Melissa's Wedding Reception

Last Saturday, Brian and I went to the wedding reception for a friend of mine from nursing school. Melissa and James were married in January in Costa Rica and they celebrated at Park Ave Restaurant in Stanton on Saturday. They had live music and the food was wonderful!
It was a very fun reception and we didn't even know anyone! But we enjoyed getting to know some of their friends - we sat with some of James' friends from high school. You could just feel the energy in the room - it was great! Congrats Mr. & Mrs. Kinnings!

ACLS

Today I took ACLS - Advanced Cardiovascular Life Support and I also renewed my Basic Life Support certification as well. It was a fun class, but there is SO much stuff to know! I took it with 8 friends from school which made it much more bearable and also made it fun. :) I don't need the certification at the moment, but it doesn't hurt to have it and add it to the resume! So, I am glad it is done and the place was really awesome (thanks Tiff for telling us about it). :)

The course is an all day thing and at the end you have to lead and play various roles in a "megacode" - scary! At first I was the time recorder and thought "phew! I got the easiest job first" HA! It was much harder than I thought!! I had no clue what I was doing as the recorder! Then, we rotated and I was the leader! Boy was my heart pounding when I put the "Team Leader" badge on!! Thanks to Anna and the others around the patient who gave me hints while I stuttered! ;) It definitely is about teamwork and I sure had a great team. Luckily the instructor was really nice/chill and we all passed and got the certification!

It was really interesting to learn about this right after witnessing a MET call the other night. I was really able to imagine what it all would look like in real life (which was nothing like the videos they showed today). Even though my patient's scenario was different than those in class today, there were some things that took place during the MET call that were similar to what we learned today (experience makes learning it easier). Overall, it was an enjoyable (yet stressful) class, but I am thankful I took it and got it out of the way.

Work last night

Yesterday was a weird day for me, trying to figure out when to go to church, when to sleep, what to eat, etc all in preparation for my night shift that night. I ended up going to church at my usual time, 5 pm, and then just headed straight over to St. Jude's. I was not really looking forward to working last night, but I really want the experience so I went. It was a good night and I did almost all the charting on all 4 of our patients, so that was good. Around 3 am or so, I was getting REALLY tired and couldn't think of anything else but my bed. I just wanted to be home sleeping! Anyway, the night was pretty uneventful except for right before my shift ended.

I gave report to the day shift nurse and then saw one of my patient's was calling in on the call light. I answered it since no one else was and it was the nursing assistant asking for the nurse. I let the day nurse know and next thing I know it the Medical Emergency Team is being paged on the overhead for this patient! This was my first experience with anything like this, so I immediately ran over to the room (along with almost all the other staff on the unit). My heart was pounding. It was of course a learning experience - one of the nurses was walking me through everything, letting me know what goes on and what I would do as the nurse. It was very helpful. I am thankful that I was able to stand back and watch before actually having to be the nurse during it all.

So, looking back, I am very glad that I went in last night; although I could hardly fall asleep by the time I got home because I was so full of adrenaline!

1st Wedding Dress Fitting

Today is my first wedding dress fitting! I am really excited! My gown has been in storage for months now because I ordered it so early. Of course I know what it looks like, but I forget just how beautiful it is, so it makes me happy to see it. My friend Tiffany from nursing school is going to keep me company, so that makes it even more fun. :) Soooo exciting ...and time is just flying by! :D

Back to School

Well, last Monday was the beginning of another semester at CSUF. Excitingly, this is the LAST ONE!!! YAY! I can't even believe it (but at the same time, I can). My time off went by so quickly that I am still not ready for school to start (even a week after it already has). I am majorly procrastinating on doing anything for school...that's definitely not a good start. Some brief updates:

• I am still working 1 night shift a week in 5N at St. Jude's this semester with the same preceptor, Kelly.
• I will be at St. Jude shadowing another nurse during the day once a week (while also working on a leadership project). As of right now, I will be with the manager of perinatal! That's pretty exciting!! I'll keep you posted about that.
• I still haven't heard if my manuscript has been accepted or not for the journal we submitted it to (the 2nd submission, since the 1st one was turned down). So, in the meantime, I decided to help my thesis advisor, Dr. Rutledge, with her new study on Fibromyalgia and falls. I am working with another student, Alex, and last week we started recruiting participants. I have keys to an office on campus where I will put in approx 10 hrs a week. If the grant goes through, I will be paid for my time, so I am really hoping for that little extra money!! I know it just started, but it has been really fun! It is very similar to what I did in my undergrad internship at CSULB and there is a lot of stuff similar to what I did at SAYM.

I think that's all the school updates for now. It is going to be a really crazy semester with wedding stuff on top, but I know I will make it through. :) I just might be hibernating for most of the weeks, as usual...

LA Zoo

On Saturday, I went to the LA Zoo with Brian, my sister & brother-in-law and his mom who is visiting from Mexico (her 1st time to the US!). We had a great time!! Here are some of my favorite pics from the day:

Tiger

Giraffe sticking his tongue out at me

Simba & Nala :)

Happy New Year!!

Happy New Year!!! I cannot even believe it is already 2010! I hope each of you has a wonderful year filled with happiness and blessings!!

Today Brian and I also celebrate being engaged for 1 year - time sure does fly by! It has been an amazing year of engagement and the two of us only grow closer and closer to each other every day.

Happy 25th Birthday, Brian

Today is Brian's 25th Birthday!! We went for a little hike in the hills of Orange/Anaheim
and then after church there was a surprise party for him. A couple of his friends wanted to throw one for him, so I helped make an evite and get him there. It was rather hard getting him there because he is so clever, but he was surprised, so that's good. The theme was "boy bands", so I made a shirt for my costume
and the whole night there were NSync, Backstreet boys, LFO and other boy band songs playing. We had a good time that night - thank you to all those who were able to celebrate with us! :)

Christmas Pics

Just a couple pictures from Christmas that I thought I would share:

Me with my mom and sister

Sisterly Love

...and Brian & Me

6 Months to go!!!

Six months from today, Brian and I will be getting married!! It is soooo exciting, but I can really feel the stress building up. Since I put a lot of wedding planning on hold until the semester and holidays were over, I am starting to get serious with it now, but have very little time before school starts back up again. So, every day of break right now is a busy one - trying to check things off the long list (not all wedding planning stuff though). I can't believe we only have 6 more months to go - it is going to FLY BY!!!