US meets UK

Have you read this article yet? No, go read it, I’ll wait for you to read all 6 pages.

Yesterday I received my baby fix. We were at my cousin Megan’s house and their friend had his baby over. She was just 2 months old and at that stage where she isn’t too picky about who holds her. It’s funny how babies have the ability to make you feel like a monster pariah-WHAT?! YOU WON’T LET ME, A STRANGER, HOLD YOU!? JERK! I don’t know why baby rejection makes people feel so bad, it just does. But thankfully, this baby loved me and that of course, made me feel great. This baby loves me, ME! ME! ME! ME!

(I’m self-banned from touching babies-this is what they do to me)

I had started to read this article that afternoon, but only hopped onto page three before we left. So while I held, coddled and cooed stranger baby into loving me, I couldn’t help but think about it. Additionally, since I had only reached page three I didn’t have (ha) the full story.

I thought about how of course she was great at 2 months… but what about the future? I’m so empathetic I cry at hallmark commercials, I can’t even watch war movies because they affect me for days. How on earth will I be able to relate to my child’s successes and failure without losing my mind?

After reading the last page I think the takeaway is this (from Tom Gilovich)”Should you value moment-to-moment happiness more than retrospective evaluations of your life?” This is important, because as a parent it appears that your moment to moment happiness is lessened by children, but that your retrospective evaluations of your life are pretty great.

As someone who literally went from saying “I like other people’s kids, but am unsure about having my own” to “ooooo! Baby! ME HOLD BABY?!” I’m just not sure what my answer is in regards to children. When you have children, you give up so much for them. I wonder if I will ever feel it is the right time. Will we ever have “enough” money? Will I ever lose “enough” weight to become pregnant?

Not to mention, deciding which country to raise children in. Talk about a big decision! Hypothetically speaking, say we decide which country to have them in, are we tied to our familial geographical locations? Can we raise our nonexistent kids on our own, without familial help? Would we even want to? My cousins, aunts, uncles and certainly grandparents were a large part of my upbringing. I can’t imagine life without them. Will our kids have to? Will they know the close ties that cousins can provide?

When it comes to kids, there are too many questions and not enough answers.

ps. Sorry this post is old, but I am clearing out my drafts!

It’s the D’orsay first anniversary, as far as anniversaries go the 1st is a great one to celebrate but the whole paper thing? Well, it had me pondering for a bit. I know I don’t have to follow traditions, but I like having a theme as it narrows the field for decision making.

First up? A calendar modified from YHL’s template (thanks to Mrs. Bunny for modifying it for me)! Sadly, it was a struggle to come up with 12 quotes that would fit/look nice/have meaning. At first I had 12 quotes all from Superbad (long story) but figured while funny it wouldn’t be a very romantic gift. I sourced from our favorite movies, past emails and ceremony music for the final quotes.

(YHL version)

Mr. D is into typography, design and he has a penchant for vintage design so when the travel book store near my office closed for business I popped in to say goodbye and to peek around. I found this deserted lonely transit map book and snapped it up!

(clearly from Amazon)

The last paper related gift is the book of..um… childish adult drawings from the movie Superbad (again, long story).

(Amazon)

So perhaps only 1/3 of these gifts will work for your first anniversary. I had also considered framing maps of our hometowns… but I had a really difficult time finding Mr.D’s village on a map that made sense. What are your favorite paper related gifts?

Biscuit? I think Biscuit is adorable!

In the event Biscuit isn’t available, I think Sydney is pretty sweet.

Or Huxely?

*Biscuit, Sydney and Huxley  via MAPR

In case you’re concerned that Nick is unaware of my puppy pug obsession. He knows. Oh, he knows. Perhaps I should work on a more realistic list? I guess.

Anywho…

I’d like to meet Shiloh

We aren’t exactly in the right place for a dog, what if Nick goes to work for an agency instead of working at home? What do we do with the dog when we travel? We live in a smallish one bedroom apt-is that big enough? le sigh. No dog for now.

Even if it’s a great price and is completely adorable.

Just because it’s on a target block, with incentives to purchase and renovate…. and my dad is a contractor, and we have a great handy support system of people who could help us…. that’s no reason to buy…right? right?

F bombs. We have a 3 year plan, one that doesn’t include buying a house-but does include moving to another country. Of course, like any plan worth it’s salt, it’s liable to change at any moment. But still. I will not buy a house. I will not buy a house.

Are you a renter? Home owner? Do you have house lust?

A few weeks ago I headed up to New York to visit with friends. We checked out the Renegade Craft Fair in Brooklyn, which was loads of fun. Cathy wrote a brilliant recap and I’ll direct you to her for the fun parade we had.

(she says to make me one with bacon… she is correct!)

Before I started killing ducks, I first killed an oyster.

With the amazing instruction of Nellie (she of Canary and Pinkblot fame) Nick (Mr.Dahlia, not my Nick) and I were able to shuck a few. Did you know when you get Oysters they are alive, and when you shuck them-you’re killing them. I did not know this, and found out on Oyster #2.

We did not do the majority of shucking though, that part was done by the time the Swans and I arrived. Oh the glory!

The Canaries, Swans, Dahlias, a Penguin and a Shoe all made quick work of the amazing spread. Nellie is amazing and so, so, SO well informed. She teaches occasional classes in (I think) Brooklyn and she was also interviewed for Serious Eats.

Her seafood was so amazingly fresh - I really don’t think I can buy from anywhere else. Which is sad, because I live in DC and not NYC. Would it be wrong to bring back mussels on the Megabus? Probably…

Want more on Nellie, W&T Seafood, or Oysters? Check out the video and the article!

A Native NYer Makes the Case for West Coast Oysters: W&T Seafood’s Nellie Wu from SkeeterNYC on Vimeo.

PS. ALL, ALL the photos are from Cathy at Wifey Lifey. Stupid me brought a dead battery camera. Genius!

PPS. Don’t read Weddingbee? We all have monikers - hence the purple shoe over to the right!

Om nom. Holy moly these are good. We were pretty tired after our fourth of July weekend and I wanted to make something quick and easy with whatever we had on hand. Which happened to be a few peaches, green onions, jalapenos, garlic, and some limes. and some coconut oil.

Spicy Peach Marinade:

Grocery list- 2 peaches, 2 green onions, 1 jalapeno, 2 limes, 3 garlic cloves,

Put 2 peaches 1.5 green onions (I mostly used the white part and a little bit of the green), 1/2 the deseeded jalapeno, 1/2 a peeled lime, and 2 garlic cloves in a food processor and puree.

Squeeze the 1.5 limes and chop the rest of the jalapeno, single garlic clove, into a bowl and pour the puree from the food processor.Set aside a 1/4 of a cup to brush on while on the grill.

Let your coconut oil heat/cool to liquid stage and pour 1.5 tablespoons in to the bowl with the majority of the marinade. Stick your peeled shrimp into the bowl, cover and marinate for an hour or 2.

Pop them on the grill and grill till you see the first side begin to get pink and flip. Brush the marinade on the newly grilled side and remove once all is pink.

We like to put the vegetables all on one set of skewers and the meat on another since they cook differently. In this case, the veggies take a bit longer than the shrimp.

Enjoy!

Between moving to DC, and Mr.D being in England - I really dropped the ball on setting up a portrait session during cherry blossom season. I had also hoped that my dear friend of Jenna Cole Photography would be able to do the shoot, but alas she was busy… birthing a baby!

So I held off and considered 2011, but that puts us almost a year and half after our wedding! The vast majority of our portraits involve us kissing or about to kiss… what can I say, we were really happy to be married!

My thought process was that I’d swing by Whole Foods, make a decently looking bouquet that only needed to last a few hours at most. Then we’d take photos a bit like these (except, in a wedding dress) and Mr.D and I not kissing!

(via my darling new neighbor and Leo Patrone)

or

(egomedia)

or

(Jay Premack)

Huzzah!

But then… well. I saw these… from our photographer! Mr.D and I will be in San Diego in August - maybe we do a shoot like this instead!

(via BridePop)

I guess we could do both, but I know that I will be incapable of NOT trashing my dress. I’ll be all “you know what would be awesome? Me cliff diving in my dress… weeee!” Right. Like I won’t end up 10 kinds of dirty when we finish.

What would you do?

I hope you never have to be in this position, but in reality, it’s probably unavoidable.  Nick has been wronged by someone he considered a friend. Perhaps swindled is more accurate?

While Nick was back home he decided to sell a few of his belongings to cut down on his storage items in England, and to acquire a bit of money for our move to DC. One of his friends wanted an item, and Nick said he would sell it to him at a lower price since they were friends, but if he didn’t want it he would just sell it on Ebay.

This “friend” purchased the item and turned around to sell it at “non mate rate”, for a profit. Making almost £300 in the process. This person acted as though they wanted the item for themselves, that they would get great use and pleasure from having it. The entire time knowing they would turn around to sell it themselves.

If this were the first display of selfish behaviour from this person, I don’t think I’d be so deeply offended. But this is a “friend” who (in my opinion) has taken advantage of Nick’s good nature one too many times. It’s one thing to mess with me, because I will simply retaliate. I think I often have the “don’t mess with me vibe” - I’m like the bunny from Monty Python.  I often feel that Nick is the more forgiving, kinder half of our union. In many cases, we balance each other out quite well, but in this situation, I feel powerless to go to bat for my husband.

Has your spouse ever been wronged? How did you deal with it?

Is only bound to get worse! Nick and I have been on a roller coaster of apartment hunting. We finally found the place we wanted and without a minute to spare - this is our only “free” weekend till June! The landlord said he’d sen the lease on Sunday, but we didn’t receive it till Thursday! So we signed yesterday, and are moving in today. Instead of packing right now, I’m blogging - go figure.

If it makes you feel better, instead of packing, Nick is watching the Man Utd. and Chelsea match. I don’t know how we’re going to get it together enough to pack. WHY is this move so exciting for us?

WE HAVE NEVER LIVED ALONE TOGETHER.

That, and the fact that my commute will be cut from almost 1.5 hours each way to approximately 20 minutes each way…  Nick and I lived with 5 roommates in  house in Miami. Then we moved in our families, and NOW since Nick has his green card (he got it in January- I SWEAR I’ll write about it!) we can move without fear of denial and having to move to England instead. We’ve been together since March 2008 and have lived with others since we moved in together (May 2008). Holy cow… we’ve lived with others for over 2 years… hence…

Yippee!

BUT. Did you know that the internet/cable people take ages to come out!? I don’t know how we’ll survive without internet. sigh. Do you think the Library of Congress has wifi? we’ll be so close perhaps we’ll pop over there?

(source)

In any case, I promise I’ll be back to blogging full time when we have internet and I wanted to say how grateful I am that you’re here. I appreciate it that you subscribe, or that you visit the site. Thank you so much for being here.

ps. Have you and your partner ever lived with parents or roommates? Are we alone in this?

I’ve been absent here mostly because I’ve been absent in life. I went to Faaaabulous Las Vegas! But returned to what (I thought) were allergies aka Spring time. So I spent a week half celebrating Spring, half cursing it. Then I thought, ah! I’m finally getting better; only to discover I was actually getting worse. I woke this Monday and my symptoms (according to my dr) presented. By presented I can only assume she means my body lost its ever-loving mind.

So, I am hoped up on meds, lots of fluid and sleep and of course the usual cure - mac n cheese and cadbury eggs. I only wish Nick were home, mostly because I’m selfish and that would make me feel better. He would even make my mac n’ cheese for me, no matter how much he hates cheese. However, he’ll be home tomorrow! Which makes me OH SO VERY HAPPY! If I knew how to code a larger font (without Nick’s help) I would - because I am that excited about it.

He has been gone for a month and as much as I try and play it cool. I’ve missed him terribly. I genuinely function differently without him, and I’m not a fan. We both thought it would be like “the old days” of our long distance relationship… you know what will be fun? Skype! It’ll be like the old days, that was fun right? wrong. Once you’re married and you get to see your spouse all the time, being away is somehow 3487539847 times harder.

What do you do when your spouse is away?