Bernhoft

This dude was on Ellen.
He is from Norway and is super goofy.
Needless to say, I fell in love.

whirlwind of fun and crazy

My life is all over the place right now. I just looked at my calendar for August and literally (and I really mean literally) every single day is planned out. If I am not working, I am doing something, somewhere, with someone. Jay says I overbook myself, which is probably true and why I got sick last night (stomach ache, nausea, and ended up vomiting... ugh), but I love living every day like it is my last. I don't want to look back on my youth and think I didn't experience enough. I think part of the reason I am like this is because of my job. I take care of people in a time where they are most vulnerable... and with that comes a lot of emotion.  Plus sitting in a hospital bed with nothing to do gives people a lot of time to think and reflect on life.  From these experiences, I have concluded there are far too many people who live with regret. They regret not spending enough time with their loved ones. They regret not traveling enough. They regret not living enough.  I refuse to let that happen to me.

In the future, I will look back on Summer of 2011 and remember that I:

... went to see Brett Dennen in concert... spent time at my cabin with friends... went on a boat cruise in Chicago for my brother's graduation and mother's day... ate delicious food in many different restaurants... spent a weekend in Lake Geneva with friends... went to Summerfest in Milwaukee... watched fireworks with Jay laying in the grass... used a chain saw for the first time... saw 311 and Sublime with Rome... drank many beers... ran (and walked) a 5k for charity... rented a house on Lake Michigan with 9 of my favorite ladies... saw the last Harry Potter movie and cried... went to my family's annual picnic... went to the flea market... had lots of laughs... spent a couple days in northern Wisconsin at a friend's cabin... spent a week in Hawaii with my family... walked around the entire coast of Lake Geneva... spent as much time as I could with the people I love...

Enjoying the city lights at night.

311 and Sublime with Rome Show

Playing with sparklers at my cabin

Summer Fest in Milwaukee

Walking around downtown Lake Geneva

Relaxing on the beach of Lake Michigan

After we ran our 5k

Outside the lake house we rented on Lake Michigan

Our private beach for the weekend

4th of July

Summer is coming to an end... and that means school is starting soon. I think I am pushing myself now more than ever, because I know it will be impossible to fit as many fun trips and plans into my schedule once school starts, especially because this quarter coming up includes clinical rotation.  I am excited, nervous, and stressed all at the same time. 

I am also thinking about my future and how much is about to change. Jay graduates from his PhD program this December or at the very latest May 2012. He has to find a job between now and then. After he finds a job he will be moving somewhere in the Chicagoland area. I also plan on finding a new job next year in OB.  I want to experience being an OB nurse before I graduate as a Women's Health NP. There is a lot for me to learn. What stresses me out the most is that I plan to look for a job in the city, so I will have to move to Chicago... but then comes a lot more stress... Who will I live with? Can I afford it while paying for grad school out of pocket? Where will Jay be living? What neighborhood would I move to? Do I stay with the same company so I can keep the tuition reimbursement through work? When should I make this big change?  Will I even find a job in OB? It is all just too much. 

So... for now... I am choosing to ignore the future, live in the now, and bask in the summer sun.

Dear Summer,

     You and I have become the best of friends. You make me happy and we always have fun together. Please don't leave. Please extend your Midwest visit until November. Kthanks.

                           Sincerely,

                                  you friend Rachelle.

summer is...

live music

the smell of campfires lingering in my hair for days

fresh food

concerts

the lake

drinking beer during early hours

sparklers

music festivals

frisbee

boys being boys

laying in the grass

blue skies

couch to 5k

I am so extremely out of shape. Ever since starting grad school I put exercising on the back burner. I have totally let myself go and it is pretty gross. I kept telling myself that it was no big deal, because after grad school was over, I would hire a personal trainer and kick myself back into shape. Well, I can't take it anymore. I don't like being this unhealthy. Since I am taking the summer off from school, I am going to dedicate the time and energy I was using toward school and use it toward getting healthy again.  

So, to make exercising more exciting, I decided to sign up for a 5k.  A 5k translates to 3.1 miles, which to most people is not a far distance, but I do not run at all and I really do need to train for this. It's pretty pathetic that I have to train for such a short distance, because lots of people I know run marathons and half marathons and a 5k is like a warm up to them. But I am me and I am not them so... that is that. 

I found a program called "The Couch-to-5k Running Plan".  Their whole philosophy is that people try to become runners and they push themselves too hard at first and they tend to burn themselves out and lose interest. Well, this plan is a 9 week plan... and the race I signed up for is exactly 9 weeks away... eek! You run/walk/jog 3 times a week for no more than 30 minutes. I read through it and it is totally doable.

I also found a bunch of podcasts on iTunes that have people who talk you through each week. So, you just play the podcast and they tell you when to run and when to walk based on "The Couch-to-5k Running Plan" and they have even synced their music to go along with it!

Wish me luck... I am headed to the gym!

seduce me with your hobbit voice

This is Brett Dennen.
I am going to see him tonight!

Take a listen.
I let him seduce me with his music.

Even though he looks like a tall hobbit.

summer off

     So, after reading my last post, I think you can understand why I have decided to take the summer off from school. I was going back and forth about it for awhile, but in the end I think I made the right decision. My graduation date will be postponed for 10 weeks, but in the long run, what's 10 weeks?  Most importantly, this will help my mental sanity to have a nice break (I am half way through my program! yay!) and I am now able to partake in so many fun plans for the summer. I have also convinced myself I will work extra shifts so I can make more money... we'll see how that goes.

     One of the most exciting plans I have made for the summer is a trip to Hawaii!! My family has not traveled outside of this country in a couple years, which has been unfortunate since we used to go on big trips every year. It has been a struggle with both myself and my brother being in college, because our schedules were so hectic. Now that he has just graduated college and with me taking the summer off from grad school... HAWAII here we come!

     More upcoming excitements: My brother's graduation party. Cabin trips with friends. 311 and Sublime show in Chicago. Renting a house on Lake Michigan with 8 of my favorite ladies. Summerfest in Milwaukee. Going to the beach. Late nights in the city with my best friends. 

    One of the other things I am extremely happy to be able to bring back into my life (at least until the fall quarter starts) is reading for FUN.  Ever since I started grad school, I have picked up and put down at least 5 novels that I thought I was dying to read.  I do not blame the authors for their lack of story telling, it is just difficult for me to make it through a book when I know that I should be spending my time reading texts books.  I will pick up a book, read 100 pages in, then be busy for three weeks solid with paper writing and studying for tests, then never pick the book back up again.  

I already have a stack of summer reads:

 ... a book that I picked up and put down after page 25. This time it gets a real chance.

Summary: Geek Love is the story of a carnival family, the Binewskis, who save their traveling "Carnival Fabulon" from bankruptcy by giving birth to fabulous freaks - the children born to Lil Binewski after she ingests drugs, insecticides, arsenic, radioisotopes, anything to make her babies more "special". The result is a world readers have never entered before, a place of horror and humor, where vengeance and love are realized in unimaginable ways. And where some unforgettable "Ripley's Believe It or Not" characters are both exotically unique - and hauntingly, chillingly, just like us.

... recommended to me by my lovely, Laura. 

Apparently it is being turned into a movie now.

Summary: Aibileen is a black maid in 1962 Jackson, Mississippi, raising her seventeenth white child.  She's always taken orders quietly, but lately it leaves her with a bitterness she can no longer bite back.  Her friend Minny has certainly never held her tongue, or hold on to a job for very long, but now she's working for a newcomer with secrets that leave her speechless.  And white socialite Skeeter has just returned from college with ambition and a degree but, to her mother's lament, no husband. Normally Skeeter would find solace in Constantine, the beloved maid who raised her, but Constantine has inexplicably disappeared.

Together, these seemingly different women join to work on a project that could forever alter their destinies and the life of a small town - to write, in secret, a tell-all book about what it's really like to work as a black maid in the white homes of the South.  Despite the terrible risks they will have to take, and the sometimes humorous boundaries they will have to cross, these three women unite with one intention: hope for a better day.

... found this at a book store a year or two ago and have not had the chance to give it a try.  I have heard good things.

Summary: This is the story of two women. Their lives collide one fateful day, and one of them has to make a terrible choice, the kind of choice we hope you never have to face. Two years later, they meet again - the story starts there... 

The publishers of Chris Cleave's novel "don't want to spoil" the story by revealing too much about it, and there's good reason not to tell too much about the plot's pivot point. All you should know going in to Little Bee is that what happens on the beach is brutal, and that it braids the fates of a 16-year-old Nigerian orphan (who calls herself Little Bee) and a well-off British couple--journalists trying to repair their strained marriage with a free holiday--who should have stayed behind their resort's walls. The tide of that event carries Little Bee back to their world, which she claims she couldn't explain to the girls from her village because they'd have no context for its abundance and calm. But she shows us the infinite rifts in a globalized world, where any distance can be crossed in a day--with the right papers--and "no one likes each other, but everyone likes U2." Where you have to give up the safety you'd assumed as your birthright if you decide to save the girl gazing at you through razor wire, left to the wolves of a failing state.

... I picked it up in a box of free books. So many women read Danielle Steel, so I will give it a try. Don't laugh.

Summary: A violent crime brings together four lives in Danielle Steel’s sixtieth bestselling novel, the story of a mother’s courage, a family’s terror, and a triumph of human strength and dignity in the face of overwhelming odds.

Outside the gates of a California prison, Peter Morgan is released after four long years and vows to redeem himself in the eyes of the young daughters he left behind. Simultaneously, Carl Waters, a convicted murderer, is set on the path of freedom with him. That night, three hundred miles south in San Francisco, police detective Ted Lee comes home to a silent house; for twenty-nine years, he has been living for his job—and slowly falling out of love with his wife. Across town, in an exclusive Pacific Heights neighborhood, a mother tries to shield her three children from the panic rising within her. Four months after her husband’s death, Fernanda Barnes faces a mountain of debt she cannot repay, a world destroyed, and a marriage lost.

Within weeks, the lives of these four people will collide in ways none of them could have foreseen. For Fernanda, whose life had once been graced by beautiful homes, security, success, and stunning wealth, the death of her brilliant, brooding husband was already too much to bear. She simply couldn’t imagine a greater loss, until a devastating crime rocks her family to its core—and brings Detective Ted Lee into her life.
A man of unshakable integrity, Lee will soon become the one person who tries to save Fernanda’s family from a terrifying fate. Fernanda must draw on a strength she never knew she had. Racing against time in the underbelly of the criminal world, buffeted by the dark side of power, and unmoored by loss and betrayal, no one can predict where this tragedy will take them.

... no idea how this book showed up on my shelf, but excited to read it.

Summary: Fifteen-year-old Christopher John Francis Boone is mathematically gifted and socially hopeless, raised in a working-class home by parents who can barely cope with their child's quirks. He takes everything that he sees (or is told) at face value, and is unable to sort out the strange behavior of his elders and peers.

Late one night, Christopher comes across his neighbor's poodle, Wellington, impaled on a garden fork. Wellington's owner finds him cradling her dead dog in his arms, and has him arrested. After spending a night in jail, Christopher resolves--against the objection of his father and neighbors--to discover just who has murdered Wellington. He is encouraged by Siobhan, a social worker at his school, to write a book about his investigations, and the result--quirkily illustrated, with each chapter given its own prime number--is The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time.

beyond frazzled.

My to do list is making me frazzled. I am trying to stay calm and just focus on one thing at a time and celebrating with a "woop woop!" each time I get to cross something off.

TO DO (in the next two days):

• Study and take a quiz on the assessment of the abdomen and cardiovascular system
• Do an abdominal and cardiovascular assessment on someone
• Submit my groups diagnostic paper on a fake patient with abdominal pain and other such symptoms (we diagnosed her with acute cholecystitis) >cholecystitis<
• Write an evaluation of my peers in my group for said diagnostic paper
• Take a quiz for my research class on descriptive, exploratory and experimental study designs
• Buy: makeup remover, shampoo, things to decorate my hat for the derby party this weekend, ingredients for the food I am making for the derby party, booze for party (summer shandy!), a gift for my brother's graduation
• Decorate hat for derby party
• Alter my mom's dress for my cousin's wedding in two weeks
• Change my bed linens
• Clean my room
• Do my nails
• Get my TB test read at work. I can already tell ya... I don't have Tuberculosis.
• Make cards for my mom for mother's day and my brother for graduating college

The reason I must must get all of this done today and tomorrow... is because I am busy busy busy! Tomorrow night I am having dinner with Jay's family for mother's day. Early Saturday, Jay and I are having lunch with my family. Saturday afternoon into the night, we go to my friend's house for her annual Derby Party where we all dress in swanky clothes and pretend we fancy big hats and drinking mint juleps. Sunday morning, we wake up early and go to my brother's graduation from UIC. Sunday afternoon we board the Spirit of Chicago cruise ship at Navy Pier and have a dinner cruise along the Lake Michigan Chicago coast and eat, drink, and take fun pictures with the city skyline in celebration of my bro's big graduation and my mom for being mom.    

... just breathe. hee hee whoooooo. hee hee whoooo. Can ya blame me for Lamaze breathing? I am going to be a Women's Health NP after all!

"Can I go to the derby party?" says Dante.

My cat is a weirdo. 

He decides to sit on my hat and refused to move as I was playing with ideas on how to decorate it.

Trying not to get too excited

So, I haven't really talked about school much lately, mostly because it has been drab.  I learn a lot, yes, but the hands on experiences are what I really love and love to talk about. So, I am excited to report that my clinical rotation starts this summer! This summer's rotation will focus on basic health assessment. By the end, I should know how to fully assess people and know what the next steps are to take if I see a problem.  I found a place that is close to home that has two Certified Nurse Midwives in the practice. I am beyond excited to work with them because the thought of becoming a midwife has always sat in the back of my mind.  I am the type of person who is always planning and jumping ahead (those of you who know me are probably laughing at the solid truth in that statement). So, now that becoming a Women's Health  NP is coming up.. I am already thinking.. do I want to become a midwife??  I need to slllowwww down and make it through the program, then graduate, then get a job, then work for a little while, throw in a marriage and some kids in there... and THEN I can think about becoming a midwife. Either way I hope this works out. I haven't received a definite yes from them yet, I should know by next week.  Trying not to get too excited.  This experience with them could be so valuable to me.  So, for those of you who pray... pray for me that this works out. K thanks! 

Fabric Flowers in Bloom

Today was a glorious day. 

My friend Amanda came to town.

We ate crepes.

Spinach and cream crepes.
The one below is an apple crepe.

So incredible.

Apple Crepe from Chez Pierre Creperie.

Drank chai tea lattes to keep us warm.

It was quite chilly outside, especially for April. grrr.

Investigated a new recreation area being constructed in our home town.

walking in through the entrance

water playground for the children

I sometimes forget how colorful sand is.

My feets.

I used to love to swing. Not as much anymore.
Almost gives me motion sickness. Boo.

Visited Manda's mom at work and she gave us a bunch of free stuff that they use as incentives for the customers to sign up for accounts or credit cards! We like free stuff!

Manda with all her goodies... blanket.. backpack... books.

Joined our friend Ashley at her house.
Which looks lovely and fresh.
Hopefully she posts a before and after of her home (hint hint).
She and her husband redecorated drastically since last year.

Drank some tea.

such a funny mug.

Made headbands out of felt and old t-shirts.

Manda's headband.

My headband! I don't usually like pink, but this really pale pink I am liking!

This is the tutorial I used to learn how to make the roses... then I just cut off the bottom of the rose (you'll see the long end in the tutorial) and hot glued them to a strip of jersey t shirt.

Fun day.

These are a few of my favorite things.

I have an insane love for dresses. They are my favorite thing to wear.  I think it is because I do not have to put any thought into my outfit. I pick out a dress, sometimes a belt to go with it, a cardigan if its chilly and bing bang boom, I have a whole outfit! Dresses are easy. One piece of clothing and I am done. 

I recently counted the number of dresses in my closet (including the four I purchased last week... oops) and my grand total... yikes... 71 DRESSES. Holy guacamole! This includes summer dresses, maxi dresses, formal dresses, beach dresses, tshirt/jersey dresses, all of them... but I guess it is still an insane amount of dresses. I do, however, wear almost all of them all the time. I wear dresses whenever I can. In the summer with flip flops or strappy sandals... in the fall with tights, boots, and a cardigan... in the winter with leggings and sweaters. I wear them year round. Dresses anchor my closet.

It's a wonderful obsession.

in South Carolina Summer 09.

Dancing at Jay's mama's 50th bday party

Drinking wine at a friend's apt.

Derby Party May 2010

At a graduation party summer 2010

Ready to go out for my birthday July 2010

Boat Cruise for my birthday Summer 2010

My cousins baby, Summer 2010.

Bachelorette Party Summer 2010

Summer 2010 at the Chicago Botanic Gardens
(this doesnt really qualify since its a skirt, but i love this outfit)

Fall 2010. Before the DMB show in Chicago

Fall 2010

This past New Years

Seeing a band... being goofy.

March 2011 at a Breast Cancer Benefit

In Germany

Two summers ago

At a wedding a few years back

New Years Eve a couple years ago

At a bar at U of I

Dancing with Jay at a party

Fun with Shley in my basement