Fun things

Lots of fun things have been going on around here. We finally got our precious Prius back last week, after being in the shop for two weeks! The good news is that Jonathan was able to get Toyota to pay half the bill, even though the specific problem was not covered on our warranty. Good job, baby. :)
On Tuesday night, I took Mom to see Cirque - they were in town for only one night. It was her belated birthday present and we had a wonderful time. The show was really fantastic. The contortionist was my favorite. This character, Raven, was mom's favorite.
We are super proud of Amanda's recent accomplishments. Not only has she gotten almost all of her grades up to straight A's, she was honored this week with about 15 or so other students at her high school for a Pride award. This award is given to students by their teachers for excellence, improvement, and great behavior. I was thrilled to be able to make it to the assembly and see her teacher brag about her to the audience. We're so proud of you, Amanda!!
Finally, next week is spring break. Thank...God. Seriously. This is another killer semester. I am taking two classes with a professor in our Department who is known for assigning more work than anyone. This break could not be more anticipated. We are also puppy-sitting for our landlord for the next two weeks and J.J. is so happy to have a buddy. It's really cute to see her walk up to him while he's eating out of his bowl. She goes right underneath him, eats his food, and he does nothing but look down at her quizzically. He of course does nothing to stop her. It's pathetic but adorable.
SPRING BREAK!!! YEA!!!

Lots of news!

We've had lots of interesting things happen these past few weeks.
First, we took our car to a mechanic, thinking that we might be having some transmission trouble. We had some services done and the mechanic said that, if it didn't fix it, the transmission would be out in less than a year - the repair would cost more than the car was worth. Driving it home, Jonathan realized that the problem was not fixed. Awesome. The good news is that we had been thinking about this possibility for a few weeks and had begun to do some research into what we could afford and what was available in terms of buying a new (used) car. In case you didn't know this, my dream car has been a Toyota Prius, ever since I rode in a friend's four years ago. To my surprise, I found some online that we only a little bit more expensive than what we had planned on spending. Considering that (conservatively) a Prius can save over $10,000 in gas over 100,000 miles, the extra expense was minimal. So...we went car shopping...and here's our new car!

It is amazing! We are really in love with it. I planned on taking nicer pictures of it after we had a chance to wash it this past week, but guess what? We only got to drive it for three days until we had to take it to the shop for repair! Argh! We found out that it is a common problem with the models made before 2010, and we are currently waiting to see if we can get some assistance from Toyota on the repairs. The good news is that we are driving an awesome loaner car until it's fixed. What a bummer, though - didn't even get the "new car smell" out until it was in the shop! We'll post better pictures once we get it back. It really is the coolest car ever and we can't wait to drive it again!

Better news - Jonathan and I presented at a graduate research forum this weekend at the University. Graduate students from all disciplines presented and judges came from all over the state. I won third place in my category! Even better - Jonathan won FIRST place in his, and his was the most competitive!! So for a few hours of work, we got free dinner at the banquet, cool titles, honors to add to our CV's, and prize money!!

We also celebrated some birthdays last week - happy birthday Mom and Kaylen! Birthday wishes also to our little nephew and my friend at the University.