2009 in Review

With 2009 coming to a close, I thought it might be nice to look back at some of the happenings of 2009. Some good, some less so, it's been quite a year in these parts...

January:

• Group trip to Chicago to visit Simmer, where Jess and Angie more or less met
• Jess and Angie start dating
• Finished submitting grad school aps (7 in all)

February:

• Grad school admissions decisions received, accepted to 6/7 programs I applied to
• Picked U of M SPH to attend in the fall

March:

• Jess, Matt and I moved into a great rental house

April:

• Submitted my honors senior thesis entitled Freedom to Live, Freedom to Die: Health Disparities in El Salvador
• Graduated Cum Laude from EMU with a major in Health Administration and minor in Human Biology, with Departmental and University Honors

May:

• Matt proposes on the 16th

June:

• Jess starts his photoblog, thedirtstreet.com, featuring a new photo every day, and really starts immersing himself in photography

July:

• Matt started working as a Meter Reader for Consumers Energy

August:

• Matt bought a Ford Ranger for work, saying goodbye to his Jeep.
  

September:

• Started my first semester at U of M

October:

• Filled the house with awesome people for a Halloween party

November:

• My first meatless Thanksgiving, followed by a hilarious night of billiards and UNO at my mom's house with our friends

December:

• Jess laid off from Great Lakes Cycling and Fitness, where he's worked since I met him
• Finished my first semester of Grad School
  

As you can see, I really I had stretch to fill every month. But, here's to 2010!

1/4 complete and Holiday time!

Cocoa getting into the Christmas spirit

Well, it's official. I am 1/4 done with my Master's degree. For the most part everything went well during my first semester. It was definitely a learning experience, and as much as I may complain about the long hours spent studying and writing, and the headache that is group projects, I am very happy to be studying what I love and learning something new all the time.

It is time to start looking for a summer internship, a requirement of my program. When I did an internship at EMU I completed 350 hours, unpaid - and I had to pay for 9 credit hours of course work to get the credit for graduation. Luckily in my UM SPH program most students find paid internships, and we don't have to take any classes to coincide with the requirement. In fact, we can reduce our credit hour requirement for graduation by 1-3 hours depending on the number of internship hours completed.


Dinner I made at my Mom's on Christmas

I am spending today recovering from 3 days of Christmas. On Christmas Eve we drove up to Caro for the Tinsey Christmas. Mimosas were sipped, ping-pong was played, and a good time was had by all. Christmas morning Matt and I had breakfast with his family and opened gifts. The we went to my Mom's where I made lasagna from scratch for dinner, and many crossword puzzles were solved. We then went back to Matt's house to watch a movie and hang out with Melissa, Josh, Jess and Angie. The day after Christmas I pried my way in to my frozen car at 7:30am to make it to work at 9am in Ann Arbor, worked til 3, then at 4 the VanCamp Christmas started back in Ortonville. After an evening of alcohol, apples to apples and a white elephant style DVD exchange, it was time to pronounce the Christmas of 2009 complete.

Jon being a lush.

My first meatless Thanksgiving

I am taking a break from 3 papers, stats homework, and some other small assignments that are looming over my head right now. And only 18 days to get them done! I know I can do it, but that doesn't mean my stress level doesn't elevate around this time.

Thanksgiving was a nice distraction though. I got to spend time with family and friends, eat amazing food, and sleep in for a few days. I thought this week's recipe post should be a recap of my first vegetarian Thanksgiving. Here was the menu:

Protein: Quorn Turk'y Roast
Gravy: Recipe from AllRecipes
Stuffing: Purchased from Plum Market in a box, had no animal products, used vegetable broth



I think that's all of my meat free accommodations. My mom and I made everything the day before Thanksgiving, the day Matt and I ate with her and my Grandma, and then on Thanksgiving I was able to just heat up my left overs at the Tinseys. Overall I thought everything tasted great. The gravy was probably the best, I was really impressed with how it turned out. At my house everyone used it, there was no traditional gravy, and no one seemed to mind it. The fake turkey was a little bland, especially because I forgot to thaw it and was in a rush come dinner time to get it cooked. A little salt and pepper would have helped, but with the gravy it was fine. The stuffing had a fine flavor, but also needed the gravy to make it a little more moist.

My mom of course made her completely homemade pumpkin pies, which were delicious. I made cupcakes to take to Matt's, the recipe was from a Rachel Ray magazine. They were pumpkin with cream cheese filling, very good.

In closing, a picture of something other than food, the crew at the Tinsey Thanksgiving :)

High Price of Cheap Food

This article covers pretty well one of the reasons I am not currently eating meat.

Getting Real About the High Price of Cheap Food

Recipe a week!

I got this idea from my friend Allison. Basically between grad school and 18 hours of work a week, I don't have a lot of time to think about what to eat - and I really don't have time to cook every night. I've decided to start making one new recipe each Sunday night, big enough to have a few left overs. This way I have an extra lunch or dinner around for the next few days that I don't have to worry about. This is my third week, and so far it is working well.

Each week I am going to post the recipe I made, and how it turned out. Here are the first three recipes:

11/1/09 - Potato and Corn Chowder, from Student's Vegetarian Cookbook

1 tbs olive oil
1 cup chopped onion
2 medium stalks of celery, thinly sliced (about 1 cup)
2-3 medium russet potatoes, cut into 1/2 inch cubes (about 4 cups)
3 1/4 cups lowfat milk
1 cup frozen corn kernels, thawed
1/4 teaspoon salt
pepper

1. Heat oil in a saucepan. Add the onion and celery and saute over medium heat until the veggies soften, 7-8 minutes, stirring frequently.
2. Add the potatoes and milk. Cover and simmer until potatoes are tender, about 20 minutes. Mash up some of the potatoes in the pot with a potato masher to thicken soup. Add the corn kernels. Cook just until heated through, add salt and season with pepper to taste.
(makes three servings)

I love this soup! It is easy and tastes great. I have made it before, and it one of those things that I think tastes better the next day, after everything can mingle together longer. I actually didn't eat any the night I made it this time and had three servings ready to go during the week.

11/8/09 - Easy vegetarian slow cooker chilli

This was great, I really loved the taste of the vegetarian baked beans in it. I used a can of "chilli beans" instead of chilli powder, because they were already seasoned. Made some rice to serve the chilli over and it made for a nice filling meal, will be making this again!

11/15/09 - Brown Rice, Tomatoes and Basil

Not sure about this one yet. I used the champagne because I don't like vinegar, so I thought it would be a better option for me. I like the idea of this recipe, but something about the flavor was a little off to me. When I ate it the rice was still quite warm though, and it says to serve at room temperature, so perhaps that would make a difference. **Update, yeah, not making this again. Just not a good taste.**

It's been a while...

Long over due post I know! School has been in full swing since September, so I have been a busy bee. The first week or so of class I had to do some adjusting to get classes that worked right for me. I am quite pleased with how the lineup turned out overall. Here's an overview of my classes:

psychosocial factors of health behavior
intro to biostatistics (required class)
health care organization, an international perspective
social technologies and health communications
families and health

Midterms have come and gone, and so far everything has been going well. Between work and class and homework and a social life, I could probably have done a few things differently to stay more focused, but overall I think I've managed to keep a good balance. Most days I don't get home before 7pm, which is leading to some exhaustion but it wouldn't be grad school if I wasn't exhausted.

I am valuing more and more the time that I can spend with my family and friends. My time with Matt keeps getting cut shorter and shorter. I know people with husbands in the military who have to live with long term separations, and I am very thankful that I am not in that situation. Regardless, it is really hard to know he is an hour away and I can't see him at the end of the day. And for a few weeks now I have been day dreaming about Christmas break. I can't wait to come home and sit around with my mom and grandma and do crossword puzzles, and for Christmas with the Tinseys.

Tradition vs. Offbeat: Dancing

Dancing has been kind of a touchy topic with us lately. Here's the deal.

Matt and I hate dancing.

In our almost six years together we have danced a few times. Matt can't hear rhythm, and we are definitely awkward and self-conscious while dancing.

We have been to weddings before where the dancing felt forced and as a whole it was obvious that the group would rather not dance. Because of this we don't want to have forced/organized dancing at the wedding. That's why we want to have other things to do at the wedding and why it will be earlier in the day. There will be music playing, and if people want to dance, I'm not going to stop them.

How is it that dancing became a requirement for weddings anyway? Here's a few other couples who felt the same way we do:

Jamie & Chris

Amy & Mikel

Amy & Mike

Officiant

This is a huge update people. We have booked the officiant for our wedding...

Rod Yeacker, our friend and Matt's high school track/cross country coach.

Tradition vs. Offbeat: Introduction

I just attended a lovely bridal shower for Matt's cousin Nikki, who is getting married this October. It put me in the mood to add to the blog! As I may have already mentioned, Matt and I have a pretty specific idea of what we do and don't want our wedding to be like. There are a lot things typical of weddings that just don't appeal to us. I'm not knocking people who have traditional weddings, they are gorgeous and as long as the couple is happy that's all that matters.

In order to stay true to who we are, our wedding will take some departures from tradition. We will keep certain tradition too, and that's what this post series will be about. Topics will include: the reception, favors, the changing of my name, bridal fashion, etc.

So stay tuned for more 'Tradition vs. Offbeat' posts. And feel free to suggest topics at any time for me to post on. I want this blog to document my planning process and keep people in the loop who I may not get to talk to very often, so let me know what you want me to post on!

I will leave you with this, not something Matt and I would ever think of doing, but it is so fun to watch it!

Inspiration Collage

I ended up making this much faster than I thought I would - that's what happens when you're using your computer to watch the show Lost. So here it is, I may make changes to it if I find something that really strikes me.

Wedding "Theme"

Because the wedding date is in August, and we want to keep the day on the casual side with things to do outside other than dance, we landed on a picnic theme. When I first starting looking for inspiration on the internet, I saw some examples of weddings that actually used picnic blankets for guests instead of tables. Matt quickly nixed that idea, with the compromise that we could have some of our wedding photos taken with a picnic blanket.

But other picnic inspirations will live on. Here are some of the things I am thinking about...

• Colors - watermelon pink, green, and yellow (pic)
• Main flower- gerber daisies
• Food- while still to be chosen and planned, I'm thinking gourmet sandwiches, fruit salad, a lemonade cocktail
• Activities- croquet, horseshoes, badminton, ladder toss, etc.
• Tables- pale green or yellow gingham tablecloths
• Making use in some way, shape or form of- wicker baskets, galvanized steel buckets, and mason jars

I am thinking of creating an "inspiration collage," which I will post on this site if and when I create it.

What is Public Health?

I am pursuing a field that is usually misunderstood by the general public. When someone hears public health, they usually think of health inspectors and the people who report on disease outbreaks. There is so much more to public health though, that I kind of dread people asking me about it. It's not easy to explain, and until I'm done with grad school, I won't have a specific area that I work with.

The following description is taken from http://www.whatispublichealth.org

Public Health is the science and art of protecting and improving the health of communities through education, promotion of healthy lifestyles, and research for injury and disease prevention.

Pubic Health improves the health and well being of people in local communities and across our nation.

Public Health helps people who are less fortunate to achieve a healthier lifestyle.

Public Health works to prevent health problems before they occur.

I will be studying Health Behavior/Health Education at U of M. The program will prepare me to "utilize behavioral science and research methods to analyze public health issues, address health disparities, and develop and evaluate interventions and policies." Some of the areas of focus of this program are:

*health behavior over the life course
*health disparities - race, gender, class
*gender and health
*research methods
*interventions from individuals to communities to nations
*health communication

Graduates have opportunities to work in communities, non-profit organizations, schools, hospitals, government agencies, etc. Some job titles of recent U of M graduates from the HBHE program are:

Outreach and education director
School health educator
Worksite health promotion coordinator
Health media web designer
Patient education coordinator
Health literacy expert
Assistant professor

(U of M's School of Public Health, Health Behavior/Health Education)

I hope this helps shed some light on what is I'll be spending the next two years studying :)

The Place

After deciding on the date for this wedding of ours, the next big decision was where to hold the event.

~We wanted an outdoor wedding, that was easy. I don't like banquet halls personally, it's just not for me. And as far as the pictures go, you just can't beat being outdoors.

~We wanted to have things to do other than dancing, we don't like dancing. Having our wedding outdoors allows us to have a more relaxed, picnic, family reunion style wedding day. It just suits us more.

~We didn't like the idea of having to rent a park because we wanted control over how long we use the facility and where we set things up. Plus, we didn't want to deal with alcohol restrictions.

~Somehow we came up with the idea of using the Tinsey residence in Ortonville. They have a fairly large yard, a beautiful home, and neighbors who are family if we need some space in their yard. I almost didn't want to ask because it's a huge imposition, but I am glad that the Tinseys are willing to open their home up to our wedding festivities. It will be nice to spend the whole day somewhere that actually means something to us :)

Decision One: The Date

Upon news of our engagement the first question we were asked was, have you set a date? Here's how we picked August 28th, 2010...

~Originally I wanted a fall wedding, I love the fall, it's my favorite time of year. Fall of 2009 and 2010 wouldn't work because I'll be in the middle of semesters at U of M. We though about waiting until fall of 2011, but we don't know what will be going on then. Where we might get jobs, whether or not I'll start a Ph.D. program. We didn't feel comfortable playing a waiting game that could potentially go for years.

~The next decision was, do we do it while I'm still in my master's program, or wait til I'm done. Again, question of not know what comes next made us decide against the after graduation idea.

~I checked U of M's academic calender for the summer of 2010, and the summer semester ends August 20th, and the Fall semester begins September 7th or 8th. The weekend immediately following the end of the semester didn't make sense, so we went for the next one - August 28th, 2010.

Why this blog?

A way to keep in touch mostly.

For a few years before we got engaged Matt and I talked about what we wanted our wedding to be like some day. Since the official planning has started I've been pulling a lot of pictures and ideas from the internet. We don't want the most traditional wedding ever, so using this blog to share my ideas and inspirations will be a way to share what's on my mind with all those interested.
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I'll also be starting grad school in September, which I am really excited about - but also nervous. After 5 years at Eastern I was as comfortable as could be. I knew my professors (really well), I had an awesome campus job, and I basically felt right at home.

U of M School of Public Health (SPH) is one of the best schools of public health in the country, easily top 10, top 5 depending on the year you look at the survey. I was one of about 60 students admitted to the department I applied to, out of about 200 applicants. Not only will this be my first year at a new school (one MUCH different than EMU), I will also have to work harder than I've ever had to in order to prove myself.

I can't wait to have more to share on the school front. I start at the beginning of September. For now I am just working around 19-25 hours a week at the Ann Arbor District Library (AADL), and workin' on those wedding plans ;)