Jaw Update 3.0

Erik had another appointment today.... He has to have his jaw wired for 2 more weeks.... at least.... the doctor said that his jaw wasn't completely healed.

So 2 more weeks (at least) with the wires on... then another at least 2 more weeks with the rubber bands until his muscles gain strength.

We will update on Feb. 10, after his appointment.

Stay tuned

13 Books in 2011

So in 2010, I read 12 books, and this year I have made my goal to read at least 13 books. I know that sounds a bit ambitious, btu I think I can do it. Here is the list of books I read in 2010
2010
1. The Time Traveler’s Wife- Audrey Niffenegger
2. Dear John- Nicolas Sparks (276 Pages)
3. House Rules-Jodi Picoult (532 Pages)
4. Bed of Roses- Nora Roberts (368 pages)
5. The Lucky One- Nicolas Sparks (352 pages)
6. Savor the Moment- Nora Roberts (352 pages)
7. Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman’s Search for Everything Across Italy, India, and Indonesia – Elizabeth Gilbert (352 Pages)
8. Something Borrowed- Emily Griffin (352 Pages)
9. Something Blue- Emily Griffin (368 Pages)
10. Baby Proof- Emily Griffin (368 Pages)
11. Love the one you’re with- Emily Griffin (368 Pages)
12. The Lovely Bones- Alice Sebold (368 pages)

Here is the list of books I have yet to read. Of these 70 books I plan on reading 13 of them. I made a list on amazon of the books I want for my kindle, which I got for christmas this year from Erik :)

So here is my 2011 list:

2011
1. Commited- Elizabeth Gilbert (279 Pages)
2. Safe Haven- Nicolas Sparks
3. The Inner Circle- Bret Meltzer (449 Pages)
4. Water for Elephants- Sara Gruen
5. Heart of the Matter- Emily Griffin (384 Pages)
6. Wicked- Gregory Maguire (538 pages)
7. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo- Stieg Larsson (608 pages)
8. The Sun Also Rises- Earnest Hemingway (251 pages)
9. Friday Night Knitting Club- Kate Jacobs (384 pages)
10. Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet- Jamie Ford (320 pages)
11. Learning to Think- Peter White (328 pages)
12. The Road- Cormac McCarthy
13. Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy- Douglas Adams (224 pages)
14. The Restaurant at the End of the Universe- Douglas Adams (256 pages)
15. Life, the Universe and Everything- Douglas Adams (240 pages)
16. So long, and Thanks for all the Fish- Douglas Adams (224 pages)
17. Mostly Harmless- Douglas Adams (240 pages)
18. Happy Ever After- Nora Roberts (320 pages) (November 2010 Release)
19. Sing you Home-Jodi Picoult (Released March 2011)
20. Cross Fire- James Patterson
21. Heroes for my Son- Brad Meltzer
22. The Zero Game- Brad Meltzer
23. Dead Even- Brad Meltzer
24. The Tenth Justice- Brad Meltzer
25. The Book of Fate- Brad Meltzer
26. The Book of Lies- Brad Meltzer
27. The First Counsel- Brad Meltzer
28. The Millionaires- Brad Meltzer
29. Knit Two- Kate Jacobs (336 pages)
30. Vanishing Acts- Jodi Picoult (448 pages)
31. Knit the Season: A Friday night knitting club Novel- Kate Jacobs (272 pages)
32. Second Glance- Jodi Picoult (448 pages)
33. Perfect Match- Jodi Picoult (368 pages)
34. Salem Falls- Jodi Picoult (464 pages)
35. Message in a Bottle- Nicolas Sparks (352 pages)
36. Keeping Faith- Jodi Picoult (448 pages)
37. The Rescue- Nicolas Sparks (339 pages)
38. The Girl who played with Fire- Stieg Larsson (630 pages)
39. The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest- Stieg Larsson (576 pages)
40. Son of a Witch- Gregory Maguire (352 Pages)
41. The Pact- Jodi Picoult (416 pages)
42. A Bend in the Road- Nicolas Sparks (352 pages)
43. Mercy- Jodi Picoult (416 pages)
44. Nights in Rodanthe- Nicolas Sparks (240 pages)
45. Picture Perfect- Jodi Picoult (384 pages)
46. The Alchemist- Paulo Coehlo (208 pages)
47. A Lion among Men- Gregory Maguire (336 pages)
48. Pride and Prejudice and Zombies- Jane Austen/ Seth Grahame-Smith (320 pages)
49. The Wedding- Nicolas Sparks (304 pages)
50. Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister- Gregory Maguire (384 pages)
51. Harvesting the Heart- Jodi Picoult (464 pages)
52. Three Weeks with my Brother- Nicolas Sparks (368 pages)
53. Songs of the Humpback Whale- Jodi Picoult (352 pages)
54. Lost- Gregory Maguire (352 pages)
55. The Guardian- Nicolas Sparks (384 pages)
56. The Blind Side- Michael Lewis (352 pages)
57. True Believer- Nicolas Sparks (480 pages)
58. At First Sight- Nicolas Sparks (352 pages)
59. Mirror, Mirror- Gregory Maguire (320 pages)
60. The Choice- Nicolas Sparks (336 pages)
61. Three Cups of Tea- Greg Mortenson (349 pages)
62. Just take my heart- Mary Higgins (416 pages)
63. The last child- John Hart (432 pages)
64. Look Again- Lisa Scottoline (416 pages)
65. Olive Kitteridge- Elizabeth Strout (304 pages)
66. The Shack- William P. Young (272 pages)
67. And Another Thing- Eoin Colfer (288 pages)
68. The Art of Racing in the Rain- (336 pages)
69. MENNONITE IN A LITTLE BLACK DRESS, by Rhoda Janzen (272 pages)

70. Di Vinci Code- Dan Brown

Jaw Update 2.0

Erik went into the oral surgeon today, because the wires were hurting him, and the surgeon said that his jaw needs 2 more weeks to heal :( So he cancelled his appointment next Thursday, and made a new one for Jan. 27.

We hope that his jaw will have healed by then, please pray!

Jaw Update!

Erik had his appointment this morning, and I just got off the phone with him. The surgeon likes to see his patients a week after surgery to make sure they are comfortable, and eating. The surgeon told him to come back in two weeks (Jan. 20) and they would take another scan and if all looks good, they will take the wires off, and replace them with rubber bands. This means that he will be able to start eating soft foods! He will probably have to have the rubber bands on for another two weeks or so, but we won’t know until the appointment at the end of January.

Update on the guy who decided not to get his jaw wired shut when he first broke it: He now has a raging infection and has to have three teeth pulled. They have to also go in and completely clean out the infection and start over with the wiring and what not.

Lets just say, thank goodness we decided to go ahead with the jaw wiring when we did.

P90X is Dangerous!

Well for those of you who don’t know, last week, Erik and I were working out in our basement, and Erik slipped on a towel and fell on his jaw. We went to the ER, and they took a CT scan, and we found how he fractured his jaw *sad*. He also had a “second mouth” as I like to call it, on his chin. He got 15 stitches, on that, and we went to the oral surgeon the following morning to figure out what we were going to do about his jaw. They told us he had to get his jaw wired shut for 2-4 weeks.

We were heavily debating this for various reasons, until he told us a story about a guy who came in with a fractured jaw, and decided not to get his jaw wired shut. Long story short, he ended up coming back a few days later in excruciating pain, and when they looked at the new scan, he had completely broken his jaw, and was now misaligned. After hearing that story we decided to go ahead with the surgery and get his jaw wired shut.

He was in pain for a few days, but other than the fact that he can’t eat solid foods, he is doing really well. I have been making some yummy soups, so if anyone has any soup recipes they like to share please send them my way. He has an appointment this Wednesday, so I will update after the appointment.

Long overdue- London August 2010

Horrible blogging family! I am sure by now you have all seen our pictures on facebook from our trip to London and Ireland this past August. I warn you this will be a long bloggy, but I will break it up into sections of our trip to make it a bit easier to follow. This entry is just London, I will post the Ireland part soon.

London

Well we flew into Hethrow and were greeted by my 2 aunts and 2 uncles. This was the first time Erik got to meet my aunt and uncle from Iran, I hadn’t seen either of them in 7 years, so I obviously cried when I hugged my aunt :) After a long nap at my aunt’s house we headed out to see the city. It was quite the long day, we walked around London and got to see Big Ben, House of Parliament, and the London Eye.

My cousin Farnaz, was doing some sweet karate moves with this weirdo on side of the road. We tried to take a video of it but we were too late.

There were a lot of street entertainers along our 3-4 hour walk to find a place called Nando’s. My cousins Parsa and Kian said that we just HAD to try Nando’s. So we walked... and walked... and walked... a few hours later we found the Nando’s and finally sat down to eat! It was definitely worth the wait.

After Nando’s we walked across the bridge that is featured in Harry Potter to the train station where we headed back to my Aunt’s house to rest up for the next day.

The next day my cousin Farnaz had the day off so she took us shopping on Oxford street. That place was INSANE. We need a lot of walking all day, going from shop to shop. We were mainly window shopping because everything is so much more expensive in Europe but we did go to a place called Primark. This is where we did most of our shopping, because the prices here were amazing. That night we went on a walking tour of all the places “Jack the Ripper” committed his murders. It was a really cool experience, and a bit creepy, ok it was really creepy, but I am really glad we got to do it.

The next day we headed out again to the British Museum. They had some really cool Iranian artifacts and we got to learn a bit about ancient Iran. After we walked through the Iranian exhibit we went to the ancient Egyptian exhibit. They had ACTUAL mummies there, like with real people inside them, I mean they were dead, but regardless there was actually a dead human inside the displays. Ew

Then we walked to Covent Garden Market, which is most similar to eastern market here in DC. We saw a guy playing the “Du Xian Qin” a Chinese musical instrument. It consisted of just ONE string, and he was playing some of the most beautiful music.

We then stopped and sat to watch a street show. It was performed by 2 brothers, it was a very entertaining performance. They had some crazy funny British humor, and they did really cool tricks. The one guy ( who was really tall) even did some crazy limbo.

The next day we went to Oxford, England to pick up my other cousin Farzam. We had to stop at the outlet mall on our way to Oxford, but when we got to Oxford we walked around and saw a bit of the University. The dork that I am thought this next picture was really awesome!

The following morning we set off for the weekend to a place called Center parcs which was a place full of small cabins in the middle of nowhere. But before we went we had to stop at the Costco to go food shopping. The lady at the cash register was amazed that we had 13 people there.

It was a very long drive but when we got there, we realized it was well worth it. They had a central building where they had a bunch of water slides and pools, and different sports activities. When we got there we went straight to the pool area, and rode the “rapids” water slide about 200 times, seriously. haha. The boys played paintball one morning while us ladies went to the Spa! Oh boy was the spa wonderful. It consisted of a series of different steam rooms and saunas. It was so relaxing, and it was really great to spend time with the ladies. We ate a lot and rode our bikes (which we rented) all around the park. It was a wonderful weekend.

Monday morning we left early with my cousin Farzam, and headed back to London, while the family spent the day at Center Parcs. When we got back to London, Erik and I went back into the city. We went to the London Bridge, which was really cool and HUGE.

Then took the train to Buckingham Palace, which was completely closed in by really tall walls, so we didn’t actually get to see the Palace. Then we took a nice walk over to Hyde Park. The park was really beautiful, but we were so exhausted we didn’t walk around the park. We then headed back to my aunt’s house and spent the rest of the day with my family. We left the next morning (verrrry early) for IRELAND! Ireland blog to be posted soon.. Stay Tuned :)

Thanksgiving Poem- from an email

TWAS THE NIGHT OF THANKSGIVING,
BUT I JUST COULDN'T SLEEP.
I TRIED COUNTING BACKWARDS,
I TRIED COUNTING SHEEP.

THE LEFTOVERS BECKONED -
THE DARK MEAT AND WHITE,
BUT I FOUGHT THE TEMPTATION
WITH ALL OF MY MIGHT.

TOSSING AND TURNING WITH ANTICIPATION,
THE THOUGHT OF A SNACK BECAME INFATUATION.
SO, I RACED TO THE KITCHEN, FLUNG OPEN THE DOOR,
AND GAZED AT THE FRIDGE, FULL OF GOODIES GALORE.
GOBBLED UP TURKEY AND BUTTERED POTATOES,
PICKLES AND CARROTS, BEANS AND TOMATOES.

I FELT MYSELF SWELLING SO PLUMP AND SO ROUND,
'TIL ALL OF A SUDDEN, I ROSE OFF THE GROUND.
I CRASHED THROUGH THE CEILING, FLOATING INTO THE SKY,
WITH A MOUTHFUL OF PUDDING AND A HANDFUL OF PIE.
BUT, I MANAGED TO YELL AS I SOARED PAST THE TREES....
HAPPY EATING TO ALL - PASS THE CRANBERRIES, PLEASE.

MAY YOUR STUFFING BE TASTY,
MAY YOUR TURKEY BE PLUMP.
MAY YOUR POTATOES 'N GRAVY HAVE NARY A LUMP.
MAY YOUR YAMS BE DELICIOUS.
MAY YOUR PIES TAKE THE PRIZE,
MAY YOUR THANKSGIVING DINNER STAY OFF OF YOUR THIGHS!!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO ALL!!

In case anyone has been waiting for an update in my reading quest, my pace has slowed down significantly *sad face*. Also I have added quite a few books to my list, there is no way I am reading all of these books this year, but I will still try. Here is my list the ones in red are the ones I have already read, blue are the ones I am currently reading, and pink are the books that I currently own, the other books I will either borrow from the library or from some family or friend who has them...

1. The Time Traveler’s Wife- Audrey Niffenegger
2. Dear John- Nicolas Sparks (276 Pages)
3. House Rules-Jodi Picoult (532 Pages)
4. Bed of Roses- Nora Roberts (368 pages)
5. Wicked- Gregory Maguire (538 pages)
6. The Lucky One- Nicolas Sparks (352 pages)
7. The Lovely Bones- Alice Sebold (368 pages)
8. The Sun Also Rises- Earnest Hemingway (251 pages)
9. Friday Night Knitting Club- Kate Jacobs (384 pages)
10. Savor the Moment- Nora Roberts (352 pages)
11. Learning to Think- Peter White (328 pages)
12. The Road- Cormac McCarthy
13. Something Borrowed- Emily Griffin (352 Pages)
14. Something Blue- Emily Griffin (368 Pages)
15. Baby Proof- Emily Griffin (368 Pages)
16. Knit Two- Kate Jacobs (336 pages)
17. Love the one you’re with- Emily Griffin (368 Pages)
18. Heart of the Matter- Emily Griffin (384 Pages)
19. Vanishing Acts- Jodi Picoult (448 pages)
20. Knit the Season: A Friday night knitting club Novel- Kate Jacobs (272 pages)
21. Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy- Douglas Adams (224 pages)
22. The Restaurant at the End of the Universe- Douglas Adams (256 pages)
23. Life, the Universe and Everything- Douglas Adams (240 pages)
24. So long, and Thanks for all the Fish- Douglas Adams (224 pages)
25. Mostly Harmless- Douglas Adams (240 pages)
26. Second Glance- Jodi Picoult (448 pages)
27. Perfect Match- Jodi Picoult (368 pages)
28. Happy Ever After- Nora Roberts (320 pages)
29. Salem Falls- Jodi Picoult (464 pages)
30. Message in a Bottle- Nicolas Sparks (352 pages)
31. Keeping Faith- Jodi Picoult (448 pages)
32. The Rescue- Nicolas Sparks (339 pages)
33. The Girl who played with Fire- Stieg Larsson (630 pages)
34. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo- Stieg Larsson (608 pages)
35. The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest- Stieg Larsson (576 pages)
36. Son of a Witch- Gregory Maguire (352 Pages)
37. The Pact- Jodi Picoult (416 pages)
38. A Bend in the Road- Nicolas Sparks (352 pages)
39. Mercy- Jodi Picoult (416 pages)
40. Nights in Rodanthe- Nicolas Sparks (240 pages)
41. Picture Perfect- Jodi Picoult (384 pages)
42. The Alchemist- Paulo Coehlo (208 pages)
43. A Lion among Men- Gregory Maguire (336 pages)
44. Pride and Prejudice and Zombies- Jane Austen/ Seth Grahame-Smith (320 pages)
45. The Wedding- Nicolas Sparks (304 pages)
46. Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister- Gregory Maguire (384 pages)
47. Harvesting the Heart- Jodi Picoult (464 pages)
48. Three Weeks with my Brother- Nicolas Sparks (368 pages)
49. Songs of the Humpback Whale- Jodi Picoult (352 pages)
50. Lost- Gregory Maguire (352 pages)
51. The Guardian- Nicolas Sparks (384 pages)
52. Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman’s Search for Everything Across Italy, India, and Indonesia – Elizabeth Gilbert (352 Pages)
53. The Blind Side- Michael Lewis (352 pages)
54. True Believer- Nicolas Sparks (480 pages)
55. At First Sight- Nicolas Sparks (352 pages)
56. Mirror, Mirror- Gregory Maguire (320 pages)
57. The Choice- Nicolas Sparks (336 pages)
58. Three Cups of Tea- Greg Mortenson (349 pages)
59. Just take my heart- Mary Higgins (416 pages)
60. The last child- John Hart (432 pages)
61. Look Again- Lisa Scottoline (416 pages)
62. Olive Kitteridge- Elizabeth Strout (304 pages)
63. The Shack- William P. Young (272 pages)
64. And Another Thing- Eoin Colfer (288 pages)
65. The Art of Racing in the Rain- (336 pages)
66. Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet- Jamie Ford (320 pages)
67. MENNONITE IN A LITTLE BLACK DRESS, by Rhoda Janzen (272 pages)
68. Di Vinci Code- Dan Brown

Boston Trip

Oh man there is so much to write about here; I will try and keep it short (yea right). We flew out of BWI into Logan airport on Thursday night, and as soon as we got there and checked onto our hotel, we went out to celebrate Hyojon’s 25th birthday.

The next morning we made our way over to Fenway Park and took some pictures, and walked around for a bit. Then we walked across a very very long bridge over to MIT. While at MIT we walked around the campus, which was really cool, and went to the bookstore and bought some hoodies and sweatpants. For lunch we went to one of MIT’s road-side food stand named The Clover, it was quite delish. Here are a few pictures of MIT.



After absorbing some more intelligence, we made our way back into the city and went to the bar where the sitcom “Cheers” was filmed. That was a really cool experience, because I know I had watched the show when I was younger. Here is a Cheer’s mug:


We relaxed a while, did a little bit of chit-chatting and decided we wanted to head over to the Harpoon Brewery. Boy oh boy did we have a great time there, the guy who was conducting the tasting was hilarious and the beer was really good. I think we are all fans of Harpoon now. After Harpoon we made our way to Quincy Market/Faneuil Hall area, we walked around and absorbed the area, but we were all getting very grumpy and hungry. We ended up going to this little mom and pop Italian restaurant, which was really good. The amount of food per serving was ridiculous, way too much food for one person. After a long day of adventure we all went to bed when we got back to the hotel rooms, to prepare for Saturday.

On Saturday my friend Kelly joined us in Boston. We started the day by making a fabulous breakfast decision! We went to a place called Finagle a Bagel; oh man it was so good we went there for breakfast Sunday morning as well. After breakfast we took the train to the Samuel Adams brewery. We took a tour of the brewery, which was smaller than I had thought it would be, then went for a free tasting. The tasting was delish, nothing more to say about that.



Then we made another good food decision and went to another restaurant near the brewery, Erik had some amazing Clam Chowder in a bread bowl, and I had a fabulous burger. Highlight of the meal, was when the people sitting behind us let us hold and play with their baby girl. She was really cute. After the brewery we went back to our hotels for a quick nap, then got back together and sat on the hotel’s rooftop terrace, more relaxing and chit-chat. Then we were hungry (again), so we went to the Oyster house. I, as you know, am not a fan of seafood but I wasn’t going to make the entire group miss out on it, so we went. We had a good time at dinner, but were so tired we couldn’t stay out late. We ended up going back to our hotel area and went to a dive bar, and had a great time.


On Sunday, half of our group let to go back home early in the morning, so we didn’t really have too much planned. After Finagle-a-bagel we went the Old North Church and walked around Quincy Market. We had some yummy Mexican food at Quincy Market then headed back to our hotel to pick up our stuff and head to the airport. We got to the airport about 4 hours before our flight left, in hopes of getting on standby (no luck). So we sat at the airport and read our books until our flight home.

All in all it was a wonderful trip and we are all so excited we got to go. Check out my facebook for more pictures of our trip.

DC Scavenger Hunt

I am a horrible blog keeper! At the beginning of this month we participated in the DC challenge. Our group consisted of us, Sean, Brandy, Hyojon and Kate. Other people had signed up to be in our group, but had things come up at the last minute. The organizers of the scavenger hunt handed out clues of places we were supposed to go and take pictures at. One of the clues was, “Find an item that is older than the institution itself.” So we went to the Smithsonian and found this desk and took a picture with that. Another clue was to find a person wearing an “I love DC” t-shirt and take a picture with them; you get the idea. Here is a picture of our group when we started the hunt…

And here is one of us 3 and a half hours later (it was sooooo hot that day)…

We had a great time; we got to be out in DC when the weather was really nice, with our friends. The only negative aspect of the day was that the winners of the scavenger hunt had completed it in an hour and a half… Needless to say, if they had had a way of letting people know the race was over, we would have been able to walk the next day.

I would probably do this hunt again next year, but maybe have a better mapping system and plan out our route better.