Thursday, June 28, 2007

I'm a WIMP

Not only am I a wimp, I am a totally unprepared, scared, procrastinating and un-confident wimp. I was supposed to take the NCLEX today. After Rene left, I started studying in earnest and discovered how much I have forgotten already. So I rescheduled for Saturday, July 7th. I keep telling myself that I need to do at least 100 practice questions per day. I did today. I need to start looking for a job.

And so it ends...

SeWon Left for Korea on Monday and Rene left for Germany on Tuesday. I'll miss them. We have decided not to host exchange students next year. We were very lucky with Rene and SeWon. They are both great kids. I decided to host because of the severe attack of “empty nest syndrome” that I had the first year Emma was gone. Also because of Joseph, the child that died. He would have been 16 this summer. So in a way I have felt like we are supposed to have teenaged boys in the house. But I need to put my house in order before we do it again.

We still have a fairly active househild with James and Melissa here for the summer. Stephen is here too but will be spending the month of July up in Minnesota, working for Concordia. Emma, THE BAKER, is up there now, baking breads and cakes and cookies for all the lucky campers at Norwegian camp. She comes home for the last two weeks of July and will probably go back for the month of August. So people keep coming and going.

Tuesday, June 05, 2007

Monday, June 04, 2007

Colorado, Minnesota and New Hampshire

The week after Sarah's graduation, I made a long overdue visit to my friend Patricia in Pueblo, Colorado. I spent a pleasant 3 days visiting, seeing some beautiful countryside and meeting some of Pat's friends. I had a bit of a hard time getting home. Flying standby is always a challenge, but this time there was bad weather in Dallas and the midwest, causing 3/6 flights COS to DFW to cancel and 5/12 flights DEN to DFW to cancel. I ended up driving from Colorado Springs to Denver, sleeping at the airport, and flying out on the 6AM flight the next morning.

The next week I drove to Minnesota with Emma. We got a AAA Triptik and loaded up her car and took off. What a big, beautiful country we live in! I don't often take road trips because of my flight benefits, but it was fun to do. We drove up to Oklahoma and through Missouri to Illinois. We stopped at the Lincoln Museum in Springfield and in Decatur to see Emma's roomie, Stepheni. Then we drove to and through Wisconson and on to Minnesota. Emma's Arnquist ancestors settled some of those WI/MN areas. We stayed at a nice hotel near the MSP airport that we got a really good deal on through Priceline and ate at a great little vegetarian restaurant called Good Earth. Then last Friday Emma drove to Bemidji to begin orientation for her job as baker for Concordia's Norwegian camp and I flew home to Dallas.

New Hampshire is coming up this week. Rene and SeWon left for their YFU trip to New York City on Sunday June 3rd. They managed to get on a 'full' flight with an early check in time and D1 status. On Thursday the 7th we fly to Boston and drive up to NH for about a week. I'm looking forward to being in New England. Maybe I'll look for a job there...

Five new degrees!

Sarah is now “Master Doctor Sarah”. She is so cool. She worked on her medical degree and her masters degree concurrently and will begin a family practice residency at JPS County Hospital in Ft Worth in July. Her husband Loren also got a masters and Stephen graduated from BYU with a degree in Japanese. And I now have my second bachelors degree. I don’t know if I will go for a masters. If I do, it won’t be in nursing.

Wonder of Wonders

I graduated. I am now a GN and will take the NCLEX, the licenseing exam to become an RN on June 28th. I don't have a job yet because I have not applied. After this last semester, I'm not even sure I want to be a nurse. We shall see. Oh, and I did great on the HESI (94th percentile), so I hope that is an indicator of how well I will do on the NCLEX.