Great last weekend in Bham

Despite all of the packing, we managed to have a little fun this weekend. Thursday night we watched a movie. We NEVER watch movies, go to the movies, or rent movies from the video store. In fact, the last time we've been to a movie was in May of 2009 to see Star Trek, and we only went because our friends were going. We watched The Prestige on demand. It was a good movie, and it was kind of nice to just curl up and relax and watch the movie. Maybe we'll make a habit out of movie night??? (Don't hold your breath!)


Friday night we went to our friend Mick's house for another PhD/lab celebration. Mick started the UAB pathology program the same time Tom did and they ended up in the same lab, sitting right next to each other for the past five years. It had cooled off quite a bit by Friday night but we still enjoyed the crisp, fresh air on Mick's back patio with the rest of the lab and their families. And it wouldn't have been a lab gathering without some impersonations by Mick.

Saturday we had a busy day of packing and watched Penn State own Michigan Saturday night. It was nice to see them actually play like they are a D1 team! Sunday was spent packing, packing, and more packing with a brief interruption for a Pizza Hut date with my friend Aonya from work who shares the same love of Pizza Hut that I do. And I completely forgot that today is Halloween! I hope everyone got more treats than tricks :)

Congrats Dr. Tom!!!

Tom publicly defended his thesis* yesterday! He officially has his PhD!! My parents were able to make the trip down to celebrate with us. We arrived at the conference room early and good thing too, because the place was packed!! It was so great to see so many people come out for Tom's defense.


To celebrate, we decided to rent out the back room at Jim 'n Nick's and feed our friends and family as a thank you for their support and friendship over the past 4-5 years. A bunch of people came out and we couldn't have asked for things to work out more perfectly. There wasn't a ton of food leftover but we have enough to snack on a few bbq sandwiches while we pack the next couple days! Congrats Tom....I'm proud of you!!

Tom, Mick, and his mentor, Dan

The Drs Bodenstine :)

Jim 'N Nick's

This was at the end/after his presentation...I wanted to capture this for his family.

*This means he gave a 45 minute presentation on his research project(s) that he's been working on for the past 5 years.

Goodbye Pedo!

It's done! And no one is probably happier than Tom. Earlier this year, my work gave us all pedometers in association with the Virgin Health Miles program. Throughout the year there were little incentives to take more steps or get more points and if you completed them you would continue to get a discount on your premiums for your health insurance.

Then there was the slightly larger incentive of getting $500 in cash if you accumulated enough points by the end of the year. I had my eyes set on that money and back in August I figured out that I should be able to achieve it by my last day. And guess what? I did!!!!

Now, you would think that something as simple as a pedometer wouldn't cause that much drama, but you would be wrong. Have I mentioned that most PT's have a Type A personality and are competitive? It made for some interesting "friendly" step challenges at work.

And the poor husbands and families. They should have formed a support group. *Some of them wore it for us when we forgot it. Some of them brought them into work for us when we forgot it. Some of them thought we were crazy when we dried it out in a bag of rice because it accidently fell in the toilet, and some of them laughed when we fell down the stairs because we were looking at our pedometer to see how many steps we had.



I feel kind of naked without it. I almost miss that split second of panic when I reach for my hip during the day just to make sure it's still there and I haven't lost it somewhere!



*Not all of these things happened to just me, but some of them definitely did.

Fried Chicken and Beer!

Our lovely friend Paigethrew us a "Fried Chicken and Beer" themed going away party this past Friday night. The chicken was amaaaaaazing and we had a blast hanging out with some of our closest friends here in Alabama. As always, there was some quality "Tara and Wes Storytelling," some dancing, some flip cup, some you-tube watching, some baby Noah watching (how cute that his Halloween PJ's said "Boo!" on the butt!), and we even got to witness the Basenji 500 as we sat down to eat.

Going Away Work Party

Wow! Where to even begin??? The people that I work with at Children's threw me the most amazing going away party anyone could ever ask for! I am truly blessed to have met, worked with, and befriended so many great people. The last time I felt that much love and emotion was when Tom sang to me at our wedding reception!

Every day I strive to be the best person, therapist, mentor, leader, and friend I can be and there are some days when I honestly question whether I am making any kind of difference or impact on the world. Last night proved otherwise with the many kind words and many tears that filled the night.

Everyone at work, of course, knows that I love to eat, so there were plenty of homemade casseroles, appetizers and desserts. It was such a good turnout, I'm so thankful to everyone who came out! I'm convinced that Tom was a dog whisperer in a former life because all dogs seriously love him (or maybe it's just because he always gives them treats??) Lexi and Milly enjoyed the attention. Me with the lovely Andrea, who hosted the event and offered up her beautiful home for the evening.

So, a lot of people at work have been on my case for A WHILE about having a baby (see, Dad, you're not the only one!) My friend Laura wanted to give me a baby present because she obviously won't be living close to us when we do eventually get pregnant. So here it is, our first ever baby gift! Bailey is definitely not too sure about that!

It was truly the most wonderful evening and I wish that I could have captured it in a bottle and just be able to carry it with me wherever I go. I am certainly going to miss my friends at work dearly and hope and pray that I make this many close friends at my next job!

Chicago Trip

We made it back from our weekend visit to Chicago! It was a rocky start….between my back pain and a much longer than anticipated “interview” followed by our first house showing which was a place that you couldn’t pay me to live in!

Friday things started to look up. We went to look at a few homes/apartments and saw the one that we ultimately ended up renting. Friday evening we went out to this little restaurant/bar that was right around the corner from our hotel and it was amazing. I don’t know if it was just the fact that we were able to sit down, relax, and enjoy some quality conversation, food, and drink or if it really was that great of a place. Regardless, Rocks Lakeview is on our short list of places to frequent when we move to Chicago.


Saturday we saw a few more places to live but none compared to our favorite place that we saw on Friday, so we called the agent and fortunately the unit was still available. We filled out applications, met the landlords, and were actually able to sign the lease on Saturday (which was a HUGE relief considering I forgot our checkbook)!! Seriously, I had a BINDER, complete with tabs, organized full of everything we could have needed on this trip, from potential apartments/houses, directions, maps, hotel/flight information, and work forms!

We LOVE the new place! It is in a 4 unit building and has a shared, fenced-in back yard where Bailey can play. It was the biggest of any of the places we saw and it even has a (non-working) fireplace! It’s on the 2nd floor and gets TONS of sunlight, and it’s perfect because the house next door isn’t as tall as our building so even though we could open our window and probably touch our neighbor’s roof, no one can actually see in through our windows. Our landlords also happen to own a siding and window company so the unit has new energy efficient windows as well! I’m hoping that, along with all of the sunlight, will keep our heating bill from skyrocketing during those cold Chicago winters!!


Saturday night we drove up to see our friend Kedar who lives north of the city and met up with Anne and Brian (who live in Milwaukee) for some greek food followed by a few drinks at a cute little pub in the far north suburbs of Chicago.

I’m so happy to say that I’m FINALLY EXCITED about moving to Chicago!! Like, really excited! I still don’t have a job yet but I have a couple of promising options so I’m keeping my fingers crossed for that!!

This is my last full week of work (my last day is next Monday) so I’m sure it will be very busy (I have to give an inservice on Thursday that I haven’t even started yet) and full of emotions. Next week is Tom’s public Defense and then we will be packing like crazy for our big move!

Pumpkin roll

It's pumpkin roll time! And I did it! I actually snapped a semi-decent picture of the finished product! For the past couple of years I just couldn't manage to make it look pretty. I made this a couple of weeks ago (before my back got angry). It was so good!

Thankfulness

It's not quite Thanksgiving yet (although I do think Canadian Thanksgiving was just a few days ago). Even though I am out of work (temporarily), in a lot of pain (when I'm not laying down), and about to move across the country but have no idea where we're going to live or where I'm going to work, have nothing packed, have not hired movers, and am in too much pain to start packing, I wanted to make a list of things that I'm thankful for.

I'm thankful....

• That my back pain does not radiate down my legs
• That my back pain seems to be getting better (with laying down and pain meds...but still)
• That Tom has been waiting on me.....cooking dinner, cleaning up, doing my laundry, putting on my socks (yes, putting on your own socks is something I bet you take for granted), refilling my water, driving me to the ER/doctor's appointments
• That work is semi-slow right now so I don't feel super bad about being out
• That I have enough PTO to cover me being out for a week
• That I was able to get an appointment with a good orthopedist on Monday
• That I have a dog who thinks it's cute to walk on top of me on the couch (hey - it makes me laugh)
• That we're moving to CHICAGO!! (I haven't really gotten excited about this yet! Hopefully that will come soon....maybe when I know I won't be homeless and unemployed?)
• That I haven't been trapped in a mine for the past 69 days
• That (so far) they are successfully rescuing all of the Chilean miners
• That I haven't sneezed since Saturday

Back Update

This must be what it feels like to be on bedrest. Awful. I can only take so much of daytime television, magazines, and facebook! I went to an orthopedist yesterday who prescribed a Medrol pack and Robaxin (muscle relaxer) instead of Valium. Yesterday evening I actually felt better and was thinking I was on the mend....and today I'm much more sore.

I'm thinking I'll be okay to travel to Chicago in a couple of days but I'm really nervous. I'm supposed to meet with 2 potential employers, we're meeting with Tom's lab, and the rest of the time is already booked looking at houses and apartments. I'm debating whether or not I should cancel meeting with the employers so I can have some time to go to the hotel and lay down/rest if I'm in pain. I feel bad cancelling but at the same time our number one priority is to find a place to live....and the jobs will still be there in 3 weeks when we actually move there.

I'll see how I feel tomorrow. Wish me luck!

I've been thinking a lot lately...

...about life in general, about enjoying every moment of every day, about not taking things for granted and keeping my complaining about things that don't really matter to a minimum. There are two main reasons this has been on my mind lately. First, I have a couple of patients right now who are at the end stages of their disease and are processing and dealing with everything associated with impending death. Second (and I'm embarrassed to admit this), I've just not been motivated lately at work. Mostly I think, because I have a million things running through my brain about moving to Chicago, finding a place to live, finding a job, finishing up things here at work, packing, and leaving everyone in Birmingham.

Now, I have a whole new reason to appreciate the day-to-day activities and not take things for granted. If you've been reading my blog for a while, you know I've been having back problems for some time now (on and off for the past 12 years). Last week it was "acting up"again and on Saturday I really should have known better and just stayed home, relaxed, and tried not to do too much in hopes that it would calm down. Instead, I woke up early and tried to run about 10 errands before the Penn State game at 11. I was getting quite uncomfortable as the morning went on, but I kept going knowing that I was getting everything done and wouldn't have to go anywhere on Sunday.

And then I sneezed.

Ouch. I have never felt such intense, excruciating pain in my low back. I had to pull over almost immediately (yes, I was driving when it happened, thankfully I didn't get in an accident!) I came home and laid down for a few hours because usually that's the only thing that helps. I took some pain meds that I had leftover from the last time this happened in May of 2009. A few hours later, I tried to get up and that's when I knew I had to go to the ER. I didn't think there was anything they could really do for me but all I knew was that I was in the most pain I've ever been in in my whole life.

We went to the UAB ER (and allow me to recommend going to the ER during an Alabama football game...we got to go back immediately)! I was right, there really wasn't anything they could do for me, except give me a giant shot of Valium, Toradol, and Morphine right in my butt (and is it professional behavior for the nurse to tell you that you don't have any "junk in your trunk" while she's giving you a shot?) They sent me home with some prescriptions that eventually led to a nice, pain free, drug induced sleep.

Today I'm set up on the couch planning not to move unless I have to go to the bathroom. I can hopefully get an appointment with an orthopedist tomorrow. I really think I ruptured one of my bulging discs....which there isn't much that can be done to fix it, except rest and healing. That means I'm out of work Monday-Wednesday, and we're supposed to fly to Chicago on Thursday to find a place to live, meet with Tom's lab, and I was going to meet with two different potential employers. So now that's all up in the air!

So as soon as I recover from this and I'm able to work again, I definately won't have any trouble staying motivated!

Fun Fall Weekend with Friends

This weekend I put all of my crazy/obsessive/neurotic moving planning on hold to enjoy the fall weather and hang out with some good friends. Saturday we had people over to watch the Penn State game. Tom manned the grill and I *slaved* over the crockpot to make some Pumpkin Spice Lattes. Little baby Noah was in his Penn State gear although I think he got more enjoyment trying to stick his feet in his mouth than watching the game. We had the Florida/Alabama game on in the other room since our group is so diverse with our football teams.

Sunday afternoon we took Bailey to the dog park to let her have some QT with Jack before we move away. Sunday evening I couldn't help myself and I had to start packing. I'll thank myself when it's the night before the movers come and I can get a good night's sleep instead of pulling an all-nighter (like the last time I moved across the country)!

The Drankas are coming! The Drankas are coming!

Our good friends Anne and Brian are coming back into town this weekend and we are very excited to hang out with them! They left us back in January for Milwaukee, WI. Anne also happens to have gone to the University of Iowa so we are having everyone over tonight for the Penn State v. Iowa game. Let's hope our young team can hang in there!!