Finally, Another Post!!

Wow, our lives have been crazy-busy lately. This is going to be a small novel, so I apologize in advance.

Let's see...

Our Anniversary:

James and I recently celebrated our 5th anniversary. In some ways it hardly seems possible that so many years have passed already, and in other ways, I can barely remember a time when James wasn't a part of my life. James was actually in New York City on a networking trip for his MBA on our anniversary, but a few days before he left, we went out to dinner at Biaggi's, a great Italian restaurant at the Gateway in Salt Lake. We also saw the new Batman movie...disturbing to say the least. While at dinner, James surprised me by giving me a small diamond pendant to celebrate our five years together. It's understated and perfect, I love it! These five years have been the best, most fulfilling years of my life, and I couldn't have picked a better man to share them with. I love you, baby!

Our Move:

After a lengthy flight delay, James finally made it home from New York at about 3 am on August 16th. A few hours later, we were packing up the U-haul for the second time in less than four months to move to our rental home in Utah County. Thank you to everyone that helped...you're all awesome! It was an exhausting day to say the least, but it feels good to be somewhere semi-permanent for awhile. The house is in a great neighborhood, and we seem to have landed in an elusive middle-stage-of-life ward...that means babysitters aplenty...hopefully! The house itself is a little old, and being a rental house, a little run-down, but it has a lot of great features. Part of the downstairs was converted into a playroom with a built-in playhouse...totally cool. The laundry room is much bigger than I'm used to, and the backyard is really nice, with plenty of room to play and lots of trees to give good shade. Now, as soon as I get the bathroom and kitchen re-caulked, it will be that much better. I also wish we could replace all the flooring, the kitchen sink, the kitchen counter, and paint...but hey, it's not our house, and really, it's not that bad. All in all, I think we'll be pretty happy here.

The MBA Program:

James has been involved in orientation since Wednesday of last week, and he's been enjoying it. So far, it hasn't involved too much work...the calm before the storm, or so I've been told. During the first semester, they are put into groups of five. They take all the same classes, and work on most, if not all, of their work together...lots and lots of group work. I think James was a little nervous about who would be in his group, but he's really happy with the guys he'll be working with. They're all married and have kids, and having that in common helps, I think. One of the days of orientation was spent at Camp Williams ( a National Guard training camp) where they were given "missions" and got to use their training facilities to complete them (things like water courses, walls to climb over, beams to run across, and the like). It was supposed to teach them to work efficiently as a group and to think creatively to solve problems...and while I'm sure it did, it was also fun for a bunch of grown men (and women) to play army. James said that members of the National Guard were out there watching, heckling, and taking bets on who would fall in the water first. Aside from the nasty sunburn that he got, I think James had a lot of fun that day.

Yesterday was the MBA BBQ, and we had a really good time. All the first-years in the program (and the families of the married students) were invited to go. It was a lot of fun. They held it at a park in Provo, and had BYU cater it. The food was good, there was a playground for the kids, and they even rented several big, inflatable toys. Matthew was in heaven. It was great to meet the the guys in James' group, and their families. Already, we've talked about a dinner for all of us to get to know each other better. How exciting...we're being social. I also got to catch up with some of the spouses that I met at the information day back in March. A couple of them already feel like life-long friends to me, and I've only talked to them a couple of times. It's exciting when people like that pop into your life. We are just so excited for this experience. Hopefully we can have a lot of fun, along with all the hard work.