She said YES!

BIG NEWS!!!!

Justin's brother Jason proposed to his girlfriend, (now fiance) Lindsay this week! He planned an incredibly romantic night for them this past Wednesday and popped the question at the top of the Reunion Ball in downtown Dallas. Here's a picture of them from Lindsay's facebook from the big night. He also arranged for a horse drawn carriage ride through downtown Dallas where they could enjoy their special night together.
We are so excited for Jason and Lindsay, and are very much looking forward to their wedding and experiencing "newlywed-ness" together. At this point I don't have any details about the wedding yet, but just wanted to announce how excited we are for their engagement!


Here is a picture of Jason and Lindsay at our wedding this past May. They're standing in front of the wedding pictures from Jason and Justin's parents and grandparents weddings.
And here's a funny picture that I found that shows just how much fun this couple is! Congratulations on your engagement Jason and Lindsay! We are so excited for you and this special time in your lives!!

Two little letters after my name

I am officially the newest graduate nurse at Children's Hospital of Dallas. I am so excited and I can't believe that this moment is finally here. It has been over a 3 year long process in the works to get to this point and I am thrilled to finally be hitting this major milestone in my life.

I've been offered a job (which I immediately accepted) on the gastrointestinal floor, which is an acute care services floor of the hospital. I actually had the opportunity to complete my senior internship on the floor this fall, so I'm already slightly familiar with the day staff, the unit, the physicians and the patients. One of the biggest blessings is that one of my very good friends Laura Harn works on this unit as a patient educator. She is one of my sweetest friends from Baylor and has been one of my biggest nurse supporters during my time in nursing school. I look forward to seeing her much more often now...and to her probably seeing me cry a few times over the first few months of working as a nurse.

Here is a picture of Laura which I stole from her facebook like a true stalker...

All this to say, I am so excited about this new phase of my life. I hope and pray that being a pediatric nurse is exactly what God is calling me to do and that he will reveal himself to me through this career.
Oh, and just a side note, at this point, I officially only have 4 more days of class, 4 more days of clinicals, 1 test, 1 presentation, 3 days of board review, and 3 final exams and I'm done! DONE! But who's counting right?

Halloween weekend

We had a very fun-filled Halloween this weekend. Friday night, we stayed with the Weinmann's, who had a neighborhood Halloween costume party to attend. The party was complete with a bounce house in the front yard, horse carriage rides through the neighborhood, witches brew, the biggest cupcake cake you've ever seen and a witches bucket full of Chick-fil-a chicken nuggets. I have never been to a Halloween party like this before. Unfortunately, I only knew 3 people there...Gabriella from High School Musical, Stormtrooper from Star Wars and a 2-year-old kitty cat...(see below). Justin had the responsibility of caring for the 78 pound American Mastiff puppy that's a pretty new addition to the Weinmann family. (He will double in size before he is full grown.) I tried to stay away from him, because I'm pretty sure he could have eaten me if he tried to. Justin adores this dog...I'm terrified that he wants to get one now.

On Halloween night, Justin and I volunteered at our church's "Trunk or Treat" event. We dressed as the King and the Queen of Hearts.

Here we are getting into character.

We were in charge of the Pumpkin Bowling game, which only lasted about half of the time because all of the pumpkins cracked open from being repeatedly rolled (thrown) down the concrete.

This little fireman came to see us a few times!

I thought this little cowboy was so cute. I don't think he hit any pins down until his dad started helping him though.

Here are some of my favorite girls from our home group (Janet- an accident victim, Amy and Shelby- hippies). PS. how funny is Janet's face in this picture??

After the Trunk or Treat, we went by Justin's parents house to Trick-or-Treat, but they must have already given away all the candy. We had a wonderful 1st Halloween together and enjoyed being King and Queen for a day!

Baylor Homecoming

This weekend, we traveled to Waco to celebrate the 100th year of Baylor University's Homecoming!! I can't believe that it is my 5th year as an alumni at Baylor (I've been to Homecoming 4 of the 5 years, Justin has been twice now), time is flying by!!

As we walked up to the parade on Saturday morning, we saw the Tri-delta float at the end of the route. I was so excited to take a picture, but I don't remember what their theme was! Justin and I at the parade!
It was such a wonderful surprise to see Sarah and Lauren at the parade! I love these girls so much...and I don't have many memories at Baylor without them!
We had great seats at the Baylor game...mainly they were great because Michelle and Eric walked by and there was room for them to sit with us. Then Elizabeth and Sean called, and we had room for them to sit with us too!!

This year is also the 100th Year Anniversary of the Baylor Nursing School. This is our float...don't judge us that we don't have time to build a really cool float like the fraternities and sororities...we're kind of busy.

Tami and I are very good at showing our Baylor spirit...we get lots of practice because we're usually surrounded by Aggies.

Here's Justin and I after the game was over and cleared out. We didn't win, but we had fun! And Justin scored major points for wearing a Baylor shirt!

After the game, we had a cook out at the Puryears house. We had a great time eating hot dogs, watching football and making s'mores on the fire pit.

All the girls out by the firepit.

And all the boys...having a great time!

We wrapped up the homecoming weekend by relaxing in my parents new leather chairs...here's Justin, my dad and Macy relaxing...watching other, more successful football games.

Although this may be a controversial comment with my parents, most of my cousins and all of my aunts and uncles...I'd like to give a shout out to the Aggies for their big win. Supporting the Ags is a brand new experience for me now that I'm married to one, but I guess I better get used to it! Gig 'Em...and Sic 'Em.

The Golden Generation

I am in love with my geriatric patients!! I never, ever in a million years would have imagined I'd say that two years ago before I began nursing school. Of course, this may sound ridiculous to you all, but before I started nursing school, I told one of my coworkers at American Airlines that I couldn't deal with bad smells- especially if they were coming out of another person's body. She looked at me like I was crazy? "Don't you know what nurses do?" I didn't.

I think there's a misconception about nurses by the general public. Unless you've spent a significant amount of time in the hospital, I would assume that you think a nurse is there to check on the patient, make sure the IV fluid is running correctly, and write down whatever orders a physician requires. While those things are true...there's so much more to nursing, which is why I'm working so very hard for this degree that I will be so proud of. Anyways, more about this topic once I'm actually a nurse and not a student nurse (like in 2 months)!!!!!

The older adult population is such an amazing group of people...they lived through a time that we romanticize, think of the movies from that time period...Casablanca, It's a Wonderful Life, Gone with the Wind, Wizard of Oz...I always feel warm and fuzzy after these types of movies. That's usually how I feel after a conversation with one of my geriatric patients. They are referred to as the "golden generation"...I think that might be an age specific definition, not a generation specific, so eventually we'll all be the "golden generation". Their stories are priceless...sometimes pointless...but when your story is 85 years old, I think that makes it worth listening to.

They're funny too...they say things that crack me up...and they don't even skip a beat. I asked a woman today to write something down, and she asked me to do it for her because her handwriting looked like a chicken scratching with a broken leg. She wasn't trying to be funny...but I got the biggest kick out of her little statements. The gentlemen at the home tip their hats to us, they'd open the doors but they're all automatic.

I spent about half an hour with a woman last week who is suffering from dementia. Her mind is failing but she continually said three things in response to my conversation (and I mean continually)...1. "I am so blessed", 2. "You are a blessing", 3. "I know you're going to be a wondeful nurse, I can tell". I was amazed at her peaceful and loving spirit despite her physical condition...she was still very full of love and it made me wish I had known her before last week.

I think I've figured out why I'm so enchanted with this generation of people...two reasons.

1. Most of them are very spiritually grounded. I have had the gospel shared with me a few times in just 3 days of working with this population. These people have lived a long time and they've figured out what is important...they're not afraid to ask me if I know certain stories from the bible. They want to make sure that I know who Jesus is. I love that...I have a lot to learn about living my faith the way that these people do on a daily basis. You can tell that faith is very important to most of these people, they've cut out all the "bull" as one man said, and focus on what's important. Oh, and they want to know if I'm a Baptist because I go to Baylor Nursing School.

2. Most of them are very family oriented. They want to show us their photo albums...I've met two ladies who have grand-daughters named "Leslie"...almost all of them have moved to Dallas to be closer to one of their children....some of them have great grandchildren...they tell me all of their names...their stories are incredible. Family is incredibly important to Justin and me...something that will never be compromised by work or busy-ness.

So I may not have convinced you that the "golden years" are exciting...but that's ok...maybe I'll post more of their funny comments later. I know they'll make me smile at least.

A New Tradition

This past weekend, Justin and I continued our tradition (3 years and running) of going to the pumpkin patch and picking out pumpkins to carve. We've done this since we started dating and plan to continue the tradition in the coming years. It was kind of warm outside, but I decided to still wear a scarf to make me feel like it was the appropriate season to pick out a pumpkin. Here's Justin looking for his pumpkin. He ended up choosing one of the biggest ones he could find...typical. :)
It took me much longer to find my pumpkin. I was obviously more worried about taking pictures of the event.

The ladies checking us out took a picture for us with our pumpkins. I don't think they remembered us from the past two years though.

After visiting the pumpkin patch, we went to the grocery store to pick up some ingredients for some pumpkin pie that I wanted to make with the inside of the pumpkin. I found a recipe online that said it was the best pumpkin pie in the world. I was very excited about it...we didn't even eat dinner so we could hurry up and make the pie.

I would say that between the two of us, I'm probably the better choice to draw the face on the pumpkin...this is not to discount Justin's art skills...I'm just sayin'...

I should also admit that with the carrying on of this tradition, we also broke a tradition this year. For the past two years, we've picked out our perfect pumpkins, brought them home to carve them, and instead, let them sit on the porch of my apartment until they rotted or I got a notice on the door from the apartment complex to remove all holiday decor (that notice was received in March that year). So this was our first year to actually carve a pumpkin together!

So our second project of the night involved baking the pumpkin seeds. I made some that were salty/garlic-y and I made another batch that were sweet with cinnamon sugar. The recipe said to bake them for 40 minutes...does that seem kind of long to anyone else? I only kept them in for 30 and they were a little burnt for my taste, but Justin said he liked them. (maybe to spare my feelings)The real battle that was lost was the pumpkin pie. It looked so beautiful, yet I've never tasted anything so bad in my life. At the point this picture was taken, I was very proud of how beautiful this pie was...just shows you not to judge something from the outside.Justin did the carving of the pumpkin. Sorry I didn't get a picture of the action...I was busy making the pumpkin pie. But here's the finished product with the tea-light candle inside.

He's pretty scary! He's guarding our front porch right now!

Happy Halloween!!

Procrastination...

Look out people...I've done an overhaul on the blog. And I must say that I really enjoyed myself while searching through fun new backgrounds, banners and images. I thought to myself...self...this is kind of fun, I think I'll change the blog up every couple of months. So I thought it would be appropriate to celebrate with a fall background. I'm already so pumped about the Christmas ones. They're even better then the fall ones, and it's only October.

After messing around on the computer and updating our blog last night, I looked at the clock and realized that I spent over 2 hours between our blog, facebook, other people's blogs and twitters, and my 3 email accounts. Whew...I was exhausted...and I hadn't done anything all that productive. We're supposed to study for a specific class for 2 hours every day during this semester. I think I've actually done that twice. So I'm resorting to the fact that at 26 years old, I've finally become what I've always been so grateful I wasn't before now...a procrastinator.

I don't think it's my fault though...it's Facebook's fault. And G-Mail's fault...and Blogger.com's fault. These social networking sites that were completely unheard of when I began college (the first time) have now penetrated into our lives irreversibly. Such that we have multiple avenues online to now permanently announce to the world that we're sitting next to a fat slob at the DMV, or that we're tired of watching the Cowboy's play bad against a winless team and that Tony Romo needs to thank Miles Austin...blah, blah, blah. But in all seriousness, what would I do without it. I found out that Obama won the Peace Prize from Facebook...I'm not sure I would have found out otherwise until this morning from Kidd Kraddick. I check Baylor football scores from my iPhone almost every weekend because I'm either working a shift at the hospital or because nobody wants to televise my Bears...or both. I read my friends blogs way more often then I actually talk to them. And when I don't feel like studying for an important test or working on a project, I check all of my social media outlets again...and again, just to see if anything is going on. And to see who of my friends have now nominated someone they know for a Peace prize.

It makes me wonder if all of it is doing any good for us...as a people, culture, generation, etc. What are we gaining from this? More importantly, what are we losing? I mentioned that I read my friends blogs more then I talk to them on the phone or in person. This is tragic! What kind of community exists behind html coding? I would guess, not a very strong one. I'm not calling for a boycott of social media...but I want to start making an effort not to resort to my computer instead of real-life interactions with people that I love. And I'm going to stop procrastinating...tomorrow. :)

What is the point of HESI

This Tuesday marks the beginning of the end of nursing school for me. This Tuesday, I will take a test called HESI, which is one of the exams that our instructors have been preparing us for since day 1 of nursing school. Taking this test means that I'm reaching the end of this crazy period of life called nursing school...which is in no way like college at all. HESI is an exam that is kind of hard to explain, because from what I can tell, it doesn't really matter that much. But I'd like to try to explain it, because I've been getting a lot of questions about it...and I say something different every time.

It's an exit exam from nursing school that is supposed to tell you how well you will do on the REAL board exams, which everyone takes after they graduate. However, I haven't found a real live practicing RN who says anything credible about this test. Many of them didn't pass it and many of them thought it was stupid. If you make higher than a 900, you're predicted to pass your boards, also known as the NCLEX. HESI is a comprehensive exam about everything we've ever learned during nursing school...today I studied psych, cardiac and high risk OB (obstetrics). They have free-reign to ask us anything and everything that they can possibly think of. Instructors spend a lot of energy trying to freak out the students who have to take it. However, the only consequence that I can tell of not passing HESI is that it counts as 20% of one of our class grades, which is less than what the final exam counts for in this class.

NCLEX is the one that matters, and it is a few months away still. So why am I blogging about this? Because this is what I've been spending my time doing. For the past few days, I've tried to think about blog topics to write about and have been unable to come up with anything interesting to talk about. I don't think it's writers block...I think it's content block. My face has been so stuck in my HESI review book, that I haven't had normal everyday life experiences like I normally do. So I could write about all the things I'm learning in my books, like the signs and symptoms of a heart attack or how to treat a person suffering from any of the different types of shock but I'm pretty sure that would be pretty boring for most people to read.

All this to say, I'm almost finished with nursing school!! I can't believe how time has flown by. I can't believe I left American Airlines almost 2 years ago to begin this adventure and now I'm putting together resume's to be an RN. It has certainly not been an easy two years, but it's been wonderful, and I have never worked harder for something in my life. Here I come HESI...even if you don't really matter!

How did that happen!?!?

Shoes are now required at our house as of this past Monday night. One of the most incredible (in a bad way) things happened right as we were sitting down to a crock-pot meal I had made. I asked Justin to get two glasses of water while I set the table. He said ok, I turned around to put the plates on the table, and I heard a loud crash of glass. I turned around and saw this...

How did that happen!!? The entire cabinet had fallen off the wall when Justin opened the door. We looked at each other for probably 2 whole minutes wondering how on earth this could have happened and what were we supposed to do. Neither of us were bleeding, which I consider a miracle since we lost about 36 glasses in the crash. We stared at each other, looked at the floor covered in glass and tried to figure out what to do. Neither of us had shoes on...we decided that was the first thing to fix. Since I was closer to the hallway to our room, I tiptoed through the glass to the carpet and grabbed shoes...The cabinet was being held onto the wall by one screw at the bottom, so we decided to try to reattach it to the wall. I got my little power drill (pictured below) and Justin began trying to drill...it didn't work as the wood had split, and the contractor didn't use studs. It's a miracle the cabinet held as long as it did. Justin tried hammering in nails (also pictured below) and that didn't work either. So we decided to just take the cabinet off the wall. Once the cabinet was safely on the kitchen floor, we began to survey the damage. I feel like we went through a modification of the five phases of grief- shock, fear, anger, sadness and acceptance. (P.S. for you smarty-pants out there, I know those aren't the stages of grief).

You can see the lone wine glass that fell from the 3rd (tallest) shelf and didn't break...reminds me of stories you hear about tornadoes destroying a whole village, but leaving one building in the middle of town standing with no damage. The glass is even standing upright. How does that happen? You can also see our pet fish in the background, who was luckily spared from the tragedy. There were some small pieces of glass in the bowl though.

While we are sad that we lost a lot of our fun wedding gifts, we're glad that neither of us were injured. Justin graciously spent the next 2 hours cleaning the kitchen instead of watching the Cowboys game so that I could study for my test the next day. Have I mentioned on this blog that I have the best husband ever?

So if you come over, make sure you bring some shoes...and your own wine glass...because we only have one.

I'm sorry...what?

Everyday that I have to go to my school, which is about twice a week, I drive by a restaurant called the "Taco Joint". From the outside, it looks like a breeding ground for e coli but almost everyday when I am driving home, the parking lot is full of cars. So either they have some pretty legit tacos, or they're doing something illegal in there. One day when I drove by, the sign in the front kind of startled me. I thought I read it wrong, so I made the block around (all the streets are one way downtown) to read it again. Sure enough, I read it correctly the first time...

What? I thought it was hilarious. I have driven by this restaurant a few times a week for the past 3 semesters and never seen this sign. I thought, I should take a picture of this, because if I ever want to tell someone, it will be much funnier if I have a picture. So I made the block for the third time, stuck my iPhone out the window with my left hand, aimed and caught this picture.

If the picture is too blurry and you can't read it...it says "9 out of 10 doctors agree our tacos make you smarter...avoid stupidity today".

The next week...sure enough, the sign had been changed...Week 2, the sign reads: "The playmaker won't pass this joint up and neither should you...be like Mike!" What does that even mean? My generation hears the name Mike and thinks of Michael Jordan. I'm pretty sure Michael Jordan didn't go eat lunch at the Taco Joint. Is he referred to as the playmaker? If not, who is? The sign has now become confusing as well as entertaining.

Week 3 does not disappoint...the sign now reads "3 things to beware of Turkish Prisons, Knoxie and Golf Course Squirrels!"

Seriously, who thinks of this? Because I do not understand their humor. Is this supposed to make me want to eat a Taco? And what is a Knoxie?

This morning I drove by...and sure enough...I got the biggest laugh so far.

Sign reads "Medussa once asked Chuck Norris to a starting contest...guess who won? Again...what does this have to do with Tacos...and I don't really get it...again. I've gotten to the point that as I'm leaving the nursing school, I get my phone ready to take the picture as I drive by this Taco Joint. I get a kick out of it every time. I hope you enjoyed the randomness too.

If you're curious as to where this Taco Joint is and would like to try the food, let me know. I'll give you the address, and refer you to a physician for some antibiotics.