{let’s play rewind}

I did a yearly recap last year with pictures and I thought I might do it again this year. I really enjoyed looking through my post last year about all that we did throughout the year. So, without further ado… we will rewind through 2011 as it turns into 2012! (An obligatory Christmas post coming soon… along with one about our recent trip to the Dells!)

JanuaryThe year 2011 started off a lot like 2010 did. I enjoyed a few weeks off of school before starting my second semester of my second year of graduate school. I was nervous to start my first off campus placement, but it turned out to be pretty awesome! I experimented with some do it yourself canvas art this month and LOVED how it turned out! My friend Kristi and I got our families together a few times this month. We went out to eat and had a Wii family fun night together! Also, my first ‘official’ book of photography came in the mail and it turned out great… totally worth the price!

FebruaryWe started off February with some cell phone drama. Our cellphone company switched unexpectedly on us and the transition was not very smooth. Both Jay and I were very unhappy with our service, but there wasn’t much we could do about it at the time. Ayden had his first blue and gold banquet for Cub Scouts and it was held at a hotel that had a pool. Ayden had a blast swimming with his new Cub Scout buddies! Jay got me an open heart pendant for Valentine’s Day and I still love it. What a sweetie! I worked on some of my photography techniques this month and also had an indoor shoot with a cute little munchkin!

MarchI started off March with another photo shoot, this time for my classmate and friend who had gotten engaged. The pictures turned out awesome and some of them are still my favorite to date! We went to the Dells again this month for Spring Break, only this time it was with my friend Kristi and her family. We stayed at Hotel Rome and we had such a great time together! The waterpark was small enough for her girls, yet big enough for Ayden to have some fun yet. We also had some really nice weather again this month… spring was on the horizon!

AprilI tried giving up soda this month and lasted for awhile, but I don’t think that I’ll ever be able to fully give it up again. My brother, sister, and I had our annual Mother’s Day photo shoot to make our mom her Mother’s Day book. My sister and I started something last year and we were told that we needed to continue it this year and so we did. Apparently it is something that we are going to need to continue in the years to come as well since my mom enjoys the books so much. Along with giving up soda, I also started to diet a little bit this month which ultimately led me to losing about 15 pounds by the end of the summer! And lastly, I shot a gun for the first time this month. It was kind of scary and I really don’t see myself doing it again anytime soon!

MayMother’s Day was very nice this month. Jay and Ayden got me the most awesome flower basket as a gift and I couldn’t get over how cool the flowers looked! I got down and dirty with Jillian Michaels and fell in love with her Ripped in 30 day program! I was featured on the Pioneer Woman’s website this month for one of her photo contests and couldn’t believe it! It was too cool! I finished up my second year of graduate school with good grades. Ayden ‘graduated’ in Cub Scouts from a Tiger Cub to a Wolf! He loves Cub Scouts more and more! Ayden started his spring soccer session, we went deer fawn tagging, and I started my summer clinical rotation which turned out to be pretty awesome as well!

JuneMy weight loss goals continued to progress this month and I couldn’t have been more happy! I continued with my off campus placement and was SO happy to be done with it shortly after Ayden was done with school! It saved us SO much money on childcare this summer. Ayden also started his third year of summer school and he really enjoyed it once again. I’m sad he won’t be going to it this summer because we are moving. We had some updated family pictures taken this month and they turned out awesome! Jay’s brother graduated from high school as well!

JulyMy mom came to visit for a few days at the beginning of this month and we had a great time together! We also participated in our first carp tournament and caught one big fish. Unfortunately we didn’t win anything, but that was okay. I was just surprised that Ayden stuck in so long! We kind of decided on our wedding reception venue this month, although it is still not set in stone. Jay was doing really good on his weight loss goals and he lost about 30 pounds by this point in the summer. He was doing great! Ayden went tubing behind a boat for the first time and loved it! And, we finally got a sectional couch for uber cheap off of craiglist!

AugustI spent the beginning of August in Colorado for an audiology summer camp and had a really great time! The mountains were beautiful and I learned a lot. I also went white water rafting for the first time too! There was also Hoerth camping where we floated down a river on tubes for the first time and Schwobe camping where we got rained out, but still had a lot of fun with everyone. We visited Whitefish Dunes State Park and Cave Point County Park and I fell in love with both places! Ayden and I both celebrated our birthdays and I almost cried that my baby turned seven years old! We had a birthday party and I dreaded the start of another semester of school! I had a few more photo shoots, I started the Turbo Fire workout program, and I began freaking out about having to move in the coming months!

SeptemberAyden started second grade this month. I started my third year of graduate school. Ayden had his first ‘surgery’, which wasn’t actually a surgery, but he did have to be put under because he had a bead stuck in his ear that needed to come out. Jay and I celebrated being together for eight years! Wow, time flies!

OctoberJay had a big month this month… he got a new truck! Well, it wasn’t by choice. His old truck died and we found ourselves the proud owner of ‘The Beast’ in which we all have decided that we love just a little more than his other truck, hehe! My bestie from Green Bay came and visited for a few days and we went to try on wedding dresses. Well, I tried the dresses on. There weren’t very many dresses to try on, but it was fun to try them on for the first time. We also went through quite a few corn mazes this month and missed out on trick or treating because of the crappy weather, but that was okay because Ayden didn’t really mind.

NovemberI had two externship interviews this month and after one of them, I visited with my bestie in Green Bay this time. We had a great time together! I got a new flash for my camera and experimented with it a little bit. I still don’t have it all the way mastered. I blogged WAY less than I wanted to. I got sucked into the world of Pinterest and just had a great month with my family.

DecemberI finished out the semester with pretty good grades. I wasn’t very happy with my clinic grade, but what can you do. I will just have to amp it up this coming semester. We had a great Christmas and then went to the Dells with my family and had an even better time. Both of which I will blog about soon!

There you have it… a mini recap of 2011! Overall, I have to say that it wasn’t a bad year or an overly awesome year. It was a blessed year though and I am so glad that I got to spend it with my family and friends. Definitely looking forward to all that 2012 has to offer for me and my family!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{that's a wrap}

Well folks, the semester is done and over with for me and I couldn't be more excited. Honestly though, I haven't had much to do/worry about for the last two weeks. It hasn’t been a very stress filled end of the semester for a change and I couldn't be happier! I am waiting on two final grades for my clinic and capstone credits. I ended up with an A in my Counseling class, an A in my Implantable class, and an A- in my Pathologies II class. I was pretty upset with the A- because the professor neglected to inform the students how she was determining the grade (which was different than the grades posted online) and here I was pretty confident I was getting an A... guess not. And she didn't even include one of the homework assignments that we had which I had gotten a 100% on and I know that would have helped. And what makes it worse is that I barely got the A- with a 90.6%! Ugh! Hoping for an A for capstone and clinic though. We shall see...

Ayden had his school Christmas concert this week and both Jay and I went to see him. It was cute! They only sang two songs and I was only able to get one of them taped though because I forgot how to use the video function on my camera at first and then by the time I figured it out again, the song was over, ha! But the second song was pretty cute. I also found out that Ayden won a coloring contest in his class the other day! How exciting! He is very artistic!

I am counting down the hours until Friday. I am excited to go 'home' for a few days and to see everyone. We are going to have a very busy couple of days, but that is okay. It is always a lot of fun. I think I am most excited about Ayden opening his presents. We definitely went overboard this year, okay, so it was me who went overboard, but that's okay. I can't remember if I mentioned it or not, but we did end up getting him an iPod Touch. I haven't really gotten any negative comments about getting him one when he is only seven, but I have read a few things on other people's Facebook pages discussing the ages that we get children electronics these days. I did see a lot more people getting their children thing at such a young age. And, yes, I do think that Ayden is maybe a little young for one, but I also know that he is fairly responsible. He has had his Nintendo DS for a year and a half now and he has been very responsible with that. He plays on my tablet all of the time and is very good with that too. What I thought was insane was these parents getting their children these super expensive cameras and/or giving them their old ones. We are talking about giving a six year old a $400 camera! Not in my house, haha! But all the more power to them. I won't judge their parenting styles because I know how much I dislike it when people do it to mine.

It looks like we will not be having a white Christmas this year, but you know what... I could really care less! I don't like the snow and don't want any snow. If I have to deal with the cold temperatures, I'd rather deal with them when the ground is not covered in anything. Ha!

I have all of the presents wrapped and am most of the way packed for this weekend. We will be coming back to our place for a few days then going to Wisconsin Dells for a few days with my mom, brother, sister, and her boyfriend. I am really excited about that because Ayden is tall enough to go down all of the water slides this year! I hope that he doesn't get afraid.

Final clinic grade came in and I’m not very happy with it. Makes me want to cry. It’s passing and all, but still… not what I wanted to find out before Christmas… ugh, trying to get myself out of this funk with the grade and ready to have a great holiday weekend!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{end of the semester}

WEDNESDAY: The fall semester is winding to a close and I am SO happy! I have one final and one presentation today to get through and then I will be done with my late classes! SO excited! I also have one final and one assignment due next Monday. I am almost done with the assignment and I'm not too worried about finishing it up. The final is a little worrisome. I haven't had to study for any tests this entire semester. They have all been online or open book. My grades have been pretty good. I need to do pretty well on the final we have today, but once again, it is online/open book (although that doesn't always mean it's easier). The final next Monday is an in class final that I actually have to HAND write! I haven't had to hand write anything all semester. I am so used to word processing everything on my computer. It is rare when I actually have to turn in something that I've hand written. It is also cumulative which bites, but it is for my counseling class so I'm not overly worried. What I am not looking forward to is having to hand write it because when the ideas get flowing it is so much easier and faster to get them on out on the computer than with a pen and paper and it is A LOT faster! Not mention having to avoid hand cramps, haha! Yes, I'm complaining about something so trivial as having to hand write a final exam.

I was looking forward to being done after Monday, but now I have to work on my capstone paper. Ugh! Actually, I might get motivated and work on it a little bit tomorrow and Friday since I won't have anything going on for the majority of the day, other than working for a little while in the morning. Our second revisions were supposed to be due not this past Monday, but the Monday before and I was waiting on one of my committee members to add some more edits; but I guess his edits were just the ones that he sent in an email. At this point in the game, I am just so over my capstone project and it isn't even halfway complete yet. I have to finish entering in all of the surveys and then analysis the data and write the second half of my paper. SO not looking forward to it . Then I have to create a PowerPoint presentation and then present it. Thank goodness we only have two classes next semester otherwise I'd probably be up a creek! My motivation is next to nothing so the less I have to do the better, ha! I am SO over school at this point!

The weather has been pretty craptastic lately, but it looks like it is going to get nicer for the weekend and that is good because I am photographing a small wedding on Saturday. I am excited about it and then I am having a girls afternoon with my friends on Sunday. I am excited to get my camera out again. I haven’t really had it out all that much in the previous weeks and I feel bad. I need to get it out and get back into my photographing mood. I am ready for it! It will make for a fun weekend and I am looking forward to it because the last couple of weekends have been pretty boring and laid back at our house. Don’t get me wrong, it was definitely nice to have a weekend to ourselves.

THURSDAY: I had intentions of finishing this post yesterday. I always have intentions of finishing the post when I start writing it, but it doesn't always end up that way. The grade for the final I took yesterday is already posted and I got a... wait for it... wait for it... an A-. Okay, so an A would have been better, but for the class and the teacher and the format of the exam and the fact that as I was going through it I could really have cared less about some of the answers that I put, I was pretty happy with that grade. I was pretty ecstatic to even see that it was up already because that teacher is known for not putting grades up right away. I also found out that I got an A on my last presentation in that class which was awesome. If I factored my grade out correctly, I will be getting an A... heck yeah! The presentation that I had to give yesterday went well also. I'm pretty much guaranteed an A in my other two classes, but I won't say for sure because then I'll jinx myself and end up with an A-. I need to get at least an 85% on both my presentation and my last assignment for my Implantables class to pull of an A in there and at least a 75% on my final in my other class (and that is factoring in 100% for my class participation grade and I think I participated enough in that class to get all the points for it). And I'm anticipating on getting better than all of those grades. All of this math is making my head hurt, haha!

I am excited for this weekend because I am going to be photographing a small wedding. I haven't had my camera out nearly as much as I would like and so to get it out again is exciting. To get back to my element. I haven't had many photo shoots after this fall, so to have another one is exciting. Sometimes I sit back and look at my photos and think, man did I really take those. Of course I have ones that didn't turn out just the way I wanted, but then again, I have ones that I absolutely fall in love with!

Then on Sunday I am meeting up with my besties to do some shopping. I am so happy that we've all been able to continue to get together after we graduated and still want to get together. Love those ladies and any time we spend together is never enough, but we always have a blast. The last time all four of us were able to make it was back in August (I think) and so it's been TOO long! Can't wait to catch up with everyone! And I'm so excited that I'll be moving closer to one soon! Of course that means leaving the one that still lives here in Point with me. So it's exciting and a bummer at the same time.

Next week, if the weather holds, I'm heading to Green Bay to spend some time with another bestie of mine. We are going to do a mini photo shoot of me. I want to make something nice for Jay for Christmas even though we said we weren't going to get anything for each other. I'm excited to be in front of the camera for once and to get some nice pictures of myself. My friend is dabbling in photography and it's going to be free so it's not really spending any money and I get to spend time with my bestie, which happens WAY less than it should! And then it's Christmas! This money is really flying by, although this week seems to be dragging. I cannot believe how slow this week is going. Maybe it's because I haven't had a lot to do and so I haven't done too much and it is making time go slower. I shouldn't be complaining about how slow time is going because I'm so often complaining about how fast it is going, but I am, haha!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{get to it}

I have to admit that my ambition to work out lately has been nil… I took two weeks ‘off’ after Thanksgiving and haven’t had the want to start back up. These last two weeks have led me to eating less than healthy, from eating too little to eating too much and not working out at all. This past week I told myself that I was going to start working out again on Monday and get back into a good routine with it. With the holidays I know that my eating habits were not going to be stellar and that by working out I could allow myself to indulge a little more than I have been these last few months. I was pleasantly surprised when I came back home from Thanksgiving and I hadn’t gained any weight and let me tell you, I wasn’t watching what I was eating AT ALL!

Since Thanksgiving… I’ve gained a few pounds back. Nothing that I ‘should’ be worried about, but it doesn’t make me happy and I know I have only myself to blame. I haven’t been working out and I have been eating/snacking WAY more than I need to be. What can I say, chocolate is just calling out to me! I haven’t had any willpower to stop myself either. If it’s there, I eat it. My portion sizes have gotten bigger and I just tell myself that at the next meal I won’t eat as much and it doesn’t happen. Then I say that tomorrow will be better and tomorrow comes and it isn’t any better. And then I get mad at myself for the number on the scale. I NEED to curb this now because I’ve worked too hard to start gaining back the weight that I’ve lost. I know that I’ve been through this over and over here on my blog, but my writing all of this out on here, it holds me more accountable. Or at least I’m hoping it is going to hold me more accountable. We are taking a mini vacation to the Dells right after Christmas and I want to be swimsuit ready still by that time.

I worked out on Thursday and Friday and then didn’t yesterday. I know I should have and I feel bad about it. I am going to work out tonight… right after I finish this post, I am going to go work out. I think that not working out has been one of the big reasons that I have been feeling so low lately. Working out is not only good for the body, but also for the soul and I know that when I was working out consistently, I was in a much better mood. Lately with not working out, I can feel that not only am I eating more, but my moods haven’t been as good. I’m feeling down, mad at myself, lazy, just don’t want to be around people. That has to changed. I need to get out of this funk. I will get out of this funk. Especially with school ending soon, I need to keep on the upswing and not the downswing.
With that… I am going to GET TO IT!!!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

UPDATED: I worked out tonight and did some strength training and I have to admit, despite the fact that I feel all wobbly now, I am feeling much better than I have all day long!

{housing wanted}

Jay and I got into an argument about moving the other night. Your typical run of the mill argument. But I'm dreading trying to find a place to live if these will continue to happen. Although, I'm not anticipating that they will. I understand that we need to move. He understands that we need to move. I've sort of let my Type A controlling personality slide a little bit on this issue because even though I would LOVE to know where we are going to be moving to in the next five/six months, I realize that the chances of finding a place to live right at this moment are slim to none. No one rents out their place six months in advance, they just don't. It's as simple as that. So, I was relinquished to that fact and even though I peruse craigslist for apartments/duplexes/houses, I'm not really thinking I am going to find anything.

Here's the dilemma... I DO NOT want to end up back in an apartment and Jay thinks we pretty much will. I have been spoiled these last three years with our current living situation. Is everything perfect about our current residence... absolutely not, but it's pretty darn nice for what we can afford and what we got. I would love a larger living room with more natural light, a bigger kitchen that was more up to date and definitely a bigger bathroom. But in contrast to all of that, we have a garage, a private back yard, clothes lines, TWO bathrooms, an office area, laundry area, AND a toy room! Our basement may be outdated with the paneling and the thin stained carpet, but just to have a finished basement is AWESOME! I don't want to have to give any of that up when we move. Now in all likely hood, I will probably have to give some of it up, but I'm not going to jump into the first apartment that is for rent. If we were to end up back in Chilton, what we are paying for rent now should go further there and get us something better. I think about our last place compared to what we have now and don't think I could go back to it. I don't WANT to go back to it. I do NOT want apartment living again. I want duplex or house living! I'm AM NOT moving back to my hometown to settle (not that I think anyone thinks we are doing that). I am getting my doctoral degree, I am making something of myself! There WILL be a day where we do not have to worry so much about money. I am making SURE of that with my career! Does money mean everything, of course not, but I did not decide to become an audiologist SOLELY because I love the ear. Heck no, I also looked at the potential pay check in the bank once I got a job as well. Audiologist are pretty well paid that that definitely was a perk of the career for me.

Okay, back to my point... I was already dreading moving, now I'm dreading it more so. That and the fact that so many of our family members seem to want us right in our hometown and I'm not so sure I'm ready for that kind of small town living again. I love Stevens Point. I think that is mostly it. I'm not ready to leave Stevens Point. I'm ready to have my family close again, but they should all move to Stevens Point. It has everything I need. If I cannot find something I want in one store, I have ten more to choose from and I'm not going to run into ten different people that I know when I go to the store either. Simple as that. I'm not ready for that again, I don't think. I'm a whole ball of emotions when it comes to thinking about moving and leaving the city that we have called home for the last six and a half years. I know Stevens Point and I love Stevens Point and I don't really want to leave.
It is going to take me the next six months to get used to the idea of leaving, it's a good thing we have that much time before we actually have to leave.

We went and got our Christmas tree this weekend. We went to a Christmas tree farm and picked one out to cut down ourselves. It was pretty bitterly cold outside, but we still had a pretty decent time. That was pretty much my extent of Christmas enthusiasm. Actually, I could really care less if we had a tree or not. Have I mentioned that we did not to St. Nick at our house this year. I didn't feel like digging out the stockings for it and Ayden didn't even know the difference. (Probably because he thought we got our St. Nick gifts when my mom gave us our now christened 'Turkey Nick' gifts.) I had no ambition to do any decorating this year. I didn't feel like digging out bins or getting everything out to decorate the tree. It is just a lot of extra work that I didn't want to do. Why decorate our house when I have to do all of the work myself and no one comes to see it? I just don't see the point. Yes, bah humbug! But, we got a tree and it got decorated. Jay did a haphazard job of putting the lights on and Ayden put 99% of the ornaments on and it looks good enough for someone who doesn't really care if they have a tree. I honestly don't care what the tree looks like, looks perfectly 'imperfect' to me and I'm happy, well except for the fact that I'm probably going to be stuck taking the ornaments off and putting them away. I suppose I can deal.

I was working on one of my last homework assignments earlier on my computer and it shut itself off on me and I took that as a sign I should take a break and blog. I'm blogging on my tablet right now, giving my computer a rest. Apparently it thought I was working too hard, haha! Actually, lately when my computer gets too overheated it shuts down by itself. Its rather inconvenient, but I'd rather it do that than over heat completely and stop working and I had saved my project so I didn't lose anything. Save often!!! A lesson I've learned the hard way one too many times. I need a new computer, but I'm hoping the one that I have now can at least last until my birthday in August and then maybe I'll get a new one. I would like it to last longer than that, but it is already four years old and although that doesn't seem old, for laptops and the pace technology runs these days, it is. I am contemplating getting a desktop for my next one, but we'll see. By August I will be in my externship and will not need to go to an actual class anymore so the need for a laptop decreases... especially with having a tablet. Keep your fingers crossed it will last that long. My class load this coming spring really isn't too bad so I can take it easy on my computer then too.

I went ahead and bought Ayden a new ipod touch for Christmas. I kept looking and looking on craigslist and nothing was coming up. I found a pretty good deal at Best Buy for a package bundle that was the ipod, a case, screen protector, and ear buds (even though the touch comes with ear buds). Now Ayden will have ear buds for his touch and his Nintendo ds. I cannot wait to see his face when he opens it on Christmas morning! He's going to be SO excited!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{nothing lasts forever}

I was paging through some old photos on facebook last night as I was laying in bed trying to fall asleep (stupid short nap I took in the afternoon screwed me up on that one... and I think the caffine I had for supper probably helped too) and I realized that my little boy isn't so little anymore. Okay, so he is... I mean, he's only seven years old, but he has come such a long way since he was born. And I don't mean that in he had to go through any huge medical scares or anything, just that he has grown so much. I feel like I blinked and the last seven years passed me by in a haze. I was looking at his picture on the first day of second grade and think where did my little boy who needed his mommy for everything go?!

I have a little man now who doesn't need his mom to accompany him downstairs to play. I have a little man who can pick out his own clothes and get dressed himself. I have a little man who is responsible for bringing home stuff from school every day to get signed. I have a little man who used to be my little boy not too long ago.

Time is fleeting and it goes so much faster when you have kids. The saying is SO true! And... it just seems to speed up just that much more every year that goes by. Sometimes I wish it to go a little faster, like those days when Ayden and I are not on the same wave length and neither of us can get along... yes, as a parent, it does happen. Not our best parenting moments, but everyone has them. And then on days (most days), I wish it to slow down just a little bit more. I want my little man to still need his mommy and still want his mommy. And for he most part, he still does want his mommy. Case in point, I got home from clinic tonight and he wanted to cuddle with me after I got in the door. Love him!

Speaking of clinic, today was my last day until the end of January. I am happy for the rotation to be over, but I will miss it. I did enjoy going. I brought donuts as a treat for my last day and I was able to get to see an appointment that I have been wanting to see for a while now which was pretty cool.

I've read two books in the last week. Well, probably less than the last week. I started the Hunger Game series. I had heard some good things about it and then I saw that they were making at least the first book into a movie and the preview for the movie looked really good so I thought about reading the book. The first book was really good and so I went ahead and read the second book as well. Another good book. I love getting sucked into a series and really getting to know the characters and feel like they are real. I tend to get attached to the characters in my books, especially if the books are really good. And then it makes it harder for me to finish a good book and then pick up a new one and having to get drawn into the new characters and story when I am still attached to the old ones. That is what I think about series, you don't have to get to re-know the characters. Anyways, there is a third book in the series and I don't know if I am going to read it or not. I was all gunho on downloading and starting it right away tonight after finishing the second book, but I read some reviews about it on amazon and although it has far more good reviews than bad reviews, it is the bad reviews that are holding me back. I have read the synopses of the book and overall it just doesn't sound as good as the first two and I don't think I want to 'waste' the money on it when I'm sure there are better books out there that I can read. But, I did just read two books and the semester isn't quite over so I probably shouldn't even start another book until my last final is over. Unlikely, haha! Once I get into my reading moods, I usually read 6-8 books in a row and then don't read anything for another month or so and then go through my cycle again.

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{no good excuse}

I'm sitting in my bed with my tablet on my lap. I wish I had some good excuse as to why I haven't blogged in the last two weeks, but other than being lazy and not really feeling like it, I don't have one. It's the norm these days, right?! I only posted four times in November... FOUR!!! That is less than one whole hand! That is B.A.D.! I am a bad blogger. I feel like the more time that passes the less and less I blog, okay, so I don't just feel like that, it is actually happening. I have been blogging for over three and a half years now and although I do genuinely enjoy blogging, it is becoming less and less of a priority to me. Life is changing. I do not make money from my blog so I don't have a 'good' reason to update it regularly, other than for myself. And I do love to write. I enjoy blogging when I do it because sometimes it is just what the 'doctor' calls for... a good vent session to someone who doesn't talk back.

I am listening to the Trans Siberian Orchestra on Pandora right now. LOVE them! I wish I could go see them in concert again this year, but it is probably too late to get tickets. Well, that is if they are even playing in Green Bay this winter. I haven't been to see them in concert since Ayden was born which was seven years ago. I cannot believe that it has been that long. They are amazing and I love listening to them at this time of the year. Their Christmas Eve cd rocks my socks off everytime I listen to it.

Life continues to move forward in our household. We are getting ready for the holidays. We had a good Thanksgiving. It went by a little too fast, but then again, most days seem to around here. It was nice to see all of my family and Jay's family. My cousin taught me how to crochet and I've been mastering the basic stitch ever since. Oh okay, so I haven't done all that much since we got home last weekend, but it was a busy and tiring week, who can blame me, haha! I got to do some Black Friday shopping with my mom, aunt, and the same cousin who taught me to crochet, Amanda. It was a TON of fun and it felt like the old days when we used to all go shopping together! Many years ago the aunts and cousins on my mom's side of the family would all go shopping together on Black Friday (there really wasn't a whole ton of us) and it was lots of fun. Slowly everyone started to sort of separate and do their own thing and then my mom would have to work that day and so I sort of just stopped going. I missed it. This year felt like the old days and I really had a great time! So if you happen to read this mom, Julie, or Amanda... thanks for Black Friday shopping with me! And thanks Michele for watching the little guy so I could go!

I ended up getting some awesome deals and the majority of my shopping done. It was pretty great! Now I just have to wrap it all, oh wait, Jay can, ha!

The semester is slowly coming to a close. It is taking FOREVER! But thankfully I don't really have too much to worry about this semester. One more presentation to do which should be super easy and then two finals which I'm not overly worried about either. Kind of an easy end to the semester. Just need to get through it now. This will be my last week of clinic for almost two months. I'm kind of excited, but then again, I know that I am going to miss it after a few weeks. I enjoy clinic and I enjoyed my placement this semester as well. My supervisor was pretty awesome and I got to see some pretty great things. But I am also ready for it to be over as well. Time for another placement.

Speaking of clinic... I have made my decision as to where I am going to be doing my externship and I couldn't be more excited! We have no idea where we will end up living, where Jay will be working, or where Ayden will be going to school yet, but one thing checked off the list is exciting! I'm trying not to get too ahead of myself with all of that again because it just stresses me out when I think about having to move and all of that. I cringe the thought if we would have to move back into an apartment building after living in where we are for the last three years. I'd love to find a house to rent or something similar to what we are currently living in. We just have so much space to spread out where we are now that I can't imagine going back to living in a small apartment, even if it was just for a year. Our basement/toy room/office is a life saver right now! It provides the space we need when we are all getting on each others nerves. I mean, our upstairs isn't really all that big, but with the addition of the basement it makes this place so much more tolerable. But once again, I am getting ahead of myself and I just got done saying I didn't want to do that.

I redesigned my blog for Christmas... likey?!

I feel like I could write a book or more yet, but my Kindle is calling my name... I'm in the middle of a very good book. Until next time then...

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{satisfied}

What a great weekend I had. Okay, at most it was an okay weekend. It wasn't overly exciting or packed full of things to do, but it wasn't horrible either. Ayden and I were able to spend the second weekend in a row together without Jay and this weekend went a lot better than last weekend, although I can't say that last weekend was horrible either. I do know that on Saturday of last weekend Ayden and I were at each other's throats early in the day and it wasn't shaping up to be a good weekend. This weekend was the complete opposite and I think I maybe raised my voice once (or twice), but it really wasn't that bad.

I picked Ayden up from school on Friday and we went to the library right away. We got a few books to read and then we went out for pizza for supper. It was an early supper Friday night, but it was SO worth it. The pizza was delish and we had some cinnamon knots for dessert and they were SO yummy! Oh just to die for! We were supposed to go to the holiday parade for Cub Scouts, but it was cold out and I really didn't want to go so after our early supper we headed home for a relaxing night at home. It was a great start to the weekend and a much different night than the previous one.

Thursday night was Ayden's parent teacher conference and although the conference went really well, we had a rough time with Ayden and his reading before we left for the conference that night. I didn't really hear anything at the conference that surprised me. He is behind where he should be for his grade for reading. His teacher marked him on the bubble, but let's face it... he's behind. I'm not ashamed to right that my son is not up to par with the peers for reading and he is in second grade. No one is perfect and I love him just the same. Although Ayden hasn't been formally tested for it, I have a suspicion that he might have a small reading disability and our lack of helping him learn reading at home has only hindered him. He does receive extra help for reading at school each day and he is progressing, but he is still behind. Where he is behind in reading, he excels in at math. He is his father's son when it comes to math. I was never particulary bad at math, but it definitely wasn't my super strong suit either. I was happy to hear that he is doing well in that area. He is also doing well in speech therapy. I am sad that we will be moving after this school year and he will be getting a new speech therapist next year (because lets face it, he will still probably be in speech in third grade too, but alas, I still love him just the same). Overall, there wasn't any talk of Ayden needing to repeat the second grade at this point. We are going to try extra hard through the coure of the rest of the year to help him along so that doesn't happen, but if it does... we'll roll with the punches!

But back to our weekend... Saturday was pretty laid back. Ayden and I didn't do much of anything yesterday. We played a few games, I read to him, we watched a lot of TV, I worked out and ate too much, and we just relaxed. Such is life, haha! Actually, Ayden was really well behaved and it was a very peaceful day. While I was in the basement working out last night apparently the doorbell rang (I didn't hear it and usually we can in the basement) and my lovely son decided to answer the door without even checking with me. This after we had just talked about safety in his last Cub Scouts meeting and what to do if something like that happened. I guess there was a guy at the door and he asked if Jay was home, although I don't know if he asked for Jay by name or if he just asked if Ayden's dad was home. My super awesome son gave the worst answer possible. He said that Jay was out of town! I couldn't believe it. After the guy left (Ayden never let him inside), Ayden came down to tell me and I just about lost it. Numero uno time that I kind of yelled at Ayden this weekend. I mean seriously, we have had numerous talks at home about proper answer the door technique. It scared me, honestly! I don't know who this person was. I asked Ayden if it was our neighbors and he didn't think so. So, I don't know if it was just some stranger or what! Needless to say I was a little paranoid for the rest of the night. I made sure the doors were locked... double and triple checked him and then stayed up late with the lights on. Originally I had said that Ayden could sleep in the living room that night, but after that instance I told him he had to sleep in his bedroom. All I could think about was some psycho breaking in and Ayden being right there in the living room farther away from me. I mean seriously, this person could have literally just kidnapped Ayden while I was downstairs working out and I would have never known! We keep our doors locked about 95% of the time, when we are home so if someone would have tried to get in last night, it would have been harder for them, but when Ayden opens the door for them, oops, he could be gone! It really just freaked me out. After my initial freak out on Ayden (I think I was just super scared something could have happened to him), I calmed down and sat down with him and we went over safe answering the door techniques and I explained that even though we hope the people that are coming to our door are nice, we don't always know and want to make sure we are being safe. I don't think he'll think about answering the door alone anytime soon! That aside, our Saturday was pretty low key.

Our Sunday wasn't much more exciting... I had two photoshoots this morning and they both went really well. Ayden came along and he was very well behaved until the end and I don't blame him because it was pretty cold out and even I was ready to be done. I couldn't feel my fingers anymore, hehe! After that, Ayden and I went to get a few groceries and I got my eyebrows waxed... they needed it, haha! We had Subway for lunch, man we've been eating out WAY too much lately, and then went bowling! We had the whole bowling alley to ourselves which was pretty awesome and it was pretty cheap for two games for both of us. I did some data entering for my capstone project this weekend and a little bit of homework, but nothing overwhelming. And now I am going to watching a little more TV before falling asleep for the night!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{day with mommy}

Ayden didn't have school today. Instead of going to school (well no one was there anyways), he spent the day with me. Normally on days when he doesn't have school he attends the YMCA Great Escape Days Off Program and he should have gone there today, but he didn't. Here's the thing... when I signed him up at the end of last school year for this school year's days off I was given a piece of paper that indicated the dates I had signed Ayden up for. Silly me, I 'misplaced' that sheet sometime between last May and now. I know, how I could I lose such an important sheet of paper within the last six months, haha! Normally when there are days off from school and the Y is holding their program you get a reminder in the mail (and or email) reminding you that your child is signed up for the day off. Well with no mail coming last Friday I was thinking that if Ayden was signed up, we'd probably get the reminder on Saturday or Monday when it was too late. Worse comes to worse and I would just call the Y on Monday morning to see if he's signed up or not. I don't have class until 10:30am on Mondays so it wouldn't have been a big deal had I needed to call.

The weekend comes and goes and no reminder comes. Jay doesn't get any emails (they send emails to his address) and so I began to assume that we had probably not signed Ayden up for the day off. And then I began to think that maybe we didn't sign him up for any days off. I went through his school calendar and most of his days off are on Fridays and I don't have class on Fridays so he wouldn't need to attend the Y program. In any case, I ended up calling the Y at 8:00am when the child development office opened and left a message asking them to call me back and let me know. 8:30 comes and goes and still no call back. By this time I pretty much assumed that Ayden wasn't signed up for today's day off and told me him that he could come to school with me. He really wanted to come with me anyways and was excited about that. I did end up getting a call around 9:00am letting me know that in fact Ayden was signed up for today. I let them know that he wasn't going to be there and Ayden and I headed off to school shortly there after.

Having him come to school (and work) with me wasn't really that big of a deal. I only have one class on Mondays and it is just an hour and a half. There are only two students in my class, myself and Katie, and the professor is in Madison. I set Ayden up at the end of the table and he wasn't even on camerea so I don't know that anyone in the Madison class even knew that he was there. I brought along a bunch of things to keep Ayden busy with and he was an absolute angel during class that I almost forgot he was even there! He didn't bother me or interupt at all. After class I needed to go to work for a little bit. My job is awesome in the fact that if I show up for a few hours Monday, Wednesday, and Friday and stay on top of what my boss needs done, she doesn't really care if I leave early here or there or if I have a visitor with me. I was able to get the majority of what I needed to done today at work and Ayden had a great time helping me. Once again, he was an angel!

After work we went through the little museum that is in our campus library before walking back to my car and coming home. It was a good day for the most part. Would I have preferred not to bring Ayden with me... yeah, probably, but he was so well behaved that it didn't really make my day any harder and everyone liked to see him. Turns out I had him signed up for two other days for the Y days off program as well. I wrote those down so I wouldn't forget them. I also treated Ayden with a Redbox Wii game rental for the night for being so good while we were out and about today. He deserved it.

I booked a mini family vacation for myself, Jay, Ayden, my mom, brother, sister, and her boyfriend to the Dells shortly after Christmas today. It was my sister's idea and actually she had originally suggested just a mother/daughter thing, but since a trip to the Dells can be rather pricey I thought a whole family trip would be fun and this way if there are any water slides that Ayden cannot go down and Jay and I want to try, we will have someone to watch him. I think my sister might be a little apprehensive about her boyfriend coming along and having to share a room with her whole family at the same time... especially since it will be probably only the second time we are meeting him (and that's if he can make it to our cousin's wedding in two weeks). But I think it will be a lot fun! We haven't been on any family getaways with my mom in years and despite the fact that it is just going to the Dells, I am excited about it. I mean, we are going to the Wilderness afterall... the Wilderness is fun no matter what! How can it not be fun with three huge indoor water parks?! Yeah, I thought so! And the price is pretty reasonable for all of us as well. Ended up being $99/person total for the two nights. Pray for decent driving weather there and back please! And I think we are headed to the Dells the weekend after for Jay's family Christmas, only I think the plan is to stay at the resort we stay at for sturgeon fishing which doesn't have any indoor waterparks. In any case, I'm sure that that will be lots of fun as well!

I am five and a half weeks into my Turbo Fire program at this point and let me tell you, it is harder for me to maintain weight than it is to lose it. I've been trying to be good with working out and still eating in moderation to maintain my weight, but it's harder than I thought. I've been snacking on the good stuff a little too much lately and the scale is not my friend. I have worked so hard these last six months to make my goal weight and I don't want to start heading backwards at this point in time, that would suck! I told Jay that he should probably start his P90X program again. He will most likely be done working this week and I can totally see him sitting at home all winter just eating and gaining all of the weight back that he worked so hard to lose as well. It WILL happen to him if he doesn't watch himself. I can already see him starting to eat more in just the last few days that he has been home with the bad weather. I don't want to seem critical of him about his weight, but I don't want him to travel backwards either and it will happen. But he is his own person and he needs to want it for himself just as much as I want it for him. And who knows if he does at this point in time.

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{you know, this and that}

I haven't been as ambitious lately as I probably could have been. The days are blurring together and before I know it I've started Monday morning and it is already Friday night. I remember driving to clinic on Tuesday morning and wishing for the day to be over already and now here I am on Sunday afternoon and the whole rest of the week has just flown by. Sometimes I cannot believe how fast time goes and other times it just seems to drag on and on. When I sit down and think about it, we are almost already half way through November and that means just a few more weeks of class for the semester. Quite honestly I remember starting it and thinking it was going to drag on and here I am almost finished and sort of wishing it would slow down a little bit.

I had advising for my classes in the spring this past week (wait, I think it was probably last week)... anyways, it wasn't really advising. At this point in the game we already know the classes that we need/have to take. It really is just meeting with our so called advisor to write the classes down on a sheet of paper for her. Turns out this spring I will only be taking two classes. I am pretty excited about that prospect because that is even less time I need to be on campus. The classes are School Methods and Pediatric Amplification. I am unsure who is going to be teaching the School Methods class as the professor who used to teach it left at the beginning of this semester. The other class is taught by at least two professors from the Stevens Point campus and that I am kind of excited about because it will be easier for me to pay attention. This semester it has been SO hard to pay attention in class when all of my professors are broadcasting from the Madison campus.

I had my phone interview for my other externship placement this past Friday and it went really well. Actually, the audiologist pretty much offered me a position with them for my externship so if Green Bay doesn't work out I know for sure that I will have a back up placement; however, after my interview, I am kind of torn about where I want to do my placement. I really enjoyed my time at Green Bay and the audiologists there were really cool, but I really liked the sound of the Sheboygan placement too and the audiologist is very seasoned and I know that I would learn a lot, as well as gain quite a bit of experience in a private practice. So... now I am torn about where I want to go (pending the Green Bay placement thinks I am a better fit than Katie). Ugh! Decisions decisions! But I am really excited about it all and should know by the first of the year where I am going and then the real excitement begins!

Jay and I get new phones in a few weeks and I am super excited about it. Our current phone contract expires in about three weeks and it cannot come soon enough! Jay and I have been researching the best phone companies and plans to go with and what kind of phones we want. Got to do our research, hehe! New phones... I've been counting down for the last year to when we could switch our phone company. For at least this event time cannot go fast enough, ha!

Speaking of my lover boy... he left for the weekend to go do some hunting. Just me and little man at home and we are having a good time. We made some puppy chow on Friday, went to go see Puss in Boots yesterday afternoon and went ice skating for a little while today.

I had no photo shoots this weekend and have finished editing the ones I did last weekend. This weekend was dedicated to doing laundry, cleaning a few things, and getting productive with some homework and my capstone project.

We got this freak snow storm this past week and got WAY more snow that I am comfortable with this past week. I could have cried. Okay, so it really wasn't that much of a freak storm because it is perfectly logical for us to get snow this time of the year, but I am not ready for snow just yet and the fact that the majority of it probably won't melt until spring sometime is really kind of depressing... but I am trying not to let it get me down.

Here are a few photos from the last week or so that I have been meaning to post, but haven’t… since I have been such a bad blogger. My little man definitely needs a haircut sometime soon. Probably before my cousin’s upcoming wedding in two weeks.If you haven’t heard of the website Pinterest, I don’t know where you have been. I found this super cool supper idea on it a few weeks ago and really wanted to try it out. It looked easy enough and fun and something that I know Ayden would definitely eat. You basically skewer cut up hotdogs with uncooked spaghetti noodles and then cook the noodles. Looks grosser (is that a word?) than it actually is!Here is the finished product! We actually put some alfredo sauce on top of our noodles to add some flavor, but I wanted the picture to show the end product without the sauce. And of course you cannot forget the huge honey crisp apple in the background or the can of Dr. Pepper 10 either! I had to admit that Jay has converted me to a Dr. Pepper fan, despite the fact that I don’t drink a whole lot of soda anymore.And then because I cannot get enough of this lovely face I just had to post some more pictures of him working on some homework after school (and play around with my flash some more). He doesn’t actually get a lot of homework yet in second grade, but we have a few things that we work on each day after school and we have been pretty good at keeping up with it each week so far. Other than life moving at warp speed these days, things have been going pretty good lately. I’ve had a few instances occur in the last couple of weeks that I’m working through and trying not to let get the best of me, but I’d rather not go into them. I need to realize that I am my own person and everyone else in the world is their own persons and get over it… it has been hard, I’ll admit it, harder than I know it should be. I normally don’t let things as trivial as these ones bother me, but this time I have and I am regretting it. But as I stated, I am working through it as best as I can.

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{cave point in a flash}

*I have been drafting this post for over a week now and haven’t had the time to finish it and post it, so I am going to attempt to do that right now as my cat is in my lap trying to get some attention and Ayden is right next to me wanting me to play beyblades with him. Wish me luck!*

I was able to visit one of my favorite places in Wisconsin this past weekend (which is now last weekend) and I got some gorgeous (in my opinion anyways) photographs. That place… Cave Point County Park up just past Sturgeon Bay, WI! I am literally in LOVE with that place and have promised myself that I WILL get to spend a whole day there sometime this summer. I told Jay that we needed to spend a weekend up in that area sometime this summer. The Whitefish Dunes State Park that is right next to it is pretty awesome as well, but I didn’t visit that this weekend.

Why was I able to visit a park that is about three hours from my house you ask? Oh wait, you didn’t ask… haha! I’m going to tell you anyways. I was able to visit this lovely site……because I had my first externship interview over in Green Bay and I spent the rest of the afternoon with my bestie who lives over in that area. We both wanted to get outside and take some pictures with our cameras and so we decided that it would be fun to drive up there and take some pictures. It is only about a half hour drive from her house so we thought why not!If you are wondering about my interview (and not just interested in looking at my beautiful pictures, okay yes, I am being highly biased here), it went well. At least I think it went well. I’m hoping it went well. It was the most lax interview that I’ve ever been on and I don’t know that you can even call it an interview because the audiologists didn’t really even drill me about anything. It was pretty great! I really enjoyed the facility and think that I would fit in really well there. The thing that sucks is that my classmate is ‘interviewing’ there as well While I was gone this weekend (which as I stated before is now last weekend), I also picked up a new flash for my camera. I have wanted an off camera flash for my camera for sometime and I finally took the plunge. The one that I got was not as expensive as I could have gone, but obviously, I cannot afford a hugely expensive flash at this point in time either and I don’t think that I really need one for the kind of work that I am doing.

I have to say that I am already in love with the flash and I haven’t even used it all that much. I played around with it some this weekend and I am SO happy with the results. Just a simple off camera flash has improved my indoor pictures a million times over. I totally get the forums that I read now with statements saying that the on camera flash is rarely, if ever, your friend. I’ve grown to not enjoy using my on camera flash and prefer natural light above anything else, but the problem is that my house has nil for natural light! Like NOTHING! And it sucks! So this flash is awesome already!

Here are just a few examples of what I’ve taken so far with it! My really like this picture of my pretty kitty, Diesel! So often when I take pictures of him the background is SO dark and I lose the detail in him because he is all black, but when I bounced the flash off of the ceiling it allowed the background to be more properly exposed yet also get the detail in Diesel’s fur. I really just love this picture of my pretty kitty!I then took some picture of my adorable little guy last night after his shower and right before he went to bed. I LOVE LOVE LOVE that in this picture I used the flash and bounced it off the ceiling and there is NO shadow behind him! LOVE it! And I LOVE the little guy in the picture too. Isn’t he too cute!In this last picture, I bounced the flash off of the wall to the side and I got some more dramatic lighting on one side of his face. Oh the new things that I can do! I’m SO excited and IN LOVE! Do you want to hear it again… I am IN LOVE with my new flash! It is going to do wonders for my indoor pictures. Mostly just the candid ones that I take inside because I don’t really do indoor photography.Okay, so I didn’t really add anything to this post other than the beginning. I had intentions of writing more, but what I want to say is a whole new blog post in and of itself, so I will stop here and start drafting that one in the hopes that it doesn’t take me another two weeks to finish it up and post it. I have been a pretty bad blogger as of late. What can I say… time just gets away from me!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{time stands still}

Time stands still... but only when I am in class on Mondays and Wednesdays and when I am having a slow day at clinic. This week has seemed to drag on forever! Another slow morning at clinic today, but mostly because my supevisor is gone and I came in to see some cochlear implant appointments, but I don't think that the appointments are until the afternoon and my supervisor neglected to let the other audiologists on staff know that I was coming in and so they weren't expecting me and now I sit here until this afternoon with my thumb up my patootie with nothing to do because the appointments I want to see aren't until then. My tablet only has half power left, although it should last me until the afternoon. My phone gets no reception in the building so I can't make any phone calls unless I go outside and I didn't bring any homework along to work on. What a joyous world, eh?

Well, actually, I did bring a little bit of homework along. I finished that already (twice)! Twice because I had written in once on my tablet and then switched applications without saving (I know, naughty me, but I was on my tablet and I had done it before and it worked) and then when I was done with whatever application I had switched to, I hit the 'kill all active apps' button and it 'killed' the app that I had up that I was typing my assignment on and I lost it! Thankfully it wasn't a very long assignment, but I was almost done with it and so I was pretty upset that I had to retype it. I think the retyped version actually is better than the first, but still, that is twenty minutes that I won't get back. I guess I need to be more on top of saving things on my tablet as well. Oops! Life goes on though!

I happened upon a blog yesterday through some other blog that I was on (I was blog hopping) and something that the person had written struck a nerve with the inner photographer in me. The writer of the blog was pregnant and had her sister take some maternity pictures for her. No biggie. But she wrote that her sister had a nice camera and so she didn't want to have to pay someone else to take the pictures if her sister could just do it. She said that anyone with a nice camera can take good pictures and make them look professional. Okay, so I know that she didn't mean anything bad by that and it was just a simple statement, but it is SO far from the truth! Really! Just because you have an expensive camera, it does not mean that your pictures will be great. Yes, the expensive SLR camera have the ability to do things that your compact point and shoots do not, but you have to know what you are doing with the camera to get those effects. And even I still don't know how to work everything on my camera to get all of the looks I want. I am still learning. I am a hobby/amateur photographer. I will not and do not put myself into the professional photography category by ANY means! I can manipulate some stuff on my camera to get what I want, but I still don't go full manual very often (if at all). So, it just bugs me when people think they can go buy an expensive camera one day and turn 'professional' the next. One good picture out of 50 doesn't mean anything! And it really gets me when people see a picture and say wow, you must have a really great camera. Um, hello, how about the person behind the camera?! Doesn't my talent count for anything?! My vent for the day... still with me?

I officially have two interviews set up for externship placements. One in person at the clinic in Green Bay and one on the phone with a clinic in Sheboygan. Exciting (and nerve wracking at the same time)! Keep your fingrs crossed for me!

I have been eating WAY too much junk food lately and not working out as diligently as I should be. I am kicking myself for it right now. Last night after I got home from class (at 7pm) I had supper and then I literally went back and forth in my head for the next half hour about whether or not I should work out. One minute I was like, yeah, I will get up off of the comfy warm couch and get at it, the next I was like, it isn't going to hurt me to sit another night on the couch and not work out (the night before was my day off for the week). It went back and forth like that for a good half hour. Ultimately, I decided against working out. I was warm on the couch and didn't want to. LAME excuse. I know. I feel horrible about it. It sucks. And then to make matters worse, yesterday I had brownie bites, two bite size candy bars (the smallest ones, not the two bite funsize), a large hershey's chocolate peanut bar, a handful of chocolate chips, and then two chocolate chip cookies! PIG out, OMG! WAY too many sweets yesterday! I couldn't believe myself, but I also could't help myself, I was craving it, even though I wasn't too hungry for it. This morning I weighed in at 115.4 lbs... that is 2.4 lbs more than I was on Tuesday morning. Ugh! However, despite the fact that I did enjoy seeing 113.0 lbs on the scale Tuesday morning, 115.4 lbs really isn't bad either. It is still less than what I started and I should still be proud of myself for getting this far. Just right now I am not very proud of my motivation or willpower.

It's definitely been motivating to see my clothes get looser and looser, but the thing is now... NOTHING FITS! Today I have a pair of Maurice dress pants on, size 7/8 and they literally slide right off my hips! I've pinned them tighter so I can wear them! Did you see that, I have to PIN my pants so they will stay on! But, I know I have said it before, Maurice pants sizes must run big because even the size 3/4 ones that I have are a little big on me too. My shirts definitely fit better than they were; however, some of the ones that I actually liked how they fit are now too big and baggy and make me look bigger than I actually am when I wear them. Yes, I am complaining about my clothes not fitting because I'm too skinny. Deal with it. I don't have the money to go buy a whole new wardrobe. And besides, its my blog, I'll write what I want. You don't like it, don't read it. Just like how I did't have to keep reading that one blog of the lady who irked me with her camera comment. If you want to, go ahead and bitch about me on your blog. I don't care. Well, I do. So those of you who I actually know in real life that read, you can bitch, just please do it behind my back. I'd rather not have to find out online. Those of you who I don't know and just happened upon my blog (if there are any of you out there), go right ahead. Haha!

I got to see some pretty neat cochlear implant stuff so far today. The first appointment was with a patient who used sign language as her primary mode of communication and so she had an interpreter with her. I LOVED, just LOVED watching them communicate! So much so that it has made me think about finding a sign language class to take. I did take one class as an undergraduate in college, but I do not remember very much of it. I would love to learn more and become more fluent with it. I think that it would be so neat! I also got to see a patient for the second time with his implant and he is continuing to improve with it which is AWESOME!!!

Are you tired of reading yet?! Ha!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{introducing}

I’ve We’ve been pretty busy around here lately… what with cub scouts two weeks in a row, trying to find a new vehicle for Jay, and not getting home until later at night. Add on top of that homework that I don’t want to do, turning in a research proposal draft, and asking for recommendation letters from old supervisors, and then editing four (almost five) photography sessions. It’s all kept me from wanting to blog lately.

It has been a slow day at clinic for me today (where I happen to be right now), but that is okay. I have needed a slow day at clinic for a while now and it gives me some time to get other things done.
We had a good weekend. Jay has a new truck now and he loves it. Ayden and I have nicknamed it 'The Beast' and Jay doesn't like that name. He's going to have to deal with it though because it stuck!

I had a photo-shoot on both Saturday and Sunday. Both went really well. I have one of them already edited and ready for the client. The other one shouldn't take me too long to edit. I have two more shoots this Saturday. A maternity one for my cousin and a couple's one for the photographer who takes our family pictures. I am excited about those as well, although I will admit that I am a little nervous to take pictures for another photographer. I hope that I can impress her!

Classes continue to go well. I'm ready for the end of the semester already, but I don't want to wish away the weeks too fast. There is essentially only a month and a half left. I've had one test so far and I did really well on it. We have weekly quizzes in another class and the last two quizzes have not gone well for me. On last week's quiz I got an 80% and on this weeks quiz I only got a 60%. Oops! But in my defense, it doesn't take much to get a 60% when there are only 10 questions on the quiz, haha! It was hard though because a lot of the information wasn't on the PowerPoint slides we had (well I suppose that it doesn't help that I have a hard time paying attention in class as well). Hoping this weeks quiz is a little easier!

The externship hunt is moving forward at a snails pace. I've asked for letters of recommendation and have three of them so far, plus a glowing recommendation from another professor that I essentially didn't have to ask for. I did ask one other previous supervisor; however, I have not heard back from her yet. She did say that when I was with her that she would give me a recommendation if I ever needed one so we will see. According to my classmate, Katie, who is with her right now, she is pretty busy with some personal issues right now. I'll just be happy to know where I will be going for my externship and where we will be living by like January or February. Hoping sooner rather than later and I know with the coming holiday months that time will essentially fly by me without me even realizing it.

I have the two photo-shoots this weekend, two next weekend, and then one more scheduled. I am thinking about adding in clause for my clients that states they will have to pay extra if they are late. I have had three people be late in the last two weeks and it drives me nuts! Is my time not important to them? I am habitually on time or early and it drives me nuts when we are running late (which is hardly ever) and so it drives me even more nuts when I have to wait on other people. Really, I don't care if you have no kids, one kid, or six kids, plan your time wisely and budget for things to take longer and you WILL be on time. Really, how hard can it be?! Now, five or ten minutes late doesn't usually bother me, but after that it gets a little long, especially when it is an important event. Oh well, there is my gripe about that.

I took some initiative at home with Ayden's school work. He doesn't typically come home with any homework, except for a packet of math sheets on Wednesday nights. We are supposed to read with him for 20 minutes a night and for a while there we were pretty good about reading with him, but it wasn't for 20 minutes. Yesterday I got home from work a little early and had a bit before I had to pick Ayden up from school so I cleaned out his homework box that I had made him awhile ago and filled it up with some stuff. I have decided that we are going to set the timer for 20 minutes each night and read a chapter book. I read a page, he reads a page. For the most part, he is reading the majority of the 20 minutes because the time it takes me to read a page is significantly shorter than the time it takes him. We are also going to work on his handwriting and math skills. I have a check off sheet for him to do each night and it includes: emptying out his school folder, mom or dad signing his planner, reading 20 minutes, writing the book name down in his reading folder, going through his vocabulary words, math worksheet and hand writing worksheet. All in all, this shouldn't take more than an hour and I think that that is even long. But with the check off sheet I think it will hold Jay and myself more accountable for our actions because last week I noticed that it was too easy for us to sit back on the couch and watch TV as a family than to pick up a book and read as a family. And at this point, reading is WAY more important than watching TV. Both Ayden and Jay know that his check off list needs to be completed before the TV goes on for the night. Keep your fingers crossed and wish us good luck with this. We are entering a whole new phase of parenting as Ayden continues to get older and although he is more able to be independent on things, it is a whole different level of help and responsibility that we need to give as parents.

And since there are a whole lot of pictures that I want to share yet and don’t really feel like continuing to write, enjoy! CIAO! LOVE ME!