Francophile in the West

It's been a slow start to the year blog-wise, but my, how quickly time flies! Especially when life is busy with the best combination of stress, happiness, love, hard work, the prospect of new adventures, and all things that are good.  I survived the Winter Quarter with my 4.0 intact (Wahoo!!) and followed up finals with a few days at home with my family in Vancouver, WA. While there, I enjoyed daily snuggles with Scout, the family cat, top-rope climbing with my sister, a day of skiing with my dad and sis, dinners with the whole family, French pastry baking, and LOTS of laughter. There's never enough time to enjoy with my family. We made "Financiers", my dad's favorite French pastry that he discovered in Nantes! Ski buddies at Mt. Hood Meadows. Over the break, I received some most excellent news about an internship from some important people in Geneva... but I'm only going to tease you all with that much for now. Things are moving in a good dire...

It seems like just yesterday that fall quarter was ending and I was in a flurry of final paper writing. Well, here we are again, folks! Winter quarter is finally coming to its conclusion, and I have about 45 pages to write before March 15... Needless to say, I'm very busy. I haven't been very good at updating this poor, neglected blog this quarter, but I have been pretty good about taking pictures with my trusty iPod! Here are some of the photo-worthy events from the shortest month on the calendar: Happy hour with friends at the Black Pearl: drinks, oysters, and delicious calamari on S Pearl Street. Voodoo Donuts! I have never been to the original location in Portland, but they just opened one here in Denver and a couple of friends and I decided to brave the lines and try the doughy phenomenon. Valentine's day was spent skiing with friends at Loveland Basin! It was an absolute blast.  The cute little "coffee corner" in my apartment saves the day,...