Our last three months continued...

3) Yard

Once we got the house in livable condition, we had to move on to the yard. Like idiots, we didn't take nearly enough "before" pictures. Most of the "before"s we have are actually "middle" pictures. But after seeing the disarray of the house, I'm sure you can imagine the disarray of the yard as well. Actually, like the kitchen, the yard came with a free pair of men's underwear, and several stuffed animals. Again, sorry for the lack of picture.

Dusty built the deck. I helped with the railings, etc.

He, with Will Yao's help, air-kicked the tree stump out of the middle of our yard.

The roots on this puppy were HUGE. Thank goodness for Karate.

Dusty built the retaining wall and we ripped out all the weeds.

And planted flowers (and a grape vine):

We then ripped out a lot more weeds and prepped for sod:

We have grass. Yay!

And the front yard, which wasn't quite as bad as the back, but we still have to rebuild the flower beds and, once again, rip out all the weeds:

Here are a few of my favorite flowers we planted. These daisies are so incredible. When they first bloom they are white. Then, as they age, the blooms turn lilac!

Johnny Jump-Ups

Polka Dot somethings:
A little bird family built their nest in one of the haning plants on our front porch:


4) Fun

We haven't had nearly enough of this, yet.

Our community has a pool and this was taken just prior to Ella's first swimming adventure.

Our wild girl in the tub:

With her papa:

At her first Rockies' game. They won!


5) Residency

Dusty's first shift is tonight. He's very excited, and a little nervous for his first day. But his three girls are VERY proud of him and would trust him with our lives any day. We think his patients are lucky to have him!

Minutes before his first shift:

Well, I'm trashed from all this posting. It did take several hours, so that should get me off the hook for the next three months, right?

No...

We didn't all die in a freak gasoline fight accident. We've just been REALLY busy (like the rest of the world...I know, it's not a very solid excuse). However, in an effort to prevent death-by-nagging (Mom and Sarah) I'm going to sit down and post a few updates. Here is what we've been up to:

1) Graduation

This is probably the most important event of the past three months. Dusty is now an MD! We are all so proud of him and his hard work. He'll be starting his residency in neurosurgery in two days. Time flies. I can't believe how quickly these past four years have gone by.

The gang celebrates a few days before graduation

Dusty's dad was able to hood him. This was SO COOL!!!

Four Generations



Ella's favorite part of graduation...the edible regalia

Our Family

The Richardson Family



The Crooks Family



Dusty will forever be grateful to his parents for loving and supporting him.

My family had to go home for McKenna's high school graduation, but the Richardsons were able to stay. We had a GREAT time at the Denver Zoo and the Downtown Aquarium.

Ella kept trying to grab the fish at the aquarium.

2) House



While Dusty's graduation was the most important event, the fixing of the house (kind of like the running of the bulls--both death defying experiences) has been the most time consuming. I'll try to organize the photos into before and after shots. I'll have to apologize in advance for the disorganization...I'm still not finished unpacking!

Dusty's Grandpa Harvey made it all possible. When he heard how much work we had, he flew to Denver and helped us. For THREE weeks. And without him, our home wold have taken MUCH longer and wouldn't have been nearly as nice.

View from the front door into the living room and dining room:

Dusty tiled every part of the floor that isn't carpet. He and his grandpa also added the baluster-thing at the bottom of the stairs, and also the railing on the top of the banister. We also changed the dining room lights, which we managed to get 85% off at Home Depot. We became VERY adept bargain hunters.

From the kitchen into the family room:

The kitchen included several pairs of dirty underwear and also mouse droppings. Sorry we don't have photos of those:

Grandpa single-handedly tiled the backsplash:

I LOVE the kitchen! We got all of the appliances off of craigslist (except for the fridge, which we got at the Sears outlet store).

The master bedroom was by far the worst in the house. The previous owners had kept two malamutes locked up in the room and rarely let them out...even to relieve themselves. Dusty sawed out all of the subfloors and I sawed out TONS of wallboard. It all was rotten through with dog pee.

The master bath:

View from the landing/office space:

As you can see, it's been A LOT of work, but as a result, we've got a BEAUTIFUL home with some pretty good sweat equity.

I'll continue the "what we've been doing for the past three months" in another post. I'm afraid this one is getting too big with all the pictures!

The Results are In...

And we're very pleased to announce that we will be moving to a house in Alton Park. In Arapahoe County. In Denver. Hooray!

Dusty matched here for his neurosurgery residency, so we'll be here for at least the next seven years. We are THRILLED to be staying in Denver. We love the area, and it's close to many of our friends and family. And Dusty loves the program. He really felt like Colorado would provide the best combination of training and family/lifestyle needs...not that any neurosurgery resident (or neurosurgeon, for that matter) really has a great lifestyle, but the program isn't malignant like so many other programs across the country.

Our other exciting news is that we really will be moving to Alton Park--a little subdivision about a mile directly south of where we're currently living in Lowry. We're currently under contract on a cute little home in that area and, as long as things keep moving along smoothly, we're hoping to close in the middle of April.

Life is never boring. Isn't it wunderbar?

Pre-Opened Envelope

The Letter says Denver

The match

So, it's match day today. You'd think that graduation would be the most exciting day for medical students--four years of torturous psychological beatings (many self-inflicted) culminating in the bestowal of the MD degree. Actually, for me, graduation is a distant second in importance to match day. Who cares if you're an MD if you haven't been trained to do any specialty? It's the residency training that makes all the difference. In today's world, the MD degree just gives you permission to start that training--a formality, if you will. Match day is the day that your dream of becoming a real practicing physician comes true. Since neurosurgery residency is seven years, I'm barely more than half way done with my training if I count med school and undergraduate studies--residency is the time I'll really mature as a physician. Match day is the day that I feel like all of my hard work, the hours of toil, the early mornings, the sleepless nights, the stress, the anger, the joy, the frustration, and the satisfaction of helping people culminates into the promise (in writing) of a neurosurgical training program putting their confidence in the fact that they think I'll make a good neurosurgeon. I think we'll match here in Colorado, which is my first choice. I'm confident that I'll get good training here. There are so many opportunities for excellent training at this program and I'm excited to take advantage of them. But, I've also been very fortunate to be invited to many of the best training programs around the country and if I don't match here, I know I'll be going somewhere where I will receive excellent training. I just feel blessed to have matched.

Our Laughing Girl

Our life has been full of insanity for the past several weeks. Whose life isn't?--That's what I'd like to know.

Thankfully, we have our Ella Joyce to keep reminding us of the important things...like laughing. Or, maybe it shoule be classified as controlled hysteria.

She's our wild girl. A bit like her mama.

December and January

Ella with her cousin James

Ella loves Abby...as you can see she's getting her riding form down--one hand on the saddle, one hand in the air behind her head.

Dusty was very pleased when she learned how to hold her own bottle...now they can eat at the same time.

So, it's been quite a time since we last posted. We've had a lot going on since the middle of December. Dusty finished interviews, Lauren went back to work, Ella doubled her birth weight, and McKenna (Lauren's sister) came to visit for a little while to help with the baby.

We're trying to figure out where we want to do residency. The Neurosurgery program at the University of Iowa paid for Dusty and I to fly to Iowa City and take a second look at the program. We really like the city, and the program is top-notch, so we'll probably try to go there. But, we also like the University of Michigan, the University of Florida, the University of Utah, and Dartmouth. We're trying to decide which one to rank first, because we think there's a high liklihood that we'll get our top choice.

We've appreciated having McKenna around to help with the baby--she's really been great to have around. I went back to work starting in late December and Dusty got a job as an adjunct professor teaching anatomy and physiology at the Community College of Denver. He's also tutoring, which means that he is nearly full-time--a huge blessing since we're hoping to buy a house wherever we go for residency--with the economic downturn, we have to come up with a relatively substantial down payment and Dusty's job will really help us to be able to make it work.

Ella is growing more than we could have ever imagined possible. There was a two week period where she was only awake about 5 hours a day--enough to drain two bottles and go back to sleep. In that time she grew out of her 0-3 month clothes and out of her three month clothes, and now is in 3-6 and 6 month clothes. She was right at 16 pounds at her appointment with the pediatrician last week. Here are some pictures...