Week of Festivities.

This week has been so refreshing. Like I just broke free of a way-too-crowded sidewalk and escaped all the smelly people. That sort of refreshing.

Sunday was the WSU fireworks. Ohhh, memory lane. We have been going to this as a family for as long as I can remember. There are about 10,000 people who gather around this little pond at my college. People walk around and visit while other people stare and people watch. Then, around 10 o'clock is the most magical firework show I've ever seen. It's lovely.

Monday Caden and I spent the day in Salt Lake shopping to our hearts desire at City Creek. We bought some more bath salts that are to die for and a shiny new tie for Caden's dad. Then, dinner of all dinners at Good Wood. Hellllllllo, chicken and potatoes.

Tuesday was my last day of real class. EVER. Besides the...maybe 4...classes I have in the Bachelor's year. That's a super great, weird, nervous, exciting feeling. Afterwards we celebrated with more delicious dinner with Caden's dad and grandparents at Maadox. We took a hundred rolls home with us. ...maybe not a hundred, but a lot.

After dinner we went back to the most magical place ever, Caden's grandparents ranch. Their ranch is such a heavenly place. Their garden grows every kind of vegetable and the horses are trained well enough to let me ride on them. It's like I'm a real farm girl all the sudden. Yee-haw.

Wednesday was the county rodeo with both our families. All that horseback riding got to my head, maybe. Something about the rodeo makes me really want to be a rodeo queen. Sequins, hairspray, big giant curls, and bright colored jeans. I was meant for Ms. Rodeo.

After all this fun and excitement, my body rebelled with a nasty cold. Saturday and Sunday I called in sick and spent majority of the weekend coughing my guts out on the couch. Phlem is my least favorite thing, so you can imagine my joy with all that business. However, I did get to watch "The Notebook", "New Year's Eve", and "Life as We Know It". Got caught up on all my chick flick romance movies and snuggled with the new pillow my Mom got me. Life isn't too bad when you're sick, I suppose.

Monday I decided my cold wouldn't get the best of me and me and Caden spent the day on the lake with some of the friends in my nursing class. We wakeboarded, knee boarded, Caden surfed, we tubed and we got some serious sun. Things like this make me miss my nursing class, they are a bunch of super great and fun people.

...and here I am now. Back to real life and back to coughing my guts up.   Turns out my body won the fight and I've now got bronchitis, sinus infection and a ruptured ear drum.  Hooray for sickness.    :)   But, a super fun week was worth all this trouble.   Hands down. 

Hooray for free time.   

Hooray for graduation.

Hooray for ruptured ear drums.

Sick and Bulging.

You know when you're out on your first date with a cute boy?  And you wear your skinny jeans to try to impress him?  And you suck in your fat all night long so you don't scare him away?  And then you finally get home and you unzip your jeans as fast as you can and your fat just comes bulging out of your jeans like a volcano?

That's like me during finals week.   

I suck in all my sickness the entire semester and then the second my body realizes the semester is over, I just explode all my sicknesses all at once like a volcano.   I've got a wicked cold, nasty cough, fever, chills, and a serious lack of energy.

Awesome.

Thanks to Caden and his cute nurturing skills.  I got medicines, juices, popsicles and blankets to keep me feeling better.   What a gem he is.   

Here is he, helping me study.   Melts my little heart.

Last Day of School. The End.

Last Tuesday was my last day of real class.   It's a little bitter sweet.   Of course I'm ecstatic to be done with school, I'm ready to graduate and I'm stoked to finally be a real live nurse.  

...but parts of me feels a little bummed that that chapter of my life is over.   Nursing school was a big chunk of something I didn't realize I was taken on.  It consumed my entire life.  My thoughts, my actions, my sleeping schedule, my showering schedule, my family time, my boyfriend/fiance/husband time, and my personality.   It's a journey that has changed my life forever and it lasted an entire two years.   So yeah, I'm a little sad for it to end.  

I've been going to college for seven years.  I've been going to school for twenty.   I've been studying, reading, memorizing, making flashcards, staying up late, waking up early, reviewing, more memorizing, rehearsing, explaining, asking questions, learning, more memorizing, testing, failing, passing, more memorizing, more learning for the past 7 years of my life.   Now it's over and I'm not sure how to be a normal working girl.   I don't know how to work 40 hours a week and then be done.  I don't know how to handle free time or a schedule that doesn't need to be written down day-to-day and planned to the moment.  

I'm not sure I know how to be normal.

...I'm not sure I'm ready for big-kid life.

...I'm not sure I'm ready for school to be over.



Things that Make me Happy.

Spend a full half-hour at a fabulous florist, garden store or greenhouse. Inhale.


Browse a bookstore and buy one classic book I've always meant to read.

Put a deep-conditioning treatment in my hair and soak my feet in a bubble or salt bath.

Go outside and do a cartwheel, summersault, or tumble.

Make a comforting treat that conjures up good memories: a root beer float, snickerdoodles or cinnamon toast with the crusts cut off.

Take a coffee break at a nice department store. Sniff uplifting new perfumes and try on a dozen lipsticks until I find the perfect shade.

Make a list of the best compliments I've ever received. Pin it up next to my computer and mirror.

Make some alone time in the bathroom, where I can read a trashy magazine in the tub or belt out Adele in the shower.

Let myself have total stillness for 15 minutes in the middle of the day, even if that means sitting in my car with my phone turned off.

Go shopping for one very specific and completely impractical thing I've always wanted, like kidskin gloves or a fascinator.

Coat my feet with an exfoliating lotion, put on cozy socks and keep them on all day long.

Paint my nails candy-apple red.

...just to name a few.

Bath Bombs and RN-ness.

Yesterday was a magical day.  Caden and I both had it off, which never happens.  No school. No work.  No homework.   Don't know how that worked out the way that it did, but I loved everything about it.

We went to City Creek and spent the day shopping our little hearts out.  I finally bought myself some awesome colored jeans.  Caden bought his first pair of real shorts,  and we loaded up on bath bombs from Lush.  

[If you're from Utah, go to Lush and get yourself a bath bomb.  Those things are incredible.   I love baths.  And a bath  bomb just throws me way over the edge.  ...in a good way.]

We bought one last night called Dragon Dust.  ...or something.    It's white and foamy.  Then the middle is orange and turns your bath water super orange.   And then when all the fizz is gone, the bath water is glittery.   A glittery bath makes me happier than anything.   Eeeeek! 

I wish I could have 100 more days with Caden without homework or school on the brain.   Just 25 more hours of precepting and three more tests and then I'm a free bird.   Eureka!  

Look out world, I'm almost an RN. 
Don't get sick. 
Keep your family out of the hospitals. 
This may be scary.  
...Kidding.

...kinda.

Anxious Aide.

It's difficult working as a CNA when you are licensed as a nurse.  It's super difficult.

Never have I disliked my job as an aide.  I think it's so rewarding and the things I'm able to see, do, and learn is such an incredible experience.   However, all the sudden I have this incredible amount of...anger or remorse or animosity or...something. 

 I can't tell if I need a swift kick in the butt while someone yells at me to get off my high horse.  Or, if I need to take a stand and realize that I am allowed to feel this way and I shouldn't have to work as an aide anymore after the amount of work I've put in to being a nurse.

When I'm at work and a nurse floats to our floor and asks a question that I know the answer to, I feel angry.  When a nurse walks out of a room and tells me to fill their water so they can go pass meds, I feel angry.  I feel mad about doing CNA work and I shouldn't.  

I'm an aide.  That's my job.  I know that. 
...but my knowledge is so beyond CNA work and it's incredibly frustrating that I can't put that to use.  Every time I come to work, my ego is smashed.  I feel inadequate and incompetent.  And, if you know me at all, you know that that is the worst feeling I can feel. 

I'm stuck in limbo.  I graduate as an RN in 21 days.   I finish my interniship in 6 days.  And, until those things are done, I'm not able to progress into a nurse.  It's too late to work as an LPN and it's too early to work as an RN.  So, here I am stuck as an aide.  

And I need to swallow my pride and work as the best aide I can possibly be.

...I just need a little encouragement.

Boogers and Homework.

Yesterday I got off work at 1pm.  I came home and immediatley climbed into bed.  Fell asleep for 5 hours.  F I V E hours.  That's no longer a nap.  That's a sleep.

I woke up and rushed to finish my homework so Caden and I could spend some quality time together.  Just a movie, or a snuggle, or cook dinner together or...something.  I miss that boy.

Well, in my mad rush I got flustered and wasn't thinking as clear as I should.  I took a 256 question test SIX times because I couldn't get a passing score.  I had all the right answers in front of me, and I had read them all over and over.  But, whenever I would go to take the test, I would mess up.  

Caden got home and my homework wasn't done.  Instead I was crying on the couch about how dumb nursing school is and how much I hated homework.   After 7 years of college and a million and a half assignments, you just hit your breaking point where you decide NO MORE.   That was my deciding factor last night.  

Caden, as cute as he is, just held me and let me cry boogers all over his shorts.  Instead of a cute, romantic, evening together cooking dinner and snuggling--he watched TV and I cried on his lap.  

Not my idea of a stellar evening.

Bleh.  Is it July 31st yet? 

Mormon Message: Pride Parade.

I know I'm late, but I just read this gem of a post and felt an incredible desire to blog.  This woman makes me feel like she is speaking from my own heart sometimes.  It's bizzare.  And comforting. 

As she blogs, she talkes about the Pride Parade in SLC and the group of LDS members who walked and supported the gay community.   This makes me so happy that I cry.   

I've blogged before that my sister is gay.  She is the most incredible, strong, lovely woman.   I will love and support her always.  I will continue to push for gay rights and I will stand for her and for her rights always.  

My transition into an active mormon was rough on her and rough on me.  How can I believe in a religion that doesn't support my sister life style?  How can I follow a prophet that is telling me my sister is living a sin?  It was hard.  And it still is hard.  And it does some damage on my testimony.    However, after a long talk and a serious heart to heart, I came to realize that my sister is my sister.  She is my family for always.  She is my very best friend and I will continue to love her and continue to support her and her girlfriend for always whether she wants to marry boys, girls or the television set. 

What an incredible step the church is making in walking in the Pride Parade.  That's a huge step. And it makes me happier than anything ever has.  I feel like I can blend my two worlds.  I can believe in a church and a God that I think is true, and I can love and support my sister and her relationship with her darling girlfriend.  My worlds can mesh and I can breathe easy knowing I don't have to pick a side. 

 As Stephanie@MormonChildBride said:

"People cheered for us as we walked. People stood on the street crying and thanking us. I cried too. Please forgive us, I thought, for taking so long. Forgive us for moving so slowly. We should have been here all along."

Agreed.  Please forgive us for taking so long.   We should have been here all along.

The Reception.

If you have a sudden urge to feel mushy-gooshy, romantic, smitten, lovey-dovey, want-to-smooch-my-lover kind of a mood: watch this.


Callie+Caden {reception} from Jesse Felter on Vimeo.

Internet. Precepting. Husbands. and Graduation.

Ohhhh, computer. Here I am juts blogging away at home on the couch with good intents of posting this as soon as we have some form of internet connection.   Soon, hopefully.  Real soon.

These past two to three-ish weeks have been madness.  I started precepting, which in nursing world is like an internship.  I am supposed to follow one nurse for 135 hours.   Luckily, I got a nurse who I knew before and he is pretty laid back and relaxed.  So, I pretend to be a nurse and he makes sure I’m doing everything correctly.  It’s comforting having him there, and I wish that I always had a nurse to double check my work.  One wrong move and I could kill a person.  That’s a little scary.   

On top of precepting 39 hours a week, I’m also working 24 hours a week and going to class 8 hours a week.  So, from Sunday to Saturday I’m putting in 80 hours of some sort of something related to nursing.   Plus, each shift begins at 0500, which leads me to wake up at 0330.  So, I have been going to bed at 7:00pm.   The worst part of going to bed early is that I miss my cute husband.  He has been working nights, so he rolls in around 9pm and comes to snuggle me in bed for a minute.  We talk about our day briefly with sleepy eyes and then he tucks me in before he goes to watch a movie on the couch.  

That makes for one sad Callie.   The first week or two I would go to bed crying because all I wanted to do was spend time with Caden but all I really could do was sleep.  Nursing school has officially taken over my life and it makes me cry.    Thankfully Caden is SUPER supportive and he reminds me that, in 135 hours, this will all be over and I’ll be a real nurse working only 3 days a week with no homework.   Who knows where I would be without Caden.  He keeps my little engine trucking along.  Toot-Toot.   …That’s an engine noise.

For those of you who blog-stalk me, you’ll remember that we were originally going to be married in August.  Thank my heavenly stars that we decided to move the day up.  Had we waited until August, I truly never would see Caden.  The only time I see him now is when we go to bed and sleepovers didn’t happen when we were just dating.  Good thing we got married in May, folks.  Prayers were answered with that decision.

Speaking of getting married, married life is incredible.  Cade is such a good, good, good husband.  He takes very good care of me, especially during this precepting business.  He cooks dinner, cleans the house, folds our laundry, waters our little garden, and always makes sure that I’m happy.  What a gem.  I can’t wait for the day that I can be a wife, instead of a nursing student.  I look forward to dates, romantic nights, snuggles, traveling, making babies, and being able to stay up late just being silly.    It’s so close I can taste it.  Eeeeek.  So close.   

So, there you have it.  That’s our life.   I plan for some good blogs in a few weeks, when I’m a little more sane.  31 days, 4 hours, 38 minutes until graduation.  And counting.

…now 37 minutes.

Setting Goals.

Goals for after graduation (which is in 40 days, by the way):

Start yoga. 
Start running. 
Find a job I love.
 Make a difference. 
Spend way more time with my husband with way less worry about school. 

There.  If I say it outloud, now it must be done.

...to be continued.

Clinicals in Rehab.

This week I got the opportunity to do a clinical at a rehab and detox center.  Woah, that was an incredible experience.  I saw things from the eyes of an addict and it was such an eye opening experience.  There were moments when I cried, moments when I laughed, moments when I was afraid, moments when I hopeful, moments when I felt discouraged, and lots and lots and lots of moments when I truly was touched emotionally.  

As a student nurse, I was able to sit in on their group therapy sessions and the things these patients were sharing was such an “aha” moment for me.   I’ve blogged before that my dad was an addict.  He was an addict for several years.  For my whole life I’ve heard stories about drugs and addiction from the sober eyes.  Stories of how drugs affected the life of my mom, my siblings, my grandparents etc.  Not once did I hear stories from my dad, the addict himself. 

So, when I was able to hear these stories at rehab it was such an incredible experience for me.  The reasoning for starting drugs,  the reasons for trying to detox, the effects of their family life, the way they got the drugs, the way they found a dealer, etc.  These people shared their most intimate details about their addiction with me.  It wasn’t only therapeutic for them, but so very therapeutic for me. 

Addiction is a scary thing for me.  I worry about my children being affected by addiction,  my husband, my siblings, my parents, and myself.  Anyone can be affected.  Everyone can be affected.  I saw patients of all ages, young, old, teenagers, mothers, fathers, rich, poor, successful, not successful. Anyone.  

It was such an experience.  Super emotional.  Super inspiring.  Super insightful.   And I still can’t stop thinking about it.  I pray the patients I met make it out of the rehab unit and I pray they never go back to their way of life.  But, that’s something they will have to continue to work at every single day.  Every day.  And I admire them so very much for just taking the first step, despite how absolutely difficult it must be.

Keep going.  Keep trying.  Don’t ever give up.
Beat it. Win it. 
Amen.

Heaven at City Creek.

For those of you who live in Utah: ever been to Lush in City Creek? Oh my lanta. It's like Bath and Body Works x 100. They make all their own soaps, shampoos, body wash, tooth paste, bubble baths and...my most favorite of all...massage bars. We bought one. Wanted to buy one million.

Side Note: The other night I went grocery shopping. And, because I'm very stubborn, I refused to make two trips from car back to apartment. So, I attempted to carry allllllll the groceries in one hand. And then I dropped my keys so I bent down with all those groceries on one side of my body and, what do you know, I tweaked my back.

So, my cute Caden rubbed my shoulders last night before bed with our new massage bar. Holy heaven. The smells coming from the bar, the warm icy-hot-feeling it left, my cute husband pampering me--that's what heaven is like. When I picture heaven, it's smothered in massage bars and Caden. ....and hamburgers.

Moral of the story: go to Lush. Get a massage bar. Make your husband/boyfriend/neighbor/friend/dad/mom/stranger from the bar rub your down. It's mind blowing.

Typing From Home.

I’m typing this post from our brand new laptop.   Exciting news.   This was our first big purchase together as husband and wife, and I would say we did pretty dang good.   Caden usually picks one he likes and I usually say “Perfect.  Lets get it.”  And that’s how we make choices.   Where he is strong, I am weak.  Where I am strong, he is weak.  We compliment each other well.  For instance, I’m horrible at technology.  All I know is if its pretty or if I’m able to facebook/blog/email from it.   Caden isn’t the greatest at decorating.  So, he buys something and I make it pretty.   It works out well.

Today I had the entire day off to study.  Guess what I did.   Everything EXCEPT study.   We cleaned our apartment, I officially changed my name, we made dinner, baked some cookies, vacuumed my car, visited my mom, played with her puppy, etc.   Around 9pm I decided to study, just for a few hours until our midnight showing of Permethius.   Guess I can’t be upset if I don’t do well on my test.  I had every chance in the world to study.   The test is on mood disorders and schizophrenia.  How hard can that be?  

Am I right?   J

Celebration.

Im blaming our no blog posts on our new internet.  But, we are alive!  And we are still married. Suprisingly, that silly boy has decided to stick with me. Something about..eternity and beyond. :) He is much too good to me. Just last week I came home from an 8 hour shift to dinner made and a bubble bath a brewing. Yep, my husband makes me bubble baths. Isn't he the greatest? 

I know people say this all the time, but married life really is the best thing. I was always so terrified of being married. I thought it consisted of fighting, jealousy and money issues. Well, I'm happy to report we haven't fought, been jealous or had money issues. I know it's still early in the game, but I would say we communicate pretty dang well. Thank goodness!

This summer has been full of festivities already, and it's only June. We just bought season passes to the local amusement park, plus we have season passes to the local soccer team, hockey team, indoor football team, water slide park and ski slopes. Yeah, we are awesome.

My only complaint about this summer is school. School. School and more School. I don't recommend summer school and I definitely don't recommend summer school when your husband isn't going to school. Oh man, it's hard. All I want to do is swim and play with my husband, not study or learn about being a nurse. Luckily, Caden is super supportive. Just last night he sat on the bed right next to me while I took a 6 hour test on our new laptop. SIX HOURS he sat and just watched TV and rubbed my back, kissing me for encouragement every few questions. That's pretty dang supportive. Never the less, the blasted test took me 7 tries to pass. Super discouraging. After the 5th time of not passing, I start to doubt my abilities as a nurse. It affects my self esteem pretty hard.

Also affecting my self esteem, I'm still looking for an LPN job. I've applied several times for several positions, all report back with a "try again next time" response. I've had meetings with my manager that have led to tears of frustration and led me to believe that maybe, for whatever reason, she doesn't want to hire me. It's hard and it's frustrating. As much as I love my job, I'm ready to work as a nurse. I'm trying to have a better attitude about it and I'm trying to trust in God. He's obviously got better plans for me and I'm learning to turn my plans into his plans.

So, there you have it. That's us in a nut-shell. We've almost reached our month-iversary. I'm almost graduated from the RN program. and I've almost blogged a whole entire post.

That's something to celebrate, friends.

C E L E B R A T E.