2010: A Summary

What a year... Whew... I'm happily exhausted just thinking about it. Let's review, shall we?

January 
Daryl flies back to Nashville to resume coursework. This marks our 5th month of living apart since September.  Boo.

I fly back to New Jersey to start my final semester of classes at Princeton Seminary.

I start rehearsals for "A Caucasian Chalk Circle," the spring seminary play where I am cast as (yay!) Grusha, the resourceful peasant mother. One of my best friends is cast as Natella, the evil villainess, and we enjoy verbal sparring on our rides to and from practice.

February
I watch my friend Jinelle skate to Olympic silver with the U.S. Women's Hockey Team. Since the seminary doesn't get the channel, we watch from a nearby Mexican restaurant...

Daryl and I celebrate Valentine's Day apart by cooking the same meal and having a Skype dinner date. Not the real in-person thing, but still pretty good.

After noticing that there are few church jobs in the Nashville area, I apply to the Nashville CPE (Clinical Pastoral Education) partnership as a chaplain. I anxiously await word back.

March
We welcomed our new niece, Sophia Joy, into the family! She was, and still remains, the cutest baby EVER. (Besides our other niece, Aleah, of course!)

I have my final review at the Presbytery of Chicago where they officially certify me as ready for ordination in the PC(USA)!

Daryl and I travel (together!) to California for spring break where we visit his family and lots of friends. We also eat at In n' Out Burger about nine times. In one week. Yum.

I hear back that the Nashville CPE partnership would like to interview me. I interview, and a couple of weeks later in...

April
...I hear back that I've been accepted as a chaplain resident at Alive Hospice in Nashville. Daryl and I both breathe a sigh of vocational and financial relief.

I performed in "A Caucasian Chalk Circle" at the seminary. After performance #1 I lost my voice for several anxious hours. Lots of tea with lemon (prescribed by the director), lots of prayer (my addition), and it came back by showtime the following night. Phew.

May
Daryl and I slogged through finals and were rewarded at the end... with one another. The long-distance marriage was over! Hooray!

My parents treated us to a cruise to Mexico. All the gluten free food I could eat, delicious sun, and lots of napping. It was A-MAZ-ING.

We returned to Princeton for my graduation! All done, seminary!

We packed up all of our belongings, and with the help of my parents, loaded them into a storage POD that was sent to await our arrival in Nashville.

June
We headed north to Wisconsin to spend much of the summer with my family resting, reading, and relaxing. A wonderful  reward after nine months living apart from one another, three years of seminary, three part-time jobs, and a whole lot else...

July
We trekked to Nashville to pick out a new home and found the townhouse of our dreams. Less than two miles from Vanderbilt for Daryl, less than two miles from the hospital where I'd be working, and within our price range. We signed the lease the very next day.

August
We travel to Michigan for a week-long family reunion with my dad's side of the family. There are games. There is food. It is awesome.

We move in  to our new home in Nashville, after waving goodbye to our wonderful family in Wisconsin. After hauling in box after box in 105 degree heat, we both agree: this is the LAST move we are ever doing ourselves. Next time (which we think will be years and years down the road), we're hiring movers.

I begin work at Alive Hospice on my birthday, August 30th. Lots of orientation, lots of preparation, lots of great people.

September
Daryl begins his second and final year of coursework at Vanderbilt.

We travel to Asheville, NC with some dear friends to visit Posana's Cafe, an all-gluten free restaurant. It is worth every mile.

We head back to Wisconsin to watch two other dear friends tie the knot in an outdoor ceremony on a beautiful lake. Then we dance all night.

Daryl travels to Oxford to deliver a paper at a conference. He visits all of our old haunts, even eating one of "Ben's Cookies" for me at the covered market.

I receive a semi-cryptic email from a church in Wisconsin asking me if I'd be willing to move to Wisconsin... I respond in the affirmative... They interview me over Skype and we immediately hit it off.

October
The church flies me up for a weekend interview. It goes wonderfully, and at the end of the weekend they extend the call to me! Daryl and I take a week to pray about it and feel nothing but confirmation. I call them back with the news - it's official (though not yet Facebook-public, as I still need to be examined by the Presbytery)!

Daryl's dad and step-mom visit, and we hit up the Frist Museum and the best Predator's game of the year.

My mom and dad visit and we visit an outdoor Chihuly exhibit and explore Nashville and Dad teaches me to make the best gluten free cookies ever.

November
I meet with the PC(USA)'s Company of New Pastors at their conference in Nashville. We spend hours talking and learning about prayer and how to incorporate Scripture into worship in different ways.

We eat the world's best Thanksgiving dinner with some dear (and gluten free!) friends in Nashville. I can still taste that cornbread stuffing.

Friends from Michigan come to visit us and we play board games for hours and hours.

I finish my final day of CPE and say goodbye to some wonderful patients, staff, and fellow chaplains.

Daryl surprises me with tickets to a Ben Folds concert after my last day of work. I sit, enraptured, listening to one of my favorites perform.

I fly up to the Wisconsin for the congregational vote and Presbytery examination. Both go well and now it is officially official - in January I will start my tenure as pastor of 1st Presbyterian!

December
Daryl finishes his coursework after a grueling two weeks of final exams. Cough drops, coffee, and meals I cook and set in front of him get him through.

Back to Eagle River, Wisconsin for a white Christmas at home with my family. Restful, fun, and full of delicious food.

Down to Nashville to pack up a few suitcases and await the arrival of movers who will take all of our worldly goods north to Wisconsin where we will move into the church's historic and very beautiful manse (parsonage).

Which brings us to New Year's Eve, where we'll say goodbye to Nashville and ring in the new year with some dear friends and a pile of gluten free goodies.

Whew... What a 2010! What will 2011 bring? I can hardly wait to find out... New Year's plans coming soon!

I Loved this Summer: Part 2

Part two of a wonderful summer begins in July. We celebrated Daryl's birthday in Wisconsin with gf German chocolate cake... Yum, yum, yum... I'm thankful to have a husband who was more than willing to let me bake him a gf cake so that I could share in the gluttony. He proclaimed it, "Just as good as a glutenous cake, and maybe even better. The frosting was definitely better!"

I discovered that making German chocolate cake frosting from scratch is pretty easy, but it's a bit horrifying what is in it. It is not good for you. But, birthdays are birthdays, and it was well worth all the butter and egg yolks for the amazing taste.

Aleah helped me do P90X. She was pretty awesome at it. She actually figured out the yoga positions and would do downward dog and upward dog before the fitness guy told her to do them. She's going to be quite the athlete!

Caitlyn was convinced that the water reserve tray for Daryl's coffee-maker birthday present was actually a giant remote control...

Daryl decided that we are probably not ready to have kids for awhile... (This is my favorite photo of the whole summer. You just can't beat these two facial expressions and matching outfits!)

We went to St. Joseph, Michigan, to visit our wonderful friends, and rode a bicycle surrey with a fringe on top. During our visit, Daniel (backseat) proposed to Megan (pink shirt) and she said YES! It's the first proposal I've ever been a part of (besides saying yes when Daryl asked, of course), and it was a wonderful and joyful day.

We had a great family reunion in Michigan (notice how many girls are in our family!). People came from as far as Pennsylvania for the annual event.

Sophie discovered her feet.

Aleah curled her... eyelashes?

We played about eight hundred games of mafia with the cousin crew (and I actually won one!)...

We saw the Cubs lose to the Cardinals on one of the windiest, hottest, rainiest days of the year. My knee-length skirt kept blowing up around my waist, so I actually had to change into some shorts I had in my backpack from staying at a friends' house the night before... I was never so grateful to have a backpack full of trip stuff. Came in verrrry handy.

We moved in to Nashville! This is a perfect picture of how randomly we packed some of the boxes. On top of those two boxes are the following: a three-hole punch, lavender soap from Trader Joe's, a makeup bag, one white heeled sandal, a small box of checkers, a handmade table runner (thanks, Caitlyn!), and six Christmas candle holders. What do these things have in common? Absolutely nothing.

And dear Eliot helped us unpack.

It was a good, good summer indeed. I'm sad to see it go!

I Loved this Summer: Part 1

Well, the new academic year is upon us. Daryl heads back to school on Monday. I start work the following Monday. I'm grieving the end of an incredible summer. Does it really have to end? Below are some of the promised pictures from a really wonderful and blessed time with family and friends in states across the country. I wish it never had to end...

We hung out at my parents' lake in Wisconsin and swam, swam, swam.

We visited Bayfield, Wisconsin, on wild Lake Superior with all its natural beauty.

We celebrated our friends Daniel and Emily's wedding with a post-wedding reception in northern Wisconsin. This is a photo of our old homeschooled group of friends. Sigh... Everyone's so grown up now!

I read books to my four-month old (and ridiculously adorable) niece, Sophie.

The girls had days out on the town.

My niece Aleah helped me put on some makeup for date night.

Sophie bonded with her great-grandpa.

Aleah wanted more brownies...

We visited the soon-to-be-married Mike and Tonia up in Duluth.

We saw Split Rock lighthouse on Lake Superior.

I wore my Chacos pretty much every day (and now have a rockin' sandal tan).

Daryl and Dad grilled in a downpour. That's dedication!

Mom and I did some great flea market shopping.

The rest? To be continued (including my very favorite photo of the whole summer!)...

Ouch. My ____ Hurts!

I have been seriously out of shape for the past three years.

That's not a sentence I thought I'd ever write. Growing up I played ice hockey and soccer and ran track. I was always in shape.

In college I rock climbed four or five days a week. I had shoulder muscles on my shoulder muscles. I had triceps on my triceps. I could do (wait for it... wait for it...) NINE pull-ups in a row. It was rad.

But then I went to graduate school and spent all my time hunched over my laptop writing papers. The time I had where I wasn't hunched over my laptop writing papers I was either working dozens of hours at an internship, teaching classes at a local university, working as a teaching assistant at the seminary, or (most often) all three. After days like those I would be lucky if I could cook dinner before I collapse onto the couch to do the next day's reading.

I learned a heckuvalot, but I sure didn't exercise.

By this point in the post, if you don't know me personally, you're probably picturing a giant, flabby person. That's the thing, though - I haven't really gained any weight. This is good and bad. Good because I still fit in my clothes, but bad because I had no real incentive to get back in shape. Why bother?

Well, now is the time. This summer I've spent time with family in northern Wisconsin and I have decided - nay, vowed - to get back in shape. No matter what. At any cost. My rationale is this: if I can't exercise now, with no real time commitments, I will never exercise again.

Fifteen days ago, I began ninety days of insanity.

I began P90X.

P90X is basically a 90-day boot camp to get in great shape. It's a big infomercial seller, but my parents had the good fortune to find it at a local thrift store for $20.00, so I'm doing it for free right now. You exercise for between an hour and an hour and a half six days a week at intense levels. You work out your arms, legs, abs, and cardio. You push yourself to the point of wanting to throw up. It's insanity, I tell you!

After two weeks, my everything hurts. On the upside, I am beginning to see a bit of toning in my arms, legs, and abs. And I'm sleeping better than I have in years. I mean, like the dead, sleeping. It's glorious.

Daryl's doing it with me. It's hard. It's glorious. It's necessary. It's time.

We'll keep you posted.

Apartment Hunting

Daryl and I are in search of a new home. One that is not in New Jersey (woot!). One that is close both to his school and to the hospital where I'll be working.

I have an utter love/hate relationship with apartment/house hunting.

One the one hand, I love it. It's exciting to dream and explore, to decide what is most important to us for the next phase of life, to plan on making a home home. I get excited about how we'll arrange things, what spots the cats will find in which to snuggle up, what our view will look like.

One the other hand, it can be very discouraging. I found one apartment complex I loved (seemingly safe, affordable, close to what we need it to be close to, with nice floor plans) and then read some reviews.

"I loved living here, until the shooting."

Eep.

Others warn of brown recluse infestations. Um, excuse me? If I see one poisonous spider, we are moving OUT. Is that just an innocent northern thing to say? (Probably).

Another review of a hopeful place: "Live here if you love mold!"

Yuck.

As two-former (and one current) grad. students, we don't have an unlimited budget, which, of course, limits us from just plunking down our Black AmEx card at the Grand Hotel and asking for room service. We don't need anything fancy, just a place to call home. Preferably one where we can paint the walls and decorate it to look like home (and not like an institution, as our previous white-walled seminary apartment could look at times). I would also like to do laundry in my own apartment, not in a mold-infested basement as I have been doing for the past three years. When Daryl and I moved out in May most of the stuff in our basement storage unit was moldy and needed to be thrown in the trash. And I did my laundry down there for three years. SO gross. Though I may be willing to budge on having our own washer and dryer and just use a community laundry room if it is not infested with mold. Maybe.

One of the trickiest parts of this process is that we're up in Wisconsin right now, hanging with family, so we can't easily drive by and check places out. We're planning a foray down to Nash-Vegas in a couple of weeks to see places in person, though. That seems to be the only way to know for sure if a place is truly livable.

Top three things I want in an apartment or rental home?

1. Safety. I want to be able to walk from the car to the apartment at midnight without looking over my shoulder and/or running.
2. A guest room for friends.
3. No poisonous insects/spiders/pests. I don't mind the occasional bout of ants or ladybugs (I grew up in the woods!), but I draw the line at things that could actually make me, my dear husband, or one of my cats lose an appendage and/or die.

Daryl's top three:

1. Light. Lots and lots of light. (He's from California. He can't help himself.)
2. Something newer or cute and vintage.
3. Something affordable so that we can pay off loans/save some money.

Any other things we should put on at the top of our lists? Anyone have a beautiful, new, insect-free, place we should take a look at, or an apartment complex in Nashville that they've loved? Class? Class? Bueller?

Graduation

In all the hubbub of final exams, traveling, and packing to move, I almost forgot what a momentous occasion this May was. I graduated! I guess that is kind of a big deal.

Princeton Seminary's graduation takes place in the University Chapel, which is beautiful and historic and almost British in feel. Daryl, my parents, and my grandparents were there to cheer me on, which meant a great deal. On Friday we packed and packed, and on Saturday I had an awards' breakfast and then a long walk up do get my diploma.

The breakfast:

The chapel, before and after:

The family:

Some of my favorite professors in the entire world (sadly, I couldn't catch a few of them after graduation, and some of them are on sabbatical and hence, weren't there):

The friends:

Company of New Pastors folk (a program for PCUSA ministers or ministers-in-training):

The guy who got me through it all, and sacrificed his first PhD acceptance in order to follow me to seminary:

I did it! Woo hoo!