Come see my new blog

Hey all, yes, you probably figured out that this blog has been neglected and abandoned.  But I'd like to invite anyone out there (do you hear the cavernous echo?) to come visit my new blog Running with the Baby-Mama Drama.  See you there!!!!

I PASSED!!!!!

Sorry to leave everyone in the blogosphere in suspense about my fate as a nurse but i was in suspense too!

Here's how NCLEX works. You sit at a computer and start answering questions. The test is designed to determine where you are competant to practice nursing with in a 95% accurace range. So you answer questions and as long as you are getting them right they get harder and harder until you are answering questions above that competancy level. Once you have answered enough to establish competancey (or they are pretty sure you are likely t kill someone) the whole exam shuts off. The minimum questions is 75, max is 260. So if the exam shuts off after 75 you probably passed or failed miserably. After 48 hours you can pay another $8 to the exam company (you've already paid them $200 for the priveledge of taking the test) to get your unofficial exam results. Official results come from the state board of nursing when you get your lisence in about a month.

So I took my test on a Thursday afternoon. Should be able to get my results Saturday afternoon. Look on line, look on line. No results. Finally find a place on the website that says 2 business days, not 48 hours. Everywhere else says 48 hours. So start looking Monday afternoon. No results. No results. Maybe Friday wasn't a business day afterall. Maybe the testing service took that as a holiday for 4th of July. Look Tuesday afternoon. FINALLY!!!!!! At this point I seriously considered not getting the unofficial results just because of how long I'd had to wait and I was pretty confident that I had passed. But I can only resist "Your exam results are now available" for about 30 seconds. Paid my $8 and say those four lovely letters PASS!

Now all I have to do is wait for my Texas lisence so I can apply for a transfer to a state of Georgia lisence!!! Whew!

So mine shut

This close to the finish line...

Tomorrow is NCLEX, the licensing exam for nurses. This is the last step in this two year journey called nursing school. (Oh yeah, there's also the job thing...) Tomorrow, 4 p.m., somewhere between 75 and 260 questions. One more hurdle. I don't think I'm nervous. Well, maybe a little nervous. More like ready to get it over with.

Tomorrow. 4 p.m.

What a crazy trip this has been...

Perfection is impossible

So my new house is pretty close to perfect. Land, Pool, view, teenager has her own bathroom. But nothing is perfect. So here are two slight issues that interfere with perfection.

First, Bugs. We have a new scourge of bugs to learn to live with. Houston has its bugs but they were pretty much two varieties. Giangantic cockroaches and mosquitoes. The former were pretty easily dispensed with by spraying highly toxic chemicals around the house inside and out about 5 times per year. I'd know it was time to spray when I'd find dead ones in the house. This meant that the perimeter shield was compromised and the interior shield was still effective. Yes, killing cockroaches in Houston is serious business because I HATE COCKROACHES. I'm pretty sure the chemicals we used have the potential to cause my grandchildren to have two heads. Ah well, more cheeks to kiss!

So anyway, here in Georgia, I think we have smaller cockroaches which is a good thing. We just have a larger variety of other bugs. More ants, more random flying bugs. HUGE green grasshoppers that look like leaves. And spiders. Lots of very large spiders. Like this one below. I would bet that legs and all it was about 3 inches in diameter. It was in my pool hanging on to the hose for the polaris. So I scooped it out and what did I discover???? Hundreds of baby spiders hanging on to its back. Lovely. I'd rather have spiders than cockroaches but it was still creepy.



And the other less than perfect thing about my neighborhood is the running situation. Our street is about a mile long which makes for a nice training distance. You can run laps like a track on it and know how far and how fast you ought to be going. However, it looks like this....



Yes, that is a hill and another hill beyond it. Truly the picture doesn't do it justice. You have to stand at the top of the hill and contemplate running up it to fully appreciate the sweat and heart rate increase involved. I have run these hills four times now and it is a completely different workout experience than running on the flats of Houston. Yowza! I better have an incredible looking backside by the end of the summer given how much said backside hurts after running up and down that!!!!!!!

The inside story...

So Ihave a few pictures of the inside of the house. When you walk in the front door there's a huge room with big windows which is what you see in these three pictures. It provides a perfect home for hubby's hunting trophies.



I love the fireplace!!! I t has a woodburning insert that will help heat the house in the winter. The previous owners also left us their wood pile which i think has enough wood to keep us warm for the 2009-10 season and beyond. One of hubby's first purchases was a riding lawn mower. The second was a chainsaw!!!!!! (Insert Home Improvement grunting here...)



This is apparently referred to as a "Baptist Bar" because it has doors that will close it off from sight when the church members come over!!!! That cracked me up!



This is probably the biggest negative of the whole house. The master bathroom leaves a little to be desired. You can see the sink is actually in the bedroom. Next to the sink area is a pocket door for the toilet and shower. It is definitely a project for the future. I have emailed on of the production companies at HGTV/ DIY to try and get on a renovation show. It would be an awesome renovation!

If my kitchen is clean later today I'll take a picture of that too!!!

My new digs...

So this is my new house!!!!! We love it!

This isn't my field but it is the field next door and it is what I see everytime I drive up to my new house. I think it is absolutely gorgeous. It reminds me of where we went on vacation last year in New York.


This is my field or as we like to call it "The Far Meadow" because we also have a "Near Meadow". I can't believe I have enough property that we have names for the different areas!!!!! COOL! The woods beyond it are also ours and have trails already cut through them. The girls are a little intimidated by the woods still but I am having major childhood wish fulfillment. I ALWAYS wanted woods. It's like "Bridge to Terabithia" back there - minus the drowning and the head trauma....



This is the garden with grape vines, blueberry bushes that are almost ripe, a banana tree that is just for show, too cold here to produce and a few blackberry vines. There's also room for veggies but I think that is a project for next summer! Beyond it is the "Near Meadow."


This, my friends, is the pool. I love the pool. It keeps my children happy, it is lovely to jump in after gardening and it is just a dream come true!!!!!

Tomorrow interior shots...

Lesson learned: Move your refrigerator frequently

So I'm not the world's greatest housekeeper. As the kids have gotten older, I've gotten better but truly what is the problem with sweeping stuff under the rug once in a while. I can't see it, you can't see it and I didn't have to find the dust pan to make it so! I like a tidy house but I don't need a spotless house. The little extras of housekeeping really escape me. Like I don't get the draw of buying no-iron sheets, are there people that really iron their sheets to begin with? Or Martha Steward's admonition that properly folded fitted sheets are essential to a neat and tidy linen closet, (read that in a doctor's office once.) Or my own mother's yearly trek around the house with a bowl of soapy water and a rag cleaning the baseboards. But upon moving i learned one thing that really ought to be cleaned every other year or so...
A view under my fridge...


Not only was there stuff under there but the freezer was defrosting too and leaking water all over the floor. Now we added slimy to the distgustingness. The driver of my moving truck had his 15 year old son with him. When I was dying of horror over what was under my fridge he said, "yeah, my mom cleans under our fridge now cause of what we see under other people's." Thanks buddy, that helped...


In my defense, the cat loves to play with most of the stuff you see under here and probably batted it under the fridge while playing in the kitchen. He especially loves to play with clothes from the girl's Polly pocket dolls. He also loves to play with hair elastics. However, i found hair elastics and barettes EVERYWHERE! Now I know where they go when we can't seem to find any. Under the beds, in corners, on doorknobs and certainly under the fridge...



I just had to include a close up of the Christmas card since a couple of my readers will recognize it. Think of it this way, although it eneded up under the fridge, at some point it held a place of honor ON the fridge.



Famous last words...
From now on I will clean under my fridge more frequently than every 6 and half years.

The last supper

The last supper at this house...

I have created a menu that should allow me to use up a significant portion of my refrigerator/freezer inventory.

For your dining pleasure:
1. Curry Chicken Salad (HA! TAKE THAT YOU LEFT OVER MANGO CHUTNEY!)
2. Hot Dog or Chili Dog
3. Boca Burger
4. Pasta - Choice of red sauce or olive oil and parmesan Cheese
5. Chicken Corn Chowder (compliments of Campbell's)
6. Spagettios
7. Cold Cereal
8. Old Fashioned Oatmeal

There you have it. My last evening of cooking on a gas cooktop. (I'll have electric in Atlanta).

Packers come tomorrow. Remind me to put my sanity in the "DO NOT PACK" cabinet...

I still have plenty of mango chutney

So we went and picked up the kids from one more sleep over at the grandparents and Natalie was sick, sick, sick. Fever, very sore throat, upset stomach. Hurled on the way home. Called the doc and got amoxicillin called in for Strep throat. That meant one less kid spending the night and one less kid to drink the salad dressing. (Oh yeah, she's feeling much better. Nursing school definitely gives you the advantage of being abel to describe the symptoms of Strep to the pediatrician so convincingly that she perscribes an antibiotic over the phone!)

The girls just don't understand that you can't just throw away the mango chutney because what if you decide that you absolutely must have curried chicken salad. What would you do then, huh?????

O-kay. Deep breath. We will move. Everything will be fine. Heck, I got through nursing school with three kids and a husband, I can handle a cross country move!

(Karen - we are moving to the Atlanta area!)

Moving is hard

That is seriously the name of a children's book that someone gave us the last time we moved. It's got this blond haired kid on the front clutching his teddy bear with tears in his eyes. Yes, thank you who ever gave that to us. It was comforting to our small children!

But yes, we are moving. Am I ready? No! At least i don't feel ready. i am not packed because we have movers that do that. (People keep asking me that and it adds to my feelings of not being ready tremendously.) I haven't used up all the food in my refrigerator. But tonight we have 4 or 5 little girls spending the night so they should make a pretty good dent in the food. Do you think they will be okay eating Mango chutney with a spoon? I also have a supply of salad dressings I need them to eat straight.

Despite the logistical side of moving, we are very very excited. The new church is fabulous. The new house is very cool. The new town is gorgeous.

Now if we can just get through the next 5 days...

I finished nursing school today

And that's why I haven't blogged in almost two months.

Let me say it again, i finished nursing school today. I took my last two finals. I am done!!!!!!!!!

I'm so relaxed I hardly know what to do with myself....

I just can't believe it. I did it!

My $5000 gift to my daughter

We all have those days. Like, I feel fat days, bad hair days, My head hurts days, I'm ugly days, I have nothing to wear days, etc. And when you are 12 and in seventh grade you have more than your fair share of those days. And you can add the No one likes me days, I have no friends days, Edward Cullen isn't real days, I can't do math days, I hate my life days, and of course, no one understands me days.

But for all those days there is one thing that my daughter can always look in the mirror and say, "That is perfect."





Braces came off yesterday. The world's most perfect smile....
And yes, my friends, braces really do cost about $5000. If I ever see her asleep without a retainer in her mouth cover your ears because what comes out of my mouth won't be pretty!

Oh to have my problems, seriously...

What is a girl to do when the painters show up the same day that the housekeeper is scheduled to come?????? Yes, I have a cleaning lady and I'm not ashamed (too much). I love her and she keeps me from having the EPA declare my house a superfund site. Cleaning is not my deal: I'm not good at it, I don't like it and I have no problem letting someone else do it. But today, the painters showed up. You gotta love the Hispanic concept of time.

Scene: Saturday, I'm at clinical. Hubby is supposed to get an estimate from the painter.

Hubby: Sounds good. When can you get started.
Javier: Hmmm, like maybe next week.
Hubby: Like early in the week, Monday.
Javier: Yeah, or maybe later.
Hubby: Like before the weekend, maybe Friday?
Javier: Yeah like that or maybe Saturday.

Hubby (reporting to me): Yeah, I hired Javier. He's going to paint the house. Don't have any idea when.

So Javier is painting in my dirty house. The cleaning lady is not coming. And if I stay in the paint fumed house any longer I am going to be unfit to drive a motor vehicle...

Adios. I'll be back to blog maybe tomorrow, or like maybe next week. Yeah I'll come back then. Seeya!

What are the signs and symptoms of pretzel withdraw?

Some things you should know about me. I am addicted to pretzels. The saltier the better. When I was in college Rold Gold had a different formula for their pretzels than they do now that included a lot more salt. My roommates used to brush the salt off because they were too salty. Not me. Loved them. Those were the days. I eat a lot of pretzels. Especially in the evening. Like while watching T.V. If you eat pretzels while drinking cheap white wine, the white wine tastes better because of the salt from the pretzels! If you drink diet coke with pretzels the diet coke tastes better too. But diet coke tastes best when consumed with Fritos. But I digress. Or actually maybe I don't. So eating pretzels is a way to eat something that is crunchy and salty without eating what I'd really like which is Pringles or Fritos or Salt and Cracked Pepper Kettle Chips.

Number two thing you should know about me....I don't usually give things up for Lent. No real reason just never been motivated. This year I am giving up pretzels. Why? Becuase I want to see if I can. Because it would be a real sacrifice. Because I think they might make me retain a little water. (My fingers are a little tight this morning after the pretzel fest last night.) Becuase I think I eat way too many of them!

So I put this in my blog to make myself accountable. I'll update you as the season progresses!

If I end up in the fetal position rocking myself in the corner of the pantry muttering, "Rold Gold, Rold Gold, Rold Gold." I'll get Madeline to take a picture...

June Cleaver's secret life? You decide...

So one of my favorite blogs to read is June Cleaver after a Six Pack. It's linked right over there... She is just really really funny and not at all Pollyanna! (Read her blog, you'll get it...) Anyway, she used to have a picture of herself on there that I just looked for but it isn't there any more. Which means that this post isn't going to make nearly as much sense. Oh well, that's o-kay. Six pack fans will get it.


My point - the other day my friend was over and saw this picture of me. She suddenly said, "Hey, you look just like June Cleaver in that picture!" How many people get compared to their favorite blogger????

June - If you read this, I am sad to say that although I looked like you in that picture I gave up on staying blond. I hope that doesn't make me a traitor to the cause. Cheers!

Sad Week

So last week I kept wanting to blog but it was just a sad week and I blogging seemed like a massive pity party. Since I got through the week now I'll blog about it. It is still a sad week but I dunno, now I choose to blog.

So first there was our friends whose 16 year old was killed in a car accident. You can read about their family here. Who has their life's tragedy profiled in Reader's Digest only to have their life sustain a second tragedy the same week???? It is suffering on the scale of Job. Hubby did the memorial service and it was amazing. I was very very proud to be the Reverend Dr. Mrs.

Then one of my babies (nurses have their own language in the NICU - any baby that you take care of on a regular basis is "my baby") from the NICU died. I knew he was not long for this world. I knew he was much much better off in the arms of Jesus than in anyone else's arms. He was never going to get better. He was in incredible pain. But he was a sweet little baby and when he had a good dose of morphine going he would interact a little and I just liked him. So when I read the email that he died I was very sad. I should have been glad he had a new body and was done suffering but I was just sad.

And lastly, we talked to a realtor about listing our house and it ain't pretty. (Well, duh, Magan, have you read the news about the imploding mortgage market and the economic crisis?????? Yes, thank you very much, but I don't have to like it!) If it sells, we will lose a little equity to get to closing. Bummer. Sigh. Could be a whole lot worse. A whole lot worse. And I have gotten some perspective on it given that the equity that we have came from selling a house that wewere able to buy because our church gave us a down payment that we repaid out of the profits and then had profit left for our next house. Just a little whine, a small whine given other people's housing situation. On the plus side I found a very cheap painter who is going to freshen up a bunch of stuff and fix some hurricane damage for $1300. Maybe I'll get another Siesta picture to add to my collection!

Sort of good news on the kidnapping case

They still haven't found the woman but the press is reporting that they think she knew her kidnappers and probably went willingly. In other words, she's mixed up in something yucky. The Brazoria County Sheriff described the men they think are involved as "Mean as hell." So I hope she's o-kay but I'm really relieved that masked men aren't snatching random women out of parking lots.

There are three men asleep in my front yard...

Good news! We are getting our new roof today! Bad news! The roofers are literally sleeping on the job. I wish I could take a siesta under a tree on a beautiful day. Sigh... I suppose that would mean being paid minimum wage for a dangerous job that involves working on rooftops and the possibility of falling off and dying. I guess nursing it is...

Too close for comfort

This happened in my part of the world.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/nb/pearland/news/6245052.html

"An expanded search begins on Thursday for Susana De Jesus, who was abducted at gunpoint Monday night as she left the Pearland-area clothing store where she worked.

As police Wednesday released a photo of a possible suspect, they said they don’t know why she was targeted.

De Jesus, 37, of Houston, was abducted about 9:15 p.m. Monday as she and a co-worker walked to their cars after leaving their jobs at Catherines Plus Sizes."

I was at the shopping center where this happened in the afternoon that this woman was kidnapped. That is scary. Scary scary scary. News reports of violence and whatnot are sad but thaey don't usually freak me out because I figure the chances fo it happening to me are infiitesimally small. This, though, feels way to close to home. I'm a little freaked!

This last part of the newspaper article makes me feel a little better. No way any one could mistake my 10 year old minivan with 130K miles on it for an impressive new car...
"Miller said single women driving impressive new cars — such as De Jesus’ Cadillac — sometimes become targets.

“I don’t believe this was just random,” Miller said of the kidnapping. “I would anticipate he’d seen her over a few days or few weeks.”

Brief updates...

So once again blogging is suffering as the schedule starts to get kind of crazy but here goes on some updates. (Particularly because I can't see to catch Teri at home!)
1. We are getting a new roof!!! Yippee!! The materials for it are sitting in the drive way and we expect the installation this week. Thank you very much Texas Windstorm Insurance Association.
2. My fingernails are short again. Isabella gave me a manicure for Christmas and for about 2 weeks they were so pretty and even and relatively long. But chop chop and they are short again.
3. Graduated from physical therapy with newly developed abs and significantly less pain in my back. The pain came back early this week and I was able to get everything back in alignment doing some maneuvers they taught me in PT so that was good. I will never neglect strength training again. (Famous last words!!!)
4. I got my clinical assignment for the semester. I'm going to the NICU at Texas Children's Hospital. I'm excited. Very excited. But I never expected to go to the NICU. There are so many people in my class that would kill for that it is just surprising to me that I got NICU. I know I'm going to love it and I'm probably going to be very good at it. I guess I'm surprise I got something that good!
5. No, I don't know what area I want to go to when I graduate. It is worse than being a senior in high school when everyone makes conversation with you by asking where you want to go to college and what you want to study. I like lots of stuff and I don't know where I'll end up!
6. My eldest daughter is taller than me. How did that happen?????? She is also a very good writer and has a wicked sense of humor.
7. My checkbook no longer balances to $4242.42. The fear of bill collectors forced me to pay up.
8. I am totally inspired reading about Teri's half marathon training. Being injured I got out of the routine of running but when I go, I really love it. AND being stronger in my core has made me faster. I'm running three miles in under 30 minutes. (29:49 counts as under 30 minutes!)
9. I'm still working on Christmas weight. I know what the problem is. I know how to fix. I just haven't done it consistently. I need to count every point and quit eating so many carbs. There I said it. Now I just have to do it!
10. Don't really have anything for #10 but it seems like a good place to end a list...