Just in time.

It seems I made it home just in time for the wonderful Maryland winter to set in. Hooray!



I flew in this past Thursday, with easy, on-time flights and parents waiting for me at baggage claim. I couldn't have asked for a better a Christmas present. It only took a few minutes to be able to see my bags through my uber-wimpy tears of joy. Anyhoodle, I'm home now and Christmas Christmas time is here. I will be in Maryland until the 12th of January and will take tons of photos for a later post. But I have other updates from before I flew home:

Last week, my friend Mackenzie and I went into downtown San Diego to the museum district, Balboa Park. It was super-fun until I realized how spoiled I am with free admission into the Smithsonians in D.C. So instead of actually going into any museums (and wasting $16) we watched street performers, got some lunch, and walked around. Here's a snippet (including a Dr. Seuss tree!):

We even had the privilege of watching a performance at the Spreckel's Organ Pavilion, complete with ADORABLE San Diego children's choir.

Then I went north to San Luis Obispo again, which seems to be an occurance every two weeks or so. While there, I went to my friend Kayla's graduation from Cal Poly (an event that made me miss college oh-so-much again), and I gave some Christmas presents to the kids. And then what did I do? Why, I took pictures of them, of course!

Here's Kayla, all graduated.


Here is AJ in some new clothes I bought her


I bought Nathan a Lego Chicken Walker to go with his Darth Vader Tie Fighter and this is what he did with it:

I bought Jessica clothes as well but she didn't put them on for a fashion show. Here she is anyways :)

After all the rain I drove through to get to San Luis, I got up Sunday morning to drive back, and I saw this:

Gorgeous, huh? If you look closely, you can see it's actually a double. I like to think it was a sign that this is going to be an excellent holiday :)

OK, just a leetle more and then I'm done. Promise. For now, at least.

I think I've mentioned I volunteer at the animal shelter in Coronado. Before I left for the break, I took some pictures of the kittens I get to play with every week.

This is Cyrano (who I call Chicken Leg), a very unsightly but total sweetheart kitty.

These are my dessert kitties: Biscuit, Biscotti, Cookie, and Muffin (and no, I did NOT name them)


And this is Luke, who I think looks like Salem from Sabrina the Teenage Witch.

There are plenty more but I don't want to bore you too much with kittehs. Hope you enjoyed all the pictures again. The more photos I put up, the less everyone has to deal with my horrid writing skills. And on that note, here's one last pic of Coronado as seen from the plane on my flight out.

Pretty huh? I wish I could point out where I live, about half an inch left of where that tiny bridge hits the island, in that little bay. Again, prime locale.

Wellllll, I hope e'erybody has a very safe and enjoyable holiday, and if you are in Maryland, SO AM I. Also, that little bay where I live? That's where my car is too. So come get me and hang out with meee!

Happy Holidays favorite people!

Love, Shub :)

The Thanksgiving Post!

I am warning you: I spent Thanksgiving with tons of babies. So that's what most of these pictures are.

Since I didn't go home to Maryland for T-Givs, I drove north, back up to San Luis Obispo, to spend it with the Cowards. It was quite an enjoyable weekend and I now have plenty of photos to prove it. All the cousins were there except for Mike and Lucy, so it was a full house. But the fuller the better if you ask me.

The day before Turkey Day I took the kids to Montana de Oro again and we, as always, played all day long in tidepools and on cliffs.

Nathan is always being goofy.

For dinner on Thursday I made the most incredible sweet potato casserole, compliments of Aunt Judy, of course. And I can't wait till next Thanksgiving so I can make it again.

So again with the kids, in total this weekend: Jessica (12), Nathan (10), Cole (10), AJ (4), Quincy (2), and Zetta (4 months). Commence baby pictures.

Quincy on her scooter

Zetta Sue with her Grandma Mary Sue

Quincy and Jessica

Baby on the hip - Zetta seems a little annoyed

My love AJ and I

The baby girls - Quincy is at the stage where in order to smile big, you must close your eyes

Grandma and Grandpa Coward with all of their grandbabies

Shortly following dinner my camera was stolen by a 12-year old. So, sadly enough, there's not many more good pictures of babies from Thursday. But alas! The weekend is not through. And neither is the post.

On Friday I went into San Luis with Jeff, Katie, Quincy, and Zetta. It was a little chilly, but fun nonetheless. As you can see, the baby is always prepared for the weather.



Quincy found an outfit she liked, and decided to smile as big as she could while holding it.






OK enough babies, onto the good stuff. Saturday morning my cousin Matt took my other cousin Jeff and I to a shooting range. It was VERY cool and I got to shoot some sweet guns:

A semi-automatic pistol (.45mm) - lots of fun to shoot, but not as easy as it looks

A .22 long rifle (which I did shoot, there is just no picture of me with it)

And a .30-'06 rifle - super loud and scary

*Note: All of these firearms belong to my cousin Matthew

All in all, a very successful Thanksgiving, I would say. I am back in San Diego for a bit, before I go back to San Luis again in a few weeks for my friend Kayla's graduation from Cal Poly. I have started volunteering at the animal shelter in Coronado, which feeds my soul because I get to play with kittens as much as I want. I will finally start tutoring next week (papers didn't go through before), and they seem to like me well enough at the new office, I hope! I am going to a Christmas parade in Encinitas this Saturday, and am doing all the cultural museum-y parts of the city on Sunday. A blog post will surely follow.

Again, I come home on the 17th! Yay! That's like, 2 weeks or something. I hope everyone had an amazing Thanksgiving and has an even better Christmas! I can't wait to be home to see everyone!

Stay classy San Diego,

Shub :)

I get to come home! (But life here is good.)

The deed has been done people! I fly home on December 17th! And with all the miles my mom had racked up, it only cost $5.40 round trip. Pretty cool huh? Anyways you all better mark your calendars :)

SO, what's new, you ask? Lots of things, say I! First, the job: Although I am back in San Luis Obispo county for the weekend, I have been down in San Diego for my new job. Yay! I work at San Diego Miramar College, and I'm living in Coronado, which is one of the most gorgeous places you could ever go on the west coast. Miramar College is a junior college (or community college) about 25 minutes northeast-ish of Coronado, not too bad of a commute. Miramar is in the process of developing a new Medical Lab Technician Training Program, and that's why they hired me. Even though it's only part-time for now and is not always the most thrilling, I know I'm doing something important for this program and the school. Hooray!

I've only been working in the afternoons, so I just recently signed up to volunteer as a tutor at Miramar. I don't get paid for it, but I don't mind. I have my first real appointment on Monday, with a girl named Michelle, who needs help with math. Wish me luck!

In other spare time I've been babysitting some really cute kids from New Zealand. Not only are they adorable, but they have the most fascinating little accents as well. Below is a picture of 4-year old Lucy, or Loossaayy, as they say (there is also 5-year old Emma, and 7-month old William).

Unfortunately, they are only here for another week and are going back to New Zealand soon. I will definitely miss listening to them talk.

I'm also still trying to sight-see as much as possible. A few weeks ago I went with my new friend Lindsey to a place called Point Loma, which is a national park just north of Coronado. Like Montana de Oro on the Central Coast, it's full of awesome cliffs and spectacular photo-ops.


Remember that monster of a boat my parents bought a few weeks ago? Well, it has proven sea-worthy, and well worth the 7 or 8 years my dad has waited for it. It is still in a marina in Annapolis but will be taken out of the water for the winter soon. Here's some cool pics the sales guy took of the rents coming back into dock. Check out how nerdy and cute they are:


Moving on: Now that I am in San Diego, I am closer to my cousins Jeff and Katie and their girls Quincy Jean and Zetta Sue. TheCaliforniaInitiative first met the girls a number of posts back when I had first gotten to California and visited them for just a few days. They live in Encinitas, which is about half an hour north or Coronado. Quincy (Q-bug) is 2, and Baby Z is almost 3 months. Take a look! (The little man in the foreground below is 1-year old Wyatt, Quincy's cousin on her mom's side. He's quite a character, as I'm sure you can tell from this photo.)

This one looks vaguely reminiscent of Morgan's wet-lipped wild-eyed look when he was a baby. See the resemblance?

And here's Z with her Daddy. Now, I did not photoshop extra cheeks into this picture. They actually are the size of melons.

And in the spirit of family, I had very well-missed loved-ones come visit! Aunt Judy and Uncle Jim flew all the way out last weekend just to see me! Just kidding, Uncle Jim had business, so I showed Aunt Jude around Coronado and met them for dinner a few nights. It was SO wonderful to see them, and a total breath of fresh air to know my Maryland family is still as wonderful as they've always been :) So here's the photographic proof that it is not difficult to visit Shub in California:


To be sappy for a sec - I have had more than one person, when I tell them how much I miss home and all my family and friends, ask me if I regret coming to California, or if I could go back in time, would I just choose to stay. And my answer is always no. Although I do miss everyone more than I ever thought possible, I know I am learning a lot about myself, and as cheezy as that sounds, it's actually rather true. Driving all the way here and seeing so many different places has opened my eyes, and made me appreciate my parents and my brother and my home even more. And it's starting to make me more independent.. which is what I should be at this point in life, right? I'm so blessed to have such tremendous people putting me up in San Diego, and such amazing family to fall back on when I get lonely. So even though I don't think I want to ultimately settle in California forever, it's actually pretty great for now :)

OKOK enough of that crap. I drive back to San Diego on Sunday and then I am again driving up to the Central Coast for Thanksgiving! This time with a different side of the family!

I still miss everyone just as much as always and I can't wait to visit when I come home for Christmas!

Much love,

Shub :)

Pumpkin Patches, Boats, Haircuts and San Diego!

Alright peeps, lots of little things have happened in the last few weeks. To start, I spent a weekend with my little cousin AJ a few weeks back. I took her to the beach one day and she had a grand ol' time playing in the tidepools in her girly little bikini. The next dy we went to the pumpkin patch and we had quite a day there too! Since California has absolutely NO seasons, it was nice to pretend that it felt like Fall. Being that this place was the only pumpkin patch/orchard on the central coast, it was very busy; but we had fun anyways. We fed goats and pigs, rode the hayride, picked our own pumpkins, had homemade cider, and got lost in the corn maze! Hooray for Autumn! I took lots of pictures because she's so uber cute.

Nathan also got himself a very sweet bearded dragon named Harry, although she is a girl. She is also very cute and apparently loves bathtime. Keep in mind how long my hair is in this picture:

As of now, I am actually in San Diego! I came down here last weekend to get things set for this new job. More on that in a bit. On my way down to SD I stopped in LA and spent the weekend with my wonderful Christopher :) He took me to some awesome places in the city, including a sweet hooka bar and an even better bar after that! With drag queens! Yay! We had a blast. Funny that we both ended up on this side of the country huh?



Walking around downtown LA we (much to Christopher's dismay) stumbled upon one of the seven American Girl Places in the whole country. I realized at that moment that all of my childhood fantasies had come true. I would have absolutely KILLED to be at this place 12 years ago. MAN it was awesome. At that age I had to buy my American Girl, Molly, with my own money, so I certainly did not have the funds to come to one of these places back then. But it's ok, because now I've been there :)

So I finally made it to SD and I technically start the new job on Monday. I am currently living with my roommate Bits' parents in Coronado, CA, just off the coast of San Diego. I am going to be working part-time at San Diego Miramar College about 25 minutes north of Coronado, so I am also in the process of trying to find another part-time job. Only problem is, NO ONE IS HIRING. One of these days things might turn around. For now I am grateful for this position, and for the place to live right now :) Below is the view of the San Diego skyline, which can be seen after a short bike ride to the other side of the island.

More news! My parents have, after what seemed like years of my father sitting on the computer looking at boats, finally purchased their own. It's a 36' yacht-type dealio with lots of good room to spread out and sleeping space for at least 5! Wow! This means that at some point they will be renting out the Gaithersburg house and taking the boat down the east coast... or something like that. Whatever they end up doing, I always have to remember that home is where they are :) So here's some good pics of the boat:





Cute boat huh? So about the haircut.. I grew my hair out mainly because I listened to my best friend Nikki, who told me it made me look older. I decided a few weeks ago that it was too long for me to manage anymore... I knew I wanted it cut, so I decided to go all out and donate it! Wooooo! So I went today with Mrs. Hopkins to get my hair chopped away. Paul cut a good 8 1/2 inches off, enough to donte to Pantene Pro-V Beautiful Lengths. Before it was cut, it was longer than it's been since first grade, and now, it's just super short. It's ok though: Pantene Beautiful Lengths partners with the American Cancer Society, whom I have volunteered for before, and they give their wigs to cancer patients. Even if it is a haircut I hate, I feel so great about donating my long locks. Here's the before and after:


Even though it's short, the beauty of hair is that it grows! And I cut it for an awesome cause. I think part of me is accepting the new look more as I write about it. I suppose that's a good thing! It really is super cute and makes me look, as Mr. Hopkins says: "well into your teens!" which is certainly better than the 12-year old I had going before. The pictures don't really do it much justice but that's ok; you will just have to come visit me to see the real deal :)

I miss everyone SO much and I can't believe I wasn't home for the Terrapin Homecoming! Oh well, better luck next time, boys; and better luck to basketball maybe.

I love everyone!

Love Shub :)