boat looks like today. School is cancelled for today and tomorrow, so I've just been relaxing. I guess I really could be studying, but who wants to do that?

Carl's boat finally arrived yesterday. He's absolutely ecstatic about it. I've never seen him more excited. Its a 14.5 ft Shoalwater Catamaran. Unfortunately an arctic front is arriving, so he can't take it out for a while.




Carl took this picture of River the other day. I think its super funny.

There is a super cool park by my house that River loves to go to. What makes it so cool is that its more like an escape to the country than a park. There isn't a playground or anything, but there are tons of dirt trails that spread out over acres and acres of park. Even though you're in the middle of the city, you feel like you're in the middle of nowhere. There are places like that in every town, and I'm sure glad to have one right by me. A couple of days ago River and I were driving by to go to the post office and noticed that there was not one single car in the parking lot. I just had to stop because River especially loves it when she can just run free and not be attached to a leash.





I don't remember if I've written about this already or not, but I started making duct tape wallets over the holiday break. Its really quite fun. I found about 6 different colors and just started going to town. Then I got the idea to paint designs on some of them. Here are a couple of examples.

Heather and I went to the Witte Museum a couple of weeks ago. I told her we were going to start throwing a couple of learning days in with our play days. She was not at all enthused when I told her we were going to the museum, but she ended up having a really great time. The first two buildings had exhibits about animals and history, and I encouraged her to read all the descriptions. Then, we got to the last building- the children's part. They really had a lot of fun toys. Here she is on a bicycle that is suspended on a cable about 2 stories high. You can see the river below. There was also a huge treehouse and a room full of science projects.

I just love the new hit counter I got(on right of screen). It makes me want to post all the time because I feel like people are really reading my blog. I got 19 hits in one day! It was probably all from random people that I don't even know, but oh well, it still makes me feel good. So I think this might be the beginning of a new era for me. I'm not making any more promises, but it looks like I'm addicted to blogging.

I've added two links- one to my mom's blog(bean anderson), and one to Carl's sort-of blog(extreme coast). He doesn't write on their every day, but he does pretty often. His name on the forum is shepnuts, and I'll alert you when he puts up a cool post. He usually writes some pretty interesting stuff and puts up great pictures.

Here's a picture of Carl and Kennedy playing at Aunt Shelly's house. I left them alone for 3 minutes, and I came back to an entire room full of bubbles. It looked like a lot of fun. Kennedy and Carl got along so well. I can't wait till she's old enough to come stay with us.

The weekend before Christmas(which was also the weekend before finals), Carl drug me to the beach. We had a really good time, and I actually got a lot of studying done. Studying on the beach is so much nicer than sitting in a library or something. And I think the ambiance may have made the material stick in my head better. This is a picture of Carl's St. Nick present in action. We never would have made it that day without the waders. The water was 62 degrees, and I wasn't about to step foot in it. He took care of getting all the bait out in the water for us.

And here's me with the largest red I've ever caught (28.5 inches). It was so beautiful. I wanted to throw it back, but it was really tangled in the line and while I was trying to get it off, all the other poles started going off too. Needless to say, we caught a lot of fish that day, but this one was definitely the best.

This is a picture of me in my absolute favorite Christmas gift this year. I've wanted a U of O hoodie for so long, and I finally got one. My mom told me she was thinking about what all she should get me for Christmas, and she thought,"Stacey didn't ask me for a hoodie this year- I should get her one." Isn't that so funny. And it was extra awesome because I was not expecting it at all.

I had such a great Christmas! I got a lot of family time, and it was awesome!
But the one downer- Kirsten moved to California. I'm so sad about it. We got to spend a lot of time together before she left though, so that was good. I tried to throw her a surprise going away breakfast at her mom's house, but only one person could make it- Anthony. We had a lot of fun though. It was probably better that way because we never get to see Anthony since he lives in Ohio, and we got to do a lot of catching up.
Kirsten and I got back to San Antonio on Wednesday, and she was supposed to leave the next day. However, things took longer than expected and she didn't actually take off until Saturday afternoon. When they drove off on Saturday, I stayed behind a few minutes so that I wouldn't have to see them again 'cause we were both a crying mess. But I ended up catching up to them just as I was turning off to my house. I looked over and saw Kirsten waving her arms and crying, and I just started bawling again saying, "They're so cute!!" They were in this huge yellow Penske truck with her car in tow, and they looked so adult-like.


And I'll end with a couple of pictures of the best little girl in the world doing some yoga. Kennedy is just the cutest thing you can imagine, and that's an understatement.