Overwhelmed

We have had a crazy couples of months with re-renting the Noblesville house, moving and settling into our new home and me starting classes again (fear not- it is just for CPA exam review- I'm not seeking yet another degree. Yet.) Anyway, it has been a lot. I have been working out with a trainer about 4 days a week and while I'm getting stronger I do not see the pounds disappearing as I hoped they would. I have class for 4 hours on Monday and Wednesday nights from now until December 14th. I have a CPA exam on August 22, October 10 and November 23. I will have one more to take in early 2012. Yes, there are four parts to the exam. Yes, they all suck. No, my work life has not slowed down at all to balance out with studying for and taking the exam. To top it all off I will be in India (yes- across the globe) for 8 weeks starting in early January for work. It is a lot of administrative work here in the States to be allowed to go work somewhere for 8 weeks so that has been fun, too. Whew. I'm exhausted thinking about it all, honestly. I have taken some life simplification steps. I quit Facebook. I mean it this time. I think it has become a real time suck for me and I need every minute of my day these days. (I also think it breeds unhappiness and annoyance with others. I mean people are either complaining or showing off with their posts.) I am moving my workouts to be in the morning so that I can spend some evenings (when I'm not working late) with Jackson. I'm taking large chunks of time each weekend and dedicating them to studying. I'm not going to do any additional fiddling with the house (after the window treatments are done, of course) until I return from India. I think if I just make a few shifts that balancing everything will come a lot easier. I'm still going to blog as I get free time and something to blog about, but let's be honest my life is going to be a lot of suckage until Thanksgiving. Yay. ;)

U-verse

Let there be INTERNET!!!!!! :) :) We finally have television and internet. Woo hoo! We're in business. I'm so happy!

BB&B

We are slowly but surely moving into our new house. We do not have internet there yet so I will continue to be absent for a few more weeks.

Anyway, we NEED Bed, Bath & Beyond coupons. (It is amazing how much stuff we "need" to get settled!) The coupons never expire so do not believe them when they say that they do. Please, please (if you are not using them) send them our way. I will send you our new mailing address if you just email me at: jennapetefish@gmail.com

Thank you!

Happy birthday, Deb!

We want to wish my Mom a very happy 50-something birthday today! She's over the hill, but not too far. ;) We hope you have a fabulous day, Mom! We LOVE you!

"I'm in a couch buying mood!"

This evening Jackson decided that we ought to go ahead and order the love seat that matches our new couch. I was surprised and happy! We decided to just swing into a local store to order it, but did not know when the store closed. Jackson called at about 7:25 and the lady who answered, Eva, said they closed at 8:00. This was the conversation:

Eva: "Thank you for calling Godby, this is Eva."

Jackson: "Eva, I wondered what time you all closed tonight. I'm in a couch buyin' kind of mood."

Eva: "We close at 8:00, sir."

Jackson: "Oh! That soon, huh? I guess I better get out of my mood then."

Eva: *Laughs*

We hurried and made it before the store closed. We walked in the door and were greeting by who else? Eva. We did not tell her that Jackson was couch buying mood guy so we got to hear all of the store's employees laughing about his call. He finally came clean to Eva that he was the jokester and she loved it. Oh that kid drives me nuts and keeps me laughing all at the same time. :)

Fireworks of our own

Grace brought some fireworks with her from home (I swear. I would never have purchased them for her, but obviously Kathi said it was OK so now she won't kill us!) and saved them until the 5th so Uncle Jack could light them off with her. You can barely see the little girl in the shadows above. Amazingly enough, no one was hurt in this firework display.
They really enjoyed their sparklers.
Jackson is such a little kid- look at his face! It cracks me up.
We're so glad to be Americans and be free to make noise in our neighborhoods at 10:45 on a random Tuesday night.
Our happy little lady. It was so nice that Grace's time with Grammy overlapped our coming home from NYC. We always love to see her pretty little face. :)

Independence Day!

It was a warm day here in NYC and this pup had the right idea- he went for a quick dip in the fountain! :)

We went out on a boat tour this morning to see the city from the water. We had a gorgeous day today. It was a lovely time to be out on the boat.

Jackson was pretty excited to be on the boat. :)

Some people get to come into the city in style- in helicopters! Awesome!

I love the city from the water! Gorgeous!

It was such a cool thing to see Lady Liberty on Independence Day!

After we got off of the boat we went for another bus tour. (This day was all about Jackson! He looooves this stuff.)

I thought this was such a cool photo! My iPhone impresses me.

I love clocks.

We loved this apartment building. Our tour guide claimed that a 2 bedroom apartment there goes for $15,000 a month.

This is the start of the new Freedom Tower (I think they are calling it something else now, but I like Freedom Tower so that is what I'm going to call it).

WALL STREET.

The Chrysler Building is Jackson's favorite. I like it, too. :)

A shot of Rockefeller Center from the tour bus.

We went back to my favorite Italian restaurant for lunch. YUM! :)

One of my former co-workers from Boston went to Columbia University Law so she was very familiar with Manhattan. She suggested stopping at Magnolia Bakery so we did. I had a cupcake. The icing was gross so I had to take it off, but the cake part was good. Jackson had a whoopie cookie that he loved.

This evening we walked about a mile from our hotel to watch the Macy's fireworks. We were there with about 1 billion other people, but who is counting?! ;) I used to get really nervous in crowds- not anymore. I was just right there gunning for a good viewing spot. We got one! It was amazing.

It was so crazy to see 5 or 6 sets of fireworks!

A rare photo of both of us. Obviously taken by me. Jackson liked this photo of himself so much that he wanted to cut me out and make it his Facebook profile picture. Rude! ;)

It was very worth the crowds to see the fireworks. NYC knows how to deal with crowds so it really was not bad at all. The fireworks were just amazing and seeing them in person should be on everyone's bucket list.