Archive for ◊ 2009 ◊

16 Dec 2009 Merry Christmas
Author:  |  Category: David, News, Sarah  | Tags: , , , , ,  | 2 Comments

Merry Christmas to all!  (and to all a good night?!?)

This will serve as our Christmas letter, simply because
(a) who really wants to read a Christmas letter,
and
(b) our lives aren’t incredibly exciting.

Where should I begin?

January 2009 brought frigid weather (not that we expected anything different in Minnesota), and a slightly extended trip to Fargo to celebrate Christmas with my (Sarah’s) family.  We arrived on Friday, and my grandma went to be with the Lord on Saturday, at the age of 101.  So along with having Christmas, we also were able to spend some time with relatives from far away.

January also brought a new President.  The world did not end, and the country’s problems were not immediately solved, so not a whole lot ‘change’-d, in my opinion, we ‘hope’ they will.  Except, of course, that we no longer had to see campaign ads!

Since we moved into our new house in November of last year, we have been spending time painting, decorating, assembling furniture, cutting holes in the wall to allow for more cables & wires, installing fans in the fireplace, rewiring things to make them more exciting, etc.

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The spring brought two trips to Illinois for weddings 3 weeks apart; one was my cousin Eric’s, the other was my old college roommate Kristin’s, in which I was her Maid of Honor (or rather, Matron of Honor, but that makes me sound old).

This summer was our year with my family for vacation.  We spent a week at Weslake Resort playing games and driving tractors, and also made a trip up to visit my brother at Camp Wilderness (and subsequently take him to dinner, which he was grateful for).

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David decided spending a year and a half out of school was plenty, so this fall he started working on his B.S. in Medical Laboratory Science.  Now he’ll be a scientist instead of just a technician.  He assures me that it will still involve poking babies, especially with a move to days on the weekends, where there will be many micro-preemies who want to be poked.  He is, once again, taking advantage of the family discount he gets through his mom at Argosy, although this time he is taking his courses online while working at Children’s Hospital in Minneapolis.

I continue to sell things at aerie, although this holiday season brought me a change in location:  at the beginning of November I found out I was moving from Rosedale to the Mall of America.  I am enjoying the added busy-ness of MOA, although I miss everyone I worked with at my old store.  I also continue to help out with Confirmation, as my schedule allows.

We hosted Thanksgiving at our house this year for David’s parents, Kari, my parents, and Philip.  I have to deem it a success, although I didn’t get pictures of anything except the pies (which were beautiful & delicious, see?).

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We hope this “letter” finds you and your family well as we celebrate the birth of our Savior.

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And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.

For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.

And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying,

Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

David & Sarah Signature

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19 Nov 2009 new aerie adventures
Author:  |  Category: Sarah  | Tags:  | 2 Comments

You may or may not have noticed, but David decided he wanted to get in on my blogging fun, and decided to write a post of his very own.  Interestingly enough, that was the day before a friend of a friend(Michelle’s “real” blog is private, so this is her book review blog) was featured in a blogging segment on Fox 9.

As he mentioned, I was transferred to a new store effective last weekend.

Kristen’s response to this was, “Oh, poor Sarah!”

(In reference to the fact that the holiday season will soon be upon us and those of us who have the pleasure of being able to frequent the MOA whenever we feel like it avoid it like the plague from November through January.

Fun fact:  did you know it takes 30 minutes to find a parking spot on a Saturday?  Two weeks before Thanksgiving?  And that’s only because I followed someone to their car?  I can’t wait until the day after Thanksgiving.

And I’m just noticing that this is a very long parenthetical, so I’m going to stop now.)

That response was actually very similar to a comment I made a few days after finding out:  “Wait…it’s almost holiday!  Does [our DM] hate me?  ‘I’m going to send Sarah to MOA two weeks before Green Friday [the term AE uses for Black Friday]…muahahaha!’”

Obviously I know that is not the case (in our conversations leading up to this, she expressed her confidence in my ability to step up to this new challenge), but the thought of battling holiday traffic for a few long weeks is rather intimidating.

After working there for about a week, I’m getting used to the new environment; it’s a lot different coming into a pre-existing store with pre-existing employees after having opened a store and hiring all of the girls who worked there, with the only exceptions being the few girls who transferred over from AE when we opened.

It’ll still take a while to get away from referring to MOA as “them” and Rosedale as “us,” though.

Sarah Signature

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17 Nov 2009 Fall Update (by David)
Author:  |  Category: David  | Tags: , , , , ,  | Comments off

It’s fall, technically. October felt like winter, but November has turned out to be pretty warm…actually fall-like. As you may have noticed, I’ve merged my old blog with this one. All posts have been updated and left here for your pleasure. It’s been busy the last few weeks.

I’m back in school at Argosy to get the final 2 years of my second 4 year degree in Medical Technology (MT). I am now the Chemistry Lead at work and report to the Chemistry Tech Specialist at work. I am learning her job so that I could potentially take over for her someday. I am ready for a break.

Sarah has moved stores and is now at Mall of America. She is still with aerie. It’s about 2.5 times the drive she had before, but she said that she likes how busy it is at the store there versus Rosedale, although she misses the people she worked with at Rosedale.

We’re hosting Thanksgiving here this year. It should be interesting…we’ve never hosted a major holiday before. We will have lived here for a year tomorrow! Tha’ts all for now! I put up Christmas lights outside today…will post pictures once we have more decorating done.

(FYI: The barcode is for BlackBerry Messenger) Updated 12/20/09: No more BlackBerry for me!
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29 Oct 2009 Wedding Bells at Northwestern
Author:  |  Category: Miscellaneous, Sarah  | Tags: , ,  | 2 Comments

Congratulations Kate and Jordan!

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Kate, one of my wonderful college friends, got married a few weeks ago in beautiful Nazareth chapel at Northwestern.  Despite going there for 4 years and going to multiple chapels, recitals, and having many tours through Naz chapel, this was the first (and, most likely, only) wedding I’ve been to there.

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Kate was, as expected, a beautiful bride.

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(Pictures via various facebook photo albums, as I didn’t have my camera with)

Marie was able to come from Denver and spend the weekend.  We had fun watching movies and having post-wedding pizza and ice cream!

Monday morning, we awoke to this:

snow 10.12.2009

Poor Marie’s flight back was delayed over an hour!

However, I can’t write a whole post about that.  So, let me tell you about a pre-wedding event.

A couple weeks before the wedding, Kate’s soon-to-be in-laws had a shower for her.  Since I had the day off, I decided I might as well go since it was only about 15 minutes from my house.  That was an exciting time.

It went approximately as expected:
awkward small talk with people I don’t know
eat food
more awkward small talk
eat more food
watch Kate open presents
still more awkward small talk
leave

I, if you didn’t notice, am not a fan of small talk.

(Goes with the territory of my apparent Myers-Briggs type, INTJ:
“[T]hey tend to have little patience and less understanding of such things as small talk [...]“)

I’m pretty sure every conversation I had went something like this:

Random Shower-Goer:  Hi, I’m [Helga/Bertha/LuAnn].  How do you know the bride?
Me:  I’m Sarah.  We went to college together.
RSG:  Oh, isn’t that nice.  So you know Jordan’s family?
Me:  No, not really.
RSG:  Oh…well, I’m [Marlene/Belinda/Sherry]‘s friend from church.  Our kids have been friends since birth.
Me:  That’s great.  I’m sure Kate and Jordan appreciate your being here. [That reference did not help me at all, since I don't know Marlene/Belinda/Sherry either.]
RSG:  So you’re from the Cities?
Me:  No, I came here for school.
RSG:  Oh, you’re in school?
Me:  No, I graduated a few years ago with Kate.  [didn't I say this earlier?]

At this point, the conversation would inevitably go in one of two directions (both if I was really lucky), either questioning me about my job and why I’m not using my degrees, or asking me about David, his job, and why we don’t have children yet.  Fantastic.

I must say, though, that the food was delicious, the hostesses were very gracious, and Kate received lots of wonderful gifts.  I just don’t like small talk.

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16 Oct 2009 Last Days of Summer
Author:  |  Category: Miscellaneous, Sarah  | Tags: ,  | 3 Comments

Once again I find myself having to catch up with all you readers my mother.  (Does anyone else read this?!)

My parents and brother came to visit us two consecutive weekends at the end of the summer.  The first weekend we went to the Walker Art Center (2 free tickets courtesy of Museum Adventure Pass, a program the libraries here are running).  The “boys” enjoyed climbing on the one thing people are allowed to climb on, especially Philip, who made it most of the way to the top, then slid down. (I’m not sure that this is an activity sanctioned by the Sculpture Garden, but nobody yelled, so I guess he was okay.)

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The second weekend they came down, we went to the MN State Fair, where we experienced a variety of culinary delights and some interesting people watching.

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While my parents and I were eating our Uff-Da Brats in the Food Building, the people sharing our “table” with us stared at us and our food, and asked what it was repeatedly:

“What’s that?!“
“Where did you get that?”
“What’s in it?”
“Is it any good?“

This final question was asked very incredulously.  Philip returned with his own food, Falafel-on-a-Stick, [this was after he had already eaten a Spam-Burger] where he was greeted with the same Spanish–Minnesotan?–Inquisition.  I take that back; they must have been from Wisconsin or Iowa.  Then my dad went to get some more food–fried smelt–and, guess what?  Same thing.  Seriously people, if you don’t want to experience bizarre, fried, anything-on-a-stick, don’t bother coming to the State Fair!

Philip got Veggie Fries next:  “Fun on the Outside, Healthy on the Inside.”

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Along with eating delicious cheese curds, we did some actual fair-type-stuff.  I decided that maybe we should check out some of the animals, so we found some cute baby goats and piglets!

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There was also an amazing ride where you were strapped into a giant hamster ball and bungee’d into the air.  If only it didn’t cost like $25 for a 4-second ride…

Along with the fun of the WAC and State Fair, we had some fun game-playing time at our house.  Biggest hit:  In a Pickle, a game David got for Christmas.  When we played it with his family over Christmas, it seemed really weird, but we re-read the directions and set up more strict guidelines, and it worked a lot better.  Basically the game consists of cards with nouns on them, and you play on top or under the cards based on what it can be “in.”  Such as, the TURKEY is in the SOUP; followed by the SOUP is in my STOMACH.  Dad cheated by having outrageous cards, like LOVE, SOUL, and DANGER.  He won many final rounds by having the KANGAROO be in LOVE and the AIRPLANE be in DANGER.

That concludes my summer.  Stay tuned for a “fall” update (since it’s already snowed, I’m pretty sure we skipped over fall this year and are already in winter).

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12 Aug 2009 Summer Fun
Author:  |  Category: Miscellaneous  | Tags:  | Comments off

Happy Summer!  Here’s a little bit of what we’ve been up to this summer:

May

Kari graduated from Bethel!

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The graduate with her parents…

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          grandpa…

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          siblings…

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          and Chad!

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Here’s our favorite graduation attendee:

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Our apologies to anyone who may know her,

but we got a kick out of her matching ensemble,

even down to her pink-tinted tights!

 

The next afternoon we headed down to David’s parents for a barbecue and fire.

Well, I worked, but I went afterwards.

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and made yummy s’mores.

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June

We celebrated both Father’s Day and David’s birthday on Father’s Day by having David’s parents, Kari, and Kristen & Chad over.  We split the day into Father’s Day (pre-dinner) and David’s birthday (post-dinner) so they each got their own time!

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July

We spent a week at the lake with my extended family

    playing Kanook & Love your Neighbor;

DSC_0258     swimming, boating, and fishing;

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     meeting new cousins (Andi) and babies (Luke);

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     playing Bocce;

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    and driving tractors!

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To see more pictures from this year, here’s a link to my Facebook photo album.

We went up to Fargo after the lake to pick up some boxes and furniture from my parents’ house, so we finally have furniture in all of our rooms now!

Guest Room

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Second Bedroom & Family Room

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03 Jul 2009 The excitement never stops.
Author:  |  Category: Miscellaneous, Sarah  | Tags: , , ,  | 3 Comments

So I’ve realized I never really have anything exciting enough to post about on here…no small children doing amusing things, no fuzzy pets being cute and cuddly, no miscellaneous tips on household chores…so here’s the closest thing to interesting as has happened to me recently…

On my way to work one day last week, I decided to listen to the “regular” radio (not XM, my iPod, or a cd), so I had the joy of hearing Dave Ryan on KDWB discussing boring educational summer camps.  Apparently his daughter, or someone’s daughter, didn’t quite catch that, went to business camp, followed by yearbook camp.  This obviously generated a conversation among him, the miscellaneous interns, and the other people on the show about the weirdest camps they’d ever gone to.  Bible camps, sports camps, scout camps…those have got nothing on some of the crazy ones people have been to.  Apparently, they got calls from people who had been to diabetes camp, asthma camp, U.N. camp (which I’ve actually heard of), and–my personal favorite–Jewish asthma camp.  My question, how did they find that there was a need for this specific of a camp?  Was there a large population of Jewish children at the generic asthma camp, so they decided to branch off and create their own camp?  Who came up with this?

For some reason, I was telling one of my associates (we’ll call her Katie) about this while we were in line at the bank, and we started talking about completely contrived plot devices (doesn’t Jewish asthma camp sound like it would be a great setting for a random children’s book?  “Jacob and Aaron find out that even though they have asthma, they can be accepted by their peers…they become great friends and they promise to invite each other to their Bar Mitzvahs.”  ?!?  Right.)  This reminded me of a blog I read just a couple days before that, where the author recaps much of the great children’s series literature available.  She has an affinity for Sweet Valley High, but this post was about a Mary-Kate and Ashley book, in which the town would only get funds for a community center if they created a band with four kids in it:  blond twin girls, a red-haired boy with braces, and a boy named Johnny (or Jimmy…don’t remember which).  Talk about your contrived plot devices!

Anyway, while discussing this, I found out that Katie had never even heard of Sweet Valley!  Wow, I didn’t know you could have not heard of it; sure, maybe people haven’t read them, but to have never heard about the series?  Crazy!  The next day I worked with her, I mentioned to the other girl working (we’ll call her Hannah) that Katie had never heard of Sweet Valley.  Hannah, also, was appropriately shocked at this.  Her response was, “What?  You’ve never heard of Sweet Valley High?  Jessica and Elizabeth Wakefield?  That’s insane!”  She then went on to ask about different characters (Bruce’s last name, Jessica’s husband for like 3 books in SVU), miniscule plot details (the color of Jessica’s bedroom, type of car each person drove), and so on, and was suitably impressed with my knowledge of all, what, 8 Sweet Valley series.  It’s a gift.  Obviously.  Or else I just had way too much free time at the age of 12.

Clearly, I need a small child or a pet to post about.

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