Going Abroad!!!

The past three months have been so busy that I have neglected to blog!!! Well BIG NEWS!

I GRADUATED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I am so excited! I am currently a GN (Graduate Nurse) and will start working in January. I plan to take my Boards at the end of January or beginning of February. I was offered a job where I did my internship and will be starting my career in Labor and delivery/postpartum/nursery :) I am so very excited!!

Right now, Cory and I are sitting in the Orlando Florida airport waiting for our plane to...IRELAND! We are traveling Europe for the next three weeks! Happy graduation to us! This is a post-graduation gift to me and an early graduation gift to Cory as he will graduate in August 2010. We are sooooo excited! We will be visiting Italy, Austria, Germany, Ireland, France and England and who knows where else ;) We are traveling with a bit of a spontaneous flair and figuring it out as we go. One of the weeks we are there we will be at the Edelweiss Resort in the Alps with Cliff and Jennifer Jackson for New Years. HOW FUN!!! It is going to be a blast! If I can get wi-fi as we go, I will try to post on here as we travel to keep everyone up dated.

Have a very Merry Christmas! Love to all!

Another weekend gone...

Another weekend gone, another busy week ahead of us. This weekend Cory attended the choir retreat all day Saturday. I went to Lubbock with some Mary Kay girls to a Robert Jones makeup artist workshop. I learned so much! It will be extremely beneficial to my business and to my own makeup application! It was alot of fun :) This week, I will be in the ICU for clinicals, which I am looking forward to. I also have a project due at the end of the week, 2 Mary Kay parties, several meetings for school and 2 papers to get to work on! PLUS my exit exam is in about 2 weeks so I am frantically trying to study and do practice questions. We have to pass this exam to graduate and we get 3 chances. I am very nervous. So I am trying to squeeze in as much study time for this as possible. Cory's week has hopefully settled down some. He has a ton of homework and is continuing to work hard on his research. I am so proud of him :)

I am going to leave you with some pics of our Dove hunting adventure. Have a great week everyone!

Cowboy Days/Hale on Wheels

Howdy :)

This last week I missed a few days of school for a severe sinus infection, bleh it was yuck. Im recovering but still have some congestion issues. Cory was busy at school this week preparing for his conference he will be speaking at on Wednesday, not to mention the insane amount of homework he has plus an exam that same day.

This weekend was fun. Plainview had its 11th year of Cowboy Days this weekend. It kicked off with a chuckwagon breakfast, then a bike ride, followed by a parade/cattle drive down Downtown Plainview, and then a days worth of cowboy activities. It was a ton of fun. Cory and I did the 21 mile bike ride in hopes that we would be done early enough to see the cattle drive, but we missed it :( We finished our 21 miles in about 2 hours. We got to the parade 15 minutes late and missed the horses/cattle! BUMMER! Click here for some picks of Cowboy Days/Hale on Wheels.

BIG NEWS! Cory and I will be going on a Europe tour in December and visit our friends, the Jacksons in Germany:) CANT WAIT! We are still in the planning process but it is gonna be amazing!

This week is gonna be busy. Got another round of clinicals and our final presentation for our Capstone project. See yall at the end of the week maybe :) Have a good week!

Preparing for another busy week.

This past week was busy as usual. Tomarrow I will be attending a Diabetic Education class as a part of my clinical requirement. We have to follow an alternative nursing role and I am following a nurse educator. Tuesday, I have practice for Capstone. Capstone is the final project of nursing school. Our project is to make a presentation on our given topic, which mine is Nasogastric tubes, and make a powerpoint presentation. Then on the 22nd, all the junior and senior 1 nursing students will come in for a skills day and we will be teaching them how to insert an NG tube and nursing management. An NG tube is a tube that is inserted through the nose and goes down thru the esophagus into the stomach. It is used to decompress the stomach, and delivery of nutrition and medication. Fun huh? ;) We will set up a "booth" where we will present to them then they will do a return demonstration to us, proving they are competent of performing the procedure. Of course, we will be using mannequins but it is still nerve racking for them! I have been there many a times in my nursing school career! It is fun to be the one on the teaching end :) Other group topics include wound care, foleys, iv's etc. I think it will be a fun day. This week its just practice but the following week is the real thing. Im looking forward to it ! On Wednesday, I will be doing a 12 hour in Same Day Surgery. I hear I will be starting iv's all day, whoo hoo! ;)

Cory is working a million hours of homework and he is also preparing for a NATAS (North American Thermal Association Society) - or something like that. He will be giving a lecture at this conference on "The Use of Differential Scanning Calorimetry and Thermogravimetric Analysis for Development of Reaction Kinetics for Aluminum-Iodine Pentoxide Reactions" And because I have no idea how to explain what any of that means, we will leave it at that!

I have some pictures for you, of course. I would like to introduce you to Jack, Cali's brother, her littermate.

Jack is my brother Jimmy's new dog. Its awesome cuz the siblings (my brother and I) have sibling dogs (hes got the brother and I got the sister!) Its fun :) Jack is in love with his new dad and is turning out to be a really good dog! We all adore him and hes such a little lover.

Here are some pictures of the weekend our nephew stayed with us before we took him to his new dad. Click on his name here --> JACK

I also have a pretty decent sized album of pictures from our trip to St. Louis this August. It was so much fun and great to be with family. Click here --> August STL

Better hop it to the homework. Hope everyone is having a great weekend :) Talk soon!

Summer fun and some catching up!

Long time no blog!

I hope we find everyone doing well. I have sort of neglected the blog for the past month. We spent a few weeks in STL in August and it was alot of fun! We were busy with garage sales, visiting family and I worked some Mary Kay :) It was really great getting to spend time with the family. I miss them so much!

We have been back for a few weeks and back into the swing of school. Cory is working hard on getting his papers completed and he is always researching, researching, researching. I am doing my clinicals at Covenant Plainvew Hospital right here in Plainview and its AWESOME. I am loving it. Small rural hospitals are a great place to work! I have already been offered a job at this hospital which is exciting! Clinicals are for 12-13 hours on Tuesday and Wednesday although I do some extra hours here and there throughout the month. I have to get 228 hours completed for my internship which means I will be done by the beginning of November! I also have class Thursday mornings and I am on the Nursing Pinning ceremony committe which also meets Thursdays. Busy busy! Tuesdays look like 12 hour clinical then Mary Kay meeting, Wednesdays- 12 hour clinical then choir practice, Thursday- class, Pinning meeting. But after the middle of the week is over, its smooth sailing. Cory and I joined our church choir and we are very excited about it :) Today was our first Sunday to sing with the choir and it was a BLAST. We have rehearsals every Wednesday night. We are also preparing for a Christmas special that will be happening December 12/13. The songs are AMAZING! In November, we are making Christmas cds to sell to raise money for a mission trip and will be performing these songs at the Christmas special! Its gonna be amazing. I missed choir so much and it is great to once again be a part of it :) Cory has also decided to join "are you smarter than a 2nd grader?" which is a tutoring group through our church that tutors elementary school students and he will be doing that on Monday nights. We are really happy to be getting more involved in our church and community!

Of course I have some pics to share with yall. :) They have been piling up!

Here are summer pics - backyard fun!

Cory just finished his Fantasy Football draft so we are off to play some racquetball at the Y! Peace!

Crazy water dog!

Hey folks!!!

Its been a busy summer! I hope everyone is doing well! Cali has been keeping us incredibly busy as she has the energy for about 10 puppies! My goodness, she is crazy! But we love her ;) She is getting smarter everyday and it is fun to teach her new things. These are the following commands she knows: Come, Sit, Up (stand up from a laying or sitting position), Leave it, Stop (for when she is doing something she's not suppose to, like chewing on something or ...swimming), Bring it here (toys), Drop it, and we are currently working on Stay and Follow. She is doing good with stay about 1/2 the time so that is definately a work in progress. She is also doing good with Follow...I never taught this one to Luna so I thought I would give it a try with Cali. First, she was on a leash and i would tell her to follow and as long as she was staying beside me I would continue in one direction and as soon she quit following me, I would turn and go the other way saying "follow." We have graduated to OFF LEASH! So now she will follow me all over the backyard or the house without a leash, as long as I say that command. I want to teach her this because we like our dogs to not have to require a leash. So we are teaching her to follow us so that she will be able to go in the front yard or other places without a leash...building trust here! Luna didnt require a leash once she got older so that is our goal with this one as well. I like being able to take them out in the front yard with me while I work in the flowerbed without having to tie them up. So we did a test run, Follow to the mailbox. She did great!! She is a smart girl :)

She has officially learned the use of the bells on the back door finally. While it was a great accomplishment, it was super annoying lol. Last Thursday, I decided to completely redo our kitchen and reorganize the pantry/fridge/cabinets. It should have only been a few hour project but it definately turned into an all day event becuase every 3-5 mins Cali was ringing the bells to go outside. First it was to potty, then it was to dig holes. I started using a treat at the door to get her to come to me faster and actually listen (you know puppies and thier selective hearing), so then she started to ring the bells, go outside and turn right back around, like "mom Im coming back in, where's my treat?" Oh my goodness. I couldn't say No to outside cuz it was the first day she rang the bells purposefully, so I had no choice but to let her outside everytime...PHEW! So potty training is definately been progressing. We do take her out ALOT to prevent accidents, but now that she is actually telling us when she has to go out, its exciting lol :) The joys of puppies, eh?

So thought I would throw some pictures up here from the past month. Jimmy came down to visit and hang out with us for about a month. And of course, I have lots of pictures of the summer so...here ya go :)

Click Here for pics of Quitique fun with the bro :)

We are convinced that Cali is confused and thinks she is a lab or some other water dog...cuz she LOVES water...here are a few videos to prove this fact...



And here she is yesterday in the backyard lol




When you hear Cory say "crap" and us laughing, its cuz we were about to get wet and while we were backing up Cory lost his flip flop ;)

More vids and pics and updates to come later this week!

Vids and pics of this past week

Got a couple of goofy videos for yall as well as a handful of pics of this past week. Cali is picking up on the bells for outside! Potty training is definately in progress! She spends most of her time being a goofball. She is a very happy, outgoing puppy and we adore her :) Here are some videos and pics! Hope everyone is having a great week.

Pics of the past week

Here is a video of a nightly ritual...as it turns out, its an anytime ritual and occurs multiple times a day....zoom mode!


Puppies always want what is not thiers....Here is proof!



Playing in the hose :)



and lastly, hide and seek ! This is a great way to teach "come" and its really funny too!

Another day with the crazy one!

Another day with the crazy one! This morning Cali let us sleep in til 830 ish. The first few nights she slept in the bed with us but once she discovered how to jump off (which just so happened to be a "death from above" attack on June's head), she has been sleeping in the kennel. She started jumping off the bed and not being completely potty trained yet, that posed a problem. She doesnt mind the kennel to much (as long as she can you). She even puts herself in there when she is tired. So for the past few nights we have taken a t-shirt that has our smell on it and put it in the kennel as well as a chewie (cow hoof) and she has done really well. She sleeps very well thru the night and whimpers if she needs to potty in the middle of the night. She wakes us up about 3 times so I say we are doing pretty good.

Yesterday we went to the park to play and I have some pictures of that...as well as just some random pics of Cali (i know i know...i take ALOT of pictures !)

Click here for the pics

I also have another video of June and Cali playing. This time Cali decided it was safe and was really playing!! Have a great day everyone!

Meet Calypso, aka Cali :)

Hi from the Farleys :)

Well, its been a lil over a month since we lost our baby girl. I am still very saddened over it and I miss her soooo much. She was such a great dog and such a blessing in our life.

Currently, I am back in Plainview and my lil brother, Jimmy, roadtripped back with me. He is hanging out for most of the month and we are having a ton of fun. :) Cory is back to the grind of grad school so he spends the daytime hours at school running his experiments. I am trying to catch up on projects around the house that were neglected because of school (such as cleaning out the garage, closets, cabinets) and I am trying to reorganize different parts of our house. I will also be doing some work in the house as we are going to be moving next year some time so I need to paint our bedroom and change the wallpaper in the kitchen. Those are just a few of the many projects. However, it is quite difficult to get anything done as of late because our new addition came into the home last week. Luna's cousin has made a permenant home with us :) Here she is. Her name is Calypso but we call her Cali (this is whats on her tag as well). My dad came up with this name because she has a black eyepatch on one eye (pirates of the caribbean), she acts like a pirate and Calypso means the "greek titan of the moon" so we can get Luna's name in there too. She looks like a panda bear to me so I like to call her Cali Bear, like Luna was Luna Moon.



She is a riot. Luna was 75% snuggle and 25% crazy and when she was crazy she was CRAZY...now Cal is 25% snuggle and 75% INSANE. When she is awake she is AWAKE and like a blazing tornado thru the house. She is not really food motivated yet so the first few days were spent trying to find something that would motivate her so we can start her training. We are using some liver treats that she seems to like because now she knows "come" and "sit". We are clicker training her and she is picking up on it as well. She is taking a great amount of patience because she is incredibly puppy A.D.D. Luna learned very quickly but she was highly food motivated. Cali wants to play, play play play so she is not learning quite as quickly, but thats ok. Persistance will pay off and everyday I see some improvement as we continue to work with her. I think she is going to be a great dog. She is SOO funny and a complete wild woman. We have also discovered that taking her for a walk around the block with JUne = a couple hours of nap! So we are walking them everyday to help burn some of Cali's energy. This has also helped improve her eating. FOr the first few days, I left her food in the kennel and she could go in and get it when she wanted. Starting Saturday, I started putting her food down at 4 different times during the day and this is helping her know to eat when its put in front of her so she is pickin up on that as well. She also doesnt mind the kennel to much. She isnt a huge fan of being left alone in the kennel but she will learn that its ok. For now, she goes in there to eat, stays in there for a lil bit cuz she usually passed out after eating, then goes outside. At least once a day, I put her in the kennel and leave the room so she cant see me but come back in like 15 minutes. This is helping her know that we will come back. Since its been a while since we have raised a puppy, we are combining what worked with Luna, advice from others, and a mix of Cesear Milan and Victoria (off of Its me or the dog) and I think this is greatly helping us with her. Things that worked with Luna may or may not work with this one who is way more hyper. But I am confident we can turn her into a good dog :) She is a raging tornado when she is awake but she is a lover too and you can tell she is just a happy happy girl. June and Cali are doing great as well. Today they played for the first time. June was snarly at first because she didnt want the puppy near her. But now I think she is accepting her into the pack because when Cali flops and pounces on June's face, shes cool with it. Here is a video of them playing today (more like Cali trying to figure out if its safe or not lol) Its kind of long ...but you never know if you are going to miss something.



Here are some photos of her when she was 3 weeks old. Click here

To see some pics of Cali's first few days home, Click here

We also went on a trip to Port O Connor, Texas for Kristen and Clayton's wedding. It was a blast! Here are some pics of the Trip

Well I better run! I need to work out, do laundry, pick up the house and train a puppy! Thats not even the beginning of the list! I will be trying to blog more this week. Tomarrow is our 2 year wedding anniversary so we will be going out on a date and leaving my brother to babysit the puppy! ha!

Have a great week everyone :)

I want to leave you with a very funny video... Cali is a water lover...enjoy!

Luna Moon July 20,2007-May 2, 2009.

I really do not know what all I can say except that my heart breaks today. Miss Luna Moon has crossed over the Rainbow Bridge today.

Last night, she continued to worsen and couldnt breath well at all. She had to sit up to breath because of the fluid and she would fall asleep sitting up but wake her self up as she tipped over, so she really didnt sleep much the past 2 days. Last night she wouldnt eat nor would she eat this morning. Her breathing got increasingly difficult and last nite when we went to bed, I did begin to feel like she was suffering. I also noticed last night that her back legs were edematous, meaning fluid was building up else where in her body as well. This morning when I listened to her heart, there was a nonstop Gallop, I knew this meant things were really getting worse. Her paracentesis continued to leak and we got gauze and an ace bandage and kept it wrapped to prevent infection. For the past few days we were hopeful and how quickly the tables turn. We called the vet first thing this morning and our vet was out of town but reachable so Jennifer (the main tech that has assisted us)called her and Dr. Carol suggested we get a 2nd opinion before we make a drastic decision so they gave us info for a pet hospital in Lubbock that they recommend. So we took her there, expecting that it was our last ride with our pup. Everytime you ask her "you wanna go?" those ears perked up and she was out the door and flying to the car. Not this time :( I sat in the back of the car with her and loved on her. When we got to the vet we just continued to love on her because we were pretty sure we didn't have much time left with her. When we went into the exam room and the vet listened to her, he said her heart was even muffled with the gallop, meaning that the fluid was filling around her heart and you could feel, just touching her sides, crackles in her lungs. What a horrible way to live. So we decided we had no other choice but to put her to sleep :( They took her back and put a catheter in her leg and then brought her back to us. We spent about 5 minutes with her and then they came with the medicine. They connected it to her catheter and I held her head in my arms, wrapped my arms around her neck, kissed her and loved on her while cory rubbed her back. She didn't struggle really, tried to pull away slightly but not to much. It was so fast and she was at peace. We stayed with her for about 5 more minutes and then we left. Cory is taking a final right now, poor guy. Not a good way to start your day before a final. We are having her cremated at the same place Demi was cremated and she will be picked up from the vet today so hopefully we will have her back early this week. We plan to go pick out a pretty something to put her in at Hobby Lobby after Cory's final. We are staying in Lubbock this evening to go see the play Cats which will help take our minds off it for a lil bit. But it sure is gonna be sad when we get home. I have been talking to the breeder through this whole battle and today i called to give him the news. He was so sorry for us and his heart was breaking for us. He has 4 puppies, with 1 left that is unclaimed. They are three weeks old. He told us that shes ours if we want her. So we may go see her tomarrow morning. He said she has a moon mask like Lunas and is black and white like Luna. This may sound silly, but if we decide to take her, it will be in honor of Luna. I by no means want to replace her, and there is no dog that could replace her. But we can still give the great amount of love we have for Luna to another special puppy.

This is one of those things that you don't think you can handle it, you hate anticipating it, but you make it through it. I praise God for the time He gave us with our special Luna Moon. It may have been short but it was very very special. We will miss her dearly. Thank you all for your prayers.

The sad news...

Hopefully you have gotten to read about Luna and are up to date. If you arent, its the previous blog for April 30th. As far as today, she is still leaking from the paracentesis spots (3 holes total) and this is abnormal. This should not be happening but as my vet says "she defies all things" evidently. It did help her. She isnt panting quite as much but she is still uncomfortable from the fluids. But we have to give it til next week to see if her own body is going to reabsorb it. For now, my instinct was to put a wrap around her belly with gauze and basically make a dressing for her (can you tell I'm a nurse?) When I talked to dr. Carol today, she said thats pretty much the best thing we can do. So we are putting neosporin on it and keeping it covered in hopes of preventing infection. I just pray that it stops soon so we dont have to worry about infection, because she is immunocompromised right now from all the meds shes on. So we can only do our best and we are. She is moving about a lil better and seems a tad more comfortable. She ate really good this morning so we are still hopeful. It just sucks living in uncertainty :(. So thats where we are right now with her.

In other news...spring break was alot of fun being at home with the family. I really miss them so it was really nice to see everyone. Here are some pics from the visit :)

Spring break 2009

And now for sad news. In January and February, my lil ferret, Demi, started to play with me less. She used to get out and play for hours. She started playing less and less and searching for a cozy more and more. This is normal for old age ferrets. She was going to be 7 this year and 6 is old for a ferret. Well she had cancer, as you may know. She has had it for 2 years but we were giving her treatments that suppressed the symptoms to improve quality of life and she was a happy girl. Over spring break, Cory stayed home with the cat and the weasel so he could do research. Demi began to be uninterested in food and was wobbly, unsteady and just not acting right. We made an appointment with the vet on March 20th. Cory took her to the vet with me on speakerphone in STL. The vet did an assessment and said that she had had a stroke. :( If we didn't put her to sleep, she would only live for 1-2 more days so...I was in STL on the phone with Cory when they put her to sleep. unable to be with my weasel I have had since I was 16/17. :( That was heartbreaking, very heartbreaking. I wish I could have been there for her. When I came back home, it was strange to not see her cage, not be scheduling time to get her out to play with her, and to not hear "weasel itches" or noises such as her balls she would play with. So on March 20th, my weasel lay to rest. Here she is, loving her Momma...



Here is a rose that our vet sent us in memory of Demi Brooke.



And here is a lil memorial place we set up for her. We had her cremated because I would like to bury her in my parents backyard with the rest of my ferrets. Until then, she is in this lil memorial Cory made for her. She LOVED her igloos and in fact, would get in them and push it with her nose across the floor...we called this "weasel tank" She had her own personal army tank ;) One of her blankies with her favorite ball toys are in the igloo. The colored paper is a Rainbow Bridge poem that the cremation place gave us and she is inside a velvet pouch that is embroidered with the words "Until we meet again my friend, on Rainbow Bridge". I miss her greatly.




Now I get home from Spring break, having just lost my ferret. And Luna's illness saga begins, June ends up getting sick and my stupid betta starts laying on the bottom of the tank. That week I got back everyone was trying to croak! Well, June got medicine and she was well within a few days. My fish acted like he was dying for about a week and now he is revived and well again. Strange. And we are still battling whatever is wrong with Luna. Even though we are hopeful I am wrought with grief because I know there is a possibility that we may lose Luna now. I am trying to be stay hopeful, but its hard to get that out of my head. I look over at her and see her panting because of the fluid in her tummy and while she is still that happy/tail wagging/cuddle me/give me a treat pup, I just see her not being "healthy" and it breaks my heart. Its one of those things that you really dont want to deal with but have no choice to. I am just grateful that I am not dealing with this uncertainty with a person. It sucks, but I would much rather deal with this with a pet rather than my husband, parents, grandparents, brother... but that doesnt make it easy at all. Luna is my baby and I have a special connection with her so ...it just is hard, especially after just losing one of my other pets Anyway, I know that I am "miss happy sunshine", arent i? ;) I guess I better go study for my final I have on Tuesday...if there is even such a thing as being able to focus... Have a great afternoon everyone and I will be blogging more tomarrow. Until then...caio

Luna's battle

Well, I havent blogged in just about forever. My critical care rotation is coming to an end. I have a final next week and I am done! YAY! Then all I have left is my internship in the fall. Exciting stuff :)

Been kind of down here, :( struggling with Luna's health and so I am finally gonna write about whats goin on. To start, Luna has had chronic diarrhea since she was a pup. We got her at 7 weeks old. But she gained weight, and ate good. Then at about 1years old, she got super picky about eating. We tried to figure out what was going on for the past 6 months, putting her on different antibiotics and such, switching brands of food etc. She is suppose to eat like 2 1/2 cups of dog food a day. Often times I could only get her to eat 1 1/2 for the whole day. She just kept getting pickier and pickier but acted totally fine and happy. Since she was about 1 year, she has weighed 45 lbs. She realistically should weigh at least 50-55 which is why we tried to figure out what was with the diarrhea but cuold never come to a conclusion. Well I got home from spring break in March and she lost alot of weight and there was blood in her stool. She was 38-39 lbs and was acting tired, but not lethargic. She wouldnt eat very much at all, 1/2 cup a day if that. We started doing test after test trying to figure out what could be going on. We put her on a special prescription diet (z/d diet). She would eat the canned food ok, but it was still very difficult to get her to eat. I tried adding peanut butter, bbq sauce, anything to make it taste "better". That first week we got back, we did blood work and found her hematocrit and hemoglobin were very low and that she was extremely lacking in the albumin department. She was super anemic and malnourished cuz we couldnt get her to eat a good amt. So she got a B12 shot and antibiotics. Our vet had a huge list of things that could be happening and narrowed it down eventually to Lupis, leukemia, severe allergy or a rare disease called lymphangectasia. Her first initial thought was Addisons diease but the other diseases we were facing were much more severe so that got put on the back buner. The next week her platelets crapped out and the vet told me that I needed to face the inevitable that I was most likely going to lose Luna cuz if her platelets got much lower she would bleed out. That on top of my crazy school workload has really made me down lately, cuz Luna is my baby! Well, we put her on a new diet... 1/2 cup farina, 1 1/2 cups of cottage cheese, 1 tbs veggie oil, 3 tbs sugar and 2 tbs brewers yeast with one boiled egg. BOY! Did she start eating good. We also put her on prednisone. Prednisone is bad long term for dogs and causes complications and shortens thier lifespan, but its a short term wonderdrug. We were willing to do whatever we needed to do to help her. A few days later, her platelets had doubled. YAY! We were seeing small improvements. We did a titer and found that it was not Lupis. A buffy coat smear showed that it is most likely not leukemia (although for 2 weeks we thought thats what it was). She began to gain weight like crazy. Last week she was back to her 45 lbs and starting to feel much better and much happier. Then a new symptom. Shivering. Emergency trip to the vet we go and I miss class for it. We thought it was her potassium being low causing the shivering and they did an electrolyte panel checking her potassium and sodium. Abnormal potassium levels can cause heart arrthymias so it was important to check this. The electrolyte panel comes back... Prednisone makes ya really hungry, thirsty and pee alot. You pee out potassium so her potassium should be low and her sodium high due to the pred. well, her labs were perfect, which made the vet think its Addisons (the first thing she initially thought). She kept thinkin its addisons, while the pathologist she has been working with on Lunas case thought leukemia or lymphangectasia. Well this past monday we put her on Florinef, a drug that manages lifelong Addisons. 4 days later her stool is improving despite the fact that her poor intestines hate life. Rather than being watery, its got some kind of consistency which again makes Dr. Carol think its Addisons. So we have been on a roller coaster of "shes gonna make it, no shes not, shes gonna make it, no shes not". Well Tuesday, she begins to do the shivering thing again (which is a sign of addisons, but at this point, could it be somethign else?) But this time its her whole body, so I call Dr. Carol and ask her what she thinks, do i bring her in or let it pass? She wants me to bring her in for another complete blood count. well, her hematocrit and hemoglobin are improving YAY! She also has reticulocytes which means her body is TRYING to make Red blood cells. But her platelets went down the hole again :( lower then the first time. So Wednesday, she goes in for a blood transfusion. Ya gotta think we are crazy at this point to be doing this for a dog. But Luna is not even 2 yet...and if it truely is Addisons, if we get her past this stupid part, she will be a healthy dog once again. So, blood transfusion goes well. Her gums are pinker, rather than pale paper white. Now we got a new problem. Over the past few days she has been breathing more rapid each day. Prednisone can cause that. Its a side effect. Well by yesterday when we took her to do the blood transfusion, Dr. Carol wanted to do an xray of her tummy cuz her tummy was distended. Sure she has been eating 3 times a day, a healthy amount, and shes got a big belly. She went from 39 lbs to 48 lbs in 2 weeks. On the xray, they were looking for a constricted bowel or intestinal problem that we would finally be seeing cuz she was eating. If this was the case, surgery would be required. Well, good news, but uncomfortable news for luna. No surgery required is the good news. Bad news, She has ascites, this means "fluid in the abdomen" The reason her tummy is so full is that fluid from her blood vessels has leaked out into her peritoneal cavity. Albumin, one of the largest proteins in our bodies, helps maintain an osmotic fluid balance in our vessels. If you lose albumin, your fluid starts to shift out of the vessels and this is what has happened to Luna. Albumin also is a sign of how nourished one is. So if you are malnourished, like Luna was, byebye albumin. This fluid buildup is mashing up on her diaphragm and making her take shallow breaths so she is breathing much faster. And she is quite uncomfortable now :(

well, just got back from the vet. We did a paracentesis, which means Dr. Carol drew fluid out of Luna's abdomen. She pulled 265 ml's total. This should help her feel a lil more comfortable. Because she got a whole blood transfusion yesterday, her blood should have albumin in it now which will pull that fluid back into the vessels. But that is gonna take 3-4 days or so. So, we went ahead and did a paracentesis to help her feel a lil better. This may sound awful and like we are prolonging something and just making her uncomfy and unhappy. But she is still a happy, love on me, cuddle with me, do tricks for a treat happy dog. We just have to fix these other problems (which means she may be uncomfy for a short while) before she gets better. We really are trying to do what we can for her. Right now, we still have options and we are taking them, as we did yesterday with the blood transfusion and today with the paracentesis. Our vet feels good about her prognosis so that is hopeful. If it truely is Addison's as they all believe it is, then all this will be well worth it since she can live a normal life with Addison's... Here are a few pics of our baby girl. Look at her lil paws where they shaved to do the blood transfusion. Please pray for our pup!

Hey folks!

Whew. Time sure flies. My community rotation is coming to an end. We had our last exam on Monday (which I got a 94 whoohoo!) and we also did the ERI (which I talked about at the end of last semester -national exam) which I got 4 points above the national average! Monday was a great day for me! I have finals this week and then I start critical care! I cannot believe how fast the semester has gone. Already halfway done! While I am nervous, I am really excited for critical care because students that have been thru this semester say this is the rotation where it all seems to come together. It has slowly been coming together. Each week that goes by makes me feel more and more like a nurse :) I can't believe I only have a semester and half left til I am a nurse! Wow! Through my community rotation, I have found that I really enjoy community health, educating and managing cases. I started to look into grad school at SLU (St. Louis University) even though its a ways off still. I am thinking about becoming a Nurse Specialist and being a case manager. I would love to work with individual families, educating them and helping them find resources for whatever their situation. But I will most likely work in the hospitals for a while to get experience and while going through grad school. Grad school is just a thought right now and since graduation is getting closer, it doesn't hurt to explore options now :)

Cory is still blowing things up and spending alot of time in his lab. I will be heading to STL for spring break while he stays behind to work in the lab. He also has been working on his Roadrunner and working on getting the engine built with the help of a machine shop in Tulia. He has really enjoyed it! He also did some engineering on the side and I was really impressed with it so I wanted to share a picture of his beautiful engineering :) A work bench for all his lovely greasy car parts!




well, time for me to unload some pictures. This first album is from last semester. We delivered a baby, nursing student style with SimMomma, a simulation mannequin. It is as realistic as it can be to a live birth so enter at your own risk!


SimMomma's delivery

My good friend Christina added a new addition to her family a couple weeks ago. =) Lil Jake entered the world on February 16th! Here are some pics of her new lil one :)

Christina and Jacob

There is much more to blog about but I need to go run some errands and pick Cory up from the Chevy dealer. He is getting the radio in his HHR worked on. So, I am off! Here is a video to make you smile. It made me laugh and I hope it does you too!

The Smarty Pants Dance!

Long time no see!

Been quite a while since I been able to update the blog. We have been so busy! And there is much to update so this might be a long one!

My semester has been a happy one so far. I only have 2 weeks left of my community rotation and then I move on to critical care, which I am pretty excited about. I have done clinicals at a cancer center, a slaugter house (ya, a slaugther house, I got to see the WHOLE plant too...poor cows, but I sure do love hamburger), home health and hospice and our campus medical center. I have enjoyed all my rotations so far. I have also been working on a project with my partner Christina for the past 4 weeks. We had to research Hyperlipidemia and create a booth for a health fair we will be doing for the homeless population at a shelter next week. We created some pretty nifty handouts as well as a pretty awesome poster that we are proud of. Here are some pics of our presentation day and some of the other groups posters. We also made goodie bags to hand out to the homeless. It was a fun day. I would rather do public speaking then take an exam!


Health Fair for Faith City Missions pics


Christina is 39 weeks pregnant now but has been in active labor for the past week. We weren't sure if I was going to be doing the presentation alone or not! She is due anytime! So we worked on our project together every Mon/Thursday after clas for the past 4 weeks. It was the least stressful project ever. Christina was the best partner I have ever had for a class project! One day we were heading to hobby lobby to get some materials for our project and to get materials for a mum for her door when the baby does come. We heard that Kat Country was giving away a pair of tickets to the Monster Trucks. We went to thier location they were hanging out at but missed it. Someone had already gotten the tickets. Willy (the dj) said he would be in Canyon later that day so we had another chance. Well, I was staying in Canyon for most of the day because I was going out with Kendra (girls nite! Dinner and Beauty and the Beast musical at WT which was AMAZING). So I ran some errands in Canyon and hung out in the parking lot by Hastings across from campus, listening to the radio and doing homework. Around 4:45, Willy pulls right up beside me in his Kat Country truck. I rolled my window down and he started laughing, remembering me from earlier and I said "You couldn't have made that any easier!!" He handed me my tickets and we chatted for a lil bit. YAY!! It was a surprise for Cory and I told him I love him enough to hang out in my car for 4 hours to get him tickets to the Monster Trucks. Here are some pics from the Monster Trucks

Monster trucks

Many of you have recieved my emails that announced I am now a Mary Kay Independent Beauty Consultant! I am having alot of fun with it and enjoying running my own business. It is great because it is SOOO flexible and I am my own boss. It is what I make it. Its great! It has introduced me to some wonderful women that I spend every Tuesday night with (when clinicals don't get in the way!) We have a blast and it is so fun to be around encouraging women who have thier own business as well. I am going through "Stiletto Camp" right now which is a conference call new consultant training and I have "to-do" lists. If I complete all the objectives, I recieve a prize! I didn't realize how much I love winning prizes until now LOL. So far I have shared the Mary Kay opportunity with 6 women via conference calls with my director (Thanks to those that helped me!) and I won my pearls of sharing earrings and bracelet! Even a ring! I have also won other little prizes including a Mary Kay money bag! its so cute!





Cory has also been working on his Roadrunner alot here lately. I will post more pics later this weekend if I get the chance. For now, I will end with a video of Luna.

I like to call it Luna vs. Plywood

Cookies and Christmas!

Whoa, been over a month since I blogged. Its been a crazy past month and I have about a billion pictures to prove it ;) As everyone knows, I am overly obsessed with pictures. I think after I graduate from nursing school, I would really like to take some classes on photography and get a really spiffy camera and follow in the footsteps of my Uncle Tim ;) I love taking pictures so much and of course, they are nowhere near professional level at this point, but it is something I am considering pursuing in the future.

Anyway, I hope everyone had a fantastic Christmas and a VERY happy new year! I believe I left off with deer hunting and finals last post. It was such a relief to be done for a short while. To celebrate, a couple of my girlfriends got together at my house and we had a cookie party! It was so much fun =)

Cookie Party 2008!

Here are some photos of my Christmas Decor. I post these for my Mom and Grandma ;) Since we all love to decorate!

Christmas Decor 2008

We had a great Christmas! This was our first Christmas with the Farleys/Hedricks. It was their turn ;) Here are some pics of Christmas in Texas

Christmas in Texas: Volume 1

Christmas in Texas: Volume 2

I hope everyone had a blessed Christmas. We did!

I will be posting more pics tomorrow as I am trying to get caught up and this 4 day weekend is a great time to do this. Have a great weekend everyone!