4 down 4 or more to go

Chuck and I have spent the past few days dedicated to law school applications. It is much more time consuming here at the end than I expected. After three days we have completed 4 applications and eliminated 2 schools from our list. Thankfully BYU has finally been crossed off. I don't think I could spend 3 more years in Provo. We also eliminated Univ. of San Fran.

So these 4 are due Feb 1st;
University of North Carolina
University of California-Davis
UCLA
University of Utah

Now we start on March 1st deadline.
Wake Forest University
University of Hawaii
Lewis & Clark in Portland
William and Mary in Virginia

Then we just wait for our future to be decided by a group of people who don't really even know us except on paper. If we don't hear back from any of our top choices by April 1st we have more schools that have later application dates.

there should be a warning on these things

I was so proud of myself this morning, up at 7am (2 wake up yells from Bob and the threat of my car being towed) I love the gym in the morning. The only problem is I only get free parking until 9am. (another motivation to get up at 7am) The gym here is empty in the mornings. about 10 people, wandering from machine to machine. All the other girls remind me of the "ED" girls from the psych floor I worked on at Hopkins. Thin as rails, stringy hair and baggy sweats. In the evening the gym is packed, last night the only machines that were avalible were flat tread mills and stair climber. I had to get on a stair climber. A stair climber! The one machine at the gym that actually makes your butt bigger!

Back to this morning. I had my choice of the machine selection, so I chose the eliptical (legs were tired from a long treadmill run from the night before - I got my fat ass off the stairclimber as soon as a treadmill vacated) I've gotten a little obsessed with perfecting my eliptical training. I try to keep my revolutions per minutes above 70. Today I decided to alternate between forward and backward revolutions. I use to do this all the time, every ten minutes switch directions. backwards is much harder. But I was concerned about my 70rpm goal, what would an appropriate goal for reverse revoluitons?? Well I don't know what happened to the machine, but it went nuts, it was going soo fast, the revoluitions were in the 80's! I've never gotten that fast forwards! My legs were totally spazing out, I flet like I was road ruynner, where his legs are just spinning in circles. Most of my efforts were put into trying to slow down. I was pumping up the resistance, but nothing was working, it would just speed right up. Then I realized the fatal flaw of the elipitical machines, you can jump off! If your treadmill goes nuts you just hop off, stairmaster, jump off, bike, lift up your legs. There was nothign I could do here, if I tried to get off while it was runing I would have been malled by the machine, or flown off it and most likley land on and kill one of the ED girls. Finally I did get the thing to stop and almost collapsed on my jello legs. Those things really need a warning!

Family Matters

Do you ever wonder how much you really are like your faimly members? I mean besides physcial apprearances. The way you fight, or love, laugh and cry. And where does that all come from? You can take a gene and identify the segment that determines your eye color, and you can trace it back to one parent. But where does it tell you that you can't look stranges in the face the same way your mother can't, or that your sister puts her hand in from of her mouth while eating the same way you do, or that you would marry your first boyfriend (mom and jeane). Terra has for a long time claimed there is Family curse on her and myself explaining our inability to enter into a comitted relationship with the oposite sex. Luckily I avoided the dual marriages before 25, but other than that it looks like I'm on the same path. So imagine my excitement when my little baby sis (after years of repeating the same dating pattern as her older sisters) met a nice boy, fell in love and made plans to get married. Maybe there was hope for the Johnson girls. Alas, the curse continues and she broke everything off and regrets the joyus way she told everyone how much she was in love, brought him home for Christmas and even went dress shopping (another Kristen charchteristic, never tell very much info, less embarassment for yourself when it all falls apart - which it will, you're a Johsnon, remember)

I wanted Jennifer to be happier than me, to have everything she wants and deserves. How do break the family curse?

We are moving!

To California!





Just kidding
We have decided though to buy my parents house. We are going to be there this way as they get old and it will give my mom the support she needs now too. It will either happen this summer or next summer at the latest.

crazy huh!
liz

Christmas is coming

Thanks for the addresses. Now i can send out your Chirstmas cards.
MIss you both. My mom had surgery on monday and it all went well. Thanks Kristen for the heads up on stuff to look out for. They have her on a sliding scale so the blood sugar is remaining under control. She is in a lot of pain but is working through it.
She will be home Thursday we think.

liz

No Money

Trying to balance my life and a business with no money is difficult. PI is at it's down time for sales so I'm trying to pay the bills with not a lot of money coming in which is difficult to manage. My life is easier, but still hard to balance with no money. It's an interesting adjustment in life that we should have made months or probably a year ago. This is one of those ways in which Leland has changed our life more than we imagined. I obviously wouldn't trade her for all the money in the world. She's what has been our "free" entertainment. Who needs to laugh at movie when you can laugh at your kid.

Law school application due dates are creeping upon us and we are still trying to get everything together. Chuck of course is a perfectionist, which is a good thing, so he has been editing his statements for a few weeks now. I know the Lord will have a hand in our acceptance so we just pray that we will be ready for whatever comes our way.

Liz - my address:
133 Willow Bend Dr #4D
Owings Mills, MD 21117

back to the grind

back to work. No fun. but what a good break I had. Ashley, sorry about yesterday, ti wasn't event hat fun in DC<>

Liz - I forgot to copy the recipie for the stuffed florentine shells, but I remember a lot of it

1 box jumbo shells
1 can pasta sauce
1 cup cottage cheese
1 cup mozerealla cheese
1/4 cup parmesean cheese
1 egg
1 pkg frozen spinach

there was another spice, right? And how long and at what temp do you cook them? Thanks!

Ashley, I forgot the recipies you gave me too, did you find them?

Ok, here's the real reason I wanted to post. Who would be up for a joint vacation family style vacation this summer? Beach house? Like late August? Think you guys will be in a good place by then ash? I have to put in my vacation requests now, and want to do something fun. Let me know what you guys think.

hugs!

my driving plan for going back to Maryland - beat the snow.

6am - pull off of Liz's street jsut as the first flakes are starting to fall. Not bad, now if I can just stay ahead of it I'll be good and make it home in great time. Time enough for a nap. Getting on I-70 the snow is heavier and blowing everywhere, but my windshield is staying clear and the road are fine, I'm crusin and lovin my new Driving Playlist I made on my iPod the night before.

7am - (still in Ohio) the snow is still comming down pretty heavy, but the roads are still clear and I'm nice and toasty int he Civic. There's a lot of snow on the side of the road though. I wonder how big this storm is. I hope I'm not under it the whole time.

730 - Well it looks like it's finally clearing up. Maybe now I can stop for some breakfast somewhere, but I can never rember which three exits on the whole trip have a Starbucks (coffee cake, yogurt and chai - yum)

745 - Holly crap! What is going on here?! Hate these damn West Virginia mountains. The snow is a lot heavier now and everone is creeping along in a one lane caravan. I take stock of the rations I have in my car; 2 1/2 bottles of water, some animal crackers and a paclage of fruit snacks from Liz's and 5 chocolate covered cherries. I can suck on those for a while. 4 hours of battery life left on the iPod. I can't get stuck.

830 - Chocolate covered cherry count = 3. I don't want to drink anything because I don't want to take any potty breaks. Everytime I come to a big hill (a mountain, if you've never seen a real one)

915 - found the Starbucks, no yogurt and I decided it wasn't a good idea to eat coffee cake in the car, so just chai for me, but I just rememberd I ahve about 20 energy bars and goo in my exercise bag (REI had a sale, 10 for $5). I could last a week on those. Now I'm not so worried.

10:30 - Just crossed the Maryland line, and it's still snowing. I was suppose to stop before Maryland! What is going on?? I'm very annoyed at this storm, but glad I left town when I did.

12:30 - Just made it back, costed in on a few drops of gas, and no room left in my bladder. That was the longest last 30miles ever! So glad to be home, now time for a nap before the aprty tonight.

Liz- had a great weekend, so good to see you guys, we'll do it again soon. I forgot the cards, you'll have to mail them. My address: 411 SOuth Wolfe Street, Baltimore, MD 21231, ASh, she needs yours.

my f*#%-ing life

Troy is engaged. To Laurel, his ex.

that's all.

Flip This!

Okay so my new crazy project is going to be flippng houses with my brother dave. This is no california, but it will hopefully be a way to pay off our debt (by first getting into more!). wish me luck.

I just have this major urgency to rid ourselves of debt. So we shall see if we can even find an okay property to buy. We looked at some last week and it was a joke! One of the counted 'bedrooms was litterly in the attic. In a small coat closet there was a pull down ladder to go up. it is so bad and very disheartening.

Big cheeks!

What are you feeding that baby Ash? I just saw the pics and she has some cute little cheeks on her! My kids never really had big cheeks.

She is cutie-pie, i can't wait to see her.

liz

the new year

My favorite things of 2005

Tim graduating
Our beach vacation
Having this blog started
Not being the only one with a child!!
Feeling like things were normal, for a few weeks that year.
Being medicated-and seeing the world as it really is.
Enjoying my children grow.


Things i won't miss.

Boot camp
ugly hair-still isn't much better
having you girls far away
my shrinking belly
not having a period


My resolutions this year

To be selfless in my marriage
Emlimate our debt from school within this year.
To be a better friend
Realize i can't do everything, yet do as much as i can.
Finish the BOM-(I prayed and got an extension;)


Miss you girls
love you
liz

road trip!

So ladies, I have a bunch of days off next week (inteded for a trip to Vegas for Em's wedding and hanging out with the nursing school gang, but M bailed on me, so now I have no date, it's going to be a formal, sit-down dinner, and Em would be the only person I would know at all, and Iris and Mark are the only nurses going, and Mark's whole fam decided to come too and make it a vacay, so the whole weekend I would be basically on my own, not so fun)

So, I was thinking of comming to OH Thurs to Sat. Can't miss the Parker festivities.

Ash, up for the trip?? We'll check the weather report first :)

New Year's Post

Things I loved about 2005
Adding more initials behind my name, Kristen Johnson, RN, BSN
411 Wolfe with Devin, Bob, Mona and Sasha
Welcoming Leeland into this world
Finding India
Manicures with Ayesha
Becomming closer to my mom
Easter Brunch
4th of July
President Hinkley's Book of Mormon challange
Being in love
Weinberg 5B
Gilmore Girls & Lost
My iPod
My roof deck

Things I hated in 2005
Being broke
Heartbreak
Losing a friend
George Bush
Fighting with my sister
My car
Next, My Sweet Sixteen & Law & Order SVU
My leaking roof
my cell phone

Top 10 Songs I listened to in 2005 (according to the iPod)
She Will be Loved - Maroon 5
I Love you - Sarah McLaughlin
Breaking Me - Jonny Lang
You'll Think of Me - Keith Urban
Raining in Baltimore - Counting Crows
When You Say Nothing at All - Allison Kraus
Somebody's Crying - Chris Issac
Only Time - Enya
Hey Mama - The Black Eyed Peas
Fell in Love With a Boy - Joss Stone

Looking forward to in 2006
My first family vacation in 8 years
Running a marathon in a different state
Cooking dinner once a week
Trips to Ohio and North Carolina :)
Going back to school (yep)
knitting my 2nd scarf
Reading Reading Lolita in Terhan and all coresponding books

Love you guys! Thanks for being there for me this past year, it was a bloddy mess for me, but I got through it, next year will be better.