The long weekend awaits!

For some reason, my mind doesn't seem to be functioning tonight, so I'll just update briefly :)

Not much new around here, but recently we've been trying to get out and about more. So we've been doing things like trying new restaurants and finally using some of our free movie passes.

 And having mini-golf competitions before devouring tasty Russian food.

And bowling and Indian food dates.

Meanwhile our little buddies still haven't gotten tired of each other. Abby's getting bigger each week, but manages to hold her own against Daley's rough play. They love each other.

 Speaking of growing up, Daley turned 1 today! So for his birthday, we gave him his new Zack the Duck toy. He got pretty excited.

 Then for dinner, we went to Taylor's and picked up some chuck steak and chopped it into little pieces for the pups. It lasted like 2 minutes before they inhaled it all. Best treat ever.

And now for a lovely 3-day weekend! Happy Labour Day!

Thankful Thursday

So much for consistency in posting - oh well. Luckily, today is Thursday, and therefore merits a little thankfulness. Which I need. So let's do this with some pictures, okay?

1. I'm thankful for my first niece! Odessa was born the day after my birthday, and is a sweet, beautiful girl. I'm already plotting ways to steal her away and do fun things with her as she grows up. I love being an Aunt!

On that note I SUPPOSE I should document in here somewhere that I turned 30 since my last blog post (yay?), and never ever have I felt so confident and ready to be my age. I didn't do anything particularly big that day, but in general I felt entirely loved and ridiculously happy. #IsThis30?

2. I'm thankful for our newest addition! I know we're crazy...but we got another puppy. Two Sundays ago we drove to Napa to pick up Daley's cousin from a new litter, and we instantly fell in love. Abby is already so different than Daley - mellow and lovey, and even fell asleep  like this on the way home in Nolan's lap.  

And Daley LOVES her. She is his newest obsession, and he spends a lot of time either wrestling her to the ground, licking her ears, or cuddling with her on their futon. Super cuteness. 

Milo, on the other hand, has been somewhat irate since she arrived. He'll get over it.

3. I'm thankful for Nolan's new bike! We used to love exploring new places on the motorcycle and driving windy roads for a day trip to some beautiful place. It's been a few years, and I'm super excited to do that again! Even though the maiden voyage was a somewhat hot and sweaty freeway experience.

4. I'm thankful for good friends. Even though I know my friends are keepers, it's still nice to realise how awesome they are. I've been so deeply grateful and warmly surprised at how truly incredible my people are.

5. I'm thankful for my job/flexibility. This one is tough, and I don't have a picture for it unless you desperately want to see a picture of the rings under my eyes. I've been working roughly 8am- 2am every day for the last couple of weeks (with of course, some small breaks!), and it's been wearing on me...but I know that it's temporary, and only strikes a few times a year. And it balances out with the fact that my commute is 30 seconds long and I get to be here watching my pets during the day while I work. Also, I really love what I do, and I genuinely believe that I'm doing something meaningful. So for that, it's totally worth it.

What are you thankful for?

When you start monitoring your cows' activities with drones.

Milo turned 9 yesterday...and we totally forgot to celebrate, as we always do. One year, we had a birthday party for him and people brought him catnip and Hello Kitty cards with pictures of a cute girl cat for him. This year, he spent half the day laying on our newly growing creeping fig and being chased out of it by me with a hose, and the other half doing this. Birthdays are hard as you age.

For Father's Day, we went up to the ranch to spend time with my dad. Luckily, my aunts and most of the cousins were there too, so we got to spend time with them, which is rarer than it should be. My dad loved his new drone for about 30 seconds, until it crashed into the pool. Tragedy ensued, but abated once the drone was revived a few hours later. Nolan probably thought the slow-mo version of the drone crashing was funnier than he should have :-\

You can extol your own praises as much as you want on Father's Day. Just kidding. All those things are true.

As usual, there was much game-playing and weirdness. Games as shown below, and weirdness...well. See for yourself in the video. 

 My mom was deceived by Pinterest's claim that putting a very brown banana in rice for an hour then blow drying it will turn it yellow again.

I tried to take a picture with the cows and inadvertently got Daley in it...chasing them. As he does. After he chases them though, they realize he just is being friendly, and they sniff noses with him. Pretty cute. He then spent most of the day chasing around the other dogs, swimming in the pool, and generally being annoying.

Which was a nice change, because burning off his energy recently has been a challenge. This is pretty much what he does...always. When I try to walk him. Walks take a ridiculous amount of time now due to all the coaxing. This is what happens when your dog is born in the cold and thinks that heat shouldn't exist.

This morning, I'm feeling extra grateful for friendship. I started my day with a sweaty hot yoga session and this girl...who is pretty awesome. I wish every day could start with yoga, coffee and sweet friendship because it only starts the day off on the best note possible.

Everything.

A friend of mine recently remarked on the fact that we've stopped writing in our blogs, and how that's made it difficult to keep up with all the day to day things that make up our lives. So here I sit, on a Sunday morning over a year after my last post, and a little bit stumped on how to recap the last year. How can one cram a bazillion tiny things into a super nerdy blog anyway?

There are so many things I could say about all of the huge changes in my life in the last year, but I've decided that the best way to capture a period of time is just to summarize. Try not to be bored to tears overly excited with my lackluster narrative.

After 7 looong years, Nolan finally finished his road through med school and residency. We celebrated with MANY World Cup festivities (Oranje!), and squeezing in all the time we could muster with all of our dear friends in the Bay Area.

Quakes vs. Galaxy game. Landon Donovan was sad panda on the field after his US team rejection.

Then, we packed up everything, like...two days before our lease was up, and moved to Sacramento. I don't think I've EVER hated moving and packing as much as this time, and we've done it a fair amount. I said goodbye to our sheep pasture in Redwood City, my desk at Corporate HQ, and really excellent Indian food. 

And then...a few days after moving, I got a call about a project in Atlanta for work. After just going from New Jersey to India/Nepal to Scottsdale, I was a little travelled out. But I packed up again and spent a few weeks living and working in Atlanta, while Nolan was in Italy having a solo trip during his month between residency and work. I was a tiny bit jealous, but he DID stop in Atlanta on his way back to visit and spend a weekend eating ALL OF THE BARBEQUE we could find in Georgia and the Carolinas.

And then I got home and went straight to Napa for a leadership team meeting. In which my colleague made me take pictures every 5 minutes. Like this one.

And then the fall happened, and my life was basically consumed with Sacramento...I found an amazing CrossFit box that I was totally in love with, found a church and a community of pretty freaking rad people, spent lots of time biking to incredible coffee places...and even found bomb Indian food.

Of course, as anticipated for SO LONG...we added a little buddy to our family :) Daley Blind Caldwell is super cute...and an absolute TERROR. But we love him. And so does Milo. Instead of putting up a thousand pictures of my puppy, I'll only relegate you to three that shows the sweet little friends together.

Waiting for treats. When Milo was still marginally taller than Daley.

Waiting for shots together at the vet. Milo's an old hat at this but Daley's obviously concerned.

Sleeping on the futon. Daley was still only 40 lbs here and he is 51 now so...

Then we had our annual Christmas extravaganza, which was even more exciting this year because we closed on our house on Christmas Eve! We spent much time negotiating with the sellers and finally were able to move in on December 26. We L O V E our new neighbourhood.

The men in my life being forced onto one couch Christmas morning.

Moving was...exhausting. And would have been totally impossible without our army of friends to help hoist things over balconies and carry endless boxes. So that was time-consuming for many weeks. Then I ran my first trail half-marathon (so fun!), ate lots of carbs, did my first CrossFit Open (SO nerve-wracking but SO fun!), and spent many hours chasing Daley away from tearing up our drip system.

Finally after getting mostly settled into the new house (this picture was still pre-furniture), we celebrated Nolan's big 3-0 with, what else? A Rijsttafel. And many friends and full hearts.

Post-Rijsttafel hanging. Table looks like crap because we aren't technically fitted for so many people.

And here's where I insert the obligatory cute picture of us from a wedding we went to...

NBD, just my smokin' hot husband.

These days, my life is pretty much comprised of late working nights, early workout mornings, constantly chasing Daley, sitting on a train to San Francisco for meetings, finding new ways to appreciate my girlfriends, and trying to convince Nolan to bike to Vic's ice cream with me. Doesn't get much better than that!

And don't worry, future posts won't be as dry, so you can put away that pencil with which you were about to poke out your eyes.

Thankful Thursday

Last week, Nolan informed me that his obsession with Babybels finally took its revenge. Lesson learned here: don't leave Babybel cheese wax in your car on a warm day. Oh yeah - this was really fun to clean up.

 One of my little treats recently was to summerize myself. Since the days are longer and the temperatures warmer, I decided I need to start dressing the part. So I tapped into my swimteam days and put a little sunshine in my hair. Best part was still the stylist washing and massaging my head though - I swear, I go to salons just for that!

Since we're in recap mode also, I guess I should write a little about our hunts. The house hunt has all but dried up. There is little to no inventory for us to even consider, so we're kind of just playing the waiting game until something comes on the market. It's an adventure, and I can honestly say that I view it that way. I'm learning to live my life with less grip on the reins, and this is one area in which I have almost no anxiety anymore. 

As far as the puppy hunt goes...it couldn't be more opposite! We're all but holding our little pet in our arms! I've been filling out forms and chatting with the breeder, but last week I went to a dog show and I got to not only meet her, but also meet the Sire for our pup-to-be. This is a picture of him from a recent show - isn't he handsome?! I can't even tell you how bubbly I was with excitement after meeting all 70ish Vizslas at the dog show. This is 110% the dog breed for us! The Sire (below) is named Riot, and comes from an ancient line of Vizslas that was actually stagnant (dead), and then re-started via frozen materials. The mother-to-be is from an imported family of Vizslas in Hungary...so our pup will be the cream of the crop! SO EXCITED!!!

After I went to the dog show, I drove into SF to meet Nolan and some of our friends for a late lunch at Burma Superstar. We've tried for 7 years to go to this place, and each time it just hasn't worked out for one reason or another. Finally going there was a small victory! I had the tea leaf salad and it is absolutely all that the Food Network and other ravers say it is :) Unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture that day, so this is the best I got (see the orange sign in the distance...haha!).

As you can see, we stopped for Boba afterwards as a treat for the drive home. Haven't had that nectar in years! So.worth.it. 

Fortunately for you, my readers, I went BACK to Burma Superstar yesterday with a friend, and got the tea leaf salad again (and so did she because it's BOMB), and this time I remembered to take a picture. Mine is the mixed together one and hers was about to be mixed. Same thing though. They actually go to Burma to get the fermented tea leaves, because you can't get them here. Tasty!

 I started posting signs for Nolan celebrating his last shifts in residency! As exciting as this is, neither of us are on Facebook much, so when I started posting these each day and tagging him, he informed me that I need to stop. Hah! So...I'll just celebrate here at home so he doesn't get so many notifications :) I can't believe we're down to just 8!

And on that note:

1. I'm thankful there are only 8 (7 as of tomorrow morning!) shifts left in residency for Nolan. I can't for him to start working less hours and have more time to pursue other passions.

2. I'm thankful for the "7 year itch". Personally and also relationally, this has been a huge season of growth for us. It hasn't been easy, but the horizon is blindingly bright and we're so excited about opportunities for growth and getting to know ourselves and each other more! Who knew that such a wives' tale could be such a beautiful thing? Growth and struggle are always > complacency and mediocrity.

3. I'm thankful for 8 more days of me working out of the San Francisco office. I love working at Corporate Headquarters, and now that we're down to the home stretch  before I go to full-time working at home, it's sad and a little scary to think of leaving it. I'll have to find lots of excuses to make the drive to the city very often.

4. I'm thankful for things God's bigger plan. Even though we technically don't have an address to move to and need to be out of here by the end of the month, and even though there are a lot of unknowns in our near future, I'm learning more and more each day that all of these little things are known and planned and purposed. Why worry about tomorrow when today has trouble enough of its own? And such lovely troubles they are, when we're so blessed to have these types of "first-world problems". Seriously. Whenever I feel stressed or worried or pity myself I remember how many people I know or read about or see that have so much more on their plates and such burdens on their lives, and still reflect joy. This is like when Nolan told me he saw a patient in the ER who came in because she had a hangnail. A HANGNAIL. That's how I feel, with my little worries, compared to the person struggling in the next bed.

5. I'm thankful for graduation this weekend, because it means we have lots of excuses to celebrate, see family and friends, and really just enjoy our last times together with the other residents. Truly bittersweet, this whole "finishing" thing.

What are you thankful for?

Friday and I'm still thankful

Sometimes I have a really hard time keeping track of what day of the week it is, particularly when there is a holiday weekend or something to throw me off. This was obviously one of those weeks. So I'm just off a day with this post, I guess.

We celebrated one of my colleague's 40th anniversary with McKesson this week. It's mind-boggling - she's been with the company over than a decade longer than I've been alive. This woman is the most incredible person to work with, but also a good friend. It was so nice to be able to celebrate her with some of our colleagues and her family! This is her below, giving her speech :)

Yesterday morning on my way to work I took this picture outside of our house because I hadn't noticed the baby lambs in the little pasture next door. There are about 10 sheep there now, and some of them are these little cute things like below. They all bleat though, and worst of all: they cause a disturbing amount of people walking around the neighbourhood to stop, hang over the fence and yell loudly, "baaah! BAAAAAHH!". I've debated pulling out my airsoft gun to discourage the behaviour, as it's SUPER annoying to always hear that.

It's been a fun week, what with BBQs, game nights, work dinners, and date nights like last night, in which we noshed on homemade gazpacho and chicken while having a conference call with our financial advisors, went for a bike ride/run, and watched our favourite show before bed. Tonight's a girls' night, and tomorrow is either mountain biking or windsurfing, so the weekend looks promising ahead. Yay summertime!

1. I'm thankful for our a/c (have I said that before?). It makes sleeping so much more bearable.

2. I'm thankful for friends to relax and catch up with.

3. I'm thankful for my excellent co-workers and company. It does make a difference!

4. I'm thankful we have a BBQ. I can't imagine only cooking with an oven, indoors, during these hot days. Phew.

5. I'm thankful for fun potential plans with Nolan in July. Research currently underway - stay tuned :)

What are you thankful for?

Sunny-side up

I thought I had more pictures from the wedding we went to last weekend, but apparently of the many pictures that were taken...only 2 were actually on my phone. That could be a good thing, because I wore a dress that I'm pretty sure will turn out in pictures as either really not-flattering or slightly slutty. Either way, it's clear how classy I am.

Anyway, I'm trying to hunt down others, because these are not great. Like this mid-chomp shot across our table of some of our friends and colleagues.

This one actually is okay. Nolan's super good at selfies, so we took this one while waiting for dinner to come out :) I need lip colour, but Nolan looks perfect of course. 

This weekend was another jam-packed one. Here I thought we'd end up bored and whatnot due to our change of plans, but no. Friday was a workday, but I managed to catch a quick lunch with Nolan at a great Mediterranean place that I so wish I'd discovered 3 years ago. Bah! After work, we grabbed dinner at our favourite Vietnamese place. Saturday morning, we had more friends over for waffles (yay!), then drove like bats out of hell to Sacramento in memorial day traffic to make it to a couple house-viewings with our realtor. Finished the day with dinner in Sac with some friends, then a nice drive back. Sunday we woke up, opted to spend some relaxed time together at home instead of church, and then headed to Pulgas Ridge to run the trail there. It's my favourite trail run thus far, though I certainly can't do it all the time or my calves would implode from the effort. It's only 5.3 miles, but MAN the elevation change is brutal. You go up, up, up, then plunge down into the bottom of the gulch, then you climb agonizingly way up to the top of the ridge along a series of many, many switchbacks, before having another long set of downhill before the end. There are about zero flat stretches.

This was us at the top of the ridge. VERY happy to be done with the switchbacks.

Post-run pic. I always feel accomplished after this particular run, so I'm glad we captured it this time :)

What can I say? He's jacked and I'm one lucky woman ;)

After we did the run, Nolan had a lunch meeting and then chess with a friend, and I did some errands, read my book out in the sun, did a bit of weightlifting and stretching, then picked up Milo and headed to our friends' house (where Harley lives!) for a kitty play-date and dinner. Nolan had to work, so it was just the three of us. Milo was so anxious the whole time about me taking him in the car again, that he didn't take advantage of the playdate until the last hour or so. Lame!

Monday was an incredibly luxurious day. I woke up, did a long yoga session, went for a nice run, then did a bit more reading outside in the sun. So nice! Then Nolan woke up from his post-night shift recovery, we hung out a little bit, and then we went over to his colleague's house for a memorial day bbq before Nolan had to head back to work for another night shift. We're down to just 15 shifts left now (JUST 15!!!) standing between him and the end of residency. So crazy!

Thankful Thursday

Last weekend was packed. We put an offer on a house (but the counters were crazy so we stopped that pursuit), had dinner with my Dad, had some friends over for a waffle breakfast, went to a super-fun wedding of one of Nolan's colleagues and danced the night away, did some work, and then I went to a Thai "massage" Sunday afternoon. Really, it was more of "pulling on all my limbs and chanting buddhist exhortations while inhaling incense for an hour and a half" instead of a massage...but it was relaxing. I think I'm cancelling my second session (even though it's free), as I was hoping for more of an actual massage, but I will say that just laying there and letting my mind relax and even meditating on some of the general thoughts being chanted about happiness and bringing joy to others and learning to let things roll off of you was a good exercise for me. No matter what religion you are, there are some truly beautiful common threads like those that I think we can all learn and benefit from. This is partly why I like travelling, and really soaking in some of those nuggets of wisdom that we can glean from others with different belief systems and cultures.

This weekend is going to be super different than planned. We were going to head up to the ranch, look at homes, maybe go up to Tahoe for a day...and now we're sticking around our house, having waffles with more friends (who doesn't like healthy waffles with friends on a Saturday morning?), grilling with friends on Memorial Day, maybe mountain biking, maybe making a day trip to Sacramento to view homes if needed, maybe just lounging around...we'll see. I had a fun work dinner on Monday, then we hosted a big party at our house on Tuesday, and are going to another one tonight at someone else's...so it may be a chill weekend. I also have big plans to take Milo to my friend's house for a playdate with his little girlfriend, Harley. He's been acting out a bit recently and I think he just needs some friend time. But now I'm blogging about my cat. So...let's move on.

1. I'm thankful for the slightly cooler weather, even though it means I've actually been cold at times this week. The heatwave last week was too.hot. Oh yeah, and I'm thankful for our little A/C that helps make life more bearable during those hot times!
2. I'm thankful for the beautiful area we live in now for running! Every direction is interesting and pretty, and if we want trail runs, all we have to do is hop in the car for 5 minutes for our choice of preserves to run in.
3. I'm thankful for Milo, that turd.
4. I'm thankful for Nolan, and our times of growth and learning together - buying a home and transitioning out of residency are both big, stressful things, and I'm so glad that we can learn from them and grow through them together.
5. I'm thankful for a long weekend, in which I plan to maybe not open my work laptop at all! I love my work, but it's good to practice that balance and let yourself do nothing sometimes.

What are you thankful for?

Thankful Thursday

This house hunting thing is a real trip. We're going on random trips to look at places, locations, changing all sorts of parameters, and learning about ourselves in the process. Whew. I'm excited to find our home but I won't be sad when this part is over :)

Last weekend was one of those random trips up on Saturday morning, supposedly just for a quick few hours and then back home again, but we ended making a lot of changes and even staying the night to look at more homes the next day. It was fun to get together with friends for dinner, see new neighbourhoods, and see my family a little bit on top of that.

Sunday morning, I decided to go for a nice run on the ranch while Nolan got some work done...but I hadn't brought anything for working out. So I threw together a sportsbra from high school, a shirt from my college freshman dorm, my mom's socks, the shoes I leave up there, and a pair of my brother's tiny running shorts...which ended up being just my size (almost). Win!

I took Captain with me for the run, and he kept up the whole way, but by the last few laps the poor guy was flagging. He stayed right here (below) until we left. Haha.

That's a little bit how I feel lately, what with the hot weather and all these upcoming changes. Just kind of pooped. Still: I shouldn't complain! Look how many great things I have going on!

1. I'm thankful for Nolan's residency coming to a close. It's been great being down here and meeting new people, but residency is just as tough as the stereotype says it is.
2. I'm thankful for free massages! I was going to use a groupon massage today that I bought awhile ago, and the masseuse had to cancel last minute - so he offered me an EXTRA free massage, and we booked both for within the next 3 weeks. w00t!
3. I'm thankful for the A/C unit in our little apartment. Yes, it is tiny. Yes, it is loud. Yes, it is huge and inconvenient. But YES it does make life more bearable when it gets super hot like it's been this week.
4. I'm thankful for our neighbour. She watches Milo and FDR when we're gone, she is super kind and thoughtful, and today she killed and disposed of a really nasty spider for me when I just couldn't.
5. I'm thankful for my food processor. Every.Single.Day.

What are you thankful for?

Thankful Thursday

I realized recently that I've been too casual about thankfulness in my life. I say I'm thankful for a lot of things (and I am, really!), but I don't let that thankfulness manifest in my everyday life. For example: I say I'm thankful for our home and where we live, but I complain about the traffic or the single-paned windows that never seem to keep the heat in or out  (depending on what we need at the moment). Instead, if I'm truly grateful, I can look outside my window as I am now, and appreciate the lush green of the trees right outside, and the quiet of the breeze blowing and the birds singing. I can go for a walk through our beautiful neighbourhood and think, "this, this is a great place for us right now, and I'm thankful for it", even if it means I'll be stuck in Bay Area traffic this weekend at some point.

Is thankfulness really thankfulness, if you don't stop to consider what it means, and just say that you're thankful for it? If I said I was grateful for a roof over my head and a full belly, but just superficially consider it to be true and don't actually absorb what that means or feel how truly grateful I am for those things...am I really appreciating those blessings? I don't think so.

So this week, I'm keeping it simple, and saying and meaning these 5 things that I truly, sincerely, am profoundly thankful for each day. My goal is to really feel how grateful I am for these things, so that I don't let complacency rob me of the true joy I should and can feel at all of these blessings.

1. I'm thankful for my relationship with the God of the universe, and His relentless pursuit of my heart.
2. I'm thankful for my true media naranja, my husband. He is my world.
3. I'm thankful for our time in the Bay Area, even as it comes to a close. I have learned so much while living here, and have truly enjoyed so much of it.
4. I'm thankful for my job. I hope I don't take for granted just how lucky I am to have a job that I love.
5. I'm thankful for my families, and truly appreciate how blessed we are to have godly, loving families on both sides of our little sub-family :)

What are you thankful for?

Things white people like.

A fitting title, when you see my two displays of glorious pictures for today.

A couple of days ago, my dad sent me this picture, that he said he took when he had to drive by Jack in the Box a second time just to make sure he wasn't seeing things:

Who knew that any 4-wheeled vehicle could go through a drive-through? Classy.

 Today Nolan had to get some dental work done, so when I got a text with this picture, I decided that I need to make sure and look this awesome next time I go to the dentist. Seriously, why didn't I think of wearing sunglasses to guard against the hellish lights? Why didn't I think of bringing my own music so I don't have to listen to Celine Dion one.more.time. while I'm sweating in that chair?

Seriously though.

This week is chock-full of work, both professional and personal. Each day, once I'm done with work-work, I start on other chores and things on my to-do list. Pretty normal for me, except that this week that involves more house-shopping, which I semi-really love and semi-loathe because I just find it exhausting to get excited that much. Hah.

Wish us luck!

Thankful Thursday

It's Thursday again, and I sit here with a belly full of avocado and sore feet from a lovely run early this morning. This week has been crazy busy, as a lot of new things come down the pike and a lot of old things come to a close. I've gotten to spend time with out of town colleagues, good friends, and try a new lunch haunt with our developer that I'm adding to my short list of good places to eat. However, this week has also been crazy productive and you know how I thrive on that feeling. Woo!

I've already written down my massive "to-do" list for the weekend, and I still have another workday between now and then.

Anyway - let's get on to the good stuff.

1. I'm thankful for a bit cooler weather. For awhile there, I thought it was time to haul up the huge A/C for our bedroom again. Phew.
2. I'm thankful for a wonderful Easter with family again, and that our families love each other and love God.
3. I'm thankful for chocolate avocado mousse! Hah! For real, though.
4. I'm thankful for my little lacrosse ball that Natey got me, because it saved my quads from some real bad soreness this week.
5. I'm thankful for the many homes we are able to search in order to find just the right one for us. I know many people don't have that luxury, and I am so looking forward to finding something perfect for our family.

What are you thankful for?

mint condition

Ah, Easter. The season of bunnies and peeps and green grass and family. We kicked ours off with a trip to our favourite sushi spot with my dad and our friends John and Julie. Please note that Julie and I controlled ourselves this time and didn't get the all you can eat. It was a tough decision. Possibly also the first meal where we haven't eaten more than our husbands, as is our habit.

We also spent a little time house-shopping, and got so close to finding what we're looking for. It's exhausting, but exciting. We've narrowed it down pretty far at this point, so I think one of these next forays will lead us to "the one". Phew.

Saturday morning we celebrated my father-in-law's birthday (Happy Birthday, John!) with our traditional breakfast out at Sweetie Pie's. Nolan and I also spent part of Saturday learning how to recycle his "baseball cards" (business cards a la Stanford), since he won't need them anymore. Hopefully my dad's rental car company won't mind finding an extra picture or two laying around of some random dude from Stanford. It's nothing in comparison to the plethora of these babies that lurk in odd places in my parents' house, waiting for discovery.

The rest of Saturday was spent with family, celebrating Easter up on Easter Hill, and enjoying the gorgeous weather and good people around us. This is a terribly nondescript picture of some of us, but I was eager to get back to the festivities, so I didn't bother trying to get a decent one.

Sunday while we were driving back, I came down with something. I think it was mild food poisoning from the symptoms, but not really sure. Anyway - after making it home and deciding to suck it up, we drove over to our friends' for a game night and dinner. We drove separately because Nolan had to stay until about midnight to work on a residency task, and I had grand plans of nursing myself to health again with an early bedtime. That plan didn't work, because I barely slept at all that night. Blah.

Anyway. As I was driving, I get a text with this in it:

And I got another one tonight as Nolan was headed to work. These make me laugh out loud and smile to myself at how full my heart feels when I think of him :)

Thankful Thursday

You know, it's past 10, I have to get up before 5, and I'm still here. That's commitment to trying to get back to my blogosphere right there.

This weekend we're celebrating Easter with our families, visiting with some good friends over sushi, and house-shopping (yay!). So I am totally hyped up with anticipation, and I'm thinking that's why I'm okay not being in bed yet.

I took a picture last week of my fancy pearls that Nolan bought me for my birthday (in July...hah), and was going to post them last week but totally forgot to blog so...here it is. Aren't they gorgeous and glow-y?!

I finally was able to connect with a breeder today about a potential puppy litter that would allow us to adopt our dream dog in the Fall. I didn't want to wait that long, but Nolan's right - we've waited this long for a dog, so we might as well get exactly the one we want and wait until that's possible. 

This house thing is exciting but tiring too. I almost have a hard time looking at homes these days because I just want to find the right one and stop weeding through duds! Nolan seems okay with it - he's spent hours looking at homes, and doing a lot of work on that front. Ah well, maybe this weekend will be fruitful! Speaking of which:

1. I'm thankful for the opportunity to own a home soon.

2. I'm thankful for a job that will allow me to move to that home and still keep working and doing what I love for a company and a team that I love.

3. I'm thankful for hopefully finding a good breeder to help us get our puppy! EEE!

4. I'm thankful for a tiny bit extra time to cook recently...almost every night! It's been awesome, and has yielded some stupidly delicious food that happens to be healthy, too!

5. I'm thankful for productivity and opportunity. Even though it's been a super busy time at work and at home, it feels good.

What are you thankful for?

Real World: Bay Area

Back to real life. After I got home from our vacation, I spent a day in the office and then flew down to Scottsdale for an offsite with our Corporate partners. We stayed in a gorgeous resort at the base of Camelback mountain, and enjoyed lots of great discussion and learning, awesome food, and the most beautiful weather. Friday morning, we all even fit in a long hike up to Piestewa Peak, and enjoyed the view of the whole valley. 

As you can see, by Friday, many of our colleagues who had joined us had already flown back home, and so it was just a large party of women left. Fun!

One of the best parts about being back and settling into routine again is cooking. I love cooking, and have been able to make a whole bunch of new and delicious recipes, mostly from the wealth of deliciousness at paleomg.com (like this one! serious caution: only use half the cayenne and chili called for; even with half the amount, it was really hot. I'm also going to add a little sweetness next time, per Nolan's request :)). No, we're not paleo - we just practice clean eating, and these recipes fit the bill for a fantastic dinner! Try this one and this one, too - they're both going in the rotation as they are fabulously delish!

Milo's been loving having us back home again, and been very affectionate in the hours we spend with him around the house. But his habits haven't improved. This is what I found (below) the other day when I got out of the shower and had been letting my cooked broccoli cool so I could eat it. When my parents were over this past weekend (fun!), he made off with a piece of asparagus and was ferociously growling over it. Seriously, I can't even trust him with greens. The vet told me I have to be careful about him stealing veggies, too, because the calcium in those babies isn't good for his already-susceptible urinary system. 

Last night I was supposed to pick Nolan up from work after my bible study ended, and since I was a little late, he started biking and told me to find him from my location. Since I had a good guess which route he would take from Stanford home, I had to estimate where he would be along that route, and at which point in time so I could intercept him while I was coming from another location also. After his challenge, he was dismayed (but I think impressed!) when I pulled onto a street and flashed my brights at him JUST as he was coming towards me on it. I demanded my prize and felt very pleased with myself for guessing just right. And this was before I had time to read the tiny street sign in the photo he sent me!

After a serious lack of energy for the last couple weeks, I'm finally starting to be back to my normal levels, and back to getting in hard workouts and checking a million things off of my lists. This includes buying a house, finding a puppy, and starting to de-clutter and pack up things in our house. We've got a lot of fun stuff coming up, but a lot to do in the meantime. It's good to be back and at it!