Happy Holidays

Happy New Years Eve everyone!

We spent the last week in Minnesota for Christmas. It was a VERY busy trip home, that resulted in both Andy and I getting really sick. Good news is he is better and I'm almost better too! Our first 3 days home consisted of attending 7 family Christmas gatherings...it sure was hectic but when you're with family it doesn't matter. It was so great to see everyone. And it was so great to have our first married Christmas together :) because last year Andy wasn't able to be home.

Like our festive outfits?!

My amazing and beautiful mom-in-law!!! (cellphone pic, sorry)

The "Amanda&Andy Kurkowski" cookie made at the annual cookie decorating w/ my mom's family!

The rest of our trip home was spent seeing friends and snowboarding! It was a fun trip home but both of us are happy to be back in San Diego relaxing until Andy is done with leave next week. We have noooo idea what we are doing for our first married New Years yet either, so more info on that coming later!

Still no luck with jobs but next week I'm going to search until I find ANYTHING! Just trying to keep in mind I'll only be at the job for 6 months! Living in California is expensive and we are learning really fast that we need another income and we need to watch our spending :) but it still is nice to live in such a beautiful place!

2011 was a year of ups and downs, but I did gain a husband so I'm not complaining ;) Hoping you all have a fun and safe New Years Eve and wishing you all the best in 2012!

Beach!!

Helloooo everybody! I hope everyone is having a fantastic Monday :)

It's kind of a bleh Monday here in San Diego, cloudy and not very warm. I was hoping for some nice weather this week before we head to Minnesota for the holidays! This past Saturday though, was beautiful! Andy had to spend both his Saturday and Sunday on base taking a mandatory motorcycle safety class required by the Navy...so I did a little exploring! I went to check out Coronado island, which isn't too far from us and super easy to get to. I must say, this is my fav area of San Diego so far. It's got lots of cute shops (I found a Bruggers Bagels out there too and was SO happy) and gorgeous stretches of beach. I'm sure once the weather here warms up some more, I'll want to be spending all my time out there!

I drove down to the far end of the island and found a stretch of beach that wasn't busy at all and sat down and read my book for awhile. It was nice to get away from the city for a bit! Here is a picture of my view:

As for the job search...still waiting :( I did get in touch with someone my dad knows and I think he may be able to help me find some temp work at least! At this point I'll take anything for a job! I'm hoping the job hunt is easier on our next move.

I'm still keeping busy though, keeping the apartment in order and running errands and such. I bought the hunger games book because I wanted to do some reading and ended up finishing the book in a day. I'm telling you people....READ THE BOOK! I am obsessed. I went back to the store the next day to buy the other 2 books from the series. The books are addicting and perfect for all you bookworms out there :) even the non-bookworms!

I hope you are all having a fabulous holiday season!

Photo time

Okay, as promised, I finally have some pictures of our place to put up! I know the walls are still a little bare and need some decorating! Also, I just realized I didn't get a picture of the kitchen table area...but I promise you it's nothing special :) just a table and chairs!

Just a glimpse of the horrible mess our place was! (and my handsome hubby unpacking) :)

Our little Christmas tree :)

The newest addition to the Kurkowski family...Andy's motorcycle haha

 Those pictures don't do the apartment justice but I tried! In other news, I still haven't found a job...San Diego isn't the easiest city to find work in but I'm still trying. It's been a COLD and RAINY past few days here but the weekend was beautiful and we drove to Pacific Beach and walked along the boardwalk there. There are some awesome and very expensive houses to look at along the boardwalk too!

Today I was in the waiting area at a salon sitting in pants and a t-shirt and the woman next to me goes, "Aren't you freezing?! I'm cold and I'm wearing a jacket!" I explained that I was from Minnesota and that 51 degrees and rainy is easily pants and a t-shirt weather :) I still haven't totally lost my MN toughness to weather!

Settled!

Hey folks! I have good news, we are basically all settled in...FINALLY. Our stuff came on Friday and it was a long and stressful weekend of unpacking and organizing but we made it through and now have a normal looking apartment. It's a big apartment and still almost looks kinda bare, guess we just need to accumulate more stuff ;) I WILL GET PICTURES UP SOON!

As I mentioned before, parking here is ridiculous downtown so we motorcycle shopped over the weekend and bought one on Monday. I know absolutely nothing about bikes but from what Andy says we got a really good deal and it's a pretty "badass" bike! He loves it. And our next step is to clean up his car and sell it! We are going to be a one car, one motorcycle family :)

Another exciting part of the weekend was stumbling across a cutesy little area called "uptown" and "hillcrest"...they have a Trader Joes there (I had never been to one before) and we had fun stocking up on yummy food and two buck chucks ;) Also, I started the job hunt this week, no luck so far but I have faith I'll find some sort of job out here!!

I'm hoping that by my next post I'll be able to report that I can drive more places with the help of my GPS...right now I can only get to the grocery store, target, and two highways without any help haha.

First blog post!

Hi everyone! I have had lots of requests to start up a blog for while we are moving about the country in the next few years so I caved and made one! :) I am excited to share my adventures with you all.

I will post pictures once I get some good ones taken. Our moving truck STILL hasn't come but will hopefully get here this weekend. Once our little home is all set up I'll try and post some pictures!

I am really enjoying San Diego so far, it sure is a BEAUTIFUL area! I love that it's set up just like the twin cities, with a downtown and it's surrounding suburbs...it's helping me figure the whole place out! We live right downtown and love our apartment. I'm already used to all the city noise outside too :) Only downside of living downtown San Diego is lack of parking. It's impossible to find street parking and we were only given one spot in our complex's garage. Andy is actually looking into possibly selling his car and buying a motorcycle for our time here since it's much easier to park!

I am excited to start job hunting next week but for now am just taking time to settle in and organize the apartment. A goal I do want to accomplish here is to test out all sorts of different yoga studios! There are SO many different ones!

Here are two pictures Andy has gotten on his phone...enjoy!

                                  Our deck!! It faces a courtyard and the other building of our complex!

                                        Dinner in Seaport Village, which is only 3 blocks away :)


That is all I have for right now! I'll try and keep updating this blog regularly! I have never blogged before so bare with me while I figure it all out!