Daily Dose of Conference

General Conference is over. Boo. I love conference and hate the wait between the first weekend in October to when the November Ensign is sent to my home. I hate that wait. But this time it will be bearable. Why you may ask? Because I stumbled across podcasts. 1 hour after a session, the podcast is available. Why have I never known this before?! I feel like a whole new world is available to me because of podcasts!

Each day I have a 30 minute drive to school. And another 30 minutes back. Plus traffic delays. I spend over an hour each day in my car commuting to school. And what do I normally do during that time? Listen to music that I already know all of the lyrics to. Skip half of the songs on my ipod's playlist because I'm tired of hearing the same ones over and over again. But this week, I've listened to General Conference on my way to and from school. And you know what? It's so much better than music! I really can't believe how much of Conference I've listened to already in just one week. I'm a much nicer driver too, because lets face it, how can you cut someone off when President Monson is talking to you?

Anyway, I've noticed a huge difference in my attitude this week and my stress levels by listening to Conference talks as I commute. In case you are like me and had no idea this was available to you, I urge you to download the free podcasts from Conference and experience the difference for yourself.

Superwoman

Yesterday I was superwoman.

I had class from 8:30-3:00 (and I paid attention during both lectures with a little munchy help from pretzels). During my break between classes, I worked on medication flashcards that need to be completed by Monday. Yes, Monday. That's nearly an entire week away and I started working on them now. Can you say "ahead of schedule"?

After class, I went shopping at Costco. During the 15 minutes I was inside, Mother Nature managed to wreak havoc on the Portland area creating massive puddles that neither my shoes nor clothing were equipped to handle. I was drenched. So much for doing my hair that morning.

I came home and wiped down the groceries and put them away. Next I proceeded to do laundry since the clothes I was wearing were begging for some soap. Yes, I did laundry. Willingly. On the spur of the moment.

But my superwoman-ness does not end there. After doing laundry, I proceeded to make a lovely dinner, and a healthy one at that! I mean, seriously, who does that? I made grilled tilapia with wild rice and a fruit salad on the side. I should have taken a picture as evidence that I prepared a healthy well rounded meal that Bob and Jillian would be proud of. (Nevermind the 3 chocolate chip cookies I ate after dinner)

The rest of the evening was spent doing my nursing reading in between folding laundry. I actually finished all of the reading before class! This is a rare occasion that needs to be documented. I'm trying harder this semester to stay on top of my reading and homework without completely foregoing my wifely duties. Hopefully I can keep this up!

P.S. Shout out to Tyler's awesomeness too: he cleaned up dinner, loaded the dishwasher, helped fold laundry, and balanced the checkbook while I did homework. I'm so lucky to have him!

The Bathroom: Part 2

So a while back we redid our master bathroom. Well, we replaced the vanity and redid the flooring. Over my break I had the opportunity to paint the bathroom to finish our work. I have spent countless hours brainstorming wall-towel color combinations that compliment the vanity and the floor. After finally settling on a color, I set to work! Here is the final result:

I am in love with the blue walls (which pick up some of the blue in the flooring) with the cream towels! I feel like I'm stepping out of a Better Homes and Gardens bathroom when I come out of the shower! Now, any suggestions for a shower curtain color?

Home Improvement

I am quite impressed by the home improvement projects Tyler and I have taken on in our only 4 months of living in this house. I will confess however, that because of these home improvement projects, our home is a mess and I have not been able to take pictures because it is embarrassingly messy in pretty much every room. But these are a few of the projects we have taken on.

The TV Shelf
Father's Day weekend we saw some amazing deals on TVs and we ended up getting this huge honker + Blu Ray/DVD player + surround sound system all for less than the price of the TV. We had a hard time passing up such a great deal. However, we don't have room for an entertainment center in our living room, so Tyler came up with this lovely shelf. He did all of the work, I can't take any credit for it. I just helped hold the shelf while he mounted it to the wall. Tyler built a little tray that falls under the shelf that holds all of the cords so they aren't sticking out all over the place.

The Ceiling Fan

We bought this over the weekend because it was on a fabulous sale and we have discussed buying a ceiling fan for quite a while. I opened the box and removed the packaging, and Tyler assembled it/did the electrical work. It is in our bedroom upstairs which is very nice because we do not have AC and it gets pretty hot at night. Oh, and it worked on the first try! Way to go Tyler.


Backyard Draining System
So our backyard has a bit of a downgrade that causes water to collect near the base of the house. That isn't good, especially in Oregon where it rains pretty much everyday for 10 months of the year. We just started this project over the weekend. Eventually we'll pour more concrete where the grass has been removed and we'll dig draining tile under the lawn where the water will dump out onto the street. Honestly, I don't really know the details of this project. This is Tyler's big thing and I'm just going along with it.

Oh, and this picture proves that the sun does occasionally come out in Oregon. There's shadows and everything.

Bathroom Conversion to a Pantry
We are fed up with the lack of a pantry in our kitchen. So we are converting the downstairs bathroom into a pantry to help with the lack of storage in our kitchen. So far we have removed the sink (shown outside being cleaned) and the mirror/towel rack. All we have left is the toilet to remove, which hopefully shouldn't be too hard. We've got shelves ready to put in the bathroom, and voila! Instant pantry.

Note: Chloe is quite the helper with the renovations. Maybe too much of a helper.

Peaches and Blueberries, oh my!

Tyler and I went to a pick your own farm a couple of weeks ago. We went to one that specifically only has blueberries and peaches. Oh my goodness, it was so much fun! We were one of the first people there and had first pick at the peaches! There were just so many that looked so good! We ended up picking 19lbs of peaches and 4.5 lbs of blueberries! And let me tell you, I'm not much of a blueberry fan, but these blueberries were so sweet, not tart, we had a hard time not eating them all on the way home! We also discovered that Chloe loves blueberries. She would try to knock them out of our hand every time we went to snack on them.

First off, we made this with the peaches that needed to be used immediately.
Then we made peach ice cream. It is all gone, so no pictures of that deliciousness.

I originally wanted to can the rest of the peaches, but since I don't have canning equipment and didn't want to borrow from someone, I set out to learn how to freeze peaches. Turns out, the process is almost exactly the same, just without the mason jars! Freezing is like the poor man's canning, but I'm ok with it! I think they turned out beautifully and I am rather proud of my accomplishments.
P.S. Freezing blueberries is quite possibly one of the easiest things I have ever done. You don't even wash them! Just stick them on a cookie sheet and freeze them until they are rock solid, essentially until they become marbles. Then, just transfer them to whatever container you plan on keeping them in (for me it was a ziploc bag) and freeze them! It's important that you freeze the blueberries out of the bag first though so they don't clump together and then freeze. I used them to make muffins later, and sure enough they were not clumped together and came out easily!

New insulin pump!

Over my break, I have upgraded my pump from a plain old regular insulin pump to a pump that has continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) capabilities. I have only been using it for less than a week, but so far it's pretty cool! The CGM is a device that is sort of like a wick that is inserted in my skin and soaks up the fluid between cells and measures that fluid level of glucose. Every five minutes, it measures my glucose levels giving me a better idea of what my levels are between regular blood glucose testing. I really like it so far! It is helpful to see how I trend during the day, not just at meals and bedtime. It also has the capability to predict if I am going to have high or low glucose levels, and alerts me in advance so I can try to fix it. The major setback though is that the glucose readings aren't entirely accurate. If I measure my blood glucose levels and compare it to what the CGM says, they are usually off. The CGM has a delayed response to my blood, so it is not entirely accurate. Overall though, I am really pleased with it and hope that I can have better control of my diabetes with such cool new technology.

Summer Break: Day 2

I'm officially done with the summer semester and enjoying the lack of homework/clinical/papers/sleep. For now at least. Yesterday I baked these: and got the recipe here from my best friend's cooking blog. They're like cinnamon rolls, only with an unexpected twist. Very tasty. Highly recommend.

Today I got to do laundry (not so fun, but now I have options when I get dressed) and watch this:
Seriously, the best movie ever. And it's instantly streaming on Netflix! Double awesomeness. Chloe and I just chilled watching it together. Ok, she sat on the laundry I was trying to fold, but it was still cute.

I also got to do this: (except my person is not a black man, but a white female who somewhat resembles me)I played Tyler yesterday and beat him in basketball. Rematch to follow tonight, but don't worry, I've been practicing. He's going down!

Yep. Summer vacation is treating me well. Life without school is good. :)

P.S. My camera battery is charging now so that I can take pictures of our house and (finally) put them up.