Monthly Archives: December 2015

Fall 2015

MathClassWell even after watching Ben do a PhD I think I underestimated how much work/stress a PhD can be! It’s been a very busy semester and I came out with more Bs than I like to admit (I think my last B+ was 8th grade dance 🙁 )… but I survived lol! And even had some occasional fun with the classmates – a few game nights and we started a dinner club where someone hosts each month!

Kristine'sDinnerClub Kristine'sDinnerClub-SadNickBailed Kristine'sAppetizers Erin'sPreGameBrunch

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In November we bought a house :D! But its a 15 minute drive from campus so we decided to finish up our apartment lease (1 mile from campus) and rent out the house until the end of the semester in May. We love being able to walk to school/work but every time we go over to the house we get super excited to move in! I has 2 garages – so Ben can use one for wood working and a nice little fenced in yard so we can get puppies this summer!

For Thanksgiving, Vanderbilt gave the whole week off! We were too poor from buying our house to do our original plan of going to Peru so 3 of Ben’s sisters came to visit for a couple days which was fun! We played lots of games and made a delicious Thanksgiving dinner with them and 2 of my classmates. Everyone’s first apple pie making and our first time doing the Turkey… even if it was pre-cooked lol. We also visited the flea market (so much stuff! Ben found us a dining room table for our new house and a painting lol!), farmers market, forced them to try Indian food (which I think they liked!), saw the Parthenon replica, downton Nashville, & some Christmas lights.

BensSistas_DowntownNashville Ben&Sistas_DowntownNashville

Athena&BensSistas Athena Parthenon_RachelKarenBen Parthenon_Karen&Tey Parthenon_Tey&Ben ChristmasLightsWBensSistas ChristmasTreeWBensSistas ChristmasTreeWKaren

 

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We also did a 5 mile run on Thanksgiving morning! My previous max distance was a 5k and I finished the 5 miler in 50 minutes which I was pretty happy with! (Ben was a couple minutes ahead…he ditched me the last mile ;).

 


Race_RachelKarenTeySarah  Race_Ben&TeyFinishingTheRace_Tey  FinishingTheRace_KSR

Besides that we took Family Pics (just Ben&me) for the first time since our wedding which was fun! Pics can be seen here. Thanksgiving week was a much needed break and it was hard to get back into things for finals :-/. But now we are enjoying Christmas break and are excited to see our families in VA/MD/AZ this month!

Misty (& Otter)

Sadly, when I visited my family in August was the last time I saw our dog Misty. She died of bloat a couple months later. She was almost 16 years old and was one of the sweetest souls I’ve known. She got a little cranky in old age but she was a sweety!

Misty

We got Otter & Misty as 6 week old puppies when I was 10. We had many adventures with them – hiking Sycamore Creek (and teaching them to swim and not drown me lol), hiking Windcaves (and pulling cactus out of Misty’s nose), we had puppies with them (first they had puppies 1 day apart – Misty had 5 and Otter had 11 so 16 total! and then later Otter had a litter of 13!), camping, and lots of walks and love.

Otter was full of adventure… Perhaps a little too much. We had 2 6 foot fences and she would jump both and take herself on a walk when she didn’t get enough walks or when there was a thunderstorm. So we made sure to walk her everyday and locked her inside during thunderstorms but unfortunately got hit by a car when she was 11 when there was a storm and no one was home to lock her inside :(. Guess we learned the hard way to use electric fences for some pets. Misty was a princess (she liked to sit cross her legs like a princess – see below) and they were the best of buds. Chelsey & I had lots of fun growing up with Otter and Misty. Chelsey now has a chocolate lab Coco (which my parents let her adopt after Otter died to keep Misty company), Coco’s puppy Scottie, and she adopted Addie – a pitbull mix which after much love is almost like a normal dog again! Ben & I are hoping to get a puppy or two this summer :). Here’s to all dogs and all good/loving dog owners! Dogs really can be Man’s/Woman’s Best Friend.

Misty&Otter Otter&Misty