The largest aquarium in the world

This morning Anthony and I finally visited the largest aquarium in the world, the Georgia Aquarium in Atlanta, GA. We have been wanting to see it since it opened, and Anthony especially wanted to see the coral reef exhibit that has real corals (most places have fake stuff). It was amazing!!!! I felt like a kid because everything was so cool and new to see and all around awesome. We stayed in a hotel an hour outside of Atlanta and here are some pictures of us this morning:

Ant and I could not get over a peach tree in the parking lot of the hotel! I don't think either of us had ever seen a peach tree up close before. We even picked some, but they were definitely not ripe yet :)
On to pictures of the aquarium exhibits. I can't stress how amazing everything was! They also had little signs next to different tanks with a cell phone number to call and get a little guided tour of that part of the exhibit.
River Exhibit:
A big part of the river exhibit is a river that you walk under so you can see underneath all of the fish. These are some serious catfish beer bellies:
Cold Water Exhibit: All I could think about when I saw this guy, was how much good eating his legs would be! This whale was seriously loving all of the attention he was getting from the crowd. One little girl asked a worker why he chased away the other two females and he had to struggle to figure out a way to say that the whale wasn't chasing them, he was actually "interested" in them and the females weren't feeling it.
Leafy Dragons The jelly fish were so surreal! It is almost like they are some kind of alien creature or something.
The coral reef exhibit:
This is the view as you come to the main reef tank: They have a simulated wave that comes through every few minutes to mimic the ocean: I could just see the wheels in Anthony's head turning, trying to figure out how he could get his tank to do a wave like that.
Ocean Voyager Exhibit: The fish is bigger than the kid next to it! There was a moving platform that took you underneath the tank so that you could see all of the sharks and fish. We stayed a good 30 minutes just at this display window. It was so big!! The tank is the largest in the world and holds 4 whale sharks, which grow to be 30 feet long! Here are two of the whale sharks. Believe it or not, they are actually still juveniles and can grow to be twice as big.
It was so fun, and even though we had to cut our trip short, we are both so glad that we went!

Summer Semester Over!!!

The summer semester is finally over! Ant took his last test today at 5PM and ended up with a high B in the class. We literally fasted and prayed our way through this class, so we are so relieved that it ended well! "We" also got a 96 in Anthony's research class, so take that! I am so happy to have my husband back!

On Monday we are going to Atlanta for a few days so that we can finally see the aquarium there. We have been wanting to go since it opened, but we both hate to drive and have always come up with excuses to not make the 5 hour trip. Now that we are moving 2 hours south, we figured we have to go before it turns into a 7 hour trip! My goal is to take a serious amount of pictures since we have been such photo slackers lately. I don't think we have taken more than a few pictures together since our anniversary last December!

Who wears the pants in the family?

Apparently Bitsy does! I turned around and Bitsy had decided that my shorts were the most comfortable spot to be in for the night. She stayed in it for at least 3 hours without moving, I even double checked to make sure she was breathing after awhile. I swear, I have never seen a dog so obsessed with being comfortable!!! She will root around non-stop until she finds that perfect spot and then lay there as long as she can without moving.

Where did the time go?

I decided I should update this thing, since I finally have the time to. A few weeks ago I went from working 50 hours a week, to having all of my time available! My internship at Children's Home Society did not work out for many reasons which would bring back too much irritation to recount. Grrrr... I actually just got some residual irritation just writing that sentence. I was going to try to stick it out for the summer, but my family was having a bit of a crisis and I really felt inspired that I needed to spend this time with them before we move to Tampa. I also quit my weekend/nights job at Shands, so I now have Fridays and Saturdays open for the first time in 2 1/2 years. I must say, I still haven't figured out what people do on the weekends!

Anthony has been studying and studying and studying and studying (you get the picture) since the summer semester started. It is only 10 weeks long and there is a ton of material! But, he is doing really well and after this semester it will all be clinical work, which is where he really shines and what he actually enjoys doing.

The move to Tampa is looking good. We found an apartment we like for a good price and I found a paid internship at USF. Ant just needs to find a job (which really just takes a phone call) and we need to find renters for our condo. I am working really hard on trusting in the Lord that it will all work out, and so far I've been feeling good and not obsessing. It helps that we still have a month before we move and we haven't started the horrid packing process :)

Virginia Needs

This is a fun tag, and since I haven't posted in awhile I thought I would do it.

Go to Google and type in your name followed by "needs." Here are my top 10 results:

1. Virginia needs a moratorium on the death penalty. (Doesn't everybody?)
2. Miss Virginia needs some stealthy goalie pads. (For my ninja fighting, if you didn't already guess).
3. Virginia needs more charter schools.
4. Virginia needs to ditch unwieldy two-year budget process. (Did Anthony write this one?)
5. Virginia needs a signature wine
6. Virginia needs this fighting democrat.
7. Virginia needs assessment.
6. Virginia needs to avoid the siren song of a gross receipts tax. (no problem. I think I can do that)
8. Virginia needs power. (MWAHAHAHAHA!!!)
9. Virginia needs more spring rain.
10. Virginia needs to stop it. (You stop it.)

A Well Earned Break

This semester is finally and officially Over!!!! I can't stress enough how difficult it has been. I am still a little shell-shocked and I can't believe it has only been four months. It felt like MUCH longer.

Anthony passed his crazy difficult class!!!! It was a little close, but he made it. Now he only has one more semester of academic classes before he has a year of clinicals. He absorbs practical learning like a sponge, so it will be a big relief for both of us once he actually gets in there and starts doing things. We just found out that his classes over the summer are going to be online so he won't have to drive down to Tampa every week. Yea!!!! His semester ends in the middle of July, so between then and the beginning of fall semester in August we'll be apartment hunting and he will be job hunting.

As for me, I am done with classes! I won't have to set foot in another classroom or listen to another lecture for the rest of my life (unless I decide to go back to school much, much, much later from now). All I have left are two internships. My first one I am doing over the summer at Children's Home Society in Gainesville. I will be a case worker for their in-home program so I will make home visits and do parent coaching, counseling, and case managment for families that have been referred from the abuse hotline. The neat thing about it is that it is a voluntary program, so the majority of the clients I will have will actually want help. If they didn't, they would quit! (It's not court mandated or anything). My supervisor also runs the adoptions program and since she knows that's what I am really interested in, she said she would throw me some of their cases too. I am excited, but since I will still be working part-time in addition to this I will basically be working 46 hours a week. After this semester though, I know I can get through anything :)

So, in 2 days we will be on our way to the Bahamas in our first real vacation since our honeymoon! Ironically, right as we are getting ready for working all weekend and packing our realtor called us to say someone wants to look at the house. This is the FIRST person ever and it had to be this weekend. So, not only did I spend all day cleaning, tomorrow when we are trying to sleep so we can stay up 36 hours to work and then drive to Cape Canaveral to get on the cruise ship we will have to get up and sleep in our car for a few hours while someone looks at our house. I just keep telling myself it is all going to be worth it. Maybe they will want to make an offer? Maybe? :)

A light at the end of the tunnel

This gruelling semester is almost over people!!!! Only three more actual class meetings left in my entire formal schooling career! As a reward for making it through alive (which has been challenging to say the least) Ant and I are going on our first cruise! The week after school ends we will be in the Bahamas, baby!

Real women sweat

A lot of people assume that I am the type of gal that is constantly cold and doesn't sweat, just perspires gracefully. Nothing could be farther from the truth!! I am almost always hot and I have to use man-deodorant (like old spice) because girl stuff just doesn't cut it. I also sweat like a champ, both from nervousness and exertion.

To illustrate: on Wednesday I went to the gym to work out and spent a good amount of time there. When I got home, Anthony looked up from the couch, confused and said, "Is it raining?" No. I just sweat like a man.

Moving On

It is official, our house is on the market! We have had a whirlwind month getting everything ready, painted, and fixed up and now the challenge is to keep it clean for potential buyers. We are trying to be optimistic without getting our hopes up (now how do you do that exactly?). We are definitely moving in August, but we are hoping that we won't have to end up renting. Even though we are losing money, we both figure it will go a long way towards our peace of mind to not have to worry about it. Here are the pictures that will be in our listing so far. Eventually it will have our upstairs bathroom that we completely remodeled ourselves and are very proud of :)

Perfect Example

I came across a perfect example of how I've been feeling lately with school/intership:

Yep. Confidence seriously compromised by reality :)

I took the plunge!

I've been thinking about selling Pampered Chef for a few weeks now and today I took the plunge! I am officially a consultant(doesn't that sound funny?). So, I am going to be having an Open House at our place on March 5th and you are all invited!!!

I was kind of nervous about having an open house, because I don't want anyone to feel like this is going to be a get together where I try to strong-arm you into buying something. (If you know me at all, you know I am NOT that person:) It is more like a get-together/celebration of my new fun hobby! We are going to have good food, games, and lots of visiting. I'm thinking about having a mexican fiesta theme complete with sombreros...

So, if you want to have some fun, visit, and eat good food, then let me know. It is going to be on March 5th at 6PM.

Evil Sickness

So, we've been cursed by the plague at our house. I was in-bed-want-to-die sick for about two weeks and am going on my third week of lingering cough/stuffiness. Ant just started to get sick at the beginning of this week and I feel so guilty!!! I've been trying to be very accomodating and I even cooked dinner twice this week :)

Life update
Me:
I've been suffering through school and practicum with my sickness, and I haven't been seeing too many clients since I don't want to spread my germs. It is nice to feel like I am moving towards being done with classes, but I have started to get overwhelmed with insecurity. After getting some critque from one of my professors, I just started to wish I had chosen a profession that wasn't so personal. I bet insurance agents don't have to spend large amounts of time trying to be self aware and improve interpersonal skills. It's exhausting. Anthony assures me that I'll feel much better when I don't have someone offering me critque on everything I do, telling me what I should have said and making me feel stupid (not in a mean way, but still).

I don't know if I blogged about this before, but a few months ago I got called as a Relief Society teacher. I was genuinely excited about the calling, but I still find myself nervous the day of. I'm working on it, and I don't feel like I'm bad or anything. I just have issues being center of attention of a large group. In addition, I just got set apart with a Stake calling!! I sort of thought only older, more experienced people got stake callings but I was sorely mistaken. I am the new Stake assistant music specialist. Cool, huh?

Ant:
Ant is studying REALLY hard for one of his classes. Seriously, it takes up quite a bit of his time and I am proud of him but also worried with him. His teacher has never taught this class before and doesn't really know what he is doing. He started out being too lenient and now has swung to the other end of the spectrum and has ridiculous expectations. All prayers for him to pass would be appreciated :)

So that's us. We're still working on selling our house and crossing our fingers to move to Tampa in the beginning of May. If not, we will stick around in Gainesville at least until August until Ant starts clinicals. Know anyone who needs a condo? :)