A post about Kenny

Since the absence of a Facebook profile has left my friends and family without a picture album of our beloved doggy, I thought I'd do a quick post about him.






Kenny continues to be a very spirited dog full of personality. Our latest challenge is making sure he gets enough exercise so that he doesn't get bored and into mischief during my long studying days. The three day weekend worked out well, because we took him to the dog park for long play sessions on Saturday and Monday, and on Saturday he had young cousins to play with. So, today he has been really easy and all he wants to do is sleep. I'll probably try to get him to the park for at least a few minutes tonight, since I start bar class again tomorrow.

His hair is coming in, and with that, a slight wave, as well as that Carmel color that is unique to the Bichon breed.







Curtis and I continue to disagree on how much food he should get, I give him less than a scoop and Curtis gives him a heaping scoop. Thankfully, we each feed him about half the time, and he seems perfectly happy and healthy.

Curtis and I have become quite smitten, it has been particularly fun watching Curtis embrace the role of doggy-daddy. Every night the three of us spend a few minutes cuddling in bed together before we send Kenny to bed in his crate. He came at the perfect time in our lives, and I know that my mood has greatly improved thanks to his company. We say that someday if we have a yard we might get Kenny a doggy brother or sister to keep him company, probably another Bichon, but we'll see. On August 24, he will have been with us for a year already!

Have a good week :-)

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Shutterfly Father's Day Cards

As I've mentioned before, I love Shutterfly. I can upload photos directly from iPhoto, and they have great designs and prices, not to mention a ton of discounts and sales.

For Mothers' Day, I did customized cards for both my mom and Curtis' mom, which they loved, so I'm doing the same for Fathers' Day. They are super easy to make and a nice keepsake. Here's a sample below.

5x7 Folded Card

View the entire collection of cards.

New iPad!

I had a fun surprise yesterday! My mom had mentioned that she had a graduation gift for me that hadn't arrived yet, but I didn't think much of it. Well, we were there yesterday for a family BBQ and I was presented with a new, white iPad!! It is even engraved on the back with my name! I am so excited, and am enjoying playing with it and moving content from my laptop to it. It has a lot of cool features, including the ability to stream content from the iPad to our apple tv, we even watched some of Tangled last night doing that - very cool. I already bought a Pink cover for it, so I'm all set :-)

One of my first pics from the iPad was while we sang happy birthday to my brother Jon, who will be 24 on Thursday. My grandpa is also in the picture.

Graduation

It's rather strange to think that I've graduated from law school.  It was just yesterday I was starting this blog to chronicle the application and decision process. Unfortunately I don't really have time to think about it because I start intense study for the Bar tomorrow. So, before life takes an even more hectic turn, I wanted to get some pictures up of graduation, since I will be disabling my Facebook very soon.

Me & Jackie

 

Me & Maisha

Nanny, Jon & Mom

Curtis & his parents - Robin & Jeffrey

Me & Kevin, a close friend 1L year who transferred to Penn, but was awesome enough to come for our graduation!

Me and one of my favorite Professors

Me & Curtis

Me & Jon (he was in a good mood that day, I swear!)

Nanny, me and Mom

The entire family crew at Graduation

Curtis, Me, Jackie, and Josh (Jackie's Boyfriend)

Celebrating the following day at Disneyland!

My celebratory hat :-)

A Set of Setbacks but I survived :-)

On Monday evening, I suddenly realized that my right wrist was super stiff. I told Curtis that it hurt to bend backwards and forwards. We looked up the symptoms of Carpal Tunnel, and it looked like it probably wasn't that, but I was still concerned, but decided to sleep on it.

Tuesday I took my last final (!!) which was fine, but I didn't feel like my wrist had gotten any better, so a bought a sports brace to put on, to see if some rest would do some good.

Something like this, to stabilize it, and to remind me not to lift things with that hand :-)

Today (Wednesday), I got the workout bug, and tried to see if I can get into a plank position - turns out, I basically can't put any weight on that wrist, it just isn't strong enough..... UGH! That wrist has always been relatively weaker, and even though I hadn't worked out in 4 days, I must have tweaked it somehow*. I had one Ripped in 30 Workout left, and I had just bought a Jillian Michaels for K-Swiss sports bra to do it in (she wears them in the video), and I could not get into a normal plank position.

I obviously don't look this good yet, but compared to when I started in February, I look much better :-) The bra is very fun and fits well :-) Obviously I don't go out in public with just a sports bra on, but it's fun for working out at home and seeing my progress, my tummy is so much flatter!

So, after watching an Oprah show about weight loss (those always motivate me, I should watch one every day), I decided that just because I can't do a Jillian workout doesn't mean I can't work up a sweat. So, I put on my running shoes and went to the gym here in the apartment complex and decided to try the treadmill, for the first time in months! It wasn't too bad, my legs and abs felt good, but my cardio wasn't as good as I expected. But it occurred to me while there, that using the treadmill afterburn, I should go back and do the video, and just modify or skip the moves on my wrist. So, after a sub-13 minute mile (not bad not great for me cold turkey), I went back, and put in my Ripped in 30 DVD.

Except that it turns out that my Ripped in 30 DVD is now ripped in half! There's a giant crack in it!!! So, I sadly went over to my computer and ordered myself a new DVD (only $10, and I get free 2-day shipping on Amazon), and decided to do Level 3 of the old 30 Day Shred, thinking I'd get a good workout and minimize the plank interruptions.

It turned out that I didn't have to modify much, and that I could hang in plank on my forearms during the plank and push up moves. That ended up being as hard if not harder than what the video called for, so between the mile jog and the intense 30 minute workout, I felt pretty tired at the end, and quite satisfied. But it's a bummer to not do everything full out, and I missed my Week 4 Ripped in 30 workout, so I hope my wrist heals soon. And perhaps today will get me to do more treadmill cardio while studying for the bar!

Enough procrastinating for me, now I need to go write a 10 page paper within the next 28 hours :-)

*I am worried that I am getting a repetitive stress injury... we will see in the next week how it holds up, but talk about timing right?! Just before Bar Prep... at least it's not my writing hand.

Bar Studying - The Plan, Part I

Bar Study Starts Monday, May 16! Let's look at what I've already thought about:

I will definitely give up: Facebook and Blog Stalking
That's right, I will be disabling my Facebook from mid-May to the end of July. Partly because I've grown bored with it, and so it does waste my time. But, as you see below, I will stay on Twitter. Blog stalking is much more interesting than Facebook, but it doesn't really matter in my life and does take up some time, so I'll have to resist that temptation.

I will likely ration: my television consumption
The good thing is most of my shows aren't on during the summer anyway, and I haven't been watching that much TV lately anyway. But I'll probably eliminate Reality TV and just watch some Sports, like the NBA playoffs (although the Lakers and Celtics are making it easy for me right now, both down 0-2 in their respective conference semi-finals...ugh!)

For the sake of sanity, I will keep: Twitter.
I love Twitter b/c it's an efficient way for me to stay connected w/ the outside world. I think Twitter will be a useful tool during this time.

Subsequent parts will look at study schedules, plans to maintain a good amount of sleep and fitness, what I need to actually take the exam at the end of July (like a new computer?) and what to do about Kenny on days that I have class in LA all day.