Apparently I've been Stressed

Apparently I've been just a little stressed. I have shingles. Yes, I know I'm young for it. Every time my dad answers the phone, he calls me "Old Women." Thanks Dad. But here's what's been going on to make me so stressed.

Carl started his rotations at the hospital. Right now, he's in surgery, which means he wakes up before 4, gets home sometimes at about 7, still has to study, and get to bed by 9.

I haven't gotten enough sleep lately because I'm a light sleeper. When Carl's alarm goes off at 3:45, I wake up as well. Sometimes I go back to sleep quickly. Sometimes not. The other day, I stayed awake worried about my care plan for school and then realized I had already turned it in.

School ends on the 18th. Yippee! However, that means my time is taken up with papers, papers, and more papers. Oh, and tests. Joy.

My class I'm taking right now is horrible. It's only a eight week test, but they decided to squeeze 5 tests into that. You do the math. That's a test about every 2 weeks. No time to rest in between.

The professors for this class are horrible. Their favorite line is "this is in the book, so I'm not going to cover this." They also lecture incredibly fast, so it's impossible to take notes. Basically, I'm having to teach myself. It's a pain.

I have a mid-curricular exam coming up. They told us about this test this semester and have expected us to study for it on our own. Um...who has time to study for that with everything else? They expect us to pass with a 78% or we have to take an extra class next semester. I really do not want to have to do that.

I joined a gym a couple weeks ago and have been going nearly everyday. So far, it has payed off and I've lost 5 pounds since joining! I'm really excited to lose weight, but it's one more thing on my plate. I'm worried that my current condition is going to cause a setback but I'll do the best I can. However, the gym also causes a problem because I go after work so sometimes don't get home until after 7-7:30, still have to shower, get dinner, and study.

Sometimes I feel really overwhelmed with everything. School, work, gym, and keeping up the house take up my entire life. My house is constantly a mess because I don't have time to clean it. It's fantastic.

Because of everything I've had going on, I've had to cut somethings out of my life. One of these has been blogging. Another thing has been reading. I've read one book in the last couple of months. If you know me, you know this is a tough thing for me. I hope that I will be to catch up on stuff when this semester is over.

Sorry this post was kind of a pity me post. I just had to get some stuff off my chest. Thanks for reading!

Sad news

School started yesterday. Ugh. I was kind of excited for it, at least excited to have some structure in my life and to be doing something. I think it's going to be harder semester for a couple reasons. It's harder material and I'm doing it faster (8 weeks instead of 16), which means longer classes and more studying. They adopted a +/- system for grades, so to get an "A", I have to get a 96% instead of a 92%. We'll see how that goes...

Carl's been back in school for a while now. He's in the hospital and does rotations, were he is in different sections of the hospital for a little bit at a time. So far, he's done radiology, ER, Neurology, and is in Psych for another month.

In other sad news, I found out last Friday that the gym where I work at is closing at the end of September. Not enough money coming in. With the economy, a gym membership is one thing people are cutting out. I'm frustrated with it. It took me so long to find a job and I finally found one that will work with my school schedule and let me do homework/blog/read when it's slow. This job was perfect for my schedule. And now I'm back on the job market. Ah-well. If you hear of anything let me know!

And now I have to go study about kidney problems. Joy.

Yesterday was our 4th wedding anniversary. He got me slippers.

My favorite Christmas present

If anybody spends an extraordinary amount of time with me they soon notice my one (out of many) peculiarity:

I have an addiction to slippers.

There. I said it. That's the first step, right?

When I'm at home, I have my slippers on. I've been known to sleep with them on, mostly while sleeping on the couch. I get quite distraught when I lose one for the slightest second. I get frantic when people hide them from me. I take them to my in-laws house. My MIL has suggested I buy two pairs and just keep one at her house. I once took them to Olive Garden with a group of friends.*

I thought this obsession started when Carl and I lived in our first apartment. It was student housing, with that tile carpet floor. Meaning, no padding underneath the floor. My feet were uncomfortable walking sock-footed on the floor, so I started wearing my slippers all the time.

Recently, a good friend from college sent me a picture of me at Christmas. And there I was, wearing my slippers. That surprised me. I didn't remember wearing my slippers all the time, but there was proof. This made me think long and hard about my slippers. And I remembered when I would take my slippers to work.

Before you start thinking I'm completely nutso, let me explain. I worked at a pool, lifeguarding. This meant wearing flip-flops all the time, even in the winter. This wasn't too bad while I was lifeguarding, but in the lifeguard room it was freezing. This room was only connected to the building by one wall, so had three walls right next to the howling winds of Utah County in the winter. And these three walls were mostly windows.

As you can imagine, this room was quite cold. Which is why I brought my slippers to work. It was much warmer getting back from guarding and being able to put my slippers on my frozen feet, wrap up in a blanket, and try to get some homework done.

I will admit that I am much more attached to my slippers now. I go through a pair a year. Usually, by Christmas, the current pair is trashed. Most of the time, the only thing I can think of to ask for for Christams is a new pair of slippers. Carl knows that if he just gets me a pair, I'm happy.

You're probably wondering what brought this post on. My slippers are starting to die. One side of the right slipper has split open, with the padding hanging out. Soon, I'll have to duct tape it shut. Last year, I think, I sewed them back together. Maybe it's time for me to start getting slippers on my birthday and on Christmas.



*In my defense, I was at Colleen's and she dropped me off at Olive Garden, where I met Carl and our friends. So, I shoved the slippers in my purse. Makes sense, right?

A couple weeks ago, we had to opportunity to go, once again, to Nauvoo. It made Carl jealous: while he was on his mission, his mom never came to see him, but has seen Travis twice on his 3 month mission!

Anywho, the singles ward (yes, you read that right) planned a trip up to the Nauvoo Pageant and because Arlyn and Colleen are a part of the singles ward and so, by extension, we are to, we decided to go with them.

We left on Friday after a test Carl had and drove the 8 hours to Nauvoo. There's no direct route, so we enjoyed miles and miles of corn. And soybeans. At least I think it was soybeans.

We got there a little bit before the pageant. It was kind of fun. They had set up the whole block with games and activities to do before the pageant. That's free. That automatically makes this pageant better than the Manti pageant. :) Of course, along with all the fun and games, this pageant was complete with anti-Mormon protestors. But honestly, would it be a good LDS event without them?

Of course, my of-so-friendly husband talked to the protestors. And talked. And got their tract. And then laughed at their tract afterwards. I wandered around while he engaged the protestors in uplifting conversation.

Before the pageant started, we found my friend David Smith in the lighting booth. He lived not very far from me as I was growing up and, although he's a few years older than me, we were good friends. He was designing the lighting for the pageant. It was nice to catch up with him.

The pageant was, of course, wonderful. It was about Joseph Smith and Nauvoo. It's nice to have a reminder about how much the pioneers sacrificed to get us here today. They turned off the outside lights on the Temple until the very end, then lit it up twice as bright. It was beautiful!

The next day, we drove around Keokuk for a little bit. We found an old bridge that we wanted to go look at. When we got back in the car, the car didn't want to turn on. We tried and tried. We turned off the lights, unplugged the GPS and iPod, and finally got the car to turn on. And then we promptly drove to Ace to get a new battery.

On Saturday, we mostly wandered around with Trav and his companion. They know all the good spots in Nauvoo now, so it was nice. At 4, we had an appointment at the temple to do baptisms with the singles ward. It took forever! We had a big group, so it took about 2 hours to be completely done. It was nice, though. I haven't done baptisms forever and was able to do some family names from Carl's side of the family.

For dinner, we went to Hotel Nauvoo. It is delicious! If you're going to be in Nauvoo, go there for dinner. If it's busy, you might have to get a reservation. (we had to, because of the pageant.) It's a little bit pricey ($15 a person) but it is a wonderful buffet with the best food on a buffet!

The next day we headed home, but stopped at Ken's in Peoria. Michelle and the girls were in Utah, so we took pity on Ken and took him out to dinner. As we all piled in the Cherokee, once again, it wouldn't start. But worse than before. Wouldn't turn over, nothing. So we all piled in Ken's car and went to a Chinese buffet. It was good, but two buffets in as many days propably wasn't good for my diet....

After dinner, we decided that the starter was out on the Jeep and couldn't be fixed until tomorrow at the dealership. I should amend that-the boys decided the starter was out. It only took them a couple of hours in the heat while I stayed inside Ken's air-conditioned house and watched Cake Boss on TLC.

So, Arlyn, Carl, and I all piled in the Corolla and headed for home. We didn't get in too late, but we were excited to hit our beds. Unfortunately, Colleen ended up in Peorio until Tuesday waiting for her car to get fixed.

It was fun going to the pageant; I've never done that before. Seeing Nauvoo is always fun and I'm glad I live so close I can go a couple times a year!

I Love to See the Temple

I had the opportunity on Friday to go to the Louisville Temple. I went with Colleen (mother-in-law) who works in the temple every other Friday, so it took a little bit longer. We left at about 7:20 and didn't get back until after 3! It kind of stinks out here, the temple is about an hour and a half away. Do a session (about 2 hours) and it's an all day thing. I haven't been able to go to the temple very often because it is an all day thing. Plus, the temple isn't always open. It's usually just open either in the morning or at night. They usually only run a couple sessions a day. I usually can't go due to school and work.

It really makes me miss Utah and all the temples. I grew up with a temple 5 minutes away and plenty of others within driving distance. If I wanted, I could do baptisms before school. It was easy to go do a session, it was just a couple of hours. Now, I wish I would have taken more advantage of it. I kept putting it off, because I could always go tomorrow or was too busy. I miss that now. I wish that when I wanted to, I could just drop by the temple. I wish it didn't take up half the day.

I guess what I'm trying to say here is that the temple is a blessing and I didn't realize how blessed I was until I moved out here. And I guess I'm also trying to say to all of you in Utah, you are blessed. Take advantage of it. And now I'll step off my soapbox.

P.S. sorry if the picture is huge. It's of the Louisville Temple. And it's tiny.

Alright, I guess I've procrastinated long enough. It's time to update this thing. So far, summer has been good. Here's the rundown of what we've up to so far:

Finished school (both of us)
Visited Phil and Bonnie in Charlotte
Colleen and I went to visit Ken and Michelle
Went to Nauvoo to visit Carl's little brother (he's on a mini-mission there this summer)
Went to Chicago and saw JoAnne get baptized
I started my summer class (Research, ugh!)
Carl has been studying and studying and studying and studying for his board exam, which is tomorrow
I found a job at started it this week. I'm working at Contours Express, a women's gym.

Umm....I think that's about all we've up too. I can't think of anything else exciting that we did. I'll be better about updating with more detail!

Fun Weekend

We had an action packed weekend. On Friday night, we went to the Reds game against the Braves. My school had a Reds night and we could get tickets for half off. We invited our good friends Dustin and Merideth to go with us, along with their cute little guy. The Reds lost, 4-3, but it was still a good game. We had a lot of fun and I got to eat my ball park hotdog.

After the game, they had some of the best fireworks I've even seen. They shoot them off on the other side of the stadium, so they're close and really loud. Dustin and Meri's little boy was so tired he fell asleep through them!

On Saturday, Travis, Trav's girl JoAnne, Carl and I all went to King's Island. The had their new roller coaster open and it was awesome! I highly recommend it. We had our camera with us, but this is the only picture that got taken.

Can you tell that Carl had the camera in his pocket? It was an action packed weekend that left us exhausted when it was over. Aren't weekends supposed to be relaxing?

December 2010

My experience with school has been frustrating. Not that I don't enjoy it, I do. I love learning about how to be a nurse. What's been frustrating is that I am not set to graduate until May of 2011.

When I transferred to NKU, I was put behind. A lot. I came with 3 years of school and was told it would take me 4 years to get my degree. All of my credits transferred. The reason was that their program is a 4 year program and I wasn't allowed to combine semesters or take anything out of order. This left me with filling up my time with pointless classes so I could still be full time.

This semester, my advisor suggested something that might work. I was to write a letter petitioned the Admission Committe and ask to graduate a semester early, by combining two semesters into one. I wrote my letter, explaining that I have a good GPA, all of my generals are done, and I would love to graduate early.

This week, I found out that I was approved! While graduating just one semester early doesn't seem like a big deal, it'll be incredibly to be working as a nurse 6 months sooner and earning some money instead of paying it out.

I am very excited and even thought it'll be a lot of work, I am thrilled to be able to do this. Wish me luck!

Fingers crossed?

I found this on my sister's blog and I wanted something from her, so I guess I have, I mean get to, do this as well.

Here's the deal:
1. The winners will be the first three people to comment on this post.
2. You will win something made by me. Something good.
3. Now it's your turn to serve someone else. You are supposed to do the same giveaway on your blog.

And no, I don't know what you'll get. And hopefully it will be good. Cross your fingers!

Black, Please!

I had the opportunity to go to Utah a couple of weeks ago to go to my sister's wedding (Pictures to come later!) While I was there, I was blessed to babysit Savy, Amber and Sam's adorable little girl. I got to spend all day Monday with her and part of Wednesday. I don't get to see her very often (she was born after Carl and I moved), so I loved watching her while Amber was at work.

On Monday, we wandered upstairs to do her hair. While in one bathroom, she found fingernail polish. I convinced her to put it down while we went into the other bathroom to do her hair. Once she looking good, she remembered where the nail polish was and insisted I put some on her. She was funny...she held still pretty well and insisted that I put on a top coat of clear fingernail polish! Unfortunately, the color she choose was black...


Here she is showing me her nails all done up.She loved my camera and cheesed everytime she saw it!

She was also quite entertained by my phone. She would sit and play with it forever!

Don't know exactly what she's doing here...maybe showing me the phone?

That wasn't the only time that week she got her nails done. It was hilarious when she asked my dad to paint her nails and he went through 3 different nail polishes until he found one that he liked. He would put on one, not like it, take it off, pick another color, and repeat the entire process. I don't remember he doing that for me!

I'm a litte behind-Christmas!

So, I was finally downloading pictures from my camera and found these pictures from Christmas! How embarrassing... I've decided to post them months late for your entertainment and enjoyment.


This was the big present of the year. Especially if you know my parents. First video game console EVER. It took a lot of sweet talking apparently. As you can tell my little sisters are just thrilled to get it. (It was a surprise for both of them, amazingly enough!) The older sister, not so much. I do have to point out that the Wii Fit was bought on Christmas Eve. I think between my mom, dad, and me we hit up every store in Utah County looking for one.


Here's the amazing Stroman fam rocking out. As Sam told Amber later "I thought you were a bad singer, but then I heard your sisters!" Thanks Sam. We know we are not blessed.

This is Taran, Mal, and Carl. Carl became the most requested singer. Probably because he was the only who could remotely carry a tune and have it sound good. I think my mom requested him to sing so she didn't have to hear the rest of sing wailing...

You have pools in Utah?

I find it funny what people think of Utah. Or don't know about Utah. Until recently, my favorite had been about arches. When I first moved out here, somebody was explaining to me what Natural Bridge is. It turns out it's an arch in Southern Kentucky and there's a state park associated with it. The person explaining this to me asked "Do you have anything like that in Utah?" "Arches?" "Yeah. Arches. Like Natural Bridge." All I could do was smile and say "Umm...yes." She apparently hadn't heard of Arches National Park or didn't realize it was in Utah. This was my favorite until Tuesday.

On Tuesday, I went out to lunch with my clinical group. We do this at the end of every clinical and it's quite fun. We started talking about tanning and I mentioned I worked at a pool for a long time, until I got married. My instructor looked at me and said "You have pools in Utah?" Honestly, is Utah seen as that backward? It turns out, she thought that Utah would be too cold for a pool.

I guess it's not all about Utah. Carl's grandma was worried that Kentucky wouldn't have newspapers or freeways when his parents moved out here...

Eavesdropping

Our neighbors upstairs like to fight. A lot. How do I know this? Because, often, we can hear them screaming various expletives at the top of their lungs at each other. Or hear her sobbing. And, like any good person would do, we promptly put in earplugs, turn on good church music, or watch a movie to drown out the noise.



Yeah, right. We actually sit there, quiet as we can be, so we can their argument. We try to figure out what they're arguing about. Is it her mom again? Or money? Is she pleading with him or kicking him out of the apartment? (We can hear her voice much louder, as it's higher-pitched.) If only one of us is in the bedroom, where we can hear them the best, we'll call the other in to listen as well. We'll comment to one another about how sad it is that they argue all the time. The other night, when I could hear the F-bomb being dropped multiple times, I was actually listening to make sure I didn't hear a slap or anything like that. If there was, I was prepared to send Carl up.

Is this horrible of us? Or would you do it as well?

Valentine's Day

I've been waiting to blog until Carl gets the pictures of an awesome storm we had a couple of weeks ago onto my computer. I'm kind of picky about having things on my blog in the proper order. However, this hasn't happened so I'll tell you about Valentine's Day instead.

We didn't do anything special for Valentine's Day. Money is tight, so we didn't go out to dinner. Colleen offered to cook us a nice dinner and we took her up on her offer. We had a nice dinner of chocolate-covered strawberries, yummy chicken, asparagus, and a fruit salad. We also had some nice bubbly (non-alcoholic, of course!). Earlier, Carl and I and Trav and his girl went up to a chocolate store in Bellevue. It's a nice store that makes everything by hand. We all picked out some gourmet chocolates to eat. For dessert, I made some really yummy molten lava cakes. These were surprisingly simple and very rich.

Carl got me the video game Spore for Valentine's Day. I know you're all thinking, a video game? This is a game that I wanted for a really long time, but neither of our laptops could handle it. Carl built a computer for his birthday (Yes, he's a nerd) and made sure it could handle Spore. He did have to make a few modifications, such as install Vista (it just had Linux on it. Don't ask.) and a CD drive. To make a long story short, he stayed up 'til 7 in the morning making sure it worked so I could play my video game. Isn't that sweet?

In other news, I have an interview with Cincinnati Children's Hospital next week. They are ranked in the top ten nationwide for Children's Hospitals. I really hope I get the job because, well, we need money, and second, it would be nice to get some experience in a hospital. Wish me luck!

I can't Hula-Hoop

Somehow, I've lost the ability to Hula-Hoop. I've tried. Multiple times. It's one of the best things on the Wii Fit, and I can't do it. I could before Christmas. Not great, but I could. In fact, I'm in the top 10. But I can't do it anymore. I usually fail. If I don't, it's only like 50 spins or something like that. Today, Carl came in to see what I was doing wrong. He had to give me pointers. And I still can't do it.

In other Wii Fit stuff you don't want to know, has anybody else noticed that the guy's hair changes? Sometimes it's down, all cool-like. Other times, it's in this nasty ponytail. And I mean nasty. Short and barely there. On days he has the ponytail, I don't like him.

But I like him better than the girl. Even when he has the nasty ponytail. She bugs me. I think it's her boobs. They're too far apart to be natural.

My Husband

Since Carl's birthday was on Saturday (the 17th), I thought I'd share a little bit about him. I stole this from Britney's blog.

About Carl.....
1. He's sitting in front of the tv. What's on the screen?
A video game. He doesn't watch tv much. If it's tv, it's The Office or something I've turned on.

2. You are out to eat. What dressing does he get on his salad?
Ranch Without a doubt.

3. What's one food he doesn't like?
Nuts. Hands down. Also eggs.

4. You go out to a bar. What does he drink first?
Sprite. Or water.

5. Where did he go to high school?
American Fork High School

6. If he were to collect anything, what would it be?
Computers, video game systems, and anything else that's expensive. (At least that's what it seems like!)

7. What shoe size does he wear?
Umm....I'm going to guess and resist the urge to run to the closed. 9 1/2?

8. What is his favorite type of sandwich?
He hates sandwiches, but if he has to eat one, it would be a hamburger with ranch and bacon on it.

9. What would he eat every day if he could?
Ooo...tough question. Mashed potatoes.

10. What would he never wear?
Sweaters

11. What is his favorite sports team?
Utah Utes

12. What is something you do that he wishes you didn't do so much?
Get upset about something and then not talk to him about it.

13. How many states has he lived in?
4: Utah, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Kentucky.

14. What is his heritage?
European-American

15. You bake him a cake for his birthday. What kind of cake would it be?
It really depends. He's likes his mom's cheesecake and he also likes brownies, vanilla ice cream, and homemade hot fudge. Out in Utah, he just asked for a plain chocolate cake.

16. Did he play sports in high school?
Swim Team

17. What could he spend hours doing?
Playing computer games, video games, and fixing his computer.

Happy Birthday Carl!

Heartwarming Stories

I got an email yesterday telling me that the nursing department didn't have my health information and I needed to get it turned in so I could continue with the program.

What?! You mean you lost all of my health information? My CPR card? My physical exam? My proof of insurance? My proof of vaccines? How could you? I watched you file everything in July!

I got handed a new packet this morning and was told I had to have everything turned in by Feb. 1. Umm....Excuse me. 2 weeks? It took me 2 weeks last time just to track down where all of my vaccines were at. Another 2 weeks to get everything faxed to the right place. (This is what happens when doctors close their offices and you switch offices multiple times.)

After class, I went to the nursing office and demanded an answer. How could they lose such precious paperwork? They assured me that they looked everywhere for it yesterday, all through the R's. I asked if they could please check one more time, because I know they had it, because I turned it in.

After just a few moments of searching, they found it. Phew! The staple in it had gotten stuck to the staple of the paperwork in front of it, (?!) so it all looked like one big bundle.

I'm just glad they found it. I did not want to have through all of that again.


In other heartwarming news, the radio this morning said it was -4 degrees, but it felt like -21. Geez, that's just what I wanted to know. Right now, residency in Florida sounds awfully nice...


P.S. Is heartwarming one word or two? I'm too lazy to look it up.