Wednesday, July 23, 2008

U to the Tah

That's Philly talk for Utah. I'll be heading out there, well I guess WE'LL be heading out there next week-- that's right, Pete is actually going to come with me! We'll be around from July 29- Aug 5. If any of you long lost friends are still around, I'd love to catch up-- let me know!

I have a ton to blog about, but right now it is 90 degrees inside my house and I am going to go crawl into bed, blast the AC and take a nap. Seriously.

Thursday, July 17, 2008

Welcome!

A new family just moved into our ward a few weeks ago. Dave is starting his intern year as an ENT (Ear Nose and Throat) Resident at PCOM. Anika is a fourth year medical student, finishing up her rotations at the hospitals here in Philly. And when they moved here she was pregnant. Rather pregnant (although she totally didn't look it)-- about 9 months pregnant.

We threw a shower for her Saturday morning, even though she had been having contractions. She came to the shower anyway and by the time they were headed to the hospital, her contractions had stopped, so she went home and took a nap. Sunday morning, however, they were not at church. She went into the hospital at 9:30 Sunday morning and less than two hours later, Charles Kendall was born, all 5 pounds, 14 ounces of him! He's super adorable, even if I do feel like I am going to break him! (Caleb was probably only ever that small when I was 7 months preggers).




Since Dave was on-call at the hospital the first night they were to be home with the baby, Anika came to stay with us for the evening. I forgot how much work newborns are! It made me appreciate how good I have it with Caleb-- he is at the perfect stage where he can't yet move around on his own, but he can entertain himself. Anika did a great job with little Charlie and I am impressed how quickly the whole motherhood thing comes along. Even though they are a lot of work, babies are such a blessing.

So congrats Dave, Anika and little Charlie! We're so excited to have you here!

Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Easily Pleased





Caleb really likes sweet potatoes.

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

It's Kinda a Big Deal

I've been meaning to write this post for awhile now, but I've had a good excuse for my lack of effort (more on that later). Anyway, as some of you may know, my mother is a Registered Nurse. She has done it all-- home health, hospitals, charge nurse, nursing home, assisted living, administration, etc. Growing up we never went to the doctor, mostly because Mom always dealt with really sick people so no matter what was wrong with us, we were "fine." I was telling this to my L&D nurse when she commented that her mother was a nurse and she never saw a doctor either. Apparently its a common theme with nurses.

And she's a great nurse, too. She knows her stuff and she works hard for her patients and for her employees. I worked at the ALF (assisted living facility) that she ran when I was in high school and I was always impressed how well she knew her staff. Everyone from housekeeping to the nursing aids to the charge nurse to the activities committee knew that they were welcome in her office. It was sad and hard for her to leave when they moved to Maryland. Since they moved a couple of years ago she has been staying at home, going to track meets and helping my sister fill out college applications. She has loved being a stay at home mom as well, but now Katie is about to leave for school this fall and my mom is facing an empty nest.

Here's where I get to the main point of my ramblings.
A few weeks ago my mom called me to tell me that she is enrolling in classes this fall. I'm just so proud of her for going back to school. She's going to take a year of pre-reqs and then next year she will start working towards her masters in nursing. She plans to teach nursing students at the college level when she is done. I cannot imagine how daunting, exciting, scary, exhilarating-- you name it, she probably feels it-- it must be and yet she went in and met with the counselors and scheduled her classes.

So here's to you Mom-- always setting a great example. I'm so proud of you!

Saturday, July 5, 2008

Fourth of July

My father has been in town this week, although from the amount we got to see him, we'd never know! He has been in seminars all week and left our house at 6 each morning, usually getting back after 10 at night. So it was great for us that he was able to spend the Fourth of July hanging out with us. Despite the rain, we headed down to the Benjamin Franklin Parkway and enjoyed the festivities. The weather kinda put a damper on the whole event, but it was fun nonetheless. Pete was able to join up with us after work and catch the fireworks. They were great!

Caleb also had his fifteen minutes (its actually less than 15 seconds) worth of fame. A local news station caught him on camera. It's a 5 second clip, and it's poor quality (I couldn't figure out how to download it from the station, so I recorded it while it was playing on another computer... is that illegal? oh well).

I hope everyone had a great and safe Fourth of July!