One Year

Yesterday was Aaron and my first wedding anniversary! I can't believe it's already been a year, it went by SO quickly!
A lot has happened in the last year:
We started off the summer living apart while I was in Dayton doing an internship and Aaron was in Oxford working and taking summer classes.
Aaron's parents and brother moved out to Oklahoma.
We made lots of road trips to Lexington to visit Noah and Mel.
Aaron drove out to Oklahoma to visit his family (I was still in school so I couldn't go).
We welcomed our first child (aka Zoe the boxer puppy) for my birthday in November.
We celebrated our first Christmas together with my parents (it was also our first Christmas not celebrating with Aaron's family :-( )
We rang in the New Year in Lexington with Noah, Mel, Isaac, Leanne and the girls. We left the following day for a cruise around the Caribbean with my family.
I found a job I'm extremely excited about starting this fall.
And I GRADUATED from Graduate School!

We didn't really do anything exciting to celebrate. We ate the top layer of our wedding cake, went on a nice long walk with the dog and helped one of my closest friends from grad school move out of her apartment :-( But we got to spend the whole day together and that's what counts!

It's been a wonderful year and I'm excited to see what the next year has in store for us!

Graduation

On Saturday, I am officially done with my college education! After 5 years of year-round classes, lots of hard work, and some tears I will have finally earned my Master's degree! I have worked so hard for this degree and I'm not one to "toot my own horn" but I am extremely proud of myself!
There are two ceremonies on Saturday (one for just my department and one for the entire university) and I have a lot of family coming into town to help me celebrate this exciting occasion! It should be a good time!
I have the summer off (Aaron and I hope to get a few vacations in) and then I start working mid-August. This will be a much needed and well-deserved break!
Now we just have to get Aaron graduated in December! ;-)

This past weekend my Aunt Jenny came into town from Michigan. On Saturday my mom had a brunch/tea party for all of her sisters (all 5 of them), my grandma and a few of my cousins so we could get together and catch up. We had lots of "girl food" quiche, fruit pizza, spinach salad, french toast and muffins. It was nice to talk with everyone and see what's been going on in their lives and with the rest of the family. My mom, her sisters and my grandma started reminiscing about when they were growing up. It was funny to hear the stories and how each of them remembered things differently (or didn't remember it at all!). It was a great day filled with good food, good company and lots of laughs!

Good News!

Yesterday I had an interview with Warren County and I was offered a job on the spot! She told me to take a night and think about it and let her know today. Well, Aaron and I talked about it and decided to take the job. I'm really, really excited because it's a position I'm actually interested in. I have had a few other interviews for positions to be a speech therapist in the schools, but none of them were what I wanted and I felt like I'd be settling, but then this came along and it seems like a perfect fit. The caseload hasn't been 100% decided but it looks like I'll be working in 3 classes across Warren county: one preschool class, a classroom that serves emotionally disturbed kids, and a social communication classroom which works with autistic kids. This seems to be the job I have been waiting for!!
Aaron had an interview today for a summer internship at Nationwide in Columbus. Aaron said he thought the interview went really well and they hope to have everything finalized by the end of April.
So it seems as though things are coming together nicely for us and there's a HUUUGE weight lifted off my shoulders. :-)

Today was a long, long day and I was not in the best mood. So as I was driving home I realized how excited I was to get home and see Zoe (I knew Aaron would be in class, otherwise I'd be excited to see him too). As soon as you open the door she comes running, full speed, with her whole body wiggling to say hello. Then she starts doing this super cute heavy breathing through her nose as she tries her best to sit and wait patiently for me to take off my coat and shoes and set my bags down. She's just so darn cute and makes you feel so welcome and loved after a long, rough day (or even after a great day). Now if only I could train my husband to greet me the same way, I would feel like the most loved person ever!

We're growing up

First off, I would like to apologize. The background of the blog has been winter themed until several minutes ago. I fear that all of this snow and cold weather is due to my blog background so I have changed it to something spring-y, therefore warm weather should be coming soon (as I sit here writing this, it is snowing.. booooo!)
Now that I only have 8 weeks (eek!!) until graduation, I have begun the job search. I had an interview last week that I should find out about later this week and I'm in the process of setting up several more interviews. It's scary going out and getting a real job in a profession I will be doing the rest of my life!
Aaron's also been looking into internships for over the summer. We'd really like something that's paid and will lead to a job offer after he graduates in December.
We've also started looking into buying a house. Our lease is up at the end of July and I desperately want to be moving into a house we OWN and not into something rented. We've been looking at houses online and next weekend will be going with my aunt, who is a realtor, to look at houses. Since neither of us have any real income right now we can't buy anything but it'll be good to see what we like and what we don't like. Hopefully I'll have a job contract on paper soon so we can start looking into getting a loan!

Snow Storm

After two days straight of snow, the weather is finally letting up!
We woke up Tuesday morning to a ton of snow and no school for me. Aaron's night class was canceled due to snow. Tuesday night I found out we would already have a two-hour delay this morning and when I woke up I discovered school was closed again!
But now I'm starting to go a little stir crazy after being indoors for pretty much the past 48 hours.
Zoe's enjoying all the time I'm at home because this way she doesn't have to be locked up in her crate. We take her to a nearby field so she can run and she is loving all of this snow. It comes up to her chest so she can't really run very well, she just hops around. It's super cute!
Hope everyone else is staying warm!! Looks like I'm actually going to have to go back to school tomorrow...

On a side note, the opening ceremony for the Olympics is Friday. I love watching the Olympics! :-)