It's been a while...

It dawned on me yesterday that I haven't blogged in forever. It is directly related to being on facebook which is an addiction that has captured my husband but which is slowly fading for me...most likely the reason why I'm now blogging again.

A decent amount has happened since I last wrote. First, Chris and I both passed our boards and are officially licensed clinical social workers. For social workers, this is as good as it gets. Most people receive a pay raise with this achievement but for us, we get to keep our jobs which, in a sense, is a pay raise. We took the test October 20th and I think we are just beginning to feel as though we have our lives back after spending so much time with our nose in the books. For fun, we spent one study day at Oliver Winery in Bloomington, IN and yes, we actually studied. At the end of our study session we goofed around in their garden a little.



Chris took me to a Chicago Bear's game as my 30th birthday present and the weather couldn't have been better.


Then right before Halloween, we went to a pumpkin patch and went apple picking with a friend of ours.























Last weekend we went to Gatlinburg, TN for a mini vacation with some friends of ours. We rented a fabulous cabin with three other couples. This is a picture Chris took from the inside of our cabin looking out onto the back deck.

Each couple had their own bedroom and walk in shower. There were flat screen tvs in every room, a hot tub, a huge kitchen, a pool table, etc... We hiked, zorbed (more on that later), ate, and most importantly, relaxed. It was just what we needed and felt like a bit of a reward for our hard work. One hike we did required scaling up some rocks to get to the very top. We got about half way when I chickened out and decided that going further without being roped in wasn't worth the risk. These is a picture of Chris going up and another of me at the furthest point we were willing to go.


There were some beautiful places along the hike. This was one of them, albeit with Chris and I a bit washed out from the flash.

Another little reward for passing the exam was the purchase of a new counter top for our kitchen. We have never liked what we have and have always wanted a seamless kitchen sink that is attached from under the counter. We picked one out and it is going to be installed in a few weeks. Our winter projects are to paint the cabinets, attach hardware, and depending on how our yellow walls look, possibly paint the kitchen. Of course none of this will start until the new year since we are going to be out of town almost every weekend starting with Thanksgiving.

Now, back to zorbing. Our friend did take video of us doing this but we haven't received it yet. I'm sure it won't look much different so check out this from youtube. It is the same company...the only place to zorb in the United States.

There is water in the inside ball we are in which prevents us from going upside down. We get wet but I don't know when I have laughed as hard as when Chris and I did this together.

Needless to say that Chris and I are still enjoying life together and the blessings we have been given. Stay tuned and hopefully it won't take two months for me to blog again.