Looking back on 2013 and ahead to 2014

2013 was definitely a wonderful year for me.

Here are some of my favorite parts ...

• I bought a new car.
• I had 3 successful semesters of Nursing school.
• I started tutoring and loved it.
• I went back to PKU camp for the first time in 10 years.
• I lost 20 pounds and started running.
• I got my first job in healthcare at UHS.
• I got comfortable in clinical and doing many skills.
• Our vacation to NYC this summer.
• I threw a fabulous 50/60th birthday party for my dad and stepmom with my siblings.
• Emailing and interacting with my two favorite gymnasts Elise Ray and Tasha Schwikert regularly (which I still can't believe is real life).
• Shawn Johnson following me on Twitter.
• Obsessing over gymnastics during the 2013 season with my friend Alexis.
• Falling in love with Once Upon a Time.
• My 30th birthday party.
• Getting a new job with AHC in OB!! 
• Getting our immigration petition approved!! 

2014 Goals

• Graduate.
• Get a job post-graduation.
• Exercise more and get back into running.
• Keep saving for/buy a house.
• (Hopefully) be pregnant sometime during the year 2014.
• Go on some kind of vacation to celebrate graduation if possible.
• Get a small sized Bible and begin doing Bible study.
• Journal everyday.

May add more ...

• Start and complete a Project 365.
• Update my gymnastics blog through last years World's and be better about it during 2014.

Happy New Year everyone!

Christmas 2013

I had a wonderful Christmas this year :) 

Christmas Eve Ryan, Laura, D and I went over to my dad and stepmom's house in late afternoon and stayed until around midnight. We played games and had a delicious dinner and then opened presents. It was so much fun, it always is! I got several nice things, and everyone loved what I got for them!! 

Christmas Day we went to mass at 9:00 and then went out to breakfast with my grandparents after. We went over to my aunt's house for another delicious dinner! We played this game called Buzz with all of my cousins which was really fun. Then my mom, D, Ryan, Laura, Luke, and I came back to my mom's house to open gifts. Again I got so many nice gifts and my mom loved all of our gifts to her! It was a very merry Christmas and I loved every minute of it.

Hope you and your family had a blessed Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas Eve<3

I hope that everyone has a blessed Christmas this year!! 

I am so grateful for all of the blessings in my life, 

most importantly that God sent His son to Earth to be our Savior<3

Winter Break Happenings ...

My Winter Break has been excellent so far!

MONDAY 12/16

I got on a productive kick in the middle of the day and crossed two big things off of my to-do list: organizing all of my school papers and organizing my desk area.

Tuesday 12/17

I had my pre-employment screening for the new job and then a meeting at school about becoming a paid tutor for next semester. I also went to the post office and mailed my best friend's Christmas gifts!

Wednesday 12/18

My mom and I took D to see Christmas lights for the first time! When we were little my mom would always take us to the same neighborhood to see all the decorated houses. We would get our pajamas on and bring hot chocolate with us late at night. This year we went to a campground that was decorated for Christmas. It was amazing, and I took way more pictures but these were some of them.

Thursday 12/19

Started another item on my list which was to start reviewing my OB lectures from school in preparation for my new job. My doggie had to go to the groomers at 9am and it takes a long time, so I went to a Starbucks down the road and did some studying.

Thursday night I went to get a mani/pedi with my friend Tessa from school. Then we met up with two girls from our work for drinks. One of them (the one in the picture above) was one of my best friends in high school. She moved to Japan with her husband and we hadn't seen each other in over 10 years. It was amazing to see her and we're going to continue to hang out in the future. 

Thursday I wrote a fan letter to Lana Parrilla! She is my favorite actress everrr since I started watching Once and a lot of people have gotten replies from her via her fan mail address. I was also excited because Walgreens printed the pictures I sent with no problems!

Saturday 12/21

Saturday afternoon my mom, aunt, cousins, sister, and I all made a ton of Christmas cookies and treats!! We made SO much!! We did regular cutouts, the pretzels with chocolate in the center, and OMG we made chocolate covered Oreos (the third picture). Everything was just amazing!

At night we went out to a really fancy steakhouse for my sister's graduation dinner with my dad and stepmom. My brother also came home on Saturday, this was us at dinner!

Sunday 12/22

We all went to a bar to watch the Packer game. They lost, but luckily the Bears also lost, so we have a big game Sunday for the NFC North championship and a playoff spot.

Monday 12/23

Today I got all of my presents wrapped!! Okay, so I always buy Target's wrapping set which usually comes with 4 wrapping paper rolls, tags, ribbon, and bows for $9.00. Well, this year they didn't include ANY ribbon or bows and their tags were crap. Very upset about this, LOL. Will not be buying again next year. Now I am playing Monopoly online with my brother and later I'm going to study some more OB. This has been a great vacation so far but my gosh is it flying by! Hope everyone is enjoying theirs!

Weekend Recap

This past weekend was my first real weekend being done with classes!

On Friday, two of my mom's friends that she works with came over for a cookie decorating party. They are both RNs and I've gone out with all of them a few times. They're super nice and I love them! My mom and I made cookies and we all decorated them together. It was so much fun! We are doing another cookie decorating party next Saturday with my cousins.

Decorations :)

Our stockings :)

The cookie decorating set up!

COOKIES :)

Marla and Lisa ... two amazing people :)

The most amazing mom in the whole wide world.

All of the girls by the Christmas tree :)

My doggie Beau likes presents!

Saturday was the first time since school began that I did nothing at all for a whole entire day! Although I did catch up on every single episode for every show I had on my DVR! (4 Survivors, 3 Biggest Losers, 3 Sing Offs, 2 Trophy Wifes, and 1 Parenthood) I get such a great feeling erasing the episodes after I watch them haha :) 

Sunday was my sister's graduation from grad school! She graduated with her Masters in Social Work. I'm so proud of her and I can only dream to someday graduate with my Masters as well. After, we went out to a bar/restaurant near where the ceremony was to watch the Packer game. They ended up winning by 1 point, it was a great end to the game! 

My little sister the graduate!

When I got home after that, I watched the Survivor finale and the Once Upon a Time and Revenge winter finales on my DVR. Survivor ended up kind of lame. No one I wanted to win got to the final 3, but out of the 3 left the person I wanted won. BUT OMG, Once Upon a Time and Revenge!!! These are seriously the best two shows on television, the writers are absolutely amazing! I literally bawled my eyes out the entire last 30 minutes of Once, I'm so happy I started watching this show it is just incredible. Then Revenge had me like :O !!!! I can't wait to see what they do with what happened, there's so many possible storylines from seeing what the preview showed. The fact that Once doesn't come back til March 9th ... I don't really know how I'll live.

Lana Parrilla is my LIFE. I love her so much!!!!

Hope everyone has a wonderful week!

[NON] Winter Break To Do List

I have off of school until January 15, 2014.

I do not start my new job until January 13, 2014.

I know that I should probably take a break and enjoy this time, but I am not going to do that. When spring semester ended this year I had 2 weeks between that and my summer class beginning. I was totally lazy and by the time CHA began I did not want to go back at all and it was a huge drag. I don't want that to happen especially because this is going to be my hardest semester ever! So I made myself a lengthy list of things to do to assure I stay on track.

1. Organize nursing school papers by course.

I have all of my nursing school papers saved but they are all thrown in a box.

I want to separate them all and organize them by course.

2. CHA review with Tessa.

My friend Tessa and I have a lot of studying planned over break.

We want to review all of our material from CHA since it's been a long time since we both took it.

3. Start CHA 2 material.

I already got the schedule and readings for CHA 2 from one of my friends that just graduated.

Tessa and I are going to review the reading and use our Alterations notes to review those systems.

4. Listen to my Promotions lectures to refresh for the new job.

My new job is in OB, and it has been a year since I had my OB classes.

I have all of Paula's lectures saved and I'm going to listen to them all over break to refresh.

It will also be good for CHA 2 since the first two weeks material is OB.

5. Buy the HESI NCLEX review book and other NCLEX study materials.

The NCLEX is the exam that I have to take after graduation to get my license to be an RN.

There are about 3 books and some review flashcards that I want to purchase to help me study.

6. NCLEX review with Tessa.

After we review CHA and start on CHA 2, we want to start studying for the NCLEX.

I don't know how much we will get done, but any little bit will help.

7. Decide what I want to do for Transitions.

Our last class in nursing school is called Transitions. 

It is basically kind of an internship; you go to a hospital and work with a preceptor for a month. 

You get to choose what field you want to work in, and I was thinking I wanted to do OB, but now that I have a job in it I was thinking maybe I should try something else. I'm thinking possibly ER or cardiac.

8. Organize and clean my desk area.

I do have some enjoyable things that I want to do as well.

1. Re-read Harry Potter series.

2. Re-watch The O.C.

3. Re-read the Crossfire series.

4. Catch up on my DVR.

5. See Frozen in the theater.

6. Begin Jillian Michaels' 30 Day Shred.

I also was summoned for jury duty January 6th-11th. 

This break is going to fly by but I'm going to try and enjoy it as best I can!

December 13th -- My Christmas!

Yesterday was my Christmas.

I honestly would be perfectly happy receiving not one gift at all this year.

I am so very blessed and could not as for anything more.

The student that I tutored for Pharm this semester got 100% on her final yesterday! I am so happy for her because she was failing pretty badly after the midterm (I think a 71% -- failing is anything below 80%), and she could only get 6 wrong and still pass. She was so nervous and then she didn't even get any wrong!! It also is an amazing feeling to know that I can help someone like that! Paula (the instructor I tutor for now) gave my name to the person who runs GTC's tutoring for pay and next semester I am going to do it for money for CHA and Pharm. I love it, and it's made me more sure that somewhere far down the road I want to get my Masters and be a nursing instructor.

I finally got the official offer about the new job yesterday!!! 

I posted awhile ago about this HERE. I am now a Nurse Extern in OB, and I cannot even believe it. This is honestly LIFE CHANGING and is going to be the start of a career that I'm going to have forever. I have wanted to do OB for so long, and this opportunity is literally a blessing because most places will not hire new RNs in OB because of lack of experience. 

My last day at UHS was Wednesday, so I was really getting anxious waiting for them to offer me the position officially. I prayed and prayed for patience, and it helped. But getting the offer finally was just so relieving and exciting! They do not have any orientations before Christmas, so I am going to orientation on January 13th, which actually works perfectly because I was summoned for jury duty January 6-10th, so I was all worried that I would lose that time I could be training. 

From what my manager told me during the interview, she is going to train me in labor and delivery and postpartum. They also have NICU, which she said I can learn over time. She also told me in the interview that I would have a job waiting for me after graduation, assuming everything goes well as an Extern. I honestly just still can't even believe it. I'm so grateful to Paula for saying great things about me, I don't know if I would have gotten it if not for her. I can't wait to start!

The last gift yesterday was getting a phone call from our immigration lawyer letting us know that our petition is approved and D will soon be a legal resident! This isn't something that I've talked about with many people, but my husband came here illegally in 2006. I myself was definitely not for illegal immigration before I met him, but knowing him, his family, and some of his friends over the past 8 years has redefined my views on this issue.

My husband works 80 hours a week at two different minimum wage jobs. He is the hardest worker that I have ever seen. He has never been in trouble with the law and he has paid taxes for 8 years. He also has learned English (not speaking a word of it before he came here) and is now fluent. I know that there are immigrants here that do nothing but refuse to learn English, do not work or contribute to the community, and live off of others. However, my husband is not one of those people. But he cannot get a drivers license, travel anywhere by plane, go to school, or get a decent job because he came illegally. 

We began this process to get him residency (and eventually citizenship) in June 2012 and it has been a long, tedious, stressful ordeal. Contrary to what most people think, being married to me does not give him a free pass to residency or citizenship. We had to hire a lawyer and go through months and months of paperwork and also putting roughly $7,000 into the lawyer and filing fees for the paperwork. Long story short, we submitted the final waiver in August and were told it would be probably 6 months before we heard if it was approved, but at just a little over 4 months, we got the good news yesterday! 

We are so thankful to all of our family and friends who have supported us during this difficult time and we could not have done it without them! 

I have prayed and prayed about all of these things for so long and I am so thankful and grateful to God for listening and always being with me and giving me strength and patience to wait for His answer.