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.