Our new adventure!

We've known for awhile that we would be moving somewhere, but until last week the WHERE was a big question mark. After lots and lots of discussion, we decided to take a position in Hartford, Connecticut.

When we started the whole application process, we didn't think we would get a full-time position that started until January, but he officially starts October 8th!

Which means we are moving out there SOON.
As in tomorrow.
As in David is picking up our rental truck right now.

This is so fast. It still doesn't seem real to us.
But we are so, so excited for this adventure!

We'll tell you more about it when we get there.
Come visit!

Our (MY) bed.

We are home in Utah right now. With David off flying around to different parts of the country for interviews, I get to stay home and find things to do to feel productive. I've had my eye on making this bed for a long time and now that we are at his parents' house and they have all the tools and expertise we need, we get to make a bed!

via

We are getting the plans from THIS site and we modified them to fit what we want. We picked out our wood (seriously probably the LONGEST part of the whole process). Lots of stores were involved because we wanted good-looking wood without spending money on the expensive kinds.

All of the planks for the footboard and headboard got cut yesterday and I got to sand them all today! I think I have sawdust in my lungs and coming out my ears now.

Finally!

I finally did it!
I sat down and made a blog header. I have no idea why it took me so long.
It was one of my goals for the summer, and it was the last one to get done.

I'm actually kind of secretly really proud of myself because I have a hard time paying attention during video tutorials and I'm not super designy-creative.  So for me to make ANYTHING design related on my own? BIG NEWS.

Which means I should probably reward myself with chocolate or pizza.
Splendid idea.

August!

August has been a weird month for me.
We move out the 28th, so I pretty much spent all month waiting until I could pack up.

Things that happened in August:
- Whirlyball
- job offer
- interviews!
- sewing/reading/pool days
- golfing
- we finally went and bought David new clothes that fit (!)

We really have loved Dallas and our relaxing summer. Even if we don't move back here permanently, we will always have good memories. But we are so excited for the next phase of our life.

And here's my phone pictures for this month:

This is what I did when I watched the Olympics.....

This is what happens when you let 2 year olds take pictures. 

I saved me $100. Boo-yah.

I don't know how many of you read The Daybook, but she posted this picture a week ago.

IMAGE FROM HERE - Sydney is awesome, so you should click over and read her blog.

My first thought?  I WANT THAT SKIRT! I NEEEEEEED THAT SKIRT!

Well, being the fashion blogger that she is she posted the link to where she got it. Don't click the link unless you really have $115 to spend on a skirt. I was mucho disappointed when I saw that price tag. 

Then I figured what the heck I'll just make it myself.  After staring at Sydney's pictures and the pictures off of the actual skirt's site and making tons of notes on it all, I went to work. 

I already had fabric that I had decided didn't quite fit with a quilt I was making, so I figured if I can make this skirt with this fabric, maybe after our move back to Utah (and then on to who knows where yet) I will get myself some always-classy striped fabric and do the whole shenanigan all over again.

I was pretty proud of myself when it actually looked kind of similar. Sewing it was a struggle when my wimpy machine decided it didn't want to handle more than one layer of fabric. I won't tell you all the places where the defects are.  But now all I need is some stripey fabric because I would love to save $100 and have that striped skirt.

Here is my only after picture. An instagram from the church bathroom where there is a full-length mirror and half my eyebrow disappears. Not at my apartment where I stand on buckets to see my hemlines. 

Last event

from here

Towers Watson has a really great intern program. They assign buddies to help you the whole summer, have a big summer project for you to get to know what it is like dealing with clients and deadlines, and have tons of social activities every week.

Rangers game, beach volleyball intramurals, broomball (broomstick hockey), concert on the lake, Speedzone (gokarts/dragsters/mini-rollercoasters and an arcade), horse races, ice cream socials, work dinners, and whirlyball.

Whirlyball and going to dinner was the final intern event last night. It was kind of a weird game. But fun! You drive bumper cars around while carrying a "scoop" and pass a ball around trying to score in the circle at the end of the court (there is a version where you score if you hit the board, but that was too easy). It got pretty intense sometimes.   Especially when you can ram each other or if you forget to take your foot off the gas pedal and can't slow down before you hit the wall -- these make it feel like you were in a bunch of mini car accidents. Maybe that explains why I woke up with a nice smattering of bruises up and down my legs.

Really, we had a great time. We have loved working with this company (and by we, I mean David. I just bummed along on the fun stuff.). They are really good about treating their employees well and really want you to have a good experience. Even though retirement isn't the branch we (David) want to end up in, it would be hard to turn down an offer from them.

But why think about that when you can just eat leftover pizza and watch the Olympics all day? 

July 2012

It is weird to think that August 1 is tomorrow. It seems like we just barely got to Dallas and now we are already getting ready to leave. We had a lot happen in July between trips and family and work events.
Here's some of the pictures off my phone from July that haven't been put up here yet.

Texas waffles from Texas hotels

From my quick 19 hour trip to San Antonio

New Sperrys!

I'm guessing this is after we went running? Nice tan lines :)

The lake on our way home.

It has been SO HOT this week. All in the 100s. 106 today and yesterday.
The pool is one of my best friends

Concert at the Dallas Arboretum (which is right next to our lake!).

The rest of these pictures are from the Chihuly sculptures at the arboretum. They were pretty cool to see. Some of the colors are unbelievable. Also, how did these not break in the hailstorm we had that smashed windshields? 

The water in the background is White Rock Lake. 

I think this one is my favorite.

This one was HUGE. 

We also have no pictures of sand volleyball, the huge outlet mall, lots of trips to the pool, running around all of White Rock Lake (a 15k!), soccer games, redbox movies, and a lot of other things I can't remember. July was pretty fun.
Now onto August!

Happy Birthday! part 2!

I remember going on daddy-daughter dates to Macey's for 10 cent ice cream cones when I was little.

And spending lots of time with my dad trying to help him fix things (even though I really just watched him do it). 

Thanks for being the best dad in the whole world!

happy birthday!

San Antonio/Austin

This is a little out of order from the other posts, but oh well.
The week before my mom and little sisters got here, the boys were in San Antonio for EFY. [It was their first time!]
David and I left Friday at lunchtime and had Friday night to walk around San Antonio/the Riverwalk by ourselves. Then we picked them up Saturday morning. It was so fun to just hang out with them for the weekend!   [David was kind enough to pause his diet so we could have some delicious food on the trip. ]

The Alamo is surprisingly smaller than you think.

 The Riverwalk was super touristy (read: expensive and crowded) but it is really pretty to just walk around.

We found a great Thai place for dinner instead of eating on the river. [Our philosophy for eating on vacation is to eat at a place you can't go to anywhere else.]

This place was called Thai Dee - super affordable and you get so.much. food. 

We got the tom kha gai, massaman curry, and spicy basil pork. YUM.

 Of course, we made the boys see the local historic site as well. 

They were all good sports about me constantly taking their picture.

  Plus we took them to some awesome places for food, so they couldn't really complain about me taking pictures.

Best buds. Seriously, they share everything.

on the grounds of the Alamo

Saturday morning after picking them up, we all went to Magnolia Pancake Haus.

We got there around 7:45 and just barely missed the morning rush. Great food, big portions and decent prices. I had a  very delicious HUGE omelette and I think everyone else got french toast or pancakes. 

After we forced them to see the tourist spots, we went to the ginormous outlet malls a little ways north out of San Antonio. So many stores, but it is really good exercise. I got my belated birthday shoes, but no one else bought anything.  Then we started on our way to Austin.

 We stopped at a great place outside of Austin for some barbecue at a place called The Salt Lick.

We all got their plates of meat. We had brisket, ribs, sausage and turkey. All were delicious. The brisket was my favorite though.

So excited for some bbq!

Their meat pit.

 They also sell fresh lemonade outside while you wait. [And by fresh, I mean, the minute you order it they start squeezing a bowl of lemons into your cup and then add the sugar/water mixture.]

 Funniest picture of the whole trip.

After we got to Austin, we went swimming, rented a redbox, fell asleep.

The next day we got up and went to Barton Springs - a natural, spring-fed pool that is natural rock and freezing cold. 

photo credit

Then we went to lunch at a burger place called Hopdoddy Burger Bar.

They have a different way of taking your order/seating you that was kind of interesting.

Really good burgers and chili cheese fries.

Then we went to the capitol building in Austin.

It is quite, quite large.

Overall, we loved our weekend. 

I think we decided that we liked San Antonio better than Austin, but both were fun.

And now I want to go on a vacation again...

The Zoo

David and I went to the zoo one Saturday in June and were really impressed. Then when everyone came to visit, I got to go again! I think it is a great zoo. (Plus Wednesday are half-price days......)

These first 5 pictures are from when David and I went.

An Asian Rhino - not a hippo like we originally thought....

Creepy sloth bear. Paced around almost the entire time.

This crocodile is seriously big. And now the song from Peter Pan is in my head....

I submit that a baby anything is cute.

 Thomas liked to mess around on our camera. David taught him how to adjust the focus etc etc.

He took these next 2 shots.

 You can pay $1 and get a "feeding stick". Everyone was going crazy trying to get birds to eat off of their sticks.