I am a CPA

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. My last post was the same month I took and passed my first section of the CPA exam. Today, I got a passing score on my fourth and last section. Pending some paperwork, I have completed my long journey toward being a CPA.

This has been the longest year and a few months of my life. I always looked forward to school being over so I would never have to study again, but then I started working on the CPA exam and I was right back in the books. I am so grateful to Chari for putting up with all my hours of not helping out at home while I crammed for these tests. I am grateful to everyone in my life who has had to listen to me talk about nothing but the current test I am studying for or waiting to get scores for. Finally, I will have a life not defined by studying and stressing about a test.

For anyone out there wanting to be a CPA and going through the testing process, I highly recommend the Bisk study books and the another71.com website. The website gives you something to do while waiting for test scores. It is kind of an online support group for CPA candidates and it has some suggestions and study helps as well. The Bisk books are probably the cheapest option out there and worked pretty well for me.

I am in Dallas, Texas this week for some training. I think I will go look for something fun to do and a nice restaurant to eat at to celebrate. I am looking forward to returning home tomorrow to my family. Sam is now five and is growing up too fast. He is very smart and is going to do great in kindergarten this fall. Andrew is doing his best to keep up with Sam in everything he does. He quickly got the hang of riding Sam's old bike as soon as we got Sam a new bike for his birthday. Every time I am away for work, I am amazed at how clearly he is talking the next time I talk to him. Abby, our daughter, was born last November and is threatening to start crawling while I am out of town this week. My kids are, by far, the cutest kids in the world. No offense to everybody else's kids.

Anyway, I just wanted to tell the world that I finally passed and am excited to never study again.

My Birthday Weekend

Yay!! It's my birthday tomorrow. It has been a fun weekend. Work has been really busy with trying to get everything done and fit studying in for the CPA exam. I finally scheduled my first of the four parts of the exam. I am starting with the easiest section to get a feel for what it is like. I will take it on the 27th, which leaves very little time to make it through the study book I am working through. I was out of town this past week and got a good amount of studying done in the evenings.

It has been nice this weekend to take a little break from the hectic pace of work and have some birthday celebrations. Thanks to everyone who made it to our little get together yesterday and to my in-laws for having us over for a special birthday dinner tonight. I got some new Wii controllers and games and some iTunes credit for my birthday. I only wish I were done with the CPA exam so I could play my Wii games.

I am really looking forward to these next two months being over. I will be out of the office most of these two months, and it is hard on the family. I definately notice a change when I am coming and going on these trips out of town. The kids adjust to me not being around, and I adjust to being on my own. Suddenly I come back and the kids are doing things to get extra attention and I am a little less patient with all their noise and whining.

Now Andrew is into hitting. He just really likes to raise his hands and slap them down. He'll hit the table that way, his stomach, our faces, our arms, etc. I don't know what to do about it. He knows it's wrong. He even has learned our time-out routine from watching Sam.

We'll sit him down against a wall and tell him he is in time out. He'll jabber a little bit or sometimes cry, but he'll usually stay there. After a minute or two I go over and tell him what he did wrong and tell him not to do it anymore. I'll ask if he understands, and he says "Yeah." I then ask for a hug, and he comes and puts his head on my chest. So I don't know what else to do. I can't really reason with him. Hopefully it is just a phase.

He is learning lots of new words. He answers all yes or no questions and some other questions with "yeah." He found a baby doll he likes and calls it "baby." He says "more" for anything he wants, whether he's already had it before or not. He also says "up" a lot. He is also the climber in our family. He can barely reach one step to the next on the bunk bed, but he flies up and down the ladder anyway. We got a bunk bed to eventually get the boys in the same room for the next time we have an addition to the family.

Sam always makes me feel good when I come home from work or from trips by telling me how much he really missed me. He gives me big hugs and always wants to play. He also talks to me on the phone on trips, but he seems to have an internal clock that tells him when we've talked enough. At very random points in our conversations he'll simply announce that he's done talking. He'll then tell me to have a good night and/or have good studying and that he loves me. Anyway, I will be glad when the warm weather is here and I am working a little less and we can all play outside.

My First Post

I have a fat lip. Sam gave it to me. He likes to climb on Chari's hope chest and jump off. I'm supposed to catch him. After about six or seven jumps, he was getting less and less elevation on the jumps. The last jump was more of a torpedo dive at my head. I still feel a bit light headed. It was fun though. We also got to play in a blanket fort a little bit and play "Ghosties."

He got the term "ghosties" from one of his children's books. He just likes to turn off all the lights and sneak around in the dark making "whooooo" sounds. It's kind of fun, except that he just randomly decides to play "ghosties" at all hours and starts turning off lights while we're changing Andrew's diaper, brushing teeth, washing dishes, etc.

So, I don't really have a good reason to be writing today. I just always follow Chari's blog and often check out some of her friends' blogs and read the comments on her blog. I guess I'm hooked. It just seems like a fun thing to do.

Chari got called to the primary presidency today. I'm jealous. She gets to be in there with Sam. I really thought they were going to give us both callings, and I was hoping for nursery. I loved being in nursery with Sam, and Andrew will start nursery in three weeks. Instead, I have no official calling, but I will be teaching the twelve year old Sunday School class indefinitely until they call someone to the position, if they ever do. At this point, I don't see why they would bother. They might as well just have me keep doing it "unofficially." It's not so bad, I guess. The kids are really nice, so far. I've just never much liked teaching. I just don't think I'm very good at it. I always feel like I'm getting a lot of bored stares.

In other news, I'm looking forward to the church basketball season starting for my ward this week. I really hope Chari's primary presidency meeting doesn't go long that night because I've been looking forward to this for many weeks now. I don't know why I look forward to it so much each year. My teams usually get creamed. Oh, well. I just like to play.

Oh, yeah. Also, we are getting a treadmill tomorrow. I'm excited. We have a wellness program at work where we get pretty good prizes each month for getting the most steps on our step counters and doing other kinds of exercise. I've been doing pretty poorly, but I think I'll do a lot better if I can take a little stroll on the treadmill at night while watching "American Idol," "Lost," and "The Office."

Well, that's what is going on with me right now. I think maybe I'll try to do this weekly. It's therapeutic and I've been meaning to keep a journal anyway.