Ava's First Birthday

We had a nice weekend with the Meendering family at Sam & Nick's house in Cedar Rapids, IA. We celebrated Ava's First Birthday Saturday afternoon. She had her first real sugar experience, as you can tell from the photos she enjoyed it thoroughly.

Home Owners.....well almost

We put an offer on a cute 1930's brick tudor house near the UNO campus. After what seemed a million counter offers, addendums, and home inspection requests we finally came to an agreement with the seller last night and it looks like we are going to be first time home owners! We are set to close on the house on the 24th of July and take possession on the 29th of July. We are really excited to move into our first house!!

Building a Deck

We drove up to Minneapolis MN this weekend to visit my my sisters and their families. My parents also came up to Minneapolis so our whole family was together for a fun weekend. Harry, Sophie, and Rita have a new brother George and Jon and I got to meet him for the first time this weekend. He is so cute! The project of the weekend was helping to build a deck for Julie and Joe. Harry jumped right in and was a big help to Grampie, Jon, and Joe. After the deck was finished we got to attend Ali's birthday party and then we had a big family bbq at Jen's house.
We got a cute picture of Jon and Rita , which was special because Jon is Rita's godfather and we haven't taken a picture with just the two of them since Rita was a baby. We also took a family picture after church with everyone together.

Dr. Meendering

Jon and I went back to Eugene this weekend for my PhD graduation.
I was nervous as I was asked to be graduate student speaker for our department and there were over 700 people there. My speech went well and I can officially say that I am Dr. Meendering! My parents even made the trip out to Eugene for the big day which really meant a lot to me. I feel so lucky to have such amazing supportive parents. After graduation we went to Stephanie and Davids for a BBQ and then out for drinks to celebrate.


More than anything on this trip, Jon and I realized just how much we LOVE eugene and miss all of our friends there. There were like our family for the last 5 years and it is hard to be away from all of them. We love you guys! Luckily, Grant, Nicole, Tom, and Donna will be driving from Oregon to Omaha at the end of july to visit. Brett will come up from Kansas and we are all planning to spend a few days in Omaha and then head to Kansas City for the weekend. We can't wait!

Tour de Cure

Jon and I decided to do the Tour de Cure this year to raise money for the American Diabetes Association. We rode 50 miles on our bikes and were lucky to have many family and friends support our ride. Together we raised almost 800 dollars for a wonderful cause. Thanks to everyone who donated to support our ride and the National Diabetes Association.

The bike ride was difficult, but fun. Who knew there were hills in Nebraska? After the ride, all of the riders met at local vineyard for dinner and entertainment. We will post more pictures from the day when we get them off our camera!

Back to Eugene....

Jon and I went back to Eugene last week for my dissertation defense. I was so nervous for the entire month before my defense, but it went well, I passed, and I am now officially Dr. Meendering! The last year of nonstop work on my dissertation was challenging in so many ways and I can not even describe how good it feels to be finished. Jon and Nicole surprised me with a party at Pegasus Pizza after my defense and had invited all of our friends in Eugene.

In the same trip back to Eugene Nicole and I threw a baby shower for Stephanie, David, and Baby Swayne. We outdid ourselves with mom-to-be friendly drinks and a beautiful spread of food. We played a game where everyone had to taste baby food and guess what kind it was. I am now second thinking ever feeding our future kids processed baby food. After the baby shower, Nicole and I met Grant, Jon, and Sean at a beatuiful winery just outside of Eugene and enjoyed some wine and the beatuiful scenery for the rest of the day.We also went hiked up dog mountain in the columbia gorge. It was super hard, but a lot of fun.
When we were hiking up there were all these people hiking down in full winter weather gear. We thought they must be crazy because it was warm and we were all in shorts and t-shirts. After we got past the tree clearings at the top we realized why.....we were freezing and the wind was whipping around. After hiking we had a great bbq at Nicole's parents house with her familly and Grant's parents. We had a wonderful time, but it was not to hard to leave this time because we will be going back in 3 weeks for graduation!

Friends in Omaha

Jon and I have met a lot of really good friends since we have been in Omaha.
Here are some pictures of us at our friend Lisa's birthday party. I work with Lisa's husband Josh at UNO.


The other couple we hang out with a lot is Jen and Rodger. I work with Jen at UNO, her office is right next to mine and she has been great at teaching me the ropes at UNO. Both couples are about our age and have really been great to us since we moved here. We are looking forward to many more years of fun with them.

Easter in Brookings

Now that we are closer to home we are able to go home on Holidays that we normally could not make it home for. This also means that on shorter holidays we have to choose which family we are going to spend the holiday with. We decided to do Easter with the Gees this year and Thanksgiving in the fall with the Meenderings. My parents made Easter a wonderful celebration and invited all of our extended family from the Gee side to come to Brookings for Easter. We also got to celebrate Harry's birthday while our whole family was together.

Christmas in SoDak

It felt great to DRIVE home to our parents houses this year for Christmas. We spent a few days with Mom and Dad Meendering and a few days with Mom and Dad Gee. Here are a few pictures from our time at home visiting family and friends.

Moving.....

Here are some pictures of loading the moving truck...our drive....and unloading the moving truck. The drive was eventful to say the least. Our check engine light came on the moment we entered Idaho and stayed on until we were 4 miles outside of Omaha and our windshield washer fluid froze as we were going over the mountain pass and so we had to stop periodically on the snowy roads and clean our windows with swifers that we had in the car. We were happy to arrive in Omaha and were greated by Mom and Dad Meendering and our friends Rachel and Sam. Rachel and Sam drove all the way from Peoria Illinois to help us unload the truck before heading to Wisconsin for Christmas. They are the best! They stayed in Omaha for the night to help us celebrate being back in the Midwest...unfortunately, I got a horrible case of the stomach flu and they had to celebrate without me!