Happy New Year!!!

Oh the blog:) We have been doing great at Stanford so far. Chris passed all of his fall classes with flying colors and is enjoying a small break right now. We took a crazy trip to the Pacific Northwest for Christmas... we drove... in the middle of the state's worst snow storms in years! So smart. We knew it was trouble when they closed the 84 freeway and we had to cut through the mountains in the middle of Oregon. After being stuck a couple times, we arrived and had a great time with our neices and nephews. My brother Gabe got married and we all played in the snow... well, I should say we shoveled snow. That's the same as playing in it right?!

Chris is getting ready to start Winter quarter and it seems like our year here is already almost over. Pretty soon he'll be knee deep in books. Work is going great for me. I've loved working at home and it's been nice to be able around during the day. I'll be designing the Stanford Sloan program yearbook this year... freelance work is great! It's a big project and will take a lot of time, but I'm looking forward to it.

We hope everyone had a great Christmas! Chris and I are so appreciative of all our friends and family and wish you the best for the upcoming year.

New address, new outlook on life.

Well we made it up to Stanford and are loving it so far. Correction, I am loving it. Chris is already knee deep in homework:) Really, he loves it. We have met a lot of new people and they are all very nice. If you are wondering about the happenings at Stanford, I made a Sloan Blog for the program. The link in on the right... check it out. One of the partners (Yeah for Jenny Mu) has already posted to it and the others are excited to learn how to blog. It'll be fun to create one as a group together. We have our first "partners" meeting with all spouses and significant others tonight. Get ready, we are party planners!

We went to church on Sunday to our new ward and also met some great people! There are even a couple families living near us on campus that are also in the business program. It's nice to have someone from church close to us.

Work is going great! I'm getting used to working at home and loving it. It's really not as hard as I thought to be diligent in doing my work. Being connected all day isn't that bad either. So far, it's working out well!

Aarika and Everett came and visited us for Labor Day! They were on their way back to LA from Seattle and stayed the night in our tiny bungalow:) Eating was first task on our list on Labor Day morning! We went to the greatest breakfast place called Stacks and ate like kings. We shared 4 dishes and couldn't eat for the rest of the day... well until we went into San Fransisco and ate hot fudge sundaes at Guiradelli Square. It's a tough life, but somone has to live it, right?

All in all, things are good!

Inquiring Minds Might Want To Know...

I've been working on Melissa's invitations and they are finally done! I had such a great time designing them and putting them all together. I'm beginning to design the next invitation order I have. So far it's been fun, maybe it'll be my booming business someday... Kristin's New York Invitations Inc.

Recent East Coast Weekend Trip

Our recent trip to the East Coast was great! We got to visit with Chris’s grandparents. His grandfather is not doing well, so it was great to see him again. He spoke slowly and was able to walk a little with help. He is a very wise man. They gave me a gorgeous jade and gold bracelet that Pau Pau (Chris’ grandmother) had made from gold coins and a large piece of jade she received at her wedding! It’s beautiful and fits my tiny little wrists like it was made for me. Thank you!

In the record temperatures, we also got to go to Melissa’s bridal shower! It was so HOT… like 110 degrees! Yikes. But it was so fun to see Melissa and Jim. In the midst of all the surprises and spoiling of surprises, Melissa was actually surprised I think! She got so many gifts and ate lots of bubble gum in the sole bridal shower game!

We are so excited for her and Jim. Their wedding is going to be so much fun! We are looking forward to the week in NYC for their wedding and to help them celebrate!

Has it been 10 years?

It was bound to happen...a time has come that I never actually thought would get here. It's my 10 year High School Reunion! What?! I know, I look so young:) I just can't help it. Ha!

Honestly, I knew it had to be happening and I wasn't really looking forward to it. But I just got the little evite and I actually wanted to go! It would be so much fun to see all the great people I enjoyed years of torturous school with. It's happening a couple days before we move to Palo Alto, so I don't think we'll be able to make it. Maybe we'll go to the 15 or 20 year.

So, to Rogers High School Alumni... Congrats on making it 10 years out of High School! Oh how I miss the back hall, the portables, the little smelly gym, the sketchy pizza place across the street, the ghetto tennis courts and purple tennis skirts, Joe Albi Stadium, sweaty dances in the cafeteria (yes, we had dances in the cafeteria), Spanish class (hola, como esta usted?), Miss Munoz for Algebra (all the boys had a crush on her), Our wierdo Chemistry teacher, and my favorite sticky place the auditorium. I know there are other great things and places, these are just a few I've pulled out of the back of my brain. Any others?

What I'd like to say...

In this day of technology, namely the internet, there are many places to "post" things to or whatever. A lot of the time you have to make a profile of yourself and describe your interests. Well, I'd like to say... I love yoga. Because it seems to be very cool to say that you love yoga. I CAN say I like yoga. It hurts my knees a bit and I'm not that patient (hence, probably why I NEED yoga) with all the poses. So there I said it. I like yoga, I don't love it. And I'm still very bitter that Blessing (our rockin' Pilates instructor) decided to quit 24 hour fitness and teach independently. This left us with no Pilates and I'm not a very good self instructor.

Oh the places we've been... so far!

• Create your own travel map or travel blog


• Visit TripAdvisor.com

The Lam Lineup

50th Annual Grammy Awards!!!

The Grammys were AWESOME this year! Chris was there too, but he was taking the picture with my camera we smuggled into the Staples Center. Again, I was the token white girl, but loved every minute of it! If you look really close (you still can't see him, but pretend) the singer Ne-yo is standing directly behind us eating a bag full of McDonald's fries.

This year we got to be dropped off in a limo and walked the red carpet. Granted, we were still walking on "red carpet", but we were segregated from "Actual Celebrities" by a railing and many people wearing earpieces shouting "keep moving".

If you didn't see the Grammys, they were pretty amazing this year. I'll let you look it up for yourself, but my favorite was Beyonce and Tina Turner singing Proud Mary together. Good times! Chris and I had a great time, but were way too exhausted to go to the after party. After last year's P-Diddy after party, I'm pretty much spent. It's too much work being a celebrity, I'm totally content to keep a low profile from now on.

Thanks, Chris, for taking me down the red carpet:)

Lauren said, "Meet me at AREA!"

For those that aren't fans of the hit show "The Hills", AREA Nightclub is one of the favorite hot spots in LA, at least it was on Season 2. So I wasn't at all surprised when Lauren called and said, "meet me at AREA! Make sure to wear leggings like me."

Actually Lauren Conrad doesn't have my phone number. But we did go to AREA the other night. Lexus was having an event to honor someone successful (again, it wasn't me) and we were fortunate enough to get in the door, thanks to Leticia!

So AREA... it's a lot smaller than it looks on TV. I can just imagine the scene when real people are there. This happened to be a private party which only included select celebrities and photographers. Really, Lauren wasn't invited, but I think Heidi might have been working the door for Bolthouse!

Thanks, Leticia, for a fun night and a good excuse to wear my new leggings!

$2 Hambugers and chocolate cake... Need I say more?

So happy hour has never been better! Really, I've never been a part of happy hour since we don't drink. But after a chance meeting at McCormick and Schmidts, which is normally a fancy, high priced restaurant, we found our Happy Hour! $2 appetizers including a 1/2 lb. hamburger and a plate of these lovely egg roll looking things filled with yummy mashed potatoes. Since we don't drink, our bill is next to nothing compared to others'! Julia and I ordered Chocolate Cake and another dessert made of a chocolate bowl filled with chocolate mousse. Well, the waitress brought us the chocolate cake, but failed to bring us the second dessert. Oop. We had already devoured the first dessert and felt a little ackward asking her to bring us a second... so we cut ourselves off at happy hour.

All in all, it was a fun night. Chris got to catch up with some Alumni from Lafayette College and we got to spend a fun evening with Steven and Julia. One of guys we had dinner with was part of the writer's strike and gave us the low down. Interesting to hear it from someone other than MSN homepage. Happy Hour is definitely something we will be doing often. Next time, Everett is coming!

Conversation Skillz.

I may not be a great “communicator” but I can carry a conversation properly (usually). By definition, a conversation is “an informal talk with somebody, especially about opinions, ideas, feelings, or everyday matters” or “exchange of ideas or information between two or more people”. The key word, in my opinion, being EXCHANGE. Let’s see an example… Person one asks a question, person two answers, person one acknowledges the answer and either asks a follow up question or provides other incite to the exchanging of words. Person two then asks a question to person one. Person one responds…. and so the cycle goes.

How many of you have that friend who is not an exchanger of words? We will call them the givers of words. They GIVE you all sorts of words and stories but never EXCHANGE. They never ASK you anthing or or even graciously accept the words you try to give them.

Pretty much I have a friend/acquaintance that I have frequent contact with that never listens to a word I say… I’ve pretty much quit talking about anything because she neither acknowledges my comments or, better yet, never asks a follow up questions or perhaps provides any incite to what I was asking or saying. She simply ignores my words and keeps talking about her thoughts and problems. And to make it worse, she repeats herself constantly, so I’m hearing the same thing over and over.

I know this seems like a bit of complaining but, to be honest, I don’t want to bring it up the situation because a.) she probably won't listen anyway and b.) she might start asking questions. And so the cycle goes. This is person one… How is everyone doing?

Hot Tuesday!

I voted! Today was hot Tuesday at the polls and I was there… 1st in line at the Hope Methodist Church! All in all it felt pretty good to voice my opinions (not that I don’t do that often enough). They didn’t have my name down as “registered” but I filled out some paperwork and let me vote. It’s a pretty good system I supposed, except Chris had some trouble. He is classified at non-partisan for some reason and they wouldn’t let him vote Republican. Turns out he has to call and change his status before the next election. I hope Romney didn’t need that one vote!

The local voting stuff is a little hard to understand. I’ve seen all the commercials telling me to vote Yes on this and No on that. I really wish there was a little more information on the ballets. Or, they could do it like Amazon.com does it… if you bought this product here are 16 other things you MIGHT like. If the ballet said, if you voted for Huckabee, you might like to vote No on this issue or if you voted Romney, you might like to vote Yes on this issue. Let’s all be honest… that would be helpful, right?

For the most part we are following the race for the nomination. Our friend Stephen even gave us some Romney bumper stickers! I’m going to hang it in the window of my office so everyone will walk by and notice I’m a fan!

Stanford Here We Come!!!

The good news is finally here! After months of studying for the GMAT and many more months of school applications... Chris got just the answer he was looking for! It's a YES from Stanford! After his interview, it was only 6 days before they called and begged him to be part of the exclusive program. They said he was perfect for the program!

I am so proud of him I can hardly stand it! He's worked so hard for this and is excited to start this new part of our life! If everything works out, we'll be up there in the fall. The campus is beautiful and the town is a lot of fun. Plus, Chris' good friends from DC are in the area as well.

It's a slow ride on my wagon...

So as easy as blogging is... it's still pretty hard. But I'm making time because it feels o-so-good to be a blogger.

We made it back from Mexico. It was great! We were very cold, but pajamas under your jeans keep you very warm. We saw and did a lot of things that I'll eventually get to. As for today...

I'm starting a yoga class. Pilates has been great so I'm venturing out and taking the next step toward fitness and relaxation. Actually it's just a new class at our gym and I like all the stretching:) Blessing (the pilates instructor) told us last night you could grow an inch from doing yoga and pilates. 5'8 here I come!