Sorry in advance, but this is going to be a nerdy post.

So a few nights ago, It just started to snow as I went to pick up Leah from her night class. The snowflakes were so huge, I could see hexagons on my car from 5 feet away. Some of them were 7 to 8 mm. across. Once we were back, I wanted to see if I could take some pictures. After awhile I got the hang of it and there were just a few that turned out really well (click on the pictures to make them bigger).


Nothing spectacular, but I thought they were pretty cool.


About my interview on Tuesday- I found out that I will be interviewed for two jobs at the same time, the one I mentioned and one with Wisconsin DNR. It would be a similar job at a 4,000 acre recreation area and wildlife preserve about 45 min. south of town. We will just have to wait and see what happens.

We haven't done anything else blogworthy lately because Milwaukee is pretty boring in the winter (if you don't have extra spending money) as evidenced by my snowflake pictures. We are already looking forward to spring so we can do stuff outside. So just as a heads up, if you want us to keep posting, our blog might become a little boring. Hang in there until spring!

Hi All,

As many of you know, I've been looking for jobs for quite awhile now. I applied through Americorps for a stewardship assistant with the Milwaukee county park system. It would involve many things that I have done before, like invasive species removal, seed collecting, plant propagating, and general maintenance. The job also comes with some form of health insurance. It would start March 1 and go through August, full time. Today I got an email inviting me to come in for an interview. I'm not letting myself get excited, but it would be great if I got this job. It's on February 2 and I'm asking for prayers that all will go well.

We just came back from another relaxing weekend in Holland. The main reason we went home was because one of Leah's older cousins got married. The reception was at Boatwerks and had a 10 piece jazz band all night, very cool. We also got to hang out with Joel, Julie and Kyper. They were in town because Joel is in between rotations. We had a "business meeting" at JP's and talked about a project that we might get going soon. More about that later.

No pictures today, but we'll keep posting.
Aren

So. I guess it's been awhile. We kind of gave up on the whole blogging thing for a bit, mostly because our camera was broken and wouldn't turn on. I guess it just needed a little bit of time to itself, because we tried it again yesterday, and it works again! Yay!

Now to bring you all up to date on our lives (even though we've likely recently seen everyone the two people who read this). I made it through my first semester of grad school quite successfully and was all too ready for a break. Fortunately, Marquette has a month-long winter vacation, so I was able to totally forget about school for awhile. We spent a fabulous two weeks in Holland; some of the highlights included:

-Going sledding and playing in the snow with cousins
-Having Christmas morning with the whole Phillips family for the first time, and seeing our nephew Kyper's first Christmas
-Going snowshoeing on fresh snow at the nature center
-Spending New Year's Eve at the local retirement center. Without the old people. More fun than it sounds, I promise. There's a hot tub, pool (swimming) and pool (billiards), games, food and family.
-Going on a walk through the Allegan woods with my family
-Going to the beach and stealing signs (Aren and his brothers; I did not participate)
-Having a knitting and tea party (me and my friends; Aren did not participate)

After two weeks at home, Aren and I came back to Milwaukee so that I could work for my assistantship. It's been pretty nice for me to be here and not have homework to do all the time. After I got home from work, we had time to relax, get things done around the apartment, watch movies, etc. I finished our wedding album finally and Aren got his butterflies all labeled and put in a case, they look pretty cool:


Today, we went to the Mitchell Park Domes, a botanical garden near our apartment. We are always looking for cheap (and by that I mean free) entertainment, and today residents got in free, so we took advantage of that. It was a sunny day and the gardens are in glass domes, so it was very bright and summer-y feeling. Here are a few pictures:


(Stealth photography...Aren had no idea I was taking this one)


And that brings us up to right now. This may be the last you hear from me for the next few months, since I start back up tomorrow with classes. I guess it's all up to Aren for awhile, so complain to him if there aren't any new updates. Peace out.