Happy Mother's Day!!

Just wanted to do a quick post and give a shout out to all my mommy friends/family. Most of whom don't read this blog at all!! But at the same time I want to take the moment to praise God for how he takes care of those that aren't yet mothers, who have lost their moms, and who have lost children, as well as those that had moms that weren't as great as they could have been. God is the parent that never disappoints us or lets us down and never ever forgets about us! My mom has always been an inspiration to me as the kind of mom and woman i want to be, but this day is a day of sadness to some people, and i want them to know that there is a God out there that loves all of us!

So today we called Audie's mom and my mom, but since we'll be seeing them and all our family next week we're giving out our cards and etc. then. we also went over to Raleigh to the new apartment to take another load of stuff. Some of our family is going to stay there when they come up, so we needed to make sure it was ready for them, i.e. had to have towels, shower curtains, and TP over there. So we had to make a run to the dollar tree and target to pick up some extra things (we needed them anyway) but as we were in target we found the perfect dresser for our living room!! It looks a lot like this, but i couldn't find the exact one on the website. We're going to put it against the back wall in our living/dining room, and put china, serving pieces, and linens for our dining room in it. We also got some cute end tables that match for really cheap (15 a piece) and then we got some cute canvas cubes to put under them for some storage!

I think it's going to look awesome!! I'm so excited about seeing everyone and graduating!! I have an appointment to get a haircut tomorrow and i'm packing more stuff. Tuesday and Wednesday are days set aside for cleaning up the whole house. Then Wednesday night my sister and her hubby are coming!!

I hope you guys all had a productive weekend, and i have a great recipe (though not great for you!) for you guys! It's SO easy and yummy!!

Easy Peach Cobbler


2 cans peaches (or any pie filling)
1 package Cake Mix any flavor
½ cup butter (1 stick)
1 Tablespoon Cinnamon
1 Tablespoon Sugar

•Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
•Pour canned peaches or pie filling in a greased 9x11 pyrex dish.
•Evenly distribute cake mix over the top of the fruit.
•Cut the stick of butter into small pats and place across the top of the cake mix.
•Sprinkle the Cinnamon and Sugar evenly over the top.
•Bake for 30-40 minutes, serve with ice cream or alone.

I made it to take to a party last night, and i'm making it again this weekend to serve to my family! it's so yummy! and you can make it in a bigger pan with just adding more canned peaches!

Make it and enjoy!!

Julia

great day

My second day of summer was just as good as the first one, i craigslisted some new dressers for our living room. One of them feel through because we can't fit it in our car and they can't hold it until the 22nd. Not good but we're not in a rush to get anything really. and we looked at our favorite thrift store and their stuff was was more expensive than we wanted, or was too little/too big. we're going to keep looking 'cause they get new stuff all the time.

Audie is at work today, it's his first time being in charge as Assistant Manager. Very exciting for him! I'm packing a little bit more today, and we're going to take a load over to the new apartment tomorrow. Monday - Wednesday will be devoted to cleaning our house and packing some more. I hope to have another load of stuff to go to the new place on Wednesday or so, and for our house to be cleaned for our families arrival.

We have 12 family members coming in for graduation weekend, luckily most of them are going to be in hotels! I'm really excited to see all Audie's and My family this weekend!! We have a ton of things planned that are kind of stressing me out, but i'm glad to have everyone here and to be graduating!!

Julia

first day of real summer

So since yesterday was a celebration day (by the way i had a blast last night for Cinso de Mayo!) i woke up this morning and did very little. I watch DWTS earlier in the week but never really shared my thoughts. I agreed with the judges that everyone did really well! I'm still pulling for Erin and Evan, though Neicy makes me laugh so hard i want her to stay too!! Chad and Pam I'm kind of indifferent to, and nicole is really good i just don't want her to win. SO i was glad to see Pam go i guess 'cause that means that none of my people went home, though i was really nervous for Erin being in the bottom 2.

Today i started to pack some stuff up. We have two huge closets that we only use for storage because we don't have an attic, and i cleaned them out today. As I was clearing them out i sorted through everything and made one big stack in the upstairs closet of stuff for the yard sale. Then i packed up what was left to take to the new house. Tomorrow or Sunday i'm going to try and tackle my clothes. I have so many, and our new closets in our bedroom are much bigger than the ones we have now, so i'm hoping to edit my wardrobe to get rid of the 'college' look and only keep the stuff that i wear and love. But i'm hoping to edit down so that all my clothes will go on hangers in my closet, and i'll just have to rotate for winter, rather than totally pack and unpack all my clothes twice a year, it's such a hassle. So no we have a big ol pile of stuff going to the new apartment on Saturday.

Audie is working so i'm going to go over with him and unpack and then search a few thrift stores for some furniture and visit our new community's yard sale, which is this Saturday too. I'm looking for a pantry-type cabinet to store excess kitchen stuff in because we're downgrading in cabinet space, and a dresser/buffet for the living/dining area. I've been looking for a while, and we're trying to find something that isn't too expensive, but so far we haven't had much luck at the thrift store in durham.

Well that's all for now, i'm sure you are all glad that i'm no longer talking about my finals and junk that i have to do for school! I know i am!!

Julia

DONE!!!!!

It's finished! the dang exam i have been working on since Sunday morning (off and on with a study break after each paragraph) is DONE and that means that all the course work necessary for my Masters of Divinity is DONE!! And i finished before bed, which means i can enjoy my Cinco de Mayo plans with gusto!!

SO now pending all my grades coming back on Monday or so as C's or better (not really in danger of this, but i guess it's a possibility) i'll graduate! Which i'm really hoping happens because in a week and a 1/2 i'm having my whole family come up to watch be walk across a stage and damn it i better get a degree after the intense hard work i've put in the last three years!!

So for my graduation present - i don't ask much - but i want everyone who reads this blog to comment on this post! Come On i would love to know who has been following me (if any) through this journey! Maybe share what the biggest accomplishment of your life so far has been, because this takes the cake in my life (at least for now!)

But don't worry i'm not stopping blogging just because school is over, i still have plenty of material - like DWTS updates, moving to my new apartment and the hunt for new furniture that doesn't break the bank, starting my new job, ordination papers and going before the BOOM, all kinds of stressful fun awaits you readers!!

LOVE to you all! I'd like to thank all my friends and families for sure, your prayers and support in other ways have been so great throughout the last 3 years!!

Julia

five pages!

I have 5 pages down on this last question and just 2 left to write!! I'm not going to bed tonight until i'm done because i have big plans for tomorrow, and really that's all that is keeping me going on this exam!!

Audie is off tomorrow and i'm so glad to be able to spend the day with my husband for the first time not having school hanging over my head!! This may be kind of dramatic, but our entire marriage has been a cycle of semesters it seems like, and counting down how many more days i have left until school starts back again! So i'm so happy to get to spend a day not worried about how much longer i have of school!!

We're going to have breakfast together, i'm hoping for muffins, but we may just do pancakes and bacon 'cause we have the time to do it! then we're just going to enjoy the day doing all kinds of things! The biggest plans we have is to get together with some great friends of our for Mexican food because it's also Cinco de Mayo and all of us will be done with our finals at that point. I'm so excited to have a margarita or more!!

Ok got to get back to this big bad final, i'm so close i can taste it!!!

Julia

one more!

I just finished question 2, after a long day i'm going to bed finished, instead of with a few paragraphs left to write which makes me happier than last night! Alright, just one more question on this final left, and i have all day tomorrow to work it out! Here's hoping i can get up and get going to finish it up!

This last final seems like it is taking forever, but at least i'm not right up against my deadline and i have some time to sleep and take good breaks. That being said, these last few days, thursday through today spent writing is getting old real quick!! i think that if i weren't going to be done tomorrow i would really just be done!!

alrighty! time for bed, hopefully this time tomorrow i can say that i'm all finished with my M.Div!!! (or at least the course work of it, i'll still have to pass all my classes in order to graduate!)

prayers for a good day of work tomorrow!

Julia

ugh

last night at 12:30 i went to bed with 3 paragraphs left on my first question of this last final! I know i was supposed to finish it by going to bed but i was so close. i set my alarm to get up at 8:30 this morning so that i could finish up Question 1 and then get question 2 started. Well then i turned off the alarm this morning and slept instead. So then today i just finished the 1st one and now i'm starting on the second one, but i'm limiting my tv to just rewarding myself for writing paragraphs.

ok but i'm 1/3 done with this last final!! it's a good feeling, but i need to finish it up so i can have that great Wednesday i have planned!!

Also i took a study break to try out my new chi straightener! I LOVE it! I showered last night too, which i never do because my hair always is frizy gross the next day, but with my straightener it was no problem. 10 minutes after i plugged it in my hair was all straight and shiny!! so excited for the possibilities that this gives me!!

Ok love to all of you but i have to get to work if this thing is EVER going to be done!!

Julia

Final number 3!

As tired as my facebook friends are of getting updates on my final progress, and as tired as you guys are of hearing how much i hate writing finals I am WAY more tired of writing them myself!!! I sent in my second final this morning and immediately began on my third one!

This one is a three question exam and we're suppose to answer the three case studies with a 5-7 page response and then a 2-3 page justification for that response. I'm shooting for the 5 and the 2, rather than writing three more 10 page papers i'm hoping for them to be more like 7! But in order to send in all three quesiton answers by Wednesday at 5 i'm hoping to tackle one question a day for today, tomorrow and tuesday! so far that's going alright. I got a good outline together for my first question by 2 and then started writing, with some good incentives by my DVDs of shows that i like, i have a bit more than 4 pages of the response right now, so i'm hoping to only have to write a bit more tonight. Then i can go on to finish up question 2 tomorrow and 3 on Tuesday. I really hope that means i'll be finished to enjoy waking up and spending the whole day Wednesday with Audie for the first time in forever without school work looming over my head.

i have cinco de Mayo plans to get Mexican food (and margaritas) to celebrate with my good seminary friends that night, but other than that and emailing in my final i have no plans for Wednesday!! then i can let myself enjoy my summer time!!

first on the agenda, moving enough stuff to the new apartment so that my house isn't a mess when my family comes for my graduation!! And of course sorting through it all to figure out what to sell at our yard sale, more and more things are getting put in that pile and i'm so excited to see how much money we make!!

Julia

what a day!

This morning we went over to our new apartment to sign the lease, clean it all up and take some measurements and just generally get ready to move in there. I was hoping to have some stuff in boxes to take on over there, but in the midst of finals and whatnot stressing me out it just didn't happen.

So we toted our cleaning supplies and not much else so that i could wash the windows, spray down the cabinets, makes sure the bathrooms were clean and the floors swept, mopped and vaccumed before we brought all our dirt in. Is that weird? do other people do that or not? I know the apartment people sent in professional cleaners and whatnot, and i'm not normally a neat freak about stuff. i guess i like knowing that once i set up my bed that the floor underneath has at least been vacuumed at least once.

Now for the good part: PHOTOS!!

Here is the outside: So cute!


The Kitchen! Loving the dishwasher!!


The view from the living room, the dining room area and kitchen, as well as Audie writing down some measurements!



The closets in our room, plus a small peek of the attached bathroom, it's tiny, but the bedroom is bigger than ours now, and the other bedroom is smaller by far.



This is the guest bathroom: it has a little bit of shelving in the corner, so we'll put a bit of our normal bathroom stuff in there.



lastly this is the laundry area: it's upstairs in the landing from the stairs, between the two bedroom/bathrooms. I'm not so excited about getting the washer/dryer up the stairs, but i think it will be nice not to have to run laundry baskets and clean clothes up and down the stairs like we do now.



Overall i like the storage of this apartment more than ours, and the space is definitely bigger, but the storage is organized a bit different, so we're going to have to figure out how to shift some stuff around to make it work.

After cleaning the whole house we went to lunch, game stop (for video games that i get to play once i finish my finals) and big lots. Can i tell you that i love that store!! I got a shower curtain liner and good shower curtain rings for like 6 dollars, Audie got some headphones and we browsed for some new furniture for our place, maybe after his big raise we can get some! I am totally going there for anything we need ahead of target or walmart from now on! one thing we didn't find, a bathroom rug that ties in all our colors for our guest bedroom.

After our errands we went back home so i could work on my second final! ugh, i'm getting pretty tired of all this, but i'm hitting a good spot right now, i have about a page and a half before i'm done with this one, and then i have to start on the next one! But i'm hoping to slow down a bit. My next final is three questions with 7-10 pages per answer, so i'm hoping to do one question each on Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday. It's not due until Wednesday afternoon, so i have some wiggle room if i hit another hard spot.

Ok i need to keep writing, i'm not sleeping until i finish these last 1.5 pages, and i'm pretty tired after cleaning and everything today.

Hope you had a productive saturday, i'm glad this is the last one i'll be doing homework!! Sorry for the long posts, but i have to keep my fans (amber, it's plural!) happy and they requested pictures!

Julia

Day five of Reading Week:

So i finished up my first final last night and after dinner got to work on my second one. I got a pretty good outline together before bed last night. Then i spent the night tossing and turning, mostly because i was concerned about my dr. appointment today. Everything went great. i'm not going to give the gory details, but all is good, i'm not Pregnant, but Audie did have to hold my hand! We'll see how this whole thing works out, but for now all is going well. The only thing was that the nurses and stuff figured out i was nervous and kept just reassuring me and stuff, awkward!

After the dr. appointment we went to lunch at Chipotle. I had seen an add for a Chi hair straightener on sale this weekend at Ulta. So i went over there and got one!! it was normally 149, but i got mine for 75!! it was pink too, with a thermal mat/cover thing. SO excited. I had a chi that was a hand me down from a friend and it broke about 2 years ago, and try as i might i have not had good luck with other ones!! I didn't really want to spend 100 dollars on one, so when this deal came along, i was SO excited!! The sale runs through Sunday, so go out and get you one too!! You know if you want.

Now we're back home and chilling out while i start to fill in my outline from last night to be a great paper!! Let the bribing with Sex and the City episodes begin!!

hope you have a great friday! tomorrow morning we have to get our lease signed!! though we're a bit disappointed that because of a glitch we won't have power tomorrow, which is sad because i really wanted to vacuum. But we can take good photos and hopefully show off our new place!

Julia

done with one

One final is finished and printing out as we speak, or i write!! feels so good to cross one thing off my list of things to do! I hope to get a good outline and sources together for the next 10 page one tonight so that i can carry on this streak of good writing through tomorrow and saturday!!

Wish me good luck please!!

lots of love

Julia

finally

so i finally hit my stride and am working on my finals!! i now have 6 out of 10 pages on my first one and a good outline to get me to the end of it. I'm finishing this one today!! I won't be sleeping until it is done, but if i keep going at this rate i'm bound to be done before dinner even, which means i can spend the evening working out an outline for the next 10 pager!! then hopefully i will have that one done by Sunday morning. I'm taking the first one in to turn in on friday afternoon after my dr. appointment. and then i'll be spending the rest of the afternoon/evening writing that second 10 page paper.

Saturday morning will be all about the new apartment, we're going over to sign our lease, look it over for stuff that needs fixing, and moving in some small things after cleaning the whole thing down. I'm so excited and ready to be there for real, though we won't be done moving in until the 22nd. not fun! Saturday afternoon/night i'm not going to bed until the second final is done!! then Sunday-Tuesday are going to be all that 3rd final!! hopefully i'll be done in time for the 5pm on wednesday deadline.

I did have a dream last night that i was in a car crash and tried to use that as an excuse for why my finals weren't done. But it didn't work out well in the dream so i'll not try that!

I've also begun bribing myself with Sex and the City episodes, for every paragraph/main point i finish writing i get to watch an episode. I did this over spring break only with harry potter chapters. I had to step up my game for sure because this is like torture finishing these finals!!

But now i'm finally on my way to finishing them, starting them was way harder than actually doing them, i should know that by now, but its something i always talk myself into that i can finish them in less time than it actually takes

ok sorry this is all i have to talk about, but literally it is my whole world right now!!

Julia

DWTS

I realized i was so excited about my new robes yesterday that i didn't update you on my thoughts about DWTS this week. Since we went to the Sr. Banquet on monday i DVR'd it and watch the dancing show yesterday morning. I thought everyone did pretty good. You can tell that the good folks are left because the lowest score anyone got was a 21. They are all going to have to step it up if they want to win. I still love Erin and Evan so much!! and I think Niecy is doing so good too, but so funny.

The results: I was glad that Jake went home, bless his heart but i think most viewers didn't like him. He has like no personality and he was so cute and sweet when he was a contestant on the Bachelor show, but when he was the bachelor i didn't like him at all. He's just so goofy and fake feeling. I think maybe that's why he and Vienna get along. Well that's all in the past and we do not have to see him on DWTS anymore, which makes me pretty happy!

So i guess we'll see what happens next week! i've got to go back to working on my finals and stuff, not fun!! i just need some bottled motivation to get this stuff done so i can enjoy being finished with school!!

Ok enjoy your Wednesday, i have exactly one week to write these 3 finals!!

Julia

New Robes!!

I got my preaching robes today!! You know i ordered them FOREVER ago!!! ANd they finally came in. Which is good because i'm wearing the black one for graduation and that is only a few weeks away!! So i took a few pictures, I think i look totally weird, just because i've never worn a robe before and it's strange to think of myself preaching in one. I'll get more comfortable in them i'm sure. What do you think???



Sorry for the messy room/bad background and the fact that i was in my pajamas underneath, probably won't be doing that in the pulpit, haha! But then again it is reading week and my only tasks are to get these three finals FINISHED!! (by the way didn't get a good start on them again today, might still be working a bit tonight) Here is my Alb:



So i'm liking the way both of them look the only thing that makes me think the alb looks a bit strange is the neck, the neck in the black one is a lot closer in, which i like the look of a lot better!! I also got a deacon stole for free because my total was so much, and i didn't take a photo of me wearing it because technically i can't wear it until i'm ordained, which won't be for the next year or so. but it looks good too, and it fits pretty good, though i'm not going to tempt fate by taking a pic of it!!

Let me know what you think for real, should i get the neckline looked at on the white alb?

Julia

reading week

One thing that is different from my college experience to grad school experience is the difference between having a reading DAY and a reading week!! Reading day i never saw as an opportunity to do work, but as a day to enjoy off before getting into finals. Reading week in grad school is the time when i have to basically finish everything because there isn't time to finish stuff just during reading week!!

Yesterday i started out pretty good, i finished 2 of 3 blog postings for my class, i have just one left and then i'll be working on my finals. I'm trying to finish stuff in the order that they are due, but ahead of time so that i'm not stressing out at the last minute. Last night the Div. school had the Senior banquet. It was amazing food with good friends! then we all went out for a drink or two with some folks at a bar downtown. SO much fun to relax a bit and enjoy our time together before all things with finals and moving get crazy.

We also started planning our yard sale a bit. We set the date and place, which is a big step in the right direction, and we're going to have at least 4 couples that are selling a whole bunch of stuff, and maybe we'll make some money by selling the stuff that we don't need anymore. We're doing it the weekend of May 29th! woo hoo! So you guys in NC put it on your calenders so that we can sell you our stuff!! It's going to be pretty fun i'm thinking. And we're not hosting which means most of the work won't me on me!!

So i've procrastinated working on my school stuff all morning so far and i should probably get on it!

ugh, not fun, but in a week it will be ALL over!!!

Julia

picture of our new guest room!!

I tried to take a photo of our new stuff!! I was too excited to get stuff on the futon and all set up!! So i took a photo with my phone and here we are!!





What do you think??

Julia

weekend of relaxation

So i have 3 finals between me and graduation, the first two (10 page papers) are due a week from tomorrow. The other one (30 page paper) is due a week from Wednesday. I also have to write 3 one page blog entries for my class by friday. Did i work on any of that this weekend?? NOPE!! I have tried to just relax a bit and get ready to work on this stuff this coming week. I no longer have school to go to, just school work to get done, so i'm hoping to work on the blog posts tonight/tomorrow and then Tuesday get going on the two 10 pagers and then hopefully plan out the 30 pager by Friday. I have a dr. appointment on Friday and then Saturday we have to sign our lease at the new place, we're also going ahead and cleaning the apartment and moving in some stuff that we hardly ever use (i.e. christmas decorations, camping equipment, nice china, etc.) so i will begin writing those 30 pages as soon as i can on Sunday or Monday, all hoping to have it emailed in by Wed. at 5!!

Friday night we went out to celebrate Audie's new job and then we watched Avatar, it was pretty good. Not my favorite movie by far, but it could have been a lot worse for sure. Yesterday i did basically nothing, we even ordered pizza for dinner because i was not cooking. today we went to Home Goods hoping to find a new guest bedroom bed set. In our new apartment we have a full guest bath and since we'd be getting a new shower curtain and stuff for the bathroom, i thought this would be a good opportunity to get new bedding and curtains for our guest room/ office. It was hard to find something cheap enough to warrant getting rid of our current stuff, but cute enough to satisfy me, and not too girly to satisfy audie. We found NOTHING at HomeGoods that fit into that small window!! Everything they had was almost pastel, and not in our style at all!! So we went to Target. We looked at EVERY bedding set/Comforter/ duvet cover that they had! FINALLY we found this. We really only needed a comforter with sheets and curtains because technically we have a futon in our guest room for now, but i wanted something that would work later when we have an actual queen bed in our quest room. We also picked up two panels of Maroon/Red curtains for the window in the guest room, Navy sheets and a maroon shower curtain. I wanted to get new towels, but Audie was kind of done after the time it took us to find one we liked. So i figured i could look at what we had at home and then get some another day if i needed to. But when i got home I realized that we had some dark green bath towels, hand towels and wash clothes that we got when we got married but couldn't return for whatever reason. They match great! SO grand total was 22 for the quilt (on sale from 89), 15 for the curtains, 20 for the shower curtain and 20 for the sheets! I'm really happy with the result and happy that we got it all in place before our guests descend on us the weekend of graduation!!

ALSO we'll be having a yard sale shortly after we move so i'm going to be able to sell the curtains/comforter and sheets that we just replaced, so maybe we'll get a small amount for them and take our grand total down some. either way i'm so happy to have something that will last us for a while, because what was there before was what I had from my college dorm room, and we had been just waiting for a good excuse to replace it. Well that day has come and i'm so happy!!!

So that was our weekend so far! i know it wasn't too exciting to you guys, but i had a great time doing nothing!!

here's to having a week of working on homework so that i can have just as uneventful of a summer!!!

Julia

New Job

Audie got a new job today! he had interviewed for the Assistant
manager's job at work a few days ago and we just found out that he got
it! that means a pay raise and more responsibility and hopefully less
working on Saturdays! I'm so proud of him and i'm so gla i have a
husband that loves his job enough to go out and work everyday, so that
i could go to school full time and not have to work. That has been
such a blessing, and while that means we have more student loans that
maybe we would if i had worked it has totally made my life easier!

Also i'm blogging right now from babysitting because my charge H. is
napping. She's 3 and hardly ever naps anymore but we played at the
playground for almost 2 hours after lunch today. She did so well! She
is a quite a shy child sometimes and i think it's hard for her to play
with new kids on the playground, but we saw a friend of hers at
Chicfila and he came out and played with her. I think since she
already knew him it made her more confident with the other kids too.
Last time we were there around a month ago she tried really hard to
get up to the highest level of the playground to get to the big slide,
but got freaked out and came back down. I was really encouraging her
to keep trying because i could see that she could do it if she would
just keep going, but i didn't want to push her too hard. So today on
our way to lunch she said that she wanted to try again, but that she
might not be able to, and i just said that if you try you might be
able to, and if you can't it's ok too, but you kind of have to keep
trying until you can do something.

When we got there she tried once right away and got up one big step
with my help, giving her a boost, but then she really didn't want to
go any higher. So she came back down did great playing with the other
kids and her friend. Well eventually her friend and his parents left
and but she kept on playing with the other kids! it was so great, and
i was so proud of her for making new friends! well then, all of a
sudden (i was talking a bit to one of the moms) she comes out of the
big slide. She came running over and was like "Ms. Julia i tried and I
did it!!" it was the sweetest thing ever, and i was SO proud of her
for trying again all on her own and for doing it all alone. Then she
just kept climbing on up and up and sliding down all on her own, it
was great!

So several people in the world are making big leaps and accomplishing
alot today! I hope you accomplished something that you have never
done today too!!

Julia

Camp Love Story

So Kelly's Korner is doing show us your life today and she's 'McLinky'ing people who will tell their stories of how they met their spouse. I love telling our love story so I'm participating! Even though i'm sure most of you know this story, maybe a new reader will come on over and read too. But really i think that God was so much in charge of our meeting and story that i always love to share about how God works in ways that sometimes we least expect it, and actually when Audie and I stopped looking for someone to spend our lives with is exactly when God decided to introduce us.

So approaching the summer after my junior year of college (about 4 years ago actually) i was all set to go back home for the summer and work as a youth intern at a church that i had worked at the summer before. I drove home after finals, my car full of stuff from my dorm room. When i got home my mom told me that she had gotten a call from the church and that the position i was suppose to fill, was no longer available. So suddenly i had to figure out what i wanted to do that summer. so i started calling and emailing everyone i knew pretty much to see if they had any job available 'cause i was suddenly without something to do! One of the people that i called was my friend Hannah and she was working at a camp for the summer and she said that they did still need summer counselors. She decided to talk to her boss and his boss and see if they could find a time to call for an interview. The next day i got a phone interview and they said that they did want me to come and work at the camp for the summer. So of course the first question i had was when should i come up there, and they told me that new counselor training started the next day at noon, and if i could get there by then then great and if not to get there as soon as i could. WOAH! talk about moving fast, my mom and i stopped everything and tried to pack for a summer of working at camp, but had really no idea what i was getting into. Little did i know that Audie was Hannah's boss that summer and was on the phone for that interview. I met him the next day as i checked in for new counselor training.

Little did i know that Audie wasn't supposed to be at camp that summer either. He had worked at camp for 6 previous summers but had not worked there for 2 years. He was living at home with his parents and working full time but felt a calling to go back to camp for the summer. He really couldn't figure out why that was, but talked to his parents about it. They really discouraged him to go, why would he give up a full time job for a summer at camp, with only a small possibility that he'd get a job after the summer was over. He decided to come to camp anyway. We met and he knew immediately why he was there, and i did too.

So that's how we met, we went on our first date over the mini camp break we had in the middle of the summer. The next year (really 365 days later) we got married at my home church. and then we moved to NC so i could go to seminary. Four years after we met, and now 3 years after we were married we still credit our meeting to God alone.

Yesterday was my last day of classes in my Seminary career!! i still have finals ahead of me but i'm done with classes and i'm so excited about our next steps. We'll be moving in May and then i'll be starting a job as a full time Chaplain.

Hope you enjoy our story and have a love of your life too!!

Julia

last tuesday of the year!!

Today i preached a sermon in my class and that was my last regular assignment for this semester (and therefore my entire seminary time) It actually went ok. I worked out an outline the night before and it turned out to be a very detailed outline, that was basically in full sentences. So when it came time to write my manuscript, i just took out the bullets, which worked pretty well in my opinion. I felt more comfortable preaching that way than i ever had before and others said that it was pretty good too. So that went well today.

Also Audie interviewed for a new job at work today. He is up for an assistant manager's position at his current company. That is a two step up change, because there is a level of supervisor that is in between where he is now and the assistant manager job. the other person that is up for the job is already a supervisor and it's come down to just the two of them. SO either Audie will get the job or if the other guy gets the job then Audie will be able to take over the available supervisor's position. That helps things so much because there will be a good result either way. We should hear by Thursday so we'll just have to see what will happen.

SO i've been working on homework the last few nights and now i just have 3 take home finals between me and graduation. that's a good feeling to have for sure. I'm hoping to finish two of those finals pretty quickly next week so that i can work on the last one early. But all of that will be finished with a wonderful Cinco de Mayo celebration with all my friends because we'll be all finished with school!!

Last night i was working so intently on my sermon that i did not watch DWTS, so sorry that you don't get my comments about it until later, but i'll probably watch both last nights and tonight's show after dinner tonight. I hope that i can enjoy my wednesday and Thursday and then work on my finals starting up on Friday, we'll see if that plan works out well or not because i have to babysit on friday afternoon. But i hope to knock these things out and still have time in between to rest and relax and not have a stressful time of finals week.

ok ladies and gents, hope you are having as wonderful tuesday as i am!!

Julia

is it really saturday?

I wish i had a really good reason for not posting recently, but i just don't. I haven't bee super busy or anything, i've just be getting into a funk with the end of school. I've been counting down the days and i haven't has a ton due this past week but i'm gearing up for finals, so i've been enjoying just being less busy than normal.

Yesterday Audie was off of work so we spent the day together which was pretty great! I had a dr. appointment yesterday and it all went well. Nothing is really wrong so don't worry about it and the dr. made me really comfortable and talking out our options with her was great. Really all we were talking about was birth control issues, so i won't go into the gory details, but i'm very happy with the plan of action, and i'm going back in 2 weeks for another visit. And it was good that Audie got to be there because i was worried that i would feel judgement/ pressure from the dr. and i didn't at all, but i was glad he could go with me, and he's going to go in 2 weeks with me too.

after the dr. appointment we went to mellow mushroom for lunch and then headed to Raleigh to our new neighborhood. We reserved our uhaul for the move, and just explored everything a bit more. Then we had buffalo wild wings for dinner, yummy!!! It was a great day of just hanging out and looking around, but it was nice to do it together and being over there really made me want to move a ton sooner!! Then we came on back to Durham and I chatted with my mom and older sister, which was so great to just get to talk with them, it was like they were sitting right there but they were back home. i wish so much that we lived closer to them, and i'm so excited to see all of my family when they come up for graduation.

alright, audie is working today and i'm trying to get some school work done for this coming week. so we'll see how that works out while i'm home alone and not very motivated!!

Julia

Tuesday

This week has been pretty good so far. Yesterday was just kind of getting used to the idea that i have to be at school again after such an awesomely relaxing weekend, but i'm good now. I had class and precept yesterday and was pretty frustrated by my preceptor telling us that we still would not get our midterms back yet. We turned them in forever ago, and i know they guy has other stuff going on, but really you knew that this class had a huge midterm when you took on the responsibility of grading for it.

Today was just any old class day. Last week my professor of my preaching class told us that she might not be there today, and that we would probably have a substitute and that we would get an email letting us know for sure. SO at 1:30 today (an hour before class began) we still had not gotten an email from her. I was all ready to just skip and go on home and enjoy my afternoon, but i ran into a classmate and she guilt tripped me into going. (not really but there are only 4 students in the class i started to feel bad that if i wasn't there then 1/4 of the class wouldn't be there) So i decided to go. When we got there the sub. wasn't, and one of our classmates wasn't there either. SO the three of us that did show up decided we would wait 10 minutes. The sub never showed up so we were out of there and i got to enjoy my afternoon after all!!! it was lovely, i took a nap, watched some friends and cooked dinner, we had steak, baked potatoes and salad, one of my favorite dinners ever!

the only thing i have yet to reflect on is DWTS! Last night i thought everyone was getting a little shaken up about the two score thing, but that's not a really a big deal. I thought that Kate was a bit harsh looking, though she said she had the best time, she just needs to learn to smile and show how much fun she is having. I'm watching the results show and i was really concerned that she would go home, but she's back for another week!!! maybe she can get it together next week. I'm not that sad about Aiden going home, not because i don't like him but because i hate Edyta. She gets on my nerves, and she never wears any clothes pretty much (even in the shots from rehearsals and their field trips!!)

Ok everyone, lots of love from NC, i have 6 days of classes left, and i already have an idea for my last sermon that i'm excited about and hoping that i can conquer my finals early and get them done!!!

Julia

MIA

Sorry for being missing this weekend, I was taking kind of a break from technology. I have to get up the energy to finish up my final semester and so i enjoyed doing very little this weekend. I don't have anything to turn in this week and we spent a very tiring last weekend in GA so we enjoyed doing as little as possible.

Friday i took some Claritin and was out all day and night. Seriously i took one little baby pill around 9 am and then slept until 11:30, then again from 2:30 -6:00 and then again from 11 until 10 the next morning. it was awesome, i'm not going to lie!! My allergies were a bit out of control, but this weekend has been a ton better, though i can't take allergy medicine and get things done for school, so it's only a weekend thing.

Saturday i didn't do much but watch Friends on DVD, you know, Chandler, Ross, Joey, Phoebe, Rachel and Monica!! I got all 10 seasons for my birthday and i have been watching them a few episodes at a time ever since, I finished them for the first time around thanksgiving and immediately started them over again. I'm just starting Season 9 now, right after Rachel and Ross have Emma!! My favorite show ever by far, i mean i still laugh out loud at least once an episode and it has brought me to tears many times too!! (especially when Monica and Chandler get engaged, when Phoebe talks to the triplets after they are born and the last episode of the series) I spent just about all day watching episode after episode, then last night Audie and I went out with some friends for some dinner and a movie. We (the girls) saw "Bounty Hunter" while the boys saw "Clash of the Titans" Both groups liked their movie pretty well. The Bounty Hunter was good, funny and sweet at times, typical romantic comedy, I would wait to netflix it later on if i were you, it wasn't that great, but pretty good.

today we went to target for a few things, and then grocery shopping, which was a good thing because we hadn't been in a few weeks. we spent more than usual, but we saved 20 dollars in products that were on sale and coupons. we also had to stock up on some things, so it was a pretty big bill and trip. Laundry was also on the list to do for today, and i also printed and addressed my grad announcements.

Alrighty, Our weekend was quiet but awesome! I'm loving not having much to do and i'm SO looking forward to a month from now when i'll have little to do for the whole summer! I have 8 class days left to go and 4 assignments left, one sermon due next week and then 3 take home finals/papers. After that sermon is done i'll have a week before i have to start really heavy on those finals and then i'll be all finished!! VERY ready for that day!!

Ok but first i have to make it through this week!

Julia

slacker

I know most of you realize this already but yesterday i was a slacker!! i know i've talked about on here before that i get really unmotivated on Wednesdays because i just have the one class and i usually don't want to go. well yesterday i didn't go, and i have a paper due today at 4 so i was supposed to work on that all day/night until it was done, but i really probably started on it around 9pm. I went to bed last night at 12 and it was about 1/2 done. I got up this morning and went to my other class, finishing up my paper around 12:30 this afternoon. I really want to go on home because i'm feeling pretty crappy/tired today, but i have to go to my classes to turn in stuff, i have class in about 20 minutes and i have to hand over the manuscript/ DVD of the sermon i preached on Tuesday to my prof. who wasn't even here. then i have to turn in my other paper at 4. ugh i really want to take a nap and just relax this afternoon, and both of my class are super boring and i just play games in them anyway, but i still have to be here!!

well at least there are only 8 more days of this stuff, and the weekend will be here at around 5:30.

julia

tuesday

So i had a crazy day yesterday, between trying to watch DWTS, the NCAA championship game, writing a sermon(while fretting about the preaching of said sermon) and getting back in the swing of things with being back in Durham.

So first off, DWTS (most important to me, sorry if you thought it would be b-ball) I thought everyone did well again last night and was proud of Evan for getting the highest score 'cause he's just such a cutie and so sweet!! it was really interesting keeping up with the scores because basically that was the only change in the line up from last week to this week. I know i'm a dork that keeps up with the scores and then line them up in order before the elimination round, but actually no one moved around from last week. I just finished up the results show, and i'm pretty glad that Buzz went home. I've been saying it for a while so i won't repeat it again, but i was really torn when it got down to Jake and him, because i just hate Jake so much! he's such a doofus!! Well we'll have to see what happens next week. I do want Kate to keep getting better and better, because i think this week was at least a step in the right way.

Next: Basketball!! watching the game last night was nailbiting!! i was so proud of both teams and they both worked so hard. They basically matched each other point for point the whole time and that last shot that didn't go in, my heart was in my throat!! It was crazy around campus today, just tons of Duke shirts on everywhere and everyone was so happy/excited about the whole thing. It was awesome.

Unfortunately i had a sermon to preach today so after the game i stayed up til 3 working on getting it all down and then got up early to finish stuff up this morning. NOT FUN!!! So i wound up preaching from an outline, and it went ok, not fun, and i was still a nervous wreck about it, but i survived. I thought it went pretty bad because i didn't stick to my outline very well and was just flying from the seat of my pants it felt like. The folks that gave me feedback were pretty complementary of the sermon itself and said that it was a lot better than the last one, but i still could have been less nervous and more confident of what i was saying.

So that's the update of my life since we got back from GA! I have 10 more school days left and now only 5 more assignments due before graduation. One of them is due thursday so then i'll have one sermon the last week of class and then just finals. Not too bad if you ask me, definitely hard to stay motivated, but since the countdown is getting lower and lower it's getting easier!

Ok guys/gals! Hope your tuesday was good too, we'll see how Wednesday goes!

Julia

great weekend!!

I had the best weekend!! We loved all our time with family and friends! i hope you guys had a great Easter weekend! There is too much that went on to discuss it all and i have a sermon due tomorrow that i still haven't started on!! so you'll have to just believe me that all was good even though i don't give you the play by play.

But basically we had a blast seeing all Audie's family and my roommates/husbands (their husbands, not that i have multiple ones!). We had a great easter, went to an easter egg hunt, and a birthday party and we also got to watch Duke win Saturday night! I'm so looking forward to watching the championship game tonight and i hope that Duke wins!

we also have to be excited about the fact that Audie is interviewing for a new job this week! His boss told him this morning that he's being considered for the assistant manager's position since the person who is doing it now is leaving. So he's going to interview this week and we should know sometime this week if he gets it or not. There are other people being considered so it's not a sure thing, we'll see what happens! and if he doesn't wind up getting the job it's ok because he loves his job now just fine, and if a person higher up than him gets that job then maybe he'd be promoted to their job, so there are lots of good things in the works. we'll see how things go, but be in prayer that he does well in his interview and that whatever happens will be ok!

Ok i have to get ready for my class! boo hoo, i hate school on Mondays!! I just wish it was Thursday again! Hope you have a great monday!

Julia

now it's all good!

So my friend and i hashed it out and we're all good. After a long conversation where both of us cried it out, we're ok and moving on towards a better relationship. It was a long time coming and it's alright now. Just thought i should give you an update since i was so dramatic earlier!

Julia

good and bad day

Ok so it's a good day because I'm now done with school until Monday!!! I have so much fun stuff planned to do this weekend and i'm so ready to go to GA tomorrow night!! i do have to write/ practice a sermon while i'm there so i can preach on Tuesday, but hopefully it will be ok and not too tough!

It's a bad day because a friend of mine and i got into an argument and i'm kind of frustrated by the whole thing. We kind of left things in a strange place, where both of us were upset and mad but we were chatting online so i asked her to have a further conversation about it in person because i didn't want to be misunderstood. I'm really nervous about it, because i'm just afraid that she's not going to want to be a good friend of mine anymore after our conversation, but probably it will take away some resentment and hurt feelings that have been building up over this situation. I think i just have to hope for the best and know that i have to just listen and care about her in all of this and be honest about how i feel because if i can't be honest with a person we shouldn't really be friends anyway, and if she doesn't want to work it out then she had that right, and i can't force her to work it out with me.

So just pray for now, i'm not sure when we're going to have our face to face convo, because audie and i are going out of town. but it needs to happen as soon as possible so that we can get this behind us and move on. I'm really worried about it, but i know that it has reached a breaking point with me and i can't really let it go any more. Ok also a good thing about today/tonight - we're having leftovers!! that might not be a good thing to most people, but that means i don't have to cook dinner!!!

Alrighty, hope you've had a good day today too, and here's hoping that all will be resolved sooner rather than later.

Julia

wow what a long day!

so last night's dancing with the star's was not all i had hoped for. Poor Kate and her sad dance! she was so frustrated with her inability to do it really well. I can totally empathize, it's so hard to be bad at something and know it, but still have to do it (especially in front of other people). That's how i feel about preaching! She needs to be more in character and try to lose the nerves. Nicole's dance was shockingly great and the judges thought so too!! i thought that Buzz still needed to go home! While i'm on the subject, can i say that i DO NOT like the new lady cohost Brooke Burke. I know she used to be on the show, but Natalie from last season was a lot better live, Brooke is all kind of scripted sounding, not good! I'm watching the results show already so we'll see what happens!

so today was a pretty long day of class, not too fun, but i'm so excited to get to have an extra day off this week that i can't wait to be done tomorrow. But today was the majority of my school week, so with it behind me i'm glad! i have my one class tomorrow but that won't be too bad and then i'm done! We're also having leftovers tomorrow night to clean out the fridge since we'll be on our trip this weekend.

IN other news: i ordered plane tickets for a trip that i'm going on this summer! I'm going to work a spiritual retreat back home and my sisters are working too! i found a great deal for plane tickets for the Wednesday before the weekend and then for the wednesday after it's over, so i'll get to see my family some in the midst of my visit too.

So now my thoughts on the results show: Buzz still should have gone home! I'm glad that people care for him and want him to be there, but really he's not a dancer and he could hurt himself pretty badly! I wasn't really shocked that Pamela was in the bottom two because i think people who watch Dancing with the Stars aren't exactly her fans. I think she just danced too sexy. The Ten/Len Commandments were not really funny, but cute. The Beach Boys performance was pretty good, but i knew that John Stamos was an original part of the group, and not just a special guest! Also i'm always pretty bored through the whole results show because i just want to know who is going home, and all the other stuff can just be left out half the time. But the Haiti dancer tribute was SO sweet and sad!! I was sad to see Shannon go, and of course i was glad that Kate got a second chance. I thought that Shannon did pretty good, she was so sweet with the relationship with her dad! i would have rather seen Pamela go, but we'll see what happens next week!!

ok folks, hope all is well with you and that you are as excited about Easter as I am!!

Julia

long day of nothing!

So today i went to another ministry workshop, but it wasn't nearly as helpful as the wedding one last week. This one was about SPRC's. Or Staff Parish Relations Committees for you folks that don't do Methodist Church stuff (though i'm pretty sure that all pastor's have something similar to deal with in their tradition) The lady that did the training is normally training SPRC's so it was kind of weird for her to talk to a room of future pastors. She would be a great lay training event for folks on the committee, but it was kind of not pertinent information for all of us.

After our workshop i had class and precept! I'm so not here this week because i'm so wanting to be on Easter break and in GA! we're leaving on Thursday night after Audie gets home from work, and we'll be in ATL until Sunday afternoon!! We'll be seeing good friends on Friday night/afternoon and spending Saturday at the church Easter egg hunt and then at our niece's birthday party. then we'll be spending Easter sunday at church of course!

Also we're excited because Audie did our taxes last night and we're getting a good refund! loving that for sure, and already planning what we'll spend it on!! ok i hope all of your mondays were at least as good as mine, even it wasn't too exciting!!

Julia

productivity!

This weekend Audie and I were very productive! Yesterday we had a ton of errands to do and so we went shopping at a million different stores. Audie bought some software at the Apple store. We were worried that they wouldn't give us the student discount on it, but they did so we saved like 1200 dollars!! really for real that was the discount we got!! i couldn't believe it! So we now are the proud owners of this super crazy professional adobe software that Audie needs to do art stuff. (he's working on a new project, a webcomic that he'll write/draw/produce/put on the internet himself! i'll get you the link when it goes online) Then we went to Target and got some basics, you know new socks, undershirts, deoterant, etc. It was then on to Michael's to get some stationary. I'm sending out graduation announcements in a few weeks and we were looking for some kind of plain wedding type invitation to print my own rather than spending a ton of money on them. we basically found some plain white cardstock that is precut and comes with envelopes for 100/ 15.00 so i thought that was a pretty good deal. (and with audie's new software they'll look really good once he's done with them!)

Also we went to Ross and found me an easter dress. I didn't really think i needed one, but i just decided to look just in case they had something cute/cheap. I tried on 4 and only one really looked great and it was a good price too, so i have a new dress, perfect for Easter next week and work in the long run. We also bought the cutest stuff for our niece's birthday! We're so excited to see our family and friends next week for Easter and her birthday party! Audie has friday off and i have thursday and Friday off this week so we're going to be able to drive down Thursday night. I loved what we got for her birthday ! (i would tell you what i got by my sister-in-law, AKA niece's mom reads this blog most of the time) we also made a stop by old Navy for me to look at some clothes for work! i got four tops appropriate for work that were all on sale!

Today I've wrapped my niece's present, put away laundry, done 3 loads of laundry and made lunch for Audie and I. Audie went and paid our rent, got the mail and did grocery shopping for the week (we only needed like 4 things, and i didn't want to get out of my pjs to go shopping today - which is why he went instead of me) so now we're all set for this week and ready to go to GA for the weekend!! so excited to see everyone! I know i already said that, but i really am!!

I hope you had a great weekend too!
Julia

i lied!!

ok i have to confess that i didn't correct people when they ate my cookies and said, "You made these, they are great!" I just smiled and said "thanks, they're easy!" BUT when my friend who i carpooled with asked for the recipe i fessed up, that they were pillsbury. I felt kind of bad, because most people there wouldn't have cared, but i didn't want to admit it anyway. I figured that since i did bake them that it's kind of the same. It's ok too because you guys know the truth!

i hope you all have a great weekend! we're going shopping tomorrow for a few things, mostly groceries and a birthday present for our cutie niece!! we'll see what we find.

Julia

Thursday is the new Friday

So since i don't have class on Friday, I love thursdays even more than ever! Thursday brings survivor (usually, it was rescheduled because of basketball this week) and Grey's Anatomy, and one of my new favs, the Marriage Ref. IT is really funny because it shows couples that have strange weird or just strange arguments that are at a stalemate. Then they come on the show and a panel of celebs discuss the different sides and the host makes a final call on who is the winner!! Too funny to see what other couples fight about. At the end of the show they all get a second honeymoon. I really want us to go on it, but Audie isn't willing to be on TV with me!! that could be the fight we submit to the show!!! or maybe not.

Anyway last night i was craving some good pasta so we went to Johnny Carino's! it was so good, and i got the all you can eat pasta/salad. No way a person can eat more than one serving of salad and their pasta, so i got some to go so that i can eat it for lunch today, yummy! I'm enjoying my day off so far by eating my yummy lunch and baking cookies! One of my classes is going on a field trip today and then having a potluck dinner and i'm taking oatmeal chocolate chip cookies! And i have a confession, i used store bought snap and bake cookie dough, you know, the kind where it's all done for you!! i baked them at home so i feel like that qualifies them as home baked cookies!! I'm a little afraid of judgement because this class is a class on food and faith and it's full of foodie folks who are all about organic, healthy food stuff. Not that it's bad to be that way, i'm just not, but the cookies were on sale and i'm not a good baker. so i figure i can deal with the judgment, but i'm not going to advertise that they are store bought. Don't judge me!!

ok yeah you can judge me i guess, but you're my friends i don't think you would hate me since you knew the cookies are store bought, and some folks in my class just might.

i'll let you know how it goes!

Julia

wednesday, ew!

I'm continuing my days of the week posts by talking about my wednesday! I have a love hate relationship with Wednesday because i have just the one class in the afternoon. I love it because i don't have to be gone all day in class but it's crappy because i have to get out of my pajamas to go to school. Well today i went and got gas in my car, because it had been a while, took the trash and got myself some lunch. Then i had to go to class, :(.

Overall a good day, quiet not too much to report. I never did a DWTS update, but basically i liked everyone except Buzz and Pam. I thought overall it was a good first week, some folks have some serious talent/ability! other folks not so much. Buzz, i love that you are 80 years old and doing something so outside your comfort zone, but you need to go home. It's cute to watch you dance/practice one week, but i'm not sure i can watch too much longer. Pamela- you looked like you were drunk/drugged the whole time (quite possible that she was i guess) and looked like you were about to get nekid with your partner on the dance floor. not cute, we'll see if you get better when you do the V. waltz next week, maybe it was the cha cha that was the problem. Kate, bless your heart, it wasn't good, but it wasn't awful for the first week, get better quickly and people will like you better, and i think that Toni is your partner will work for you, because people like him! Evan and Erin, i love you both and hope that you do good, and since you have some talent that might actually happen! everyone else, i have nothing really to say to you good or bad, we'll see how you grow on me or not!!

Ok those are my thoughts, what did you think if you watch?

Julia

Tuesday, best day so far!

Today was pretty much the best day this week! My 2:30 class was canceled and since my 4:00 class is pretty much crap, i decided to go home early and have an afternoon off. LOVING IT!! i slept for a whole 2 hours and made dinner! We just had chicken from the crockpot. They had whole chickens for $.47 a pound and so i did it in the crockpot all day and then we also had corn, salad and cresent rolls, so yummy! and I picked off the bones and made stock to make chicken and rice soup for tomorrow night. and Saturday we'll be having poppyseed chicken if there is extra leftovers. all super yummy!

Not much else is going down today, it's a down week because i'm in a lull in schoolwork for now because we just turned in midterms. not much to report but all is good. We found out that we will be moving in to our new place on the 1st of May! so excited about that too, because hopefully at the time i'll have finished all my schoolwork by then and I can relax and clean the whole apartment, then move in all our small stuff and then the weekend after graduation we can move all our big furniture and then i can have a few days to clean out our old apartment and then turn in our keys and be done with this place and on to our next one!! so excited about moving!!

Have a super de duper Wednesday!!

Julia

yay monday!

Ok Monday is not one of my favorite days of the week, but i'm glad for some things:

i went to a workshop today about performing wedding ceremonies! we had free lunch and learned so much! we even had a mini 'wedding' ceremony to practice rehearsals! We also learned what is necessary for marriages to be legal, and what three reasons you can't marry a couple (they are already married to someone, they are related, or they are not of sound mind (i.e. they don't know why they are doing it, and are being forced into it) We also talked about what to do in emergencies, how do give premarital counseling and how to follow up with couples that we have married! It was so exciting to think about! Any takers? Anyone want me to do your wedding??

The other thing i am excited about is Dancing with the Stars, hopefully i can give a recap tomorrow and we can talk about what we thought! I am watching it right now and i'm loving it so far! Can't wait to see who goes home!

Julia

Update:

We sat right behind home plate, got free tickets, i ate a hotdog!! and then we lost by only one run!! It was exciting right up to the last pitch though which made it a great game, NOW i have to get going on some homework!!


Julia

This weekend's recap

So Friday night was awesome! My good friends up in NC gathered together at a danny and amber's house and then went and ate Cajun food at this local place: Papa Mojo's Way yummy! they had live music that night too, but we didn't stay because it was a cover charge and we weren't really ready for that, plus it was really loud, not good conversation music. Then we went back to danny and amber's house and ate birthday cake because we were celebrating folks' birthdays!

Saturday Audie went and gave official notice to our apartment people as to when we'd be moving out! Monday we find out for sure when we'll be moving in to our new place, but we know we have to be out of our current place by the 31st of May!! I'm so ready to move to a new place, it's so much better/closer to Audie's work/cleaner/ the people are nicer!!

Last night we got a call from danny and Amber (we hang out with them a lot because they are a couple where Audie and I get along with both of them, and they live really close to us) we all went to eat Chinese together and then walked around Target for a while, you know i could do that all day! We also made plans with them today to go see a Duke baseball game, I'm really excited about eating a hotdog for lunch! the tickets are apparently 5 buck a piece for duke empolyees/students. And Danny and Amber said that they didn't check ids at the gate, so we're hoping to just spend the 10 bucks. then it's just sit wherever you want, and they place at the durham bulls stadium, which is a great location! We're pretty excited!

Gotta go for now, see ya later! Hope you had as great a weekend as I did!

Julia

Hypochondriac!

OK so i'm a huge hypochondriac, i'm all about WedMding something to figure out what i have, but usually when I complain to Audie he tells me to go to the Dr. Good advice i guess but it's hard to make time to get there. So when Audie called me to say hi on his lunch break today i was telling him how weird I felt. (i didn't take my BC yesterday on Accident, and all last week i felt strange because i was doing the inactive-sugar- pills and it always makes me feel really strange when i do either) So he was like, go to the dr. or stop complaining.

So i called student health and they had an open appointment (very rare, usually it's a two week wait if its not an emergency) so i went in at 3:50. So the dr. tested my blood for some stuff, (including being pregnant - thanks for the worry Amber! it came back negative by the way) They asked a ton of questions and were really helpful, but didn't really know much to tell me. So i have a referral to go see a Birth Control Specialist at the Real dr.( i mean not student health, i know they are real too, but you know what i mean) so i'm supposed to get a call to tell me when i can come in (i hope next week) and we'll see if she has a suggestion for what i should do.

i'll keep you updated on what's up, i guess it could be a TMI, but this blog is about my life and processing my thoughts, so that's what i'll talk about if i want to. Don't worry i won't give you the gory details.

Tonight very excited about going out with some awesome friends tonight to celebrate two of their birthdays at a Cajun restaurant around here.

Julia

What is wrong with me??

I am a night person, i always have been. When i was in elementary school i would hide books under my bed and then read them under the covers until midnight (very late for a 8-10 year old) And now, while i don't usually stay up really late anymore it doesn't bother me to stay up late if i know i can sleep in the morning. I don't do well when i don't sleep for at least 7-8 hours, but i can't make myself go to bed early, so i wind up making sure i don't have to be anywhere too early and i go to bed around midnight (many times i still don't go to sleep right away).

The last two nights, right after dinner i was exhausted!! I almost fell asleep right on the couch while watching TV, so audie made me go up and get in the bed each time, i went to bed. Wednesday night i went to sleep at 10 and last night i was asleep by 9!! what is wrong with me, i don't feel bad or weird just extra sleepy!!

Julia

i missed you guys!

So the last two nights i have not slept AT all, well i snoozed for a few hours early in the morning. Monday night i went to be at 2 because of my midterm, last night my mind was just going a mile a minute until 2. I realized, it might have been because i didn't blog yesterday at all.

Blogging is just a great way for me to get my thoughts out there for so many things. today i had a meeting with my preaching professor to discuss my last sermon. I had to be at school at 9:30 for the meeting and i was pretty worried about it. it wound up being pretty good, though she wants me to start preaching from an outline alone and not a manuscript. we'll see how that goes when i preach in a week or two, but it kind of freaks me out, but i know that her comments were right on. I hope that it will free me up to be myself in preaching and not be tied to a script.

I also today had to deal with a bunch of stupid drama with out apartment complex. I am pretty peeved at them, and i'm ready to move like whoa!! we did get approved by our new place and they have the apartment we liked that is going to be ready in our time frame. SO we're all set to move sometime in May!!

alrighty gotta go, i'm starved for dinner tonight for some reason!

Julia

I interrupt this broadcast...

well it's not a broadcast, but i interrupt this midterm writing session to tell you that we are putting in our application for the new apartment!! I talked to the lady today and they are having a special where you get 2 months free (spread out over the 12 month lease, so basically we're getting an apartment for $713 a month that would normally cost $885.) if you move in by May 31st so I told her we'd be sending in our application and if they approve us to live there (why wouldn't they, we're great neighbors!) and I told her that we could move in any time in May! We're going to probably break our lease at our current place a little early so that we don't have to wind up paying more in the long run. We'll have to pay a one month's rent penalty, but if we stay for the rest of our lease we have to pay for a month of rent for June and almost 100 dollars in rent for six days in July! so we decided we would rather move sooner than later to capitalize on the offer. Here is the floor plan:




It's got two bedrooms and two and 1/2 baths, which is an upgrade for us of a whole bathroom. The community also has a pool and fitness center which will be nice and they have community activities, like a block party, yard sale, easter egg hunt and stuff. i've got to get back to writing! Two questions down, and i have outlines for the other tow already. Now i just have to fill them in!

TTFN!

Julia

finally!!

I'm done with one midterm, and i've decided i'm staying home from school tomorrow to finish the second one, which i know is probably counter productive, but there is no way i can write 16-20 more pages without working all day. I just emailed in the midterm i've been working on all weekend and it was in total 28 pages! why do my professors think that this is how i want to spend my spring break!! I hope you have a great week and you get everything done that you need to get done!! i hope i do too!

Julia

still working!

i'm stopping working on my midterms briefly to say that i'm still alive, but i'm still working on this stupid work!!! i will be so glad when May comes along and i have a whole summer to do what i want to do! i'm thinking i'm going to be doing a good amount of work to try and get this stuff done so that it's done on time!!

ok guys,

Julia

we found an apartment!!

Today we went and looked at 5 more places to live. i won't go into the whole process now because i have midterms to get to! too many things left to write before i get to school on Monday!! I'm still only 1/2 way through with my first one! but i have until Tuesday afternoon to finish the second one and i can work over lunch that day. So i think i'll get it all done.

BUT we did find a good place today! good price, good location, good neighborhood, good amount of space and it will be about a 5-10 minute commute for both of us! we spend all day out looking for places, but one of the places when we got there we decided not to go for our appointment at 2. We didn't have an appointment with this other one, so we just stopped by and loved it!! then we had like 2 hours to kill before our next place. so we went to this shopping area and went to TJ Maxx! i love that store! I got a purse, big and green, lovely! and a pair of shoes, and two pairs of 'no-socks' for like 60 dollars! the purse was regularly 95 from Liz Claiborne so i think i got a great deal! It's very work appropriate, and cute! the shoes are comfy and will be great on those 24 hour on calls. The 'no-socks' are like those little tan socks that you can wear with dress shoes and you can't see them, but they keep you from getting blisters! i love them so far. i got a pair in black and tan!

Ok more on everything later! i have to get working!! ew gross i hate schoolwork!!

Julia

not so productive

Ok i have to admit that i didn't work as diligently as i should have today, i haven't yet finished even one question on these horrendous midterms!! but i did finish Harry Potter 7 so now there is nothing to distract me tomorrow, well not really because i may just start the series over!!

I hope you got all you wanted to get done today!!

Julia

Today is finally productive!

Since i have SO much homework to do this week before school starts back i decided that i needed to get going on some homework. I finished Harry Potter 6 last night and so today i started a good system of getting motivated. For every chapter or section that i read for school i get to read one chapter in Harry Potter 7! i hope to be all read up to schedule and ready to start to plan and write my midterms starting tomorrow. We'll see because right now i have 7 more things to read before i can start that project. i think i'll have a similar system of rewards for my writing. Like i think for every question/answer i write a full outline for i get to read another chapter, or when i have written 4 pages i get another chapater!

We'll see if that keeps things moving so that i can write the answers to 7 midterm questions that will total about 50 pages of written answers. Boo on midterms!!

Well i have to get on with making dinner and doing other stuff in the small break i'm giving myself to make and eat dinner. Nothing spectacular tonight, just a salad and beef stroganoff hamburger helper!

i hope you enjoy your wednesday!!

Julia

not much to report

Well today i got up to go to have coffee with a friend but she had something come up and so i wound up spending the whole day at home chilling out. I went and got a package from the post office, and one was delivered to the house. The one that was delivered was our plates from our paint your own pottery trip! they turned out really well!

This is Mine:



And here is Audie's: (showoff!)



Other than that i didn't have anything exciting happen today!! sorry not to have more to report, but that's all i did, except for reading more of Harry Potter 6 i have almost finished it in 2 days, which is awesome, but does nothing to finish those two big midterms that are staring at me!! tomorrow i'll start for sure!

ok have a great night guys!

Julia

spring break day one

so this spring break i have a TON of work to do, including two take home midterms that are 30 and 20 pages each, NOT fun!! so what did i do the first day of spring break?

-investigated 12 different apartments online and by calling for more information. most were shot down completely for being too expensive, or not big enough. Two were shot down because they were income restricted and we make too much money to live there. two are in the area that we really liked on saturday. and we have four appointments for this saturday. Some of them as so great and have really great deals right now!! I want to move in tomorrow for sure! i know that we can't really move until our lease it up here, if we do break our lease it's a penalty of like 600 bucks! so we'll be waiting, and hoping that they have great deals in May/June!

-i have done or will do 5 loads of laundry before the day is over. I love to do laundry, it's actually one of my favorite chores around the house. i like to wait and do it all in one day though, and that makes it a big chore, but it doesn't make sense to do it until i have a full load of colors, whites and darks, and audie and i just don't have enough clothes to do that. when i was little my mom did laundry once a week too unless she had to so i guess that's where i get it from. i usually do clothes about every 2-3 weeks, and it has been nearly a month since i last did laundry, we were scraping the bottom of the clothes pile!! i actually wore a cotton dress, tights and a cardigan apartment hunting and babysitting saturday because i was so out of clothes! you know that the only excuse i can give for dressing up, no clean clothes!

- i made dinner for my hubby and me! I am making steamed peas (one of those frozen steamer bags of veggies. they were on sale and i had a coupon, so i bought three different kinds) Mac and Cheese, my mom's yummy baked kind, and BBQ pork loin. all i do is marinate them in our favorite BBQ sauce and then pour some more on top and bake them for 30 minutes or so, easy peasy!! also i might have some cresent rolls or something!

- i also read for a good well, no not stupid school reading, but Harry Potter 6! ok yeah i should be getting on to doing those big homework assignments but i just couldn't today!

i hope you enjoyed your day as much as mine was!

Julia

more apartments!!

so we went over to raleigh yesterday and looked at two apartments. well actually not so much! one we found by the GPS and parked only to find that it was closed for a little bit. i think the folks in the office were off showing an apartment or something, but as we sat there looking around we thought that the neighborhood wasn't exactly where we wanted to live. plus it was kind of a long way from the hospital i'll be working at. So we decided to go on and try the next one.

The second one looked really nice online and it was in a good location/neighborhood, but they didn't have any apartments to show us because they were all full. So they said to call them closer to the time when we wanted to move in and they would see if they had something available. So we went on back to Durham and hung out and then i went and babysat for the evening. had a great time chilling out because the girl i was babysitting went to bed at like 7:15 and then i just watched TV until the parents came home. I didn't watch the duke/unc game, but i hear it was good, and as i was coming back home i saw tons of smoke coming from campus, and i figured that we won! If that doesn't make sense you should read Danielle's blog today about what this tradition is all about.

Today Audie and i went to Raleigh to see more apartments. We stopped by one that was closed today, but we gps'd it to see how far away it was from work and decided to keep it on our list, and go back next saturday to see it. We went to the next place only to discover it was WAY to far away for my commute and it was out of our price range anyway, so we didn't even get out to see it. Then we made our way to the third place, and we thought it was way too small, but as we went back to our house we figured out that we loved the area it was in, it was set out away from all the major roadways but close enough to a lot of good stores and yummy restaurants. So while we will probably not live at that place, but we're going to look at some others along that area, i'm pretty excited about the places we found online when we got back home today!

so our search is over for now, we have crossed three off our list and are still finding some great places that we want to look at next weekend or beyond! I'll keep you updated. OH and Amber asked what the program was that Audie downloaded so i'm going to give you the information. it's called Sweet Home 3D and it's really cool! you can even make things all different colors and try out different looks and stuff. I hope you guys can play with it and have fun working on your own interior design stuff!!

Overall we had a great weekend, i loved not doing any homework and finding some good stuff out about the apartment situation. hope your weekend was just as great!

Julia

New apartments!

Since it is spring break and audie had yesterday off of work (he's working today until 2) we decided to go to Raleigh and look at some new apartments. We didn't have a lot of time because i babysat until 3:30, but we have an appointment at one place at 4:30 yesterday. We loved to look at the model apartments and see how awesome it would be to move!! So our current lease is up July 6th so we're hoping to move into our new place at the latest on July 1st. But we have to find a new place first. So we're looking for a place in the middle of the area of Raleigh that we'll both be working in next year. our jobs are about 20 minutes apart, so we're hoping for each of us to have only a 10 minutes commute or so. We looked online and found 8 places that fit our budget and seem to be in the right place.

So we went and saw the first place, it was kind of pricey. right now it is on special and that's the only reason it's in our price range. but they don't have any two bedrooms available, which is what we really want. So we don't know if in June when we'll probably move in if it will still be in our price range or if they will have things available. But the lady encouraged us to keep in contact and in Mid May if we contacted them then we could know for sure. Also she told us that they require 30 days notice before moving in, so we have to sign a lease 30 days in advance before we can move in. The apartment we saw was awesome!! Right now we live in a townhouse, and so it was weird to think about living in a regular apartment with neighbors upstairs and down. But it was really, REALLY nice. the bathrooms were huge, and it had really big closets. it had more square footage than we have now and 2 full bedrooms and bathrooms. right now we only have 1.5 bathrooms. it would be very nice to have two so that guests could have their own bathroom.

We were a little worried about how our furniture would fit or not. thought it is a bit bigger than ours, but the dining room was a good bit smaller, and i couldn't tell if the bedrooms were larger or not. So audie went online and downloaded this program to his computer where you can make floor plans and put little furniture in it!! it is so cool!! we can totally make our own little apartment and move around the furniture so that we know where to put our stuff when we get there!! i'm so excited about all the possibilities! I hope we can print out the floorplans so we can compare them and stuff, which i think we can.

So after looking at that first place the other places were closed, but there was one place that isn't open at all on the weekend, which i thought was strange, but that means we don't have the ability to go see them at all for now. But we drove out to see it anyway, to see if we should even concerned about not being able to see it. SO we decided that it was too far away from my work to bother with for now. I was disappointed a bit because it was a duplex, and it was in a neighborhood, like a real house!!! i want a real house really badly, but it was higher on the price range scale and it was too far outside the commute that we want. so we crossed it off the list for sure!!

Ok guys got to go for now so that i can get ready to meet audie, i'm babysitting again tonight so we have to see two apartments before i have to be there.

Really?

Ok professor, class is supposed to be over at 5:15!! Can you please get it together to stop your pointless rambling in time for me to go home! Especially since as soon as you are finished i will be able to stay at my house for a full week of spring break! AND the people in my class are rambling on too, they continue to offer comments and questions even though we have already gone past time!

Also, another professor presented us with our take home midterm today. It's supposed to be done over break and turned in next week. Today was the first we have seen of it. And we are told that it should be 16-20 pages after we have answered the 4 questions!! REALLY?? because that is a bit long for a midterm first of all, and I already have a 30 page midterm to do as well. I'm going to be writing 50 pages in this week? It took me a whole semester to write my senior project in undergrad, a total of 34 pages! Really??

Thank God that i didn't have other plans for spring break, i mean i didn't want to relax and enjoy the only time off i get all semester! and i certainly didn't want to see my friends or husband who i don't get to see as much as i would like!

ok that was my rant for the day, and i really do not mind being a student, and God has called me to this but, really??

Julia

and i didn't skip class today!

I have a bad habit! the last two wednesdays i have skipped my class because it drives me crazy and gets on my nerves. I have just one class on wednesday and it's in the afternoon. I thought i would love this schedule, but it is not that fun. mostly because i dislike this class. My professor sends out notes for us a day in advance, and it's word for word what he says in class. really!! so sitting there and following the notes is kind of boring! so i wind up sitting there and reading blogs, playing games online and updating facebook. not a bad way to spend an hour and fifteen minutes. But see the issue is that it's the only reason i have all day for getting out of my pajamas and leaving the house. So i usually have to be dragged to school on Wednesdays. But today i went because i figured we have spring break beginning after i'm done with class tomorrow.

I also had a take home midterm to do today! it got sent out yesterday and we had to do it whenever we wanted to but we could only spend and hour and fifteen minutes working on it. it's not due until friday afternoon, but i went ahead and did it so i could take it to school with me tomorrow!! it feels good to get it out of the way! now the next assignments i have due are for after spring break! so i have a whole week off to get things done. i need to work really hard to get them out of the way so that i can go camping with some friends next weekend, but i think i can do it. we'll see anyway! i basically have 2 other take-home exams to finish, and one of them is 30 pages or so! NOT cool, but i'm going to work hard to get them out of the way!

ok hope you are having as productive a wednesday as i am, because not only did i finish a midterm, i also made spaghetti for dinner, did dishes and made sweet tea. i know i'm up for wife of the year next week!

so bye for now!

Julia

so tired, must last until Thursday evening...

today is Tuesday and i have two full days until spring break begins. i have been totally worn out this week. I think it was because of how awesome our weekend off was, because i am not motivated to get anything done. I had a paper due today and i totally reworked an old paper so that i didn't have to do it from scratch.

Tonight we made frozen pizza, and caught up on the DVR. There are very few shows that i watch and Audie enjoys (see yesterdays discussion if you need proof of my TV tastes and why Audie is not a fan) But one show that we do watch is Chuck, a funny show about a spy (or accidental spy). It's great TV, and we DVR it on Monday night and watch it on Tuesday because there is a lot that we watch on Mondays. We also are watching the gold medal game from Hockey. I know the whole olympics are over, but i still have some stuff on the DVR. But unfortunately i found out the results Sunday. Audie specifically wanted to watch this game and told me not to delete it. so i kept it and we decided to watch it tonight.

Well a combination of a game that i already know the final score, and my tiredness i just took an hour nap on the couch during the game, and now i just want to go to bed. But am i better off for napping instead of killing myself to finish my reading for this week? most definitely!! I figure if you are tired enough to sleep with a hockey game going on in your living room you need the rest!

ok i hope you all are doing better than me, but i'm happy to have two days until spring break, a forecast of snow for tonight that won't be a big deal hopefully and only 25 more days of class for me!!

Julia