An Eventful Week

So, I always say that nothing terribly exciting ever happens to us; which is probably why you haven't read a real post from us in quite a while. However, this past week has had some exciting moments!

On Thursday, I (along with another member of my research team) presented a poster on the research we have been doing for the last year and a half at the Fulton Conference. It was a great experience and it's something that always takes me out of my comfort zone a little bit, which is good. For those of you that don't know about my research job, here's a little run-down: We are finishing up a quantitative and qualitative study on how multiple chronic illnesses affects older adult couples. I have been recruiting couples through the Diabetes Management Clinic, interviewing them, transcribing the interviews, and coding and analyzing the interviews. It's been incredible to talk with these couples about their daily experiences. This poster contained most of the quantitative results, which is something that I didn't have much to do with on the actual study but wanted to learn a little more about it so that's why I volunteered to help out.
Chad, being the supportive hubby he is, came during his lunch break so he could see my poster and he took a picture, so here it is! Notice the poster to our left won first place...which is funny, because ours looked so much better. =)



On top of trying to get this poster put together, I've been feeling quite overwhelmed with my tutoring job. Last weekend I had to read about 14 students' 10-12 page rough drafts (total = 140 pages!), annotate on the drafts, and write each of them a letter telling them what they needed to work on. Then, this week I had to conference with each of them for 30 minutes. I had to do this in all of that spare time I have... Needless to say I'm glad it's over. It was a great experience to feel like I was helping these students with their papers, but it's stressful when I have so much going on anyway. Thursday night after dinner, Chad and I went into our bedroom to relax at about 7:15 and we totally crashed! We were both so exhausted that we slept for hours. When we do things like this (going to bed before the sun sets) we always laugh about how old we're getting, but I'm not gonna lie, it felt great.

And it doesn't stop there...In the middle of the night Friday, I got up to go to the bathroom. On my way back I tripped and rammed my left foot into the bedpost. Ouch! Now, I'm a pretty clumsy person, so stuff like this happens all the time. This time, however, it didn't quit throbbing. I tried to go to bed but it hurt so bad that I couldn't fall asleep. I took some medicine and in about 45 minutes I was able to lie back down. I awoke the next morning to quite the scene:

You can see one place where I hit the bedpost, on the second toe from the left (the big red spot). The other place I hit was right on top of my pinky toe.

Check out the fatty left two toes on my left foot! These pictures don't really do it justice. They're black and blue, too.

After I realized that the pain was not going away and was actually getting worse, I went to the doctor. What did he say? My pinky toe is broken. I actually think that the next toe over is broken, too, but I didn't think so at the time and it probably didn't get looked at in the X-ray. So what did the doctor tell me I can do? Absolutely nothing. Gee, thanks. So, I'm hobbling around and trying to avoid bumping it on anything, which is difficult considering I'm a chronic klutz. I've been keeping medicated with about 600 mg of ibuprofen every 4 hours. Anyway, I'm worried about driving, I drive a stick, and work, I walk about 3 laps with a lady every day and I walk another resident's dog. Oh yeah, and that graduation thing too. But that's not for another three weeks, so I should be better by then. In the mean time, I'm really going to work on that chronic clumsy thing...

Spring Fever

I'm desperately needing sunshine, so I figured since Mother Nature won't give it to me, I'll at least see it when I check my blog!

I've been tagged:

Here's to my first tagging experience:

TEN YEARS AGO:
I was living life fully as an experienced 11 year old. I was in 6th grade, living in Decatur, Indiana. I was attending Adams Central Middle School (or "Amish Country Middle School" as we had coined ourselves.) I was excelling in my math class (weird, I know) and doing well in my English class with Mrs. Schwartz. I hated art and gym, and continued to make a fool of myself in both classes. I had just barely moved from Lewisburg, Pennsylvania almost two months ago. I was at an extremely awkward stage of life, but the fact that I had upgraded from my spectacles to contacts just two months prior greatly improved my appearance. I was still somewhat upset with my parents for moving me two states over, but was really enjoying the small branch we went to. The school was kind of a joke, though. We were way behind compared to what we were learning when I moved from Pennsylvania.

5 PLACES I HAVE LIVED!

I can do better than 5:
1. Round Rock, Texas
2. Mt. Airy, Maryland (We lived in Gathersburg before this, but I was so little it doesn't really count)
3. Lewisburg, Pennsylvania
4. Decatur, Indiana (2 places in Decatur, but the move caused a change in school districts between my 6th and 7th grade years)
5. Goodrich, Michigan
6. Provo, Utah
7. Bixby, Oklahoma (Lived with my sister and her family for 4 months)
8. Provo, Utah
9. Orem, Utah
10. Soon to be: West Lafayette, Indiana!!

FIVE THINGS ON MY TO-DO LIST!
1. Finish chapter 14 of the 5th Harry Potter
2. Pick up my house
3. Get ready for dinner
4. Prepare my Primary lesson for tomorrow
5. Get some homework done

I ENJOY!
Relaxing, talking to my husband, dancing, singing, scrapbooking, cooking (sometimes), taking hot baths, playing with my nieces and nephews, and marking things off my to-do list.

TWO BAD HABITS!
1. I am a nail biter and I can't stop. I keep trying to break this awful habit, but I haven't been successful.
2. I am addicted to Diet Coke. It's a disease...Seriously, whenever I have a headache it's the only thing that makes me feel better.

FIVE THINGS YOU MIGHT NOT KNOW ABOUT ME!
1. I've been to Paris, France.
2. I used to want to be a veterinarian when I was little. I quickly changed my mind when someone informed me that I would have to work with blood and guts.
3. My husband first told me he wanted to date me when we were in a women's restroom at Provo High.
4. To clarify #3, I was a janitor at Provo High and so was Chad. We often did our rounds together so that we could talk.
5. I really want to work with old people when I grow up. They're my favorite.

FIVE JOBS THAT I HAVE HAD!
1. Subway Sandwich Artist (Yes, that was my title. It was printed on the sleeve of my purple work shirt.)
2. Janitor in the Clyde Building on BYU campus. I worked from 4-8 AM. This was the worst job, ever. I averaged about 4 hours of sleep a night for 3 months when I came down with mono and had to quit. It was awful.
3. Nanny for my sister in Oklahoma. Probably the best gig ever. Get paid to play with nieces and nephews? Couldn't beat it! It did get a little crazy when I had to watch the 3 kids for a few days while my sister and her husband went to look for houses in Michigan. It was fun playing mom but it was exhausting. Best birth control ever.
4. Dishwasher at Legends Grille from 8-11:30 PM Monday, Wednesday, Friday. I quit after two weeks.
5. Janitor at Provo High - Where I fell in love with my husband, so I have to say it was good. I have some great stories. If you want to hear them, just ask: cleaning out urine in the garbage cans in the boys bathroom and spit wads from the walls, teacher's complaining of rashes on their bums because of the toilet cleaner, busting a picture frame in a teacher's classroom. Yeah, those were good times.
6. Manager at The Pita Pit
7. Research Assistant and Teacher's Assistant for a BYU professor
8. Writing Fellow
9. Personal Assistant to the residents at Courtyard at Jamestown Assisted Living Facility - My favorite job in the world. I work with the best people...
Wow, that's a lot of jobs.

I hope you enjoy reading this. I sure had fun reminiscing. Just so you know, I have lived so many places that it took me about 15 minutes to even remember where I was when I was 11.

I tag Mindy Hill, Jessica Richardson, and Lindsay Moore.

I may have spoken too soon:

Chad had a pleasant surprise on Friday afternoon when he went to the mailbox. Inside was my acceptance letter from IUPUI! He rushed over to campus so that we could open it together and I was very relieved when the first word I read was, "Congratulations!" =) I'm in and very excited about it all.

Chad also decided a few short hours ago that he will in fact be attending Purdue. He bought his plane ticket to go out for orientation in April, right before graduation. We feel very good about our decisions and are excited to be graduating in April and moving to Indiana the first of August.

Another bit of good news. We bought our tickets to Mexico!!!!! We'll be leaving Friday June 13th (pray for our safety in the sky) and coming back on Sunday the 22nd. This will hopefully be a summer of fun and relaxation before we begin our rigorous master's programs in the Fall.

Yay for good news!

Playing the waiting game...

Well, for those of you keeping tabs on my grad school applications, I am still waiting to hear back. I sent in my applications the first week of January, and they weren't due until February 1st. I thought that by sending them in so early, I would maybe hear back quickly. That has not been the case, however. I know that the applications are at the right place and that they're being reviewed, but I don't know when I'll get an answer. The secretary at IUPUI said she couldn't give me a definite date, but that it would be sometime before March 31st. I'm trying to be patient, but have found that I'm not good at this waiting game.

Primary

Chad and I got called to teach in the Primary last year during the spring. We taught the cutest little kids, ages 4 and 5 for about 7 months. Well, at the beginning of this year, we were asked to switch to the 10, 11, and 12 year olds. Needless to say, the experiences we've had thus far have been vastly different from our younger crowd. The older ones really want to understand and ask great questions. But, we don't get to color every week. Our last week as teachers of the 4 and 5 year olds, we had a little photo shoot just so we could remember the kids in our class. This is my little tribute to them. As soon as I get pictures of our new class, I'll put them up here. (I should let you know that this is only part of our class. We had about 10 on the role and usually we had 7 or 8 of them show up. This day, we only had 6.)

They wanted to make silly faces. So we did...

From left to right...Lexi (purple), Eve, Andi, Christian, Billie, and Kaci (pink, yes they're twins)

The Jorgensen Clan

While Chad and I were in California, we were able to stay with Dave, Rachel, J.D., Jacob, and Pablo for a few days. (By the way, Pablo is the unborn child. And we are so excited!) It was so good to see all of them. We actually had their names for Christmas this year, and they had ours so it was fun to exchange in person. The best part was watching the boys open their Road Rippers: