Bonus

As a bonus, here are pictures of our cats: Taffy and Sadie (Sadie hates the flash)

Also, here are our rats: Minion and Maude



I love pictures. I only wish my parents would start a blog so I could see pictures of Amy's haircut, Mom's braces, ect (Hint hint, Mom. I know you read this). I'll try to put up new pictures every time I post, just to keep things interesting.

The Search Is On For A New Home

Jeff and I are officially moving to Utah, and we've been extremely busy trying to take care of everything that needs to be done before our move. We've already spoken with our property management, and they're willing to let us out of our contract early. We forfeit all deposits and are responsible for rent until the apartment is rented out again (or until October, when the contract would end). Also, we get charged with the marketing fees for putting the apt back on the market. I'm a little annoyed that we're losing about $1,000 in deposits alone, but if someone picks up our contract soon, it will be worth it.

Jeff traveled up to Utah to take a look at possible apartments/houses, and he also looked into the possibility of applying for a mortgage. It looks as though we would be approved for a mortgage up to $200,000. Now we're seriously looking into purchasing a house/townhome. It's fun, but it's also stressing Jeff. This is a really big step, and a huge responsibility.

Jeff left Thursday morning for Utah (he was suppose to leave Wednesday, but I talked him into staying another day). I was perfectly fine Thursday and Friday, but by Saturday I was depressed, lonely, and more than ready for my husband to come back home. He had originally planned on leaving Utah Sunday night, but when he heard how much I missed him, he left Saturday night and drove all night for me (stopping for a 2 hour nap). He is so amazing!

This next week is my last at the Computer Learning Center. We finally found someone who looks as though they'll be a good replacement for me. Now I just have to train her. Thurday, Jeff and I are going back up to Utah to go look at our favorite properties from the real estate listings. Hopefully we'll find something that we would be able to move into right away. August 4th, Jeff starts work, and I get to go back to Las Vegas to pack and clean. Fun fun. Thankfully, this should be the last trip that separates us for a while. I don't think I can handle another one any time soon.

Offer Received

About 5% lower than what I asked for, but it includes stock options and relocation assistance that bring it higher than what I asked for. I start August 4. Overall a pretty sweet deal. The hardest part is that they took so long to actually get to this point, that was pretty annoying.

So, we're not quite sure what our timetable looks like from here on out. I want to head to Utah for the latter half of the week to try to get an apartment all set up, or at least to get started with it. We're looking at possibly Pemberley, where Duane lives, or a place where Ricky and Taylor (Cyndi's soon-to-be-married friends) are going to be living and managing, or maybe renting/buying a house. We'll see what happens.

I don't know when Cyndi's going to be leaving her job or when/whether our current apartment managers will allow us out of the contract. There's no way that we're going to be willing to live apart for more than a week (if that). However, her current job is very dependent on her, and as far as I know there haven't been any decent applicants since they started trying to fill Cyndi's job. It's a real testament to just how good she is at what she does. Since she got hired, business went up by something like 60% (she can tell you the exact number), and it's largely fallen on her to cover all that by herself. She's incredibly good at her job and I'm sad to see her give up such a good job.

So, the deal is that Cyndi will go to school full time this fall and I'll take one class. If she can handle it, she might go for a part time job. It's an exciting change.

They said yes, I said wow

I said when, and they said either today or early next week.

Okay, so the country song attempt breaks down right there (link for the uncultured), but still, I just heard from the recruiter at Omniture that they're just putting together the final offer with the finance department and that I should hear from them either today or early next week. As long as they give me a reasonable offer, I'm going to take it.

This means that Cyndi and I need to start packing up the apartment to move it all up to Utah. I'll want to see the final figure on the salary, but I think it's safe to say that we'll be looking to rent a house or a spacious apartment. The problem is that the apartment would have to accept us having two cats. Renting a house would hopefully be more conducive to us living with cats, and it would maybe let us let the cats out of the house instead of keeping them inside all day. I'm tired of cleaning out that stupid litter box every day; who knew that cats would create so much waste?

Phone interview

The phone interview with Omniture happened this morning, and it went fairly well. I'm cautiously optimistic :D There was one programming question, and I did okay with it. He asked about my education, I told him, he didn't sound happy about that. Overall, it's a solid "meh".

Another Perspective... With Pictures!

We recently got back from an awesome family reunion in Idaho with my family. Jeff is really good with children, by the way. One of my favorite parts of the family reunion was staying up until 3am with Jeff, Uncle James, Katie, Joe, and my dad playing Munchkin. Another favorite part was the talent show. Jeff was a really good sport and sang with my family (Jeff and I couldn't really come up with a talent we'd be willing to do in front of everyone). We sang "Peanut Butter and Jelly" by InsideOut and Jeff and I were Peanut Butter and Raspberry Jelly. It was cute. I also really enjoyed watching my Aunt Amy sing with us from the back of the room. Apparently she really likes the song. I can't blame her.

On the way to and from the reunion we stopped in Utah and hung out with Jeff's family. We joined in their family reunion and got to eat some pretty amazing food (including homemade rootbeer!). I really enjoyed seeing all of his family again, especially his grandma Rosemary who tells me how pretty I am every time she sees me. She's adorable, and really good for my self-esteem.


I've posted a couple of pictures for color. The one above is from our wedding reception. I think we look better here than we do at the actual wedding -hence the posting. I've also posted a few pictures of Jeff and myself being silly from our long distance relationship:

As for the job situation, I feel a little uncomfortable about being the only one with employment right now, but I'm also extremely happy Jeff gets a break from work he doesn't enjoy. Plus, he makes me dinner. Omniture sounds like an awesome opportunity for him, but I would also love living in Colorado, so I'm fine with whatever position Jeff decides to accept (once offered). I really wouldn't mind getting out of Las Vegas. I'll miss everyone we have here, but I'm ready to be closer to family again.

jobs update

So, Monday's phone interview with Omniture fell through. The VP thought that it was a face to face interview, and the recruiter wasn't in the office Monday. Today the recruiter contacted me and set up an interview for Friday morning at 7:30 am PST.

Yesterday I had an interview with Kaango, which just got bought out by the hearst corporation. I have no idea if I'm going to get another interview with them or not. They're based in Aurora, CO, which would be a good way to get closer to Cyndi's family. I would really, really like to have either of those jobs.

It's about time that I start applying for more jobs in Vegas, however. With the family reunion right there and Omniture looking so good and me not even sure if I wanted to go back to school full time, it didn't seem prudent to apply for jobs locally. Now, I'm thinking it's time for me to go ahead and start casting a wider net.

New blog, new job, new schools

Cyndi's aunt Karen suggested we start a blog to keep everyone up on our lives, and so here we are. This blog will (theoretically) keep everyone in the whole wide world up to date on our lives. Just think of it, now even John McCain can know what's happening with our little family!

So, what's happening in our lives right now? I lost my job on June 19th, and last week I interviewed with Omniture in Orem. They're a good company, treat their employees right, etc. They even have a game room set up to look like a dungeon where you can play World of Warcraft or other computer games. Tomorrow I have a phone interview with the VP of Engineering and Wednesday should hold a job offer for me. From what the recruiter said, the only way I won't get the job is to completely screw up the phone interview. Here's hoping I get it.

Assuming I get the job, then Cyndi's agreed to go back to school full time and I'll take a night class at UVSC. I'm not sure what I'll major in, but it'll probably be either math, science or computer science. Cyndi wants to do elementary education, although I think she'd be great as a botanist or, really, anything else. It's fun to walk down the street with her and have her identify all the plants that she learned in High School.