{nostalgia}

*This post was started Monday night… and finished Wednesday morning*

Monday: Wikipedia (oh beloved Wikipedia, haha, or not) defines nostalgia as a yearning for the past, often in an idealized form… I’ve walked around all day with a sense of nostalgia. Is that the correct use of that word?! Maybe, maybe not, lol! If, indeed, it does mean an yearning for the past, then that’s what I’ve been feeling. It all stems from a dream I had last night. Stupid dreams. What I’m really yearning for is something that never was so in all reality it doesn’t even make sense. But it is what it is, it’s ridiculous. I’m sure all will be forgotten by tomorrow.

I started Week 3 of my Ripped in 30 program with Jillian Michaels tonight and for the life of me I cannot remember why I ever thought Week 3 was my favorite. It killed tonight and my arms are STILL burning (in both a good and bad way)! I’m proud of myself for doing so well with working out. I did ‘miss’ two days last week which isn’t the end of the world, but I am disappointed in that. I did not work out on Thursday night because I had a long day at clinic and I just couldn’t get motivated. Then when I had the chance to work out on Saturday morning before heading out for the wedding I attended, I slept in instead. Actually, I didn’t even sleep in that long and I did have the time to work out yet that morning, I just didn’t. I tried to rationalize it with the fact that I was going to be on my feet all day long and not really eating all that much so it would be okay and I suppose that it was, but I am hard on myself like that. I’m going to try and work out every day during Week 3 without taking any days off. We’ll see if I can pull it off! I am a little disappointed with the weight loss though.

I have read through other forums that with these kind of programs it is more important to keep track of the inches that you are losing instead of the weight because you are gaining a lot more muscle which weighs more. I know that I am toning up for sure, but I wish the scale would reflect that a little more. I think I have been eating somewhat okay. I haven’t had any soda since starting and I’m trying to drink more water than I had been. I started out at 119.4 lbs and this morning I weighed 117.6… not quite two pounds lost. (Super bummed that I weighed in at 118.8 Wednesday morning though. But I know it partially has to do with the fact that your weight fluctuates every day and that I didn’t workout last night, although I didn’t think I really over ate at supper time either.) I know that with the weight that I am at I wouldn’t go from 119 to 115 in two weeks (without seriously watching my calories and probably under eating), but the irrational part of my brain wishes I had. If I reach 116.9 by the end of the 30 days I will consider that an accomplishment because I know that incorporating more cardio with Turbo Fire will get me to where I want to be. Slow and steady is how it goes! Besides, I’m going to have rocking arms by the end of the 30 days, haha!

Tuesday: I am so sick of being sick. While at clinic today my nose would NOT stop running! I am thinking it probably had something to do with the dry air in the building because at one point I gave myself a nose bleed. As if that isn't attractive! Luckily it wasn't during a patient's appointment, but rather in-between appointments. Still, I would rather not have had to deal with it in the first place.

I don't really know how much snow we are supposed to get tonight... the weather people continue to tell us many different things. We all know that I would be happy with NO snow; however, I just don't think that I am going to be that lucky. I don't think we are supposed to get very much though. My drive into clinic this morning was rather interesting. We must have gotten just a dusting of snow over night and usually that wouldn't make the roads too bad, but I guess with the temperature being what it was, it made for some very hazardous driving conditions this morning. The roads did not look bad, but they were covered in a thin layer of ice. Unfortunately for me, as I listening to the radio this morning they kept saying that there were accidents happening all over Hwy 39 and wouldn't you know... that was the exact highway that I was driving on and I was headed right into the accidents. Ugh! I have to say that given the circumstances and the fact that I hate driving in anything but pristine conditions I handled myself pretty well. I could feel my anxiety building, but I tried to stay calm and just slowed down quite a bit. There were two accidents that I ended up driving past... neither was too bad, but it did delay me getting to my destination in a timely matter. Okay, so I was only 10 minutes late and it wasn't really late, just on time. But I like to be running early.

Wednesday: My goal of working out every day for Week 3 is gone. Haha! It lasted for one whole day. I got home from clinic last night and was just drained. My whole body ached and I was in bed super early. We didn’t end up getting too much snow which is good. Unfortunately though, Stevens Point is about the only school in all of central Wisconsin that is NOT closed! Wisconsin Rapids, which is south of us, and Wausau, which is north of us, are both closed for the day. I supposed it worked out for the best though because even if Ayden wouldn’t have had school, I would have had class. It is just easier to drop him off at school than to worry about getting him to the Y for the snow days program. Either that or bringing him to class with me.

My sense of nostalgia is gone. Yeah! It really wasn’t one of those things I wanted to be feeling about that particular chapter of my life.

Off to finish getting ready for the day! I’m thinking about redesigning the blog (yet again) sometime soon… maybe tonight!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{wedding}

I spent the majority of yesterday at a wedding being the second photographer and I had a great time. I was asked a while back by our family family photographer and friend if I would be interested in helping her photograph a wedding and I really couldn’t say no. (I don’t know if you read by blog Jacki, but if you do… HI!) I thought it would be a fun time and I couldn’t say no to a little extra money. The only sucky part about the whole thing was sitting there knowing that I have to wait another 573 days for Jacki to photograph my wedding! She does some pretty AMAZEBALLS work and it makes me so excited to know that she will be capturing mine and Jay’s wedding when the time rolls around. She had mentioned to me why we were there that when she had been the second shooter for weddings with another photographer that she looked at that woman as a sort of mentor… I have to say… I definitely aspire to Jacki’s talents and I look forward to the next weddings we shoot together because I am sure to continue learning and learning!

Now I just need to start planning things for my wedding. With how fast everything else in life is going, the wedding is sure to pop up before I know it! It is probably a good thing that we are pretty busy with life right now and will be for the next six or so months because then I won’t sit and dwell on how long it is to the wedding. I mean, it will be March by the end of this week… where did February go?!

In other news, Ayden had his pinewood derby car race this weekend for Cub Scouts and he placed… THIRD!!! Okay, so it is not first or second, but third is still pretty awesome! He got a little trophy, medal, and even a plaque to put a picture of him and his car in. I was kind of bummed to have missed it, but I also think that it was special that him and Jay got to experience that event as just a father and son thing. Besides, there are district wide races this weekend that he can participate in and we might go to that so I can see him race. I think he is kind of excited about that because he did so well this past weekend.

Because my weekend has been kind of short, I am SO not ready to head back to school and clinic this week. Insert sad face here!

Before I have to think about going back to my one class tomorrow (I know, life is rough, isn’t it), I’m going to sit back and enjoy some TV and relaxation time!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{another proud mommy moment}

If it seems like I am having quite a few proud mommy moments lately it is because I am! Who is going to complain about that?! NOT ME!

We had Ayden's second parent teacher conference of the year last night and it went AMAZING! I cannot remember if I mentioned the math timed tests that he has been having to do in school and at home for homework. He is a math master and so he wasn't having any trouble with them. Apparently they had to do a 100 problem timed test in school and the goal was to complete it in 10 minutes... my math master of a son completed it in... SIX minutes! Awesome!

Both Jay and I attend his parent teacher conferences when we can. We've been lucky enough to be able to schedule them during time that work with both of our schedules. I know it will most likely not always be that way and at some point they probably won't be as important to me. But given that Ayden currently receives services for reading and speech therapy, I find it very important for us to go to these conferences. There are normally two conferences throughout the year and many times the second one is optional. His teacher did note that we didn't need to meet for the second conference because Ayden was doing so well, but I wanted to in order to see the progress that he's made.

I love the fact that both his reading teacher and his speech teacher (along with the student clinician who is working at his school) both made it a point to come to the conference without me even having to request it. I really love his school and am sad that we will be leaving at the end of the school year and we got the guilt trip from his speech teacher about leaving too because she loves him so much. AWWW! Apparently Ayden is a little ham at school because his current speech teacher will be leaving for maternity leave towards the end of the school year and the long term sub will actually be the speech teacher he had when he was in kindergarten at his other school and she specifically asked if he was still in speech because she wanted to see him. Leaving lasting impressions on women already, haha! I think we might have our hands full!

The report from all of his teachers was amazing! He has made many strides in reading since he has started working with his reading teacher in October. He is still having some fluency issues where his reading isn't super fluent, but he is enjoying reading SO much more and everyone can see it. His confidence has increased and it is just awesome! I am in awe! His reading teacher said that if he continues to make the progress that he has that he will be right on track for reading when he starts third grade.

His speech teacher stated that he has met two more of his speech goals for his current IEP which is awesome! He has a few more sounds that he needs to work on, but they are the later developing sounds and as of right now, as long as he is continuing to make progress I could care less that he is in speech therapy. Actually, I really never cared that he was being pulled out for it. I think a lot of that has to do with the fact that almost my entire undergraduate course work centered around speech therapy and so I understand a lot of it and what they are working on and I never thought of it as something that woud classify my child as slow or behind. I do know that for awhile I did feel really bad about his reading being so behind his other classmates and worried that he might have to repeat the second grade over and what not and I know that I shouldn't have, but as a parent you want the best for your child and I couldn't help feeling that maybe I had let him down just a little bit in that area.

Anyways, Ayden will likely need speech therapy throughout the third grade as well, but that is okay. I am okay with that.

Overall academically his regular teacher says that he is doing great! Like I've mentioned, his reading has come along, his math skills are great, he is doing better and better with his writing and penmanship, and he is SO social! His teacher joked that she doesn't know why we ever said that he was shy because sometimes he is  just a little chatterbox in school. It made my heart swell to hear that! I think he will adjust just fine when we move to a new school!

My only current concern is learning to write in cursive. We asked his teacher when they start cursive in Stevens Point and it is not until the third grade. We had asked Jay's mom (who works as one of the administrative assistants at the elementary school where we might be moving to) to ask one of the teachers there when they start cursive and apparently it is in the second grade. Well, I know that some kids who transfer in might need some catch up time with those already in that school district, but because Ayden already will be in speech therapy and might still need some reading help (fingers crossed that he doesn't), I don't want him to feel more behind if he doesn't know any cursive and his new classmates already do. So... we might start some cursive this summer or before if he wants to learn how to write in it. It kind of depends on his interest in it. I don't want to push him too much right now when we still want to concentrate on reading and his articulation.

Wow, have I bored you do tears with all of my wonderful Ayden talk. Sorry... any parents that are reading this know what it feels like to be so proud of your child and to know that at least some of the stuff you are doing is right. I'm not a perfect parent by any means. I lose my temper and get irritated with Ayden sometimes. But I also try my hardest to make sure that he knows I love him more than anything that I will always be there for him. I don't want him to ever be afraid to come to me about anything! God bless me when this child hits his teenage years, haha!

Okay, enough about Ayden (even though he's pretty much the center of my life). Life has been going pretty good otherwise. I had clinic today and it snowed pretty much the entire day. The roads were okay driving in and I am hoping they are better than okay on my way home. I am still at clinic (yummy lunch time) and it is STILL snowing, but it is a wet snow. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

I have a bit of a cold going on and it started Sunday night. Sunday afternoon Ayden and I ventured to Jordan Park (I have yet to upload my pictures from the adventure, but I'll be sure to share some in a different post) and had a great time. We did see one other person there and maybe it is just me being paranoid, but the guy kind of freaked me out. He was alone and probably in his late 40s and in sweats and I had no reason to be afraid of him or think he meant us any harm, but it was just a little weird. Maybe it was the fact that I didn't hear him coming up behind us until he was almost there. He was really friendly to talk to for a bit, but it wasn't long after we talked that I told Ayden it was time to go. You want to think the best of people these days, but you just never know. Sorry dude for thinking you might be a crazy person! Anyways, after we got home from the park, I laid down for a while because I felt a headache coming on. Even though I felt like crap, I made myself get up and workout Sunday night. Last night of Week 1 of Ripped in 30 with Jillian and I rocked it out. I woke up yesterday with a runny/stuffy nose and felt like crap pretty much all day and I REALLY didn't want to work out last night either, but I knew that I was probably going to use my 'off' day on Saturday, I made my sick self get up and start Week 2 of the program. I felt pretty good while working out. I can feel myself getting a little stronger. I know I'm not losing as much weight as I would like as fast as I would like, but I'm trying not to concentrate on that (or weigh myself everyday either because that is just depressing). I will probaby forgo going to Cub Scouts again tonight so I can workout instead. And then go to bed early because getting up at 5:45am SUCKS! I don't know how I am going to do that on a daily basis when we move. I'm thinking my day will probably start around 8am, which means getting there probably by 7:45am... which means leaving by 6:45am and getting up by 5:45am. Ugh, too early!!! I just can't think about that right now, haha!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{you know that point}

That point when you realize things HAVE to change. I've gotten to that point in multiple facets of my life recently and it feels kind of liberating. Insert smilely face here, hehe!

Six days ago I stepped on the scale and it read 119.4. Ugh! After all of my hard work over the course of the last nineish months to get to a weight that I wanted it sucked to see it creep back up. At first I just put up with it. I was no longer working out. I started eating like crap again. Puke! But I refused to let the scale read out 120... so I knew something had to change. Because I had tried to start working out over the last two and a half months a few times with my Turbo Fire program and hadn't succeeded in getting past working out two days in a row I knew that I needed to try something different. This time I decided to work back up to the Turbo Fire program and before jumping back into that I would go through Jillian Michael's Ripped in 30 program again. I had done this before and liked it well enough and thought I could pull of working out 20 minutes each day for a month... work back into working out. I won't lie and say that I wasn't tempted into getting Jillian Michael's new 90 day program that she just launched because it looks pretty neat (you know how easy it is to fall into the trap of wanting to try every new workout program you see), but I didn't. I already have a few of her DVD's and the Turbo Fire program. I am proud to say that I worked out Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and today this week. I did not work out yesterday, despite the fact that I sort of wanted to. I workout best at night (getting up earlier than I need to in the morning is hard for me, I like my sleep too much) and Ayden and I went to a movie last night and didn't get home until almost 9pm. No excuse, I know, but it is suggested that you not workout EVERY day of the week. So, Friday was my day 'off'. Despite the fact that the scale only read 119.0 this morning, I am still proud of myself for making it past day two! My goal weight is still 115 and at some point I will get there, but I am not really dieting this time around. I really restricted myself when I lost the weight the first time around and it wasn't any fun. This time I am watching more of what I eat, but chocolate is not off limits. I haven't had soda in a while and am trying to drink more water. I AM measuring out my cereal in the morning and usually having a Lean Cuisine and an apple for lunch during the week so I sort of know my calorie count for the first half of my day and then trying to moderate my portion at supper time as to not over eat. The number on the scale is important to me, I can't lie and say that it isn't, but being healthy is more important and even working out for 20 minutes a day this week has made for a happier me. Anyone can do anything for 20 minutes, right?! I know I've written again and again about working out, so sue me, but it's my blog, I write what is on my mind at any give moment and tonight this is on my mind.

As I said, Ayden and I went to see a movie last night. We saw Journey 2: The Mysterious Island in 3D and it was really cute. I really liked the first movie, Journey to the Center of the Earth and knew this one would probably be cute too. It is definitely a good family movie to go to. It's been a fun mommy and me weekend so far. We had a mostly lazy day today which was nice. I've been pretty productive this week with regards to school so I knew that I could afford to do a bunch of nothing today. The weather was so nice though that at some point this afternoon I suggested that Ayden and I go for a walk and walk we did. We walked for about a mile and a half and it felt great. It was a little cold on our way back since we were walking into the little breeze there was, but it was a really great time for me and Ayden. As we were walking along and I was watching him scooter ahead of me through the puddles I realized just how grown up he has become in the last few years. My little man has grown up right before my eyes... seven and a half years old and I cannot believe it! He has the most amazing things to say sometimes and it always starts with 'hey momma'. Sometimes I sit and wonder just where the time has gone and what the future holds for my amazing little guy. What will he be like a few years from now? Will he still want to cuddle with his mommy on the couch? My absolute favorite thing to do with Ayden right now is read. We just started The Diary of a Wimpy Kid and he is doing so great with his reading. I couldn't be more proud! And out of the blue he will just come up to me and give me a hug or want to cuddle with me on the couch. Makes a momma melt EVERY time! Makes a momma realize what is important in life and what isn't. Make a momma revel in the fact that no matter how bad her day is going, one smile can make everything better! Best part of my long days at clinic... coming home and getting a hug the second I walk in the door! (I remember waiting for my mom to get home from work after a long day and greeting her.)

Time is fleeting and I'm moving forward, no longer backward! Best days yet to come!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{blink}

…and their childhood is gone!

My sweet little four year old went from this……to this……to this……to this…… to this…all with what seems like one blink of an eye!

I’m afraid to blink anymore because before I know it, he’ll be 18 and moving out of the house!

He captures my entire heart with one little smile, hug, smooch, ‘hey momma’, his entire being! I cannot imagine life without him and my heart swells just a little more each and every day!

(It’s just been one of those days where I’ve really taken a step back and relished in all of the glory that my life is! Good and bad and everything in between! I am immeasurably blessed!)

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{a great valentine’s day}

I wish I could say that lots of fun and exciting things have been going on and I could blog about those, but no such thing! At any rate, despite that, I am having a much better week than last and it is only Tuesday so that is probably a good sign, right?! Let's just say yes!

Jay finally got home last night after supper and we spent the rest of the night as a family chilling in front of the TV. It was nice to see him again after a few days. Heck, who am I kidding, missed him like crazy! Ayden and I got his homework and Valentine's done earlier in the night so we could just chill later on. Jay brought home some good news. He had met up with a potential employer in the area where we will be moving to and without trying to jinx it, things are looking very good. He is hoping to hear something by the end of the week for sure. Keep your fingers crossed for us because this would be a great job for him and a great fit for our family!

We also exchanged Valentine's gifts with each other last night (even though I had wanted to wait until today). Jay was pretty adamant about it last night so I let him and then I was too excited to wait to give him and Ayden their gifts so I caved too. Jay got me this beautiful necklace. He's got a pretty good track record when it comes to picking out jewelry for me if I don't say so myself! He also picked up the Breaking Dawn DVD for me on my way home, but that was more because I knew he was stopping at Wal-Mart and I had asked him to pick it up for me.

I had made two things for him. One was a picture album of me in it from a photo shoot I had done with a friend a while back and finally got edited and printed and the other one was 52 Things I Love about him. He's also getting a bigger crock pot (per his request), but we still need to go and look at one later this week when my Kohl's coupon starts. 30% off this time and crock pots on sale for $20! Heck yeah!

I had gotten Ayden two Diary of a Wimpy Kid books and a new beyblade. He was pretty excited about the beyblade... I don't know about the books, haha! But I know that he will enjoy reading them with me or Jay.

Here is a funny story for today. This morning while I was getting ready in the bathroom Ayden was out in the living room watching some morning cartoons. All of a sudden he marches up to the bathroom door and says that I called him crazy. I hadn't said anything to him up to that point so I told him that I didn't call him anything. Then he holds up the 52 reasons thing I made for Jay and told me that it said 'you put up with my crazy family' and that since Ayden was my family I was calling him crazy! Too funny! I thought it was cute that he put the connections together, even though I wasn't referring to him, and then I thought it was even cuter when he went to go sit back down on the couch and he continued to read the rest of the things I had put on the cards. To see him reading something on his own accord was great since it is something we try so hard on at home. I just smiled. It made my morning. (Well, that, and the fact that I didn't have to be to clinic until 9:30am because that was when our first patient was, although the rest of the day made up for the later start time because we were busy all day.) Side note... hugs from grateful patients are the best! :)

Hope everyone reading had a great Valentine’s Day as well!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{woe is me}

Disclaimer: This post is going to contain more whining than anything and if you’d prefer to not read it, I’d stop now. I’ll be the first to admit I have nothing to complain about in the overall grand scheme of my life, but everyone is allowed to have a bad day (or week) and vent about it.

I have to say that the culmination of my downer week was probably the weekend. I had wanted my weekend to turn my overall craptastic mood from this week around, but I think it only made things worse.

Don’t get me wrong, my weekend was not all bad. I did have a great time bowling with my bestie from high school and her son Saturday afternoon. It was great to be able to spend a bit of time together and I think both of our little guys had a great time together. It was a bummer that she had to go to work, but neither of us had control over that and I’m glad that we still decided to get together when she found out she had to work instead of rescheduling. I really needed those few hours!

Saturday night was relaxing too. Ayden and I spent it at my mom’s house chilling out and watching TV. Ayden had a great time with Uncle Casey and I spent the majority of my time non stop talking with my mom. I think she probably thinks I never shut up, ha! We even watched the movie The Hangover and I have to say that it was a lot funnier than I thought it was going to be and not quite as stupid as I had anticipated it was.

Today I was supposed to get together with three of my friends from graduate school and that plan kind of fell through. The plan was to meet at the mall at 11am. Turns out one person was sick and another one needed to stay home with her son. That left me and one other friend. I was ready to just reschedule, but we decided against it and were still going to meet. Fine and dandy, however this particular person does not know how to run on time and as much as I try not to let it bother me, 11am does not mean 1pm! Honestly, it just pissed me off. Um, its not like I don’t have my own life and other plans and can just push everything back by two hours because you don’t find it necessary to be on time. Okay, so maybe I’m going a little over board and I'm just letting my previously bad mood make things seem worse than what they really were. I don’t know, it just irritated me.

We got together for a quick lunch and that was really it. Truthfully, given my mood by that point in time, it was a waste of a day for me. After lunch I ran over to the mall because I wanted to find something for Ayden for Valentine’s Day and find some boots for myself. I found a pair of boots that I really liked, but the price was… $170! Really?!?! $170?!?! Um, I think not! I found something for Ayden and was happy with that and was going to leave, but on my way out of the mall, I happened past the Maurices store. I had been to the Maurices near us last week and didn’t find anything I wanted/liked enough to buy. This Maurices had a lot more selection to chose from and on a whim I decided to see if they had any boots I liked. Turned out they did and even though they were $60, I wanted them bad enough that I was willing to pay that much for them. I also happened upon the coat that I had seen at our Maurices but couldn’t justify buying because it too cost $60. Today I just said screw it and needed something to make me feel better. What is better than a little retail shopping?! Whatever I thought, I was going to charge it! Ha!

Time for the surprise of the day… the boots were on sale for $10 and the lady at the cashier gave me 20% off my final price even though I didn’t have my coupon with me so my total for the boots and coat was just over $60! SCORE! That literally made my day SO worth it… because believe me, the boots and coat are SUPER cute!

To top off my crappy weekend, I was ‘home’ and so was Jay but do you want to know how much time we actually saw each other… NOT A MINUTE!!!!!! You cannot count the time we spent in bed together because I went to bed before him Friday night and he went to bed before me on Saturday night. Wonderful, right?! Just made my weekend even better. (I told you, whiny, didn’t I? You were forewarned.)

I did get most of my required homework done. I just need to format the document before I submit it and it isn’t due until Tuesday morning so I have tomorrow to do that. Won’t take but maybe 15 minutes.

Best part of the weekend, hugs and smooches from my favorite little guy! He keeps me going no matter how down I am feeling. He can put a smile on my face during any moment of the day and that is all that matters right now. He’s just so silly and cute! Life wouldn’t be complete without him!

And with that, I will quit complaining about what is a seemingly perfectly great and normal life and say that tomorrow is a new day and I WILL make it better!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{you know...}

I have homework that I could be working on, but instead I am blogging. I think there is something wrong with that, don't you?! Alas, I'm not really in the mood to do homework and it isn't due until Tuesday morning at the latest so in theory that gives me all of Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday to complete something that will probably only take me 30 minutes. Maybe I will make use of my time tonight and instead of spending it lounging in front of the TV from the moment I get home to the moment I decide to crawl into bed. That, and I have laundry and packing for the weekend to get done before tomorrow night. Such is the life of a mom and graduate student, eh?

I have been feeling very blah so far this week and it hasn't helped my mood any. Last night it was especially bad. I think we all were a little crabby in our household. Ayden didn't want to eat what we were having for supper, Jay was yelling when he didn't need to be, and it all just soured my mood and so I went to bed super early. Like crawled into bed before 8pm (even though I watched TV until almost 10pm) and then I ended up sleeping like crap. The sleep I got was good, but I kept waking up. I think I was afraid that for some reason my alarm wasn't going to go off and that I would be late for clinic this morning. It also sucked because I had to get up an hour earlier because I had to drive farther this morning. I feel like I was awake and looking at my clock more than a dozen times last night. Insert sad face here, haha!

I am MORE than ready for this weekend! I am meeting up with one of my besties from high school and her son early Saturday afternoon for a game or two of bowling! Then Ayden and I are heading over to my mom's house for the rest of the day. On Sunday I am getting together with three more of my besties for an afternoon of girl talk and just venting. We got together last just before Christmas and I am surprised that another six months hasn't gone by before our next gathering. We all have families and so it is hard to coordinate our schedules so we all have time to get together. But we did and I am so thankful for it because I always leave our get togethers feeling a million times better. Friends make the world a better place!

I think just having some plans for the weekend is making me excited. We haven't done anything super fun for a couple of weekends so getting out and seeing some different people gets us out of our rut of staying home and getting on each others nerves the whole weekend which is bound to happen if we stay home this weekend. I can feel it already!

The weather has just been cold these last few days and I hate it! Ugh! At least we haven't gotten any more snow so I should be happy about that.

For some reason my school email will not work on my phone or my tablet today and it is driving me nuts. It seems like I can still receive messages, but it doesn't work to send any out and it is extremely frustrating right now. This happens every now and then and I do not know why. What I do know is that it is increasingly more annoying each time is happens because it takes me forever to figure out how to get it working again, ha! Stupid technolog is our best friend and our worst enemy most of the time!

I suppose that along with completing my homework this weekend, I should probably also work a bit on my capstone stuff. I had a meeting with my advisor that went well and now I have some more direction to move in. Pretty happy about that!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{pen pals}

Today has the potential to be a long day. I am starting out my second week of clinic and it is at a sister facility from the one that I was at last week. There are potentially three different places that I could be visiting, although I will primarily be only at two of them. I say that it could be long because there are just a few breaks in our schedule. During said breaks (especially lunch), I often use that time to go on my tablet or my phone and do things online. Apparently all of the medical buildings around here have craptastic service for my phone because whenever I enter one (even if I am near a window), I get jack for reception. Normally these facilities have a free wi-fi connection that I can tap into; however, this place's connection SUCKS and it will not connect to my laptop and therefore I am unable to connect to do anything that requires a connection... namely everything I would like to do on my tablet. Oh well... maybe it is a good thing then that we have a relatively busy schedule for the day, right?!

I must tell you about this insane new show that Jay (and his friend JT) have gotten me hooked on. It isn't all that new of a show because I guess the first season was aired in 2010, but new enough and now that we are trying out Netflix for a month I can watch the whole first season and DVR the secoond season until I get caught up. So far they have only played two episodes in the second season so I am not that far behind. The show is called Spartacus and it airs on Starz (I believe). When I watched the first episode or two I thought it was pretty dumb. It is about gladiators in the Roman time and there is a lot of cussing and nudity in the show. Definitely not something we can watch while Ayden is up or nearby. That stuff sort of bugged me at first, but now I just look past it to the story line. I have to say that Jay's friend JT was right when he said that I would have to watch the first couple of episodes to get sucked in. It is truly a dumb and fascinating story all at the same time. I say dumb because just after you get into the show and start liking someone, they go ahead and KILL THEM OFF! So far they have killed off two of my favorite people and from what Jay says, they are going to kill another important person off in the next episode, ugh! It sucks and yet I still watch it! Why do I torture myself?!

A few weeks ago I happened upon a blog that was talking about pen pals and from there I happened upon another blog that had a pen pal group. I remember being in grade school and having pen pals and thought it was the neatest thing to get letters in the mail at that age... plus I formed some awesome friendships. I actually kept in touch with two of my pen pals from Australia for quite some time and still am friends with one from South Africa and one from Israel on facebook. Cool, huh?! So, I emailed the lady in charge of creating the groups to see if the pen pal exchange was still going on and she said that it was and put me in a group! I got the list of people in my pen pal group yesterday. They are all girls (not that I was expecting any guys). One is from California, New Jersey, Pennsylvannia, and get this... the last one on the list was a girl named Ashley... from... none other than Menasha, Wisconsin. What are the odds of being put into a group with someone who not only has the same name as me, but who also lives only an hour(ish) from where I live?! Cool, no?! I thought so. I was so excited that I wrote them all letters last night. I am hoping to gain some wonderful new freinds out of this experience and honestly, who doesn't love getting something in the mail that isn't a bill or another credit card application. Yeah, that is what I thought!

Oh and guess what, because I am continuing to write this as my day progresses and I have a free minute here and there between patients, I finally got my tablet to hook up to the wi-fi system in the building. I don't know why it wouldn't hook up in the first place, but it works now, although my phone continues to have sucky reception! I suppose I will survive... haha!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{won’t be doing that again}

One would think that because I use my camera A LOT that I would be a little smarter than I was on Saturday when it comes to wanting to use said camera. We took a little trip to a place in Waupaca on Saturday for the sole purpose of me to take some photographs. No, I did not have a photo shoot, this was purely for myself. I had heard about this place and looked it up online and it looked pretty neat and I want to take some nature pictures there. As a family, we head out of the house and venture to Waupaca (which is about a half hour away). The weather was phenomenal for this time of the year and I couldn’t wait to capture some pictures!

Enter in my stupidity! We get to our destination and I turn on my camera and wouldn’t you know… it displays… NO CARD! *$%(#$*$#%(#$ almost came out of my mouth and would have if I used such words on a regular basis (I try hard not to swear). I couldn’t believe that I had forgotten my SD card in my computer! Because I am using my camera a lot more frequently these days I am uploading my pictures to my computer a lot more and I have a bad tendency of putting my card back in my camera right away. I was SUPER sad that I didn’t have a card to take pictures with (my camera has no internal storage). But I wasn’t going to let the trip be a waste and I got out my phone and started taking pictures with that. 8 megapixels should give me some decent pictures and it did.

Just as I was getting ready to tell Jay and Ayden that I had had enough and wanted to leave I checked one of the pockets of my camera bag (the only one I didn’t check the first time around because I had forgotten about it) and wouldn’t you know that my other SD card was in there. OMG, I was SO happy and I started snapping picture after picture after picture. That turned my WHOLE day around and we stayed for probably another hour walking around. Ayden had a good time playing in the snow and water and Jay was okay with it.

I couldn’t believe that I was so dumb not to check my camera before leaving the house. I should say that I am VERY careful about checking my camera before photo shoots of people. I check my camera the night before and charge my battery and make sure I have both SD cards. Safeguards to make sure my clients get the best experience they can from me.

Here are just a few pictures from both my phone and camera of our adventure!

Well, before I show you those pictures, I have to share a picture of me and my new hat (courtesy of my cousin)! My cousin made me this amazingly cute crocheted hat and I am in LOVE with it! It fits perfect and matches my coat!The place that we visited was called the Red Mill in Waupaca, WI. Me pouting because at this point I thought I wasn’t going to be able to use my camera and had to ‘settle’ for my phone to take pictures. I wasn’t happy, haha!But, we made do with the camera on the phone and I got some pretty good pictures with it. Me and little man enjoying being outside in the beautiful weather!And needed a picture with my main squeeze too! Apparently I have a bad time looking where I need to when taking a self picture with my phone, lol! Oops! It looks okay though! This one is better! Thanks to little man who took it for me and for my honey agreeing to be in the picture because according to him I had said that we weren’t going to take pictures that he needed to be in. And then when we got home you could see the moon really good and I was able to get a cool picture of it!And then today I made another project with the sewing machine and it turned out pretty awesome. It definitely isn’t perfect, but it is darn cute! it is a Kindle cover/case!Tomorrow it is back to school and once again I have been highly unproductive when it comes to doing anything school related over the weekend. Oopsies! Maybe next weekend, ha! Off to watch the Super Bowl halftime show now!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{contortionist}

When you continuously see someone contort their life to fit perfectly with someone else's over and over again, how do you tell him or her that you do not agree with how they live their life? Correct answer: you don't. Ashley answer: you don't, you hold it in, and then when you can no longer, you blog about it in as subtle terms as you can, ha! Okay, maybe I shouldn't blog about it either, it isn't fair to the person with whom I do not agree.

Case in point, I just got done telling someone that they need to care less about other people's lives and concentrate on their own instead. Make the most out of your life and quit bitching about other people and what you think they should be doing. Heed your own advice dear woman... you think I would be able to do that, but no.

So, maybe instead of bitching about how I think other people should be running their own lives, I am doing to just take a step back from these particular situations and try and take my own advice. People who are not me and not connected in my daily living can do whatever they please whether I agree with it or not. I'm sure, wait I KNOW, I've done many a thing that people have probably not agreed with. Case in point again... getting pregnant in high school (whether or not it was something I actually intended on doing).

Okay, needed to get little rant out. Think I'm good. Think I may finally need to do what I've been telling myself to do all along, but just can't...

CIAO! LOVE ME!

{another month}

I am in awe of the fact that it is February already! Where in the world did January go to?! I cannot complain that it is already February though because February, March, and April (and one or two weeks in May) and my last semester on campus is OVER! Time will fly this semester, I am sure of it!

It definitely helps that the weather we have been having is GOREGOUS and totally unexpected for this time of year. If you know me at all, you know I am NOT a cold weather person. I am ALWAYS cold in the winter and so these mild temperatures have been my saving grace. From the current forecast, it looks like it could be pretty mild for the next few weeks and that just means that much less of actual Wisconsin winter weather. Smiles all around please, haha!

I have been a bit busier this week with clinic starting. I have to say, I think I am going to love my placement. Actually, I already do. It is exactly the type of patients that I want to be seeing. After the 'hiccup' of my B+ clinic grade last semester, I was coming into clinic a little less confident that I should have been. But after my first two days, I am feeling right at home. I think it helps that the audiologists at this place have been teaching students at their facility consistently for the last 5-7 years so they know what to expect from a student stand point. At my last placement, they had had students before; however, it was about three years since their last one. That is not to say that I did not enjoy my last placement or my supervisor because I did, I just don't know if she expected more out of me or what. Anyways, I've already spent too much time analyzing why I got a B+ for my clinic grade and getting no where... enough of that!

I am so behind on laundry at our house that it isn't funny! Ayden has been digging through baskets of clean clothes all week for socks and underwear! I have three clean loads that need to be folded and put away and at least three or four loads that need to be washed. Oops! That is what I get for not doing any wash last weekend after I got home. Oh well. My goal is to get caught up on it today after lunch. Or at least to start it.

Jay made some super yummy homemade chicken noodle soup for supper last night. Seriously, the BEST homemade soup I have EVER tasted! So delicious that I could have probably eaten seven bowls of it last night. I stopped myself after two though. I think roast beef is on the menu tonight...

I met with my capstone advisor this week and it looks like my project is right on track. Actually, I think I am ahead of the majority of my classmates who are doing a capstone project right now. I know that I have a lot of work in front of me yet, but I'm not too worried. My classes are progressing smoothly and at this point in the semester I see no reason why I shouldn't get an 'A' in both classes.

CIAO! LOVE ME!