Yesterday I donated 10″ of hair to Locks of Love. Nathaniel came along with me for moral support and tried to get some photos, but unfortunately the battery was almost dead so he only got a couple. Oh well! The above photo shows the halfway state; the stylist put my hair in two ponytails because it was so thick and cut them off one at a time. It appears that I got about half the length taken off! She also did some shaping around the face and moved the part to the right side, which admittedly looks a lot nicer. It’s a lot lighter now and I’m noticing my back feels colder than it used to. All in all it turned out to be okay even though I was keyed up basically all day. I’ll try to get a photo later of what it looks like now.

This morning after a work colleague and I chatted about hair, I decided to donate my hair to Locks of Love. It’s something I’ve always wanted to do but never did, mostly because I didn’t think they accepted colored hair. But I’m going to do it–on SUNDAY. I’m going to an upscale salon downtown called 7, who supposedly cut your hair for free if you donate ten inches or more.

I’m absolutely terrified. I haven’t had a different hairstyle for like 8 years, and I have NEVER been to a salon before. Any words of advice?

After a year of filling out forms, going to meetings and interviews, and moving our things from here to there, we’re officially through with administrative tasks for the forseeable future. Jules got his driver’s license last week, which was the last official document he needed to be considered a full permanent resident (basically it means he no longer has to carry his passport around for ID.) This also cut our car insurance by over $300! Whew. Now, finally, we can sit back and relax.

I know I’m not alone in absolutely *hating* administrative crap, but I am *so* glad it is over. Jules’ move over here, our wedding and subsequent move to a new apartment, and each of us getting a new job created an incredible heap of paperwork pretty much all at once. Suddenly I was faced with helping Jules get all his documents in order, changing my name on all my official paperwork, changing our address and phone numbers on everything, and filing new tax information. It took us from May until December to finish it all! It’s no wonder I felt such a heaviness for such a long time.

Now we finally have the freedom to spend our evenings and weekends as we choose, rather than planning around taking the car in for an emissions test and getting the title changed over to both our names. That went on for far too long.

Our next big task which we will tackle over the next few months will be recouping all the expenses incurred relative to all this paperwork. During this whole process, either Jules or I were each unemployed for a significant portion of it, which meant charging all our expenses to credit card or dipping into (and thereby depleting) Jules’ savings. The wedding itself wasn’t terribly expensive (the plane tickets were by far the bulk of the cost for us) but it was still significant. Filing for Jules’ permanent residency/employment authorization cost more than the entire wedding! Moving just across town (less than 6 miles!) cost thousands of dollars. Thankfully my parents helped us out then so we didn’t drown in debt. During all this time I was doing my best to pay off as much of the credit card as I could (we got rid of the entire balance on one card and are now chipping away at the other) and luckily it was still in its promotional period so there were no finance charges (they only started applying that charge this month.) So really all that’s left is the balance on that card and my car loan.

All things considered, to come out of the first 6 months of an international marriage and a new job with a debt under $10k is pretty incredible. It makes me happy to think that it will only take a few months more until we’re debt free and can begin saving beyond the $1000 that is required to keep our money market account active. :D

As you might have heard on the news this week, the Pacific Northwest has been ravaged with winter storms that have caused massive flooding and landslides which have closed down roads and entire towns. In general, Seattle was lucky and only a few places had damage. Where we live in the SODO area (Chinatown/International District), the worst we got was a few inches of snow on Saturday. The flakes were huge, and it managed to turn our apartment’s already beautiful courtyard into a scene from a postcard. It was the first time Jules had seen snow in Washington (it’s pretty rare to get snow in Seattle) so we went outside and built a snowman (his first ever!) It reminded me a bit of winter in the Midwest, except for the whole below zero windchill factor business. The snow was extremely packy and soft, so it made for good snowballs. :3