Favorite Picture Friday: April 27th, 2012- TRAVEL ANNOUNCEMENT!

Jason and I are happy to announce our plans for this summer.  If you know us, you know that we have a hard time sitting still, so naturally we were looking for something exciting to do while Jason is off school and I am off work.  We made our plans and we are happy to share it with everyone where we are off to.  To give you a clue, here is a picture of some items we have received from friends that live in this country, and a Mulan doll that should give the country away.  

Give up?  Well, we are going to CHINA!  Actually we will be out there for most of the summer because Jason will be studying abroad for a few weeks in Nanjing and then he has an internship in Shanghi.  We will be spending some extra time out there to make sure we cover everything we have ever wanted to see.  

We are both just ecstatic to have this experience and honestly I am already packing in my mind.  Jason has always wanted to see the Terracotta Warriors and I have always wanted to walk on the Great Wall.  It's thrilling to know that we will soon be heading out there.   

Good News and Great News!

Every time I write a post on our blog I feel like a broken record, because I seem to keep mentioning how grateful we are for our lives right now.  Jason and I strive so hard to live our lives to the best of our ability, and we are definitely seeing the benefits of our hard work.  We thought we should take a moment and let everyone know what is going on in our lives right now.

For the good news, I am happy to announce that I signed on with my current school district for another year.  I have to admit that it was a tough decision because I had some offers for other schools and even hospitals to work at after the school year ended.  Jason and I discussed it and since my current district is offering me a pay raise along with some new responsibilities, I decided that I would continue working with them.  I just love my job and one of the biggest selling points for me was that as long as Jason is in law school I will be able to celebrate holidays and weekends with him with my current job.  Plus, I don't hate having the long summer months off to relax.  So our plan is that I will finish work, enjoy the summer, and return back this fall to my elementary school and favorite students.

Now for the great news!  A couple years ago Jason began a research quest on the Tudor family and the connections and influences they had in Europe.  He spent countless hours studying and reading about this era and we even traveled great distances so that he could see 1st Edition books to read about this time period.  Over this time Jason began to compile a book  that has come together in a completed novel.  He submitted it just a few weeks ago to see if it would be picked up to be published, and it has!  Jason is now an official author of his own writing, "Patronage And Social Networks, Of London And Calais During The 1530's."  Isn't that amazing that even during all of the things that he has had to do, especially law school, he has managed to discipline himself enough to do this.  I am so proud of him and it is thrilling to see the title of his book followed by the words "...by Jason M. Burrows."  If you want to see Jason's book being sold on Amazon click here.

Here is a picture of the cover of Jason's book.  

Oh wait! I almost forgot more good news.  Jason was recently elected onto his Student Government at Whittier Law School.  Jason ran for an elected position and won for the title of the Alumni Relations chair.  His job is to work with the alumni from the school and see what they can offer the current students at Whittier.  Along with that, he is in charge of hobnobbing with the big wigs in Orange County and he is also in charge of hosting several alumni golf tournaments.  Basically Jason is getting credit for making connections with rich lawyers, eating tasty hors d'oeuvres, and playing golf.  Rough, right?!

Well, that'a quick update on our lives and how we are doing.  We are so happy to be together and we are so grateful that we followed the promptings to move down here to California, because joy and love have followed us down here.

Favorite Picture Friday: April 20th, 2012

Tomorrow marks the 1 year anniversary of when Jason and I had decided that we would be moving to California and he would attend Law School.  When Jason got accepted to the different law schools we started praying and researching them.  We had narrowed it down to a few and started visiting the U of U and then moved on to the California schools.  We were starting to feel that none of them were going to be right, but then we visited Whittler Law School.  It was so amazing how right it felt and we knew immediately that this is where Jason is supposed to go to law school.  Once we had prayed about it and got our confirmations on it, we began looking for apartments.  That day we had found an apartment we liked and we still had some time left in the day.  I still remember Jason looking over at me and saying "We could get season passes to Disneyland!"  

Looking back a year ago it seems such a long ways in the past.  Some many wonderful blessing and people have come into our lives that we don't even know how to express our gratitude.  Here is a picture of Jason today showing how happy he is and then he is giving us his adorable pouty face because you can see his pass expires tomorrow.  As of today we have visited Disneyland a total of 61 times!  

Don't worry, we are still Disney fanatics and will continue to be there every Friday after work and whenever we want to walk hand in hand in a beautiful place.  

We Left Our Hearts in ...

Every year since Jason and I first started dating in college we have gone on a trip during Spring Break.  More often than not we ended up in California in the Anaheim area (possibly for Disneyland), but this year we didn't have much of a choice as to where we went.  For my job as a Speech- Language Pathologist in the schools I was asked to help assist during a presentation at the annual California SLP convention.  I had agreed to attend it and later realized that it lined up with Jason's Spring Break.  That was how our Spring Break was decided for us.  The actual convention took place in San Jose, which was fun to run around while I was busy presenting, but we spent most of our vacation in San Francisco.
It was Jason's first time visiting SF and he had always wanted to see the Golden Gate Bridge.  We arrived one morning and it was all misty and mysterious.  When I went to SF years ago it was late Spring and it was sunny and hot.  This was such a difference to need a coat and drink hot cocoa while riding a trolley.  Sure there was a part of me that missed Southern California and how it's always sunny there, but we had such a fantastic time in SF.

We had just driven across the Golden Gate Bridge and pulled off on a bike bath nearby to take some pictures of it.  Here are a few of us in that area.

This picture shows how green the area was that we walked to see the bridge.  The parks and walkways around town were so bright and lush with the plants that I thought we were in Washington.

Here is a view of the bridge.  Don't worry, there is another side to it, but the fog was so thick you couldn't even see the other side as you drove on to it.  Let's just say that made it a little bit more exciting for me and I kept a good grip on Jason's hand in the car.

Once we were done "Oohing" and "Awwing" the bridge we moved on to one of the other landmarks in SF: The Palace of Fine Arts.  I just love this area and how gorgeous it is.  The rotunda is iconic and the carvings on all of the pillars and buildings are so impressive Jason and I kept thinking we were back in Italy.  We spent some quality time there before moving on.

Here is a picture of a swan swimming in the pond.

We spent some other time visiting the Walt Disney Family Museum.  That's right, not an amusement park, a MUSEUM.  Since we are Disney fanatics we've spent some time doing research on Walt Disney and his family.  We knew that there was a museum up in this area that focused on Walt's family growing up and how he started in the movie industry and then how he started the parks.  It was done so well and we were both immensely impressed.  Let's just say that as soon as we got back to SoCal we had to go to Disneyland just to show Walt how much we appreciate his vision.
Later in the evening we made it down the piers and Fisherman's Wharf.  We were hungry and looking for some good seafood.  We had the best crab cakes, lobster bisque, and salmon sandwiches ever!

Here is a picture of Jason at Pier 39.

A picture of both of us down at the pier.

The second day we drove back up to San Francisco the second day we ate the move divine breakfast at the Palace Hotel in downtown SF.  Talk about luxury, this hotel was so gorgeous and the room that we ate our meal in was an old- fashioned, glamorous room fit for a movie star.  

We then made it down to Baker's Beach which gave a great view of the bridge.  I took off my shoes on the beach tiptoed into the water, and man was it freezing!

To warm up we made it Ghirardelli Square to give ourselves a candy fix.  You can't come to this area and not get some of the chocolaty goodness.  

Oh what wonderful goodness.  

The hot fudge sundae that made our eyes roll in the back of our heads.

We had to get back to SoCal so we were getting ready to leave our short trip up to SF, but on our way out of town we just had to test Jason's driving skills by going down the curvy windy road known as Lombard Street.  Just when you think it zigs, it zags back the other way causing you to have to drive down the street at an accerlated pace of 5mph.

Here is a picture of Jason driving down Lombard Street.  Yes, he is talking on his phone in this picture, so don't tell anyone about that.  Shhh!

I realized that we didn't take any pictures in San Jose.  I was so busy during the daytime that we didn't really go sightseeing around town.  We had some amazing meals of Chinese, Indian, french, and the best Mediterranean falafels I've ever had!  One of the nights we wanted to go see a movie and heard about the coolest place ever to go see a movie: A Drive-In!  I had never done that before so I was so excited to try it. We stocked up on yummy snacks and went and watched a double-feature while listening to the radio station tuned in to the movie.  I've decided that drive-in movie theaters need to make a comeback, because that was pure awesomeness!

We had such a wonderful time in both San Francisco and San Jose and I am glad that we continued our tradition of traveling somewhere during our Spring Break.

Favorite Picture Friday: April 6th, 2012

We had so much fun at the Easter Egg Hunt for our family held at Kurt n Shel's house.  Jason and I always get the honor of hiding the eggs when we're in town and really I think it's just as fun as finding the eggs.  We had so much fun!