Month: June 2012

Prom prom promenade…

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Wow… It’s hard to believe but next week, we will have ONE MONTH until our wedding. That is SO exciting (can’t wait) but also scary because there are sooooo many little details left to plan that life and grad school have decided to not give me time for… :p So we’ll see how this last […]

Sharks N Stuff

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This past weekend, Cobalt and I went to the Denver Aquarium with the Denver regional alumni club for my undergrad university. Knowing, as you do, about my love for sea creatures, you would think that the Denver Aquarium would be a place that I would frequently visit but actually, in my 4 years of living here, I had never once set foot in the building. So when I got the invitation for the regional club event, I pretty much instantly signed Cobalt and me up.

It was kind of a neat event (and three of us from my graduating year turned up!). We got to meet an African porcupine up close and personal (see below for pictures) and we got to go on a behind the scenes tour of the aquarium! On the tour, we met some of the sea turtles who are named after the ninja turtles (even the girls); we learned all about how the animals are trained, how their food is made, how their water is made, etc; and I pretty much decided that it is time for me to get dive certified so that I can volunteer in the shark tank! Anyway, after all of that, we got to go explore all the exhibits (it was really cool to look into the shark tank and be like “wow… we were standing right there!”) which is where I took this super awesome shark picture.

For those of you who are skeptical of aquariums in land locked states like I kind of am (having grown up in CA), I think this little aquarium actually does a pretty good job (and it is bigger than the one in Albuquerque!) though I was sad that they didn’t have an octopus…

Moving on…. porcupine! So this porcupine is like 6 months old and we got to meet her! A couple of pictures for you:

Here she is!!! She got really excited about being in a new room and shuffled off behind one of the tables before the trainer could get her leash on her. It was really neat to see how she is trained to follow a target and gets positively reinforced with food and a clicker when she goes to the target. The people in the room who have never heard of this training method before thought that she was making the clicker noise… Haha… Though she does ruffle her quills together to make this weird swishing sound if she thinks you are trying to eat her (this was her response to being put on a leash too…).


I just wanted to show you what her quills looked like in more detail. Apparently if she really wanted to quill you, she would back into you. Yikes! The trainer said that she is pretty much harmless and that she, the trainer, has only gotten quilled once – when she accidentally dropped the porcupine she was holding and then tried to catch it with her knee (>_<). She said that the only thing you really have to worry about is getting your shoes eaten. Apparently this little porcupine was on the news recently and the news anchor was freaking out because the porcupine was reallllly interested in her leather shoes… Hehe… aww porcupines…

Anyway, that pretty much concludes the aquarium summary. I will leave you with an Instagram of me and a shark at the gift shop…

What did you do this weekend? Cobalt and I also saw two movies, Moonrise Kingdom and Brave. Have you seen either of them? What do you think?

Challenge Course!

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One of my favorite parts about grad school is that I get to be part of the SMART program every summer. The SMART program hosts 20-30 undergraduate interns in the STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) areas to come work on our campus for 10 weeks. Basically, each student gets to have an individual project in a lab in order to get a taste of what a life in science/grad school is like. They also have a ton of fun weekend/evening activities to get a taste of what life in Colorado is like too. So it’s kind of awesome.

It’s kind of awesome for us grad mentors too because our job includes: mentoring the students in different scientific techniques as well as science writing (they have to write a proposal, a paper, give a presentation and a poster), being a resource about what grad school/a science career is like, being the people students come to (generally I think we are more approachable then the heads of the program) when there is a problem in the lab or with their roommates/etc so that we can help them/find someone else to help them, and… hanging out with them. Yeah… our job “requires” us to go eat some lunches and dinners with them and then take them around Colorado! It’s kind of awesome. I love my job in the summer. And I love the SMART students. They are always super fun and excited and really smart (I guess that’s why it’s called the SMART program… ;))

This picture is from a challenge course I did with the SMART students last weekend. It was a lot of fun and we got to spend some time getting to know each other and doing crazy activities together. In this picture, another one of the grad mentors, M, and I climbed up this huge ladder (called the giant’s ladder). It was the scariest of everything we did that day for me so I can’t believe we actually made it to the top. I was so proud of myself.

Anyway, this is by far one of the coolest parts about being a grad student for me (yeah sure, being able to set your own hours, looking at coolness under fancy microscopes, and being at the forefront of research in your field are pretty cool too but I absolutely love helping these students get excited about their science/passions). It reminds me that there is a bigger picture out there and makes me feel whole.

What is your favorite part about your job? Or, if you hate your job, what is your least favorite part about your job? What is something you are passionate about? Let’s discuss!

Just like brothers…

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So some of you may not know this, but my first animal love was not the shark. It actually started out with whales and dolphins (and I still love whales and dolphins too… don’t let my shark filled blog lie to you). I always loved toothy, grumpy things too though so once I got my first stuffed shark as a present, it’s easy to see how I was soon obsessed with sharks. Anyway, because of how much I love sharks, I decided that what better present to throw to my girls than a shark (instead of a bouquet) at our wedding (and you were wondering how this was going to turn into a wedding Wednesday post…)! I mean, my first stuffed shark is still one of my absolute favorite stuffed animals today and he paved the way for sharks being my new favorite animal! Plus, my friends told me they would much rather catch a stuffed shark instead of a bouquet so I say it’s a win-win situation.

Because Scrarmpl (scr-ARM-pul) was my first stuffed shark, I decided to buy the same stuffed shark to throw at my wedding (the gateway shark… hahaha). He arrived Monday and I am a bit embarrassed to see how “loved” Scrarmpl is compared to his little brother. They barely even look like the same shark! In this picture, Scrarmpl and “new shark” are reading the most recent Entertainment Weekly together… As you can see, “new shark” is much bigger and fluffier than Scrarmpl…

Anyway, “new shark” is going to be totally decked out for the wedding. I know I have pretty much zero time right now, but I still would like to at least make him a bow tie or something to wear for the wedding. I can’t wait to see who catches him!

As for the garter… that’s just going to have to be a surprise. Though Cobalt and I are super excited about that too (it came this weekend… we giggled a lot…).

As for the rest of the bouquet, I haven’t decided what to do – if I want to hold long stemmed flowers during the ceremony and then just throw the shark during the reception or if I want to have long stemmed flowers surrounding the shark during the ceremony and then throw him? Who knows…

Your task for today – tell me what you think I should do about my bouquet. I don’t really have any specific flowers in mind (had planned on anemones but I don’t think they’re in season that late in the summer). Recently, someone suggested that I use dahlias. They seem really pretty… I’m actually not very picky about the bouquet. I think I should probably be holding something but I haven’t decided what. I like the idea of a simple bouquet (just a few long stemmed flowers would be fine with me) but otherwise I am drawing a blank. Ideas? What are your favorite flowers to see in bouquets?

So many weddings!

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So Cobalt and I have been busy: this past weekend we made pasta and then the weekend before we went to see our friends A and T get married! What a great night! The ceremony was adorable and heartfelt. A made her own dress which is freaking awesome. This first picture shows off her dress as she stands all ready to get married to T! What a gorgeous bride! :)

During the ceremony, they sealed love letters in a box with a bottle of wine to be opened on their 10th anniversary. Look how cute it was! 10 years from now will be exciting!

Finally, I love this cake picture!

After all the cake shenanigans, we danced the evening away and that was awesome! Congratulations A and T! :):):):):)

Pasta Party!

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Yesterday, Cobalt and I went over to our friend L’s house to hang out with L and our friends T and C for a day of adventure. We made homemade pasta. L charged us with two tasks: making mushroom ravioli and spaghetti carbonara. So we divided into two teams – Cobalt and T on the spaghetti and C and me on the ravioli while L started on the ravioli filling. That picture up there is my sad looking mummy ravioli. He surprisingly didn’t explode when we cooked him so I guess I patched him up pretty well! C said he was delicious… :)
Anyway, it was really fun/tasty! Here are some more pictures:

First we have C mixing the ravioli dough:

Next we have Cobalt and T working on making the spaghetti… The pasta machines were of course the best part…

Once the spaghetti was ready to be cooked, everyone switched over to team ravioli and we had quite the assembly line going on (someone painting the dough, someone filling the dough, someone making the little raviolis, etc). Look at C’s cutting skill!

And two hours later, we have the final dishes:

Spaghetti Carbonara

Mushroom Ravioli

Oh man… it was so delicious… Have you ever made your own pasta? What is your favorite kind of pasta to make/eat? Did you do anything amazing this weekend?

Who you gonna call?!

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Cobalt and I ran some errands yesterday (bridesmaids’ and groomsmens’ gifts acquired!) and we found this amazing claw machine! All it had in it were Stay Puft and Slimer from Ghostbusters! Cobalt happens to be very good at claw machines and Ghostbusters happens to be his favorite movie of ALL TIMES so within 2 minutes of me taking this picture, he had gotten us a brand new Slimer! I think it’s that one in the top left hand corner…
Anyway, what are you all up to this weekend? Something fun? What is your favorite movie/what would make you the happiest to see residing in a claw machine?!

Mr. and Mrs…. ????

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Let’s do a scandalous post today….

Let’s talk about last names.

I know I know… I can hear everyone get all awkward… or maybe that’s just me being awkward. Maybe everyone else is totally cool with it. If so, can you help me?

So the last name thing is a hot spot for me and I’ve blatantly shrugged it off over the past few weeks and months promising to deal with it later. Well, last weekend we had our last premarital counseling session with one of our officiants and we were working on planning the ceremony. He asked if we had thought about how we want to be introduced at the end of the ceremony (you know, after “You may kiss the bride,” there’s that part where you are announced as “for the first time ever…”). What’ll it be? Mr. and Mrs. [insert Cobalt’s last name here]? Cobalt [Cobalt’s last name] and Potassium [my last name]? Just Cobalt and Potassium, for the first time ever as husband and wife? The short answer is I don’t know.

For the entirety of my life, I always assumed that I would change my name to be my husband’s last name and become “Mrs. Whatever” because that is what you do. Then I even started joking about it and I was like Hey! My last name is cool! If he has a boring last name, then he should change his last name to match my awesome name… but then when it actually happened and I actually got engaged and actually had to think about changing my last name… it broke my heart. I have been Potassium [last name] for so long that it is part of my identity! Some of my nicknames even are based on that last name. It seemed like changing my name would be like changing my identity. Like lopping off my connection with my family and my past life and joining Cobalt’s family. I mean, I want to be a part of Cobalt’s family but not at the risk of completely losing my connection with my own. I know that is not what is going on here but it still seems weird to me that the girl is expected to do that but the guy doesn’t do anything like that for her family. I don’t know. These are the things that I think about.

So I’ve compiled a list of my feelings on this issue.
Reasons why Potassium doesn’t want to change her name

  • Read the above paragraph for all the emotional reasons Potassium is attached to her name: family, identity, etc.
  • I’ve published a paper in the scientific world with this name. And if you look up my last name in a certain scientific database, this paper along with papers published by my uncle and my grandfather pop up as well… Which is kind of cool. A nerdy family legacy if you will… Okay that is sort of a family issue but the real point here is that if I publish any other papers under any other name, then this one paper will be lost in a search for me and so people won’t have my complete paper publishing record… It’s a complicated science thing…
  • It’s a pain in the butt/very expensive to change your name!!!!! I don’t really think anyone LIKES going to the DMV so why would I purposely give myself a reason to have to go back there?

Reasons why Potassium does want to change her name

  • I still do kind of want to be Mrs. [Cobalt’s last name] because marriage is a joining of families and because it makes everything all tidy with kids and mail and checks and bills etc. Plus my mom didn’t change her last name and it made me feel like she didn’t want to be part of the family or something (it sounds stupid but it was kind of weird for me…)
  • I can keep my scientific name my maiden name so my papers could still be published under that name even if I legally had a new name.

I am sure there are plenty of other reasons to go in both categories but there are a few. Let’s discuss!

In other news, it is really exciting to get our RSVP postcards back in the mail every day.

In other other news, we are having problems coming up with the fortune for the inside of our fortune cookies. Any suggestions? Someone suggested that we put “lucky numbers” on the back that are 8, 4, and 12 (wedding date… hahaha) but what about the actual fortune? We have thought of jokes, trivia about the two of us, cute “ice breaker” questions like “When did you first meet Potassium/Cobalt?” and nothing has really stuck. Thoughts about those?

Okay… Here is your mission for today:

  1. What are your feelings about name changing?
  2. Be excited about RSVP postcards (and send yours in if you have one but otherwise just be excited)!!!
  3. Fortune ideas?

One more thing – the picture! It’s the cake for the bride and groom at the wedding Cobalt and I went to last weekend (hopefully a post about that coming soon!). Adorable, right? I love it. The groom’s mom made it too. Nice work!

I’d like my state medium well, please…

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So in case you haven’t heard, Colorado has a huge wildfire going on right now. The High Park Fire is currently 5% contained and it is the third largest wildfire in the history of the state at 43,400 acres. Keep us in your thoughts though. People are being evacuated and one person is thought to be dead… scary stuff! I was worried about this when we didn’t get much snow/rain this winter and spring… Booo…

Today’s pictures feature the picturesque Flatirons that look over Boulder. The top picture shows all the haze from the High Park Fire that we got here this morning. The bottom picture shows a Flatiron peaking up over some bushes in less hazy conditions this afternoon to give you an idea of the difference…

What sorts of natural disasters do you get in your area? Have you ever been evacuated? Btw, this week has been a bit ridiculous so my usual Wedding Wednesday post is probably going to be late… Also, for the record, I prefer my steaks medium or medium well… I like my states to be not charred too…