Week In Review

Jami

I was very worried about what things to work on in my Family History class this week, but I guess I shouldn't have worried so much, because I got called into work at the hospital and didn't end up teaching.  This was one of those days when I love being a nurse.  A calm day - something that is quite rare - and a day where I could just focus on the needs of my patients and share the joy of having a new baby with them.

 I also enjoyed working with Jami who also has another job as a nursing instructor.  It was fun and also extremely beneficial to compare notes and teaching techniques.  I feel like I am still so new at teaching that I can use all of the help I can get.

It was a good working day, but I do miss church.  I miss the association with all my friends in the ward, I miss taking the Sacrament, and I miss being spiritually fed.  It seems that if I don't get that once a week I miss it, and my week feels a little "off".

I started a diet this week.  Something that I have been thinking about doing for months and months.  So far so good!  Mostly I am just being aware and responsible for everything that I am eating and recording it.  Now if I can just get my butt off the chair to do some exercise!

Sally had asked me to teach her Layton Pharm class for her since she was going to be out of town.  I was pleasantly surprised that the topic was antibiotics.  Last semester I felt that the best class I taught was on antibiotics - mostly because I did the entire presentation in clipart pictures instead of words.  For example,

 

This guy represented the "Big Guns", meaning that it was
a very strong antibiotic

This represented an allergy to an antibiotic.

 It was really a fun PowerPoint.  I sent my PowerPoint to Sally to see if she was okay with what I was teaching the students and apparently she used my slides to teach the Murray class.  Then she proceeded to complain to me!  She said that the students all loved my slides, and that  she felt that I had raised the bar because the students were now expecting visual representations in every class!  I don't honestly think she meant it, but it made me feel good anyway.

Throughout the week my computer at work has had major issues with being slow.  I mean slower than turtle slow, slower than sloth slow.  All of my textbooks and supplementary material is on the internet and a slow computer does not make for a productive day.  Between adding in Sally's class and not being able to have access to the material I needed to teach my class it has been a very stressful week.  I resorted to only working in the office 4-6 hours a day and then coming home and working another 6-8 hours at home.  I do put a ton of work into my class lectures right now, hopefully it won't be so stressful next semester because I will already have my slides prepared.

Monica

On Tuesday I supervised students at McKay Dee hospital while they passed off their IV skills before starting clinicals.  It was fun to see my students from last semester.  It is amazing to me how attached I get to my students!  While I was there I ran into Monica.
Monica worked with me in Labor and Delivery and got her Master's just before I did.  She teaches at another nursing school and brought in her students for the same IV skills check.  It was so fun to catch up with her and to compare notes on our two programs.


It has been a snowy, foggy, and definitely winter week.  It is a good thing that I have good friends to help ease those yucky winter blues!  Yes, the January depression is back.  It is so strange, Wednesday morning I was joyfully thinking to myself, "Wow, it is almost the end of January, maybe I'm not going to get depressed this year" and then WHAM!  it started later that afternoon.  I go from being a happy, frazzled, fun-loving person to this sad, overwhelmed, self-esteem-less creature who doubts everything and just wants to crawl into bed and not come back out.  Personally I DON'T LIKE IT!

I'm so glad that Karen, Jonell, and Ash joined me for our monthly lunch at Old Grist Mill.  That is our favorite haunt!  Those ladies make my heart happy.

I ended up working at the hospital Saturday.  I just had one little guy to take care of that needed some one on one attention, so I spent most of the afternoon just rocking him.  It was very, very nice!  Of course he had a lot of tubes to work around, but we made it work, and I loved it!

Saturday night Harper and Janis invited us and the Lotts up for pizza to see their new house.  They just finished building the house and moved in just a few weeks ago.  It is a beautiful house, very open and spacious.  Harper did most of the wood and steel work, and it definitely shows his personality style.

Here are some pictures of their new house.




It was so good to get together with the Johnsons and the Lotts again.  It has been far too long.  We kept remarking how strange it is that when we were younger and had to get babysitters in order to spend time together we thought it was difficult, but somehow we made it work.  We used to always say how much easier it would be when our kids were all grown, and that we would get together (even go to St. George or Bear Lake) more often because it would be so much easier to go.  But, we were mistaken.  Since our kids are grown we hardly ever make time to get together.  I wonder why that is.  Perhaps it is because we are even more busy with our adult children and grandchildren that we are just too tired to do anything!

I can't believe I totally forgot to get pictures of us. . . I must be totally losing my mind!


This week I am grateful for:
Good friends who care about me, who make me laugh, who make me feel special.  Together we share good times.  Together we share trials and struggles.  We lean on each other, share shoulders and hugs.  We laugh and we cry together.  They celebrate my successes, they encourage me, and they listen when I am ranting.  I feel so blessed for my extra special friends.  I love them all.