Our Apartment in Boston and other news!

Some other things about our place: We have a cute yellow kitchen (no idea why Ryan did not take a picture of it- I will work on this), as well as a front porch with some flowers (planted by yours truly) and a fenced back yard with a patio area, little garden plot, etc. Another thing we recently discovered is that there is also a basement with storage and a workshop area (though it needs to be cleaned up and organized!)

 Each weekend we manage to do a few more projects that make our place feel a bit more home. This past weekend included power washing the outsides of the windows, our porch and siding. Next weekend: setting up compost pile and perhaps some more gardening/leaf raking. If we end up sticking around much, we just might have to get ourselves some chickens!

 In other news, school is going well. I spent this last weekend working as a sub-citing grunt (that means working on a team checking the citations of an academic paper) for the Harvard Journal of Law and Gender. The article my team worked on was about different theories under which victims of domestic violence from other countries might succeed with asylum claims in US courts on the basis of gender-based persecution in their country of origin. Aside from this project, I am finally getting geared up on working as a research assistant for Professor Deborah Anker (faculty director of Harvard's immigration law and refugee clinic) on a project analyzing the current state of US law and policy with regard to individuals seeking asylum in this country and the continuing impact of the United States' agreement with Canada that requires asylum applicants to apply in whichever of the two countries they first arrive in.

 All in all, with the combination of the time I spend in classes, on homework, and doing these extra-curricular activities, I am clocking in at least 70 hours per week. The good news, is Ryan has found a job and is working lots of overtime, and so at least our schedules are somewhat mutual these days (though he is still doing more than his fair share of chores on the weekend!) For my part, so long as I keep getting a full night's sleep, managing to eat well, and continuing to run 3-4 days a week and do yoga 3 days a week, the peanut is happy and that means so am I.

 Signing off until next time, Alletta