2008 in Review

I sat today reflecting on the year past. A whole lot has happened to the both of us this year...

January: January began with me starting a new job at Digi Key here in Thief River Falls. I trained for this new job the whole month and all of Feb. It was bitterly cold in Minnesota and we spent lots of time going to hockey games and watching movies. We thoroughly enjoyed living in our townhouse and being only a few miles away from my mom and dad.

February: February was a whole lot of the same as January. Nothing too exciting.

March: This was the craziest month of the year. Early in March, Abhay flew to Indiana for a job interview. We figured it would take weeks to hear back, but within one day he was offered his job at Emcon. We thought long and hard about, put a pen to paper, and consulted our parents. After much debate, he accepted the job, gave notice at his job at Arctic Cat, and I gave notice at my job at Digi Key. Movers came at the end of the month and packed up our townhouse. We said goodbye to our family and friends and we off to a new life in Indiana, a place I had never visited or seen.

April: We settled into a 6 month leased 2 bedroom apartment. I started my job as an infant teacher at CCDC and Abhay started his new job. We did lots of exploring around Columbus and Indianapolis. I met lots of Abhay's friends from Michigan Tech that live in Columbus and we began to from/rekindle friendships with them. We made a trip to Chicago at the end of the month.

May: May brought lots more of exploring around our area. We really started to like Indiana. Abhay's mom and dad flew in from India on the 28th and spent the rest of the summer with us, which was a treat. We found the closest IKEA in Ohio!!! We started getting used to Starbucks coffee--much to our dismay there are no Caribou Coffees close to us.

June: The beginning of June brought heavy flooding to Columbus. I was off of work for almost 3 weeks due to the flooding and continued to work part-time at CCDC all summer--when it was supposed to be a full time job. Happiness for us came in the form of a Greencard for Abhay. What a intense ordeal...but makes life a whole lot easier for us.We enjoyed time with each other, Abhay's parents, and our friend in Columbus.

July: July 4th brought Gunjan, Abhay's sister our way. She was in the US all summer for work and she was able to come and visit us for the long holiday weekend. We all had such a great time. We did lots of traveling in July--all over Ohio and back to Chicago. July 7th brought Abhay and I's first wedding anniversary. We also began our house hunt.

August: Our highlight in August was the chance for our parents to meet!! My parents flew out to Indiana before Abhay's parents left. It was so nice for them to be able to meet. We all had a great time together traveling around Indianapolis and down to Kentucky. Before everyone left, they were all able to see the house that we had put a bid on and were hoping to purchase (which we did).

September: September brought the happy and stressful time of purchasing our first home!!!

October: Our whole October was preoccupied with packing and settling into our first home. We could have never done it without the help of our friends. In October, I received my temporary Indiana teaching license and was finally able to quit my job at CCDC and start subbing in the elementary schools in Columbus. We had so much fun handing out candy to trick-or-treaters in our neighborhood

November: November we were both busy with work. We enjoyed a 3 day trip to Minnesota for Thanksgiving. We had a blast decorating our house for Christmas at the end of the month.

December: Of course, our highlight of December was spending two weeks in Minnesota with my family. It was so nice to be able to relax and spend time with people we love. We loved the milder weather of Indiana in December but were then shocked to the core when we arrived in Minnesota.

Abhay and I are looking forward to what 2009 brings us. 2008 was a great year for us personally, and job wise. We hope to travel more--we'll be heading to India sometime and we also hope to make a trip to NYC, DC, and where ever Gunjan comes in the US. We have lots of plans for re landscaping our whole outside when spring comes and lots more projects for our house. And as always, we hope to spend lots of quality time with each other, our friends, and family. After all, those people are what life is about.

We wish you all, and your families, a wonderful 2009. We wish you joy, health, and prosperity in the new year!

--Mandy

Night owls...

If you're like me and are NOT a morning person, check out this article. Finally, something in our defense!!

3 Smart Things About Sleeping Late


--Mandy :) :)

Christmas recap

I realize it's been a whole week since I last updated this blog. I thought I'd have TONS of time to do this while on vacation...I was wrong!

We had a very nice Christmas eve and Christmas. They were both filled with family, friends, and lots of good food. That's what Christmas is all about, right? I swear we have both eaten for 5 days straight. We didn't do a whole lot of gifts this year...it's so not necessary. Abhay's favorite gift was a Green Bay Packers blanket I had made for him, and mine was the Brewstation Coffee maker he gave me before we flew home for the holidays.

We've also gotten the chance to check out 3 new movies while on vacation. Seven Pounds, Marely and Me, and Slumdog Millionaire. While they were all very good and entertaining in their own respects Slumdog Millionare is by far the best movie we have seen in YEARS!!! (Click on the title to read more about it) It it doesn't win any Oscars, I will be sadly disappointed. RUN, don't walk, to see it now. (and I'm not being biased just because I love India. )

Last Friday night we were able to meet up with some of my friends from high school. It was so good to see my very dearest friend Beth, my friend Jessica and her husband Ryan who were home from London, and our friends Mike and Leslie. We plan to go and see our Bemidji friends at the end of this week.

We still have one more week left of our vacation. We plan to spend lots of time with family and friends, sleep, watch movies/hockey, and enjoy the cold and snow!!

My Nephews Cade (5) Carter (2) and I making dessert for Christmas

Abhay and his new blanket

It's the most wonderful time...

We made it Minnesota safe and sound on Saturday despite all the yucky weather We squeaked by with no delays. Seriously, we got really lucky. We are so happy our flights were early in the morning. When our connection flight from Minneapolis to Grand Forks took off at 9:15am there was only ONE runway open. We were greeted in Grand Forks by my dad and my brother Brad (driving his truck)...and also -30 degree weather and a full raging blizzard. We're not used to this junk anymore. When we left Indianapolis it was almost 60 degrees!! YUCK!

Yesterday was spent baking cookies and candies all day long. Abhay and I had a very good time. He was a HUGE help and did all the almond bark items. My mom hung out with us, and of course supervised all we did. :) We ended up making 11 different kinds of cookies, bars, and treats. I got really tired and didn't get everything made that I wanted to. Tomorrow I plan to do a bit more.

My parents are right at the end of a remodeling project of their house. They have redone their kitchen, redone their upstairs bathroom, ripped a wall out of the living room, and have put new flooring throughout the house. It looks gorgeous and we're so happy for them. Abhay "got" to help rip out the 20 year old living room carpet last night. What a job!! My mom and I "supervised" the work. haha

Today Abhay had the chance to go and visit his old co-workers at Arctic Cat while I was getting the full beauty treatment at my favorite salon. He had a great time seeing and talking with old friends. Afterwards we met my mom at her office, helped her out for a bit, and then headed to Grand Forks to do some last minute shopping. We truly are enjoying every minute spent with my family. We don't realize how much we really do miss our families until we are around them.

Us making cookies at my mom and dad's

Vacation!!!

It's official, my Christmas vacation had BEGUN!

I was supposed to sub today in my favorite classroom, but school was canceled today due to yucky weather. There was a bit of an ice storm last night. To me, it didn't seem like a reason to cancel school. You cancel school when there is a blizzard or it's -50 degrees with wind-chill--not ice. I will forever be a Minnesotan, I guess.

Tomorrow I "GET" to go to another lovely dentist appt. This one shouldn't be as bad as the last one. *knock on wood* I just need to be fitted for a crown and have a temp. one put. I also need to run around town and pick up the last few little items needed for Christmas.

Abhay begins his vacation on Friday. (and he couldn't be more excited about it...maybe only if we were going to India) We're both taking that day to celebrate Christmas together--just the two of us, pack, and get ready to fly back up to Minnesota early Saturday morning!!! We're excited to have two weeks to spend up there. This time, we're excited to be able to see dear friends we miss so very much. We're trying something different, we're going to get a 1-day, 1-way rental car to get to the airport in Indianapolis, and one to get back. We found a good deal--19 bucks each way. We figure it's MUCH cheaper than leaving one of our cars at the aiport for two week (plus they will be able to be home in our nice warm garage) or inconveniencing one of our friends to get up in the middle of the night to take us to the airport. We'll see how it works out...

--Mandy

Bah Humbug!

I have been having a whole lot of trouble getting into the Christmas spirit this year. Normally, Once December hits I love listening to Christmas music, doing Christmas shopping, watching Christmas specials, etc... But this year I just haven't been able to get into those things.

Last night I finally figured out why. For the very first time in my life I'm living in a state without snow and warmer temperatures (30-50 degrees most days). Funny how I equate the holidays with snow and cold weather. It's what I've known my whole life. Now that I've realized my reason why, I hope I can overcome it and enjoy the next 12 days to the fullest.

--Mandy

You'll shoot your eye out!

Abhay and I LOVE the movie "A Christmas Story." These 12 facts about the movie were on Yahoo! today. We know many people love this movie as much as we do, so we thought we'd share this super fun article

12 Things You Might Not Know About A Christmas Story (even though you’ve seen it 90 times)

1. Jack Nicholson was very interested in playing Ralphie’s dad. But casting (and paying) Jack would have meant doubling the budget, so he was removed from consideration. Director Bob Clark – who didn’t know Nicholson was interested at the time – says Darrin McGavin was the perfect choice, and I’d have to agree. I think Jack would have been too much of a scene-stealer.

2. What does Porky’s, the raunchy ’80s teen sex movie, have to do with a wholesome film like A Christmas Story? Bob Clark directed both – Porky’s in 1982 and A Christmas Story in 1983. If Porky’s hadn’t given him the professional and financial success he needed, he wouldn’t have been able to bring A Christmas Story to the big screen.

3. For anyone keeping count, Ralphie says he wants the Red Ryder BB Gun 28 times throughout the course of the movie. That’s approximately once every three minutes and 20 seconds.

4. Peter Billingsley, AKA Ralphie, has been good friends with Vince Vaughn since they both appeared in the CBS Schoolbreak Special (their version of the after-school special) in the early ’90s. He doesn’t do much acting these days, but he did make a surprise appearance on the “Vince Vaughn Wild West Comedy Show” in Memphis, Tenn., in 2005. Peter’s doing quite well for himself, though. He was the executive producer of Iron Man and had a brief bit as William Ginter Riva – I’ve seen Iron Man twice, but I can’t place his character. I’ll have to go back and look. Peter also executive produced Vince’s latest movie, Four Christmases (which he also had a cameo in), as well as 2006’s The Break-Up.

5. Mythbusters tested whether it was possible to get your tongue truly stuck on a piece of cold metal. Guess what? It is. So don’t triple dog dare your best friend to try it.

6. Scott Schwartz, who played Flick (who stuck his tongue to the frozen flagpole), was submerged in the adult film industry for a number of years. He got out in 2000 to try to become a mainstream actor again, but I can’t say he’s done much of note: Community College (“A love story between four dudes and their ability to get free drinks”) and Skinwalker, which starred ex-MTV veejay Jesse Camp, if that tells you anything. Joey Buttafuoco is in it, too, and gets billing over our poor Flick. Sad.

7. Next time you’re in Cleveland, you can visit the original house from the movie for only $7.50. It was sold on eBay in 2004 for $150,000. Collector Brian Jones bought the house and restored it to its movie glory and stocked it up with some of the original props from the film, including Randy’s snowsuit.

8. Director Bob Clark got the idea for the movie when he was driving in the car with a date. He heard Jean Shepherd on the radio doing a reading of his short story collection, “In God We Trust… All Others Pay Cash,” which included some bits that eventually ended up in A Christmas Story. Clark said he drove around the block for an hour until the program ended, which his date was not too happy about.

9. The Wonder Years was inspired by A Christmas Story. In fact, in one of the last few episodes, Peter Billingsley appeared as one of Kevin Arnold’s roommates.

10. The real Red Ryder BB Gun was first made in 1938 and was named after a comic strip cowboy. You can still buy it today for the low, low price of $44.99. But the original wasn’t quite the same as the one in the movie – it lacked the compass and sundial that both the Jean Shepard story and the movie call for. Special versions had to be made just for A Christmas Story.

11. While we’re talking shopping – you know you want the leg lamp. Put it in your window! Be the envy of your neighbors! It’s a Major Award! You can buy it here, but if you’re not feeling quite so flamboyant you can get a replica that serves as a nightlight for $14.99. The people who own the house also run a gift shop, and they sell pretty much everything you could possibly want from the movie – the decoder pin ($7.99), Lifebuoy soap ($3.99), the leg lamp variants mentioned above, and even pieces of the original house.

12. There’s a sequel of sorts, My Summer Story, which came out in 1994. Kieran Culkin plays Ralphie, Mary Steenburgen is his mom, and Charles Grodin is his dad. I’m not sure if it’s because of this movie or A Christmas Story, but whenever our dogs are running around together in a pack, my husband always yells, “It’s the Bumpus Hounds!”

Merry Christmas! Happy Holidays! Don’t shoot your eye out (kid).