December:
Jay spent the month flying out to several interviews for residency. He had his last interview December 30th and then the waiting game began.
We spent Christmas in Tucson and had a wonderful Christmas Eve dinner and program, which included a visit from Santa Claus, with Jay's brother's family.
For our annual Christmas hike this year we hiked Wasson's Peak on the west side of Tucson. Can't hate 70 degree weather on Christmas day.
For our annual Christmas hike this year we hiked Wasson's Peak on the west side of Tucson. Can't hate 70 degree weather on Christmas day.
We drove up to Utah for the week of New Years. I got my 3rd flat tire in 12 months while driving down the freeway in Utah. Full blow out. Dang Tucson potholes. We replaced all the rims on the car since it was also the second time a rim was dented.
We enjoyed cholocate dipping with the Robertsons on New Years Eve.
We enjoyed cholocate dipping with the Robertsons on New Years Eve.
January
Best highlight-Yurt camping and cross country skiing at Lily Lake with our friends the Mechams, who were brave enough to bring their 4 daughters along, and the Burkholzs, Jay's old roommate from 2nd year in medical school.
And since we live in Tucson and hiking season is in the winter we also hiked Picacho Peak and Sabino Canyon.
February
The anticipated month finally arrived. On February 10th, Jay had an email by 7:10 am announcing that he had matched into a surgical residency program at Mclaren Macomb in Detroit Michigan. We feel truly blessed to have matched into such a great program and definitely recognized the hand of the Lord in how everything turned out. Little did I know that the work of moving was about to start. And that is a chore. We had to figure out how to store all of our stuff for 3 months, move our belongings which included 2 cars and an expensive musical instrument across 2000 miles and find a place to move it to. This was all very new to me.
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| celebration dinner for residency at Elvira's in Tubac |
Moving to Michigan means snow. A whole lot of snow. With this realization and also trying to figure out the safest way to move my harp across country, we decided to get a 4 wheel drive that would fit my harp. We found a great deal on a 2010 Toyota Highlander and sold Jay's Honda to my brother Geoff.
March
Jay and I made one more trip to Haiti with our favorite team.
As a late Christmas present, James and Emily made Jay and I a dinner in the wash with 3 very handsome waiters to serve us our food. What a fun surprise and treat.
When we moved to Arizona we made a bucket list of things we wanted to do while we living there. We didn't get close to finishing that list, but we did make it to Sedona in March and loved having James and Emily and their 4 boys join us for the weekend. It reminded me of the red rocks of southern Utah. We loved hiking Devil's Bridge and swimming at Slide Rock. It was a great memorable weekend.
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| Cathedral Rock at sunrise |
Our storage and shipping POD arrived March 29th. We miraculously fit our entire apartment into a 7 ft x 7 ft x 8 ft POD. It was kind of like a really complicated version of tetris in there. We were glad that we stuck to our mantra in Tucson-if we buy it we have to move it in 18 month-and therefore acquired very few extras.
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| Jay fit a bed, 2 couches, 2 dressers, a desk with chair, kitchen table and 4 chairs, a rocking chair and 2 shelves. |
April
My last day of work was a short 4 hr shift on April 1. (I needed to keep those benefits the month of April!) We were on the road by noon to Oregon via Utah. We arrived at Jay's parents house around midnight. We could have made better time except I was falling asleep and had to pull over around Filmore for a quick 30 min nap. When I woke up it was snowing. WHAT?!? I just left Arizona 10 hrs earlier and it was 90 degrees. I didn't mentioned that Jay and I were driving 2 separate cars because we were delivering his Honda to my brother in Oregon. In Utah we met Julie's new baby, Evan and celebrated my brother John's birthday and had all the Utah Dougalls plus Heather's family there for a birthday celebration. We also hiked Y mountain and up Mill Creek and watched Grace play soccer.
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| Baby Evan |
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| John's bday lunch gang exept john is out showing Jay is new car. |
We then drove on to Oregon where Jay completed his last 4 week rotation with Dr Douville, a cardio thoracic surgeon. It was one of Jay's favorite rotations and we are so glad we made this rotation happen. The Brennans hosted us for the 5-6 weeks we were in Oregon. We enjoyed our late night Tillamook ice cream conversations, morning runs, day trip to the Oregon coast and Greg's passing out episode. It's never a dull moment there.
In April we also flew to Michigan, met with a realtor and put an offer on a 2 bedroom condo in Chesterfield.
I tended Kathryn's kids for 5 days (she may not have me back after accidently putting cayenne pepper on her children's toast instead of cinnamon and sugar) while she was in Hawaii and Geoff's kids while he was at a conference. We drove to Seattle to see Sheri post New Zealand and visit Jay's friend who was in the hospital after a serious biking accident where he suffered a severed spinal cord.
May
SCHOOLS OUT FOR SUMMER!
We went to the oregon coast on Jay's first day off his rotation!
The next day we had a flight scheduled to Cabo that got cancelled once we arrived at the airport. We rescheduled for the next day and that flight had mechanical problems and was grounded! We got rebooked on a different airlines and made it to our final destination in time to enjoy 7 days relaxing in the sun.
During all of this I was getting everything sent to the lenders and underwriters for our home mortgage. We signed official papers in Utah on May 22 and it was a done deal on May 23rd.
Jay's graduation was May 28th. His grandparents, parents and 3 of his siblings attended. What a great accomplishment for him. One night a month or so before graduation he mentioned to me that this-4 years of intense school with no time to slow your pace, and show up to new rotations every month and figure out patients and doctors and computer systems-was the hardest thing he had ever done. I teared up for him at graduation thinking of all that he has accomplished and overcame in getting to that point.
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| Midwestern graduation |
And in the middle of all of that-we celebrated our 2 year anniversary. We went to lunch at Zinburger with James and Becca and then had tuna steaks for dinner with James' family, Becca's family and the Thompson's from church.
June
I have always dreamed of spending a month in europe and we made it happen post graduation. We flew out the morning after graduation and spent 3 weeks traveling to Italy (Rome, Florence and Venice), France (Paris, and a 4 day tour of the countryside including Normandy and Mont St Michel) and Germany (Munich and Garmisch). And let's not forget a little world cup soccer. I'll write another post about europe.
We flew home from Germany on Friday the 20th and drove across country arriving at our title company on June 23rd at 830 am to pick up the keys to our new condo. Thankfully the power hadn't been turned off. The gas company was able to come out that day to turn on our gas and the water company came to switch that over to our name. Don't get me started on what a headache it was to get internet and a washer and dryer into our place but after 3 weeks it feels more like a home.
July
Residency officially starts for everyone across the country on July 1. Jay's first rotation is Internal Medicine.
I accepted a job at a local Pediatric and urgent care clinic a few miles from our house. It's flexible hours and close to home. How can you say no to that.
We actually got to celebrate the 4th of July together! I ran a 1/2 marathon that morning while jay was at the hospital. I came in 3rd for my age group and won a hat. Jay didn't have to work that evening and we BBQ-ed with friends and got to watch some amazing fireworks over one of the lakes in Michigan.
