Thanksgiving and The Big Apple

We were lucky enough this Thanksgiving to be with ALL of Andrew's immediate family members (that's quite a task seeing as how they are well spread out from Washington to Maryland). Andrew's parents used to live in Manhattan and, later, in New Jersey (they moved to Ohio when Andrew was about 8). It was a tradition for them to take their children to the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade every year. This year the kids wanted to take their own children to see the parade and so the planning began. We stayed in the Poconos (about two hours away) and took some trips into NYC. We also were able to bless Luke at a small church building in Lehighton, Pennsylvania. It was a great week and we are so grateful that we were able to be with family.

Luke's first subway ride.


Here is Times Square. Both Andrew and I were reminded of our missions while we were in New York (I served in Tokyo, Japan and Andrew in Milan, Italy). I think it made us a little homesick.

Central Park

Here we are with Andrew's sister Jessica and her husband Doug.

We also stopped by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. My favorites were the Impressionists and the Rembrandts. Although, I have to admit I was a little distracted because Luke kept projectile-spitting-up all over the floor. In fact, I can still hear the horrifying "SPLAT" noise as it hit the nice wood surface. Sometimes I'd miss it and a sweet foreigner would come up and try to act out something that looked like throwing up while pointing at the ground. We didn't blend in very well.


Luke loved FAO Schwarz.

Luke's cousins had a blast on the famous giant piano.


I don't know what this is, but it was on the sidewalk and we think it is was meant for pictures.

We had dinner in "Little Italy" at Lombardi's. Andrew said it was very authentic.

And then, Thursday morning....there was....(drumroll please)


THE PARADE!


At first, our view wasn't so great. But who cares?! We're at the Macy's Parade! Here are Alexis and Karrine up in a window seal. They made sure to tell me when Hannah Montana was spotted.

It was the first time that I actually was glad to be the shortest person in Andrew's family...no one wanted to sit on my shoulders.


Eventually, we pushed and sweet talked our way into a better view.


Luke was obviously enthralled by the whole experience. But it's okay. We have pictures to prove he was there.


I love this picture because you can see the back of the parade going down Central Park West.


We enjoyed some "New York style" hotdogs. Very tasty.


I decided while we were in New York that I could TOTALLY live there. As long as we lived across from Central Park in one of these swank homes.


The LDS (Mormon) Temple in Manhattan was very close to where we watched the parade.


Andrew got some great pictures of the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, the New York skyline, etc.

As if the day wasn't exciting enough, Andrew and the guys drove down to Philly to watch the Eagles game. Andrew never misses an opportunity to show his true devotion to the Cougars. The ladies went back to the cabin and had a rockin' girls' night with mud masks and everything (sorry, no pictures).


At first, Luke wasn't sure what to think about all these new people in his life. But he warmed up to everyone eventually and now he seems lonely with just Mom and Dad around all day.


Luke and Ammon


Luke and Amber (it's too bad that Luke is crying in this picture because he actually grew quite fond of Amber).


Luke is REALLY starting to like books these days. He was probably staring at this book for 15 minutes while cousin Karrine read to him.


Saturday we had the annual Pinata event. The Stacey's have a tradition whenever they get together. They have to break the pinata but no blugeoning objects are allowed (this rule is sometimes bent a little). Instead, they have to think of creative ways to destroy the pinata. In the past, there have been blow torches, giant slingshots, spitballs, Coke bombs...you name it.


There was also a talent show. Here is an American Idol skit with Simon, Paula and a really little Randy.


Luke had a photo shoot with the other cousins (I don't have the pics with the other cousins but I can't wait to see how they turned out).

He already has a little gut.


And last, but definitely not least, we were really grateful to be surrounded by family (at least half of Luke's family) as he was given a blessing by his Dad. (For those of you who aren't familiar with our religion, it's basically a special prayer...we can tell you more about it anytime).

Luke's Grandma Stacey knitted this sweater for him to wear. She got the button for it while she was in Israel the week after he was born. Thanks Delta.

That's a wrap folks. We hope you all had a great Thanksgiving. We definitely had time to think about all of our blessings and especially feel grateful for our family and friends who mean so much to us. I love reading your blogs (for those of you who are my blogging friends) and reading about the things you do and the things you care about. I admire how you look for the positive or at least laugh through the difficult times (as we all know, the blogging world is always rosier than real life). I love it even more when I get some real life contact with a good friend...I'll try to get better at that. I'm grateful that I'm surrounded by people who inspire me to be better. Thanks.

Catch Up

Sorry for those of you who, like me, felt mentally stymied after that last post about Bayesian statistics (I've been waiting since my high school sophomore English class to finally use the word "stymied"...only took a decade). Now we're back to mindless jabber. It feels like it has been forever. November was definitely a busy month for us. Due to the fact that this blog is also kind of like a journal for our family... I must go back and catch up on some of our most memorable moments of which there are many. This is only the first half of November. The next post will cover NYC and Thanksgiving.

First of all, Luke is making friends. If anything positive can be taken from the BYU v. Utah nightmare, it is that Luke and Will bonded during the rivalry game. Either that, or Will was just trying to figure out how to get Luke's fist in his mouth. Cute nonetheless.



My sister, Michele, and my nieces, Dallyn and Trestyn, came out to see Luke. We had a blast...lots of mini-road- trips and late night movies. I'm grateful that they came all the way to Ohio from California and Utah just for us!


Here is Dallyn with Luke. The girls made lots of presents for Luke including this cute little hat.

Michele and I in front of the Whitney home in Kirtland.

The girls show us how to dress like really hip pioneers.

We took a tour of the Kirtland Temple. Dallyn's picture-taking skills truly impressed me.

We also drove a few hours away so the out-of-staters could see Amish people. This picture makes me feel like we were undercover.

Here are Luke and Dad all dressed up for Church.

Luke is all smiles these days

I didn't take as many pictures as I wanted to, but thanks for a great week ladies!


We discovered something scary this month. As you can see in the picture, Luke has a mobile. It's actually the first toy we have ever purchased for him ($7.00 at Ikea...yes, we made ANOTHER Ikea trip...maybe we should just move to Cincinnati). Luke absolutely loves it. As we watched our little kiddo coo with delight, a scary reality began to set in....We LOVE buying toys for our little guy. It made us so happy. I don't know how I'm going to control myself from buying him everything! (Oh wait, we're poor med students...problem solved).

The Results Are In

Well, that was a hit.


Not only did we receive two quickly submitted correct answers but we were showered with a myriad of subsequent personal perspectives. Amazingly, the results center received only two correct answers among a full mailbag which consisted of 4 problems with question wording, arguments about 10 lurking variables not properly defined, 3 paragraphs of plagiarized anti-Bayesian literature, one lesson on medical school loan money, one inside joke, and finally, one box of donuts.


RESULTS:

The correct answer was 0.01099, meaning that there is a 1.099% chance that the student in the car was in medical school.

The race to the correct answer did not come without a story line. Our runner-up responded within minutes with an answer very close to the right one, if it weren't for a forgotten subtraction. However, less than a minute before he corrected his mistake and resubmitted his answer, the crown was stolen by one Ryan "MegaWATT" Watkins, applause please.


Ryan not only provided the correct answer in the fastest time, but he also sent me his work which is outlined in proper Bayesian format (available HERE). He deserves some extra credit for that don't you think? Props to a budding Bayesian-economist-physician.

In following the pageantry of the greatest competitions, lets not forget our runner-up who fought valiantly but was edged out in the end. Every pageant needs a worthy runner-up! Congratulations, Jeffrey "Liberal Libertarian" Nye.


I can not yet reveal the prizes as they have not all been handed out, but rest assured that they are wicked awesome. Keep your eyes peeled for the next Stacey Sizzle competition, I promise it won't be quite so nerdy.

Liberally Bayesian

Today the junior editor has decided to design his remarks in the form of a math question. I do this for two reasons, firstly to address the many questions about “Bayesian Statistics” and secondly to point out some irony found across the country.

Ever been to a college campus? If so, you have probably heard the word “diversity” once or twice. In the wake of such a polarizing national election I thought it would be a good idea to take a deeper look at the “diversity” that universities are so proud of.

Let’s create a hypothetical university. Let’s just say this university is located in Columbus, Ohio and has 60,000 students. There are two groups at the university, medical students and non-medical students. Each group is very diverse as illustrated by the following statistics: during the 2008 election 90% of non-medical students and 99% of the medical students supported Barack Obama.

(Aside: Isn’t diversity great!)

One day, as I am pulling into the parking lot of this hypothetical university in Columbus, Ohio with 60,000 students, I see a car pull in next to me with a bumper sticker saying, “Too poor to vote Republican” (a slogan that provides WAY too much ammo for this writer to address on this blog).

Now for the bipartisan question; what is the exact probability that the student driving that car is a medical student? To answer this question you will utilize Bayesian statistical methods (see Wikipedia) whether you realize it or not. Oh, by the way, let me tell you one last integral piece of the problem; we have obtained some ‘prior’ information that there are 600 medical students at the university.

The first person to respond with the correct answer (to the 5^th decimal) will receive a gift that will make all your friends jealous…..I promise.

Happy 8-year Anniversary Andrew

Andrew claims that I only get one anniversary a year...but I prefer to celebrate two. Obviously our wedding, April 25, 2007 is the most important. However, I also think that our first date, November 4, 2000, is a day worth commemorating. I want credit for all 8 years, not just the year and a half that we've been married. So to celebrate this meaningful milestone, I wanted to provide a brief (actually no, it's quite long) synopsis of our 8 year courtship. I just thought it was about time I wrote some stuff down. Andrew, enjoy.

Year 1:

I hate to admit it, but I actually asked Andrew out first. I had boycotted asking guys out on dates and was much more interested in studying than in going to silly college dances, but my friend Lindi convinced me to ask Andrew to Preference a few days before. No one had asked him and I was the only girl who didn't have a date. Word on the street was, Andrew already had a girlfriend at another college (true -- long story) and so no one would ask him out. Andrew was in my freshman ward and I had probably talked to him briefly before, but I only knew him as that crazy guy who walked on the BYU football team. Well, Lindi can talk me into anything, so I broke my two rules about asking guys out and going to silly college dances. Now I'm grateful.


If you knew Andrew freshman year, he'll be easy to pick out. He's the only guy who would ever wear a bright yellow vest in public. If I had known we were going to get married 7 years later, I would have taken a better picture.

It didn't spark into a romance right away (after all, we're slow movers), but we did become instantly great friends which is always the best way to start in my opinion. As just friends we spent a lot of time walking around BYU campus late at night in the freezing cold, just talking (no really, just talking).

Look how young we were! I don't even remember what we were like to be honest.


Our relationship back then might have been based on teasing each other. One time, Andrew found a dumb senior picture of me in my cap and gown and made t-shirts out of it. The caption across the front read "Lauren McCann -- My Idol". We're still friends with all these guys in the picture...and I still see them wearing this shirt occassionally...grrrrrrr.

I like to think that I took pretty good care of Andrew before he went on his mission. This was when he got his wisdom teeth taken out and needed someone to stay with him while he was drugged up. I had never seen a person drool so much. Every once in a while he'd wake up, hand me the bloody gauze from out of his mouth, put some clean gauze back in, mumble something about football, and then go back to sleep. I must have really liked him.



Of course we both knew that changes were coming. Here is Andrew opening his mission call to Milan, Italy. Andrew had been preparing for this experience his whole life. We were all really excited.

Years 2-3:

So Andrew goes to Italy and I go back to school. At first I was pretty sad, but time passed and we occasionally wrote. We both grew up a little.

Year 4:

Well this would be an interesting year. Andrew coming home...Lauren not currently dating anyone. But was it interesting? No, not really. Andrew was kind of weird...Lauren was kind of impatient. Sometimes we were dating...sometimes we weren't. We got really good at the "break up-just be friends- get back together"cycle.

But regardless of relationship status, we still walked. Andrew had a way of finding out what classes I had and sometimes he would meet me after class and walk me to the next one. I could never figure out why he did that. I don't think he knew why either. Then there was Christmas. We had decided not to date and a few days later he came by my apartment to drop off a present before going to Ohio. Out of all the things he could have given me...he gave me two fish. Two fish!? Two living things that I would have to take care of and would remind me of Andrew everyday!?? Andrew still refuses to admit that there could be any symbolism implied with such a gift, but in any case, I fought to keep those fish alive through thick and thin. They made it well past our wedding day.

Eventually, it reached decision time. In the midst of deciding our future, a really strange answer came out of the blue. I should serve a mission - something I wasn't planning on doing. Andrew didn't really think I was serious at first...probably just trying to get him to propose :) haha. I still don't know how I got the guts...must have been because it was right. We said goodbye. My friends and family mourned what they probably believed to be my only chance at marriage :)

I went to Japan
Andrew, devastated over my departure, rebelled and tried (unsuccessfully) to grow a beard.

Nice try. He had more success in other endeavors.

Year 5:

I conquered fears.

Andrew conquered mountains.

Year 6:

The moment of truth. Would the stars finally align? This time around, I was weird and Andrew was ... luckily patient.

Grand Canyon

Jackson Hole

Raft races down the Provo River

Year 7

Thanksgiving

And just when our friends were about to lose all hope, we finally got engaged....on a Sunday morning in December...at around 6 am. I guess it was a busy week.

My sign at the Las Vegas bowl.

I usually hate kissing pictures, but I make an exception when the background is incredible.


Here's to eight more miele.

Dad and Luke Have a Man-to-Man