Getting Settled

The last few weeks have been absolutely crazy for us with both school and our jobs keeping us very busy. In the middle of it all, we still try to find time to get more situated at home and I've been getting pretty excited about decorating in our first place together. Although money's tight and space is small, my new little obsession with decorating has made me more creative than ever with ideas. I decided since we have such limited space, we could put a little table in the hallway downstairs, just outside our bedroom, where I can display our decorative items and holiday pieces. When it comes to me and crafts, things don't usually turn out well, in fact don't usually turn out at all. I can be too much of a perfectionist which will frustrate me to the point where I give up. There have been far too many projects that have been left uncompleted than I could even count. However lately, I’ve come up with ways where I can create something and feel satisfied. (These projects usually don’t take too much time or effort which is probably why I finish them.) Another exciting piece of news is that just the other day as I was looking over my map to graduation, I realized I don’t have too many credits remaining. For some reason, I thought that if I condensed my classes as much as possible, I might be able to graduate by April 2009. I began to divide up the number of credits I have left and discovered that if I only took 12 credits winter semester, 3 during the summer, and the last 12 next fall, I would be able to graduate by December 2008. Manuel recently started working part-time with a study abroad program in Mérida, México which is scheduled for this coming spring. If everything works out the way we hope, there is a good chance we will be able to go as facilitators at no cost. This would be a great opportunity for me to obtain the foreign residency requirement for my major and it would be a fun vacation for us to take as newlyweds. Then, after I graduate in December, Manuel will most likely do the same just 1 semester later. This means that he could likely start his first semester of chiropractic school in the fall of 2009. The two of us were getting pretty excited about the future--so much that yesterday morning, instead of working on my homework, I spent my time online looking at all of the chiropractic schools in the country and thinking about how fun it would be to live in a new place. The feeling sort of hit me that once we graduate from BYU and leave Utah, we will really be on our own, and that wherever we go may be where we end up building our life together and raising our children. It’s an exciting yet nervous feeling. I just have to remember that we still need to focus on the here-and-now and not lose motivation in our studies. Over the past couple of weeks, Manuel and I have been watching all of the Harry Potter movies starting with the first. We are in the middle of the 4th which we hope to finish tonight so we can go see the newest edition in the dollar theater tomorrow. It’s getting us into the Halloween spirit! In the next couple of weeks, we want to go to a haunted house and a corn maze. We’re also getting excited about pumpkin carving since last year it was one of our first dates together, as well as Manuel’s first time experiencing the American tradition. With everything going on, we’re having fun, but I have to admit that I’m already looking forward to the Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday breaks!