As newlyweds in a new city and a new house the adventures are endless. These adventures may occur nearby, like in the kitchen, or far away, such as another city, but they all make up the moments of our life together. We hope you enjoy keeping up with us! xoxo Lauren & Alex

Tuesday, December 17, 2013

Merry Christmas 2013! {xoxo}

This year I had trouble deciding what to send out for a Christmas card. I contemplated ordering a photo card because I felt behind schedule {thanks a lot late Thanksgiving} and there was a lot going on, but ultimately I decided I had to take the time to create something unique {and my lovely husband may have encouraged me because he knows I would've regretted it if I hadn't made them}.

Earlier this summer I opened a shop on Etsy to sell stationery and I have been working on adding more items to my shop; anytime I can exercise a little creativity I find that it usually leads to even more good ideas! I had a friend order some stationery sets to give as gifts this year and they included hand-drawn personalized icons, which is what gave me the idea for our Christmas card {they are not on Etsy yet, but I can do custom orders}! Thank you Maria! The stationery set I made for her birthday this year was one of my very first projects, so it's fitting that I would end the year with projects for her.

If you've read my blog before, you know that I like to write. That can be challenging when confronted with an itty bitty card that you're printing in a large quantity. My goals were that it would tell a story, spread Christmas cheer and the good news of Jesus' birth, be appealing to the eye and also appropriate for everyone receiving it. While I am creative at heart, that doesn't necessarily mean I am the best artist. I tried. If I had allowed my perfectionist side to come out during the making of this Christmas card I probably wouldn't have gotten it in the mail before Christmas day. Anyways, enough about my "creative" process. 

Here's the tree and the legend that were printed on the outside of the card {the tree was on the front, and the key on the back so you could lay the card flat and see them side by side as seen below}. 



And as I copy and paste the content from the card to expand on it, I notice a few misspellings. I guess that's what I get when I stay up until the wee hours of the morning... Oops!

HORSESHOE- Our home sweet home in Lexington and Lauren's brand new job. Lexington is considered the "Horse Capital of the World." Here's a brief background from Wikipedia: 
Lexington has been known as a major center for Thoroughbred breeding since the late 18th century due to the high calcium content in the soils of the InnerBluegrass Region, which leads to stronger bones and greater durability in horses. 
The city is home to two horse racing tracks, Keeneland and the The Red Mile harness track. Keeneland, sporting live races in April and October, is steeped in tradition; little has changed since the track's opening in 1936. The Red Mile Harness Track is the oldest horse racing track in the city and the second oldest in the nation. There you can see horses pull two-wheeled carts called sulkies while racing, also known as harness racing. 
The Kentucky Horse Park, located along scenic Iron Works Pike in northern Fayette County, is a comparative late-comer to Lexington, opening in 1978. Although commonly known as a tourist attraction and museum, it is also a museum and working horse farm with a farrier and famous retired horses such as Cigar and 2003Kentucky Derby winner Funny Cide. The Since its opening in April 1978, the Kentucky Horse Park has hosted the Rolex Kentucky Three Day Event, which is one of the top 3 annual equestrian eventing competitions in the world and held immediately before the Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs in Louisville. In September and October 2010, Lexington hosted the World Equestrian Games,[50] the first time the games were held outside of Europe. Since October/November 2011, the Kentucky Horse Park has hosted the National Horse Show.
The week of Thanksgiving I started a new job with the Race Track Chaplaincy of America {National Service Center}. It is an inter-denominational Christian organization aimed at ministering and meeting the spiritual, emotional, physical, social, and educational needs of people working in the racing industry. {That's the short version, here's a great article about our organization that provides a larger picture}. I am blessed to have this new opportunity. 

ST. LOUIS ARCH- St. Louis & Kansas City road trip. In late April Alex and I drove West to Kansas City for the wedding of one of his former co-workers. Along the way, we stopped over in St. Louis! It was my first time visiting both cities and I was pleasantly surprised. I thought they were quite wonderful and it was an amazing trip, even though it was short! {Read more: http://www.thejaneszfamily.com/2013/05/nothing-like-road-trip-to-kick-off.html}

LOBSTER- Road trip to Maine and the East Coast. We took an extended Labor Day holiday in order to drive East for the wedding of Alex's college roommate. Once again, I visited quite a few places I have never been. It was an exorbitant amount of driving, but we saw so many loved ones along the way and had a chance to spend some quality time together and just relax. I would love to go back to Maine one day, and Rehoboth Beach, DE. {Read more: http://www.thejaneszfamily.com/2013/09/east-coast-road-trip-alexs-bday.html}

UK- Alex completed his third semester of his MBA program at the University of Kentucky. After finishing some prerequisite classes last summer, Alex started his MBA program in August 2012. Since then he has had class three days a week from 6 p.m.-8:30 p.m. {summers off!}. With his work schedule requiring a lot of after hours office time and traveling, it's been a grueling schedule. It was extremely challenging at first to adjust, but somehow we made it work. As I write this he's finishing up his last assignment for this semester and then he'll be done until Jan 15! I can hardly believe he'll be starting his last semester already; the time flew by and I am so proud of him. 

#3 CANDLE- We celebrated three years of marriage. Talk about time flying by! It's been a wonderful adventure so far and I am so thankful that we found one another. With Alex having a crazy schedule, we had a low key anniversary this year and spent the following weekend with his family who came in to visit {Read more: http://www.thejaneszfamily.com/2013/10/september-celebrating.html}

WEDDING CAKE- Lots of beautiful "I do's". Last year and this year have been that time in our lives when everyone we know is getting married. It's so exciting to celebrate with them and reminisce about what it felt like to get married. We had eight or nine weddings this year! Congratulations to all of our friends and family members that tied the knot this past year! Here's a few blog posts about them:

WELCOME MAT- Friends and family came to visit. We had a few visit from friends and family this year. It's surprising we had that many visitors considering how often we were out of town. Pat Janesz wins the award for being our most frequent visitor! Visitors are always welcome, so let us know if you'd like to come down for a visit or even just a stopover. We are not far from Cincinnati and are on the way to quite a few warm weather destinations!
BEER- Alex attended the Siebel Institute of Technology for a course,  "Starting your own Brewery." Life has just been flying by and as a result Alex and I try to take advantage of every opportunity that we can. Alex's dream is to one day open a brewery, so he took advantage of his summer break by heading to Chicago to attend a three day course at the Siebel Institute of Technology which is America's oldest brewing school {more history here}. They had instructors from various breweries and drank beer during class {for learning purposes of course haha}. Here was the curriculum: 
  • Brewery Process and Design:
    • Anatomy of a Commercial Brewery
    • Buying Brewing Equipment & Fermentation Capacity
    • Buying and Starting Up Packaging Equipment
    • Site Selection and Practical Considerations in Building a Brewery
    • Utilities, Waste Water & Regulations
  • Restaurant Operations
    • Restaurant Components and their Management
    • Steps in Creating a Successful Restaurant
    • Site Selection and Real Estate Considerations
  • Marketing Your Venture
    • Public Relations and Events
    • Packaging Design and Point-of-Sale Materials
  • Distribution
    • Finding a Distributor
    • Franchise Laws
    • Working with Distributors
  • Business Plan Creation
    • Financial Measures and Statements
    • Anatomy of a Business Plan
    • Researching and Writing Your Business Plan
P.S. It's taking place June 9-11th, 2014 if you want to go!

OHIO OUTLINE- Cincy, Columbus, Cleveland. Repeat. I was very tempted to go through our calendar and count all of the weekends we were in each city, but I got tired just by thinking about it. We are lucky to be close to my family and some of Alex's extended family in Cincinnati, so we make that trip frequently. Sometimes we even just go up for the day. We also drive to Cleveland once every month or two, and whenever we do, we usually stop by Cincinnati for dinner with my family on our way back; it helps break up the drive! Two of my best friends from college are in Columbus, along with Alex's youngest brother at OSU, so we usually end up visiting there every so often as well.  
BLOCK O- Columbus + Football Festivities. Alex won us football tickets through the alumni lottery so we went up for the San Diego State game which happened to be on his birthday. We went back up in October just to tailgate. Alex's former co-worker and Buckeye came in from Texas so we had a little gathering of old friends and new friends. It's surreal to walk around campus, because I feel so old, yet my experiences all comes rushing back to me when I'm there and it feels like yesterday.
WPJH- The initials of our families' surnames together. I am so incredibly thankful to have married into such a wonderful family and that my family adores Alex as well. Our families have a tradition of going out for drinks and appetizers every time the Janesz clan is in Cincinnati {usually Christmas and Memorial Day}. My parents are always welcome at the Janesz Family Sausage Making during Easter in Cleveland and the Harshman Memorial Day picnic. My caring in-laws came to Toledo for my Grandpa Wagoner's funeral this past March to show their support for my family. Our parents even spend time together when we are not there! I couldn't imagine our lives without all of them. There might even be a Peterson-Janesz family vaca in the future even...
CANNED GOODS- Our Power for Life Food Drive. Alex was inspired to coordinate a food drive this past summer to help give back to the community {more here: https://www.facebook.com/PowerforLifeFoodDrive}. I also helped with some of the coordination, along with one of our friends, Amy, that also works in the electrical industry. After all of our hard work it was so rewarding to drop off all of the food together and discover that we had brought in over 700 pounds of food! Not bad for our first effort! Hopefully, we will be able to do it again next year.

PALM TREE- A trip to Charleston, SC for 4th of July. My lovely friend and my first college roommate, Karleya, invited us to join her and her husband on a road trip to Charleston, SC. Her parents moved there within the past couple years. The only time I had been to Charleston previously was to have dinner and pick up a cruise ship during my senior year of college. It was beautiful weather and company with no shortage of delicious food and drinks. Her parents are fantastic hosts and it's always nice to see them. I would go back without a doubt!

BRIEFCASE- Alex started a new job in April. During one of Alex's college courses Spring Semester 2012 his professor encouraged them to always be open to other opportunities. He took his professor's advice just as a learning opportunity and the next thing he knew he was starting a new job. It is always bittersweet to move on, especially when you still love your job, but his new job has been an amazing learning opportunity. It has provided him with the chance to learn more about the inner workings of a business as a whole and how to build a business. 

HAMMER & NAILS- Home improvements; all new ceiling fans & exterior lights, plus a garage overhaul! It seems like we are finally done with upgrades to the house for now. I still need to paint my back doors and we're hoping to update our small guest bathroom, but we are satisfied for now! Over the past two and a half years we have put a lot of sweat equity into this place and it's nice to see it come together. This year our biggest projects were replacing all of the ceiling fans and the exterior lights as well as overhauling our garage. A lot of the smaller projects I have done on my own, but these were two projects that Alex and I did together and I always love how well we work as a team. 
It's crazy to look back on the past year and remember everything that's happened. Sadly, my blog and my facebook pictures actually help me keep track of it all! It makes me very excited for what's to come next year. Now we just have to wrap up the rest of our week and then it's time to celebrate Christmas with our families. Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! And now to close, the most important part of our Christmas tree.





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