Hi There

Well well well.  Look who it is!  "Where have you been," you ask?  I have no good excuse to have missed so many days blogging and updating my swarms of intent readers on the general happenings of my life.  Oh, except that- my life.  Yes, it has been absolutely crazy.  Let us count the many many ways of craziness:

#1  (and most important).  WE BOUGHT A FREAKIN' HOUSE!


WOOOOOO!!!!  I know, I know.  I need to post more pics.  I will- I swear.  For now, there are a couple to get you going on the Picasa page.  For example:



and



#2 (and also a pretty big deal):  I'm going to South America for two months!  AHHHHHH!  In exactly one week, I will be on a plane to Colombia, where I will be for two weeks while the orchestra I work for does their Residence (rehearsing and learning from some of the top musical instructors), after which we go on to tour Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Brazil.  I come back to me wonderful husband and new home on August 17th.  Oh Em Gee.

Welp, time to get goin and make the most of my last weekend in the States. 

Talk to ya'll laters!

Getting Ready to Say 'Goodbye' to The Jefferson at Fair Oaks

After almost two years, we are about to say goodbye to our apartment here at The Jefferson at Fair Oaks in Fairfax. It is small and pricey, but it also has been good to us. This is me waxing nostalgic over everything that has happened since moving to Virginia:

We drove from Seattle in August of 2008, without knowing where we would end up living, and found this apartment.



Shortly after, Patrick started his new job, I got my first car, and I started grad school.



We explored the cute walking trails and tested out the food in the area. Wegman's, our newly discovered grocery store down the street, turned out to be one of the best grocery stores we've been to. The greek mom 'n pop restaurant we originally thought we would be going to all the time, HavABite, gave over to the much closer and DELICIOUS Moby Dick's House of Kabob. (Ok, they're not exactly the same type of food, but to me, they feed the same craving.) I don't even want to count the number of delicious delicious burgers we have sampled.



We had many adventures being tourists in DC. Friends came to stay with us, including Seth, Steve and Jessica, and Brian.



In the summer of '09, we flew back home to Seattle to get married. Our little apartment became crowded with boxes of wedding presents, and I crammed as much packing material into hiding places as I could so that we would have it ready for us when we inevitably moved again.



Christmas came, the whole family came out to Virginia, and we all got to experience the craziest winter I have ever seen.



School ended, and I got my first full time job. Now, with 5 months of employment under my belt, we finally leave this small space that we have, for a short time, occupied and I look back fondly at all that we have been able to accomplish while we have been here.

It has been a busy two years. And I imagine we won't be slowing down for some time yet. This is such an exciting time for us.

Gorgeous New House

Have I ever mentioned that I CAN NOT WAIT to move in to the new house?  Well, if I have, then I didn't know what I was talking about back then.  Because now I REALLY can not wait.  It is SO gorgeous, and it is done.  Like, almost move in ready.  They just have to repair a few things, but it is clean, and it is so so so pretty.

Here are some of the good-uns from my album:












In other news, Patrick and I are leaving for a mini-moon at Williamsburg for the weekend.  We're taking off tomorrow and heading down to a little bed and breakfast, and will check out Colonial Williamsburg, eat delicious food, and relax.  I am so psyched.

Ants in my pants

One month till my mommy visits! Woo Hoo! I am super excited for her to be in town and am bummed that we have to waste some of her time over here with the stupid graduation ceremony hahaha. I am not exactly sure why I'm walking, but meh. I have my cap and gown (and hood! OK, maybe I'm a little excited about that part), but other than that I haven't even thought about school lately.

Work has been great. I am always busy, but I feel like I am doing better about not stressing myself out. Working full time has been a big change for me. I've lost a little weight, and I can't really figure out why. Not a ton of weight, and I don't look any skinnier, but I wasn't under 155 all through grad school, even when I was running all the time, and how I haven't seen myself above 150, which confuses me, as I haven't been running nearly as much as I should.

The house is coming along still. I am getting antsy for a closing date, and think it might be as soon as one month from now! I just want to be in my shiny new house.

Last weekend we went to Bull Run with Patrick's parents. It was a gorgeous day for it, and we got some great pictures. I just decided to look up how to code mouseover text. I will try it on this picture from Bull Run. (Try my mouseover!)



Neat.

Cherry Blossom and House Progress

The weather has turned absolutely gorgeous out here on the East coast! It seems like not too long ago I was bundling up to go out in 3 feet of snow, but now I am wearing my contacts more so that I can wear my sunglasses, and I am leaving my coat at home. I had a lovely short week last week, as I took a vacation day on Monday and got to leave early on Friday because it was such a nice slow day. Next week will be a bit more busy; I have my normal late days, plus an extra late day somewhere in there for a development committee meeting.

We have spent the beautiful weather checking out the new house; it won't be long until it's done! They have already put in the cabinets, and have done the tile in the bathrooms.

UNFORTUNATELY, it looks like they screwed up the tile, so we'll be making them do it again, but still- it is coming along quickly.

Back story: They told us in the beginning that our tubs and toilets were already ordered, and we confirmed with them (over email, so I have evidence) that they were "biscuit" colored. Based on that info, we made our selections at the design center. Well, NOW that we see our "biscuit" tile selections next to the "biscuit" tub.... I am pretty positive that they were white after all. They haven't responded to my email yet, but we'll stick to our guns and make sure they make it up to us. Here's a picture of our biscuit tiles against the so-called "biscuit" tub. Looks pretty damn white to me.

They also screwed up the listello in the guest bathroom, but there's no way they can get away with that one. They did one wall in the correct color scheme (a mix of greens), but the rest was in the same tile that our master bath was in (browns)... Pretty blatant.

Other than that though, the house is coming along great. I know they have to fix that stuff too, so I'm not really worried about it.

We walked into DC yesterday. The Cherry Blossom Festival is going on right now, so we got some great pictures of the blossoms. We went to the Jefferson Memorial for the first time. That was a good call too, cause the "mass of humanity," as Patrick calls it, was less dense over there. We also walked by a cool seafood place which we will have to try some time, but were too full from lunch to try this time around. The weather was absolutely perfect. It was beautifully sunny, and warm enough to walk around with shorts and a tank top, but not so hot and humid to make Emmas wilt.

Happy Easter!

Home Inspection

Today we did the Pre-Drywall Home Inspection. We are very happy with the quality that Toll Brothers is putting into our townhouse, and can't wait to move in! At the rate it has been coming along, I think we will probably be moving in by the end of May! HOORAY! I have already started packing. Hahaha. Below are some of the cooler pictures, but a lot more can be found, as always, on my Picasa album here.

Siding AND Brick is up now!


Our living room is going to get some beautiful light.
Here is one of the Realtors we have been working with, Bill Draper.


Stilts! Seemed like a pretty effective way to put up insulation.


I love it.


We have our name on the sign! YEY!

New House Update

We went into the design center on Thursday of last week and made all of our selections for woods, tiles, and things like that. For a new construction, we jumped in on the process very late, and this is going to all go really quickly for us. Most people have to wait a year or so for their new construction to be built, but ours will be ready before I can imagine, and will still have our custom touches.

...But for now, it all feels a long way off.

Here are the awesome choices we made!!

KITCHEN

Verde Butterfly Countertops with our Cherry Cabinets

60/40 Sink

Simplice Faucet, by Kohler

Cherry Hardwood Floors (throughout main living level)

MASTER BATH

Parchment colored sink, Cherry Cabinets, Upgraded Walnut colored tiles, and (my favorite part) the Lake Shores Listello accent

Forte faucets, by Kohler

POWDER ROOM

Floor Tiles

SECOND BATH

Spice Cabinets

Biscuit tiles with the Rain Forest Blend Listello

That's pretty much all of the most interesting stuff we chose. I will update my captions in our album from the design center to reflect what we ended up choosing. I'll also keep on uploading pictures there of our other ideas for designing our place, even though we are ALL DONE with the Toll Brothers design center! YEY!

New York City and New House... city...

UPDAAAAAATE!!!!

So two weeks ago (already!) I was in NYC for work!! Who knew I was going to have a job that involved travel! Pretty exciting. We performed in Carnegie Hall, and I was extremely busy with my first experience "on tour" with the orchestra.



I barely had time to myself, but I did manage to eat at Carnegie Deli, which was FAN.TAS.TIC.



I got a pastrami sandwich, which was absolutely HUGE. The bread was basically just there to justify calling it a sandwich; it immediately soaked up the delicious juices of the pastrami and disintegrated in my hands.



So the day after I got back from NYC, we signed papers on our townhouse!!!! We are so excited for our first home, and have been having a great time keeping track of its progress and making plans for how we will design it. (click on those links for LOTS of pictures!)

This Thursday we go into the design center to finalize what options we want, so I will be sure to make an update later! We also plan on visiting the house every Sunday (Construction's day off) to walk through and take pictures of the progress. It is coming along fast! I can't wait.

We have already determined a few design themes that we would like to try and stick to for the general design of our house: Frank Lloyd Wright/Aeronotics, also Tiffany lamps, and art deco. Hopefully we can have our "grown up" house decor soon, instead of the eclectic hand-me-downs and IKEA furniture we have now. I will be working on an "inspiration board" for the design stuff, like I tried to do for our wedding, and will post when I have something cool.

I officially have one week of professional employment under my belt. Hooray.

Week one of work at Youth Orchestra of the Americas went pretty well. I like my boss and colleagues, and I'm pretty sure that they are pretty excited to have me on board too.

The commute isn't so bad, as long as I am able to get in and leave early. Obviously I will have late days here and there when I have meetings or huge projects to finish, but other than that I think my schedule will work just fine with them.

I left at 5:30 am on Friday, and instead of it taking an hour to get in, it took me 20 mins. That was amazing. And my drive home, even though it was a bit later than I was planning on (3:30 pm), it still only took me 25 mins instead of the usual hour. Actually on Thursday it took me closer to 1 hour, 45 mins because there was an accident on 66. I definitely like my early commute better. Hopefully it will be similarly quick mid-week.

I got a book-on-CD from the library for my commute anyway. It has been such a long time since I regularly went to the library; it has been fun re-acquainting myself with this resource.

I already have travel lined up for my work too. In February I will be in New York for a couple days while the orchestra plays in Carnegie Hall! I'm sure I will also be going to a few of our fancy fundraiser events that we are in the process of planning for February in various DC locations. One of them will be at the Colombian Embassy. I went to tour it and it is an amazingly beautiful space. That will be an awesome event.

Also, I am tentatively holding my schedule in the summer for the big tour as well: Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Brazil! My boss hasn't confirmed it yet, but I think I might be going. It will be a long time to be away from my Patrick, but will also be a fantastic experience. I have never been to South America!

Tomorrow Patrick and I start house-hunting! We are hoping to be able to find a place and close in time to meet the first-time-home-buyer's tax credit deadline. I doubt that any of the houses we see tomorrow will still be on the market by the time we are able to make an offer, but I am excited to start finding out what we will be looking for and narrowing down our search. I can't wait to own a house. I have been nuts about houses since I was a little girl. Finally being able to pick out one of my own instead of daydreaming over floor plans is going to be amazing.