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    Life Update

    Sep 17, 2018 · 1 Comment

    Big things happened this summer.

    HUSBAND GRADUATED

    To kick things off, Husband graduated law school! Yay! So exciting! I still can’t believe that phase of our life is over. He started when we had been married a mere two months, and three years later at his graduation, we were expecting our first baby. Life, it really gets you sometimes.

    After graduation he immediately began studying for the bar, aiming to make as much progress as possible before the baby arrived. His schedule was honestly pretty laid-back, and he is so good at time management that I got the luxury of having a househusband while I did my best to survive late pregnancy (read: put pants on every day for work).

    I HAD A BABY

    Yes! You knew this was coming. You even have seen some of our shared room. But the baby part happened! Which is the best part!

    Labor was hard. Maybe sometime I will share the whole birth story, but the cliff notes version is this: I got induced 8 days after my due date. I was in labor for 27 hours before it was time to push. I pushed for 3 hours. Baby didn’t go anywhere. I had a c-section. I hemorrhaged in recovery. Things were scary. Healing was hard. 

    BUT. We have our sweet baby. All of labor and delivery and pregnancy and a thousand other things are worth it for him.

    So, much of my summer was spent healing and bonding. I oogled, I counted fingers and toes, I started many, many discussions on whether his hair is red or blond. I still am in disbelief that we get to keep him. We really are the luckiest.

    IMG_2941

    HUSBAND TOOK THE BAR

    Next on the agenda was the bar. 

    The envy of all law students: Husband got to study for the bar with a newborn. He took it in July. For reasons beyond our comprehension, results don’t come out until November. (How is this a thing? Half of it is Scantron.) I won't even try to play it cool here - I can't wait to find out how it went. HURRY UP, GRADERS, I AM HOLDING MY BREATH.

    HUSBAND GOT A JOB

    Yeah - a real, grown-up job! I am still not used to this because he’s been a student for all of our marriage (and all of the whole time I’ve known him), but I guess this was the point of all of that schooling.  

    Anyways, the job is in Virginia, so…

    WE MOVED

    We live in Virginia now! It was so bittersweet leaving Michigan. We met there, dated there, got married there, started a life together there, had a baby there. We had a church and friends and a house we loved. But we were nevertheless excited about this Virginia adventure.

    The move itself was total chaos. We thought the packing and preparing to move would be the hard part (what with the seven-week-old baby, and very little time to pack due to the bar and said baby), but things completely fell apart when we got here. This is deserving of its very own post, so stay tuned.

    We’ve been here a little over a month now, and it’s way more different than we were expecting! We love having a Trader Joe’s. We’re getting used to ABC stores and so. much. heat. The scenery is beautiful, and we are so excited for our first winter here! (Although, to be honest, I’m a little worried I will miss Michigan's snow.)

    So, that was our summer in a nutshell. The most stressful, hopped-up, anxiety-inducing, loveliest, tenderest, and sweetest of summers.

    We’re excited for this new chapter, and to see all that the Lord has planned for us in it. We’re also relieved to get a break from major life changes.

    IMG_1542

    I hope you read along as I work on making our new apartment our home, and keep cooking up more food!

    « Quick + Easy Banana Bread
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    Mandy Jackson

    hi, i'm mandy.

    A regular Midwest homebody. Here, I share recipes we love, and how we're thoughtfully renovating our 100-year-old American foursquare.

    Learn more about me.

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