Bright Spots in the Busy Season

Happy summer everyone! It is looking a little bit different for me this year because I am still in school! I just started up my summer semester on Monday, but fortunately it is beautiful outside so I can enjoy lunch in the beautiful weather and on the weekends too. So that makes the 15 credit load a little more bearable.

Now let’s rewind to the past couple months! Jeremiah and I were SO busy with work and school. This past semester kicked my butt. I’m talking hardest semester of school ever (at least that’s what it felt like). I felt like I was just a little behind all semester, basically right when I was about to catch up and be on top of things, more things piled up. Meanwhile at work Jeremiah’s test lab was getting way more work than they could handle and everyone was expected to work extra hours to stay on top of all of it. For the month of April he worked about 50 hours per week. No fun. In many ways though, we feel like it’s kind of nice to be in busy seasons together because then one of us isn’t just bored without the other person’s company.

Anyway, I don’t like to talk about only the busy/stressful things because that is no fun, and we both try to have a good balance despite the busyness. So we definitely managed to have some fun occasions.  

I had Good Friday off, a benefit of attending a Catholic school, so late Thursday night before Good Friday Jeremiah and I hit the road for Salina, Kansas. Jeremiah’s grandparents live there half the year, so we were visiting them! They were both in a performance of Bach’s St Matthew Passion on Good Friday in the nearby small town of Lindsborg. It was a great performance in a beautiful, old church. The performance was unlike anything I’d been to before, because it was treated like worship, with a lot of singing/narrated parts depicting the events of the crucifixion, and the audience sang along in certain choruses. The orchestra was also split into two with half performing in front of us and half on a balcony behind us for a cool surround sound experience. Before the performance we also got to meet up with our friends Stephanie and Kyle, along with Stephanie’s parents and sister, for dinner in Lindsborg! They had all gotten tickets to see the performance which we were very excited about because we had not seen them in awhile and we always love spending time with them! The rest of our time in Kansas we spent just hanging out at his grandparents’ house enjoying our time together! We drove home Saturday night, so it was a quick turn around. I was supposed to have an exam the following Monday but it was postponed pretty last minute though we headed home anyway. We went to Easter Service at our church, Red Rocks. It was a great service. We both always look forward to Easter service, so it was really great. We debated for awhile whether to do Easter Brunch or Easter dinner. My family traditionally did a nice dinner, while his did brunch. I ended up winning out, but maybe we’ll switch off year to year. We made a ham, cheesy mashed potatoes, green beans, and had homemade bread courtesy of my sister, Emily! Everything was delicious! But we ate that meal for way too many nights after that… Maybe by next Easter I’ll want that meal again, but right now I’m set! We have had fun with the few holidays that we have gotten to celebrate on our own, making some new traditions for ourselves.

In mid-April our friend Ryan came and visited us for a really quick trip! He was in our small group back in AZ and we hadn’t seen him in a long time, so it was great to have him even though it was basically only 24 hours. He had never been here so we took him on a little “Tour of Denver,” visiting some of the most well-known spots like the Red Rocks Amphitheater, Platte River, Union Station, and Cherry Creek. It was a lot of driving, but it was really fun! We ended the night with dinner at Beaujo’s Pizza which was delicious and even better was the ice cream we had at a place called Cream. You make your own ice cream sandwich by choosing either two cookies, two brownies, two “cronuts,” or two Belgian waffles, then the ice cream flavor, and a topping. So yummy! I think this is going to rival our other favorite, Little Man Ice Cream, when we are wanting to go somewhere for dessert!

Jeremiah and I have this list of restaurants that we want to try here and it is getting so long and I feel like we are checking things off at a very slow rate. Good for our bellies and wallets, but we are anxious to try all of them! It’s fun to keep a list so that we don’t forget a place when we are looking to go out to eat.

Speaking of food, Jeremiah and I had a date night at the Melting Pot a couple of weeks ago! It was awesome. If you have not been there, it is a fondue restaurant, and we went for this early bird special (4:15 pm reservation) where we got four courses and a bottle of wine! Cheese fondue, a salad, the entrée portion, and of course the chocolate fondue. It’s not a place to go often because it is expensive, but the early bird special was a really good deal. But the reason we decided to go there was to celebrate my winning the Masters Draft! Every year my family does a draft of the players in the Masters, so we all end up with about four players, and we put in $5 to participate. This year, for the first time ever, I had the players who landed in both first and second place! Jeremiah and I were pretty excited so we decided to treat ourselves to that date night.

Also in April we went to another Symphony concert, this time for Copland’s Rodeo. It was excellent and it is really fun music. If you listen to it, you will likely recognize it. I also randomly saw this ad on Facebook that the Noodles and Co. headquarters near us wanted participants to taste some of their new dishes that they are considering putting on the menu. I thought it was a long shot that I would get selected but I did and I told Jeremiah to sign up too, which he did. So we went to the tasting together which made for a nice free date night! They were testing out vegetable “noodles” which I actually hope they do put on the menu because they were a great healthier - and delicious - alternative! Bonus, for participating we each got two additional free meals to use in the future!

Finally, just last week, the day after my finals were finished we headed to AZ! We were both very excited for this vacation and to get away from school/work for a little bit. The trip was a surprise to both of our moms sort of just for fun but also to celebrate the fact that they are both retiring this month! We arrived really early on Saturday and Jeremiah’s dad picked us up at the airport and drove us back to their house. His mom was on a phone call so we just sat down in the kitchen and when she walked out of the office into the kitchen, there we were! She was very shocked to see us just sitting there! We stayed and chatted with them for a little while until it was time to meet up at my brother’s house to surprise my mom. My sister, Heather, flew in from Philadelphia and my other sister, Emily, had picked her up from the airport so we all met up at their house. I already loved spending time with both of our families before we moved, but now that it is more rare I just am so happy any time everyone is together. We have the best families. Anyway we were planning to surprise my mom just at home as well but she was taking a really long time with her grocery shopping and we were getting a little impatient! Fortunately my dad has the “find your phone” capability so we decided to surprise her at Fry’s (her third grocery store of the morning by the way). Nine of us met up at the front of Fry’s and started scouting the store for my mom. We probably looked really strange and suspicious but it was really fun. We caught up to her right as she was getting milk and she was so shocked when she turned around. If you know my mom you know that of course she cried when she saw all of us; she was very excited. We all went back to my parents’ house, had Raising Cane’s for lunch and swam in the pool. It was 106 degrees already, so it definitely qualified as pool weather! After spending the afternoon with my family we went back over to the Dwights’ and we all headed out to dinner for Nathan’s 21^st birthday! Since it was his 21^st we went to a brewery in Scottsdale and his mom had made a Brownie Caramel Cheesecake that was insane. Four layers, alternating brownie and caramel cheesecake and topped with a caramel frosting. You should have seen the piece Nathan managed to eat. I had as thin as she could get a slice, which was tricky with how tall the cake was! We finished the night with board games and Nathan and Jeremiah playing video games together, a favorite tradition of theirs. Sunday we went to church back at RMCC and saw a few friends there, then headed to Crackers and Company with my whole family to celebrate my mom! It is one of her favorite places. Then we then went back over to the Dwights’ because they had just picked up their new puppy! Her name is Syl and she is an adorable yellow lab. So literally we spent the whole afternoon watching the puppy and playing around with her since next time we see her she will probably be just about fully grown! Sunday night we had hung out at my parents’ house and stayed the night there. Monday Jeremiah got his suit fitted for a wedding we are both in in October, we had lunch at Nando’s with my mom, Heather, and Nathan, hung around at my parents’ house, had Barro’s Pizza for dinner (yes we ate out way too much), and went to Tommy and Emily’s for a game night! Tuesday morning both Heather and Jeremiah left, but I had one more day. I dropped by my mom’s classroom in the morning, which was actually a little sad. It was the last time I would be in her room and likely the last time I will swing by Mountain View! I loved being a Toro with my mom! After that I stopped in at Parker’s preschool during his lunch time and brought him a treat (Gushers), and then picked up Chipotle for Paisley and brought that to her school! It was so fun visiting them both at lunch! I got to meet some of their friends and even went to recess with Paisley. It reminded me of how fun and exciting elementary school was most of the time. After lunch with Paisley I stopped by my old roommate Kim’s apartment to see her and her new baby, Caleb! He is so cute and it is always so fun to hold such a little baby. It was also great to catch up with Kim! Finally I had a nice time hanging out with my parents and grandma Monday night, cherishing my last little bit of AZ for awhile.

The rest of my one week of summer I had our small group, which we go to every Wednesday night, I observed in a Pelvic PT office to learn more about that setting, went on a hike with my friend Stacey, went on the Celestial Seasonings Tea tour in Boulder, and just relaxed! Now like I said I am back at it and Jeremiah is a little less busy at work. We are looking forward to our first full summer in Colorado. We have so many things we would love to do, so I think it will be a great season for us!