Seven Years

Mine and Clay's anniversary was on the 25th of July. We have been married for seven years. Here is where our journey started, on our wedding day, in California. I was 19 and Clay was 25.

Before we knew it, it was time to pack up and leave for New Orleans. Clay would be attending Tulane to work on a Masters/PhD in anthropology.

We arrived in New Orleans. There was lots to see.





Our first apartment was uptown. It was student housing but a bit of a walk to get to campus.


At the end of the semester, we moved into the basement apartment of this beautiful uptown house. We spent a lot of time upstairs with our awesome landlords!

Downstairs was nice too.


When summer break came, we flew to Queltzaltenango, Guatemala, more often called Xela. This is the view from the roof of the school we lived in.


Inside the school, eating with the spanish students.

Mid-way through summer, we moved further up into the mountains to the small village of Santa Catarina Ixtuahacan.



At the end of summer, we had a flight to go back to New Orleans, but had to cancel it because of the hurricane. We were lucky to get to live with Clay's parents for this semester. This is the only picture I have of all of us at their house, and it's in the back yard. Clay was lucky to get to finish his course work at SDSU.

The following semester, we went back to New Orleans, but we couldn't move back into our awesome basement apartment that we loved so much. It was flooded pretty good.


Instead, we moved into a great apartment off of St. Charles in the garden district of New Orleans.


At the end of the semester, Clay found out that he would get to study K'iche at the University of Chicago for the summer. Here's Clay and Cole by Lake Michigan.

We loved living in this small, IKEA furnished apartment. It had a great view of downtown Chicago.

For the fall semester, we drove back down to New Orleans, and stayed in our friends apartment while they were on a medical rotation. (Here Cole is pretending to be the lion king.)

It had a nice little back yard.

Halfway through the semester, we moved into this "creole cottage". It was soooo fun. We were right next to the french quarter.


And the mississippi.

Then we moved into my parent's house for a semester while we prepared for what was supposed to be a year in Guatemala.



At the beginning of summer we flew back to Guatemala. We only stayed for a month...instead of a year...but that's another story...



Not knowing what to do with ourselves, now that Clay's career as an anthropologist was on hold indefinitely, we stayed with Clay's parents for a couple months while we figured out a new life plan.

We decided to move to this apartment in Vista, while Clay worked as a long-term substitute teacher. (As you can see, Thomas and Friends was our one constant through a lot of change.) This is also where we lived when Luke joined our family.



During this time, he chose Public Administration as his new passion and USC as his new school.

Now we live on this beautiful street in the cutest little city, with two adorable boys and a job that Clay loves. We've lived here for two years, which is 1 1/2 years longer than we've ever lived anywhere. The nomadic lifestyle has definitely slowed down, but I have a feeling we're still not home yet.

Clay has given us such a great life! He is the most amazing husband. He is all about making me and the boys happy and completely spoils us. Thanks for the journey so far, Clay! Happy anniversary! I love you!