Monday, July 13, 2009

One year anniversary

Can you believe it? One year ago yesterday we got married. It's already been a year! It was wonderful and flew by so much faster than we had anticipated. We're already packing up our first apartment (!) to head down the road toward another adventure. Thanks everyone for celebrating with us at the wedding :)

Saturday, July 11, 2009

Zoo

Today Chris and I decided to take advantage of some of our tax payer dollars at work and went to the National Zoo. We took the metro which is still running slowly and is way overcrowded due to the red line accident a week or so ago. It was a wonderful day because it wasn't too hot or overcast, which of course meant the zoo was really crowded, but we ran into several people we knew throughout the day. Some pictures to entice you to visit the zoo soon:

Starfish, anemone, jellyfish:

Meercats, lion:

Octopus, elephants:

Thursday, July 9, 2009

Hampden Sydney

As many of you know, and some of you don't, Chris and I are MOVING! Ahh! 2 weeks from TODAY we will be packed up and driving a moving van down to Hampden Sydney, VA.We have been getting lots and lots of questions over the past few weeks, so I will try to clarify in this post. If I leave something out, just ask and I'll try to fill you in!

Where is Hampden Sydney? You may never have heard of Hampden Sydney because it is very very small, so here are some facts for you:
1. It's too small to be a town (4.5 sq miles), so it's considered a CDP (a census designated place - a concentration of population) for statistical purposes.
2. It's very close to the geographical center of VA.
3. It's home to an all male college with an enrollment of about 1,100/year (smaller than my high school!!).
4. The closest town is called Farmville.

So, why are we moving? Chris was offered a position helping coach basketball at Hampden Sydney College. If you know Chris at all, you can understand what an amazing career opportunity this is for him. I think we can all agree he will be better off in the gym playing and coaching college basketball than being a consultant behind a computer screen.

What's Hampden Sydney College like?
It's a small male college but absolutely beautiful. The campus reminds me a lot of William and Mary. All brick buildings and a very close-knit community. Their mascot is the Tigers and the colors are garnet and gray.
How's Hampden Sydney basketball?
HSC is a Division 3 team in the Old Dominion Athletic Conference (ODAC). They're 10 time ODAC Champions and have made it to the NCAA D3 Final Four twice. Check out their schedule for this season and come to a game!

What is Katie going to do?
I don't know! I am in the process of looking for a job. I have been applying to every opening at HSC and Longwood, scanning the classifieds, and will hopefully start hearing about more opportunities through word of mouth once we get down there. It's definitely a bit harder to find a job down there than in the D.C. area..!

Where are you going to live? We don't know! We are driving down 2 weeks from today and if we don't have a place by that point, we are throwing our stuff in the Head Coach's garage until we find something. Again, we are working with the college and scanning the classifieds - we'll keep you updated once we find out!

Are you excited? Yes. We both are. I am very sad to be leaving the area we are in now, especially because several of my best friends are all within walking distance of our apartment, but I am ready for a new adventure. Chris can't wait to be part of a team again, and this time he'll be getting paid for it.

Can we come visit? YES!! Our door (once we have one, of course!) is always open. Any visitors are welcome, all the time.

Monday, July 6, 2009

4th of July

We barbecued, watched fireworks, dressed in red white and blue, and spent time with family to celebrate our nation's birthday. Hope everyone had a wonderful 4th of July!









Thursday, July 2, 2009

Cork

A few weekends ago Chris was out of town so a couple of the girls and I got together for the evening and enjoyed a bottle of wine or two. Anyway, Chris went to open a bottle for dinner the other night and when he pulled out the corkscrew he found the cork from a previous bottle still on it! I'm not really sure how this happened, but I definitely thought it was funny that for some reason I (or someone else) put the corkscrew away without taking the cork off. Guess I should pay more attention next time...

Wednesday, July 1, 2009

Brick breaker

Okay, who has played this game?? It is really addicting! Brick breaker was on my Blackberry and I loved it. I wasn't any good at it - in fact, my mom had a higher high-score than I did in the game and she claims that she doesn't even play it that often. I recently had to give up my Blackberry due to upcoming work changes and now I can't play anymore :( I googled it to see if I could play online and found out that many people play the game including Dan Steinberg and Nick Young, who unfortunately both had higher high-scores than me... Anyway, I'm sad to say my days of playing brick breaker are over...

Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Folklife

Well, it's the end of June and I feel like time is getting away from me these days! Maybe it's just the effects of summer and wanting to lay by the pool all day and read (which I did all day Saturday!) instead of getting things done, but I'm certainly feeling like time is slipping by too quickly. This weekend we took advantage of living close to D.C. and went to the Smithsonian Folklife Festival. We got there in the afternoon and spent most of our time exploring Wales - which meant listening to cool accents - and enjoying the fact that everything was free. We caught a cooking demonstration where the chef gutted a fish (never seen it done before and I was impressed!), listened to Welsh rap/poetry, watched some stone carving and just wandered around. It's continuing at the end of this week and the weekend if you missed the first week and still want to catch it!

Thursday, June 25, 2009

Father's Day Go-Karting

So for Father's Day, Rob and I decided to get our dad a membership to a go-karting place in Dulles that Rob already belongs to. We made our first trip out there on Sunday afternoon to give the place a try and it was a ton of fun. We met up with Rob's roommate Chris and his dad as well. They make you wear racing suits and everything. I am proud to report that I was the third fastest in our heat, which you can see on the TV screen next to the track.