California here we come...

But it's not where we started from. Oh well, guess the song doesn't quite fit.
Well, Justin and I are officially college graduates.

Didn't really get any good pictures from my graduation :( 

Christmas was a blast, as usual. Very busy, but we loved spending so much time with family.
This past weekend we went up to Sacramento to look for housing and found a nice duplex that we applied for, and we have been approved. It has a really big kitchen, and a huge family room with a fire place. It will be a nice upgrade from our current apartment. It's also just a house away from the church building, which is remarkable since they are so much more spread out up there. We plan to walk to church when the weather permits! Should be lots of fun.
We had some time while we were there to do a little site-seeing as well. It's really a fun town, with lots of things to see. Here are some of the more interesting things we got to see.

Lots of cool architecture. This building made us think of Zach.

I still have no idea what that building is, but if you look at the picture bigger, you'll see how weird it is. 

The state capitol. Apparently they leave Christmas decorations up longer there than they do here. 

And their trees are old, so they have HUGE trunks! 

There are lots of really neat bridges. This one seems to be pretty popular; there was a picture of it at the airport. 

In Old Sacramento, there were lots of fun shops. We couldn't resist snapping a picture of a cop car parked by the donut shop. 

An entire store dedicated to SOCKS!

Another priceless pic of two horse-drawn carriages parked under Wells Fargo. 

Weird pyramid building?

The Sacramento Temple. Small (compared to Mesa), but gorgeous. 

A chocolate shop with a very friendly owner. Mary chatted to us for quite a while all about Sacramento. Apparently everyone there grows tomatoes. Good to know! 

This river runs all through the eastern suburbs (where we'll be). It is shrouded by trees on both sides, and I can only imagine how gorgeous it will be come autumn. 

Some sports building that is apparently cool if you like sports. *shoulder shrug* Justin wanted a pic of it. 

That's our trip in a nutshell. There are a lot of really cool buildings, and lots of homes with Scandinavian influence near our house. We'll have to get some good pictures of those later. We'll post more about this fun little town as we explore all it has to offer. 

And as a last minute note, I decided what colors to do for my quilt! It will be autumn inspired, with browns, golds, yellows, reds, greens and oranges. Lots of shades that will all blend together nicely. At least, that's the plan. :) 

Thanks for reading! 

Almost done with college!

So apparently it's been a while since I last blogged. Oops.

I've still been doing the knee sock count down, but I've gotten really bad about taking pictures, so you'll just have to believe me.

Justin and I are both ALMOST done with school. I have one last paper to write, due Monday, and Justin has two last tests to take, one Tuesday and one Wednesday. Then on Friday we walk! [By the way, if you haven't gotten a graduation announcement, I'm sorry! Life has been crazy. We have them all printed, and just need to buy envelopes in order to mail them. We even have the stamps already. Hopefully we can get them in the mail today!]

In other news, Justin got the offer from Intel (no surprise, since he's a great guy!), so come January we are moving to California! We won't be moving until the end of January, so we've still got quite a bit of time to prepare. We'll go up the first week of January to check things out and find a place to live. It still hasn't really sunk in for me, since I've never lived farther than twenty minutes from my parents' house. We're really excited for the adventure, but we'll sure miss family. At least with Intel there is the potential to end up back here in a few years.

It's really strange being almost done with college. I am officially jobless, since I worked my last day as a writing tutor on Thursday. Justin can still work for a while longer, which is good. At least now I have some time to work on all those Christmas gifts I'm making!

It has been a pretty stressful week (leak in our apartment resulting in lots of chaos and many holes in walls, financial aid at ASU being screwed up because I'm graduating), but today I'm feeling great. I started going through some of the stuff from the bottom of our closet (since it was tossed out unceremoniously during the leak repairs), and it feels good to get organized. Being a pack-rat kind of runs in my family, so I tend to save things I don't really need. However, I get so much satisfaction out of purging. I love having the opportunity to sort through my belongings and just get rid of everything I don't need.

Well, that just about sums it up for us. Moving to CA in just over a month, graduating in just under a week, getting ready for Christmas. Life is good.

31... 30! 1 month to go!

31!

30!

34, 33, 32...

I've been really good about taking a picture each day, just not so good at posting those pictures... Anyway! Here's the next batch:

34...

33...

32!

Only 32 days until Justin and I graduate! :-)

Days 36 and 35

36!

35!

And, so that you guys don't forget how awesome I am... as of today I have written 31,295 words for National Novel Writing Month! I'm on fire this year! 

Socks

So, I know I posted day 39 for the sock challenge, but it seems to have disappeared, plus I missed yesterday (I did post them to FB though, check there for proof!).
THE GREAT SOCK COUNTDOWN OF 2011!

39!

'

38!

37!

In other news, I am doing REALLY well on NaNoWriMo. I have written 26,024 words as of today! The goal for today is only 15k if you are going for 50k. I am aiming for 75k, and my personal goal for today was 22,616, so no matter what I am ahead! It's all very exciting. 

Thanks for reading! 

Life Update

I thought it would be good to do a general update on how things are going in the Clement home.
School has slowed down quite a bit for me. I actually only have one major deadline left before finals. Crazy! Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of Justin. His school work has been picking up more, and he's spent several days recently staying up way later than I ever would doing homework. Somehow it always seems to work out though that when I have a lot of homework, he doesn't, and when he does, I don't. So right now, I'm keeping him fed, and I'm trying to keep the house in a semblance of order.
It is now November, and I'm sure you all know what that means. NaNoWriMo! I am once again participating, because I think it's grand fun. I'll try not to bother y'all with it too much, but hopefully there will be a word count widget on the side bar soon (once NaNoWriMo makes them for this year... not sure what the hold up is!). For those who are curious, my current word count after 5 days of writing (I give myself Sundays off) is 16,817. Best start I've ever had.
In other news, Justin and I have been released as Primary teachers. We are now Ward Missionaries. And I have no idea what that means, lol. We went to our first meeting a week and a half ago, and I felt rather out of the loop. One of the first things the Ward Mission Leader asked was whether I play the piano, so that secret is out now. I guess I need to get to work learning some of the Baptism songs.
And probably the biggest news in our lives right now... (I saved it for last on purpose, only people who suffer through all the boring stuff get rewarded with the interesting stuff!):
Justin's job search. He hasn't been given any offers yet, but this past Wednesday he had a third-round interview with Intel. If he gets the position, he will be a Supply Chain Analyst working out of Folsom, CA, just outside of Sacramento. So, yeah, we could be moving 13 hours away come January. Right now, it's the only company that's really pursuing him, so we're keeping our fingers crossed that it works out so that he has a job when he graduates. We should find out in the next couple of weeks.
And just for fun, and because of a passing comment Justin made, I am doing a Knee-Sock countdown to graduation. As of today, there are only 40 days until Justin and I graduate. I have 36 pairs of Knee-high socks, which means I can wear a different pair every day until we graduate, with only repeating or buying four pairs. (I'm leaning toward the buying side... you can never have enough!)
So basically, I'm going to wear a different pair of knee-high socks every day from now until we graduate, at which point I'll have to get some ASU knee highs to sport for the graduation festivities.
Here's day one (oh yes, I'm documenting the process):