Great weather & a new place to live!

We are LOVING this weather! I need to live somewhere that has 70 degree days every day. Champ and I have been going on long walks in the morning, and playing fetch in the backyard. Neither one of us can get enough of the warm sunshine! He could stay outside forever I think...but only when one of us is out there with him. We tie him up right outside our door, but then he starts barking, as soon as we go out to let him in he starts rompin around...brat. Anyhow, we got word last week that we'll be moving into a new apartment on campus...IN A DORM! You may think we're crazy, and we very well may be. Especially b/c it's a freshman girls' dorm. Yikes. The situation in general has its perks. Number 1 being I won't have to leave my apt when I'm on duty, all I have to do is open my door and be available to the girls if they need me. Nights like tonight when I'm sitting at a kitchen table in someone elses dorm, 100 yards away from brian for 3 hours, will be behind us! I'm really excited about that part. Not to mention, I'll get a chance to know more students on campus...not just the injured ones! It will be the true rewarding boarding school experience...watching these girls come in as freshman then leave 4 years later a little more mature and knowing I may have had something to do with how they turned out. Pretty cool. The apartment itself is nice...it has a private outside entrance which is rare, a small balcony big enough to put our grill on (a huge plus for brian!), two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a fireplace, an office, and a pretty decent kitchen. I think it's going to be great, can't wait to start packing all of our crap...yuck. enjoy the great weather!!!!

A special story...

I have to write about one of my favorite students here at Choate b/c she's just too special NOT to write about! This year Choate was able to bring a young girl to the USA from Kenya to give her the chance of a lifetime. She is absolutely the sweetest, most appreciative young girl I've ever met. Choate has given her so many things, a year ago, she probably never even dreamed of having. People are so kind to her, they provide her with cleats if she wants to play soccer, etc. You can't help but know her, and adore her. I saw her over the weekend and she said "hey em will you come to my game on monday??" so I asked her what time and then told her I would be there. she responded "THANKS EM!" with a huge smile. I am starting to cry just writing this. She plays JV softball, so I went to watch yesterday...if you knew our jv softball team you would know how hard it is to sit through one of their games, but when she came off the field and saw me and screamed "hey em!!", I didn't mind at all! She has never played or even seen baseball or softball before and there she was behind home plate catching. Her name is Thatcher, she calls herself "Thatcher the catcher". Yesterday at her game I found out it was her birthday today. She has NEVER celebrated her birthday. She didn't know what a birthday cake was or the tradition of singing and blowing out candles. She was SO excited to "see how today would be different this year". I left dorm duty to run over to her dorm where they were having cake, it was the sweetest thing to see her experience all of that for the first time. And it was especially amazing to see how grateful she was. The admissions office gave her a digital camera....her reaction was priceless. It's great to do things like that for kids who aren't used to it...but it's even better when they are so appreciative. Someone took her earlier to get her ears pierced, she loved showing them off! She kept saying it was the best birthday ever...i absolutely can't wait to see her flourish during the next three years. That's what makes working and living at a boarding school so rewarding!! I'll try to get some pics of her, seeing this girl smile will make your day!!

The last couple of weekends...

I have some catching up to do I suppose...we've had a great couple of weekends. Last weekend we went to NY to see some of Brian's family and celebrate his cousins bday =) We had a great visit...a few drinks and lots of laughs! I'll have to post some pics once I download them. This past weekend was my college roommate Jamie's bridal shower and bachelorette party in Saratoga Springs, NY. We had a great time celebrating her last night out as a single lady! I hope she had as much fun...it seemed like she did =) The shower was really cute, it was more of a cocktail party than the traditional shower. There were signature martinis and margaritas, cocktail decorations. And she requested no one wrap gifts which was a really cool twist...people wrote their names on small cards and placed them on their gift so she could just go through and see who gave gifts. it went by so much faster! anyhow, that's it for now...