Summer is here!

Patrick and I are both officially out for the summer! We are so excited to be done with school and we are looking forward to the summer months. I started off my vacation hanging out with friends and enjoying the summer weather!

I went swimming with my friends Kelly and Becky and Becky's son Cooper. It was his first time in the pool and he had so much fun splashing around and kicking his little legs. He is so cute! Check out that little face!!!

Shamrock

I give two versions of a test to my statistics class and somewhere on the test it says to draw something next to their name so that I can tell what version of the test they had. So in March around St. Patrick's Day my statistics class took a test, so one version had to draw a pot of gold by their name; the other version had to draw a shamrock next to their name. Patrick told me that not everyone would know what a shamrock was, but I didn't believe him, I thought that everyone would know what a shamrock is. So as students turn in their tests, some of them had these rocks by their name with "shamrock?" written at the top. Once everyone turned in the test I asked one of them what a shamrock is and they didn't know, so we all got a good laugh out of it!

Valentine's Day in the Snow

For Valentine's Day, I surprised Patrick and took him to South Lake Tahoe. We stayed in our favorite bed and breakfast. It was snowing and beautiful. We went to a nice dinner at a great Italian restaurant. The next day we went snow mobiling. It was so fun! We took a bus to the location where we got on snow mobiles. We were in a group of 5 other snow mobiles. We got to share one and we took turns driving. It was so beautiful going through the trees on the trails. We followed the guide and they took us all over the mountain. At the top, we stopped and had hot chocolate. It started snowing and it was perfect!

When we left on Sunday, so did everyone else. It took us over six hours to get home, when normally it takes about an hour. So we inched our way out of South Lake Tahoe and back home. It was a great weekend filled with fun memories!

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Manhattan Beach in January

We went to our friend, Braidy's wedding in January down in Manhattan Beach. It was so wonderful to be in warm weather in the middle of January. We had fun going to the beach in the morning and watching some beach volleyball. Then we went back and got ready and went to the wedding. It was a beautiful wedding on a bluff over looking the beach. They had perfect weather and the bride and groom looked great!!

 

 

 

 

New Year's Eve Gangster Syle

We got to ring in the New Year at our friends house, Stacie and Mitchell. They planned a murder mystery dinner. We were all dressed up in 20's costumes. Patrick played the mayor and I was the mayor's wife. We all had roles to play. One of the characters was "murdered" at the party and then we had to figure out who was the "murderer." It was great fun! And check out every one's costumes - it was awesome! We had a great dinner and dessert, we got to spend time with friends, and there was even some swing dancing. Happy New Year!

Fun in the snow!

We went skiing in North Lake Tahoe at Squaw Valley with Colleen's parents and brothers. We had the best weather! We were afraid it was going to snow all day, but we ended up with blue skies! I got some great pictures from the top of the mountain, where you can see Lake Tahoe. We had a fun time skiing and playing in the snow. It was a great day!

Christmas

The weekend before Christmas, Nanny (Colleen's grandmother), aunt Anita and cousins came to visit our house. We had a good time having brunch, taking pictures and playing a fun game of twister! We also hosted Christmas Eve at our house. We had both Patrick's parents and Colleen's parents and brothers over for dinner. It was fun to have both families together to enjoy the holiday.

Changing Colors

We have these beautiful trees in front of our house that changed colors the week before Christmas. I love living in Northern California and experiencing all four seasons!

Apple Hill

I know it has been a long time since our last post.... but we've been busy painting our entire house, putting in new carpet, moving, and trying to get the house together. Now that moving is over, there should be more blogs in the future!

At the beginning of November,Patrick and I went up to Apple Hill. Apple Hill is a fun area near us that has lots of apple farms with yummy things to eat. So we decided to take my brothers, Caleb and Clint, up to Apple Hill to help us cut down a Christmas tree from one of the Christmas tree farms. After hiking around for a while, we finally spotted the perfect tree! Patrick cut it down and Clint helped him carry it out to the truck. We were hoping for a tree that was around 10 feet tall, but the tree ended up being more around 14 feet tall! Luckily it fit in our new living room. Patrick loves having such a big tree in the house. This weekend we will get to decorate the house for Christmas!!

We Bought a House!!

After over a year of looking for a house in El Dorado Hills, we bought a house! Escrow should close August 15th. The house is a bank owned home that needs some TLC. We will be painting the inside ourselves and putting in new carpet. So if anyone wants to help paint, feel free to join us!! It is a large house with plenty of room for us to grow into. We are hoping that we won't have to move again for a very long time. The house is in an established neighborhood of El Dorado Hills, it is on a 1/3 of an acre and has established oak trees in the backyard. The house has 5 bedrooms, so if anyone wants to come visit you are always welcome!!

We have a lot of work ahead of us, but we are so excited to get established in Northern California. The house is about two minutes from my school and about 10 minutes from Patrick's school. So it's pretty much the perfect location for us.

Two Years

On 8/6 we celebrated our two year anniversary. Patrick planned the whole thing and surprised me with a trip to Napa Valley. He didn't tell me where we were going until we pulled onto the highway for Napa Valley/Sonoma. He then told me that we were going to be spending the night in Calistoga. We checked into our hotel and then went and drove around. The vineyards were so beautiful! I loved it! We went out to a nice dinner in St. Helena where Patrick said he had the best pizza in his entire life - that is quite a compliment coming from him! Patrick then told me that early the next morning we would be going for a ride in a hot air balloon! I was so excited!!

We had to meet at 5:30 am to go up in the hot air balloon, so it was an early morning, but worth it. We met at a restaurant then they drove us to the launch site. There were a total of 3 balloons and each one held 10-12 people. We had so much fun. You just feel like you are floating. The pilot actually took us down to this little stream and barely touched the basket in the water and took us up again.

They took us back to the restaurant and served us bruch. After that we went to the Napa Valley farmers market where we got to taste the best fruit. It is all organic and yummy!! It was amazing and truly a memorable anniversary. I have the best husband in the world!! =)

South Lake Tahoe Backpacking

Colleen and I wanted to get away for a few days beofre going back to school. We decided to go backpacking in an area just south of Lake Tahoe. Living in Folsom, the area was only 90 minutes away which made it an easy drive.


We were a bit concerned that there would be a lot of smoke in the air from all of the California wildfires. Descending down the grade into the Lake Tahoe area from highway 50, there was a visible haze over the lake. It was a 5 minute drive south on Highway 89 to the the trail.

After beginning our journey from the trailhead, there was a half-mile climb to reach Big Meadow. At the meadow we were excited to see smoke free blue skies as we hiked further south.

After a good 3 mile trek, we arrived at our destination for the evening, Round Lake. We walked around the lake for quite some time trying to find a good campsite. I think Colleen was ready to kill me after we passed ten perfectly good campsites and had to do some boulder hopping to reach the inviting area on the southwest side of the lake. The campsite did give us a nice view of the unique "dardanelle" rock formations surrounding the lake.

Colleen and I had a wonderful time at Round Lake and we hiked out after only one night. We hope to go back to the area on a longer trip to visit some of the other lakes in the area (Dardanelles Lake, Meiss Lake, Showers Lake). Next time I'll be sure to bring a fishing pole as we watched a father and son catch a nice brook trout on a fly rod.

Nanny's Surprise Birthday!

Earlier this year, my family (Colleen's) threw Nanny, my grandmother, a surprise birthday party. She was definitely surprised and a little shocked that she didn't know there was a party planned in her honor. It was a festive evening filled with fun, laughter, dancing and of course, singing!

Cruise to Mexico

We went on a cruise to Mexico in June. We had a great time on the boat and in Cabo San Lucas. When we were in Cabo, we rented a car with another couple and had quite an adventure. We went to a glass-blowing factory and a great beach. It was a little scary driving around in Mexico but we made it back to the boat safely! It was a great time to rest and relax, and we enjoyed every minute of it.

Weekend in San Diego

I've been down in San Diego since last Sunday attending an intense training program for the Aerospace Engineering course I will teach in the fall. The training itself has been extremely enjoyable as the curriculum has been extremely hands-on. We've had a chance to build many projects (rockets, gliders, etc.) and have been able to use a windtunnel to test the aerodynamics of some of our designs. On Wednesday, we were even able to take a field trip to the Air and Space Museum in Balboa Park.

Two full weeks apart from Colleen would have been next to impossible. Colleen graciously offered to drive down to San Diego to spend the weekend with me. We were able to get a nice hotel in the Gas Lamp District of San Diego and take in what the city had to offer.

On Saturday morning we left the hotel for Balboa Park, the home of the San Diego Zoo and countless museums. Our first big stop were the Botanical Gardens. Due to the temperate climate in San Diege, they are able to grow just about anything. The gardens were filled with an array of flowers, particularly orchids. We spent about 30 minutes here just taking pictures of the beautiful flowers. Colleen's pictures all turned out beautifully while mine were mostly out of focus. :)

We spent most of Saturday at the Zoo where we were able to see some amazing animals up-close. The Pandas and the Polar Bears were my favorite, but the Austrailian animals were quite fun too. They had a great variety of Kangaroos, Koalas, and Wallabies.

Sunday was another day of adventure at Sea World. Colleen absolutely loved the dolphins and we spent most of the day watching the trainers work with them. The dolphins seemed to be having so much fun playing and seem naturally friendly and curious towards people. Sea World wouldn't be complete without seeing Shamu, so we watched the Orcas before we left the park. They've definitely geared the entire park for kids so we'll have to make a return trip when we have children of our own.

It was hard to see Colleen leave tonight. I've got one more week of training and will fly back to Sacramento on Friday. I'm used to being able to spend every minute together with Colleen. During a trip like this it makes me realize how much I enjoy being around her. I can't help but smile as I look forward to the future.