Goodbye Klaus

After being here a little over 3 years, today Klaus boards a plane to head back to Denmark for good. He got to the states about 2 weeks before we got here, so as long as we have been back, he has been around. I said bye to him last night (Michael will say bye today at work) and I could tell on his face he was having a hard time realizing it was really time for him to leave. Almost like it caught up to him very quickly. I am however glad that it wasn't goodbye goodbye. We will see him next month on our househunting trip, and then we will be following in 2 months.

Speaking of Denmark Michael had the company contact him yesterday that will be dealing with all the nitty gritties of our move. VISAs, relocation, househunting trip, plane tickets ect.... So looks like the ball is starting to roll. crazy.

My 27th

Happy Birthday to me
Happy Birthday to me
Happy Biiiirthdaaaay dearrr mmmmeeeeeee
Happy Birthday to me

So, 26 has come and gone.

Now, its time to be 27. I'm not so sure how I feel about it. Perhaps since it is an odd year it feels like a strange place to be. I (for some odd reason) have for as long as I can remember always wanted to be 28. It sounds like a cool age. So on the plus side of being 27, I'm just a short 12 months away from being 28. YEA!!!

I had a great day. We started off by getting up about 945, getting ready to go and went to go see the movie Fearless. It was amazing!! The story line was very very good and the choreography was outstanding. I would reccomend it to anyone!

We came home and went to the gym (ooo fun!)

Came back home got ready again to leave and went to dinner with Mary and Jason and Klaus at the cheesecake factory and had a good time. Afterwrds we went to Klaus's where he had made me a birthday cake decorated with little danish flags all over (a danish tradition) and like everything he makes, it was soooo good.

Now we are home and I'm really enjoying sitting around and doing nothing for a bit. We have been on the move ALL DAY LONG.

So, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!!! :o)

"If you do not create your destiny.........

...........you will have your fate inflicted upon you"

Yup, thats what happened to us. Ok, by now everyone that reads this blog should know that as of Monday we are indeed moving back to Denmark. Can you say rollercoaster?

I couldn't possibly summerize the entire past 2 years of this craziness, so I won't but will pick up from here. The jist of the story is at the end of July (only about 2 months after we had decided to stay) Michael was offered the position in Denmark again. This time the job had changed back to what it was originally with a few extra bonuses (there would be some research and development involved and some other odds and ends) We decided we didn't want to make this decision again and basically put the ball in TI's court. If they could make it happen, we would go, if they couldn't , well we wouldn't. So from both ends (Denmark and Dallas) TI worked really really hard at doing everything in their power to make this happen and did some amazing work in trying to meet Michaels requests, and much to our surprise, made it all work out.

The people that wanted Michael to stay before have been relocated and/or had a change of opinion due to some inside stuff like group reorganizations and such, (VERY COMPLICATED) and now, most every is very encouraging for him to go and very much in favor of it.

So, thats that, we are apparently moving back. I will be honest though, deep down inside I'm not sure I completley trust that we are really going yet. Not until Michael signs a contract and we are there will I believe it. Michael accepted his job offer in November of 2004 for us to move back to Denmark and it seems 2 years later, we will finally get there.

Oh, forgot to mention, Michaels start date is set at December 1st. While it's a little scary that we are going in the dead of winter and the absolute darkest time of the year and I mean DARK I'm glad it will be at least around Christmas time with all the festivities going on. That will make it sooo much easier then if we were moving there in January. Looking back we have always said that December was our favorite time there from the 15 months we spent there previously. So we are very much looking forward to that. :)

Random Thought of the Day

You know what I love? I love that when you accidentally wash clothes with dollar bills in the pockets and you go to take the clothes out, the dollar bills have come out of the pockets and the presidents faces are looking up at you completely in tact without a single rip. That's some strong stuff they use to make money!!

Back to the Doctor

I got my stitches taken out Thursday. I'm happy about that. Actually the night before I went in one of them came undone and Michael had to take it out. He did and afterwards he said, "That's right, call me Doctor" I had to remind him, that he isn't that kind of Doctor!! Silly boy.

Guestroom/Office and Bedroom

Here is our bedroom.




Office/guestroom

"9-11" 5 Year Anniversary

Oh my gosh, 5 years already. It seems like forever ago but at the same time seems like just yesterday. I looked back to see if I had posted anything about 9-11 last year, and was surprised to see I didn't. So since I hope to use this blog in the future as a journal to look back on, I think its a good place to write about what we were doing 5 years ago today. Michael and I were both 21 and I was in my last year of college and him in his first year of grad school. I was working at the Tech library at the time. I usually worked at 7:30AM so I would park and walk about a mile across campus at about 7. It was the perfect time to see the sunrise and I remember that on that morning, the sunrise was particularly beautiful. The weather was perfect with a hint of fall. This is usually the highlight of the year for me...When I can sense that subtle hint of fall in the air. Put that together with a lovely sunrise and I felt like this was going to be just a wonderful day. I only remember those details because all day long, I kept recalling walking to work that morning thinking what a perfect start to what I was hoping was going to be a perfect day.

I was sitting behind an information desk when one of the other workers at the library came up to me and said that a plane had hit the WTC. The people in my office and I had thought that it was just a bad plane accident then the same guy came back again a very short time later to say a second one hit and we realized, this was planned. It seemed like we kept getting information about other planes crashing (pentagon and the open field) and it was, to say the least a bit scary. I worked until I believe about 11:30 and no one got much done. We spent most of the morning in front of a big TV watching the news. When I went to my first class, our instructor came out and said, we have to have class and not think about this and can't put our day's on hold just because of this. No one in the class took that well. There were several people with friends/relatives in NYC or working in NYC that were just as nervous as could be. But we had class. My other 3 classes were fine though, the teachers said that they wouldn't teach material but if we wanted to talk about what was going on, we could have a big group discussion or we could leave. All of my classes stayed and talked. When I saw Michael for the first time that morning after leaving home we were outside the engineering building, gave each other a hug and were both almost speechless. We didn't have cell phones at the time and so we couldn't get ahold of each other before then. We sat outside for a bit not saying much but, shaking our heads and saying that we couldn't believe all this had happened. For he next week I remember we sat in front of the TV every night, watching nothing but the news (because that's the only thing that was on). So that's that...It is absolutely amazing that 5 years has passed.

TI Shuttle Service and the Living Room

The new place we moved to is right across the street (a small street not a big busy street) from the Plano branch Texas Instruments. I know I have mentioned that before. There is a shuttle that comes there to pick up people to take them to the DART (train) station and then onto the Texas Instruments branch Michael works out. We are already seeing a HUGE difference in the amount of gas we are using and miles we are putting in the car. I've been driving him across the street because we are trying to figure out what time the shuttle comes. I'm taking him in case he misses one I can just take him on to the train station. He has been taking the shuttle back home too. I picked him up a few days, but we noticed that the shuttle seemed to be faster for some reason. Soon, he will just walk across the street in the morning. I'm glad that we ar seeing some benifits of this location so quickly!! HORRAY!

Here are some pictures of our living room!!

Can you tell the shelves I've fixed up and the shelves that I have yet to get to??

My Life on a Balcony

WOW!!! I had TOTALLY forgotten how much I LOVED having a balcony. Its been 3 years now since we had one and I am very quickly remembering why it was that we liked them. I'm actually sitting on it right now enjoying the beautiful morning weather with my computer, listening to some classical music over breakfast and coffee. Yup, thats right I said beautiful weather... Its FINALLY nice out and I couldn't be happier about it. I'm still waiting for it to cool off even more, but right now the mornings are just perfect!!!

It seems like it is taking us forever to get this place in order, I dont know if we were expecting it to be done in a week or what, but its getting there... slowly. I know I haven't posted pictures of the place yet.. but I will... SOON.

I have 10 more stitches in my back, because I got 4 more moles removed. They don't itch as bad as they did last time and aren't bothering me near as bad either. That maybe a bad thing though cuz I sometimes forget they are there and I twist or turn and I can feel them pull.. oops.

This weekend is grapefest in Grapevine. I was thrilled to find out Mary has the day off so the 4 of us will go and have a blast. We went last year and had fun, but I think this year will be ever better since we know what to expect. Yea for fun weekend plans!!!

We Love the Croc Hunter!!!!

We woke up yesterday morning and checked our email. As soon as we were online I saw a head line that said something like"Death by Stingray" or something. It sounded like he was promoting something or a movie, but as I clicked on the article and started reading I knew that wasn't the case. It is strange. Michael and I have seen many people we admire (celebrities and such) pass away but non of it has ever hit and affected us the way this one has. Is it because we actually got to watch this mans career grow? Or because he was always in our living room showing us things we would never get to see in real life? Michael and I have been watching him since we started dating and both loved watching him. We not only watched his show but everytime he was a guest on another show, we would tune in to see his crazy antics. We were both in a funk yesterday over it. It sounds silly but we both felt like we lost a friend. I think there are a lot of people who are feeling the same way. There was just something about him. The animal kingdom and the world lost a great man, husband and daddy. He will be missed in the Pate household.

WE ARE GOING HOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Just to visit...not for good.
We bought plane tickets and booked a rental car yesterday to go back to Lubbock from October 12-16th. Michael is taking off a Friday and a Monday and leaving late Thursday night and we are SOOOO excited. We were talking about it, and think we maybe more excited about going to Lubbock for a few days then we might have been about going to Tokyo!!??!!?? We actually planned the trip around one of the local wineries wine festivals that we missed so much last year. So this year, we won't miss it. We are also looking forward to meeting Baby Hagen (Michaels cousins son) for the first time. There is something about Lubbock in the fall that is so cozy. Even if its warm out. I think it maybe the Texas Tech football season in the air or something. Anyways, we are really looking forward to our little trip. We haven't been back since December and we both miss it alot.

Things in the apt. are good. I think I'll take some pictures later today to post on here. We are getting all the rooms set up slowly but surely.

This morning I made something new. And it was pretty good. Tasted like fall.

"Tony's Breakfast Couscous"

If your interested here is the recipe:

1 1/4 cups water
1/2 cup nonfat dry milk
1/2 cup uncooked couscous
1/4 cup dried cranberries
1/4 cup raisins
1/4 cup chopped walnuts, toasted
2 tablespoons brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon salt

Bring water to a boil in a small saucepan; stir in milk and remaining ingredients. Remove from heat. Cover; let stand 10 minutes. (Mixture will thicken as it cools.)

Yield: 3 servings (serving size: 2/3 cup)

SETPEMBER 1st!!!!

HOLY COW!! Is it REALLY already September? wierd. Seriously it crept up out of nowhere. I love September so I'm glad it's finally here. :o)

We are finally all moved in and only have one residence again. Wednesday night we locked up the empty house and left the keys/garage door opener where we said we would and said goodbye. We always have a hard time leaving a house and we are both starting to get really tired of it so if things all line up, we may start looking to a buy a place once January comes around. Time will tell.

Today is the anniversary (though I don't know how many years) of my first tooth that fell outta my mouth. Ok, it didn't so much fall as my mom held my crying head over the sink and yanked it out. It was barely even loose, I suppose she freaked out (since I'm the oldest) and wanted to remove it. I remember her pulling me through the upstairs hallway to her bedroom and yanking it out of my head. It obviously tramatised me if I remember the date. Actually I rememember it because it was my cabbage patch kids' birthday and I must have been wishing I were a cabbage patch kid too with teeth drawn on my face so the tooth devil couldn't strip them from my mouth. I'm just kidding mom, your not a devil.... (but she was that day...)