25 March 2011

It's Good To Be Back!

Two research papers, two exams, one presentation, three assignments and one full-time job later, I'm happy to announce that I'm still alive and glad to be back!  It was a rough two weeks to say the least, but it feels so good to have everything behind me now and just relax a little bit.

Since I couldn't make it for Virtual Coffee this week, let me just quickly fill you in on what's been happening in my life.  Jurgen is back from his conference in Cape Town which makes for one happy girl on this side - I know I've already said it before, but even though we've done distance for months in the past, saying goodbye never gets easier, even if it's only for one week.  It's nice to have him back and we were able to squeeze in time for dinner and movie this past weekend which always makes for a nice date night :)


Yesterday we finally made the drive out to Pretoria to drop my car off to hopefully finally get fixed.  Poor Jurgen also had to drive out there with me so that he could give me a ride home and we spent about two hours sitting in traffic for what should normally be about a 40 minute trip - no fun - but something that definitely had to be done at some point (totally didn't mean to rhyme there).


Other than that I'm just getting ready to start at the new j-o-b and am getting more and more excited by the day since everything is starting to wind down where I'm working now.  It's always nice to start someplace new in a completely different environment and I can't wait to see where this opportunity takes me, if nothing else I think I will learn a lot :) 

Even though I've been buried under piles and piles of books the past couple of weeks, I've been receiving tons of bloggy love and want to thank everyone for all of your kind words and encouragement!  It's really helped me to pull through and I feel so blessed to be part of such a supportive and uplifting community :)  Not only have I been floored by all of your wonderful comments, but I also won two amazing giveaways this week, one being a beautiful embroidered travel bag from Odyssa  (thanks Anna!) and the other being a $25 giftcard to CSN courtesy of the lovely ladies over at Jet Setting Divas!

If this wasn't enough to already have me riding on cloud nine, I also received an award from Caley over at Ms Rosie Posie - thanks Caley!


There are four duties that need to be performed in order to accept this award:
1) Link back to the person who awarded it
2) Share 7 things about yourself
3) Award 6 recently discovered great bloggers
4) Contact these bloggers and tell them about the award

So here goes:
1) I write with my left hand, but do everything else with my right (i.e.throw, catch, etc).
2) I studied abroad three semesters during my undergrad degree and each one was completely different from the others, but all were equally amazing.
3) I really love living in South Africa, but definitely miss a lot about the United States and hope that I'll be able to move back (at least for a few years) at some stage in my life.
4) I'm an adrenaline junky and have jumped off the highest recorded bungee jump in the world.
5) I'm extremely scared of needles and cry like a baby every time I have to get a shot or get blood drawn.
6) I have an unhealthy obsession with rice cakes and literally snack on them All. Day. Long.
7. I'm not allergic to poison oak (kind of makes me feel invincible) :)

And now here are six blogs that I've recently discovered and would love to pass this award on to:

Jamie at Making the Mundane Magical
Leigh at Very Loveleigh
Rebecca at Rubin-hood
Ashton at Soulshine
Jana at Seashells and Southern Belles
Ashley at Run With Me

Oh, and see that lovely signature at the bottom of the page?  Joelle over at Where We Love is Home hand wrote it for me :)  She does beautiful calligraphy and has her own etsy shop, so if you're in the market for some  wonderfully addressed envelopes I'd mosey on over there right about now.

13 comments:

  1. Jen, your signature is so beautiful... How do I get me one of those?
    Enjoy your weekend with no crazy work/study schedule and having your man back x

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  2. It´s good to finally rest, right? :)
    I would love to know how was your moving process to SA, I myself I´m in a long distance relationship at the moment and my Babe is South African, he´s probably going to move to Amsterdam, even though is not Portugal it´s closer than SA. But moving to SA is not out of the question for me. I just know it´s very dangerous there. what do you reckon? :) **

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  3. Oh, it looks fabulous! Thanks so much for the shout out! And let me know if you need anything else :)

    It's good to hear that life is treating you well. And I'm glad your honey's back.

    Hope you have a wonderful weekend!

    xoxoxo,
    Joelle

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  4. Thanks so much for tagging me, sweet, sweet girl! I'm in the process of answering my seven. :) :)
    <3 leigh

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  5. Woohoo for the award! And my dad is the same way...he writes with his left and everything else with his right. Too funny!

    Hope you have an awesome weekend!

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  6. I think its so cool, you're living in south africa right now. Your blog makes me think of eat pray love which I JUST saw last night. I hope your new job is great!

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  7. welcome back to the land of the living/blogging. glad you survived. yikes. stressful.

    and heeeey!! i write with my left and do everything else with my right! twinsies!

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  8. Thank you so much for all your advice, I will totally let you know if I ever decide to move to SA. Hope you have a great day! :)***

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  9. I'm so glad you survived the stressful week! I feel relieved just reading all that. Haha! Thanks for the award! :) I can't believe you bungee jumped, let alone the highest one! That makes my stomach turn, I hate heights! Also, I'm not allergic to poison oak either! I can be standing in it and not get it. So weird!

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  10. wow - i am SO honored! you are too sweet. thank you!

    whoo-hoo for being done with all that school, your man being back and date night! glad you're able to breathe some now. so many exciting things coming up for you lady!

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  11. LOVE the signature! So pretty. It's a bummer you're so swamped but hopefully things get better soon! Have a nice week!

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  12. Congratulations on your award - I'll have to check out the blogs you've listed. So glad to hear your full week is past you - mine too :) XoL

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Thanks for the love!