Anesthesia Holiday Party

I spend so much time at home studying, that I forget how much I like to capture to moment.  It's especially dreamy when there are a few flakes coming down outside and am allowed to stay snuggled up in my office next to my space heater.  The simply joys of being a lifelong student.

One of the other perks of being in training is that Paul and I were fortunate enough to join the department holiday party at the Pittsburgh Zoo this year.  We got all fancied up in the freezing cold and ventured off towards Highland Park to get to the Zoo.   I was excited to see the location and meet up with some of Paul's friends and coworkers.

We feasted on snacks and wandered around to look at the swimming creatures.  The octopus was crazy cool.  After an evening of trying to be proper, we could hold back no longer - it was time to pet the stingrays.  I went first, having a sleeveless dress and all.  Paul was next.  However, we were most impressed by the young kid who went in with both arms and forgot to roll up the sleeves on his dress shirt due to his overwhelming excitement.  It was hilarious to see him remove his soaking wet body, and try to think of what to do next. I swear he went in about neck deep!

So smooth those rays are.  Reminds me of Bergs and Joel in the Bahamas!

Paul, rolling up his sleeves to dive in!

~ It's a Pizza - Mamma Mia! ~

What a nice way to spend an evening.  Then it was home to get some sleep.  The next day I made a delicious pizza for dinner - something we will be adding to our routine menu.  Delicious doesn't get much easier, although I bet it could get a little be healthier... oh well!

Dinner for two - at home date nights are my favorite.

Dinner with Friends

Dan, Katie, and I preparing for the feast.

 I always try to run into a few of my favorites while I'm back home.  This time we were so lucky to be invited to Dan and Katie's new home for dinner.  Katie put on a feast made for a king! 

Dan showed us the bar he was working on and the man pad in the basement.  I can sense that a few Packer games will be put on the television down stairs.  We even got to meet the newest addition to their family: Josie!  What a cute little one.  She liked my toes, bold strategy puppy.

Another two fine ladies and one fine gentleman I was able to connect with while home was Ashley and Lizzo!  We met up for a quick dinner at AppleBees in Appleton.  Ashley was filling me in on all of Kayden's new tricks and how he has become quite the clever Christmas shopper.  Turns out I don't have much for games on my Ipad, but we just let him go nuts with the camera which was pretty entertaining.

Cheeeeeeeeeeese.

 So great to catch up with you all!  Ahh, miss you already...

Thanksgiving Weekend at Camp Fence

Dad and I in the trees waiting on a deer...

Blaze orange is very slimming.  So is camo.

You would think that during vacation would be the best time to blog, but time always seems to slip away on me when I'm home visiting.  Additionally, internet is hard to come by in Seymour, so I have to use my cellphone to power up my computer.  This makes for slow blogging, as you can imagine.

Dad and Tristan splitting wood, to keep us warm all winter.

Mum, Dad, Tristan, and me at Joel's cabin - Nov 2012

The Hunting MEN: Bill, Curt, Tristan

Anywho, I wanted to share some footage and stories from Thanksgiving weekend up at Joel's cabin.  Thanksgiving continues to be a time to reflect on all that we are thankful for and it's a time that I wish I could be close to Joel.  This year we were fortunate to be able to go up to his cabin and spend sometime surrounded by his favorite things: 

snow, hunting, family, and the outdoors.

The only deer I saw... behind a game farm fence.  Expensive mistake.

Excited to be in the woods.

I knew I was going to be home over Thanksgiving break and we were planning to spend it up north, so I thought it would be fun to sit in the tree and go hunting with Curty.  I used to hunt more when I was little after I so proudly aced my hunter safety course!  Whooot whooot.  The hunter safety course leaders announced that there was only one student to score 100% on the written test, and only one student who failed the distance test.... I was that person for both.  Dohhhh!  Ohh well.  So, I bought a license this year to try my luck.

Curty in his second home: the truck.

Breakfast sausage station.  Man land.

Dad and I went out morning and night until we were frozen, and we didn't see anything.  The deer were pretty smart at this point and would leave moments before we got to the stand in the morning.  There were fresh tracks all around and their daily corn was licked clean.  All I can say is... better luck next year!  I had a blast in the woods and hopefully can continue the tradition in the coming years!

"Did ya see Da Thurdy Pointer?..."

Turkey Day

Matt is carving the delicious turkey!

The night before Thanksgiving is apparently the most profitable night for local establishments… I remember hearing some of the crazy stories of how much people would make tending bar that night.  Mom, Dad and I stopped into see Grandma Marsh and I was able to spend time with Kyle’s kids.  They were having fun playing games and running around the house.

Afterwards we met up with Dan and Katie up at Jackson Point to grab some dinner before the band blasted our ears off and Lyssa and I went to downtown Seymour.  There were a lot of familiar faces out, and it was a blast to catch up with Dan and Katie to hear about their new puppy!

Thursday morning I made my wild rice with dried fruit and we had Thanksgiving with the Nagels.  It was so nice to see them all under one roof on Thanksgiving.  Grandpa VB even stopped by for a while after he had lunch with Grandma.  The food was excellent – I could barely move after dinner and didn’t have a spare ounce of room for dessert.  

After chatting after dinner for a while, Mom, Dad, and I took off for Joel’s camp to spend the rest of our Thanksgiving Holiday relaxing in Joel’s presence at camp.  It was nice to be up there to relax and reflect on the year that has gone by all too quickly.  I cannot even begin to explain the ways that life has changed in the past year, but I’m sure blessed to be surrounded by such supportive friends and family.

There’s always something we can be thankful for – I am thankful for the memories and special moments we had together.  Miss you more each day Buck.

Guest Speaker

After my recent return to Pittsburgh, Lyssa and I were chatting on the phone about the possibility of me coming to see her school and her class.  For some reason, it worked out just perfectly because I was flying into Wisconsin on Tuesday afternoon and if I hurried on home, I could make it to her classroom in the early afternoon.  AWESOME!  After my GI exam, I was scrambling around to try to get stuff done in time to have dinner and leave bright and early Tuesday morning.  The 3:30AM alarm came too quickly and soon I was in the car on the way to the airport slugging coffee like it was my job.  

A photo I used in my presentation, my big brother inspires me.

Toothbrush on endoscopy to freak out the kids!

I made most of my presentation on the plane on the way to MKE and was rummaging around Google for some gross medical facts and weird X-rays for the kids.  Haha, I was cracking up with all the random stuff I found and even managed to download a video of an endoscope where they removed a mouth moistening sponge from a patient’s stomach.   I was kind of nervous about the presentation, so wore my short little white coat and brought each kid a pen shaped like a syringe full of liquid and some stethoscopes to play with.  The talk went pretty well and I was able to witness the energy of a classroom full of 7^th graders in action.  Wheww!!  It gets even wilder once you gross them out a bit!  It was really quite impressive to see Lyssa in action as “Ms. P”!

All in all, my immense respect for teachers was confirmed!  I only worked with the kids for two hours and I was ready to go to sleep I was so worn out!  Haha!  After school was done, Lyssa and I celebrated the success at school with a double date with our mothers at Applebee’s.  Perfect!