Hello, Hello, Hello!!

So I’ve been a bit MIA on here but it’s okay, I have quite a post for today.  The weather went from terrible, to gorgeous, to terrible, and is back to gorgeous.  So let’s start with terrible:

I graduated!!  Right when we got that giant snow storm, it was great.  My mom got stuck here an extra day so I suited up and took the subway to meet her and my sister.  They were staying at the Conwell Inn on campus which was really cute. I also found out right after the ceremony that I got into WVU, my number one choice for grad school!!!  Acid Mine drainage, here I come!

The bests

I really like this picture

Because of the intense cold and snow, there was a solid period of time that I just sat inside and read and did crafts.  And let me tell you, it was great.  I started working when I was 16 and between school, work, sports, and extra curricular, I forgot what free time was.  So time very well spent.  On one of my few outdoor adventures, I went to see Kim Barnouin, author of Skinny Bitch.   The book is a sometimes crass argument from veganism.  She was speaking at the library in Center City so I took the journey there to see her. Here’s some pictures I snapped while in the city:

City Hall

Love Park

And then my cousin’s having a baby so I went home for the shower.  I didn’t take pictures of the shower itself, but here are some of my nephew and niece!

It was girl scout day at the ice rink. Kind of fun to watch but terrifying to take part in.

And we went to the bounce plex.

And this picture of Haley is hysterical.

And then it got nice out!  Morris and I got these passports from Temple to do all this fun stuff free in the city so we went to the Franklin Institute and then moseyed around the city.

The art museum.

And we went to Penn Treaty park and there was this bagpiper:

Bagpiper.

and a ship.

Ship.

And we went to the John Weiss wildlife refuge.  It’s about a ten minute drive on 95 and it was stunning.  It’s a 3.5 mile loop of marshland and it’s relatively flat so not hard at all.  We saw so many cool things!  We took the dogs too and boy did they have a blast…well, Leonidas did, Xerces looked miserable.  He’s a bit of a princess when it comes to getting dirty.

Leonidas found tadpoles and just charged into the water. Luckily, this was at the beginning so he dried off by the time we got back to my car.

Leonidas and me! If you look closely, you can see how muddy my pants and shoes are. I fell a bit while exploring.

I like this one because he looks like a real dog.

The bald eagle nest!! We saw momma and pappa eagle trade places from watch in a tree to watch in the nest. It was nuts!!!

A deer!

And why I want to do what I'm going to grad school for.

And then it got rainy and terrible again.  And so what better to do then go out to Fox and the Hound for karaoke night!!  Somewhere I heard that geologist are the sexiest scientists around.  Proof:

And now it’s back to being nice out.  Yesterday I walked for a good four hours exploring Fishtown. I’ll take pictures next time.  And my new favorite place is Penn Treaty Park, right on the rocks by the river.  I sat and read there a lot yesterday.  There’s also a lot of green space to play. It’s really nice.

And the sunset was beautiful.

And this took far too long and I’m going to go enjoy this weather!