Sunday, September 27, 2015

Jeremy's New Job!!!!!!

This week brought some really exciting news for our family, it has been several weeks in the making, but I have learned (especially when it comes to the job hunt) not to count my chickens before they hatch.  Thankfully this week the chickens did hatch and Jeremy started his new jobs as an attorney for a downtown firm called McCarthy and Holthus.  They are a large multi-state (7 to be exact) firm.  They represent financial institutions in bankruptcies and foreclosures and he was hired into their bankruptcy department.  The road to securing the job was kind of a crazy one with initial interview here and then a series of interviews in San Diego, including an interview with one of the founding partners, Mr. Holthus.  In the end, he did get the job and started this past Monday.

So far, by all indications, this is the job we have been hoping, praying, looking for and one that finally validates our decision to go to law school.  From my perspective it has been really fun to hear about Jeremy's new office, getting his name on the letterhead, and gaining autonomy as an attorney with all that goes with that.  I made a comment at one point this week, when he was telling me about some new perk of his job, that it must feel really nice to finally be treated like a real person with something to contribute, rather than just a cog in the machine.

We are all so proud of Jeremy.  He had worked so hard for this and deserves it more than anyone I know.  I know this is just the beginning of a really great career.

 

Sunday, September 20, 2015

Footgolf

I will be the first to admit that I don't do many things right as a wife and mother.  Father's Day this year was as a good example of this.  I struggled and struggled with what to get Jeremy and then ultimately decided on a session of footgolf, it is like regular golf but you play with a soccer ball, your foot, and bigger holes of course.  When Jeremy opened the gift I could tell he was not quite sure what to think of it and so after Father's Day it sat and sat.

This week we thought of it and decided to pull it out and check on the expiration date of the certificate.  Turns out it expired that coming Saturday (yesterday).  Again, I nearly dropped the proverbial ball by letting it expire, but we decided to arrange our Saturday to make it happen before it was too late.

Saturday the stars aligned.  The weather was beautiful, the golf course was beautiful, and everyone was excited and happy to try something new.  Over the subsequent hour and a half we had a great time together as a family.

As I said, I don't get a lot right, but what started out as a somewhat questionable gift that very nearly expired unused, ended up being just the right thing after all.






Sunday, September 13, 2015

Merrick's Lego 6th Birthday Party

Yesterday, one week after the real date, we had Merrick's 6th birthday party.  This year he chose to go with a Lego theme and I have to say that it was one of the easier parties we have done.


As guests staggered in we started things off by creating our own Lego mini figures.  We let the kids color and decorate their men/women with markers and crayon and it was fun to see what they came up with.

Once the majority of the guests had arrived, we had a Lego scavenger hunt.  Jeremy had hidden Duplos around the yard and the kids hunted for them Easter egg style, the only difference was that they didn't have a bag, but when they found a piece they had to add it to their existing pieces, building a tower of Duplos.  After our scavenger hunt, we took a break from the games and had snacks.


The snacks were just the pick-me-up everyone needed to give them enough energy for our next game, Lego bingo.  Our version was essentially identical to regular Bingo, but our squares featured various Lego pieces and mini figures.  The kids really like the Bingo (in fact they liked it so much we ended up playing it again at the end of the party).

After Bingo we have one more game.  We divided into two teams to have a Lego spoon race.  Each team had a bowl of Legos and a spoon.  They had to take turns scooping up a spoonful of Legos and running them down to a bowl at the other end of the lawn.  It was funny to see the different strategies as some kids went for the Legos one at a time and others put on as many as they could.  Some went for speed over accuracy and other employed the "slow and steady wins the race" philosophy.  In any case some definitely had more of a steady hand than others.

Once all the games were done we gathered for cupcakes and presents.  I had bought Lego candies at the grocery store and decorating the cupcakes was a piece to cake (pun intended) and I think they turned out pretty cute.  As for the presents, Merrick's friends were very good to him.  The vast majority of the the kids took the Lego theme and ran with it.  He was very spoiled to say the least.








At the end of the party each child was sent home with little bag of Lego candies as a thank you.

The only sour note of the day happened right before the party was supposed to start.  CC must have gone out the back door and around the house to the front door because all of a sudden I heard her crying at the front door.  She was saying "A bee! A bee!" and despite the fact that she says that a lot I think she really did get stung based on the reaction she had on her arm.  Eventually she started to feel better and the rest of the party went off without a hitch.  We survived another birthday party and now we have a few months before we have to do it again.

Monday, September 7, 2015

Everything's Coming Up Merrick

This past week has been a busy one (the reason the blog is a day late) and it has been a week all about Merrick.

Our week started with a huge milestone as Merrick started kindergarten.  After three years of preschool I was not sure this day would ever come, but come it did.  When the big day arrived, Merrick was so excited and brave (I on the other hand shed some tears after drop off).  The day must have gone well because at pick up he was all smiles and only had good things to say and the rest of the week was just up from there.





Saturday was Merrick's 6th birthday.  We planned to go camping with all our Oregon cousin's, but first we had to take care of some birthday business at home.  We started the day with doughnut and presents and then went to play some games at Dave and Busters.  We really cleaned up at Dave and Busters, even winning the jackpot on one of the games.  In the end we left with the bow and arrow toy Merrick had been pining for and still 2/3 of the tickets we had won.








After Dave and Busters we headed out camping.  I am not much of a camper and I am always reluctant to go, but we had a really great time.  We laughed, ate, played soccer, and ultimate frisbee, and just had fun being together.  I may not love camping, but the memories that were made were well worth it.