newness

It's been awhile since I last updated, so here we are:

I'm officially almost done with my 4th week at my new job--I can't believe time has flown by like this! I love it so far, although I feel like I am definitely being challenged and still trying to wrap my head around learning everything. There is SO much to know here! But I definitely am loving being in a huge corporation as compared to a small business. Oddly enough, I feel more taken care of here, and like there is more room to breathe and more opportunity to grow. It's fantastic. I am extremely busy all the time now though, as a result, so that is why I have been writing less and less! I also have been hitting the gym hard to keep my energy levels up, and am even working with a personal trainer, who is great! I am exhausted after the gym, but after an hour I feel fabulous again and am already seeing results! I have also been perfecting another habit: getting up early to spend time with God. It's something I have never had the motivation to do before, but finally I decided I would just start committing to it, and so far it's going great. Nolan appreciates it too because it means there is already coffee for him by the time I wake him up for class. He is really hitting the books hard for his boards at the end of March, so I rarely see him home before 9:00. That last hour of the day and waking up with him are my two favourite parts of the day, and I cannot wait until he is done and has at least a little bit more time! He starts on the wards with his rotations in April!That is about all I have to update with us. Next week I start orientation for my volunteer work with Project Read and Bay Area Literacy. It is a program that has volunteer tutors teaching adults to read a few hours a week. Illiteracy is something I feel strongly about, and Nolan finally told me that if I care about something, I will ACT on it...and he is totally right. So, I'm going to! Milo is still kicking and wandering around the house, in case anyone is wondering. He gets into trouble almost daily and we recently decided we are going to try and toilet train him (almost as a joke), like in Meet the Parents! haha! My mom got us a kitty toilet training kit, so we're going to launch that sometime soon! Pictures to come :)
-A

an even NEWER adventure!

Well, that ride is over. I accepted an offer to work at the McKesson Corp. as an HR Admin./Project Coordinator, and will start in a week! What a huge blessing! It is SUCH a great opportunity, and I am thrilled to be a part of their team.

I am trying to live up my last week of freedom, and enjoy every moment in the january sunshine...which has been SO nice. I was biking around today getting a new passport wearing only flipflops and a t-shirt (and pants of course), and was still too warm! How nice!

Nolan is still busy studying for his boards in March. April is when he will start his full-time rotations, so until then he is finishing up classes and studying ALL the time. He is working really hard and so far his work is paying off--his practice test scores are coming back great!

Nothing else new here. Next week we'll be back to normal life, but until then, feel free to call or email me or leave comments and let us know how YOU are doing!

ps-we also love snail mail :)

-A

A New Adventure

Today I was laid off from my job. Yes, I will be sad to leave my wonderful coworkers and everything that is Magley & Associates, but I am trying to see this as a new adventure. I had a great run there and learned a TON, and am now ready to take the next step, whatever that may be. We laid off almost a third of our workers, and so those of us who left, went out at noon, ready to take on the world. I then spent the next hour of my life putting my business cards to good use with Nolan:

I then set about finally getting some Christmas pics on here...
This was what happened when Nolan was WAY too into Twilight and tried to "suck my blood" right over my vein -- can we say hematoma?

Here is my Opa reading up on the finer workings of the opposite sex:

And here are the men of the day, doing what I would assume to be man things outside.

And my lovely (matching) cousins!


~A

2009!

Happy New Year! Sorry about the lack of posts...I am still waiting for our christmas pictures to migrate from Nolan's camera to our computer so I can post them on here! Disclaimer: the following may all look familiar to some of you. Sorry I'm not more creative.

Last night we went to my aunt's house in Livermore to visit their family and Oma, who is still visiting from the East Coast. She made a delicious all-German dinner, complete with Knoedels and Gluehwein! Nolan was broken in to delicious German food and drink, and we fought over the last Knoedel, which is a sort of potato dumpling that you MUST eat with gravy or it's a little...well, look:

Apparently my dad calls them sinkers because they sink right to the bottom of your stomach, haha! And the Gluehwein was fantastic too! Hot mulled wine is a tradition at Christmas in Germany. Literally translated it means "glowing (as in heat) wine", and it is delicious!


I guess that is all for today. Still no pics. I actually HAD the camera in my hand this weekend while I was sitting AT the computer. But alas, no cable to be found. Sad, too, because we have an EXCELLENT video of my dad hula hooping on the wii fit. So close, yet so far...
Also, I am just about done with this cold weather. For Christmas, Nolan got a Brookstone alarm clock that does all sorts of things, from my dad, whose name is Bob. Normally that has nothing to do with anything, except the alarm clock is also called the "Bob". See for yourself here. His reasoning would be so that now, Nolan can take Bob everywhere with him. Bob will wake him up in the mornings. Bob will sit in his office with him. They both thought that was pretty hilarious. ANYway, so we check Bob every day to see how cold it is in our house. Yesterday when we woke up, it was 46 degrees INSIDE our house! There's something we need to fix...
~A

Santa Baby

Is it sad that I feel compelled to keep you all updated on us with photos of our pet?...and our little Charlie Brown tree which just so happened to be also a great deal.

We're getting ready for the holiday season here. We finished ALL of our Christmas shopping. Yes, secret santa schtuff included because we are THAT impressive. Also, it turns out that my mom is going to be working on THE Eve, which means that I will be making the traditional Akin cioppino this year. Mmm! Beware: there will be a lot of cooking and cleaning this year, and Nolan is not excluded from THOSE kinds of festivities ;)

Work is winding down, and we're going to be short-staffed the next three weeks, which means we can wear jeans, listen to blaring Josh Groban christmas cds (heh), and decorate our desks.

Nolan has his final this Friday (tomorrow), and then he is officially on break! This is also very good news because it means a few things:
a.) he will have time to read Twilight
b.) he won't be stressed out as much, and will have time to study for boards
c.) he can help with the laundry/entertain Milo

That's all the excitement in our world for now. Until next time!
~A

Tree time!

It's that season again, and we've just finished our decorating, gift buying, christmas card sending, and tree chopping! We got our tree this last weekend, but since Nolan was busy studying for his final this weekend, I flew solo. We still managed to photoshop him into the picture successfully though, you can barely tell! See:


Soon I will add some pictures of Milo in his spanking new Santa suit (hah!), and give more holiday updates! For now, we are both excited about Christmas with the WHOLE family in Placerville, and for the new year and the new Presidential administration. We'll see what happens with this country, because right now it kind of feels like it's drowning in a pool of its own spit. Blech.

december: 80 degrees

Apparently it's now around 80 degrees almost everywhere. Even up in Oregon, it was baking all day long. What do we think: global warming or plain old psychopathic December weather that may result in a drought? I love me my California weather, but seriously...what about my scarves and warm coffees and mittens? 'Tis the season, indeed.

Since I write in here only about once a week or so, here is a photo-update of how we're doing :)

Ducks game at Cal


Thanksgiving feast!


Playing croquet...kind of


Our Christmas 2008 picture :)


Hope you enjoyed! There will be more to come! This weekend we pick out our Christmas tree! Happy Holidays!
~A