4 years

It boggles my mind how four years could have gone by so quickly.

It was four years ago today that I nervously sat down at a computer to take the NCLEX (aka: nursing boards). No amount of time or studying can instill any sort of confidence that you'll do well on this test. There's really no way to prepare other than to try to absorb an impossibly massive amount of information into your brain. Patho, anatomy, pharm, lab values, peds, psych, blah, blah, blah. It makes me cringe just reminiscing... and makes me so thankful that I passed on the first time around!

Having been at my hospital going on 6 years in June (holy moly!), I'm starting to think about other things that are out there and other opportunities that I can take advantage of. I'm not ready to move on from the babies quite yet, but I'm hoping to orient to postpartum so I can broaden my knowledge and gain some new skills and also those that I've completely forgotten from nursing school. The idea of travel nursing has been floating around in my head, too. California, North Carolina, New York, Tennessee, Louisiana... I could just pick a place and go -- pretty exciting! 

BTS: Breaking Dawn: Part 1

A few of my thoughts about the behind the scenes documentary of Breaking Dawn: Part 1...

Director Bill Condon (center) is standing next to a guy in a Ravens hat.
Not sure who that guy is, but he sure has good taste in sports teams!

While I was in Louisiana in 2010, they were filming the honeymoon scenes in Brazil.
Pretty sure that Rob & Kristen landed at the NOLA airport an hour after I departed.
Bummer.

My friends and I joke that were were in the wrong "BR" - Baton Rouge instead of Brazil. 

Still had lots of fun on that trip, though!

What a crazy day that was! I was in Seattle with friends,
with plans to drive to the coast of Washington to visit Forks and La Push.
Mother nature had other plans, however, and decided to produce an earthquake in Japan,
and threatened to send a tsunami towards the West Coast of the US.
Luckily, the projected "wave" was only 4 inches in the direction we were headed, so off we went!
Daredevils, we were. ;)

These are my favorite wolves out of the past three movies.

The wolf-talk is weird, but I love the way they look.

The "fake" Bella is super duper creepy. But also kinda cool.

I give props to Kristen for trying to beat it up, though. lol

Do I even need to write anything?

The transformation scene is, by far, my favorite scene in the movie -- and maybe in the whole franchise of movies. To see how they transformed disgusting, emaciated Bella into pretty, vampire Bella was really interesting.

OMGGGGGGGGGG!!

Pink Party

This past weekend I went to a baby shower for my friend, Erin, who is expecting a little girl, Makena, in May. There's been a baby boom among my friends and family in the past 2 years or so, but, really... can you ever have too many babies in your life? Of course, this is coming from a person who takes care of babies for a living, so I guess I'm a little biased :) Anyway, the shower was lovely - yummy food, good company, and lots of pink!

Weekend in NYC

This past weekend I went up to New York City with my good friend, Nicole, for a much needed mini-getaway. I'm glad we were able to pull off the trip, especially with both of our crazy, hectic lives/schedules. Our bus was leaving at 11:15 on Saturday morning, so I headed out early to Target to pick up some snacks and the Breaking Dawn DVD (of course!). We were close to missing the bus, but (with a persuasive tone and a little bit of charm) I got them to wait an extra few minutes for Nicole to show up -- and then off we went!


The ride up was smooth and we, thankfully, didn't hit any traffic. After checking into the hotel, we headed over to Ellen's Stardust Diner for lunch. This is the place where waiters and waitresses sing while they serve. Pretty entertaining, though some of the songs were a bit dull. There was this funny, eccentric, older couple sitting next to us who were sometimes more interesting than the talent, but overall the experience was pretty fun.

We headed over to Times Square where we encountered a flash mob. The cool part was that when it ended, this guy got down on one knee and proposed to his girlfriend. Super cute.

The guy on the left is proposing to the girl with long dark hair

A couple of stores later and we were ready to head back to the hotel where we chilled and watched Breaking Dawn (yay!) before heading out for the nights "main event."

Besides just wanting to get away, the real purpose for this trip was to see Pat McGee play at Joe's Pub. It had been 5 years since I last saw Pat play live, so I was stoked to see him again and to introduce Nicole to his music. The place has a really nice atmosphere, but, man, do they pack in the people! They also charge a fortune for food and drinks -- shrimp cocktail: $12, two cranberry juices: $14. Yikes! Other than that, it was a really fun night. Pat & company sounded so good and I heard lots of my favorite songs, so it was all worth it in the end.

Video of "I Don't Think I'm Listening" by Pat McGee

Video of "Elizabeth" by Pat McGee

Back at the hotel that night, we were focused on all the news programs that were running stories about the death of Whitney Houston. I pulled up some Whitney songs in iTunes on my laptop and we sang until we fell asleep. BEST. BED. EVER. !!! Gosh, that bed was so damn comfy!


The next morning we met my friends Lynsey and Jen for breakfast, coffee/tea, and a trip to The Strand bookstore before checking out of the hotel and heading over to catch the bus home. Go figure, we were sitting in the cab when 1:30pm struck and we knew we were missing our bus. Standing outside in the freezing cold, we waited another hour before we were able to get the next bus. Lots to talk about and never enough time, so I was happy we could sit next to each other and chat (between naps) on the way home.

On our way home! 

One word to describe this weekend?

Time flies...

I think it's pretty crazy to think that three short months ago I was in California, camping out in a tent in the Nokia Plaza, waiting for the Breaking Dawn Part 1 premiere. Fast forward to today, and the movie is already being released on DVD at midnight. Stores are having release parties and festivities for the event, but, to be honest, I think I've done enough to NOT have to be there at midnight when it's released. Flying across the country and slumming it on the concrete of Los Angeles to go to the premiere? Now THAT is what I call a true fan! I'll be picking up my copy at Target tomorrow morning after a lovely night of sleep :)

Me and Rob Pattinson

Talking to Stephenie Meyer

Me and Taylor Lautner