He's now a master!

Last Saturday, my husband took part in Cornell University's January graduate recognition ceremony, and this week he found out that he got at least an A on his final project for his Master of Engineering in Computer Science thus graduating with a cum laude distinction (if they awarded such distinction to graduate students). I'm very proud of him; he completed this achievement all while working full-time. And, by doing it through the employee degree program, it was all free. Just amazing! I'm so proud of you, honey!

Parrrrtaaaayyy

My husband and I hosted a small dinner party this past Monday night for 7 friends. I made a ham, scalloped potatoes and some brownies, and friends made pasta with fresh pesto and ginger glazed baby carrots. It was a very successful party! This picture was taken before everyone arrived, but I did manage to make it through the night without getting anything on myself. Yippie!

Work's been rather stressful lately because instead of my normal job I've been working on redesigning our department's website, and I'm getting significant push-back from our web team. If I make it through this process I guess I'll be a stronger person, but I may be insane too!

Well, I made it ...

though the last year and truly am better off having gone through it, with just one exception, losing Koba. I'm sure most people do these types of posts around the New Year, but given that we'll be at Disney on New Year's (woo-hoo!), I figured I'd do it now. Oh, and let me say this now before I forget: seriously, thank you all for continuing to check and read my blog. I've been significantly lax at posting lately, so I really appreciate those of you who've stuck around and have continued checking in on me!

The last year has been filled with a significant number of changes. My husband and I reconciled our marriage (and are continuing to work on it), we lost our sweet Koba, I reached my goal-weight, I made the decision to go back to school for Landscape Architecture (and am working toward that goal regularly, now) and we moved into a new apartment. With the exception of moving (which really has been positive on many fronts), these changes have all been pretty significant, and I feel I've handled them quite well. So, while I'm hoping this next year isn't quite as dramatic, I look forward to the new challenges and changes and hope that you all will continue to check in with me (as I do with you) every once in a while. Have a very happy Christmas and a fantastic New Year!

I (finally) did it

The elliptical, that is. After a 5 month hiatus, I finally got my butt on the elliptical again this morning. The last time I'd done it was right before Koba died, and I think there was some sort of a mental block involved in not doing it. And, I used the fact that the warmer weather allowed me to get outside and do more physically to excuse myself from doing it most of the summer. But, this morning, I just felt like getting back on. At first, it felt really good, but just a few minutes into it, I had to fight back tears. Thankfully, I was able to do the full 35 minute course and burned ~266 calories. Oh, and I realized something most of the way through, I probably shouldn't be doing the weight loss program any more. Duh!

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

One of my best birthdays ever!

The day began lazily enough (waking up about 9am, opening all but the present from my husband because he was still sleeping) but then swung into full gear because of a desire to watch football and get dim sum. Dim sum was, as usual, fantastic, and the company (my friend and husband) was even better. And, we made it back to our apartment in time to catch just about all of Florida's win over Vanderbilt! Yeah!

Then, the rest of my afternoon was spent doing just whatever the heck I wanted! I browsed Coach's website (my husband got me a gift card; thank you honey!), perused catalogs that came in over the past week and cut my fingernails and cut and painted my toenails. Then, while I was getting ready to go out to dinner, my dad called to wish me a happy birthday. He was very sweet and tried to suggest that this was just my 30th (instead of 34th) birthday. I told him if I'm going to lie about it, it might as well be my 29th birthday instead.

Dinner, unfortunately, got a little of a late start because the restaurant was packed, and our table wasn't ready when we arrived. But, that actually turned out to be a good thing because I had discovered earlier in the day that the club I'd planned on going to didn't open until 9pm (and dinner was at 7). After dinner, my husband stopped by another restaurant to pick up one of the most important parts of the evening, the above pictured cake, of course. I was so pleased upon first seeing it (and even more pleased once I took a bite of it!) that I wanted to dig in right away. But, alas, I controlled myself and waited until after arriving at the club.

We got there just after it opened, so we had the place entirely to ourselves, save the employees. And, while I at first thought it was going to suck if no one else ever came to the bar during the course of the evening, I soon had my thoughts changed when a group of supposed 20 somethings arrived celebrating a friend's 21st birthday ... with parents in tow. So, the place filled up rather quickly ... wouldn't you go to a party if someone's parents were footing the bill? The good thing (or so we thought) about all of the party-goers was that there would be other people dancing. But, apparently, the girlies were too chicken (with one sadly dressed woman being the exception). So, we said, screw it, let's show these girls how to dance. And, so we made fools of ourselves. In all, great fun! Over the course of the night, I had 4 drinks (a ton for me!), my entree, a tiny piece (but divinely yummy!) of cake and about 8 bites of a French bread pizza sub after arriving back at home in order to help stave off the hangover, really! :)