A thousand a day...349-362

Sunday, November 28
I know I've taken so many photos of Oakey's autumn leaves already, but when I came home for Thanksgiving this weekend, Oakey was almost all bear except for the beautiful red, purple and emerald leaves on top.

Saturday, November 27
Celebrating Mikey's 18th birthday while the whole family's together in one place

Friday, November 26
Colin's first Thanksgiving

Thursday, November 25
Through Oma's front door

Wednesday, November 24
My first attempt at making sugar cookies from scratch. I got the recipe with the Christmas cookie cutters Mom gave me and then realized I don't have a rolling pin yet! Alas, I was stuck with making your typical round sugar cookies rather than fun snowman and gingerbread man cookies. Looks like my next fun purchase is a rolling pin.

Tuesday, November 23
I have been hoping to find a hook to keep my keys by the door, and guess where I found one! Why, Anthropologie, of course.

Monday, November 22
Full moon

Sunday, November 21
Saying hello to an old friend. I have been wanting to dig up my Polaroid camera for a new photo adventure and my mom finally found it for me. Now if I can only track down some film...

Saturday, November 20
David Ledford, editor of The News Journal, gave me great tickets to today's University of Delaware football game. It was awesome to be able to go to the big game against Villanova.

Friday, November 19
This week's Anything Once adventure was learning how to bake bread at the Black Lab in Little Italy.

Thursday, November 18
Today was the day. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1. Shockingly enough, I did not see the midnight showing (as I have for the past six movies), but I did get to shoot a man-on-the-street and talk to some of the crazy fans decked out in their best Harry Potter costumes. Sadly, all I have to offer is this cell phone pic (which was taken the night I FINALLY saw the movie, Thanksgiving Eve...sorry today's photo is a big time cheat on my part).

Wednesday, November 17
After a blustery evening, I awoke to find the first leaves on my welcome mat!

Tuesday, November 16
An unusually slow day in the office means it's time to clean the keyboards

Monday, November 15
For the final "25 Who Matter" I got to visit the Wilmington Youth Rowing Association to meet some rowers and go out on the water with them. Difficult to grab a still image from all the movement on the water, so here's the video:

A thousand a day...344-348

Sunday, November 14
More than four months ago, after my job interview at The News Journal, my mom and I explored the area around New Castle. That's when we first discovered the glorious Anthropologie in my mall. And that's when I fell in love with this bird lamp. I finally decided enough was enough...I caved and bought it for myself at an early Christmas present.

Saturday, November 13
Sunset in the nation's capital

Friday, November 12
It's a tie for today's photo. I was having a very reflective day in New York City as you can see.

Thursday, November 11
A night I'll never forget...seeing Phantom of the Opera on Broadway. Breathtaking.

Wednesday, November 10
I'm officially a real person and my apartment is complete now that I have a welcome mat!

A thousand a day...332-343

Tuesday, November 9
Today was an AMAZING Wawa experience. Daniel and I left the office for an afternoon adventure. It's important to mention that this would be Daniel's first Wawa experience...something that is bound to happen sooner or later once you move to Delaware.

I was fully set on getting a coffee, but then I saw - drumroll - a milkshake machine. Say what!? I knew I had to be adventurous and get - no, MAKE - a Wawa milkshake. I turned to Daniel and said, "You can make milkshakes in Wawa!? For real!?" And he just laughed at me and pointed out that the milkshakes are actually made by the "Milkshakes." brand. Even better, the milkshake mixes said, "F'real" on them. No lie.

After staring at the machine in awe, I decided on a cookies and cream milkshake and Daniel got the same. I followed the step-by-step instructions, taking it very slowly so as not to make a mistake and, quite honestly, to relish every moment. A man at the coffee stand looked at me, clearly baffled by my joy at the discovery of the machine, and said, "It doesn't take a college degree to work that thing." Yeah, yeah. Cut me some slack. I was entranced! So, that's my glorious story behind today's thousand a day. It was one heck of a Wawa memory.

Monday, November 8

Sunday, November 7

Saturday, November 6
My Ya-Ya sister, Caitlin, is now the proud mommy of an English chocolate lab puppy. We threw her and Westin a puppy shower and just cooed over him, in addition to giving him and Caitlin lots of fun presents.

Friday, November 5
It was my first time being captain of the football ship tonight since Andre was out of town. I knew I was in for an intense night, so I'm really happy I survived it. Damian and Daniel brought their game tapes back for me and I edited theirs first before working on my two games. Lesson learned tonight: I much prefer being Gilligan to Skipper.


Rather than try to take a still from those videos, here is one of the games I shot this week:



And here's a link to the second game I covered.

Thursday, November 4
I got to partake in a unique Delaware tradition today. Return Day is held the Thursday after Election Day in Georgetown, Del. (Sussex County), and celebrates the end of the election season. Marching bands and politicians parade around the square, the town crier announces the returns and the opposing candidates literally bury a hatchet. Well, they hold the hatchet up together and then pass it off to party leaders who proceed to place the hatchet in a glass box and then fill it with sand. The only downfall to this awesome day was the off-and-on (though mostly on) rain. Daniel and I got to team up for this assignment, so we combined our footage to produce two videos later that night (we captured the footage on the long drive back to the office...very MoJo - mobile journalist - of us).

Here's the sights and sounds video I edited:


And the official ceremony video Daniel edited:



Wednesday, November 3
Another adventure with Justin Williams for "Anything Once." This time, he spent a morning working as a toll booth collector on Del. 1. The story runs Sunday, Nov. 14.

Tuesday, November 2
Election Day! My first Election Day in a newsroom was quite an experience. My day started at Charter School of Wilmington to shoot video of Christine O'Donnell voting. When I returned to the office, I edited that video along with a video on early voters, Chris Coons voting, Glen Urquhart voting and Vice President Joe Biden voting.

Here's a still from my morning video after O'Donnell finished voting.

I had the afternoon off and returned to the office after the polls closed. I waited for Damian and Daniel to come back with the tapes of O'Donnell, Coons, Urquhart and John Carney delivering their victory/concession speeches. (Here is O'Donnell's concession speech and Coons' victory speech videos.) While I was editing, David Ledford, the editor-in-chief, came over to show me the front page design with its glorious headline. It was, as we like to say to each other, "off the hook."

Monday, November 1
Another adventure with Justin Williams, this time for a special feature other than Anything Once. We spent a morning in Smyrna learning how to harvest cranberries. I'll post the story and video after they run Wednesday.

Sunday, October 31
Daddy's adorable pumpkin with melon friends

Saturday, October 30 
Baby meets baby at Amanda Maloney's baby shower. We played the baby pin game where each person gets a pin and if they are caught saying "baby," they lose the pin to the person who catches them. It's a struggle. Now, I can say baby as much as I want.

Baby.

Friday, October 29
Favorite tree outside my apartment

A thousand a day...329-331

Thursday, October 28
I've always carved the typical snaggle-toothed pumpkin but decided to get creative this year. I got my "phat jack" pumpkin - named as such because of its long handle - at Coleman's Christmas Tree Farm after Justin harvested it for "Anything Once."

Wednesday, October 27
 











Tuesday, October 26
Pinecones

A thousand a day...318-328

Monday, October 25
My new fall place settings

Sunday, October 24
Homecoming Day 3: Before leaving campus, I had to take a final walk around my favorite part of campus to take photos.

Saturday, October 23
Homecoming Day 2: Elon vs. Wofford. We don't have to talk about the game. If you must hear about it, Sunshine's story says it best:
 
With nine seconds left, Wofford College's junior quarterback Mitch Allen dropped back and launched a pass down the field. It was third and 15, with a tied game at 21-21.

Wofford's senior wide receiver Devin Reed was in double coverage. Elon University's sophomore defensive back Blake Thompson had him matched step-for-step.

In the midst of the action, Reed reached up to make the grab and fell to the ground in the end zone. After an extra point by sophomore kicker Christian Reed, the Terriers took the lead 28-21 to win the game...

Friday, October 22
Elon Homecoming Day 1: We decided to go to our favorite Mexican restaurant, Montereys, for dinner after a long day of homecoming activities. There were six of us and we refused to spend any time apart by driving separately. Blurry, yet this sums up the day wonderfully as Alexa, Sam/Sunshine, Pam and Conor crammed in the back of Jack's car. I was lucky enough to ride shotgun, thus documenting this greatness. 

Thursday, October 21
A piece of good fortune from China

Wednesday, October 20 
New frames, new decorations

Tuesday, October 19 
Another gift to myself from Anthropologie

Monday, October 18
My guilty pleasure - those fun Pillsbury cookies with shapes on them for every holiday. This one's dedicated to Roomie, the cat lady.

Sunday, October 17
Brand spankin' new roof after the crazy hail storm of 2010 damaged it

Saturday, October 16
Oakey has his first autumn leaf! I couldn't have been more excited. My oak tree's five-month birthday is coming up in a few days!

Friday, October 15
Football Friday! Middletown at Newark for the Hornets' homecoming game. It's just too hard to grab good stills from these football videos, so I'm just posting the video this time for full enjoyment. Tonight was a record night because I was out of the office by midnight!

A thousand a day...311-317

Thursday, October 14  ....annnnnd done! Dedicated to Miss Lizzie Dent. I'm sending these red velvet cupcakes to you in York! Side note: This was a cream cheese icing fail (notice the unnatural meltiness).

Wednesday, October 13
My first attempt at red velvet cupcakes...fresh out of the oven.

Tuesday, October 12
Rather than take a new picture today, I think this photo of The Pendulum office captures my day a bit better. Today, the "shot heard round the world" was the fact that our college newspaper office is being bulldozed. We moved into the old bank building during my sophomore year. The building was renovated and transformed into our home, a home that really brought us together as a staff and a family. We had so much more space in the new office and direct access to our adviser, whose office is within our newspaper office, and were right across the street from the communications building. Not to mention we were right next door to Acorn, everyone's favorite coffee shop.

So here's my ode to our office. It's tough to remember that the success of our paper is not in the building but in the dedication and talent of the staff. But still, so many memories. This photo was taken during the summer after my sophomore year when I stayed on campus to start The Pendulum's first summer editions. It's become a favorite photo of ours since it's the first view of the office while walking on the brick path from the comm school.

Monday, October 11
I had the video camera sitting in front of me at my desk and liked the fun angle it captured.

Sunday, October 10 
My Saturday was much more action-packed than Sunday, so here's a shot from the Delaware Auto Show, which I covered Saturday afternoon. This sweet little boy was so well-spoken and a simply wonderful interview.

Here's the video I edited, too:

Saturday, October 9
A wonderful morning spent very Mary Poppins style...learning how to be a chimney sweep with Justin Williams for Anything Once! "Chim Chim Cher-ee" has been on replay in my head the whole week.

Friday, October 8
First attempt at making coffee. Fail. Long story for some other time, I promise.

A thousand a day...304-310

Thursday, October 7 
Tonight's kitchen experiment? Chicken with wild rice.
How did I do? Just fine, I think.
How did it taste? Not so great.

Yes, this was an unfortunate kitchen fail considering it took me a relatively long time to make. Quite honestly, I don't know why I thought this would taste good. The recipe called for orange marmalade and Dijon mustard, both of which I can't stand. Sigh. The chicken was salvageable. Can't say the same about the otherwise-delicious-but-now-ruined-by-mustard-and-marmalade rice. 

Wednesday, October 6
A still from the video I shot of the press conference at the News Journal to announce the U.S. Senate poll results. Dan Cassino from Fairleigh-Dickinson University announced the results and we streamed it live to our website.

Tuesday, October 5
My first attempt at pecan pie...still baking with that oven fog over it

Monday, October 4
Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Chris Coons visited the News Journal Monday morning for a video interview with a panel of reporters and editors.

Sunday, October 3
Baby Colin's baptism

And because my second cousin's so darn cute, he gets a bonus photo:

Saturday, October 2
A lovely outing on Mattawoman Creek

Friday, October 1
Friday Football again! Tonight, I shot the game and Andre edited, which means the voice over is totally ballin'. This still is from a touchdown that was made after a player knocked the ball out of the other guy's hands, and his teammate picked up the fumble (like my lack of football lingo there?) I'll make up for it now: He turned on the jets...and took it to the house.

Here's our video: