Luke and I have officially entered the life of hanging out together every day while Jared is in school.  It's not bad when we have other people to play with too.  "Real" law school classes start on Monday, and I think Jared is mostly excited.  I am too actually.  Mostly we're both excited to find out what it's going to be like and how much we can plan on seeing each other.  Big things this week:

Luke:  Luke can take a few crawls up on his knees now before he starts slithering on his stomach again, so he should be real crawling really soon.  He also learned to pull himself up using the couch and other objects.  He stands up to look at his little CD player a lot--the problem: he can't get back down.  Luke loves his CD player.  He has found the pause button (but doesn't know to push it again to get the music to come back) and the volume control.  Luke also decided that the pool is pretty fun.  He's started splashing and smiling in the water instead of just zoning out while we walk around with him.  I think he likes sitting on the steps of the pool the best (always with me keeping a hand on him--don't worry, mom!)  Luke also went to sleep BY HIMSELF several times this week.  When I say by himself, I mean that I put him down, tucked him in, and he went to sleep without screaming and without having to be rocked. Go Luke!!!  On Tuesday, there was an ice cream social at the nursing home where Luke and I volunteer, so Luke got to demonstrate to every body what a little pig he is when it comes to ice cream.  (See pictures to left and below)  Luke's major damage this week: I let him chew on the remote control, and he bit the reset button.  That screwed up everything so that the television wouldn't do anything (not even play DVD's) because it kept scanning for channels trying to reset settings.  Well, we don't have cable and we hadn't bought an antennae, so we had NO channels which meant that the tv just kept scanning and scanning.  We had to buy an antennae just so the tv would stop scanning and Luke could watch his baby einstein again.  On the upside, we got to watch a few very FUZZY olympic events.  Luke had lots of fun with Papa yesterday.  Dad, Luke, and I went to Colonial Williamsburg to walk around for a little bit.  We'll probably go back on Sunday.

Stacy:  The biggest thing this week for me was something that I'm still not sure about.  In fact, I'm a little bit embarrassed.  I decided that I would get the started kit from Mary Kay to see if I would like selling.  If I was dedicated and a good saleswoman, I could make quite a bit of money.  The problem is that I'm not sure how dedicated I am and I may just have a box full of lots of base with nothing to do with it.  Of course, I could find out that I love it, so...anybody want to order Mary Kay??  Two really fun things happened for me this week.  On Tuesday night, Nora came over and brought paints and canvases.  We painted and talked.  I made a blue abstract painting that is really more than streaks on canvas, but I really like it and I had lots of fun making it.  I hung it in the living room over my computer so that I can look at it and feel happy.  Dad coming was my other big highlight.  It is so fun to show off our new apartment and get to talk to him in person.  I am also really excited to have one year of Amber's CDs.  Jared is going to be even more excited when I download them all onto his computer, but I don't have a choice because I can only add the songs onto my ipod from his computer.  So hopefully Jared will enjoy Michelle Branch, right?

Jared: I went through "law camp" this week. Basically it's a mix of orientation and classes. So, we get to meet other students (lots of cool kids here) and professors, eat ice cream, etc. We also got to learn in a classroom setting where professors sometimes used the Socratic Method. We even had homework and had to write a memo to our mock senior partner. One of the best parts of the week came Wednesday night when my "law firm" (about 15 of us under the senior partner) went to the senior partner's (his name is Rick Moschel) house for a pizza party. Aside from getting to chat with my fellow junior associates, I got to see what a successful lawyer's  house looks like. Dang.

Real classes are starting on Monday, so I am doing the readings today. Most of the professors here are world-renowned in their fields, so it is great to study under them. 

I learned yesterday that I will be working (as one of 76 graduate research fellows) at the law library (at the reference desk) and at Disability Services on the main campus. That second job worries me a little, because my supervisor there assumed I was an expert on disability law, which I am not. In fact, she seemed to assume that I had professional experience with disability law BEFORE coming to law school. She said that she wants me to write policy for the Disability Services Department for the University...gulp, gasp. In short, I haven't a clue what to do, but I'm optimistic that after reading the Americans with Disabilities Act a few times I'll get my feet under me. Riiiiight.