Life as it stands now.

Marriage. Fantabulous. So much so, it deserves a made-up word. Without a doubt, both of us can say confidently that we love each other so much more than even on the day of our wedding. We praise God for a lot of things, but the thing that He's been getting the most praise and gratitude for from us for the past twelve months is our marriage.

It's like the most fantastically fun sleepover with your best friend EVERY SINGLE NIGHT OF THE WEEK. The most mundane evening is made incredible when you do it with your best friend and love by your side. Even an evening of meatloaf and StarTrek. (Really.)

Work. We are so thankful and blessed that Brent's job remains steady. He is working as the Lead Artist at a 3-D animation studio called Flight 33, whose office is minutes from where we live. He has a blast doing what he does - I get envious sometimes when I realize just how much he thoroughly enjoys what he does for a living. He loves 3-D modeling so much that even in his off time he has the desire to work on his own projects on his home computer.

I still work part-time as a technical assistant to a blind astrophysical researcher who is a quadriplegic at Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. I read emails and contemporary astrophysics papers to him, I write emails as he dictates and sometimes I assist in his research. He understands that now that I have graduated from CSUN (as of two weeks ago!!) that I will be looking for a full-time, more permanent position, but for the time being, he has offered to keep me on until I find another job. Very thankful.

So I'm currently on a job hunt, geared with a newly-earned degree in astrophysics.

Friends and Family. We've been spending a ton of time with other people, doing fun stuff and hanging out. Especially hanging out at our place, as I love any occasion to host in my apartment. Brent and I are incredibly blessed with wonderful family on both sides, with whom relationships seem to get better and better. I was just telling Brent last night that I feel so privileged to have a father and mother-in-law that are so great, supportive and FUN, because if it was any different - if they pushed my buttons in any way or got under my skin or were just plain boring - I'm sorry to say that I have a heart that would not be patient with that, as sinful as that is of me. Instead, my Larry and Rita are EASY to love because they love God and love others so genuinely! Plus they're a blast, hosting things like a huge sleepover complete with a Star Wars-viewing marathon on Larry's birthday weekend and organizing periodic family trips to Disneyland.

On the other side of the family, my siblings are easing the pressure off of Brent and me by loading up the grandparents with grandchildren. Well, not really. Yes, there are already two granddaughters and another on the way, but I guess the truth is, the pressure isn't being eased. For some reason, with my parents, and with all my siblings, for that matter, the joy that my nieces have brought to our family makes them long for me and Brent to contribute to that joy SOON by providing a boy or girl of our own. Brent and I are excited for the day when God blesses us with a son or daughter, but if we can help it, we'd like to enjoy the first couple years of our marriage with only each other as our responsibilities and main priorities. This further allows us to eat up the adorableness of our two nieces, who provide such laughter and the doctor's recommended daily dose of cuteness medicine.

Brent and I are also enjoying the relationships that have been growing between us and other young couples, one that was married for five years before we were, one whose wedding we were a part of in mid-November, and one whose wedding we will be a part of this coming July. I am really thankful that God has brought such sweet fellowship to us outside of our own family and within our church.

So that's our life right now in a nutshell. More to come!

Here I am again.

So....life is just really bloggable right now.

I miss blogging. My husband misses it. As we were greeting each other at the end of a long, semi-discouraging day after I was laid off from my main job not too long ago, he took me by the waist, looked me right in the eye, and told me he had a command for me. "You need to start blogging again. Soon."

I left you all hanging a few months ago, thinking that it would only take a few months to get the craziness of married/student/employee life under control so that I could schedule a period of time every week in my calendar in which I would spend one hour blogging. Oh how I wish I could say that I'm managing wifehood, cooking, housework, the holidays and WORK in such a way that I COULD plan a periodic segment of time to be devoted to blogging. Rather, I think life is just as crazy, (irresistibly fun), and unpredictable as it was a few months ago, maybe even more so.

And as I'm learning from my close friends and family who have kids, the craziness is just gonna get worse as time goes on.

So, if life isn't going to get any more calm or predictable, why am I letting my sweet memories of my first year with my husband go un-blogged about? I don't know anymore.

Therefore, I'm back!