Its been a loooong while...

It has been a while since the last blog post, but dont worry you haven't missed much. In the past month and a half, Aaron and I have just been going through the week living for the weekends we get to spend together (although I've worked half of those). Aaron has been working in Richmond since the end of March and loves his commute and the stress free life that proves to be at the Richmond Ferguson branch. He gets home almost 2 hours earlier each day and gets to leave our apartment an hour later. This makes for a much less tired and cranky Aaron :)

Not too much different has been going on in the PICU. I am still amazed at the work our crew does and the resiliency of children. Ex: Just recently we had a 15 mo old who was on the highest form of mechanical ventilation we have, was on numerous medication drips to sustain life, and was made a no code (do nothing if her heart stops). We all cried with the family and were physically and emotionally drained. Yet, we continued to keep on and just a few weeks ago after being on a ventilator for over a month she went home with no tubes or other strings attached. This made me and the rest of our doctors and nurses feel so proud to be part of our amazing team and gave us each motivation to carry us for a long while. Its why we come to work daily!

Other news...we had a little glitch in our contract with our current apartment complex and did not move to Ric in April like we had planned. We are now moving on one of the best weekends of the year (the kick-off to summer). We are very happy to be moving closer to our family and our jobs, but not too excited about all the packing we must start soon. Its amazing the amount of stuff two people can accumulate in such a short amount of time. Regardless, we are still very much enjoying married life and are very excited for what the future holds for us. Forgive me if I do not post again for a bit, we havent had internet in our apt since April and making trips to Panera to get online don't happen often. Have a great week everyone!

Things I'm most looking forward to!

This past week was full of sunshine and happiness. It made me realize how much I love the summertime and great weather. Aaron took the day off on Friday and we enjoyed the day together playing tennis, running errands, and enjoying ice cream out! My vera calendar is jammed packed for the summer and I can't wait! Here are a few of the things we are most looking forward to:

Richmond Flying Squirrels baseball games. Aaron and I have gone to at least 1 game each season the past couple of years, but we are looking forward to going to many more this summer as their stadium is just minutes from where we are going to be living!

Friday Cheers at Brown's Island. Many of the gals from work rant and rave about how much fun concerts are at Brown's Island. Im excited to partake this year in the festivities!

Weddings! We have 3 to go to this summer! Aaron's best man and long time friend Michael is getting married to such a sweet and cute gal in June! My college roommate Shelly is getting married in August to her high-school sweetheart the weekend of our first anniversary! What a neat way to celebrate our marriage! And a gal from work

is getting married, also in August! We are very excited to celebrate with each of them!

The Outer Banks: Heaven on Earth! Aaron and I are looking forward to a relaxing long weekend in July at the Outer Banks with one of Aaron's long time friends and her boyfriend. Bring on the sun, sand, and this year's Brew-Thru T-shirt!

A trip to Tennessee! We are planning to leave from Shelly's wedding to head a little further south to visit Aaron's grandmother. She is such a sweet lady, and I enjoy making trips to visit her.

Last, but not least: time on the Piankatank River and Chesapeake Bay. One of my most favorite things about Mathews is the salt water that backs up to most everywhere you are! I love the bay spray on my face, the sun shining down on me, and the carefree attitude of everyone!

Phew, what a summer we have planned. Can't wait for all of it to begin!

The move is finalized!

Aaron found out this week that his last day at his Ferguson location would be March 26, which meant we needed to get our ducks in a row to move to Richmond :) Hallelujah!

On Saturday my sweet cousin turned a year old-Happy Birthday Kayley girl! We headed south to celebrate her big day and decided to do some apartment hunting also. We found one just minutes from Aaron's new office and only a few miles from St. Mary's. Its a bit smaller than the one we have now if thats possible, but will work until we're able to find an area that we like and a home that will fit our needs.

We were also able to meet my maid-of-honor and long time friend and her bf at California Pizza Kitchen for dinner that evening. We had a fun time catching up and eating yummy food.

It was a great weekend for us. We got quite a bit accomplished! Hope you all had a good weekend as well. Stay tuned for the big move in a little over a month!

Isn't this sweet little guy precious? Aaron and I saw one on our walk this afternoon and I decided it is something I need :) We've talked extensively about getting a lab or boxer, but want to wait until we have a big yard. I think this would be the perfect solution until then, don't you? Now, if I could only get Aaron on the bandwagon we'd be set! I wonder what would happen if I just brought one home one day?

Still here...

In the past 2 weeks since I've blogged not a lot, but a lot, has gone on in our busy lives. Aaron and I have been on a hunt for a 4 wheel drive vehicle so that I can get to work when it snows. We traveled the weekend after Valentines to Va Beach to carry on the search. The truck we thought was "the truck" turned out to be a piece of junk-people: take care of your vehicles if you ever want to sell them! On our way to Mathews we saw one at a local dealership that did turn out to be the one so our weekend wasn't completely a waste. Turns out its the exact same truck my dad had when I was growing up just a few years newer-like father (in-law) like son (in-law). Now that we have found and purchased one we will probably never have another snow storm, but that wouldn't be a bad thing either. Check out the new Z-71:


This weekend we travel again to Mathews/Yorktown to celebrate Aaron's dad's birthday and on Sunday Aaron has his first soccer game! Looking forward to a good weekend with family! Enjoy the rest of your week!

Happy Valentines Day blog friends and family :) We hope you are having a fabulous day with your loves. Our Valentines has been nice, but not typical. My poor 3 year old cousin that I lived with throughout nursing school is in St. Mary's with RSV. Aaron and I went to visit him today. The little guy looks pitiful with his oxygen, IV, and monitors, and broke my heart when he started saying "help me". I see kids like this every day but, I don't think I ever realized just how hard it is for families to be in the hospital with their sick children until today. I got a totally new appreciation for those families today by getting a sneak peak of a day in their life and I was only there for a couple of hours.

Many of you know that I am totally in love with my job in the Pediatric ICU. When I chose to go to nursing school I had absolutely no idea this career would give me this much gratification and fulfillment. I love the bond that I form with kids and their families. I love being able to help them feel better and I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE being able to send them home back to their normal lives and get a big hug as they walk out the door. Not all of my days are fun or satisfying, in fact, many days I want to and do cry when I leave because the kids we see are sick puppies and it breaks my heart to know that somedays we just float through the day and make no progress towards getting them better. I've had a hard time being ok with that but am slowly realizing that thats all you can do sometimes. Regardless, the job gets done and eventually the kiddies get well. Kids are resilient to almost anything-Im convinced of that whole heartedly-another reason to love my job.

Ok, ok enough with the sappiness of my job I'm sure Aaron would love to blog about how much he loves crunching numbers and taking people to court one day so stay tuned for that :) I hope everyone has a great week-Im going to wait for my call to come into work! Crossing our fingers for no more snow this week like they are predicting. Happy Valentine's Day again!

Another Snow-y Weekend!

Fortunately, the weatherman was wrong in his prediction of Spotsylvania getting up to 30 inches of snow this past weekend. Unfortunately, we still got 14 inches and were trapped inside for yet another snowed-in weekend. We were fully prepared and this weekend didn't make me lose my mind quite as bad as the previous weekend! Friday afternoon Aaron and I ventured out for one last time before the snow fell. We, well I, found a new DVD (27 Dresses-only $4.99!) at Best Buy and new North Face gear for both of us at Dicks-we were READY! That night we enjoyed homemade chicken pot pie and baked friendship bread together. Saturday we cleaned, we read, we played our wii, and we took a couple walks in the snow. The day went by fairly quickly. Yesterday, determined to get out, Aaron and his "fan club" (thats an entirely different post) dug out our cars, which surprisingly only took 2 HOURS! We didn't have anywhere we needed or really wanted to go, but decided to venture out anyways. We ended up going to dinner at Logan's Roadhouse and using a buy 1 get 1 free coupon-we looove restaurant coupons! After dinner we came home to enjoy the Super Bowl on our new 50" plasma TV. Aaron and I are getting very good at entertaining ourselves in our 800 sq. ft. apartment. Im reminded weekend after weekend that its very important to take time out of our busy lives to stop and look around and thank God for the blessings we have and the beauty of the earth he has made, regardless of how much I'm beginning to despise snow! We hope everyone has a great week. Aaron tried to start his this morning and had to turn around-roads in NoVa just aren't up to par quite yet. Stay safe and stay warm!