Merry Christmas 2009

Merry Christmas Everyone!!! Evan and I had a wonderful, blessed Christmas this year, with lots of time spent with family and friends. This year was the first year in many that we were able to spend together. I was luckily enough to get cancelled from work, leaving lots of time for Christmas fun.


We started getting into the holiday spirit by going to Christmas Eve mass in Albion with Barb, Bob, Alaina, Colby, Breslin, and Dharia! It was a wonderful service put on with a huge helping hand by Alaina!!! She did a fantastic job. Evan and Alaina even performed a solo together! They sang beautifully. It was such a treat to hear them sing.



Evan and I went home to relax after spending some time with the Linderman side of the family, enjoying yummy treats and wine. We curled up on the couch and watched "Its a Wonderful Life", one of our holiday traditions together. We stayed up so late, that we actually opened our stockings at 1am!!!


On Christmas morning we slept in, ate a delcious breakfast and relaxed before the madness began. Our first stop was at Stan and Suzs' for the Stuart family Christmas. It was fun to hang out with everyone and watch the little ones open their stockings. The next stop on the holiday express was to Baci and Papa's for dinner and more presents. Dinner was fantastic and it was fun to relax with family. After playing some Wii bowling, we made our way to Albion. There we caught up with Barb, Bob, and the Sharp gang. The kids were amazing and everyone had a great time just enjoying everyone's company.


We are truly thankful for eveyone's wonderful generosity. We loved spending so much time with all of you and are looking forward to many more Michigan Christmas'.



P.S. I tried to upload the video of Alaina and Evan singing at church, but I couldn't figure it out. I'll try again later and will get it online asap!

It's Finally Here

I know I have been a little slacking on the blog updates, well maybe that is a bit of an understatement! But the official update is officially here.

Evan has started coaching the JCC Golden Jets Hockey team again this year. Unfortunately the team is off to a slow start. They lost their first two games last week, but there is hope. All the coaches have faith in this years team that they may make another run at Nationals!!! The last JCC team to do that was Ev's last year as a player, so they definitely have some high standards to overcome. If anyone is interested in checking out the team this year, the next home game is tomorrow October 10 at 5:30 pm at Optimist Ice Arena. I hope to see some friendly faces in the crowd!

Also, Evan and I celebrated our 2nd Wedding Anniversary this past Tuesday. I still can't believe I have been married to such a wonderful man for 2 years already!!! We had a very low key celebration night together, due to both of us over coming the flu a few days earlier :( Neither of us really felt up to doing too much, but the couple that flu's together stays together....or something like that.

In Vegas updates, Evan has been scheduled for his second oral board interview and polygraph examination. He will be heading out to Vegas again in November from the 15th - 18th. Until he gets home from this trip, we are still in the dark of what's next! Hopefully we will know more information in December, but for now it's a game of hurry up and wait.

Back home in the Mitten

Well I know it's a little late, but the much awaited Vegas pics are finally here! The trip was fantastic. Evan did great on all of his tests and all of us loved relaxing and enjoying the sights of Vegas.

Suprisingly we already have good news about Evan. He passed his reading/writing exam and his first oral board interview with a 92% overall!!! Out of 2000 applicants he is ranked #29. Right now we are waiting to hear back from his assigned background investigator to tell him when he needs to return for a second interview and polygraph exam. So again we are back to waiting, but at least we have some good news this time.

Testing Day 1 & 2

Well good news everyone ...... Evan has passed both the written tests and the physical fitness!!!!!! Thank you so much for everyones thoughts and prayers. Evan did amazing both days. He scored an 86% on the reading/writing exam and in the fitness portion the only candidate to beat him in the timed mile was an ex-Army Ranger!!!!

We have one more big day, as far as testing goes. Evan has been scheduled to do his oral board interview at 10am Vegas time ( 1pm time back home). So PLEASE think good thoughts and a quick prayer of encouragement for Evan! Unfortunately after tomorrows interview he won't hear anything back from the department for about 6 weeks!

In other news I have done my Baci proud on the slots! I won $30 on the Price is Right slot machine. It was so much fun, I got to play Plink and was the Showcase winner!!! You are all secretly jealous, I know!

This is probably our last Vegas post, we will be coming home Saturday evening. We look forward to showing everyone our pictures and more fun stories!

Vegas Baby!

Well we finally made it! Saturday was a very long day. By the time we were able to get off the plane, find our luggage, get to the rental car, and check into the hotel it had been almost 10 hours of traveling. Poor Evan was barely able to take a quick shower to get the plane smell off of him before he had to meet Kyle for his first ride along (yea, I said first!).

Sunday was a very relaxing day. Everyone slept in, which was much needed. I still can't believe how beautiful our hotel is. We are staying at the Mirage, and everywhere you look there are palm trees, exotic aquariums and chic restaurants. We spent yesterday afternoon poolside. The hotel pool was gorgeous. We were able to find a nice spot to relax by the waterfalls. Afterwards we enjoyed the lights of the Vegas strip.

Today was another lazy day, which just to be clear I am definitely NOT complaining about. We finally made our way to Kyle and Britney's place today. Kyle and Evan went on another ride along tonight. Apparently the first one wasn't exciting enough!!!

Tomorrow is Evan's first day at the testing center. He starts with a reading/writing exam at around 10am. If that goes well (which I know it will) he will progress to the physical fitness portion of the test. So everyone think good thoughts and a quick prayer for tomorrow! Love you all!

Vegas Countdown

So it's finally here the long awaited Vegas trip! It seems like forever ago when we first began planning this trip and then in a blink of an eye 4 months flashed by and here we are.

Our flight leaves Detroit at 7am on Saturday, so that means we will be getting up very, very early to go to the airport. The plan for the first day is very up in the air. We will be landing in Vegas at 8am (it's a 3 hour time difference) and will make our first stop breakfast! Since we can't get into our hotel until later in the afternoon we will more than likely show Katie around the strip and downtown Fremont Street, since she is a Vegas virgin.

Saturday afternoon Evan is meeting up with Kyle to go on a ride along together. I know the boys can't wait to be a real police care together doing big boy stuff!!! Tuesday is the day the real work begins for Evan at least, my main job is to lay by the pool and go shopping!!! Tuesday marks the day of the first round of testing. From there it will be day by day. As he passes each course he will advance to the next round. Unfortunately, as always we will know limited information. But, I will try to keep everyone updated as things progress for Evan.

Love you all and will see you soon when we get back. Now it's time for me to stop wasting time on the computer. For I still need to do laundry, shop at Meijer, and pack!!!

and then ......

So it seems that our schedule as far as the eye can see is jam packed! Ev and I are busy ever weekend until late September. We will off doing events from Saturday races, birthday parties, testing in Vegas, etc.

Two weekends ago, Evan ran in his first road race of the season at the Clark Lake 12K Run. He finished 5th in his age group and beat his goal time!!! Although he didn't win any prize at the race, he did get a very cool trophy when he got home.

Relay for Life was this past weekend and as always it brought lots of fun and tired feet! The luminary ceremony was beautiful and Ev's sister Alaina was able to experience it with us. The luminary ceremony is when all teams place luminaries around the track with individuals names on the bags of people in honor of or in memory of their fight against cancer. It is a beautiful and emotional way of honoring/remembering your loved ones. Our team always tries to stay all night long! Our gang got a little silly around 11pm trying to stay awake with a Dance Party!! The dancing however was quickly replaced with more laps around the track. Randy and Katie won the all-nighter award this year, toughing it out thru the late night downpours.

First Post!!!

So this week hasn't really been all that newsworthy. Ev has been sick with the flu, so we had a pretty low key week.

This weekend was another story. On Saturday we had a wedding for one of Ev's hockey buddies. The ceremony and reception were lovely, but it was weird to think that just about 2 years ago that was us! We reminisced about how nervous both of us were before our ceremony and how to his day neither of us remember exactly what happened during the service except that Father Riley talked about salt a lot during the homily!!!

Sunday was a very early morning. We met Colby and Alaina about 6am to watch Al race in the Kensington Park Triathlon. It was a great day for a triathlon (if you are into that sort of thing and in shape for it!) Both the park and weather were great. The kids were a little fussy, but it was great to see them after a week. I can't believe how much I missed those little rascals. Al did awesome. She was the 9th women finisher overall! I was so amazing to watch her complete such a big race, she really inspired me!!! After the race Ev and I came home and had a 4 hour napfest and then resumed to a Friends DVD marathon for the rest of the day. I'll let the inspiration sink in for a day and lace up the 'ole running shoes tomorrow!!!

Coming Soon!

Coming soon to a computer near you, The Exciting times and Misadventures of Evan and Laura!!!

Our hope is to share with all our family and friends the everyday going ons in our life. As many of you know Ev and I are waiting for him to test in Las Vegas to know exactly what is going on (truthfully we don't know ourselves!). So stay tuned as more Las Vegas details come your way as well as other fun tidbits!!!!