We're Baaa-aack! (But not for long)

Well, it's been a solid month since I've posted anything on this blog and I was recently reminded that I hadn't posted pictures from our Christmas in Florida. Without further ado, or obnoxious captions, here is our trip to Florida with my sister and her family over our Christmas break. It was beautiful, warm, and just the kind of relaxing vacation we needed (the company was pretty fun, too):

Greg

Greg and Alexa

Greg, Mike, and Zach

Greg, Jim, Zach, Alexa, and Mike

Chad and Bekah

Chad

Bekah

Zach

Shamu

Alexa, Mike, and Greg

Bekah, Jen, Zach, and Jim

Dolphin

The crew with the stingrays

Greg, Bekah, and Chad

Mike, Alexa, and Greg

Alexa, Bekah, and Jen

NASA

Zach

Mike, Chad, and Greg

Greg

Mike


The cats

There ya have it! Hope you enjoyed the montage. You can check out our smugmug address if you'd like to see all 200-something pictures.

Now that I've posted this, don't be surprised if we fall off the face of the planet. We both started yet another semester of graduate school, and while this one should be slightly less work for Chad, my workload has somehow tripled. In addition, American Idol season 8 started on Tuesday which pretty much tops the priority cake. So, don't say I didn't warn you. =)

Trying out the New Camera

I think I'm in love with my new toy =) I'll love it even more once I figure out how to use it!

Action shot!

So sorry...

For the absence lately.


Here's what we've been up to: (By the way, this post somehow turned into a novel, and a pretty boring one at that. My apologies. Feel free to skip to the pictures, which I know is the only reason you people read blogs.)

• We spent 5 days in Michigan for Thanksgiving with my sister, her husband, and their four cute kids. It was delightful. We ate to our heart's content, played the Wii with the children, solved world problems (kidding, of course), and worked on homework.
• We ate our very first brined turkey. It was delish. I will never be able to cook a regular turkey again.
• I spent most of the week sick. Go figure.
• After we came home, we resumed our busy schedules.
• I wrote 5 papers, a total of 50 pages, between Saturday night and Wednesday night. I am a machine, folks.
• Chad spent practically the entire week on campus. (Blasted Quant II and Finance)
• I made chocolate chip cookies on Sunday night. (Mom, everytime I make these cookies people go crazy over them. It's hilarious. I mean, who'd have thought that people would go crazy over something that I bake.)
• I finished my first semester of grad school. (That probably should have been first...It's pretty exciting.)
• Chad continues to work his tail off at school. 2 more weeks!!
  

Here are my plans for the next few weeks while Chad will be studying like a fiend.

• We just purchased a new SLR camera for Christmas. With the help of our friend, we found an incredible deal and couldn't pass it up. For those of you who do camera stuff, it's the Canon Rebel XTi. It's big. There's lots of buttons. And I feel like a pro when I'm snapping pictures, when it's on the "Auto" mode, of course. =) I'm going to try and teach myself how to use this thing...obviously not within the next two weeks, but maybe within the next two years. Any tips would be helpful!
• I am going to read, read, read. I really miss reading for fun while I'm in school. I usually have to read something for fun a few minutes a day or else I go crazy, but while I'm in school I don't get this opportunity very often. So, I will be finishing the Chronicles of Narnia. I'm almost finished with the first book, The Magicians Nephew, and will be moving on to The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe tomorrow.
• I am going to decorate for Christmas. We're not getting a tree this year because we are leaving the 19th of December to go to Florida for a week, so really there's not much of a point. So, in order to make our place feel like Christmas I am going to bring out the decor and maybe string some lights in our place.
• Practice the piano. I'm playing for our church choir and it just so happens that the two songs the choir director picked are for virtuoso pianists (Ok, maybe they're not that hard, but for an out-of-practice pianist, pieces with 3 and 4 flats and 4 sharps are just not easy). Of which, I am not.
• That's all. Seriously. For two weeks this is all I want to do, and I think I've earned it.
  
  Here are the pics. Sorry there are none of Chad and I. I'll work on that. (These are pre-new camera)

The Porcaro kids at the talent show with my brother-in-law's family.

Zach-a-roo bein' cute.

I left the room for like 5 minutes to go to the bathroom. Before I left, the children were playing ping-pong while the adults were watching (Jim, Jen, and Chad). When I came back from the bathroom, the kids were gone and the adults were having a who-can-bounce-the-ball-on-the-paddle-the-longest contest. Awesome. Oh, and Jen totally won, by the way. Look at that form!

The cute turkey name cards that the kids made for our place settings.

The beautiful table!

Happy late Thanksgiving everyone!

Joys of End of Semester Projects and Finals

(This is Chad) So I am here waiting for the class I teach to start, and I don't have any books to read up on so here I am writing a post! So GREAT NEWS: Bekahs last day of class was today! And since her program doesn't believe in Finals she is done. I keep asking myself why my programs midterms and finals make me want to cry and her program doesn't even have tests! How is that fair?

She is excited to have her 5 end of semester papers done, and finally be able to catch up on life out of school. She plans on learning how to use our new camera! She is most excited to learn how to take pictures that are focused on one particular thing and have the rest blurred.

As for me, I am just hoping to get through Quant II (Statistics II), Financial Management and other classes! I finished my Business Speaking class yesterday with my final business proposal project so it is nice to have that done! I have class through next week and then Finals the week after that! So if I survive Quant we will all know that miracles do happen!

Good luck to the rest of you who have final projects and Finals!

Dear Winter,

...Usually your presence makes me happy, but I vaguely remember the last time I lived in Indiana.There were several days of below 0 and freezing rain...

Please take pity on us. My husband has not experienced an Indiana winter and he'll have to walk to the bus stop two days a week.

Also please remember that I have to drive 1.5 hours to and from Indy on Tuesdays and Thursdays next semester. So, if you could hold off on the ice and snow on those days, that'd be great.

Thanks in advance,
Me



Dear Cypress Square Apartments,

Thank you for having the foresight to include fireplaces in your apartments. Genius idea.

Your loyal tenants in 312,
The Utah winter wussies

Internship

After two grueling months of interviews we've finally made a decision on the summer internship. Chad will be working for Procter & Gamble for the summer months of 2009. We're very excited! I'm so proud of him for all of his hard work; it's nice to know that it really does pay off in the end.

Here's some facts about P & G:

• It started as an oils and fats company. Their first two products were candles and soaps.
• 3 billion times a day, P & G products touch the lives of people in 180 countries. Some of our favorites include: Crest, Tide, Puffs, Pringles, Cascade, Covergirl and Gillette. See http://http//www.pg.com/common/product_sitemap.shtml for a complete list of all the products.
• In 2007, P & G made Fortune's top ten most admired companies list. (Other companies included General Electric, Johnson & Johnson, and Apple).
• Their world headquarters is in Cincinnati and some call the main buildings the Dolly Parton Towers due to anatomical reasons that need not be explained:

About Cincinnati:

• Is home to more Fortune 500 companies than Boston. P & G is number 23 on the Fortune 500 list. Cincy is also home to General Electric Aviation which is number 6 (crossing our fingers and praying that our friends go to work here), as well as Kroger, which is number 26.
• Cost of living is lower than the national average. (glorious)
• Home of the Cincinnati Reds, Bengals, and Mighty Ducks.
• Was part of the Underground Railroad and home of Harriet Beecher Stowe (author of Uncle Tom's Cabin)

Chad said, "That picture makes it look like we're moving to the big city...but I guess when you're moving from Lafayette, Indiana, it is the big city."

Too Bad...

...McCain and Palin didn't win. I really could have used a few more years of this: