CPA Exam

It has been my goal for approaching 10 years now to pass the CPA exam. I haven't done it yet.

I took the old pencil & paper exam once to see what it was all about, without studying at all. I didn't do so well.

I've taken auditing on the new computer version once and I did alright, although I didn't get credit.

However, both times I took the exam I didn't put any effort into studying. Well anyone that knows anything about this exam knows it's something that requires hours and hours of studying. There are four sections and each section takes a minimum of 100 hours of really good studying. A bare minimum.

So this is what I'm going to be focusing on for the next year or so. I mean really focusing on it. I'm setting up one of the bedrooms in the house as just a CPA study room in hopes that I can shut myself in there away from the world to really concentrate.

The first section I'll be taking is FAR (Financial Accounting and Reporting). This section has the most material to learn for the exam, so my friends told me to get this one out of the way first.

For those of you that aren't accountants and think that this is something that should have been done right out of school, you're somewhat right. However, an accounting degree (which I have) doesn't prepare you for this exam. This exam is more comprehensive and detailed than any college class ever was. There are review classes I could take, but I'm not at that point yet because they are very expensive. I need to see if I can do it on my own first.

The other reason it has been 10 years for me is because they implemented a 150 hour rule. Essentially you graduate with your degree with 120 credit hours or so. That used to be what you needed to sit for the exam. Not anymore. They changed it so you needed 150 credit hours so I had to go back to school to earn the hours.

So if it has been a few weeks and you haven't seen a CPA post, ask me how I'm doing! I might need the kick in the butt to get back on track.

Cranberry Crockpot Pork Roast

This is what it looked like this morning when I left. It was oddly satisfying to cook in the morning knowing that when I get home tonight dinner will be ready. We'll probably heat up a vegetable to go with it and I might even surprise Pat with some crescent rolls.

I got the recipe from A Year of Crockpotting, here's the link: http://crockpot365.blogspot.com/2009/02/crockpot-cranberry-pork-roast.html

She has so many amazing recipes and I can't wait to try a few more of them soon!

Over the weekend Pat & I finally bought a wii fit. We're both really enjoying it! So we're both trying to get in some more exercise and eat healthier and we both need to lose some weight (me a lot more than him). I'll keep you updated!

Back to cooking!

Now that we're somewhat settled I need to start cooking at home again. Yesterday we did pretty good (cereal for breakfast, tuna fish sandwiches for lunch and scrambled eggs and toast for dinner).

Tonight is also grocery shopping night, since we never got there yesterday.

I decided to look through all the starred posts in my google reader to get some ideas. So here is the proposed week's menu:

Mon - soup or a lean cuisine (boring, but I will have zero energy after grocery shopping)
Tues - Cranberry crockpot pork
Wed - Crockpot salsa chicken
Thurs - leftovers (Pat works)
Fri - Homemade macaroni & cheese (Gram's recipe)

I also intend for these to be used as lunches all week as well. I guess we'll see how much each recipe will make. I am so anxious to get back to cooking and start trying some of these yummy recipes I've been drooling over!

Long overdue update!

Maybe I've been slightly busy...

Since I last updated we've bought a house, moved into the house and spent a week in California!

We absolutely LOVE our house. We are nowhere near unpacked yet, but I love everything about it and I look forward to being settled with no more boxes around!

We had a wonderful visit in California with Amy, Luis & Vanessa! It was so hard to say goodbye and the week seemed to fly by. We spent days in Santa Monica, Disneyland, LA & Hollywood and even an authentic ghost town of a silver mine!

On top of all that, work got a lot busier for me when one of my bosses accepted another position. So sad to see him go, but it did give my position that added little security that is nice to have in this economy.

Here are just a couple pictures, I need to upload the rest: