Quick Update

Just a quick update...boring to hear this again, but I am BUSY BUSY BUSY.  Been spending weekends in the lab as well as staying late most nights.  I'm working hard and getting things done.  Counting down the days until I go home for a MUCH NEEDED 2 week break and the wedding/honeymoon.  I'm beyond ready to have this degree behind me.  Not much else going on.  Back to the grind!

2 Months of Updates

If you can't tell by the 2-month delay in blog updates...I've been a little busy.  I'm not sure I've ever been this busy in my life, actually.  So where to begin...

Let's go back to February 1st.  On this day, I gave my first ever actual, full-on lecture.  I lectured in the class that I TA (Reproduction & Lactation) on Puberty.  It was 50 minutes in front of 80 students and it went really well!  I was very proud of my effort and Dr. Edwards seemed to be pleased as well when she went back and listened to the audio recording. 

A few days later was my birthday.  After a delicious lunch at my favorite, Dead End BBQ, I hit the road and drove to Raleigh for a weekend full of wedding showers.  The first shower was hosted by Margie Bowles and included my barn friends, a few school and church friends, and ALL of my bridesmaids!  We were showered with gifts and had an incredible time.  Justin and I had a meeting with Dan, our music minister, and Larita, an amazingly talented pianist at our church, to finalize wedding music.  Later that evening, we had another shower hosted by two of Justin's friends from vet school, Jess Huwa and Jenn Beasley.  That shower was full of vet school friends and was also loads of fun.  One friend, and talented singer, Mellissa Kerns, sang us two songs with the help of Tim Gaffrey on guitar.  That was really special!  :)  I headed back to Knoxville the next day full of excitement for the wedding!

Later that week, I entered my chili into my apartment complex's chili cook-off and won!  This is a recipe I got from Gay Davis and tweaked a bit.  I won $100 off one month's rent!  Woo!  I also attended the First Baptist Church Talentine show the next day.  It was pretty corny, but gave me a good laugh :)

A few Fridays later, Kim came to Knoxville and the lab ladies all met her for lunch at, yet again, Dead End BBQ.  (If you ever find yourself in Knoxville, it is a MUST)  Kim brought her boyfriend, Zach, and we all laughed until we cried talking about her job and all of its accompanying stories...

At the end of February, I gave my last of 2 required seminars.  Graduate students are required to take "Seminar" twice during their career in which they must present a seminar and attend all others.  This year, my topic was on horse slaughter.  I could spend a good while talking about everything I learned, my views, and the controversy, but I will leave that one for another day.  The seminar went really well, considering I was asked questions for 18 minutes...It was a topic that everyone seemed interested in and it brought about some great conversation.

One weekend (I don't even remember at this point when it was), Justin and I decided last minute to meet up in Granite Falls.  We had a delicious brunch at Bob Evans including the BEST PANCAKES I have ever eaten.  We then surprised my grandparents and spent some time with them before heading to dinner with his Dad and Louise.  It was really awesome to see him, even just for a short while :)

I got the opportunity to help another professor with his research doing sheep surgeries.  They hysterectomize these sheep in order to remove 15- or 17-day concepti from the uterus.  I actually got to scrub in on one of the surgeries!  It was pretty neat!

Ok, some other random tidbits...Asher got sick again and had to go to his normal vet for an enema.  The food and medicine regimen I currently have him on seems to be working in keeping everything flowing, so cross your fingers that we have found the trick!  We had another round of pretty nasty storms come through, but NO hail damage!  Yay!  Also, I decided to start reading the Harry Potter series on CD.  I have gotten through the first 3 and have been waiting over a month for the 4th one.  It is amazing how much important detail they leave out of the movies! 

A few weekends ago, I went on the scrapbook retreat again with Dr. Edwards.  It was in the same place as last time, Camp BaYoCa, and was just as fun.  With my new cricut, I was able to get a bunch of pages done!  I had a nice, relaxing escape of a weekend and enjoyed many "life" talks with Dr. Edwards. 

The day I came home from the scrapbooking weekend, Justin came to Knoxville to spend his Spring Break with me.  We had a pretty busy week, going to Bean Station twice (to collect my LAST cows worth of samples) and entertaining guest lecturers for 320.  We had a party at the Edwards/Schrick house on that Tuesday night and had a fun date night Friday, indulging in delicious food and authentic gelato.  On the weekend, we finalized our reception menu and picked out tuxes. 

Other wedding planning updates include my dress alteration appointment, getting wedding makeup, sending out wedding invitation, and buying bubbles and "unity sand" paraphernalia.

So the past month has been very busy and very stressful.  Things are finally coming down to the wire and I have an immense amount of work to accomplish in the next few months.  I had a meeting with Drs. Edwards & Voy last week and have finally nailed down exactly what I have to do to finish.  This has required staying at JARTU until 8 or 9 PM each night for the past few weeks and I anticipate more of the same until I leave to come home for the wedding.  Other than research, writing, eating, and sleeping...there's not a whole lot of time to do much of anything else.  So I apologize for neglecting this blog and for, perhaps, being more non-responsive than normal.  I will get to the other side of this hurdle.  With a whole lot of patience, perseverance, and strength...I will get there.  I have 2 weeks away from Knoxville (week before the wedding and then the honeymoon) and then will be returning to continue in my efforts to finish my thesis and defend.  Currently, I plan on defending in mid-late July, so I anticipate being back in Raleigh for good in August.  Justin will be in his 4th year, busy in clinics, so we will both be working very hard.  It will be annoying to have to be away from him another month or so, but it is what has to happen so I can finish and come home! 

Justin has been so supportive along this whole journey, but especially recently.  He is always there to hear me vent and cry and helps me remember how far I've come, how much he loves me, and how proud he is of me.  For that I am very grateful.  He also sent me "pick-me-up" flowers last Tuesday which brightened my whole week.  I know this is not easy on him and I am so thankful for his patience and understanding.  He is my rock and my best friend.  I am so blessed to have him in my life and cannot wait to marry him (and live in the same city!)

I appreciate any and all prayers as I work on this last leg of the race.  I am beginning to see a faint light at the end of the tunnel and will be extremely relieved once I reach it.  Thank you for your patience and I look forward to seeing everyone at the wedding in 2 months and 2 days!!!!!

Asher's Traumatic Night

So we had a little scare Monday evening in my apartment.  I came home to Asher throwing up all over the place...which means he is having a problem passing a stool.  This happened on New Year's Eve as well as sometime in October.  Those two times before, he was eventually able to pass it.  This time was different.  After about half an hour, Justin told me to go get an enema from the grocery store, as well as some gloves and lube.  I tried to give him the enema, but couldn't get it past the impaction.  The poor little guy was trying hard to pass it, but was CLEARLY in a lot of pain.  I had called the vet as soon as I got home, but they were closed for the day and told me to bring him in the next morning.  There was no way I could let him go like that all night, so I took him to the after hours emergency clinic.

They did some radiographs and decided it would be best for him to stay the night, get a long catheter enema, some IV fluids, and a shot for the vomiting.  I picked him up Tuesday morning feeling pitiful, but much better.  He is on a laxative for the next few days and has an appointment Friday morning with his regular vet to make sure everything is ok.  They also told me to add in some wet food to his normal diet to increase the fiber, hoping this will prevent future impactions.  So far he's eating most of the wet food, which is good considering he is in no way food-driven.  Other than the 2 inches of shaved leg (where the IV catheter was placed), he looks normal and seems to be doing well.  Poor, poor little guy!

That gecko-shaped thing is the fecal impaction...OUCH

How Little I Actually Know...

So I have decided to go back and re-read (or read for the first time in some cases) the "classics."  I like to listen to audiobooks on CD while driving.  It allows me to get away for a short time and provides a nice escape when my mind is racing.  I started this little quest with Animal Farm.  I don't believe I had ever read that before, but it was super short and made for a nice, quick story.  I am not huge into government, politics, or social cultures so I likely did not catch all of the references Orwell was making to society.  Nevertheless, I have now read it.  I next read To Kill A Mockingbird, which was great.  I know I read it in high school, but did not remember much of it.  You have to realize, in high school, I was one of those who read what was assigned because it was assigned, not because I enjoyed it.  So, now that I am more mature and have found a means by which I enjoy reading, I decided to take another look at these assignments.  I recently finished Brave New World, which was also great, as I remember from 12th grade.  I love reading stories that have thick plots, unexpected surprises, a hint of fantasy, and adventure.  These last two books were fun to read, but did not flip my excitement switch the way the Dan Brown books did.  And nothing, so far has, been as mind-blowingly page-turning as the Twilight series...

So this brings me to the current book, which is 1984, also by George Orwell.  I have only read the first 3 chapters, but am not very impressed thus far.  It is a lot about government, politics, war, and policies.  I am just really not all that interested in those things and, therefore, am finding this book uninteresting.  I will go ahead and read the whole thing.  I'm hoping the plot gets more interesting and that I will "get into" the book soon once things start happening.

When I was trying to figure out what it was about this book that was turning me off, it made me realize just how little I know about government, politics, war, and policies.  I know I don't keep up with the news.  I have never been one terribly interested in watching or reading it.  I just am surprised I have made it this far in life with such a small understanding of how our country and the people in it work.  If you asked me to describe differences between Republican and Democratic parties, I could probably name one or two things.  If you asked me who is the donkey and who is the elephant, I would have to Google it.  If you asked me which is left wing and which is right or what all of those in between levels are, I'd be clueless.  I have next to no understanding of the financial issues in our country, besides the obvious: the economy sucks. 

I think I'm so uniformed is because 1) I didn't have much interest when I was learning about it in school, 2) I have never been interested in watching the news, and 3) now that I'm older, I feel dumb asking questions about things most everyone knows about.  I would like to have at least a basic understanding of all of these topics so I can follow the news, follow what presidential candidates are debating about, and just because I feel like it's my duty as a US citizen to understand how our country works.  I just wish I was more interested in all that!

Things Are Coming Together!!

Ok, so I'm getting REALLY excited.  Things are just falling into place left and right for our wedding!  My wedding shoes came in yesterday.  I picked them up and they are PERFECT!!!  I am so pleased!  I've been wearing them around the apartment a little bit and will probably wear them to church a few times in order to break them in.  I couldn't be happier with how they turned out!!! 



I saw these flowers in Wal-Mart the other day and LOVE them!  Spider mums :)



4 out of my 5 girls are going dress shopping next Saturday with my mom.  I can't wait to see what dress they pick out! They are all very similar in body type and look great in everything, so I hope they can find one dress they all like!!  :)  I'll be joining the fun via text message pictures :)  Isn't technology awesome?



The next Saturday, I'll be in Raleigh for 2 wedding showers.  I'm super excited to see everybody!  All 5 of my girls are going to be at the morning shower, including Kim all the way from Virginia.  YAY!!!  Justin & I also have a meeting between the showers with the music minister & pianist about ceremony music.  I am ordering part of the bridesmaid gifts and have already decided the other part.  :)  AHHHHH!  I can't believe how close it's getting!  So excited :D : D :D :D :D


My mom has a few sets of "old" pearl earrings that I might be "borrowing".  As you can see, I definitely have the "blue" and "new" covered! :)

Hey, check out the counter on the upper right of this screen!  133 days right now!  AHHHHH!  :D

Holidays and a New Year

Well the past month has just flown by!  I headed to Marion on Christmas Eve Eve to meet Justin and spend time with his family.  We had Christmas dinner Saturday and opened presents at Alice's.  Christmas morning was spent at Scott & Louise's house with presents and snackies.  Justin and I drove to Raleigh that afternoon and had dinner and presents with my mom and dad.  I got a few little things here and there and my big present was my very own TRX.  I'm pretty excited to have my own!  Justin and I spent a very lazy, relaxing week in Raleigh which was exactly what my stressed out brain needed.  I got to ride Ivan twice during the week, which was great.  I enjoyed spending time with Justin and the orange kitties, cooking meals, going out to eat with friends, and just doing nothing.  We went and ordered our wedding bands, which was very exciting!  Mine is the matching band to my engagement ring.  It was fun watching him pick out what he liked, as he has rarely ever worn jewelry.  He ended up with a very nice white gold band with a few stripes of brushed and non-brushed gold.  They should come in around the beginning of February.  Turns out, we bought wedding bands 2 years to the day from the day he bought my engagment ring.  That was not planned, but pretty cool!  We went and saw War Horse, which was pretty good.  It had a happy ending, was very predictable, and portrayed some of the sad realities of war.

Justin making peanut butter balls

Opening Presents

Scott & Louise's Christmas Tree

The boys being lazy :)

Ivan loves hay fluffies...

Punk and Baxter playing

 

We headed back to Knoxville on New Year's Eve day.  We stopped by Granite Falls to visit my grandmother on the way.  She was in the hospital, but was better than I've seen her in months!  She looked and sounded strong.  She is currently in a rehab center where she is gaining her strength back a little bit each day.  I talk to her on the phone occasionally and she sounds better each time!  We continued on our trek to TN, stopping at Dead End BBQ for dinner (aka best BBQ in the world).  We came home to my attention-starved kitty who had made a complete mess of the carpet.  Poor guy had some intestinal problems, so we rented a RugDoctor the next day and cleaned up the carpet.  New Year's Eve consisted of us sitting on the couch, drinking sparkling red grape juice, and watching the ball drop. 

Justin stayed with me in TN for a week, helping me with my sample collection on Tuesday and Thursday.  I hated that he had to come with me to the slaughterhouse in the FREEZING cold super early and staying all day...but it was extremely helpful having him with me!  While in town, we did a little shopping, went and saw We Bought A Zoo (awesome movie, everyone should go see it!), ate some local favorites, had a chili night with my friend Milly, and just enjoyed our time together.  We enjoyed our small glimpse of what awaits when I come home for good, which made it very difficult on Sunday when he had to go back home.  It's amazing how much more enjoyable "doing nothing" is when he is here versus when I'm alone and have nothing to do.  We both have really busy semesters coming up, so hopefully the next 4.5 months will FLY and we can get married ASAP! 

Asher wanted to sip some sparkling red grape juice on New Years Eve

He loves his daddy :)

We ate the last piece of my birthday cake together.  The next time we eat this cake, it will be on our wedding day!

Soft kitty, warm kitty...

My semester started this past Wednesday.  I am only taking a once-a-week seminar class, so I do not have any courses to worry about attending or studying for.  I am a TA for the Repro class I TA'd last year, except now I am the one in charge.  Megan Goodwin, who was an undergraduate worker in the lab until this week which officially made her Dr. Edwards' new graduate student, is the up-and-coming TA who will be in charge of the course next year.  I am teaching her everything that goes on behind the scenes so she will be able to meet the extremely high demands of Dr. Edwards next year.  We have another grad student TA, which is very helpful!  It is great having another set of hands!  I will be finishing my experiment, running statistics, writing a thesis, and defending it this semester (hopefully by May so I don't have to worry about defending after the wedding).  So it will be very busy, very stressful, and very crazy.  I am just ready to have all of these big hurdles behind me so I can head back to Raleigh and start "the real world" with Justin.  I'm ready to be out of research and to find a job that I enjoy where I can help people.  I'm very thankful for the TA opportunities I have, which give me the one-on-one interaction and teaching role that is so rewarding.  Who knows where we'll be or what I'll be doing in the future.  I'm prepared to take life as it comes to me, learning along the way, and enjoying the experiences I encounter as much as possible.

Wedding planning updates:
- Wedding bands have been purchased
- My shoes should come in any day now so I can get my dress hemmed
- Mom is working on the invitations
- Save The Dates are out
- My bridesmaids have an appointment to go pick out their dress in 2 weeks
- We booked our honeymoon - Grand Cayman
- We have 2 wedding showers the first Saturday in February
- We have a meeting to go over music for the ceremony the same day as the showers
- We are at t-minus ~4.5 months!!!!

Christmas already?!?

Well once again I have failed to keep my blog updated frequently.  The past month has been...you guessed it...insanely busy.  I haven't had time to much of anything besides research and finishing up classes.  My workouts have slacked off completely (it's been 4 weeks...EEEEK!) and I had to do 21 days worth of laundry last weekend...  So, things have been a bit crazy.  I finished up my classes a few weeks ago which took the load of studying off my shoulders, so that was nice.  I have been occupying my days (and a good number of evenings) in the lab doing my research.  I am having a bit of a problem finding cows that are fat enough to take samples from, so cross your fingers that I can get 4-6 more cows worth of samples soon!  I've been learning how to do Western Blots, which is a method of testing to see if a specific protein is present in a sample.  The protocol takes about a day and a half, but I get to use the developer in the dark room which comes with a Harry Potter-like rotating black-out door.  Every time I go in there I feel like I should say "Diagon Ally." 

Research, for those of you who aren't involved in it, begins with "re" for a reason.  It's a lot of do-overs with tweaking and manipulating.  Things never work right the first time and take about 4 times longer than you think they will.  This typically leads to long days, repeated efforts, and a lot of "hmmmmms."  I guess I've experienced all of these things so much that they don't bother me anymore.  When I was first beginning, I got really torn up when things absolutely didn't work.  It was frustrating and could turn a day sour in an instant.  I've come to learn that research is just like that.  You can have a protocol so down pat that you could do it in your sleep and it might decide to not work at all one day.  That is one part of research that I am not fond of.  I don't like going around and trying to figure out the answers to questions that have no answers.  My mind just doesn't work that way.  I am not a questioning thinker.  I don't look at something and say, "Hmmmm, I wonder what would happen if I changed this."  I am much more of a "give me the facts, let me understand them and master them, then let me teach them to someone else" kind of person.  I guess that's one thing (of MANY) that grad school has taught me.

In other news, I have really gotten into the Christmas spirit lately.  I went to a concert at Harold's church where he played trumpet and it was great!  I have been listening to Christmas music, baking ginger snaps, and feeling festive.  I wish Justin was with me to share in the holiday cheer, but I'll be seeing him in a little less than a week! 

Today we had our 2nd annual gingerbread house party.  It was at Louisa's house and we all had a blast!  Megan, Leah, Becca, Philip, Jason, Louisa, Damon, Louisa's friend Nancy from her pottery class, and Louisa's sister-in-law Diane all came.  We made and decorated houses and snacked on spinach dip with bread and veggies, sausage balls, and cookies.  I had fun this year with my decorating.  I used the same roofing material as last year, but did a checkerboard pattern this year.  This year's house was much cleaner and neater.  I was pretty proud of my work, especially my snowman family and my fence :)

This week shouldn't be too stressful and then I get to spend a week with families.  This will be a much needed break!! 

OH!  If you need a new addiction...let me know and I'll invite you to join Pinterest.  Love it!