Okay, so I know it's been 2 months since our last post. SORRY! Life has been a little crazy. I'm going to give you the highlights, as much as I can type out in this next hour. I'm home alone this weekend while Dave is out screening for Dr. Drew and Lyra in Wisconsin. I've been focusing on cleaning up our apartment further, throwing out/donating anything we don't absolutely need and packing up what we're going to keep. We move next month! More details on that a little lower in this post. First, I want to talk about some of the exciting stuff we've been up to since the end of May!
My last post was on the day of Dave's Part 4 National Boards exam, his last national test! We found out two weeks ago that he PASSED!! Yay!! He can officially become a doctor on November 12th I believe, just before graduation on Nov 19th. This is very exciting for us as it means we can get started right away with training after Nov 19th thru Maximized Living. Congrats to Dr. Dave!! :)
On May 28th, Melissa and Paul (on of my FAVORITE families that I nanny for) gave us two Twins tickets since they'd be out of town. We were so excited to go to a game! We hadn't had the opportunity, so thank you Edlunds! It was at the new Twins stadium -- it's beautiful! So glad we got to see the stadium before we leave the Twin Cities. The Twins won that game, forget the exact score, but it was an exciting game! Here are a few shots:
The next day, we hit the road with Mark and Nicole for some wine trailing. We'd been wanting to go wine tasting in Minnesota for a couple years, and we finally made it happen. And what a great couple to go with! Had such a fun time! We followed the Great River Road Wine Trail. We went to four different wineries and vineyards, tasted a lot of great local wine, and picked up a few Christmas presents along the way. ;) The best part was our final stop at Valley Vineyard in Prescott, WI. Rudy and his wife Cathy were SO sweet! We arrived at a very quiet time in the mid-afternoon. Not only did we get healthy sample portions, but Rudy actually took us down to the wine cellar that he built and showed us all of his equipment, how he makes the wine and how he bottles it. It was all so interesting, something Dave and I are hoping to have the time to do in the future. It sounds like a lot of fun! And like Rudy said, you have all the power and can control how your wine tastes. If you think it needs to be sweeter, change it. Want to add another flavor, adjust the grapes used. SO COOL!
Then, on June 11 & 12 was Create Your Destiny. I think I wrote about the seminar last year..? Dave is organized it again this year. Create Your Destiny (CYD) is a group of student leaders from all the clubs on campus. They pull together to put on this huge event once a year for the students where they bring in chiropractic leaders to speak on an array of topics to motivate and instill holistic principles in the students. Their mission statement is: "To empower, inspire, and to motivate students to realize a more profound meaning and purpose to their personal and professional lives. Our vision for the students at Northwestern is to increase certainty in chiropractic philosophy, awareness of business management, and leadership within a principled chiropractic model." This year they brought in 10 leaders in chiropractic and business. What a powerful weekend it was!! Even though the event is over, check out the brochure from CYD and see all the hard work Dave and the committee put into it.
The next weekend we were off to Drew and Lyra's in Wisconsin to spend the weekend with them and their family. It's been on the To Do list for like..a year. :) Saturday was their Patient Appreciation Potluck day, so we helped out a little with that on Saturday. Got to sample many delicious Maximized Living recipes, so you know I was in Heaven! I definitely dropped the ball and didn't make anything to share.. I had a late night before babysitting. But it was fun to taste others creations! After the potluck we headed out for a hike and were treated to an amazinggggg Parmesan Artichoke Chicken dinner by Lyra! So so so good!! This is a picture of Lyra's Healing Deep Dish Pizza. It was the best healthy pizza I've had in a long time! Somehow I didn't save any pictures of their 3 adorable children..
On Sunday we headed to church with the fam then made it back to the Cities to meet Diane and Kevin for lunch at Ecopolitan, a raw vegan restaurant in Uptown. It was Diane & Kevin's first time to try Ecopolitan and they loved it! Diane and I had been planning that date for at least a month...probably more like 2 months. It was a beautiful day, so we sat outside on the front porch. And the food was FABulous! We were all stuffed by the time we left, and I couldn't even finish my portion. I highly recommend trying Ecopolitan if you visit TC! I thought I had a picture of us by the Ecopolitan statue thing, but I can't find it...something weird is going on with my camera..hmmmmm.
And then we come up to the end of June. We've been trying to figure out where we want to move..to live and raise a family, to open our chiropractic health center. We weren't very satisfied with any of the midwest cities we visited (besides Omaha, but it sounds like that city is closed off thru Maximized Living right now), so we started looking to the East Coast. From the beginning, Dave has felt called to the East, so I trusted the process when all the midwest cities kept falling thru. Right now we're putting all our trust in God to guide us to the city he wants us in. We decided to pick the best city, we needed to drive out and see the coast in person. So we planned out another road trip, half as long as the one we took April last year.
We started our trip visiting my aunt Ruth in Maryland/Washington DC area. We spent two days with her. She was so sweet to tour us around DC. It was Dave's first time seeing the monuments and memorials, so we made sure to hit up all the main ones. However, it was during a heat wave, so we decided to go out at night the first day to see the White House and Capitol building. It also helped because there were fewer tourists out at night!
The next day (Saturday) we hit up a few of the Smithsonian Museums. If you've ever vacationed with us, you know that Dave LOVES museums. If we're with someone, I usually try to avoid museums at all costs.. I'm talking HOURS spent reading every single little placard. Not saying it's a bad thing, but I wish I was that interested in, say, mummies or WWI. :) hehe So Ruth and I had a relaxing time in the AC while Dave learned a little about a ton of stuff. It was also fun walking around down town DC. They had a seafood fest and BBQ block party going on. They were also setting up for the 4th of July festivities the following weekend.
After visiting Ruth and Maryland, we headed south down to North Carolina. That same day we found out Dave passed his Part 4 Boards AND that he scored high enough to be licensed in North Carolina. Praise the Lord, because otherwise we were going to drive straight thru the state. We did a zig zag pattern thru the entire state, because Dave felt in his heart that was the state we were meant to be in. I can't say enough good things about the entire state! We mostly camped along the way, but also stayed with some doctors that we visited. We LOVED Greensboro, Winsten-Salem, High Point, Asheville, Wilmington, and a few other cities. Down in Shallot, we took some time to hit up the beach since it's right on the coast. GORGEOUS!!! I could definitely live by the ocean and have that to look forward to every morning. :)! Funny thing, when I got up to jump in the water, I returned to find the ONLY towel I brought on the trip was pooped on by a stinking seagull. And it was only half way thru the trip, still had 5 days to go! haha, thankfully my husband is the most thoughtful man alive and volunteered to use my towel for the rest of the trip.
Out of all the cities, our absolute favorite was Asheville as the city is a "crunchy" city, meaning it's organic, green and natural! We figure why not move to a city that is years ahead of the rest, right? So Asheville is ranking high for us right now. We still have to do some more demographic/entrepreneurial research on the cities to see which will be the best fit for us, but we can definitely see ourselves being happy in Asheville from a personal and family standpoint. Also, some of you saw on Facebook that we helped out a lady who was involved in a hit and run accident in Asheville. We were just casually driving thru some side streets, checking out the residential area of the south side of town. This lady was crossing the road in her vehicle right in front of us (with plenty of time, we were a few hundred feet away driving slow) and out of no where this other woman guns it from the other side of the street and hits this lady on the driver's side door. It's like she didn't even look, just peeled out! Then she proceeded to drive off with her front wheel bent in at like 60 degrees. Let's just say she didn't make it far, another witness to the scene followed her and took down her info as we found it out later. But luckily Dave and I were there to block off traffic. Dave had recently completed his first aid certification, so he checked the lady out and made sure she was okay, the scene was safe, all that. Dave got the street clear and moved the car out of the way. I must admit, it was pretty scary to see an accident happen right in front of us, let alone to have the crazy woman drive off. But we were able to help the woman who was hit, and of all things it was her birthday! We helped her talk to the police and waited with her til her family came. It made our day when she said thank you and gave us hugs! :)
And that was enough excitement for us in Asheville. After North Carolina, we headed down to South Carolina and really fell in love with Columbia, SC. Then on the last couple days of our trip we headed to Knoxville, TN and also fell in love. Knoxville's green movement has been growing over the last 10 years, it's more prevalent there than it is in Minneapolis! So we feel we could be very happy there. We had fun walking up and down their main streets spending time in all the little shops talking to locals. On Saturday they held their weekly farmer's market, and although we didn't have cash to enjoy all the fresh goodies, we made some connections with local farmers and got a good perspective of live in Knoxville. It was a blast!
After Knoxville, we headed home, 16 hour drive ahead of us. That was on the 4th of July, so the drive home we got to see a few fire works shows. It was pretty cool!
So we've been getting the questions already, based on the trip, where are we going? What did we decide? Well at this point, we only know the state for sure. North Carolina. We are starting the application process for licensure for Dave now. He'll have to take a basic test for that this fall as North Carolina has it as an extra requirement. Shouldn't be a big deal, just a basic entrance exam so they can make an extra couple hundred bucks off of doctors. We're going to continue to research cities on our list, we've ranked our top choices and are working with Chamber offices to narrow down on THE city. Asheville is #1 as of now. We will keep you posted as our decisions are made and the time line ticks down. We plan to be open in whatever the city around this time next year!
Well, that's it, I think I got thru it all. The past 2 months in the lives of Dave and Elise! Hope it wasn't too long for you, thanks for sticking thru it all and making it to the end! If we haven't heard from you in a while, or more so you haven't heard from us (like I haven't called you back yet Alanna or Ashley or Janeeeelle), please write us! Email is the best right now! Hope everyone is enjoying summer, now that it's finally here! Happy belated 4th! Will write more soon!
-E