Pleased As Punch: Catching Up

After almost a year break from blogging, I’ve decided to start it up again. I used to be an English major and I was writing often, but when I changed my major to Math, I hardly ever write anymore. I kept a minor in English, which requires me to take one English class every semester. So, I have at least been writing a little bit, but usually that means just one 10 page research paper at the end of the semester. So in order to cultivate my writing skills, keeping a blog is just what I need. I’m not really sure why I stopped blogging in the first place.

Oh yea, I remember. School took over my entire life. And Ben’s too. We hardly had time to eat, sleep, and exercise, let alone update a blog about our really exciting lives of stress and study!

But now, life is a lot more interesting. I am almost done with my degree. I graduate in December. Ben is currently finishing up an internship in San Francisco with an accounting firm. I wasn’t able to join him, because I had to take some classes in Hawaii, but I did get to visit him for a week over the 4^th of July. (I couldn’t leave Ben alone on his favorite holiday! yes, Ben ranks Independence Day number 1, even over Christmas!) So for the past several weeks, I’ve been fending for myself in Hawaii! It’s not fun being away from your spouse, but of all the places I could have been left alone, Hawaii is the best I can think of. I keep very busy with classes and work. I am a math tutor, and I work in the Online department where I write quizzes and grade work for religion classes and I edit any writing assignments people send in. I’ve also used this time away from Ben to focus on whipping myself into shape! On a side note, I’ve only eaten out twice since I’ve been in Hawaii without him! I started going to a crossfit class offered at school twice a week, and yoga, running, swimming and surfing in between. (There are some plusses to being along...no one cares if you have yams with almond butter and coconut milk for dinner. Don't judge, it's my favorite food right now!) So life has been good, and in 2 weeks it will get much better when my love comes back to me! Daily phone calls are nice, but it gets old after a while. Also, the time difference is not our friend.

So since it has been an entire year since I’ve blogged, here are some things we’ve been up to since last summer:

· As mentioned before, we got through the toughest 2 semesters of our lives. Last Fall, I began the real core of the math major. I took 2 math classes that I wasn’t really prepared for. In the Winter, I took the second half of those classes plus another. 2 and 3 classes doesn’t sound like much, but the material I was learning was insanely difficult and really made me wonder what I was doing in the math major. I didn’t feel cut out for that type of work. Now that it is over, I look back at how hard I worked to understand things that seemed impossible to understand. I pulled through all of those classes with pretty awesome grades and even if I never use the material I learned in those classes, I have a better idea of what my work ethic looks like and more confidence that I can do anything I set my mind to. Now that those crazy classes are out of the way, I am actually really enjoying my math classes! NERD ALERT!!!

· Lots of snorkeling, hiking, and surfing.

· I started to be very interested in eating paleo. I haven’t been completely paleo for any significant period of time, but I enjoy using paleo recipes. When I feel like I need a treat, I’ve made some bomb paleo cookies. Ok so Ben probably wouldn’t like them, but he’s the kind of guy who is like, butter sugar and flour. Those are what make good desserts and you can’t make substitutions! I disagree…

· Ben turned 25! And don’t you worry, I baked him all kinds of buttery, sugary, floury goodness. That night I think we fit over 20 people in our tiny apartment for cake and cookies in celebration.

· We had an awesome Christmas break. We had a couple days in California, and the rest of the time in Utah where we skied and snowboarded and had a really hard time being outside in weather at least 70 degrees colder than what we are used to! My parents and little sister came to snowboard at Canyons so it was really fun to meet up with them. I hadn’t been in the snow with my family for years and years!

· We had a memorable Valentines day…only because it was the worst ever. I worked and studied for a test all day. I had this evil teacher who thought it would be nice to make our tests pink to make up for the fact that she was giving it to us on V day.

· I turned 22. I had school all day, but Ben and I headed up to the North shore to watch the sunset at Pipeline and eat at one of our favorite spots, a little Thai spot called the Elephant Truck. It was low key and last minute, but really meaningful and perfect to be spending the evening with my favorite person on this incredible island.

· Ben’s sister and husband Katie and Dave came to visit us for a week. Dave surprised Katie with the trip the day they left!

· My roommate from my freshman year and her husband came and visited us.

· I took a really interesting class about the History of English and as my final project, I researched California and surf language. I created a guide to Carpinteria (my hometown) Slang. It was the most fun I’ve had on a school assignment. Ben likes to tease me because of my California accent. He thinks it’s pretty thick. I have my Valley girl momma to thank for that. This project allowed me to remember in great detail how my friends and I spoke in high school. And believe me, this memories are cringe worthy. I mean, did we really say stuff like let’s skrut this grub, and what uppers? Rocka shaka, bra you know we did! (ick!)

· We headed to the mainland for summer break to visit our families. We spent the first few days in sunny San Diego and stayed with my sister and her husband. Kelley works at lululemon and is a fitness fanatic (in a very good way! Not a crazy way!) so she worked us! We spent our days there surfing, rock climbing, yoga-ing, pilates-ing, hiking, and of course eating delicious food in between! We had a super fun time with them. We also visited Utah, where we went on horseback rides and hikes, ate at our old favorite restaurants, a little boating, and saw friends and family we hadn’t seen in a long time.

· Ben started his internship at the end of June.

· My parents and I drove to meet him for the fourth of July weekend, which we spend exploring Monterey, Big Sur, and Santa Cruz. Northern California is so beautiful. It has such breathtaking views of the coast, and such incredibly large and gorgeous trees. I fell in love with it. My lil sis Mak met us in San Francisco for a few fun days in the city.

· I spent the rest of the break with my family in Summerland, playing with my adorable nephews, surfing with my dad and Mak, hanging out with my momma, and beginning the start of the 2 months long phone relationship with Ben. Not fun.

· I’ve been back in Hawaii for several weeks now, working, doing math, playing, and waiting for Ben to get his bum back to da aina!

Here are some photos from this last year