Ugg

I couldn't think of a better blog title to reflect how I feel.  Just ugh.  You know that saying, when it rains, it pours?  It is true.  And it is actually pouring our right now so it's extra true.  There are so many thoughts running through my head I can't even put an order to them.  I'm gonna try though.


First, we have five exams next week - one on Monday, two on Tuesday, and two on Wednesday.  One of our professors gave us the option of postponing the exam until the following week - which would have been awesome - except some people emailed the professor and asked her not to change the time because they had already studied.  Seriously??  Who does that??  So for one day I was relieved that the exam would be moved only to find out in the end that it was not.  It was a very mean trick.  And made me want to cry.  First ugh.

Then I got home and had so much studying to do except that my husband has to take five online courses for work on HR stuff.  And he has until Friday.  And each course is an hour long at the least.  And they are all in English.  His English is good but not good enough for these classes.  They are long and complicated and have exams at the end.  Why, when the company employs a large number of Spanish-speaking employees, would you not offer it in Spanish???  Especially if you are going to mandate that all employees take it?? And it's from HR!!  So I had to sit and try to translate the entire course for him so he could take the test and understand the concepts.  It took forever and we only got through two.  Fabulous.  And we were up until 1am. Second ugh.

And then, in the middle of those courses, I go to put Evan to bed only to discover that he has a rash over his entire body (the picture above is random, but adorable so I stuck it there anyway).  I'm assuming from the antibiotics for his ear infection.  Great.  He's allergic to certain antibiotics.  So I call the pediatrician but she doesn't answer and still hasn't responded to my email so I just didn't give him his Meds this morning.  He only has 1.5 days left so I think he'll be ok, but it would be nice if I heard back from her.  I had an allergic reaction to the same meds when I was pregnant with him so I actually had a premonition that he was going to be allergic. [Update - the pediatrician does not think it is related to the antibiotics or at least from an allergic reaction to them.]  Third ugh.

So, now can you see why I feel ugh.  First I am tired, second I have a lot of work to do (both school and work-work), third we have three more online course to take for the hubs, fourth I have my nieces bday party this weekend along with our last Girl Golf event, along with an out of town guest.  And don't forget those five exams.  And I kinda need an A on all of them.  Hahaha.


Life sure never settles down.  It is go-go-go-go.  Oh well, what can you do but try and keep up!!


***************

Anyone else out there allergic to meds?

What's the most stressful thing going on in your life right now?


Thing most excited about for this weekend??

Halloween Recap

Halloween was so much fun this year.  Evan actually understood the holiday for the most part and was so adorable the entire time.  Halloween isn't my favorite holiday (I don't dislike it by any means, I just enjoy other holidays more) and usually I just make do and stumble through it.  It was fun when I was a kid because who doesn't love to dress up and get candy when you are young.  Then somewhere along the line as I got older it turned into a holiday where people like to wear the skimpiest clothes and drink lots of alcohol.  Two things I do not enjoy, so then it went downhill and was less fun.  After my sister had kids it was fun again because her daughters dressed up and we'd go trick-or-treating with them.  But this year?  So much better!!

We started out at the football game and Evan had his costume on.  He was a golfer, of course.  My mom made it and it was perfect.  I loved it.  Evan looked so darn cute.  The hat, bloomers, socks, Green jacket?  Freaking adorable.  

Evan and Camryn chased each other around during the game and had a blast.  Evan showed off his golf skills a few times, because we brought his golf clubs.  But mostly he played around and screamed "touchdown" a few times.

After the game we headed to my sister's house to trick-or-treat a little in their neighborhood.  We visited the neighbors and Evan said Happy Halloween to everyone.  I was shocked because usually he is mute when we are around strangers, but I guess even he'll talk in exchange for candy.  And boy did he want candy!  He pushed his way right to the bucket and picked out his own candy.  And sometimes he even said "uno mas please" because some people were giving out more than one piece.  His favorite candy were lollipops and he would try to grab as many as he could.  Luckily he was cute so people overlooked his greediness (don't worry, I made him put them back).

As you can see, I don't dress up for Halloween.  I was so shocked by how many adults dressed up (as evidenced by Facebook).  I am way too tired to put any thought into dressing up myself.  Maybe one year...but I kind of doubt it.

So that was our Halloween fun.  And the highlight of our weekend.  This was the best candy we got.  A fancy cookie from a local bakery.

Yum!!

Aside from Halloween, Friday I had my first clinical.  It wasn't too serious, just an interview with older adults living in an independent living community.  The school wanted us to interact with older adults that were healthy and living without assistance to show that not all people get dementia or sick as they age and that there are plenty of happy and healthy 85 year olds.  We move on to the nursing home in a few weeks.  The clinical was fun and the woman I interviewed was really nice.  I meet with her again this week too.  

Saturday I had a clinical at a soup kitchen, which was interesting.  As part of another class they want us to get experience in the community and see the living conditions of some of the patients we will be working with in the future.  I have spent the last ten years working in the community so I am a bit more aware than some of the others, but it is still a nice opportunity.  After golf in the morning and then the soup kitchen I was pretty exhausted.  I did get a bit of studying done in the evening but still have so much more to do.

Sunday was a normal day of chores.  I did four loads of laundry, made chicken stew, make a huge pot of beans and another huge pot of rice, studied, and Skyped with MImi (Skyping with MImi is not a chore).

That's our favorite Sunday activity.  Evan loved it so much that he made us call back in the evening to say good night.  He says "talk MImi" and it's really adorable.  Usually he waits until he says hi and then he bolts off to show Mimi some crazy running/tackling activity.  It's hilarious.

That's pretty much the weekend.  Fun times!  This week is all studying I hope because next week I have four exams and a validation in three days.  Yikes.  Nursing school is the opposite of healthy...they enjoy making the conditions as stressful as possible.  I do not appreciate it.

Hope your Halloween was a blast and that your week is off to a good start!

Oh the horror

Last week was a nightmare.  Looking back on it, it seems to have lasted forever.  I had two exams on Monday, another on Wednesday, and a validation on Friday.  I spent all weekend studying, and then all week studying for my validation.  Validation is when you are given a scenario that you have to perform in front of your professor.  The scenario will have specific lab skills like taking a nasal culture, taking a patient's blood sugar, etc.  This was our last validation before our clinicals start.  I was mega stressed from all the tests and then from practicing the scenarios.  Of course I got the hardest one and I made a complete fool of myself.  My lab instructor must get a hoot out of watching all us crazy birds try to do skills while stressed and nervous.  My scenario included putting on PPE (think Ebola and protecting yourself from contagious diseases), changing and packing a LARGE pressure ulcer (bed sore), and putting on bilateral restraints.  The pressure ulcer was huge and it needed to be irrigated and packed and measured and bandaged.  Ugg.  And all with my PPE on.  It was a disaster.  I won't tell you about every detail but I'll tell you about my fabulous start and you can use you imagination to picture how the rest went.  The order for putting on PPE is gown first, then face mask, then gloves.  And before all that you need to wash your hands.  So, I put in my gown and then my gloves.  Then I realize that I forgot to wash my hands so I took the gloves off and washed my hands.  Then I put the gloves back on.  Then I realize that I need a face mask so I have to take my gloves off again and put my face mask on, then the gloves again.  Except then I realize that my mask is tied so tight I can't open my right eye.  But to adjust the mast I have to take my gloves off again, so I decide to just do everything with one eye partially closed.  Fabulous.

And that was just my first five minutes.

The important thing here is that I passed.  It was just pass/fail so no grade or anything.  Nursing school is stressful!  Not only is it a bunch of exams, it's a bunch of skill tests too.  It's never ending.  And we are already getting ready to register for next semester.  Where has the time gone??

This past weekend we took a break and went to Baltimore ZooBoo!  So fun!!  We took my nieces too and they had a blast.

They dressed up in costumes and we walked around the little Halloween fair where they had arts and crafts, candy, jumpy-towers, and food.  Then we took the little shuttle to the actual zoo part and looked at animals.  The zoo just opened a new pinguin exhibit that was so fun.  The kids loved it.

They stood there and watched the pinguins swim by over and over again. Then we headed to see the polar bear and the chimpanzees.  And then that was about it.  The zoo closed at 4pm and we didn't get there until 2ish so we didn't have much time.  It was perfect though because the kids were getting tired.

The weather was perfect though and since we are members it doesn't cost so we don't care so much that we were only there for a couple hours.

I also accomplished my one goal for the weekend.  Clean out the sink drains.  Yes.  Disgusting.  When we moved into this house all the drains were clogged and it took forever for the water to drain.  I hated it.  We bought some natural drain-o and some real drain-o, but nothing worked.  I realied that I was actually going to need to clean them out.  Which is gross to me.  Especially since it had been clogged for a while so who knows what was down there.  So, I YouTubed how to do it and I did it.  I didn't take pictures because it was too gross but I was pretty pleased with myself.  I had to unscrew things and take pipes apart and drains apart and put it back together...and clean really gross sludge.  But now the sink drains so well!!  And I am so happy!!  

So that was my weekend.  And the last week.  Nothing too exciting.  Friday is Halloween and my mom made Evan the cutest costume in the world.  You will want to check back here and see it.  He cannot get any cuter!!

Hope you are having a great week.  

What things have you learned through YouTubed??

 

Another random post

I'm sitting here on the bus with some time to write but I don't actually have anything to say.  Pretty much my entire life is taken up with school but I'm kind of tired of thinking and writing about school.  And you must be tired of hearing about it!  However, then I have nothing to say.  Or so it feels.

I could talk about the weather.  Happy Autumn!!  Well, today it's in the 70s so it doesn't feel to fallish, but the leaves are changing and it's raining.  Figures, since I am wearing a long skirt and ballet slipper-style shoes that will get soaked in the rain.  Completely soaked.  I am hoping that by the time classes end the rain will have passed.

This past weekend we went to the pumpkin patch and picked out a baby pumpkin to bring home.  It was fun.  I met my sister and her kids there and the kids went to the petting zoo and played on the numerous playground-type structures.  It was a bit of a fortune though.  I haven't decided if we are going to decorate a pumpkin.  Evan is too little to really remember and has no idea that he is missing out.  We'll see.  Carving pumpkins is not my most favorite activity.  I haven't uploaded my pictures from the pumpkin patch yet, but as soon as I do I will share them...because they are adorable.

These days baths for Evan are few and far between.  If he's dirty he tends to get a shower instead, with mommy or daddy, because it's a lot quicker than giving him his own bath.  This past week I got home extra early and decided to let him play around in the tub.

He had a blast drawing all over the walls with bath crayons.  His drawings are still there because I haven't washed the tub yet....  In the morning I open the shower curtain and am startled until I remember.

Ivan is counting down the days until we go to Vermont.  It is hilarious.  He is super excited to go and insists we are staying for two whole weeks.  We will see about that.  Evan is super excited too.  I am not excited about the car ride because Evan has not been an angel in the car these past few weeks.  I might cry if he yells "No" the entire 10 hour trip!

Ok, this was the most random post.  Maybe one day I'll get my thoughts together and wrote a post that makes sense and is fun for you to read!

Random Musings

I have a bunch of blog posts that I have started and not finished.  I start them on the bus, get tired, take a nap, and then never find time to finish them.  So, I thought I would give you an update in bullet form!  Let's hope I publish this....

* Our car is finally fixed and passed the state inspection.  Yes!!  It cost an arm and a leg, but it's done.  I really hope that it lasts for a few years and that we didn't just put thousands of dollars into a car that is going to break again in five months.  My husband is happy because he was really scared for a while that it was going to be broken forever and that we would never find an exhaust manifold.  Surprisingly everything went well and we have a car still.  Good stuff.  Our mechanic is AWESOME!

* All we eat these days are eggs and beans for dinner.  I make a big pot of beans on Sunday and then we refry them and eat them all week with hotdogs and eggs.  The hotdogs are probably a bad choice but they are humane certified and the only ingredient is beef, no filler.  So I imagine them like a hotdog-shaped hamburger.  Right?  For some reason our grocery bill hasn't changed though and I can't figure out why.  I am going to really have to look at what we are buying and see how many things are just wants instead of needs.  I don't feel like we buy a lot of wants though, so we'll see.

* I finished my first round of exams.  They were ok.  Nothing to call home about but good enough to keep my scholarship.  It is really hard trying to find time to study.  And there are so many things to do, my planner is overflowing.

Yesterday I studied for four hours in the afternoon but all I did were a few homework assignments and a paper.  I didn't even get that much time to do any real studying.  Very frustrating.  I try to stay at school to get extra studying done and that works but there is always more to do.  Here is the view from the library...my second home. 

* Evan and I went on a hike on Saturday and had such a fun time.

He got to pick the trail we walked on and the entire time he picked up rocks so he'd be ready to throw them into the river when we got there.  I told him a million times we couldn't go IN the river, but he still asked over and over again.

I did let him throw rocks though and before we left I let him wash his dirty hand off...although not before he stuck his sandy hand into his mouth.

Then we raced back to the car.  If we don't race then he meanders for so long we'd never make it back and our car would be locked in the parking lot.  He also found a hiking stick and carried that around on the hike back to the car.

* It is cold already.  This morning waiting for the bus my toes froze.  Boo.  I am not ready for the cold.  Evan is excited that he gets to wear his new winter pjs from MImi.

He loves them.  This weekend I changed his clothes and got out all his winter stuff and pack away his shorts.  I left a few short sleeve shirts out and two shorts but that's about it.  The highs are in the 70s this week but the lows are in the 30s so it is cold. 

* I made a really yummy cinnamon-swirl banana bread.  We had a bunch of extra bananas and so I figured banana bread was in order.  It is pretty tasty!  It was my latest Pinterst find.  I can't figure out how to put links in these blogs posts that I do on my iPad so you will just have to do all the  work yourself.  My Pinterst page is www.pinterest.com/mapleandmud, so feel free to visit and find the recipe!

Ok, that's about all!  Thanks for sticking around, even when my posts are so sporadic!

Driving the grocery cart car

Yesterday I started a post and then it was deleted.  I hate that.  It annoyed me enough that I wasn't motivated to restart it again so now I'll just start a new post today.  Life I crazy.  That pretty much sums it up.  This week I had two skills validations (where we are tested on things like blood pressure, setting up a sterile field, moving patients, etc.), a research exam, a Physio-pharm exam, and a drug calculation exam.  Oh, and a paper due.  It was a stressful week, to say the least.  I got 100% on my drug calculation test though, so that was good.  You had to get 100% to pass and the first time I took it I forgot to round 0.25 to 0.3 so got one wrong.  Very frustrating!  This time I triple checked and did each question three times.  I did NOT want to have to take it again.

Even with all that studying we had a small amount of time to do some fun things on the weekend.  Evan got to drive his first grocery cart car!

He thought it was the best experience ever.  He turned that wheel with complete enthusiasm the entire time, along with beeping the horn every ten seconds.  Also, take a close look at his feet.  Notice how he has no shoes?  Yup, he chucked them out of the car at one point and I spent ten minutes going up and down the lanes looking for them.  We did eventually find both of them.

I also babysat my cousins for a short while on Sunday in the afternoon.  I brought Evan over with me and he fell asleep for three hours.  I was only supposed to watch them for 40 minutes but I stayed and studies while he slept.  I tried to escape to the basement and set up a comfy work space in peace and quiet but I am not sure that that concept exists at my sister's house!

I set up at the toddler school table and tried my best to get some studying done but not too much was accomplished.  My nieces decided they wanted to be nurses too so they kept trying to have appointments at the table.  Then they were bringing their baby dolls in for appointments and then they wanted me to play house.  My character was allowed to study but not as much as I needed too.  It was very adorable.  It may be less adorable when I get my exam grade back.  In the end they both decided that they didn't want to be nurses anymore because it was just too much studying. 

And you remember that car my coworker gave me.  It didn't pass the state safety inspection.  The main problem is that the exhaust manifold is broken and they don't make that part anymore and they can't find anyone that is still selling it.  I went through all these hoops and ladders and finally found a used piece in Connecticut and they mailed it to me...only to find out that the car place doesn't install used parts.  I guess I should have checked first but it really didn't occur to me.  They agreed to look at it though so it is at the shop today, but I am a bit nervous.  The only other option is to find a welder that can weld it back together (it is cracked).  Please keep your fingers crossed that this works.

So those are the main updates.  I have another test on Monday so I will probably be studying again this weekend at odd times like 1am, but that's life.  I pretty much had to give up running for the next few months because there was no way to fit it in my schedule.  It made me sad because I was in such a great routine and I was having good runs and feeling strong.  A few months off isn't the end of the world though so I will just try and focus on school and family and worry about exercise later.  That means no more PiYo either.  I have hopes that I can do the two months again in December/January.  We shall see.

And as always, Evan is the cutest thing in the entire world and I love him to pieces.  Off to the football game tonight.  It's getting cold outside and I will soon be ordering hot chocolate.  Yum!!!

Hope you had a great week and that your weekend is looking spectacular!

Nursing School Update!

Ok, so maybe this blog will turn into a once a week thing!  Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays are super packed and busy and I scheduled study time on the bus those days so there is absolutely no time to blog.  There is barley time to breathe.  Sometimes I go the entire day and never have a chance to grab my lunch to eat.  It's stressful.  I guess that's what school is supposed to be though, right?  Classes are interesting and fun but they are less fun because everything is focused on skills evaluations so then the fun stuff becomes stressful.  So far I have learned how to prepare a sterile field, take blood pressure, take vital signs (blood pressure, pulse, respirations, temperature), give a patient a sponge bath, change bed linens, brush teeth, and move a patient from the bed to a stretcher.  Seems simple ng ought but not when you are being graded and evaluated and it's pass/fail.  Any tiny error makes you fail.  Not fun.  I have been going to open lab to practice almost every day this week and I still mess tiny steps up or touch my sterile gloves to my unsterile wrist by accident.  Next week I have skills evaluation in two classes, an Physio-pharm exam, a research exam, a paper due, and a med calc quiz.  It's gonna be crazy!!

In the mean time I have been trying to spend as much non-studying time with the family.  Parks, playgrounds, sticking acorns down the manholes, kicking the soccer ball, hitting golf balls, etc.  the normal stuff.  And football games, since football season started.  

In the meantime Ivan's been teaching Evan how to finish his soup.

Slurping it down.  He actually drank every last bit...except for the chicken.  He always picks out the chicken pieces but eats the carrots.

Evan had his two year appointment last week.  He's still a little munchkin weighing in at 22 pounds and standing 33 inches tall.  He seemed pretty healthy otherwise, minus his lack of vegetable consumption.  So I am now trying to incorporate some extra veggies in things like tomato sauce.  Or spinach in grilled cheese sandwiches.  Or spinach in smoothies, which is what I made him today.  It was a spinach, banana, strawberry, peach, mango, milk, flaxseed smoothie.  He ate one over the weekend, so hopefully he'll eat another one this morning.  We'll see!  Sometimes what he eats with me is not what he eats with my sister, and vice versa.  How do you get your kiddos to eat veggies??  Please share!

Other than that news I don't have too much to report.   I miss blogging more consistently and I I miss having more time!  Hopefully things will smooth over soon and I'll be able to breath.

Funniest thing you've done this week?  Share so I can live vicariously through you!

 - Going for a run/playground outing on Sunday.

Last thing you had to study for?

 - Med calc quiz that I ended up failing.  It was pass/fail and I I got one wrong.  Wanna know why?  Because the answer was 0.25 and we had to round to the nearest tenth space and I accidentally left it like that instead of rounding to 0.3.  Ugg, so frustrating!!  Now I have to take it again next week.  Please send some prayers my way!!