Tag, I'm It!!!

So my sister tagged me a while ago and, sorry Laura, I haven't had a chance to get to it until now. I don't think i'm that interesting but I love reading other people's "tags" so here goes.

1. I love music. It has a big impact on me and is an important part of my life. Whether it's playing the piano, singing, or listening, it's all so great. It can change my mood and make me feel better. I absolutely love discovering new cool, fun songs that pump me up for life. My newest favorite is called "Unwritten" by Natasha Bedingfield (I know it's not new, but it's new to me). It's an upbeat song that has a good message and it's fun to sing.

2. Maybe this is kind of white trash-ish but seriously, my favorite treat is fruit snacks. I love those little fruity, chewy, sweet things in the little on-the-go pouches. The Welch's brand are awesome but i'll eat any kind really. I know this is weird, but fruit snacks and fruity candies are so good too me--i'd rather eat those than chocolate cake or other desserts anyday.

3. I'm graduating in April with a Bachelor's of Science in Nursing and although i'm excited, it's kind of sad too. After 16 years of formal education, I have realized that I love school, learning, and really good professors. As each semester ends and you have that last class where you reflect on everything you've learned and how hard you've worked, it's weird to take a final and just be done. (Don't get me wrong, for some classes like geology 103 I've been glad to be done.) What a choice opportunity this has been to be a student at BYU. I'll miss that class setting once I'm graduated but I will try to continue to learn everyday.

4. Here's a riddle to start off this one. What is so important, easy to do, but many people don't do it?........ Give up?.........It's visiting teaching. I feel so strongly about the importance of visiting teaching. This might sound cheesy but seriously, it can make a huge difference in someone's life. I haven't had a visiting teacher (who actually comes) in probably a year and a half and I really wish I did. I enjoy getting to know sisters in the ward and talking about the gospel together--I find a lot of strength in that. And who couldn't use a couple more friends? I know this is harsh but don't accept the call as a visiting teacher if you're not going to do it.

5. I really enjoy organizing things. I prefer cleanliness and order. I just feel better when my house is clean. I like desks free of clutter and tables cleared off. You know those notorious stacks of paper (mail, coupons, old assignments, church handouts) that accumulate around the house? Well, I love going through those and throwing stuff out.

6. Lastly, I like watches. I own four of them and wear one everyday. If I forget to put it on, I glance at my wrist all day wishing I had remembered. Maybe it's because i'm still in school with a rigid schedule but I really like to know what time it is for some reason. Silly huh?

My New Phobia

It has been snowing here for about the past 24 hours straight. There is probably 6 inches of snow on everything and the high today was around 32 degrees. Yikes, December is surely here. Well I like snow, I think it's pretty, and it makes it feel more like Christmas. But, I HATE DRIVING IN SNOWY, ICY WEATHER.

I was driving home from campus going very slow (probably 15 mph) and being very cautious. I was approaching a stop sign so I started breaking way early so I would have enough time if the road was slick. As I breaked, the car started sliding completely out of my control. I slid a full 180 degrees around before I caught traction and stopped. Thank goodness the cars around me could stop because I was blocking everything. Luckily there were no cars parked alongside the road (which is a miracle for Provo) because otherwise I surely would have hit them. Oh man, that totally freaked me out, my adrenalin soared, and I started crying. I continued to drive home, in the other direction though because that's the way my car was facing. That, folks, is my new phobia. I change my plans if it is snowy outside because I do not want to drive in it anymore. I know the situation could have been a lot worse, thank goodness it wasn't.

Thanksgiving in the Caribbean

This past week Sean and I got to go to the Caribbean with his parents, Glenn and Norine, and his two sisters, Rachel and Natalie. We flew to Puerto Rico then caught the "Crown Princess" cruise ship and started south. It was a fabulous vacation and exactly what we needed--a break from school. We had so much fun at all the islands and the ship itself was amazing. It's practically a floating city--it has everything and more! We ate too much and got some sun (although no one really got burned because we were faithful about the sunscreen.) Thanks Glenn and Norine for letting us join you!! Here is a small clip of what we did. (If you notice, we're not in any of the pictures. Unfortunately, we dropped our nice, digital camera into the ocean and it was completely ruined. The memory card was also ruined with our pictures on it. Sad day!!! These pictures below are off the internet just so you get an idea of what we saw.)

Sunday was a low-key day in Tortola. (no picture) We just walked the island and looked at some beaches. I wrote in my journal and we all read scriptures. We tried to find a branch to go to but the only one started at 8 am and we wouldn't have gotten there until about 9:30. It was still a nice day.

Monday we docked at St. Thomas. Then the 6 of us took a ferry to St. John which is a beautiful and less-crowded island. We were on our own time schedule and we just "beach-hopped" all day long. We snorkeled, swam, built sand castles, and body surfed the day away. It was a little cloudy and rainy but it didn't ruin anything. This picture (above) is of Trunk Bay where there was great snorkeling.

On Tuesday we were at Antigua (pronounced Antiga) where we took a speed boat all the way around the island. On the excursion we swam with sting rays (yes their stingers and sharp teeth were intact). I was a little nervous but they said that in 6 years of doing tours, no one had ever been stung. It was cool because we held them and touched them and fed them gross squid. The female rays are larger than the males and get up to 5 feet in diameter. They're huge!!! That day we also snorkeled along some gorgeous, deep reefs, where there were lots of colorful fish. We also saw a couple mansions of famous people (Eric Clapton, Oprah, and the rehab place where Brittany Spears went for a day) =). It was a fast-paced day but we did a lot of neat things.

On Wednesday we were at St. Lucia and for our excursion we took a land tour. We saw a volcano, a waterfall, a banana plantation, a couple small fishing village, these gorgeous "Teton Mountains", and more beaches. It was a fun tour but unfortunately the main attraction was the free local rum and beer they offered. We stuck with bottled water but it was still fun to see the island.

We spent Thanksgiving Day on the beautiful island of Barbados where we went on a gorgeous, huge, catamaran sailboat and went snorkeling and swimming with sea turtles. I know that's not a normal Thanksgiving Day activity but it was awesome. This day was probably our favorite of the whole week.

Happy Halloween!!!!

Sean and I wanted to carve pumpkins for the holiday so rather than carving a boring face for our jack-0-lantern, we decided to carve a scary black cat and a tombstone. I think it turned out pretty well. The whole process actually took quite a while but it was fun.

A Visit from Dave

My brother Dave come down from Seattle a couple weeks ago to visit us. We had a fun weekend of playing football outside, going out to eat, drafting fantasy basketball teams (well...the boys did that, not me) and just relaxing.

A Touch of Fall

I have to admit that never in my life had I raked up leaves. Growing up in Arizona we didn't have large trees that lost their leaves. The ones that did fall could just be picked up with the lawn mower. So Sean and I decided to help Grandpa Oborn rake their backyard which was covered in yellow leaves. We ended up with 7 garbage bags full of leaves!!!

Empanadas! Yummy!

We decided to be authentic Argentines for one night and make empanadas. In Argentina they make them for holidays and other special occasions. (As nurses in Argentina, we had them almost daily since we were the spoiled Americans just visiting.) Inside is ground beef cooked with onions and spices and diced hard-boiled eggs. On the outside is a special type of a mini flour tortilla. They are spectacular with a little bit of hot sauce.

Nursing School

I wanted to catch everyone up with my nursing life. I'm in my 4th semester in the BYU college of nursing and I'll graduate in April with a bachelor's of science in nursing as well as my RN (as long as I pass the boards)!! This semester my clinicals are in the Intensive Care Unit at Utah Valley Regional Medical Center (pictured below). I am really enjoying the ICU and even though the patient's are in critical condition, I enjoy having only 1 or 2 patients to focus on. I wish I could take pictures inside the unit of me doing cool things, but unfortunately, the privacy laws prevent that. =)

One bummer in the ICU is that most of the patients can't talk because they're on a ventilator so you can't really interact in that way. It is neat to form relationships with the family members and build trust with them. On my shift last week my patient was doing better and then just started going down hill. The patient's grown-up daughter was there when we told her that we would have to re-intubate her mom (a step back in her progress for sure). She was having a rough time with it because she thought her mom was out of the woods and said to me (a complete stranger until just hours before this) "I need a hug." I enjoy being a nurse (well a student nurse at least) and getting to help complete strangers every day.

Our Wedding Day - August 18, 2007

Here are some pictures from our actual wedding day. Can you tell I love the color pink? Thanks everyone for making this day so fabulous. Enjoy some moments from our special day.

Wedding Pictures

Our Wedding Day

Sorry it has been forever since I updated our blog. It's been a busy end of the summer but we're back and here is what has happened. WE GOT MARRIED!!!! Yeah!!! Sean and I were married on August 18th in the Salt Lake City Temple.

The day literally started off with a bang because the 23-story Key Bank building in downtown Salt Lake was scheduled for imposion. Crazy huh? It's true though. At 6:45 am the building was imploded and our hotel was only a couple blocks away. We watched out the window and could hear the boom and feel the shaking as the building quickly went down. Dust and debris covered everything so the sidewalks and streets were closed for hours as they cleaned it up. Good thing we didn't have an early wedding huh?

The day was perfect though because it was cloudy which helped to bring down the August tempertures. It did rain a little but that's supposed to be good luck isn't it? =) A nice old man in the temple said to me, "You know why it rained don't you?" I asked him why and he replied, "Because Heavenly Father doesn't want all that dust and debris on His temple so he washed it off." I think he was right.

Well it was a terrific ceremony and we are so happy to be sealed for time and all eternity. I love the temple. We had so much support from family and friends and we are so grateful for that. Thank you everyone for traveling far to be with us--we'll never forget that.

Early Wedding Pictures

Sean and I took our bride and groom pictures in the early evening last week. That way we don't have to do it on our wedding day (August 18th) when it is hot and sunny and crowded with tourists and guests. These aren't the photographer's shots (we haven't got those back yet) but these were taken just on our own camera by our great friend Colette who came along to help us out. Thanks Colette!!!

The sun was going down and it was beautiful evening (well, it was pretty hot still but oh well).

At first it was weird having tons of pictures taken of us and we felt a little awkward. Eventually though, we got into it and enjoyed eachother. Our photographers were great and helped us to loosen up as you can see in this picture.

I made my own bouquet from Sam's Club roses. They were supposed to get pink roses in that morning but they ended up only having red so we made do and used those instead. Sean helped me a lot in tying the flowers together with floral wire and then wrapping it with ribbon.

Our photographer had me stand one step above Sean so it looks like I'm taller than him but I'm really not. =)

Beautiful Buenos Aires

It was wonderful to spend a few days in Buenos Aires at the end of our study abroad. I was so impressed with the city. It was clean, beautiful, not too crowded, and really had a lot of culture. It was also a welcomed event to stay in hotel after 6 weeks of living in hostels. =)
Holiness to the Lord. The house of the Lord.

This is Katie, me, Liz, and Michelle outside of the temple. It was a pretty cool evening but beautiful still. We all became great friends on this trip we shared together.

This is in the same cemetary where the Peron family members rest. This always has flowers because the people loved Eva Peron so much. Her memorial plaque is the top one.

We also visited the most famous cemetary in Argentina called The Ricoletta Cemetary. It is for the rich families of Buenos Aires. The family will have a little house-like plot and then in the basement are floors and floors of stacked caskets with all the relatives together. You could see in the windows and count all the caskets below. Some were very elegant with marble floors, stained glass windows, Christus statues, vases with flowers, and places for visitors to sit. Others were very run down with broken windows, cob webs, shattered glass, and warped coffins. It was very interesting.

This is directly across the street from La Casa Rosada and it's the largest bank I've ever seen. This is a beautiful building and shows well the strong european influence in the architecture of Buenos Aires.

This is the beautiful Buenos Aires temple at dusk. This was our last stop in Argentina on our way to the airport. What a fantastic way to end the trip. The temple is beautiful inside and out. It was so neat to hear everything in spanish and realize the church is the same everywhere.

This is "La Casa Rosada" where Eva Peron gave her famous speech to the poor peasants from the top balcony. They repaint it all the time with different shades of pink but it's always pink. I'm the tiny person down by the gates. =)

Iguazu Falls

To end our fantastic experience in Argentina we visited the national park called Iguazu Falls. It was absolutely breathtaking with miles of waterfalls hundreds and hundreds of feet deep. I couldn't believe my eyes when we approached the largest fall of all called Devil's Throat. The amount of water rushing over the cliff's edge is phenomenal. It was Eleanor Roosevelt who, upon visiting Iguazu, said, "Poor Niagra". So true, so true. Here is just a glimpse of what this heaven on earth looked like.
My friend Rochelle and I spelling out our enthusiasm with our hands and mouths and saying WOW!!!!!

The one with my shoe is to show how dangerously close we were to the edge of the falls. That's my shoe, the railing, and then the deadly drop off down to the mist-filled canyon. Pretty close huh? You can't even see the bottom where the water lands because of all the mist and because it is so far down. Don't slip!!! =)

Please everyone, if you ever get the chance, visit this beautiful place. It looks like nothing you've ever seen or even imagined before. It was so much better than I ever expected. The pictures and my descriptions do not do justice.

My Newest Argentine Friends

Three days a week I work in the maternity hospital in Tucuman, Argentina. These are just a few of the babies I got to help with. They are all so cute and have lots of hair. We spend time in the NICU (neonatal intensive care unit), post-partum, and labor and delivery. I love it. I enjoy singing the babies the happy birthday song while we get them all cleaned up after delivery. I think at that young age they understand all languages.