Just checking in 'cause I got some good news today that I felt like sharing. I got the internship that I interviewed with last week! I am very happy about this because it means that I will be able to quit the jobs that I have been doing the past few months - my spring internship and Sport Chalet - and will be starting at a company that, as far as I know now, has a really good chance of being something that could be full-time after I am done with school in August.

Other than that, I have started work on my thesis project, which is going to be working with SDSU to develop some business ideas for a new technology that was discovered by some people at Cal Poly Pomona. Looks like it'll be an interesting project and my team seems like it'll work together well so that is comforting.

And, lastly, I just want to give some movie recommendations on what to see and what not to see since I was talking to Mom about this earlier and figured you could all benefit.

So here are the ones I say to rent or see at the theaters: The Young Victoria, An Education, Sherlock Holmes, Iron Man 2

And here's some NOT to see: Prince of Persia, Letters to Juliet, Robin Hood, Made of Honor

You're welcome. :)

Hey Family,

So Noah is officially a little boy. He cracks me up every day with the things he does. He is a smart kid with his iPhone knowledge, knowing which key goes in which car, and just the new words he learns every day. I am disappointed that we did not go camping this weekend with the family because of him. He would have had a ball. We WILL be there next year.

Buffy is ready to have Avery join us in the world. She keeps her up throughout the night with her somersaults and kicking. We can not wait until she does arrive. We have made up our third room into a play room for the kids which is fun. Buffy has 4 more days of work left until she is out.

As for me with work, I can describe it with one word, Crazy. With a combination of corporate visits, inventory, grand openings and just busy sales, I have been crazy with work. I love it though. It is a good store and we are very successful in certain things. There is not one day that goes by that I question the decision to leave Sports Authority and go with Dick's.

Anyhow can't wait to see the family in a few weeks and can't wait for you all to meet Avery. Love you all.

Here is what is happening here with us!

Last weekend was kind of crazy. I was trying to get a bunch of certification done for my new job. Yup, my new job!

I have been subbing at a daycare that is owned by a family friend and so I was just there to make some money while trying to find something more permanent. Well I got an interview at DICK's Sporting Goods and the interview went great, but they couldn't promise me many hours :(. Our family friend texted me 15 minutes before this interview with DICK's and asked if I would rather work for her or DICK's. Well the position she was offering me is 9 to 5 Monday through Friday and my girls will be going to the daycare. With prayer and a lot of talking with my husband and some family, I came to the decision to go with the daycare job. Last week was my first full week and the first 3 days of "school" for the girls. It has been great and we couldn't be blessed more right now.

So last weekend I was doing STARS training, blood bourne pathogen training, and food handlers permit stuff. I just got my TB test done and all I have left to do is get my finger prints and background check done. More hoops to go through, right? But I am still getting full time hours with them which is wonderful.

I was also told last week that they want to train me to do more at the daycare, become a co-teacher, along with doing the scheduling and such. I am starting off being the break person that goes around to all the classrooms to give people their breaks. I am glad this will be a position I will be in for a while and the girls absolutely love being out and playing with other kids.

That really is our biggest news. We also found out last week that after this Fall semester, Treven only has 16 credits left to take! We really hope everything works out so he can graduate ASAP!

That's it for now! Can't wait to see everybody in less than 30 days! :)

Well, we bought tickets for our trip out there and I have to admit it's a huge relief. We've been praying to know what we should do and just kept getting more and more unsettled and nervous about trying to fly Space A. It's never been easy to fly Space A and it's only gotten worse as ticket prices go up and budget goes down and they book more and more families on these flights so there isn't any extra space. Then we figured we'd try Space A and buy tickets at the last minute if we couldn't get on but the more I looked into it the more I realized it was probable the flights would all be booked, already they were telling me there were no seats for the day I wanted and only a few on the next day, etc. Plus, you pay more at the last minute and it's cheaper to buy round trip. The military deal offered out of Seattle last year was only $650 one way to get back, this year it's $950.... so if we didn't get on a flight we would pay nearly twice as much as we can get them for by buying them round trip now... and that is if there were even seats left on the flight. Needless to say, it's been overwhelming stress for the last several weeks looking into this deal and that deal and watching friends on their space A flights, etc. So I expected to feel sick and upset after spending so much money for non-changeable non-refundable tickets but I actually just felt great. So, the point is, I can't take it back now and we feel good about the decision. We fly out on June 23rd and arrive back here on July 15th (leaving the states on the 14th.) It's only 3 weeks but it will be a fantastic three weeks. We will just be in vacation mode the entire time and will love every minute of it. We arrive in Seattle on June 23rd at 9:15am...anyone want to pick us up? Then we fly to Utah on the morning of July 3rd, out of Portland. The trip is coming up fast and we are so excited! (We are even more excited knowing that it's the last time we'll have to do it!)

Hooray!

Well, not the end of everything but the end of a few things. And due to the fact that I just don't feel like writing out a narrative of everything that has happened in mi vida in the last few weeks, I'm gonna do a list.

• Spring semester is over! I finished up the semester last Thursday and did pretty well considering I had some major senioritis the whole time. Most of the people I started my program with graduated last Saturday, which was a little sad for me not to be there with them but I wouldn't trade my time in Europe to be able to do that so that's the sacrifice I made.
• Summer semester is starting! So they didn't give me much of a break. Literally 24 hours after I finished my last exam of Spring semester, I got a list of possible projects to work on for my thesis project this summer. This will be my last class of my MBA - a consulting project with a team of fellow MBA students with a local company yet to be assigned - and it will be done in the middle of August. I also had to take another class so I can be full-time for financial aid so I am taking Oceans, an undergrad online course that is only a month long and I thought it'd be interesting at least.
• Internship continues and more to come? I am still working with the same small marketing agency that I have been with since February and I am planning to stay with them through the summer at least. I am also up for another internship this summer at a large global company headquartered in San Diego. I'm really hoping to get that position because I think it would be great to see what it is like to work for a large company so I can compare that with the smaller entrepreneurial experience that I have in the other internship and see which works best with what I want and how I work. It would also give me the chance to not have to work at Sport Chalet anymore, which I would greatly appreciate.  I've been back there for a little over a month and that is about enough.
• Friends in Europe, Marnie in San Diego :( I can't be too sad cause I was just there but my best friends left this morning for a two-week European vacation in honor of Michelle's recent graduation. The trip was rescheduled after the volcano in April that canceled the first one. I wish I could be there with them but it is nice to have some time to myself to get started on the right foot with my thesis project and more work as I begin to shift away from being a student again.
• LOST ends... And I can't forget probably the biggest non-school or work-related news in the last couple weeks - my beloved show, LOST, has ended. I had the amazing opportunity to go to a concert earlier this month to celebrate the show. It was mostly like an industry event that some fans were invited to attend. The concert was at UCLA and they had about 20 of the cast members there from Sawyer to Jin to Desmond to Ben. The composer of the score for the show, Michael Giacchino, conducted an orchestra of the studio musicians who originally recorded the music for the show and played about six of the main themes from the show. Absolutely awesome to see live and watch him conduct the music. He also had a surprise performance at the end of the theme from "Up", which he won an Oscar for last year for Best Score. After the concert, they showed the audience the next episode, the last one before the finale. It was so great to see it with all fans and have the reactions of everyone together in the concert hall. Very awesome experience and a great way to end the show. Sorry I didn't get any pictures but they were crazy about security and wouldn't even let us bring our cell phones into the theater. So then the finale...this last Sunday was definitely a sad day. A few of my friends that have all watched LOST together over the years held a party at their dad's house up in the hills above Rancho Bernardo. They went all out with the decorations and we got to watch the recap and finale in the theater he has built in his house (quite a house!). It was emotional and I loved the finale. The end was a discussed a bit but it was pretty universal among us all that it was ended the best way they could do it. Of course, I still have questions but we'll just have to wait for the BluRay and see if they answer more in the commentaries or something. Here are some pictures from the finale:

So that's about all I've got going on. I am counting the days until the lake trip. I can't wait to see everyone! It has been too long. 30 days to go...

Hey Everyone,
I'm not sure how it happened but I've been able to get involved in the planning of the 2010 Stinchfield Reunion. I had a lot of fun looking at the great places there are to vacation in Washington, we can't wait until we get there! For this year we found a fantastic place, right on Lake Mayfield, the original destination. This place has a lot of appeal for a few reasons:

1. We are able to rent out the entire unit giving us some privacy and space to spread out
2. It's nearly half the price of the original place
3. Each family will be able to have their own bedroom
4. The condo's have nice kitchens, dining areas and a living space
5. Deck's that wrap around the entire home on each level
Plus more... but I'll let you check out the website.

http://www.lakemayfieldvacationrentals.com/lakeside_condos

So now the trick is how to divide up rooms and cost. I put my total non-math brain to work and came up with a feasible plan. I know there will be some things that need to change and I don't know everyone's situation on what will work best for them so please don't be offended. I had to start somewhere. So here is the plan I've come up with:

We will be renting the three condo units. The total cost breaks down like this:

5 night rentals: $2500
Cleaning fee: $225
Tax: $242
Total: $2967. let's round that to an even $3,000

We have eight bedrooms, they break down like this:

Queen Bed
Double Bed
2 Bunk beds
Queen Bed
2 Bunk beds
Queen Bed
Double Bed
2 Bunk beds

3 Sofa beds

We could break it down and assign each bed a cost:

Queen Bed $450
Double Bed $400
2 Bunk beds $200= $50 a bed
Queen Bed $450
2 Bunk beds $200
Queen Bed $450
Double Bed $400
2 Bunk beds $200

3 Sofa beds $85 each


Here is an example of assignments:
Queen Bed $450 D&A
Double Bed $400 T&T and Alyssa
2 Bunk beds $200/4 Isaac, Taylor, Parker, Hayden
Sofa bed $85 Morgan and Danica

Queen Bed $450 M&B
2 Bunk beds $200/4 Jane, Sadie, Ellyn, Sawyer
Sofa bed $85 Marnie

Queen Bed $450 K&B
Double Bed $400 A&P and Camie
2 Bunk beds $200/4 K&T and Melia/McKenzie
Sofa bed $85 Andrew and Beck

By family it would break down like this:

D&A $642
TNT $492
M&B $650
K&B $450
A&P $485
K&T $200
M $85

Unknown factors I don't know (hence the term unknown) are issues such as this:
What is the best sleeping arrangement for Ellyn? Maybe she'd rather be in the room with M&B... in which case maybe Morgan wants to in the bunk bed room with Sadie...
Maybe Marnie would rather be on a bunk bed so she can sleep in late in the mornings if everyone just goes out of the bedroom and hangs out in the living room...?? Maybe she wants to take the bunk with Kim when Treven is gone... I don't know their schedule... ??
These are just the things I've thought of with two minutes of thought, I'm sure I've missed other things so please tell me your feelings and I am sure can work it out.

I figure we will put the sofa bed sleepers to bed in a bedroom and then move them when the adults go to bed... for example, Danica and Morgan will go to bed in D&A's room and then we will carry them out when they go to bed. Same idea with Andrew and Beck... or maybe Anne is up so much with Camie that you'd rather be out on the sofa bed and your boys can sleep in with Peter...

Okay, you get the idea.... but like I said, I needed something to get us going. I hope you're all as excited as we are! Our trip to the states is going to be short (and outrageously expensive) but we know it will be worth it! We have a few other assignments being worked on including chores and food so stay tuned.