Happy Holidays!

Today I Graduate!

Well its finally here, in 4 hours i will graduate from nursing school! too bad this weather really sucks and my mom can't come. She got two feet of snow where she lives and i just got done scraping my ice cube of a car! It took me an hour to scrape the 1-2 inches of ice off my car! Ira finally felt sorry for me and came out an helped. After graduation i will be heading to sioux city for symphony rehearsal tonight. they are doing the nutcracker ballet this weekend! It is my first time playing this music which is exciting. I will be staying at my dads tonight and coming back home on saturday late evening. I hope the weather holds until i can get home!

Thank you everyone for your thoughts today! i appreciate all the cards and words!

Graduation

Well, graduation is finally this coming Friday (19th) at 3pm. I am so ready to be done with school, tests, and homework! I enjoyed my last 7 weeks of preceptorship and learned alot from my nurse. I'm still scared to do it all on my own but am excited to start this new career and to at least get paid for my work.

I am excited that it is the holiday season, this is one of my favorite times of year. It just makes me feel all warm and fuzzy. I now need to decorate our tree that has been up for a week and get the rest of our apartment decorated too, even if its only for a few days. I glad to have some time off and enjoy this holiday with my family and friends.

If anyone has some free time next week and wants to have a celebratory drink with me give me a call. This week is pretty busy for me as i have class wednesday through friday and then have rehearsal most nights this week with sioux city symphony. I am subbing with them this week and last week which i love. Its nice to play again, i miss doing it everyday just not the unsteady pay! (ha i rhymed)

Its been awhile!

Well i realize i haven't written in a while but its been one hell of a few weeks. I am now officially done with the class portion of the semester and YES i did PASS! those 4 tests were rough! I now have next week off before i start my nursing internship (or as we call it our preceptorship). I will be working at creighton on the 5th floor. I'm a little nervous but am looking forward to this last chapter of my education. We do this for 7 weeks and then graduation Dec 19th. This also means that christmas is coming soon, holy crap i need to start shopping!

Actually this is my favorite time of year. i love the fall! i love the weather and trees changing colors and just the smell of it all. it makes me all warm and fuzzy!!! LOL

Ira should be happy too now that classes are over and hopefully psycho wife is gone. Maybe we will actually see each other at night too, theres a concept.

anyhow i will be free next week so call me. I will be working too, i'm starting to become poor, loan money is not lasting as long as i was hoping it would.

Update on the blog below....

My dad informed me that he is now starting a new company called "Blinds by Rishard" (with an accent as he says it, his name is Richard in case you didn't know). LOL....the man cracks me up sometimes.

My dad...

First of all you have to know my dad to enjoy this picture. He just bought a new house and didn't have curtains up yet. so he decides to put up a temporary one but doesn't want to put tack holes in the wall so this is what he came up with! LOL...it makes me laugh just seeing it. so i made him pose by his handywork. Notice the boards used to hold up the sheet. he did this in another bedroom too.

Half way!

I'm now half way through the class part of my semester. I only have three more weeks after this one, then a week off before i start my preceptorship (nursing internship). I will be working at Creighton for my preceptorship on a telemetry floor, patients that are on heart monitors for one reason or another.

This semester we have even more group projects/presentations so its been busy trying to coordinate time for it all, especially since i work still too. My free time doesn't always coordinate with everyone elses so i've had to be flexible.

I'm back to playing in the creighton band this semester. They are playing some good pieces but nothing i haven't played before. It's still nice to go and do something familiar. I am also teaching a clarinet student this semester through creighton which is fun. I always enjoyed teaching students one on one......i would have been a horrible band director!

anyhow i should get to my 1pm class.

In my defense to my sisters blog!

In my defense i was studying for a test that i was going to have that tuesday. and i was gone to her and my dad's house from friday to monday so i had to study. thats the loving sister i am that i give up my weekend of studying to see her. LOL!!! i don't want to be a nursing school drop out:) plus football is so boring i just go for the socialization!

in reality i'm a procrastinator so i probably wouldn't have studied much if i was home until the last possible minute. this is why i only got 3 hours of sleep monday night. but i did get a good grade on the test....procrastination can pay off some times. ha ha

I'm reminiscing

Look at these sexy ladies going to Prom!

George I miss you. This must have been a good night for us.

My husband Ira and his son Trenton

Dr Reeves, my clarinet teacher from undergrad and I.

This picture is so old that neither of us look like this anymore. kind of funny.

Found this Cleaning

If you can believe it this use to be me. I want that body back.

Vacation is over :(

yes i'm sad to say, my vacation from school has come to an end. i start classes back up tomorrow and get to look forward to my first test the following tuesday. nothing like getting to the point. this semester should go by pretty fast since its broke up between class until the end of october and then preceptorship until the middle of december, then I'M DONE!! Our pinning ceremony is December 19th and graduation is the next day. anyhow back to my posts moaning about school......lucky you.

Missing Husband

This weekend I was home alone until monday, so i decided to clean house....the entire place, yes i know its a miracle. This required me to also do lots of shredding to get rid of bills and junk that we no longer needed. Ira is a pack rat when it comes to paper so i nearly took me all day to shred. this then meant lots and lots of trash. not to mention the other trash taken out to the dumpster just from cleaning. Then on monday i decided that i would get the oil changed in his car since he was still gone and it was time. now i prefice this by saying, ira NEVER lets me drive his car unless its long trip and he wants to sleep. so i took it out and drove it then for the rest of the day....just because i could. anyhow the point of this story is that if the neighbors were watching at all they had to have wondered what was going on. They hadn't seen my husband the last several days, and hes always around. Plus i always took the trash out around 10pm after dark, just because i'm lazy and waited until the last minute. And then i was driving his car which i never do.. put them all together and you get husband in the trash bags and wife with new car!!! maybe its just funny to me....


He is back now and alive if any of you were wondering...ha ha
Call him if you want verification.

I'm DONE!

I can breath again and the nausea is wearing off! i passed all my tests which means i passed all my classes. i now have two weeks to enjoy myself and then only one semester left. so call me i will be around for the next two weeks to chat or hang out!

2 down 1 to go

I have now taken two of my final tests today. this mornings went well, i got an 89 (only missed 11 of the 100 questions) which is good. this afternoons test i am still waiting for everyone to finish the test right now so we can do test review to find out how i did. it was scary so i'm not sure. what ever happens though i only have one more test tomorrow and i'm done with this semester.....thank god!!! someone needs to have an alcoholic beverage ready by 11am tomorrow as i'm desperately going to need it.....

kristi lets do lunch tomorrow, you eat your lunch and i'll drink it!!! let me know.

Finals are HERE!

Well its finals for me on Monday (2 tests) and Tuesday (1 test), then i am done for the semester!! i am so looking forward to my 2 weeks off. this past friday i had two tests as well so its been a busy week but i am surviving. i haven't written in a long time but only because i've been so busy and tired. i hope to do fun things over my break though and get to see some people that i never see.

Saturday was Ira's (my husband) birthday and i didn't really get to do much with him. we did go out the weekend before this to celebrate since i knew i would be busy this weekend, but i feel bad that i was studying at home and he was hanging out with his family.

Right now i'm just procrastinating the enevitable studing, i have to review all my powerpoint presentations since the beginning of the semester for my first test tomorrow and there are about 49 packets full of slides! the only good thing is that two of the last test for this class were fairly recent so hopefully i still remember alot from those tests so i dont' have to study those packets as much.

anyhow pray for me monday and tuesday!

Please take me out of my misery!!!

Well it's getting time for mental breakdown number 2 for this semester. And thanks to my psych rotation and knowledge at least know i know what to look for if i go completely crazy. I'm thinking drinking heavily will make these next two weeks go much better! i know it would definitely help make sense of this research article analysis that i have to do and make it sound brillant....at least until i sobered up.

next week we have a paper due, 3 tests, a presentation, and a delegation assigment all due. on top of that i start my med/surg rotation this week that has lots of paperwork to do for it...got to love prelabbing, and this week we have a different presentation due and the above anaylsis to do. i think i can, i think i can choo choo.......Ha ha.

if anyone out there would like to help, especially you nurses, i would be glad to email you something to work on.

Oh,

If you were wondering my one day of jogging didn't do much for my weight, go figure. i'm still blaming it on the ding ding man.

Long time no blog

I realize i haven't wrote in a while, its been a busy few weeks. last week i was trying to get all my school work done because we were going on vacation for the weekend. this last weekend we went up to my grandparents (my mom's parents) to celebrate their 60th wedding anniversary with my aunts, uncles, cousins, etc. it was lots of fun and a chance to see everyone at once. we only really get together maybe once a year now that we are all older. as kids we all use to go up their every christmas with our parents, but now that we are all older with our own families its to hard to go everywhere. its amazing to think 60 years of marriage in this day in age. but i couldn't imagine getting married at 18 to make that happen, i was barely ready at 25!

i will post pictures once i get them uploaded. This weekend i have a 4 day weekend so i have will have time to get them up. otherwise just another week of school. i'm going to try to get alot of homework done (write my major nursing paper for the semester, put together a presentation, type up an interview paper, etc) over this weekend since its a long one. This may be just wishful thinking, why would i want to be done early when i can procrastinate myself into a panic or meltdown. is it december yet???

Damn ding dong man!

So last night i started running and i get half way around my usual starter path and who do i hear....yes the ding dong man. i mean seriously doesn't he know that what he sells contributes to my problem and that i'm out there about to pass out. good thing i wasn't carrying a purse with me running! anyhow i survived my first night and tonight i'm a little sore. unfortunately i couldn't run tonight as i didn't get home from clinical until 10pm and its raining AGAIN. will try to get out tomorrow.

i also have a test tomorrow in my research class...this class just solidifies that i'm not getting a masters degree in nursing any time soon. we are learning how to classify different types of articles, god knows how this will help me take care of a patient. i barely have time to read glamour let alone something of substance:) i'm sure nursing journals will get read as often as my clarinet journals have been. they collect dust on my shelves.

by the way if you haven't figured it out i'm a VERY sarcastic person. its my way of coping with life's craziness.

I Survived

Thank you all for you prayers, it must have worked because i passed both my tests. tonight it was nice to just relax for once. i have another test friday but i still have 3 days before i have to study...LOL! i have to say going back to school at 30 makes you so much more relaxed about things sometimes. paperwork and papers stress me out but for some reason tests don't...go figure.

tonight ira (my husband in case some of you didn't know his name) and i went out to eat with my dad and sister Christie at the Texas Roadhouse. he came down today to watch the college world series and my sister came up to look for apartments near UNMC. she starts PA (physicians assistant) school this fall. all of us girls(my sisters and I) are trying to see who can go to school the longest. so far i'm winning! we all tried to convince my dad that he gets to repeat the funding for round 2 but he wasn't going for it. haha! i have to say both our parents set a good foundation/example for us, it was never an option NOT to go to college. now they just can't get us to stop!

i am going to try to post some family pictures soon if i can find some recent ones.

Pray for me

its 10:30pm and i just got home from sioux city band. Tomorrow (monday) i have two tests, one at 7:45am and one at 1pm. please pray for me during these times as i need all the help i can get! i'm going to now go finish studying for the first test and maybe look at the second tests stuff.

my plan is to take the first test then skip the rest of my morning class and study for the second test at that time! all you nurses out there reading this....please send me all your knowledge telepathically!

Friday!

Thankfully its friday tomorrow. i got my outline done, i have a test tomorrow and two on monday and then finally some reduced stress for awhile. not sure what i'm going to do this weekend, i just hope it doesn't rain. seriously someone is going to have to build an arc if this keeps up.

i've been wanting to start back running now for several weeks, but have just been too tired or it rains/storms. some nights i have been going to bed at 8:30pm which if you know me at all is extremely rare. i am a night owl and like to stay up till midnight or later. but hopefully i get to start jogging and maybe loose some of the billions of pounds i have put back on the last 2 years. sometimes i feel like a yo-yo, gain weight-lose weight. i usually just go with blaming my genetic makeup......or my motto is " i just haven't grown into my height yet" so if i was 5'10" i would be skinny!

Swimvitational & SC Muni Band

Today i started Sioux City Municipal Band below is a picture from last year of me soloing with my clarinet teacher from my undergrad, Dr. Reeves. This weekend i went to the swimvitational at the qwest center and below is a picture of that as well, its suppose to be one of Michael Phelps (an olympic swimmer - he is the one at the farthest edge of the pool walking) but it was taken with my camera phone, so not so great.

A picture of clarinurse is soon to come....stay tuned.

I almost had to be a patient.

Right now i am in my psych rotation at Immanuel Hospital and this week proved to be one hell of a week for me. Not only did i have my clinical paperwork to get done (which is more time consuming than anything) but i have part of a paper to write, my outline for my own paper to do - which is not your one word outline but a sentence outline that basically needs to be so complete you have pretty much wrote your paper, other group projects to work on and three tests that will occur in the next week. Then on top of that i am doing sioux city's summer band thing on sundays again this year which basically means i loose sunday pretty much completely for school work......... oh and i forgot i try to work at my job 10 hrs during the week too.

Needless to say i had a meltdown wednesday night in the car ride home from clinical trying to figure out how i was going to get everything done without having to commited. as the days have progressed since then i have been staying up late to get things done and have gotten a chunk of it done, but its so easy this semester to get stressed out with our schedule being so crazy and so much work to do.

I realize that i should probably not work and that i could get rid of band but those are the things that sometimes keep me sane. i don't have to think when i do them, they don't require an assessment, intervention, outcome plan to be put in place or ask the question what should you do to this patient...because hell if i know some days. i know doesn't that make you feel confident that i may be your nurse someday. i promise i will know more by then:)

well another 1am night i'm going to bed now.

It's clarinurse to the rescue!

After seeing some many people having a blog I decided to join this century. I feel like i have multiple things to get off my chest at times, especially now that I'm in school AGAIN. I think I deserve a medal for the most degrees before I'm 30...okay 31 pretty soon and they don't even relate which makes it all the more funny. That's why Ihave created clarinurse, she's quite the gal - she plays the clarinet and takes vitals all at the same time!!! This is just the beginning.......