Apartment Living

We are all moved into our apartment now and are feeling pretty settled after this weekend.  We moved in on February 10th.  The rental furniture was delivered that morning and Mike moved in the majority of our stuff- which essentially was only a car-full of clothes and our computers.  The apartment is about half the size of our house in Indianapolis but feels four times the size of our previous hotel accommodations.  It's the perfect size for the two of us.  And the complex has some nice perks, too including 2 pools and hot tubs, a nice sized gym, a racquetball court, and a club room with cable TV (cable TV could come in handy...).  We are across the street from several shopping centers and a mall and close to two highway access points which is also nice.  No complaints here.

The apartment looked pretty sparse even with all of our things and the furniture moved in.  Our generous friends, Aubrey and Josiah (the ones we met at our small group bible study), offered to come over and bring some extra decorations and household items they had for us to borrow.  We set those up and then made a few runs to Homegoods, Ikea, Target and the $.99 Store to fill in the rest.  The apartment is feeling like a home now.

Outside of moving into a new place there hasn't been a lot of news to report.  Both of our jobs are going well.  After this week I should be at full capacity for my client caseload and I am feeling more comfortable and familiar with the traveling aspect of the job.  I am also really enjoying all of the families I serve and have some nice challenging cases, too, which keeps me motivated and on my toes.  Mike has adjusted to the drive for his job as well as the paperwork, procedures, and staff he works with.  He also signed on with a local nursing agency in Orange to allow him to pick up random shifts here and there as desired.  His schedule will at times give him 5-7 days off at a time so those will be opportune times to make a few extra dollars.

This week we have two of our good friends, Jon and Sarah, from Chicago coming to visit.  They will be here for a week and we are looking forward to exploring more of the area together, catching up with them and celebrating Jon's birthday!  The week after that Mike's parents and sister will be here.  We're excited to see some familiar faces and show all of them around.

Below are a few pictures of our new place.  Happy Sunday!

Open floor plan- you can see the living room, kitchen and dining room
all in this picture.

Dining room

Living room with doors to our outdoor patio (which is empty)

Mike and I like the fun arch between the dining room
and living room.  It's the little things in life, right?

Our new TV! We put it on our bedroom dresser instead of
buying a TV stand- one less purchase to make!

Our bedroom.

A fun, removable AND reusable wall decal
I found.

The curtains that are too short for our window but Mike
insisted they looked fine and I was tired of shopping.

The "desk" we made out of floating shelves that Aubrey and
Josiah lent us.

I've never had granite countertops before. Me likey.

ANNNNNDDDDD...the LAUNDRY ROOM!
The selling point to this place

Bathroom

A random picture Mike took on his drive to work. Pretty, pretty.

Trying out a local sports bar with Aubrey and Josiah. They
had beer pong here :) Mike was in heaven.

The Big 3-0

It's official...I'm old.

I turned 30 this past Friday (February 3rd, in case you were wondering) and it was...well, not so monumental.  At least, the day of my birthday wasn't too monumental but the weekend of my birthday was blissful.  :)  My sweet husband worked Thursday night and knew he wouldn't see me the morning of my birthday on Friday so before he left for work Thursday evening he left a few little surprises for me around the hotel.  It was perfect timing, too, because I had a very rough day at work on Thursday but when I walked into the hotel the frustrations of the day melted away.  Mike had decorated the room with balloons and homemade signs saying "Happy Birthday" and "I love you".  He had his laptop open with pictures from our wedding playing on a slideshow and our wedding music playing in the background.  There was a vase full of flowers on the counter and my favorite candy sitting next to them.  AND he made me a cake with LOTS of frosting.  We don't have an oven so he found a mix you could make in the microwave (just as good, by the way) and made that instead.  He also bought some goodies for my breakfast the next day, a movie, and a few silly gifts to keep my forgetful mind active (crossword puzzles and such).  It was a nice start to my birthday celebration and I spent the night being lazy eating cake and watching TV.  Ahh...

On my actual birthday I worked a full day and then came back to drive Mike to work down in Poway (near San Diego).  We wanted to carpool to his job that night so that we would only have one car for the weekend.  Well, that was a long drive.  It took us over 3 hours to get him to work!  The first hour I think we traveled a total of 12 miles. It was ridiculous.  The drive to his job has been slow at times but usually averages between an hour and a half to two hours; however, Friday night traffic is apparently much worse.  After dropping him off to work I checked into a nearby hotel and enjoyed an evening of cable TV (HGTV- oh yeah!) and McDonalds...As I said, the day of my birthday was not very monumental.

Saturday morning Mike slept for a few hours while I snuck in a workout and then we pumped him full of caffeine and headed out to the San Diego Zoo Safari Park.  The park was AmAzInG!!  It is set up similar to a zoo but also has a wide open area where you can take a safari ride through a natural setting with many different animals while a tour guide gives you information on all of the animals.  At one point there was a stampede; it was so breathtaking to watch the animals run and interact so naturally.  I absolutely LOVED our time here.  We also were able to watch a cheetah run at top speed on a short track and see some baby animals- elephants and gorillas. The baby gorilla was my favorite; he was super adorable.  That night we checked into our second hotel - this one a bit...okay, a lot nicer.  We went down to the hotel's restaurant/ bar and participated in "happy hour" which consisted of the bartender  and two middle aged men who were all fairly chatty.  We split a yummy half priced appetizer of quesadillas and had a few drinks; Mike happened to mention to the bartender that my birthday was yesterday and wrangled out a free drink for me :)  We had big plans to go and try out a nearby Italian restaurant that the bartender recommended but after our long day we both felt more like staying in and having pizza.  So we did.

Sunday consisted of a drive along the ocean in Carlsbad watching a few surfers brave the waves and then outlet shopping. We found a really nice restaurant/ winery where we had brunch and mimosas and then headed to Irvine for a Superbowl party.  A couple we met at our Bible study invited us over along with another couple (yay- we have friends!! I think...).  Aubrey (the hostess) is an amazing cook and made tons of great food for us and we enjoyed watching the Giants beat the Patriots on a big screen!  All in all, I will definitely remember my 30th birthday with happy memories!

We move into our apartment in 2 days! I'll keep you posted on how it is but for now I need to get going. Happy Wednesday!

Red Knobbed Hornbill. He looked a LOT cooler in person.

Mike can hear as well as a bat...and looks like one, too.  Or maybe like a creature from Lord of the Rings.

Daddy Gorilla and baby

Did you know Giraffes only sleep for 20 minutes or so a day. They apparently get some type of mental break (similar to what we get when sleeping) when they are ruminating/ chewing their cud.

Outline of the cheetah when the sprinklers came on

After his beautiful performance running

Mama and baby