No, not the Barenaked Ladies song...it is one week until I move into my new apartment! I'll be signing my contract and getting my keys next Thursday and then later that day flying to San Diego before I even get a chance to go see the place. Not sure if I mentioned it before but the only time I viewed the apartment there were people living in it so I had to use my imagination in combination with the photos of the apartment vacant to imagine what I could make it into so I am pretty excited to see it again!

But I will be flying to San Diego to retrieve the stuff I left down there in storage, put it all in a rental truck and drive it back up here in time to then move the stuff into the apartment and be able to see the place that Sunday. My best friend Matthew will be driving up with me and staying for a couple of days to help me get settled and unpacked so I am really excited to have another fun road trip up the coast - seems to be a common occurrence for me!

So by April 4th, I will be out of Mom & Dad's and living on my own once again. For those that were betting on it, it turned out to be just over five months and I'm still alive. But really, it has been a great situation living with Mom & Dad for this brief time - very helpful to me and fun to be close to family so much. There aren't a lot of 29 year olds that could move back home for a few months and stand it, so I consider myself very lucky.

I'm excited to explore Portland even more as I make it my newest home. And I am happy to have any of the many of you that are close by come explore along with me. I plan to be chock full of recommendations for places to eat, shop, listen to music, relax and have fun very soon.

In connection with my move, I have been doing lots of searching and probably too much finding of different decor to furnish my new place. I think I'm gonna end up being like Anne and phasing in the different ideas but I am definitely grateful to all of you up here that are lending me different items until I can find ones for myself - I think I'm actually borrowing at least one item from each family!

Other than the move, work continues to go well. I am fitting in nicely with the team and we are getting a lot of really great work done. Last week was a little slow due to lots of vacations in connection with Spring Break time but it picked right up again this week and I have a full plate once again. There are a lot of projects in the works so I feel a little like I am in the calm before the storm right now but I am really enjoying what I am doing and look forward to taking on more responsibility as the months go on. In other work news, I am still working on a very part-time basis for my old San Diego company. I am managing an online project for them so I can easily do that remotely and we've worked out a good system so I can do work for them on the off hours. So between those two jobs, my weekdays are pretty full - about 50 hours a week plus about a 2 hour commute every day. - something I am definitely not going to miss about living in Vancouver and working in Hillsboro!

I have also planned another trip to San Diego in May, this one for a bit longer than the few hours I will be there next week. I received an email last week from SDSU alerting me that I was eligible to walk in commencement this May. That triggered my memory that I never walked for my MBA because I graduated in the summer semester and if you are a graduate student at SDSU, you can't walk the semester prior if you graduate in the summer. So I am now up to walk if I want to. I thought about it for a while, talked to my friends, talked to Mom & Dad and decided that I really would like to do it. It helps that it is in San Diego, so an excuse to visit all of my friends but it will also be nice to have that culminating experience for the degree. My best friend from the program is also graduating this May so I will get to walk with her too so that will make it extra special. So that is the weekend before Memorial Day - in case anyone wants to join me, Mom and Dad in our quick trip to San Diego, you are welcome to come to my commencement ceremony. It's on May 21st bright and early at 8am. Just make sure to let me know if those pigs do fly so I can put aside tickets. ;)

It is kind of crazy that all of us will be up in the NW so soon - crazy and awesome. I am really excited to have everyone so close - especially so all the little cousins can know each other that much better. I'm anxious to hear the 100% from Mike & Brooke and that the move hold is taken off for Tom & Tracey so keep us updated!

Love you all!