Regular Stuff

Recently I've been thinking that it would be nice to take more pictures of everyday stuff because those are lots of fun to look at later. So here are a few of our apartment:

This is Justin locking our door as we leave to go to Luke & Amber's house:

And here is Justin walking out to our car in the little parking lot behind our building:

Here are a few pictures of us having fun with the kids.

Graduate Housing

The other day Daddy asked me if I was acquiring lots of good stories about living in this graduate student housing that I could pass on to my kids some day. So far it's actually been quite nice, but here are some things I will not miss about living in this 1940s graduate housing setup:

• Not having a dishwasher
• Not having a washing machine/dryer
• Having a small kitchen
• Having only small-ish windows
• Being able to hear lots of sounds from neighbors, including: crying baby next door, noisy parties next door the other way, arguing couple somewhere downstairs, and a lugy-haucking neighbor in an unidentifiable direction

Here are some things I will miss about our apartment:

• Nice hardwood floors
• Great location near Rice Village
• Pretty tree visible from our window (see previous post)
• Cheap rent

On a different note, guess how much Justin and I are getting back from our tax return? $3000! (That's $3000, said excitedly, not $3000 factorial) We plan to put it toward student loans.

I have a pretty view

The other day I noticed this beautiful tree just outside my window.

It looks very Springy to me and makes me feel cheerful. I thought "if I was Mari, I would take a picture and write a blog post about it. And if I was really Mari, I would take a picture from this same window in Summer, Fall, and Winter."

I can't promise the all-seasons-from-the-same-vantage-point, but here is this Springtime tree picture.

Shortly after I had noticed the tree, one of my classmates who had come over to study said "wow! That's a nice tree!" In a later discussion with my neighbor/classmate who lives downstairs from me, who said he is thinking about moving to a "nicer" apartment next year, my other classmate said "Hannah's place is nice- and she has this great view of a really pretty tree!" It turns out my downstairs neighbor can't see the tree from his window- all he can see is the parking area (whose corrugated metal top is visible in my tree picture). Yesterday another of my classmates, who lives on the 4th floor of the apartment across the street, said she is able to see over the top of our 2-story building to the beautiful white-flowered tree beyond. I'm glad we are all able to appreciate this lovely tree... except Xin, who lives downstairs.

When I loaded the tree picture from my camera, I realized that I had some pictures from Japan on my camera that I still hadn't downloaded!!!!! So here are a few of them:

Spring Semester

The first half of this semester was spent counting down the weeks to Spring Break, which was last week (March 1 - March 5). It was a nice week, though it didn't coincide with Justin's Spring Break (next week, March 15 - March 20). But I did get to relax and spend some time not doing anything. I also got to enjoy a day of shopping with Mama, which was a belated birthday outing. I got lots of cute stuff on sale! Thanks Mama! Justin and I also got to spend a super-fun day at the zoo with Amber, Titus, Joy and Apollos. Justin and I get in free with our Rice I.D.s. As we were leaving, Justin offered to buy the kids ice cream. Yay! We get to be that fun uncle & aunt that spoil the kids! We sat by the duck pond while the kids ate their ice cream. Apollos crawled around chasing pigeons and trying to get in the water with the ducks. Then he spotted a cooler and headed speedily towards it. I pulled him away just as he was about to reap a bumper crop of strawberries and juice boxes. Thankfully the guy whose cooler it was seemed to think it was a funny as we did.

Sadly, my spring break is now over. I have 8 more weeks of class (finishing on April 23), then a couple weeks of finals, finishing no later than May 5, then ... my qualifying exams! I have to take 3 qualifying exams, each of which pretty much summarizes one of the subjects we've learned in our first year: microeconomics, macroeconomics, and econometrics. I'll be done with those on June 4, so 13 more weeks until I'm really done with my first year of graduate school! In the meantime, I have to study diligently, first for my midterms (going on now through next week), then for my finals and qualifiers. Based on past exams I've looked at, it is not unreasonable to expect that I will need to be studying pretty much constantly (or at least very regularly) from now until the exams. Wish me luck! Or, better yet, pray that I'll do well.