Monthly Archives: June 2009

After lounging around all morning, Jessie and I made our way to the Stern Grove Music Festival that takes place every Sunday afternoon during the summer. We got there after it had already started, so it took a while for us to find a spot to sit. The music was pretty good, it was just so incredibly hot and crowded that after drinking some wine and eating some yummy snacks we decided to head out. But we’ll definitely be back this summer when Kevin’s here and we get there earlier!

The hoards of people enjoying the sunny day in SF!

Me and Jess loving the sunshine!

I thought an update on work might be nice so I took my camera in today and took some photos to share:

The building where my office is, Alliant Int’l University has half of the 1st floor and all of the 2nd floor, there’s an art university and another company that shares the building.

Good ol’ Pier 39, directly across the street from my office (it’s still exciting to me…I’m afraid all the tourists might get old pretty quick though!

Here’s my office! Not much to look at yet, I didn’t bring much of my decorating stuff with me, so it’ll be a few weeks before I get it looking more like “home” 😉

I’ve pretty much just jumped right into work, they’ve put me to work pretty quick so I’ve been really busy my first three days there! What we’re working on heavily right now is going through all 4 years worth of credential student’s files and streamlining them into one clear format. So it’s basically paper shuffling right now 🙁 but this process is going to make my life a lot easier in the future!

My sister and I looked at six apartments over the weekend, but there was one that I really liked and I applied for. Today I got the phone call from our new landlord letting me know that we got the offer! 🙂

It’s an in-law unit (basically the basement of someone’s house that’s been made into an apartment) that has one bedroom, a full kitchen, living/dining room, full bathroom, and a yard…and the absolute best thing about it…we can have a dog!! We’re going to wait to get our new bundle of joy until Kevin gets a part-time job, but I’ll definitely keep you in the loop.

The neighborhood it’s in is the Portola District in southeast SF. It’s not the prime location, I’ll be honest, but the more I read about it and drive around the more I feel like it might be the perfect location for us to get our feet wet in SF.

Here are some photos of the new place!

The main house is the dark brown one in the middle,the entrance to our apartment is just to the right of their main staircase

The outside of our apartment (the black gate is the entrance [goes into the kitchen] and the window is to our living room)

The living room/dining room (the window looks out onto the patio)

The bathroom

The bedroom

The back patio (not much to look at but the landlord says they don’t use it often so we might do some gardening and
put a table/chairs out for get-togethers!

I left at 6:30am this morning and having never made the drive up north on my own, luckily it was a lot better than I was expecting! A little traffic here and there, but it was mostly smooth sailing until the Bay Bridge.

Feeling much more awake after a little Starbucks/Pleasant Valley State Prison, anyone?

Traffic?! I thought I was far from L.A./A view of the Bay Bridge

I got into the city around 1:30pm and met Jessie and her boyfriend Kindrid at Dolores Park.

What do people do with a sunny day up here? Head to the park!/Jessie and Kindrid

Jessie’s apartment (they’re on the top floor)/Her bedroom (isn’t she amazing??)

We went to check out one apartment near Golden Gate Park but it wasn’t what we’re really looking for. So Jessie and I spent the rest of the afternoon in her apartment, listening to old records and blogging! Tomorrow we’re going to hit some more apartments and have dinner with our dad who’ll be visiting. Then Monday I start my new job! 🙂

Sisters blogging away the afternoon

Kevin and I have been really busy these past two weeks packing, packing, packing! Because I’m not going to be there in the apartment the last two weeks that Kevin’s there, I wanted to help out as much as I could. So we’ve packed up about 10 boxes with things that he wouldn’t need (some kitchen stuff, photo albums, sheets, etc.) We got really lucky because we have an unlimited supply of moving boxes from Yamaha (where Kevin works), hence all of our boxes with their logo on the side.

Maybe 1/10 of all of our stuff!

Yesterday I made four trips to my car to pack up all of the “junk” we wanted to donate to Out of the Closet…it sure felt good to rid ourselves of unnecessary things before our move!

My car all packed up with stuff to donate

Wednesday, June 3rd was the day that our adventure began! I got a phone call from a job that I had interviewed for in San Francisco two weeks prior letting me know that I got the job! We immediately called family and friends and sent out a mass e-mail letting everyone know the good news. And it truly has been a whirlwind in the days since…

Thursday I put in my two week’s notice, so I have only two weeks left of working for the Orange County Girl Scouts! So many co-workers and volunteers who got the news that day told me wonderful, heartfelt good wishes and it was so nice to hear all of those great things. I will definitely miss the people that make up the OC Girl Scouts.

Friday I got to work on cleaningcleaningcleaning the apartment! It took two hours to scrub, mop, vacuum and dust the whole apartment, it had been a while since we did a thorough cleaning! Knowing that I only had two weeks left in our wonderful apartment made me get started on the moving process right away to make it as stress-free as possible.

On Saturday, Kevin and I got started on the cleaning/sorting process early and spent a whopping six hours going through files, closets, drawers, and cabinets getting things in order and getting rid of so much stuff! It’s amazing how much stuff can accumulate in only three years. We’ve got a major pile started of things that we’re going to donate to Out of the Closet just down the street.

Yesterday we had a great day with Kevin’s family…we had a delicious waffle breakfast at his parent’s house and then spent the day at Central Park in Huntington Beach for Judith’s birthday (Kevin’s sister). I will definitely miss the family get togethers, it’ll be hard not being able to be a part of all of them anymore.

Thomas, Katelyn, Sophie, Judith & Luke

The deeeelicious carrot cake Kevin made (he’s quite the baker!)

Judith “blowing out” the candles (it was so windy we couldn’t light them!)

Our niece Sophie (Thomas’ daughter), she had us cracking up the whole day!

Me taking a walk with my girls