New Job!

Me and Kenny from tonight - can't let my nice hair not be documented, although I suppose I'll be looking better on a daily basis starting next week!

I suppose it's time to come out and say it to our blog readers - I got a job! It's a little surreal, which is why I haven't really announced it to many people.

Starting next Wednesday, I'll be an Associate at Hand Arendall - an Alabama firm with its largest office in Mobile. I'm not tied to a specific practice area, except that I will probably be doing mostly litigation. There will probably be employment in the mix, but I'm not sure of what else.

Tonight I went to a happy hour that they have monthly, which was really fun because I got to meet a lot of people and see my office. The offices are on the 30th and 31st floor of the tallest building in Mobile and I have a lovely view :-). I'm sure I will have more on the subject after I start, but I wanted to pass along the good news to those of you who would be interested. It is my first real post-law school job, so I'm very nervous about it (bring on the insomnia!), but excited about the opportunity too!

Update: I forgot to post a picture of the flowers Curtis gave me on the day I got my offer - so sweet of him :-)

We went to Cracker Barrel Today for Brunch

And saw this for sale:








Hilarious.


And before you judge the state of Alabama, it is also available for fans of BYU, Utah, and Syracuse. Sadly they don't carry Stanford, UCLA or USC.

Southern Rain

Luckily I had just taken Kenny out to play and go to the bathroom, because this happened!

We're having fun on the patio watching it!


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Our new home: Living Room/Dining Room

Today I had a renewed motivation to finish putting the house together. It's mostly done, but there is still some organizing to do. I got my keyboard working and actually played for a little bit on it! I also put together our bookshelf with all of our pictures.

Don't mind the sleeping doggy :-)








We put two of Grandma Hart's paintings in our stairwell. We don't have the kind of large walls we had in our old apartment to hang our larger pictures, but this seems to look good. We do have a few more pictures that we need to find places for. They mind end up being stored as we wait to move into a larger house.

(yes, those are our UCLA and Stanford hats, that will probably be moved after I post this blog, lol)



What's on TV? "Anderson," Anderson Cooper's new talk show. I'm enjoying it.



My grandparents' table and chairs found their way to Alabama! Our first table was so small, and so I asked my Grandpa for their table when he moved out of his house. It didn't belong to my grandparents for very long, but there is a fun story behind it: My Grandma loved shopping for deals, I remember how much she loved to shop at Pic&Save, and she called my Grandpa frantically and asked him to bring the pickup truck they had at the time over to a garage sale to buy this table. He asked her what she planned to do with the table they already had, and she said that they'd give it to someone in the family. So that's what they did, it might not have been in the family for long, but my Grandma used it at the end, and she would probably find it quite funny that I use it now, in Alabama of all places!

One thing I love about the front room is the light. We have large windows on three walls, and even with the blinds closed I don't need any artificial light during the day. It was one reason I signed off on the apartment sight-unseen, because that was the first thing that Curtis noticed. It's not a huge space, but it's big enough, and the TV area especially is very cozy.

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Kenny After Daycare

Kenny had his first day of daycare today - he was only there for about 5 hours, but he definitely needed a nap after, so he slept until his daddy got home.



Kenny later in the evening when he was ready to go to sleep:







He's pretty low energy today as well - I'll probably take him to another daycare for a few hours tomorrow, as that is the one that he is boarding at while we are in the Bay Area next weekend.

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Power is out!

But we have our cell phones and the iPad with 3G connectivity - thinking about playing a game, we probably have another hour or two of light.




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Our Patio and BBQ!

When I got to Spanish Fort I looked around our neighborhood and saw that EVERYONE had a BBQ on their porch, with very few exceptions. Plus they had some kind of patio furniture, so I knew that we should try and make use of the space, other than for bike storage.

So yesterday, we went to Lowe's - Curtis' manly side kicked in and he got really excited and we picked out our grill - which had the key feature of being very compact for our space.




Curtis had the honors of cooking our first dinner on the grill: Steak with grilled corn on the cob and a grilled onion soaked in butter. We also had salad and rolls with our dinner, which was delicious. We even opened up a wedding present that we hadn't yet: grill tools and a tray!



We also bought a couple of patio chairs and a table, and Kenny is happy that we will go out there to hang out from time to time.







Tonight we're probably making BBQ Chicken :-)

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Sunday drive to Orange Beach/Pensacola

Today we jumped in the car and drove south to the beach. It was just a quick 3 hour tour but we enjoyed a quick stop at the beach and a fun drive from Orange Beach to Pensacola then back up towards home.

It was a pretty drive through lots of open space, and the coast is very pretty, quiet and low key. We did laugh a few times driving though the Florida part at some of the signs and storefronts.

Click on the Picture of Kenny to go to all the pictures: 

 

In the meantime, here are a few pics:

At a state beach in Orange Beach, AL

First time Christine has put her feet in the Gulf!

The sign says: 110 N to the 10 - sound familiar?

Kenny Scared of Shadows

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Kenny playing with his Daddy :-)

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Pictures from around Spanish Fort and Daphne (updated with captions!)

We drove to Daphne to go to the grocery store and pick up pizza. I brought the iPad to get some pictures:-)

Sign is for Pensacola to the East, Mobile to the West

The 10 Freeway doesn't look like this at home!

This says "Bass Pro Drive" because there's a HUGE Bass Pro Shop over there. As well as a Kohl's:-)

Highway 98 - Goes through Daphne, Fairhope

Whispering Pines Drive, note the pretty bridge on the right

A house along the way

The Daphne Dog Park!

Our Grocery Store (they're building a Publix across the street from our house, due to open this fall!)

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Our new home: Kitchen & Laundry Room

As you might have seen on my other blog, our kitchen was pretty messy yesterday as I was unpacking. I am happy to report that I finished it today!

Also, we had a bit of a storage concern since we brought a lot of stuff that had been stored at my parents' house (like our wedding china, since we have no idea where we'll be in 2014!), but I think we'll be okay, especially because of the giant storage rack we were able to put up in the laundry room.

I know these pictures are a little boring, but I know our parents are curious about what our place looks like. The kitchen is a really nice space, with a good view of the tv :-). The laundry room is huge, which is great because we could use the space, and we were able to put Kenny's food and water dishes in there.

Still need to go through the pantry

and the laundry room... :-)

Our new home: view from our front porch

Thankfully, we have a good sized covered porch. On my walk from the gym today it started to rain decently hard.

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Our new home: Outside

We live in a community that opened in 2009, called The Arlington at Eastern Shore. It sits next to a large shopping area (yay) and has gates around the front (the back is open space, high grass and trees, pictures to follow)

It's quite charming in that all of the buildings are only two stories, so it has a townhouse feel to it and it's very quiet.

Here is our building - our door is in the corner, and when you go in, you immediately go upstairs to our apartment. (yes this is the same picture as our change of address cards!)




It's also nice because, even though we were hoping to get a unit with a garage, we're able to park right outside our door, and, as experienced renters know, that saves a lot of time and trouble, especially with groceries.

Next: views from our unit!

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