Hello from Colorado!

I've been keeping secrets again. The biggest one I showed off on Instagram this week -- did you see?

Yup, I've moved to Colorado!

If you've been around a little while, you probably know I graduated in May with my Masters of Higher Education Administration -- a degree that prepares you to work in college administration. My people are called Student Affairs Professionals, and we do things like work with student activities, advise students academically and on career development, and provide educational and safe on-campus living.

Anyway. I got a new job in Colorado and just a short month later, here I am! (Today is actually my first day at the new job -- wish me luck!)

I am TERRIBLY behind with you all, seeing as I've spent the last month apartment hunting, wrapping up my old job and moving, so I may be posting about some things that happened forever ago (like graduation!) but that I want to document here. Bear with me!

This move also means the start of mine and Pat's last stint of having a long-distance relationship -- he's still in Kansas getting his masters and he'll join me here in Colorado in May when he finishes.

Anyway. I hope to be back here more regularly, perhaps with a few retrospective posts, but hopefully updating you all on current happenings!

Love from Colorado!

PS -- Who wants to come visit???

Trip to Denver!

Ummm....

hey.

I'm really behind on blogging, huh?

But I want to tell you about my trip to see Pat! Let's pretend it wasn't already three weeks ago...

Before Pat moved to Denver for his 12-week internship, I bugged him about me being able to visit. They'd told him he could be working up to 80 hours a week, though, so he knew he'd be really busy. He'd say, You can come visit, but I might not have time to see you.

Well then.

But then one of my coworkers found a good deal on flights between Kansas City and Denver. And I couldn't find the good deal myself but it put the idea in Pat's head and then we bought my tickets and then I was off to see Pat!

It was a quick trip -- I got in Friday night and was supposed to leave Monday morning. But it was soo great to visit him and see where he's living and his life for the past many weeks.

Enough talk. Here's some pictures! We went hiking both days I was there, so all my pics are from that. :)

It was a wonderful trip, and I'm so glad I got to go!

Have any of you been to Denver before? Any tips for the next time I'm out there? We didn't venture into the city much (or at all) -- maybe next trip!

Distance sucks and I'm a wimp

Hey friends.

I had planned to write a cute, cheeky, I-don't-take-myself-too-seriously post about all the great things I get to do since Pat's away for an internship for the next twelve weeks.

(So far, I've watched the Golden Globes and watched the same movies over and over again. I was trying to think of more ideas.)

I was going to try to show that I know it's not the end of the world: twelve weeks isn't that long, and at least I can assume he's reasonably safe where he is -- he's in an accounting internship, not deployed or anything.

And then I had to inflate my tire, and spent two dollars in quarters at the gas station trying to get the air pump to sound like it was actually putting air into my tire instead of just letting it all leak out, and then I ended up going to Jiffy Lube and playing right into the stereotype of girls who can't do anything and don't know anything about their cars when I asked them to please, please just look at my tires, and no I don't want my oil changed when I still have almost 300 miles till the next date. And then they told me that I'd managed to overinflate my tire and kind of laughed at me.

And then I ended up crying in the grocery store parking lot. Not a lot of crying. Just a little.

Distance sucks. And the next twelve weeks won't be fun in some ways. But I'm really, truly going to try to find the good parts of being away from my favorite human for a while. Like sending him a valentine's card I already picked out, sending him weird pictures, and spending time we'd usually spend together making memories I can tell him about when he gets back.

Kudos to those of you who spend most of your time away from your significant other, and extra love to you if it's because he or she is deployed.

What's your favorite way to spend a day you have all to yourself? I've got a few coming up and I could use some inspiration!