So I'm thinking it's time for a change... New look, maybe some new organization to the whole thing... just trying to make everything more efficient and streamline.  

For starters?  I'm going to abandon the au naturale look and go with something a little more colorful... (Maybe this purple dye is literally going to my head at this point?)

And ultimately?  I'm thinking of rearranging the pages a little.  One big thing would be moving the actual blog portion of my website to the homepage - so for those of you who follow me with an RSS reader, be prepared to have to resubscribe to alisonrosek.weebly.com!  (Instead of http://alisonrosek.weebly.com/all-at-once.html)  Sorry in advance if that causes problems... :-/

Ok... deep breath... here we go! :P

I'm not even sure where I saw the baby-stats subway art but as soon as Baby Lucas was born, I knew I wanted to make him something to commemorate, well... him!  I used my scrapbook software (MemoryMixer, FYI) to come up with my own design... 

and then had it printed on glossy paper and framed it in a shadow box!

Adrienne and James loved it! :)

(yes, I've blocked off their last name... just being careful <3)

Some of the girls and I kicked off May by heading up to Grafton Lake for a lazy Saturday afternoon in the sun...

Ohhhh yeahhhhh..... :)

In the beginning of April, Mom and I took a little trip down to New Orleans, Louisiana! 

Neither of us had ever been before so we were both super excited!  (Unfortunately, Dad couldn't make it because of work...)  

What was the occasion?  My abstract was accepted and so I was off to present my research at the ACS (American Chemical Society) National Conference!!  Double super-exciting!! :)

(Side note:  I'm the worst tourist ever and didn't bring a nicer camera with me.. So I spent the entire weekend taking snapshots with my phone... #thankyoudroid) 

As soon as we got there?  Out to lunch of course!!  We went to the Oceana Grill for some yummy seafood.  And alligator, too of course!! It was actually delicious - we tried it fried and cajun style.  The street view from the restaurant was super cute, too.  And we had beautiful weather the entire weekend!

And then we spent a little time wandering around...

And our wandering quickly bee-lined for Cafe du Monde so we could get ourselves some beignets!  

It was absolutely packed but they were well worth it!  Sooooo much powdered sugar...

Ok, back to walking...

Donkey carriages! 

LOVED this street art.... totally regret that I didn't get one...

For our first night, we had a delicious dinner out at the Palace Cafe - complete with doo-wop serenading! 

Yeah... Dessert was totally worth it...

We started off the next morning with a ride on the famous Streetcars!  We hopped on and went down to the Garden District, well... and then pretty much got right back on and came back... but still a fun ride!

Ahh, what an amazing line up!!! Wish the conference was just a few weeks later...

And we ended up making it back to the French Market and then finally the Cafe du Monde for our daily beignets.  We found a nice bench in the sun where I could sit for a little bit and work on my presentation slides.

This was one of my favorite areas to people watch... There was just so much going on!  Plus street art... have I mentioned how much I love street artists?

Jazzy wedding parade!!! SO FUN!  Complete with big feather hats, and everything :)

A lot of places had gas lighting for outside by the doors - Absolutely in love with the look... (they left them running 24-7 though... not sure how I feel about that... but still cute!)

Speaking of lighting, Mom was pretty crazy about the antique chandelier stores, too.  We stopped to peek in the windows every single time we walked by :)

For dinner, we went to the Court of Two Sisters - it was absolutely delicious (I have yet to eat something on this trip that I didn't like...)  We sat outside on the back patio - it was beautiful with all of the lights, grape arbors and the fountain!

Strawberries foster over vanilla ice cream?  YUM!

More gas lanterns on the walk home!

We're still on crunch time to finish my slides and "rehearse" my presentation... Hello late night, early morning!  But it went just fine!  Mom went with me and we watched the other presentations in my session - all about PPCPs in the environment!!  (Oh... right... PPCP = Pharmaceuticals and Personal Care Products...) I was toward the end of the morning session and I ran out of time to go as in depth as I wanted but all-in-all it went great and everyone seemed pretty interested in our work!

We were basically starved after and I wanted to catch one more of the afternoon presentations so we decided to have lunch at the convention center - which was HUGE by the way!  Holy Cow!  Oh, and of course snap some photos :)  Here's Mom by the conference poster!

And I just couldn't pass up VooDoo chips... 

We also went through the Expo a little to try and pick up some swag from the visiting companies.  

Let me tell you - scientists are WAYYYY more stingy than engineers!  Getting swag was like pulling teeth!  Plus you ended up tricked into surveys and questionares about videos and product shpeels they forced you to sit through... crazy!  (Everyone knows engineers be THROWING swag at you...) :P

With the rest of the beautiful afternoon to ourselves, I was ready to rip out of my suit, throw on a summer skirt, and hit the town for a little sun.  We decided to check out the riverfront (turns out there wasn't much new to see... by the time we were waiting for our fourth streetcar, we hadn't actually traveled anywhere...) and then ended up deciding on going back to the garden district to actually walk around a little more.  We saw a lot of beautiful houses - we never made it far enough to see Toulane (which Dad says is where the shopping, etc. is) but it was still pretty and made for a nice walk...

Best climbing tree EVER!!

For our last night, Mom and I went out to dinner at GW Fins - ummm AMAZING.  Everything we ate was absolutely delicious (although apparently I'm terrible at taking photos of food... whoops...)

And then it was time to head back to the hotel so we could pack up and fly out the next morning.  :( 

What a wonderful trip though!!! 

March went out with some b-e-a-uuuuutiful weather... The perfect example of a sunny Spring day!  And we (Ali, Trick, and JP) just couldn't pass it up!

First Trick and I stumbled across the Cohoes falls on our hunt for a yarn shop, so naturally we stopped for a quick photo...

Then we grabbed JP and headed to EMPAC hill (after a quick detour to the Cookie Factory) for some kite flying!

Trick was very focused on his flying...

JP was significantly more interested in his cookie...

Oops.....

Let's just say, there is NOTHING like competing at home.  :)  The best part this year?  Cousinly support!!! Thank you a billion times to Sara, Chris, Mia, and Alex for coming out to cheer us on!  (And yes, you heard me right! Us = Ali + Mom + Dad!!  They were great...) :)

This year's competition was a HUGE success - even though we had two other competitions plan their's for the same date as ours - and we had a TON of fun. We actually got to spend some time with competitors from the other schools, too which was awesome!  (Isn't making friends fun?)

Matt and I did Open American Smooth (Waltz/Tango/Foxtrot/Viennese Waltz) and Open American Rhythm (Cha Cha/Rumba/Swing/Bolero/Mambo).

Pictures speak louder than words, maybe?  Here are some highlights from the day!


Setting up for the Waltz, our first dance of the day - Sara caught me looking over at them! :)

BEAUTIFUL shot:

Then it was time for Tango.  I think this is possibly our best dance of the entire day... Plus, it's my favorite... :)

And thanks to all of the wonderful people taking pictures, we have our opening from all kinds of different angles!

Like this one a lot... 

Super fierce!!  Check out that glare! 

This one is DEFINITELY one of my favorites... AMAZING line!!   (Especially impressive once you realize that I'm actually completely off the ground... super intense, too!)

Simply stunning.  I can't believe Sara managed to capture this one:

And the full picture, courtesy of Katie:

Bendy dip!!! :)

Beautiful photo from Kevin of the start to our Viennese Waltz!

And here's just a few from Rhythm...

All in all? AMAZING day dancing :)  We took first in Smooth and second in Rhythm!

And thank you again to those of you who let me steal these pictures from!! <3

I also managed to get some pictures of Mom and Dad!  They did GREAT and managed to get a few call-backs! :)

(I'm pretty sure these are all from Rumba.)

Can't wait to have them at more competitions with me!  Maybe this summer... :)

Back in March I took a semi-spontaneous trip up to Lake Placid for a few days with Brian and his family!  Which is quite an adventure tale in itself... Let's just say it involved a lot of Jenga, related Jenga-block towers, a little hockey, a lot of snow, pushing a car out of that lot of snow, cozy fireplaces, good food, great people, and tons of fun! :)

And of course a trip to Lake Placid wouldn't be complete without taking a moment to appreciate the ski jumps.  But this time?  FINALLY went to the top of one! :)  Here are some of the photos I was able to take...

Once Upon a Time, my dear friend Katie W. (perhaps you know her as KT Dubs) volunteered to play with my hair.  I had some temporary hair color - Splat Washables - that I had yet to try.  

I have ALWAYS (ok... maybe not always... but for at LEAST the last 3 or 4 years) wanted to add some super bright colors to my hair.  So I bought these a while ago, thinking temporary was a good way to have a rebellious few days and then quick recovery back to adulthood.

Armed with pink and purple, and the support of our loved ones (Krista, Shannon, and Cici), my artiest settled in and got to work.

All in all?  The color went in nicely and when it dries it's a little powdery - i.e. won't make your hair crusty and weird (NICE!) but therefore might rub off a bit... so don't wear light colored clothing!  Oh, and be prepared to blow your nose in technicolor...

Not too bad, right??

So I go to the farmers' market like this... And started getting all kinds of compliments!  My favorite?  The little old lady who told me my hair was "a rainbow of happiness!" - yup, love her.  :)

Then came this fun little challenge from JP - If I got more than 20 compliments, I had to make it permanent.  (Well, more permanent than 24-hours...)  Yup.  So that happened...

(But let's be honest... I was kind of hoping it would...)  :)

So I took a leap of faith, got THE Splat dye ("lusty lavender" - I wish I was kidding...), and just went for it!  

Before we go for the big reveal, let me just remind future-me of a few stars that aligned to make this work out as well as it did - and perhaps help out my fellow first-time extreme-colorists...  

First, my hair was super healthy to begin with - as I refreshed the purple (I re-dyed it a total of three times), I noticed that my ends became more and more dry.  I was really dillagent with conditioner though and careful not to over-wash it, which definitely helped.  Plus, that helped me keep the color vibrant longer.

Second, my hair color was already set up in a really nice ombre.  My roots were my natural dark brown and they had a very subtle gradual fade to blonde.  This let the purple that was closest to my face stay dark and almost unnoticeable (believe it or not) and then it faded to a more vibrant purple (and later magenta and then light pink as the color faded with washing over the weeks).  

Third, I chose a color ("lusty lavender," remember) that I thought would best mesh with my skin tone.  And along the same lines, one that I thought would fade favorably.  I lucked out that this was more of a pink-based purple, instead of a blue-based one, so it faded through shades of pink instead of getting gray and weird.  (The blondest hair actually started to look strawberry blonde by the end - like I said... I got SUPER lucky...)  Another thing that helped?  I didn't color all the way to my scalp - I left some rough roots.  1. I figured not having bright purple directly against my skin would help the "blending" process and 2. the dye stays with your skin for roughly a week... so there's that...


But!  Without further ado... The results:

Quite pretty if I do say so myself! :)

I can't lie though, the coloring in this photo is a little weird... it was actually a lot more purple when I took it, instead of pink.  It turned pink like this about three weeks later.  Thank you, phone camera for the foreshadowing!

So maybe this one is a little more accurate, color-wise...

I realize the white balance in these is relatively terrible... in different directions... but work with me people!  The one on the right is actually pretty accurate...

BUT I LOVE IT!!  Plus it matches my ballroom dresses... :)

Back in February we packed up with the team and headed out to Holy Cross for (you guessed it I'm sure...) DANCING! :)

Matt and I only went out for Smooth - we left the competition early so that we could get back in time to go to the monthly USA Dance that night!  (Sunday competitions are so hectic!)  

Main reason we had to get back for it?  We were one of the showcase performances! We danced our Tango - I'm not usually one to toot my own horn but... wow.  I can't believe I don't have any video of it!!! Probably some of the best dancing we've done... We went for it and held nothing back!  (Plus, they PACKED the dance floor at Holy Cross, which made Smooth... well... a little rough!  So I think we were both pretty amped up over that and had a lot of angst to flavor our Tango) :)


Anyways!  Katie got a few great photos that I figured I'd share.  (The big windows in the ballroom were beautiful but made avoiding backlighting a little rough... but you get the idea anyway!)

I think this one might be my favorite from the day though!

Sure my face is covered, but whatever!!  Still an awesome action shot.  :)

I know, I know, I know... back in January I teased you with my upcoming Ph.D. Qualifying Exam.  And then promptly fell of the face of the planet.

Let's just say... When you walk out of the room it's a little something like this:

And is very quickly followed by a few weeks of this:

And finally a good month of: 

.... no, but seriously...


Long story short, I presented, I passed, JP and Krista picked up the pieces, we went out for lunch (Ali Baba's), I cried, I napped, read a non-scientific book, stared off into space for a few days, and then moved on.

BUT!  The most important part is, I passed!! :)  

Now I just have to start my thesis work... hmm.... 'bout that...