Back to work tomorrow! :( Oh how I loved my week off. Besides getting engaged (!!), M and I spent the week relaxing, staying up way too late, sleeping in, and being completely lazy, it was perfect! We also watched 2.5 seasons of Gossip Girl. We're obsessed! I also did a pretty impressive job of staying on my diet (minus one slip up that I'm regretting tonight with a tummy ache). Nothing like a deadline (engagement pictures! showers! wedding!) to get you motivated! I'm down 6 pounds since last week! Tomorrow I have to watch C then it's three nights in a row at the hospital. I had probably the worst night of work ever the last time I was there, so needless to say I'm not looking forward to going back. I just need to pray and have faith that everything I'm putting up with this year will be worth it in the end! Despite my best efforts, this post refuses to have paragraphs! Sorry for the long boring blob of text.

Here are some pictures that are inspiring me while planning our wedding!

(Links to the sources of all of these can be found on my pinterest: http://pinterest.com/ashleejones/wedding/ )

So since my last post... M and I got engaged!! I can still hardly believe it!

His birthday was the 19th and he said he wanted to go to the aquarium to look at penguins (which are our favorite things in the whole world). While hanging out with the sweet little penguins he kneeled down beside me and asked me to marry him! It was perfect and sweet and romantic and he thought of it all by himself. Afterwards I had a permanent smile on my face, which still hasn't gone away three days later! Definitely the happiest girl in the world right now :)
I had an idea in my head it might happen that day but I was telling myself to stop thinking that so I wouldn't be disappointed haha. Unfortunately no pictures to share yet because they are all on someone else's camera.

M had Friday and Saturday off as well and I loved spending every minute with him for three whole days! Today he is back at work, sadly.

So now wedding planning has kicked into high gear and honestly it has been nothing but stressful to think about! I would really love for us to get married next summer but considering we'll both only have been working a few months at that point, and a lot of deposits will need to be made soon, it really depends on how much our families want to contribute. Even though it is really far away, I am really close to just saying let's do it spring of 2014 so I can stop stressing!
I'm sure it'll all work itself out regardless of when we choose, but it seems like the second we got engaged the clock started ticking to have a wedding planned and payed for by next summer, and suddenly a year seems like such a short amount of time!

Despite how stressful it has been thinking about it only being possibly a year away, I am really excited to plan the wedding, and thankful for pinterest to help! Can't wait to share more posts on wedding planning ideas and progress!

Goodness I am a terrible blogger! I'm so disappointed in myself and all that has happened in the past months that I failed to document. Must. be. better.

Basically since February (it's been that long??) I have just been working, learning to be a nurse, and trying to survive until December (graduation!).

I am so blessed to have my job and I do realize this everyday. I am thankful beyond measure that I work in the ICU and I get to learn so much and see such intense stuff that I am really interested in. I don't envy my friends' tech jobs at all that consist of only bathing patients, helping them to the bathroom, and taking vitals.
That said, I HATE working full time nights and trying to go to nursing school full time. It is easily the hardest thing I've ever done and I seriously wonder at the beginning of every week if I'll be able to survive yet another week of this. I feel like all my posts on twitter or Facebook are complaining so I try not to post much at all. Most days I'm going between 24-40 hours without sleep, thanks to going straight from working all night to school or to watch C or to clinical, and then sometimes back to work. Ugh, it's just horrible.
One day in the future I can come back to this and see how hard I worked and know it was worth it, and that's what keeps me going. That and remembering that my momma paid her own way through medical school with a 5 year old by working every hour she wasn't in school and taking me to class and clinic with her. I learned from the most dedicated woman there ever was so I know I can do it!

I am happy to say that I am one test and one clinical away from being in my very last semester! That means only 12 more days at the hospital, 32 more days of class, and one licensing exam and I'll be an RN! It can't come soon enough.

In other news, I keep myself sane by planning our future wedding (thinking I'll be getting a ring any day now ;)) and decorating our future home on Pinterest (there's no time for decorating the home we actually live in!), and reading some books on kindle in my very limited spare time. And also spending every possible moment with M I can get, which is sometimes only once every three days. I feel like the song Time is Love by Josh Turner is the story of my life right now! Any second that I'm not at work or school or watching C or absolutely needing sleep, I'm rushing home to spend as much time with M as possible! I sure do miss him lately.

We also got a new puppy! I wasn't convinced that it was the best time for a new puppy, but M wasn't taking no for an answer, haha. She's a German Shepard named Reese and she's clumsy and funny and cute, most of the time. It's so weird having a big dog! I've had small or medium sized dogs for the past 18 years and she isn't even close to big yet but she seems SO BIG to me!

We are moving into a new apartment in two months since our lease is up where we live now and I can't wait! We had all but decided to stay with M's parents for three or four months until we'd graduated and gotten jobs but it was just going to be hard with the pups. And then we were blessed with the perfect place falling right into our laps for the best price and we are so happy and can't wait to move. I'm pretty darn excited to decorate it, and actually follow through this time since I will have some free time in my life in the near future.

Here's hoping my next post comes before five more months have passed!

Project366

Days 14-36!
(They are still pretty boring! Hoping for some more exciting ones this week!)

life lately

As a warning, this post will be long (I have too much to catch up on!) and pictureless, since I'm on my phone.

I am about to finish my second week at my new job! I really love it so far but I'm nervous that tomorrow is my last shift with a preceptor and then I'll be on my own (and the only tech on the unit!).
I am so happy that I found a position in the ICU, I think I would be terribly bored anywhere except a critical care setting. (And I also get to do more than most techs!)
It has been really, really hard working and going to school, especially the classes I am in right now being so fast and intensive. Luckily, this week I went to what will be my normal, three night per week schedule and it's been much more manageable than trying to work days and go to school most days also!

School has been absolutely crazy but I am almost finished with my mental health course! We cover a whole semester's worth of material in four and a half weeks and it's just been insane trying to keep up and train at work, but the end is in sight!
After mental health we start medical/surgical for 11 weeks and then it will be summer! I don't get a break until July 20th because we have school during the summer as well, but that just means I'm that much closer to graduation!

I have been trying to keep up with taking a picture each day for project366 but some days my life is rather boring haha. If I had a baby it would be much easier! Instead I just end up with a lot of pictures of food. I'll post and get caught up on those soon!

I started really trying to watch my calories and get to the gym this week and I'm happy to have already lost an inch off my waist! (I don't have a scale so this is my only method of measuring.) I really hope to stick with it and finally be able to get to my goal weight in the next couple months! I think I am about 15-20 pounds away (having already lost 45 last winter and then gaining back about 10).

I'm almost failing at my attempt to blog more but I'm going to keep trying as my life slows down a little in the next couple weeks!

This past week has been so crazy! I am glad to have it behind me.

Monday and Tuesday I had hospital orientation for my new job. Basically we learned about the company, the hospital, and hospital-wide policies and such. I have to say that so far I LOVE the company I work for. Everyone is so nice and helpful and it really feels like even though it's a huge place with a lot of employees, everyone is there to help one another.
They also have so many great benefits for employees! I've never had a job with benefits before and I am so shocked at how little I pay for amazing health, vision, and dental insurance, and how many other great things there are that I never thought about, like paid time off! I was just in awe when the benefits package was explained to us, haha!

Wednesday was supposed to be my first day of lecture but I had to miss because I HAD to be at orientation at the hospital to learn their computer charting system. After taking the computer charting class, it hardly seemed necessary to make me skip school for it, as it was mostly me working through modules I can do at home, but oh well.
I also got to go up to the ICU Wednesday for a few minutes. I sat at the nurses' station waiting for my manager to come back from a meeting and was definitely intimidated by everything going on on the unit. I just can't wait until I am trained and know what I'm doing, the period in between now and then is scary!
I scheduled with my manager to come back for my first 12 hour shift on Monday!

Thursday I had more PCT training at the hospital and learned how to take blood sugars, and then I went to lab at school and learned how to draw up medication with needles and give shots! That was pretty exciting :)

Yesterday after lecture was my first psychiatric clinical, meaning it's at a "mental hospital". I was so very excited about this clinical, but the reality of it was something I wasn't really expecting. I was just hit so hard with how sad I felt for those that are mentally ill and how blessed I am to be mentally healthy.
I don't understand why some of us go about life normally with our brains working fine and others, who are living perfectly normal lives as well, suddenly are hit with a psychotic break and can no longer function because of things going on inside their brains that are tormenting them. I hate it so much for each and every person going through it.
Last night after I got home I just couldn't stop thinking about the people I'd met. M and I went to Ihop for dinner (because it was 11pm) and all I could think about was how I get to be out here eating Ihop and going home to my nice apartment and get to go about my blessed life while they are still there at that place dealing with such terrible things.
I am happy for the opportunity to speak to and interact with and play games and do puzzles with the patients though, because I think they really liked having us there and having someone to talk to, but I definitely am seeing the world differently after being there.

Today I have to attend a 12 step program meeting (such as AA, or narcotics anonymous, or one of the many others). It should also be interesting and eye opening.
Other than that I am going to try to enjoy the weekend because next week will be even crazier and busier than this one. One day at a time!