The end of May

Thanks everyone for all the birthday wishes (via emails, texts, facebook, phone-calls..)!



Blaine and I had a great long memorial weekend in Bismarck and Jamestown. It was great just spending time with family. (and much needed after a crazy busy, stressful week of work in SD). I am so glad to be back home and back to working in the office!



My birthday was great. I told Blaine I did not want to go out to eat. Shocking I know. But spend a couple of weeks out of town, and you will understand the feeling. Instead I requested some yummy steaks from the grill, and Blaine definitely provided. I think they were the best he has ever grilled before. Rachel and Matt joined us, and afterwards we all went to ColdStone for a little dessert.



I volunteered to be a mentor for my firm's Summer Leadership Program. This program is for college students who are too young to intern, but want to get a feel for the choices out three. All the big four do a similar program. Its a pretty sweet deal. The students interview to get into the program, and once in, at the end usually they all get offers for a full time position when they are done with school or an internship. So the event for SLP on Friday was a high ropes course at a camp out west of the cities. It was awesome!! We were challenge to encourage each other to push our selves to do something we normally wouldn't. I made it to the top of the 40 foot rock climbing wall and rang the bell! What an exhilarating feeling. The second part of the day for our group was spent up 30 feet in the year, walking across ropes and beams from tree to tree - crazy!! At the end we all got to zip-line down - so much fun!



Today I am sore from my Friday experience. I also seem to have caught a cold at about 8pm last night. Weird. I don't know where it came from, but it sucks. I had a lot I wanted to get done around the house today, but I just feel like total crap. Blaine had something similar earlier in the week, so I guess that is where it came from.



Tonight the plan is to head downtown to watch the Twins kick some Yankee butt!! Right now I would much rather stay home, but I don't want to be the party pooper. I do feel a little better so that's good.



Keep your eyes open for some pics to come - Blaine got me a new camera!!!!!!!

Stuck in SD

Not much to say this week - I am in SD for a year-end audit. We work, go out for lunch, work, go out for dinner, go back to our hotel rooms, and get do it all over again. FUN! We have even been so lame, that both last night and tonight we just went to Applebees since it is across from our hotel. Not that there is anything much more appealing than that, sadly. I managed to run 5k this morning, but I squashed the benefits by getting an oreo shake at dinner tonight...boooo...

Blaine is back home keeping track of the dog and the house. Apparently we need a new deck door, the baseboard was rotting out pretty badly. He found one for a good deal on Craigslist, but I'm not sure if I will like the way it looks. We'll see. His excitement for the night, as unfortunately he shared the details with me, was watching birds mating in our backyard. SICK. I guess it looked like the guy stole the girl from another guy, what drama! hahaha

We had a great weekend! Pat and Janelle joined us for a nice relaxing weekend, with a good ol' Twins' game in the mix! Go Twins!

3 more days : )

Night!

Updates about nothing...

Friday: Dinner and Drinks at "the Office" (Matt and Blaine's name for their favorite local American Legion). That place is hopping every night of the week, so I had to finally check it out. I give it a 3 out 5. The guys find it humorous to call Rachel and I the secretaries. FUNNY. Afterwards more drinks and a movie - 27 Dresses. Pretty much a big disappointment. I give it a 2 out of 5. Thank goodness for all the drinks! I am pretty sure Blaine talked through 75% of the movie, but that's nothing new : )

Saturday: Blaine had drill. I went for a run and organized the house up. I also did a little shopping. In the evening we hit up the Twins game with some of my coworkers. Awesome weather, so it was very fun hanging out in the plaza for a pregrame drink and corndog! Twins Win - makes for a great night! We played old married couple and went home after the game, while everyone else went out....

Sunday: More drill for Blaine. I continued to clean the house, took the dog for a walk, ran a few errands....Another gorgeous day! We attempted to give Deja her "shocking" lesson. She is too smart. She just will not go across the flags, which is good because she is not suppose to, but she doesn't know yet that if she does she will get shocked. I just don't trust that a beep will stop her if she says a bunny run across the yard.

Yesterday: Work, bleh. Another nice weather day! Blaine and I took the bikes out for a near 10 mile ride. We biked to the EP community center to see if I should switch from Lifetime. It was nice, but I am just going to keep my Lifetime membership for now. Every day I am more aware of the fact that I am my mother's daughter. Mom, this is not a bad thing, but its true. Last night I cut my pinky slicing a banana. Such a mom move (you know what I'm talking about!).

Today: Work, still bleh (and its only 9:30am). I am not a fan of being unassigned, which I am all week. So I signed up for Employee Benefit Plan training tomorrow and volunteered for Junior Achievement Biz Town on Friday. Better than doing nothing....

On a side note, in the Sunday paper a couple of weekends ago, there was a featured article on a former MN couple. The young couple had their first baby, and less than 27 hours later, the wife died from an unknown blood clot on her way to hold her daughter for the first time. It is an unbelievably sad story. The husband maintains a blog of his own to share his daily struggle with the world and to help him cope with the situation. I highly recommend you check out the blog and read for yourself. He also has awesome pictures of his baby girl. The writing and pictures make you appreciate the small miracles in life.

Happy Tuesday!