Greetings from Pennsylvania!

The last few months have been busy yet again!  Rachel found out that she was accepted to Penn State, her top choice program, and we made the decision to move to the East Coast! This Spring Rachel was busy finishing up seeing clients as well as her final class.  She also finished her thesis and passed her defense in May! She graduated with her Master's degree on May 17th and a week later we loaded up the moving truck and Rachel's parents made the trip out to Pennsylvania with us.  Everything went well and we moved into our new townhome in Bellefonte on May 25th.  We are all settled in and enjoying our new surroundings.  We have already been on a hike in the mountains, and we have several more planned for this summer.  Rachel is working at the school this summer doing research for her new advisor, and Jonathan is busy looking for a job.  We are also only about 4 and a half hours away from Jonathan's family in New York now, and have already been able to visit them.  Overall, we are very excited to be out here and we're looking forward to everything that's ahead of us!

This picture is form Rachel's graduation. Her parents and Grandma and Grandpa Tysseling were able to come for the ceremony.

And Rachel and Jon:

Before we moved, Rachel was able to go home to Iowa for a short visit.  This picture is with her parents, Grandma Jane, Aunt Becky, and her brother, Ben, and his girlfriend, Michelle.  Ben and Michelle are moving to Arizona this summer for school, so this might be the last family photo for a while!

 

We loaded up the truck in Kansas, then traveled to Des Moines to stay with Rachel's parents for the first night:

The next day we drove from Des Moines, Iowa to Streetsboro, Ohio (a 13 hour drive with the time change). We of course were bringing our 2 cats, Sawyer and Hurley, and it was an experience moving with 2 cats!  This is Hurley making himself comfortable in our hotel room that night:

This is a picture of the view from the bike trail next to our townhome:

And here are a few pictures of our town home:

We were able to bring Rachel's piano, and she has enjoyed being able to play again after not having a piano for the past 3 years!

Jon built his own computer desk, which you can see in the picture below:

Sawyer and Hurley have also been enjoying our new place! It has more windows for them to look out and more birds to watch:

Here are a few pictures from our first hike on the Allegheny Front Trail:

Last weekend we had Jonathan's brother, Timothy, stay with us for the night (they enjoyed playing video games together!), and the next day we made the trip to New York to visit Jon's family.  Jon's sister, Sarah, graduated from Lake Erie College in May and will be going to vet school, and the get-together was part her graduation/birthday part, and part birthday party for Jon's sister, Rachel.

What's been going on the past 6 months?

We have definitely had a busy 6 months!  (Hence the reason we haven't been posting - oops!)

Jonathan went to live and work in western North Dakota in September and returned at the end of December.  He lived in Watford City and worked on a 100-mile section of the BakkenLink Oil Pipeline as an environmental Inspector. He is now back at his previous position at Bartlett and West.

Rachel used the time while he was gone to work on her thesis.  She also submitted applications of PhD programs in Sociology.  She is applying to University of Wisconsin-Madison, University of Michigan-Ann Arbor, Penn State, and Bowling Green State University.  This semester she is working on finishing up her thesis, and is also finishing up her 500 hours of seeing clients!

We also adopted a new black kitten named Hurley! He loves to snuggle and be held, which Jonathan loves.  He and Sawyer are already close friends and both enjoy playing with one another.

Rachel recently found out that she was accepted to Penn State, her top choice! She will travel to visit the campus in March and will make her final decision in April.