fields of opportunity

Well, since clearly I need a "Take 3," here I go! Inspired by my amazing friend Samantha who is so on top of her family's blog, I'm going to give this another go.

Its August 11, and since I last posted...

* My hubby successfully defended his doctoral dissertation @ ETSU on February 29.
* That very same day we received our SECOND offer on our house, which we accepted (literally driving from the defense to the realtor's office to sign the papers)
* 3.5 weeks later we moved temporarily to Graham, NC, while we were job hunting
* We had a wonderful trip to Johnson City for my hubby's graduation and really enjoyed spending time with our friends there again
* Spent wonderful time at the beach
* Spent countless hours with Auntie Leslie & cousins Joey & Katie (who also moved during the same time frame to Winston Salem, just an hour away)
* David interviewed at University of Iowa and at Northwestern University in Chicago
* He accepted job offer at U of Iowa
* Spent one day in Iowa City looking at the area, then from NC we bought a house, sight unseen (AHH!!)
* Had an amazing trip to MD/PA to visit with Jeff, Lindsey & Jason - we went to Hershey Chocolate World, Zoo America, toured Oriole Park at Camden Yards and had a wonderful time with them
* Came back home & celebrated Mark's 4th birthday with an aquarium party on July 14, with Papa & Boggie, Auntie, Joey & Katie, and Mum (my mom's mom), and we had a wonderful time
* Packed up the whole house and then hubby, dog, moving truck/trailer with Suburban went first on Thursday. Friday we left along with my parents and headed west, and then on Saturday July 21 -950 miles, 16 hours, 2 days, 2 cars later - we set foot in our new house!

Its really beautiful. Its way more hilly than I ever imagined Iowa to be, and a wonderful active community. David has been enjoying his new job, taking the bus while he gets his bike in gear to bike to work as so many people here seem to do. We've tried a couple of churches and met some very nice neighbors. The house is coming along, we've gotten some new furniture and we are getting settled in more and more every day and having alot of fun exploring. :)

Take #2...

Well, Jan 8 to Feb 22... not off to a good start in my plan to be blogging more haha. Hopefully soon I can get my phone linked up to this account again and then I can at least be sharing pictures more regularly!!

Tomorrow is hubby's birthday and we have a real date planned (yes!) but the BIG celebration will be taking place one week from today!! That is when he will be defending his long-awaited doctoral dissertation!! We are so excited. He has worked so incredibly hard for this day and we could not be prouder!

After that? Well, we just don't know yet :) This Saturday we have another 2nd showing on our house, and we're trying to do some major job searching and applying this weekend. Not much has come back from the first round but some of those weren't as appealing to begin with so we have not lost hope!

Well, some big storms are heading in and the housework is beckoning now that the boys are in bed... be back soon, I promise :)

a new start :)

So... I'm sorry to say, I've been a terrible blogger. In fact I don't even know if I can call myself a blogger anymore at all - but hoping to change that in 2012! I did not do very well at keeping in touch with people via email or either blog, and one of my "resolutions" if you will is to do better with that, both electronically and with actual snail mail (gasp).

Ah but guess what? This little one paragraph post has been sitting on my computer for 2+ days waiting for me to hit the "publish post" button. Ha. I'm on a roll. But at least I'm starting...

Stay tuned! :)

Happy 2012

~David, Ali, Mark & Tony

family portraits :)

we had our family portrait taken last week by our friend Jill Lewis - here's a little sneak peak!! the boys were so good and we wanted the mountains in the picture too, the night turned out perfectly!

lots of good ones still to come :)

Sooo big!

birthday preview

We celebrated our sweet Tony's first birthday on and off for the past week...

Here's the invite for his "official" first birthday party, so generously held at Doug & Jenny Bouch's house...

Here's a glimpse of this very happy camper in his brand new high chair, enjoying the fabulous icing (made by his Aunt Leslie) and looking around at all his friends at the party :)

We had lots of family come for the party which meant the absolute world to us, and many friends celebrating with us that made it even more wonderful. Many more pictures to come...

a preview of Mark's 2 year pictures

I took Mark's 2 year pictures last week on our road trip. Yes a month late, but once I was a little bit late I had the idea to wait and do the pictures in the beautiful little town outside of Chicago where his daddy also grew up! So... here are a few of my fav's that I wanted to share. When they are all up, you can view them on my website but for now (translation- until I get the rest of my work done) you can enjoy the previews here! :)

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One side of our porch garden :)

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Our accidental squash plant - the type is TBD :)

happy birthday, mum!!

happy birthday, mum!!!

i tried very hard to do this yesterday, on her actual birthday, but had some computer & scheduling complications. soo... here i am, a day late. i'm so sorry!!
this is my mom's mom, known as mum to me and my siblings and also to my kids :) we try and go meet mum & wayne in bristol at starbucks during their trips to damascus, va.

i've been buried under so many projects recently that this is the first chance i have had to post these pics, and our visit was back in mid June!

love ya mum - so glad we got to come see you!!!

here are a few of my favs :)

mum & wayne with the boys :)

mum & mark discussing how old he was going to be this summer!

mum & mark

mum & tony :)