I'm Still Here

I thought I would be able to update every couple of days, but this class got pretty busy. It's amazing how busy I am when I'm not working. This class is a lot of work and I'm glad I'm only taking one this semester. I'm having a great time and I've learned a lot, but I'm glad it's almost over. Monday is our last class...yay! Then it's off to California to spend time with family. While I'm in California, Rod will most likely be moving our stuff to our new apartment. We found a great apartment in Shirlington. It's about the same size and has about the same amount of closet space. The kitchen has more counter top space, newer kitchen appliances, and is open to the living room and dining room. I'm really looking forward to that. Also, the bedroom is a similar size to what we have. We applied for the apartment and we were just waiting to hear we got approved to put in our notice that we were leaving our apartment but I got a phone call today saying that we had to give our intent to leave our apartment to be approved for the new apartment. WHAT? Isn't that backward? I mean we should be approved because we have great credit and we are great tenants, but it's still stupid. Anyway, we complied with their rules and we put in our intent to vacate for August 31st. Hopefully, Rod will be moving our stuff on August 15th. We'll have half a month to move our stuff and clean the old apartment. I don't really want to move because I love where we live, but it will save us money. I'm going to miss being able to walk to shopping stuff but at least we'll still be in walking distance to restaurants and a grocery store. The grocery store is weird though...it's two floors...very strange. The negative besides no shopping is the metro is not in walking distance. My poor husband is going to have to take the bus to the metro which is going to add time to his commute. That really sucks and I wish we weren't moving so far out, but this apartment is really nice for the price. Here are some pictures of the new apartment.






The kitchen I love






Looking from the dining room into the living room and entryway






Looking from the kitchen to the dining room and living room






Living rooom and dining room






Looking into the bedroom






Looking into the walk-in closet in the bedroom






Looking out of the bedroom






The small bathroom (but we're used to that)

Our 1st Wedding Anniversary

Go to http://www.joeyikemoto.com/wedding/pictage_kickoff.php?key=69&event_id=266277 to see a slide show on our photographers website of some pictures from our wedding


Our wedding was so beautiful and so much fun. The glass chapel was amazing, the weather was gorgeous, and our reception was perfect. Our honeymoon in San Francisco was awesome. I just can't believe it's been a year. This year went by so quickly. I was so busy with school and school work that I don't feel like I really got to enjoy our married life. I have an amazing husband who is so patient, kind, understanding and easy going. He has supported me through my decision to attend graduate school and all of my job changes. He calms me down when I get extremely stressed. He cleans the house, does the dishes, and washes our clothes. I feel like I have neglected him through this past year due to working full time and attending graduate school. I hope he knows how much I love him and appreciate everything he does for me. I know we have many great years ahead of us and I only hope I can be a better wife. I can't wait to see what the future has to bring.






If you look really hard you can see Wayfarers Chapel (it's glass)






This is the alter where we were married






A view from the chapel






Another view from the chapel






Rod and his friends the morning of the wedding






Us with some of my family at the reception






Us with Rod's roommate from college and his roommate's girlfriend






On a boat in San Francisco






Walking around San Francisco on our honeymoon








Unfortunately we don't have any pictures from the actual ceremony that we can post online because the only person that could take pictures during the ceremony was our photographer. Joey Ikemoto was an amazing photographer and he and his team took over 800 photos between the wedding and the ceremony (to view a short slideshow of pictures from our wedding go to http://www.joeyikemoto.com/wedding/pictage_kickoff.php?key=69&event_id=266277). Next year we have the option to buy the rights to all of our photos, so eventually we will have a ton of great photos from our wedding and reception. But for now all we can post online are pictures others took during the reception.

Fun Weekend

This weekend was a lot of fun. Friday I went to my parents' house and helped clean for a BBQ I was having on Saturday. Then my mom and I went out to dinner with one of my friends who was in town from Germany. We then went to a bar for karaoke. It was so nice to see my friend because he's not in town very often. On Saturday my mom and I went to the gym. Then I went grocery shopping and cleaned the rest of the house. My friends came over a little after 4 and it was great to hang out with them. We got to catch up. One of my friends just passes his big test...yay. My other friend and her boyfriend are looking for new jobs. I hope they find them because I used to work where they work and I hated it too (and it's gotten worse since I left). My other friend is trying to find a new place because her lease is up in August...so we're in the same boat. I wish more people could have come, but we had a great time. We played Wii later in the evening. Everyone seemed to have a lot of fun :) Today, my husband I went to the outlet mall so I could get some new tennis shoes. I bought two pairs for under $40. My husband gets great deals :) We went to Walmart and I was able to exchange a swimsuit that I bought. It didn't have a strap so I was able to find one that had a strap. Then we went back to my parents' packed up and headed home. All in all I had a great time. I love spending time with my family and friends. I can't wait to be finished with school and have more time for both.

Grades

So my grades were finally posted. I took two classes during the first summer session and only one of my grades were posted. My other professor did not meet the deadline to post the grades, so instead she had to submit a grade change form for each student that had to be signed by the head of the department and the dean. It took more than a week to get our grades changed. I'm glad the grade was finally posted but I feel that if I as a student must meet deadlines for papers and such than the professor should meet deadlines to post grades. Anyway, I got an A in both my classes. All I need to do is get an A in this last class and I will have straight A's for my master's program. Yay! I hope I can do it!

Up at an Ungodly Hour

You might be thinking what might possess you to be up at 4:15 in the morning. Well last night we went to dinner and when we got home I didn't feel good at all. I stayed up because I feel better sitting up when I'm sick, but I was finally able to go lie down in bed about at 12:30 p.m. I was sleeping and having really strange dreams when this weird loud noise woke me up. Unfortunately our cats' water which has a filter was low. We have learned that if you don't remember to fill the water up when the filter and waterfall begins to run you get this horrible noise (unfortunately all those times have been in the middle of the night). So I would have gone right back to sleep but then my stomach started to hurt again. I think it's because of getting up so abruptly to stop the noise so it didn't wake my husband up. It did however wake him up, but fortunately he was able to go back to sleep. He's the one that needs the sleep because he's the one that has to go to work in the morning. I just have school work to do today so I can sleep in during the day. So I'm sitting at my computer with nothing to do. I've caught up on every blog I read and now I'm updating mine while I yawn. My stomach is feeling a little bit better so I might try to go lay back down. I hate getting woken up in the middle of the night. How am I going to handle months of no sleep when we decide to have kids? My husband will be up in a half an hour, but I'm going to try to go back to sleep...goodnight

Apartment Hell

I hate looking for apartments. It is such a hassel and nothing is going to be what we want. We like our apartment and non of the bedrooms in the apartments that we have looked at our as big as our bedroom. They all boast lots of closet space, but it's not as much closet space as we have now. We looked back at our records and we think we wont have to move out until August 31st at the earliest. This gives us a little more time to find a place. The problem is that everything around where we live has gotten so expensive. I like living in walking distance of restaurants, the grocery store, and the mall, but I just can't fathom paying almost $2,000 a month for a 1 bedroom apartment. The apartment we saw on Saturday wasn't too bad. We could survive there for about a year. It's not in walking distance to anything but the metro. The apartment is only a little smaller than our apartment now, but the bedroom is a lot smaller. I didn't think it was possible, but the kitchen seems much smaller than our apartment now. The one plus about the apartment is its about $300 cheaper than our apartment now. There are no parking fees or parking passes. We can have guests over with out having to get a guest parking pass and there is tons of parking available. The apartment complex also provides a shuttle bus to the metro in the morning and evening on weekdays, a bus on Friday night to old town Alexandria, and a bus on the weekends to the grocery store. As much as it would be different, it would be nice to be able to save so much money. We plan on buying a house next year so it would nice to save money for that. We'll see what happens. I am now going to turn my attention to looking on Craig's list for condos and apartments people have put online. We'll see what else we can find. Hopefully we can find something we like that's not too expensive before the end of the summer. Other than looking for apartments I'm busy with my class. It doesn't seem too bad though because I have to whole day to read and do work. I actually feel extremely relaxed about it today. We have e-classes on Thursdays, but I have some time to get started on it earlier so that's nice. This class is going to go by so quickly and then my summer will almost be over. I need to make sure I make time to spend with my friends and my family. I also need to make time to clean the apartment. My husband is so tired of my stuff sitting around everywhere. He would be so happy if I cleaned up everything. I hate cleaning, I really do, but I want to do it for him. During the school year and the last 3 semesters I have not have time to do anything. I haven't really even had time to spend with Rod. Now I have time so I really need to make sure I spend time with him and I work on cleaning the apartment up. I also need to think of what to get my husband for our first anniversary and what we should do on our anniversary. Unfortunately I have class on our 1 year anniversary but it's only till 7 so we can go out to dinner. If anyone has any ideas let me know please :) Today I'm going to work on getting my reading done for tomorrow's class. I'm going go sit on the rooftop deck and get some sun while reading. I'll update on more apartment shopping soon.

Back to Class

So I started back to class on Monday. It is going to be a lot of work, but not too much that I can't handle it. It's nice being off for the summer so I have plenty of time to do work. There are a bunch of 4 to 5 page papers in this class. The first one is due on Monday. It's not too bad, I just need to get working on it. It's hard to motivate myself though because my husband is off until Monday. It's nice to spend a 4 day weekend at home relaxing with him, but I also know I need to get this work done and I would prefer not to finish it late Sunday night. This week has been pretty good so far. Monday I hung out at home looking for new apartments until class. Tuesday I stopped by to see my coworkers in the office which was great :) (I miss those ladies). I also went to have lunch with my brother. Then I came home and did some more searching for apartments. Then yesterday I went and had lunch with my coworkers and we had a great time. Then I had class. After class we met some of my husband's friends for dinner to celebrate one of their birthdays. Today, my husband is home and we have an appointment at 11:00 to see one of the apartments. We have another appointment on Saturday. I am going to continue to look for places, but I wish this process was a lot easier than it is. It's so time consuming and I'm looking for specific things. Also, I wish more people reviewed the place they live. I say that and yet I have never put up a review of the place I live. I think I'll do that soon. Anyway, on Tuesday I went ask our management when we might see our new lease terms. He wasn't very nice (not mean just not friendly) and said "you mean you haven't gotten it). I told him we hadn't and I was wondering since we need to know and our lease is up in August, but then I realized it's actually up July 31st. So now I need to find out if they have to give us 30 days to sign the lease or would we have to be out on July 31st. I just hate not knowing. We don't really know what our rent is going up around here, I'm just anticipating it to be so high. If it wasn't going to go up that high than we may be able to stay. Don't get me wrong, I love where I live. If we had bought a house, I would have really missed this place. I like being able to walk across the street and go to a bunch of different restaurants, RiteAid, the mall, the grocery store, etc. I would really miss all that if we moved to an area where stores were not in walking distance. Well the place we are looking at today is just a little further down and we would still be close to some stores. It would be a hike to get to the stores we go to know, but it would be an option. I'll update after we see these apartments :)