No more Roommates!!

Our trip to Phoenix was very busy- full of family, a ton of food, celebrations, and exhaustion! I am very glad to be back home after one week. It felt very crowded in my parents' house (weird, since their house is like 3 times the size of ours) and it just doesn't feel like "home." Thanksgiving was definitely a highlight. It's one of my favorite holidays. My family is full of fantastic cooks, so I look forward to the food every year. I also enjoy seeing my family and Daniel's family spend time together. It reminds me how grateful I am that our families already feel like one large family. And this year an added blessing was time with my sister. Though no amount of time is ever enough, I was happy that we got to be together for a whole week. The best part was the Friday after Thanksgiving. Daniel was brave enough to get up at 4:30 and go shopping with his mom and Aunt Barbara. I was supposed to go, but at the last minute I bailed- I wanted to sleep. But I went into Nicole's room and woke her up at 8:00, and by 8:30 we were both ready to hit the mall. Daniel met up with us and we did some serious shopping! We got great deals, and knocked a lot of people off our Christmas list. Nicole also got a chance to go to the Apple store and pick a computer to replace hers that was stolen. We ended our shopping at Banana Republic where Daniel returned the favor and bought me a ton of nice clothes. I definitely need some new clothes, but I never feel okay about spending very much money on that. So it was nice that Daniel kind of gave me permission to spend some money on myself. We also celebrated Daniel's Mom's birthday, and Daniel's Aunt's birthday, and Nicole's graduation. Nicole had a HUGE party on Sunday with practically the entire church and some other family friends too. I got to see my little flower girls and their new baby brother. I also got to go see a movie with Nicole and Beth which was really fun. I never go to the movies here in Denver because Daniel doesn't like to. That's why girlfriends are so important. And finally, Daniel and I had our engagement photo shoot. I was really nervous, but once I got my makeup done and got all dressed, I felt more confident. I must have looked good, because when Julie saw me, she said I was glowing and asked if I was pregnant! (for the record, I'm not) I really don't like kissing in front of people, but I had to get over that quickly since we spent about half of the 90 minute photo shoot kissing. I can't wait to see the pictures. I have complete confidence in our photographer. I've seen lots of her work, and she is incredible.

Now we're back in Denver and absolutely loving our "empty nest." While in Phoenix, Daniel's parents agreed to lower our rent to just the mortgage, which means that with some tight budgeting Daniel and I should be able to make the rent on our own! And that means.... no roommates!!! We get to have our own little home with our own little family. I am so incredibly thankful to his parents for allowing us to live here on our own. It's so much more peaceful, quiet and comfortable. We're taking full advantage of our new freedom.

So for the next few weeks I'm going to work full time and hopefully make enough to pay off my huge credit card bill from Black Friday! Today I asked for a raise since I'm coming up on one year there in January. Laura told me I will get a raise in January. She doesn't know how much, but it'll be something. I'm very happy about that. She also told me that the lab will probably be moving around July. At that point, I'll be allowed to choose if I want to stay at National Jewish, or move with the lab to the University. I'm pretty sure I'll move for two reasons: one, David Schwartz is moving and he will give me a fantastic letter of recommendation to get into my first choice PA school, and two, the University is my first choice for PA school- so working there certainly can't hurt my chances. I still LOVE my job! I definitely hit the jackpot with that one. I should probably go to bed, so I can wake up ready to work hard tomorrow morning. I've got a busy few weeks ahead of me. Goodnight!

Packing Up

My last final exam did not go well. I know it's not good when 15 minutes into the test I can feel my anxiety build and I feel like screaming at the professor because he made the test way too hard. I studied really hard the past few days and almost half the questions I had to skip and come back to because I was completely overwhelmed. It was a very long test that covered a ton of material. I really enjoyed the class and I felt like I learned a lot, but I don't think my grade will reflect that. My only hope is that everyone else feels the same way I did. I left school feeling very depressed instead of elated that I have 6 weeks to enjoy the holidays and time with my family. Even though I had a million things to do before leaving tomorrow, I was left with absolutely no motivation to do any of it. So I started with the stuff I wanted to do (throw out all my school stuff) and worked my way up from there. Now I'm pretty much completely packed, the car is packed up, the house is clean, mail is on hold at the post office, and I'm thinking I might go out for sushi for dinner tonight. I think that's a good way to spend the money I got from selling my textbooks.

Now I'm pretty much wasting time until Daniel gets off work. Then we'll get some dinner, finish packing up, and get some sleep. We leave at 5am tomorrow morning! I'm so excited! Maybe we'll hit some snow on the way. That would make me very happy since we haven't gotten hardly any here in Denver. It'll definitely put me in the holiday mood. Phoenix, here we come!

Sister time!

Nicole left this morning and now I'm sad :-( and lonely. I have two days to pass the time until I get to drive back to Phoenix and spend another week with her. Fortunately, I have two final exams to study for, a short paper to write, and lots of packing and cleaning to do. I think I'll be able to keep busy.

I took my first final exam yesterday and it was ridiculously easy. Like, I'm kind of sad that I wasted any time worrying about it at all. But it's over, so I'm completely finished with one class- and I know I got an A in that one. I have one exam in about an hour that shouldn't be too hard, if the review is very similar to the test. I'm really worried about tomorrow's. Mostly because if I do well, then I will do well in the class. And if I don't..... you get the picture. So I need to spend some time today studying for that. And on top of all that, I started studying for the GRE. I have to take it for PA school or any other graduate school. I thought it would probably be really easy since the SAT was so easy. But I didn't want to just go in blind and take the test without knowing anything about the format or what kind of questions are on it. So I bought a review book yesterday. Nicole and I sat down and took a quick look at some math problems. The first question said x^2 = 16 then asked if x = 4. Naturally, I said yes. And naturally, Nicole said no. She explained to me how x could equal 4 or -4. So this is going to be harder than I thought. I continued to get 5 questions in a row wrong. The hard part is that the math section has these questions called qualitative comparison. Where they give you two quantities (like x and 4) and then you have to say if A is bigger, if B is bigger, if they're the same, or if there isn't enough information to determine. In this case, the answer is D because you don't know if x is positive or negative 4. They are SO HARD!! And they try to trick you! Consistently, Nicole was getting them right and explaining to me why I was wrong. I think I need her to tutor me over the next few weeks, at least in the math section. I guess I'm a little rusty since it's been 3 years since I've taken a math class. I'm so glad I bought the review book.

While Nicole was here, she played in the bell choir with me. That was fun because everybody got to meet her. We also got our nails done, baked cookies, and watched Oprah. Just like old times :-) I took her into the lab to meet some of my co-workers and see some of the stuff I've been working on. Then last night we drove out to my boss's house for dinner. A bunch of the girls from work went over there. She lives in a huge cabin in the middle of nowhere. It was a good 45 minute drive out of the city with no street lights. It felt like we were out in the wilderness. It was fun to hang out with everyone and Nicole for a little while. And it was good that Nicole got a break from Dad. She's been with him practically 24/7 for an entire week. I could never ever last that long. It's been really hard for her the past few weeks, so I'm really glad she got to stop here for a day and just have fun with me and Daniel. Daniel was absolutely incredible. He told me that he understood that Nicole really needs to spend time with me and not with Dad. So he said that he would spend time with my Dad so that we could spend some time together without him. That was one of the nicest things that Daniel has ever said to me. He offered to do that because he knew that me and Nicole needed some time to talk. He's the best :-) So also last night the four of us pulled out the Christmas tree, and set up the nativity, and decorated the house for Christmas. I love it! I really really want Nicole to come back between Thanksgiving and Christmas and spend some time here. I know we would have so much fun together. I'm hoping that she will get sick of Mom and Dad and need some time away from them. I would not be happy about moving back in with my parents, so I can't imagine she's thrilled about it either. I can't wait to see her again! 2 more days!

My Winter Break

This weekend has been great. I got a lot done, including lots of sleeping! I got a facial yesterday, so hopefully my skin will be perfect for our photo shoot a week from Tuesday. I think I've narrowed it down to 2 or 3 outfits. I'll have to wait for my sister to get here to decide for sure. Today I took Daniel to the mall and bought him some new clothes. He won't ever spend money on clothes for himself, so if I want him to get some new clothes I usually buy them. I actually like shopping for him more than myself. I feel like it's way easier to find nice clothes for guys. I get so frustrated trying to find clothes I like, that fit, and are reasonably priced. So I would much rather shop for Daniel.

This is my last week of autumn quarter. All I have left is one paper, and final exams. I am so excited for everything that's coming up! I'm excited that my sister is coming for a day or two, and then for our time in Phoenix. I'm really excited for my family's traditional Thanksgiving dinner, and just to spend time with them in general. Then, I'm excited to work full time for a while. Not only to make lots of money, but because I love my job. After that comes our cruise which will be extra special this year because Nicole is coming, and then Christmas! In one week it all begins. And at that point, I will be one third done with my last year of college. I'm so happy!!

The more I think about my new plan for my future, the happier I am. I'm more excited than ever at the idea of becoming a physician's assistant. The whole issue before was that I want to have kids first. I've waited so long to have kids, I don't want to wait anymore. But becoming a PA is really important too. If I can put off having children just 2 or 3 more years, I can have my dream job. I think I can do it.

I'm sitting in class right now during an interminable presentation. She's halfway through and has been speaking for 20 minutes. I'm going crazy. My presentation is next. If I don't kill myself first.

Yesterday I learned how to do IP injections. I've seen them done a million times, but I've never actually done them. If I did them wrong, I would kill the mouse and ruin the experiment. So this time we took mice that weren't being used for anything so I could practice. It's pretty difficult. You have to hold it a certain way so it won't bite you, and they're so squirmy and hard to catch. It's one more skill that I can add to my resume and use as collateral for a raise. I'm trying to work up the nerve to ask for a raise in January. I will have worked there for one year in January, and I'm already paid a ridiculously low wage for the work I'm doing. I am doing real work without close supervision, that takes a lot of skill. So I think I deserve a raise. But it's really hard for me to be assertive and ask. I'll work on it.

School is wrapping up very quickly. I have the rest of this week, and next week, and finals are that weekend. I'm so excited for the holidays! I love Thanksgiving. It's been too long since I've seen my family. I'm so excited that Nicole is graduating and I'm really excited to spend time with her. Over the break we are going to enroll Jackson in doggy day care. Today he's there on a trial basis, just to make sure he does okay. You get the first day for free before you can make reservations. I know he's going to love it. And I'm glad because he will be tired and happy when we pick him up. It's only $20 for 12 hours. I think that's really affordable, especially if it's only for 5 or 6 days. So when we're sitting down to Thanksgiving dinner with all the people and excitement, we don't have to worry about Jackson jumping up on people, or barking, or chasing the cat. If it goes well, then we will board him there while we're on our cruise in December. Daniel and I love watching him on the web cam while we're at school. There are a lot of black dogs, so it's hard to pick him out sometimes.

We have started planning our honeymoon and I am beyond excited! I'm just starting to realize how expensive it's going to be, but I feel like this is our chance to go all out and do something totally exotic. Right now we're planning on about $6000 for 10 days in Egypt. Including the flight. If we keep our wedding costs down, we should be able to use the leftovers to pay for the entire honeymoon. Some of our plans are to ride camels into the desert and have dinner with a Bedouin family, go snorkeling or scuba diving in the Red Sea (maybe even with hammerhead sharks or whale sharks or dolphins!), sail on the Nile River, and of course seeing the pyramids, tombs, etc. I'm so EXCITED!! It's in a little over a year. That's not that far away, I can wait that long.

The other development as of late is my future career. I have, for the moment, decided to go to PA school before having children. I'm hoping to take one year off after college, work for that year at National Jewish, and then go to PA school for the 2-3 years that takes. Then hopefully Daniel will be able to support us for that time, and save up some money for our family. That, of course, is subject to change. But for now I'm happy with that plan. And I know everybody else is too. Especially Daniel. He keeps telling me he's not ready to have children. And I respect that. I don't want to force him into that before he's ready. It won't be nearly as much fun.