this week's happenings

These weekly catch-up posts may be what this blog has become for the next little while as the size of this babe increases and my energy level decreases. Despite me running a little slower lately, things have stayed busy and we're enjoying this holiday season.

This week Paul and I had the unique opportunity to attend a lecture and discussion given by Tony Blair on Faith and Globalization. He's been a "celebrity" on the Yale campus this semester and being able to hear him speak is one of the perks of being a part of this community. His takeaway message was that faith has power to either divide or unite people and it's our responsibility to make sure that the latter is the case. The candor of his speech was impressive, as well as his sense of humor. The talk ended with a question from the President of Yale, asking what he thought of his depiction in the movie "The Queen". He answered by telling a story (in his thick British accent) about one of his weekly meetings with the Queen. He sat down with her and she said:

"There is a film.

I don't think I'm going to see it.

Are you?"

And of course he answered, "No."

So you probably had to be there for it to sound funny, but it was.

Kate finally got to see Santa Clause up close and personal this week and I think all the anticipation was too much for her to handle. After being excited all day to see Santa, she realized she didn't like him as much as she thought she did. Maybe next year.
It's also looking a lot more like Christmas around here. Shopping is almost done, the baking seems constant and we love the sounds of Christmas music. The excitement of pulling all the ornaments off the tree seems to be fading and we are just enjoying each other and this time of year. Paul wraps up his finals this week with a slight feeling of sadness (i think) of another semester gone by too quickly and we try to ward off the too frequent question of our "after graduation plans" because we are having a baby first, right?