Andrea wrote this on facebook of her summer adventure:
Marine Biology Program 2012
Sailing around the Caribbean on the Dan Marco, learning marine biology, and going on 20 dives – including shipwreck and night dives…livin on a boat like a pirate BOSS, basically. :) Also, I want this life forever…TAKE ME BACK!
Spring leftover pictures… that I gathered in the summer… and am posting now that it’s fall…
Andrea had this mother and daughter sent to me on Valentine’s Day.
I still need her to paint those little curls brown.
Spring front door:
I didn’t know if I’d get away with this, but I did. I sent my niece Easter goodies from the post office right in the egg.
And Andrea helped me make Resurrection Rolls at Easter:
On Mother’s Day Andrea started a new tradition: The Mother’s Day Pinata! I’d never HAD a pinata before and I don’t think she knew what she was getting herself into. Loved it!!
Then Andrea finished her junior year of college and came home. We got along so well this summer!
You can always tell when she’s home by the burn marks of her straightener.
Actually, right now she’s far, far away on her marine biology adventure and I’m ready for her to come back home for the rest of the summer.
*At the time of finally posting this, of course, she’s been long home and now back to college. I need to gather my favorite pictures from her marine biology trip now :)
It was so beautiful at Kauffman Gardens during Mother/Daughter weekend this year. This was a day in MARCH! I wished I’d worn a sundress like the girls.
The Emrald Statue:
Andrea’s on Day 15 of her Caribbean adventure and I’m missing her. I was thinking about the day we spent at the job fair for the new aquarium that was to be opening in Kansas City this past April. It was a cold, rainy Sunday in March and she wanted me to go with her. They had 150-200 jobs to fill and expected 700 people but over 1500 showed up. We were there for THIRTEEN HOURS but Andrea walked away with a coveted job.
Somewhere around Hour 10:
Map of Sea Life:
Andrea – Education Specialist!
Then we had Mother/Daughter weekend which has become one of my favorite traditions. Friday night they treated us to makeovers and I got a manicure while Andrea got some smokey eyes (that she couldn’t wait to rub off).
Saturday was the brunch and thank goodness we didn’t have to play the purse game again this year.
In the hotel lobby was this statue:
Of course we had to pose by her.
We had fun even without the naked lady:
For some reason this is my favorite.
On Valentine’s Day, Andrea’s friends went in with her and had a bouquet of colorful roses sent to me at work, which totally made my day!
On St. Patrick’s Day, I brought in cheesecake brownies for everyone. Since I colored the cheesecake green for the day, they are forevermore requested as “your radioactive brownies!”
The guy I mentioned in an earlier post that got fired (Robert), he had this plant on his desk in a baby food jar. When he got fired he gave it to me, I put it on top of my cube wall and named it Robert. We all take turns watering Robert, talking to Robert, and even taking him outside sometimes for fresh air. Robert is spoiled.
We replanted him from the baby jar to a fish bowl. He’s growing. And here now is Robert the Plant (as opposed to Robert Plant. That’s totally different):
It’s always sad to see a coworker get fired and sometimes exciting, if they make it a little dramatic. I thought it would be both of those things when my buddy Robert got let go due to poor work performance and a bad attitude.. but then I saw what he left behind. He made a frowny face out of thumb tacks.
..which was unintentionally hilarious!!
Andrea is taking a marine biology class this summer in the Caribbean.. living on a yacht with 7 other students and three instructors while earning scuba and sailing certification, as well as 3 college credits. Of course I’m worried about her. Mostly I’m excited for her and I’m getting pretty good about giving my worries and fears to God but she and I both have a protective nature regarding each other and I have to work at keeping it in check for my sanity.
I was elated that she finally was able to call me on Sunday. They had the day off and were spending it on St. Barts where, she said, they had met the President of Venezuela’s son. He was in the process of buying them food and drinks all afternoon – she had snuck off to call me – and they were all having fun. As I hung up the phone I tried to push out of my mind the image of her swimming with a shark (“a little one, mommy”) and getting stung by “something in the seagrass.” So I decided to think of something fun, “the President of Venezuela’s son, huh? I wonder what he looks like? I wonder how old he is? I wonder if he likes Andrea??”
So I googled him. I came upon his dad’s wikipedia page and the only thing on the entire internet to say anything about this first son was included in this sentence:
Chávez and Colmenares remained married for 18 years, during which time they had three children: Rosa Virginia, María Gabriela, and Hugo Rafael, the latter of whom suffers from behavioural problems.
Emphasis mine. You can’t make this stuff up.
I feel like I’m on the verge of something beautiful. Or maybe I’m in the midst of it, knowing me I probably am.
When I was going through my darkest time I stopped cooking. All of it, no making meals or snacks or even light baking of any kind. I remember Andrea’s hopes getting up when I started getting well and she said, “Maybe you can start cooking dinner again,” and that just sounded impossible even though I knew how much (and what) it meant to Andrea. I didn’t see how I could ever get there and now here I am, I am there. And when I decided to try my hand at using up some of Andrea’s paints, I knew I wanted to do up these two quotes for the kitchen…
They’re kinda crazy and sloppy!
My Magic Life 