Wordless weekend

We wound up having a crazy full weekend. Sadly since M and I have given up on/realized the challenge of/are having too much fun participating to be taking pictures I don't have too many good ones. 

But our weekend was robots, troopers, planes and more. 

Saturday we went to the Seattle Mini Maker Faire. It was so fun to see all the cool projects- M's inner 10 year old got a kick out of how much more 10 year olds have available to them these days. My heart swelled at the intersection of art and technology and A got to make Spirograph paintings. So a good time was had by all. 

Solar car

Then we met up with friends to see the Star Wars costume exhibit at the EMP. 

It's master yoda. 

We were pooped. 

(Not pictured is that I fell asleep on the couch with him immediately after this picture). 

Sunday we got an invite to Boeing family day. Got to see airplanes being made- it was pretty sweet. 

We had a very seattle weekend and a much fuller one than we typically do. 

I guess when adventure calls we must answer. What's bonus cool is that A is old enough now and has the verbal skills that he is still talking about it. 

Bonus picture of A needing to wear his fireman hat because obviously. 

Things

Traffic brings out my darkest and most troubled self. 

Why is it such a funny word for such a serious thing? Infarction 

If I were rich one thing I'd do is have a crudités valet. He'd follow me around and have delicious veggies and dip ready to go. I'd eat more veggies. 

What does it say about me that amidst all of the metric shit ton of things that need doing around moving and adding a member of the family, a thought at the front of my brain is that I got the three of us matching stockings last year and I'm worried I won't be able to find a coordinating one for our daughter?

If the sizing specs are the same is this one a decent fit? Same brand as our current ones. 

To do: continued learning

Damn it! I learned things this past week and enjoyed it. 

My manager's manager suggested I go to a conference because it was in seattle so I didn't need to travel. For a minute My panties were all in a bunch that it was sexist and annoying and reinforced my feeling that no one there is at all interested in my professional development- but as I picked my proverbial wedgie I remembered that it wasn't as though I'd asked to go anywhere so I got over it. 

It was actually a bit of a pain to do a conference in town and required some schedule adjustment and spouse assistance. But driving into UW campus I realized how long it'd been since I was on a university campus and it felt exciting and nostalgic to be there. 

The conference was mainly good. I always like seeing people who are so passionate about their work and love sitting in awe of the crazy cool ideas folks are investigating (I'm looking at you mr. Conjugating chemo drugs to activated T-cells for a double dose of killing power ). I left feeling motivated and like we have lots that we need to start doing- so it was a win. 

I do think I have some serious attention deficit though- man some of those days are long. I also remembered just how tough the impromptu conversations are for me, though surprisingly easier now than when I was a student. Back the. I spent the whole time freaking out about what I would say next and how I could try to sound smart. While I still suffer deeply from it it is astonishing how deeply I felt like an imposter. Poor 21 year old self- that was a crappy feeling I'm glad you drowned it in sour patch watermelons and self pity. 

I am also getting used to being the old lady research associate in the room full of 20 something ambition. Full of those who can't really imagine their academic lives not turning out ideally. It is actually a very comfortable place to be. 

So I'm glad I went. I think I did learn valuable things for my company and I certainly got a few valuable life lesson refreshers for myself. 

And finally, it was some big Panhellenic event wherein the ladies had to wear short dresses. Girls- for the love get coats or cardigans! Your north face fleeces were pulling up your dresses. And to the girl I gave heads up about this  please think about the fact that you were walking amongst future "sisters" and none of them did you the same courtesy. 

I found myself very preoccupied by the font choices of different speakers. 

Pull out your tiny violin

We’re buying a house!

Ok, so I get that these aren’t truly terrible problems and they are around things that are quite exciting but DAMN, this process is killing me.

 

1.       The paperwork required to buy and sell property is insane.

I understand that borrowing a lot of money from a bank requires a lot of verification but HELL, I felt really awkward digging up my 3^rd grade teacher to get an initialed copy of my second semester effort grade. Ok, not quite that bad but still. And it is made a lot easier thanks to technology but also less secure because of technology. It is bizarre, banks want you to keep your information secure but then they ask for every detail to be sent to them without a secure system to do so. So that meant M had be our technology specialist and lock down our documents before sending and try to remind the recipients to be careful with what they send. But they do send up snappy videos explaining the process with cartoons.

2.       I can’t get anyone to take large sums of money from me.

We are buying a house. Great. It is in pretty good condition but we need professionals to fix a ton of little things (if an electrical panel that caused the inspector to say “fire hazard” is little) and talk to us about changing bigger stuff. I have contacted SO MANY people- close friend referrals, anonymous referrals, blind google searches- and it is pulling teeth to get anyone to even reply. And when they do I’m not feeling good that people are upfront with what services they can provide (ex. Gate repair guy, can you also fix the deck? No is a fine answer but I need to know).    

3.       While we are good people, Michael and I are just not interior designers.

The entire house is painted yellow. We don’t know what to do about that. 

4. My carpool buddy is bossy

         Andrew is a bossy pants in the car and insists that we sing one at a time. It's adorable that he sings along to the radio and our CDs now but he is is way harsh about when I try to join in. Rude!

I'm gonna miss Friday mornings in this house with these two. M tells me that we will find the same comfort level in the new house. I believe him.