Some Videos.

So this is going to be a big video post! The first is of our little smarty britches counting in Spanish--something we didn't even know he knew how to do until he did it himself one day. Guss Dora's a pretty good teacher, huh? Now we're working on German. We're parental failures in the German department because he didn't learn German first! haha.


The next might be offensive to some, but they are NOT intended to be that way. I'm sure many of your have heard of Sarah Palin(the VP candidate)'s interview this past week with Katie Couric. It didn't go so well for her. One of my patient's said her first problem was letting Katie Couric interview her. This video is just one of the parts of the interview. The only reason I'm posting this is for comparison to the next video. The next video is a skit from Saturday Night Live with Tina Fey and Amy Poehler. It is beyond hilarious. They also have skits of the Presidential debate, but I think Tina Fey by far did the best job. Regardless of whether or not you like Sarah Palin, I think you'll find this funny. I especially love the line where she was disheartened with all the foreign workers at the UN and how she wants to bring jobs back to America. I thought someone may find it as funny as I did. :) To understand all of the jokes, you have to watch all four parts of the original interview so you can understand the finger licking and the lifeline jokes, but you can find the other parts on youtube. Tina Fey just looks so much like her and she has that accent nailed! Enjoy!
Here is the one part of the original interview with Katie Couric.




Ok, so I can't get the SNL skit to embed, but here is the link. Just Click. :)
http://www.nbc.com/Saturday_Night_Live/video/clips/couric-palin-open/704042/

Ashlyn

I did a little photoshoot of my friend Erica's new little girl, Ashlyn. I tried a few new things and got some really cute shots. I haven't had time to play with all of them, but here's a little preview. I was really happy how the editing on this turned out. What do you think? The ring is there to show how tiny her feet are and I like that Erica's ring has three stones and that she has three kids. More to come... Here's your little preview too, Erica.

My Wordle

This is a fun little thing that I found on a friend's blog. It makes a word cloud from your blog of your most commonly used words. Click on it to see mine and make your own.

Fall is on it's way!

I LOVE Fall. I love things about every season, but when fall rolls around each year, I'm always happy and excited about it. I love the crisp, cool air and the beautiful colors. My mom came to Reno this weekend while Wes was gone hunting to help me out with Liam so I could get some homework and studying done. I don't know if any of you have tried these, but these gel window clings are the best! They are so fun and you can get them at Wal-Mart for like $1. They had their Halloween stuff out at the store already(I know, it's a bit early), so we had to get some. Liam loves to put them up and practice his way of spelling. They are just fun and festive. I love decorating for Fall as well. I got some of my stuff up this week. Liam's Halloween costume is on it's way from Oma as well. :) We can't wait!

Nana also had to get Liam a treat while we were out and about, and since we were on our way home, I said ok to a sugar-free chocolate covered pretzel. We were laughing hysterically at Liam's seriously chocolately face. The funny thing is that by the time we took this photo, he had somehow licked off a large majority of what was on his face. So this is him in good shape!

I also wish I had my camera at church today. Today was our ward's primary program and Liam was thrilled to hear the kids sing and speak. They did a fabulous job and he loved singing along with them to the songs that he knew. I truly think music will be this child's calling. He was 'conducting' and had so much enthusiasm and often times was right on with the tune and melody. I love the Spirit that music and children combined bring. It was beautiful.

First Real Day of Clinical

I survived my first real day of clinical: changing lots of bed pans and all. And, the best part is, I REALLY enjoyed it. It was wonderful working with and caring for patients, even though we didn't really get to do much 'big time' stuff, you have to start somewhere. So we got to help feed a patient, change bed pans, watch a removal of a foley, fun things like that! I really love the unit we're on, but that could just be because we got a really cool RN to shadow and help us. He was awesome. The only killer? I am DEAD tired. We have to be there at 6:30 and, although we're only there until 2:15, I'm really going to have to adjust to being on my feet all day, especially after just having adjusted to sitting through three hour lectures. haha. Good thing I have some time to get used to it before I'm working 12 hour shifts. haha. So, Liam and I took a little snooze on the couch and watched Dora when we got home. Even though I'm overwhelmed by all the duties of the nurse, I'm really excited to get into the nitty gritty of it all. :)

Just Cute

My sweet little niece, Isabelle, came over for a bit today. It's so fun to have another sweet little face to photograph.
Looking out into the World: I LOVE how this one came out. So precious.
Such a big girl now. Don't you love her little ballet shoes?

Super Why and a VERY talented Oma...

Many of you know that Liam is currently in love with the show "SuperWHY!" on PBSkids. It's a show about kids that turn into super heros that go on missions using reading skills. It's really cute. (for more info, kids' games and cool shows, go to pbskids.org We love PBS!)

So lately, following his bath, Liam has been running through the house with his towel as a cape shouting, 'Super Why! Super Readers to to the Rescue!' It's beyond hilarious. So, Wes's mom decided to make him a Super Why costume just for fun and dress up(Wes used to wear his ninja costume all the time. I think I even recall a photo of him sleeping in it...). This is the picture that she sent me today from her phone. How awesome is this?! Liam is going to FLIP over it. I can't wait to see how much he loves it. I was too excited that I had to share her talent. We're so lucky to have such a talented Oma!

Some Cute Ones...

My sister and I had a fun afternoon with the kiddos today. I got some pretty cute photos of Izzy. Liam was being a maniac and running through the sprinklers and blowing bubbles naked, so I'm not going to post those. haha. She's super into eating grass and leaves lately.
Silly girl.
Not thrilled for a photo.
This is hilarious to me. She looks like she is about two!

Little Miss Blue Eyes herself. :)

Have a happy Sunday tomorrow!

I wanna drive it mommy!

Liam is getting so good at saying full sentences! This was a recent one. He decided he wanted to drive his little jeep thing. So he tried to climb in, but was slightly disappointed that he couldn't fit inside of it.
Can't you just see the mischief in his eyes?


Some other cute recent sentences,
"Jeopardy's on, Mommy! Awwwex Twebek!" (I was DYING over this one. My child is truly a Jeopardy nerd.)
One morning he came running out of his bedroom and said, "I sweep good in Wiam's bed, mommy. I had goooood dreams. I wake up now and eat ceweal and watch Cwifford." (Clifford is a new favorite on PBS kids. As well as his beloved SuperWhy!)
Those are just some recent favorites, but he is cracking me up with his new found sense of humor lately.
We are finally having some success in getting Liam to eat vegetables. For some reason, he has this strange obsession with wanting to climb a tree, so I told Liam to eat his trees one night when we had broccoli. He replied, "I cwimb trees. I eat trees, Momma." And he ate them all up. Works for me. :)

Hot Air Balloons, Stomas, and Packages, Oh My!

I can officially say I'm overwhelmed! What a week it's been. It's been stressful, therefore I'm so glad it's Friday. Yesterday on my way to clinical I was sooo mad because I didn't have the camera in the car to take a photo of the gorgeous hot air balloons from the Reno Balloon Races. Well, today they were a lot further away, but it was still a beautiful site to see so early in the morning! It's just a gorgeous site to come over the hill and see the sky dotted with all different colors, shapes and size of beautiful balloons.

Today was also a very fun day in clinical. We had a VERY long and extensive lecture on wound care that was interesting and enlightening, however I have been sitting and listening for at LEAST 5 hours a day(on average) for the last two weeks. I'm just a *tad* burnt out. All of the lectures have been amazing, but with the back pain I've been having, it's *really* hard to sit that long. Thankfully, the chiropracter is getting me all fixed up. So, you can't possibly imagine our excitement when we finally got to practice something. Let me tell you, I NEVER thought I would be so excited about a play-doh stoma and practicing ostomy care(if you don't know what that is, google it if you want to be frightened or enlightened--you decide after reading...) Anyway, we felt like we were doing arts and crafts in clinical while also practicing skills. These lovely ladies are the ladies I carpool with and study with during the next 16 or so months. Today, we for our lunch break and went to the institute's Friday Forum $1 homemade lunch! We had a blast and Brother Bolingbroke(for those of you who don't know him, he's hilarious) was quite confused by our stoma excitement, but told us he would definitely let us take his pulse because we were such a cute group of future nurses. haha

Anyway, after lunch we got to suture and staple removal-- more fun. :) I was feeling much better about things and to make things better, I came home to a lovely and thoughtful package from my wonderful mother-in-law. She made me my favorite cookies, sent a bag of peach rings(my favorite again), school supplies and some yummy Three Musketeers bars. She also set Liam a lovely noise maker and some Spiderman fruit snacks.

Anyway, there is my update. I guess you are a *true* nursing student when stomas excite you. I'm sure there is much more fun to come!

Camp, Camp, CAMPING!

We decided to make an attempt at camping again this weekend. I felt like I had gotten the allergies a bit more under control, so we thought it was worth a shot. Friday night was horrendous. Let's just say, Liam decided 12am was a good time to start waking up. He was up for good at about 3am. After a hugely exhausting and emotional week for me, you can guess we were not happy. Finally at 5am, Wes took him for a couple hundred laps around the campground.

Saturday was more fun. Even though we were all tired, Wes, my mom and dad, Izzy, Liam and I headed to Donner. We had a great time kayaking and playing on the beach. Liam loved the kayak. The whole time we were kayaking, he was singing "Row, Row, Row Your Boat" without prompting. So funny. He finally crashed in his swim trunks on our way back to camp. He slept in the car for a good 45 minutes even after we had returned to camp.

We had a delicious dinner in our "bug house" that night. Liam also discovered his love for butter by dipping his fork in the butter and licking it off. He can NOT be my child. haha. I HATE butter.
He perked up a bit and decided that the flashlight was a microphone. Here's Izzy singing her song.
And Liam performing for us.
Wild hair girl!
It was also Larry's birthday. Everyone had to shield the candles from the wind.
My favorite part: S'More Roasting. We also had a serverely hilarious game of Catch Phrase. We were sooo tired after about the tenth or so round, that I actually said "Sigmund Freud" instead of "Siegfried and Roy." The funniest part is my mom thought Sigmund Freud was the correct answer.

We actually ended up going home Saturday night at about 11pm. I just couldn't handle another night like Friday, so we slept in our own beds, had good dreams and then went back to camp with GG and Grandpa-Great the next morning. Liam had been having tons of fun watching the other kids on bikes, scooters, etc, so we brought his scooter up. He is getting so much better. He is actually putting his foot down and pushing instead of us just pushing him around.
GG and Grandpa-Great brought the Sunday paper up to camp. Who would have thought everyone would be fighting over all the sections and it would be such a treat?
The Birthday Boy was slightly exhausted.
Aunt Pam's niece came up with an outstanding idea of how to do smores. First, you roast the marshmallow. Then you put it together and wrap it in tin foil and put it over the fire. This melts all the chocolate and it becomes a savory morsel of ooey-gooey deliciousness!
Liam's favorite activity as always: throwing rocks in the creek and playing with big sticks. It was so cute while hiking on this trail, he was yelling, "Good Morning, Trees! Good Morning, Flowers! Good Morning, Sun!" Do you like his Skeletor jacket from last Halloween? The kid gets wayyy too messy for nice clothes. He is covered in dirt before we get out of the car!

Izzy had lots of fun with GG and Grandpa-Great!
Daddy's Girl in her Colts hat.
This was Liam's other favorite part. He LOVED horseshoes. He called it "THWOW IT!" Wes taught how to throw it close to the ring and he didn't want to stop!
Can you see the look of pure satisfaction on this adorable face?

We hope everyone had a fantastic Labor Day weekend. Now back to the real world for me of cardiac assessment reading...

How My Brain Feels...

After camping this weekend, I wasn't able to really digest and organize everything from this week.

I was printing off some lab forms for tomorrow and looked over at the bed and saw this. I just laughed. Organization is my goal for today. After that, hopefully I'll be able to get through the week's readings. My dear husband is so lovingly washing and folding all the clothes from our camping excursion so I can get this mess organized! When it comes to school, I tend to be the organziational freak who color codes classes and books and puts things in alphabetical order in the planner. Well, pray that I can get this mess organized to my satisfaction. At some point, I did promise I'd take a break to go get some yummy ribs! Hopefully tonight I can post some photos from camping... Ok, enough procrastinating already...