Keep Your Fingers Crossed....

Just a quick update on our lives....

Travis is plugging along in school. He is now 2 and 1/2 semesters away from his Bachelor's Degree. His weeks consist of studying, working out, sleeping, and playing football on the weekends. He also somehow is able to still be the best husband in the meantime, and always helps me out and gives me little surprises to make my days brighter (:

I am doing a million things at once (shocker, right?). I am still working at TAI full time, as well as taking nursing school prereqs on the weekend, studying on weeknights, and volunteering at the local hospital on the surgical floor.

So, for those of you who do not know, I have applied to some accelerated nursing programs in Portland with the hopes that I can have my second degree in nursing when Travis graduates from Concordia. I submitted the applications in February and will find out sometime in April whether or not I got in. Each school accepts roughly 9% of their almost 1,000 applicants. So please keep your fingers crossed for me! It would be greatly appreciated (:

Oh and on a positive note, the sun came out today, and may even appear tomorrow! Only two more months until Spring starts to come around up here. Whoo hoo!

Surprise Birthday

Because I have the best husband/ best friend ever, I had my first ever big surprise birthday party for my 23rd birthday. All along I thought I was having a girls night with Lynnette. I was told that we were going to go to Olive Garden and follow it with wearing pajamas and watching Friends at Lynnette's place (my dream come true). Once we got to Olive Garden, she led me to a back room where just about everyone in Portland I care about was there yelling "surprise"! It was so much fun! We all enjoyed dinner, then went over to Lynnette's pink decorated apartment with a delicious cake, and then all headed over to a tiny bowling alley in Tigard for some more fun. It was such a great birthday, thanks everyone!

Here is Travis and I at the bowling alley. Half of my brother in law is in this picture (:

More of the gang at the bowling alley.

The best friend a girl could ask for, thanks Lynnettey!!!

Christmas 2009

We had a great first married Christmas together! It was really neat to be able to continue our family's traditions that we love and add some new Rossman traditions of our own. Here are some pictures from the holiday season:

Travis' big present to me, which now hangs in our living room.

Guess we think alike! For Travis, I made custom books of our engagement and wedding.

I made a bazillion cookies and dessert bars to give out as gifts to our friends. Here are just some of them!

It is a tradition in my family to open one present on Christmas Eve, which is always new pajamas. Travis got me nice soft pink jammies, and I got him some Patriots gear.

Here is our little Christmas set up! Travis and I cut down this tree on a Christmas Tree Farm, got our new stockings, and was sent a first nativity set from Kelly.

Overall we were so blessed by being able to spend time with our family and friends. We hope the season found all of you well!

San Diego Trip

After a lot of flashcards, Panera camp outs, and reading, Travis and I were able to finish out our academic terms strong. Travis made the Dean's List and I got the A I needed in Anatomy and Physiology to have a chance at the nursing programs here (:

The semester ended Sunday and we packed our things for an awesome trip out to San Diego. We were able to actually spend time in a warm sun and even wear short sleeve shirts!
Unfortunately, I think when we left, I left part of my brain in Portland, and therefore I did not take any pictures of our trip because I kept forgetting my camera! ):

We were very lucky to be able to see our family and our friends, eat great food, stay in a wonderful hotel (where the Cincinnati Bengals also stayed), visit La Jolla Cove and go to the World Famous San Diego Zoo.

Thanks to everyone who met up with us and spent time with us in San Diego! We will definitely make sure we make it down there sooner than 6 months from now.

Will be posting our Christmas festivities soon...stay posted!

Thanksgiving 2009

Like many of our southern California readers, we enjoyed a day of pleasant weather and sunshine. Oh wait....nevermind, it was 40 degrees all day, and pouring nonstop. Here is a glimpse of what I see almost daily (notice the little rivers moving down the slanting driveway):




We had an enjoyable morning drinking coffee, followed by making deviled eggs and sweet potato casserole. We headed over to Travis' family's house for Thanksgiving dinner:


Here is Travis with his grandma:


After we finished there we headed over to my good friend Lynette's family's home for some jewelry making and poker playing:



Lynette was probably licking off some of the delightful peppermint hot cocoa her aunt made for us (:

To conclude the night, Travis won us a whole $5 by winning second place in the Texas Hold Em tournament!



All in all we had a great day although we missed everyone down south. We definitely agree that we have a lot to be thankful for this year. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Date Night

Last weekend Travis took me out on a nice surprise date. We dressed up and drove out to Troutdale to eat at a nice candlelit dinner on the river. Here we are!

Thank you Travis, you are the best (:

It's Freezing Here!!

I would just like to start off this post by encouraging all of you non-Portlanders to look at the 10 day forecast for zip code 97005 so you can see what we are dealing with here. Cold and rain. Luckily, the sun is still making short 10 minute appearances here and there, but it is nothing like Southern California!

Despite the weather, so far we are both still really enjoying it up here. I wish I could give you all some exciting news, but the last couple of weeks both Travis and I have been doing nothing but studying, sleeping, cooking, cleaning, volunteering and working (repeat,repeat,repeat......). Travis and I both have only 4 weeks left of our term for school, which means he is mastering general,biological,and organic chemistry mixed with matrix algebra/trigonometry and his core classes while I spend most days memorizing bones, joints, muscles, and how they all fit together. Bored yet???

Needless to say, we are definitely looking forward to our break in San Diego! Almost every day I bring up how excited I am to be making my way back down south!

That's all for now...hope you all are doing well,