Well Hello There

Long time, folks.

Short update:
The wedding is . . . 5 days away!!

Snapshot summary-In the past 2 months I:

*Have been working hard with Nick to get "wedding stuff" and all that entails done.
*Learned quickly in my internship in the hospital's acute setting and earned high praise.
*Frustrated my supervisor when she returned from her honeymoon to find me repeatedly making the same mistakes, monotone with pt's, and all around, struggling.
*Found out a doctor's visit from earlier in the summer was going to cost me full price b/c my dad's insurance had dropped me when I turned 24.
*Realized that sore throat "from allergies" wasn't going away and in fact was so bad, it hurt to eat or talk.
*Ran around re-applying for McKinley Health Care, since I'm no longer a full-time student.
*Found out I had mononucleosis (and had probably had it for awhile before I discovered it).
*Moved from the nightmare house on Elm to the house I'll be sharing w/Nick after we're married.
*Realized that weddings and moving to new houses cause you to hemorrhage money.
*Thanked God again for parents on both sides who have been happy to provide for much of the wedding expenses.
*Started working half days at the hospital so I could sleep ALL the time.
*Posted "Papa Smurf" (my van) on Craig's List and sold it a day later.
*Saw that I really enjoy working in the fast-paced, high-stress hospital setting, where each new patient is both a puzzle and a person to get to know . . . and you don't take work home at the end of the day, like you do in the school setting.
*Did a "180" according to my supervisor and not only earned a good final grade, but a recommendation that I apply for a PRN (part time) position with Carle Hospital.
*Closed out my graduate school experience and have all my paperwork for licensure and final competencies completed! <--you know, other than the 9 months of in-the-field experience I still need, but hey.
*Let's not be to hasty to leave that last bullet there: I'm DONE with graduate school!
*Have been trying to keep Nick from being too stressed out as he largely takes over for my responsibilities and is now doing much of the work of two people.
*Have been humbled by the number of serving hearts, both within and outside our church, that have offered their help and encouragement as the wedding draws near and as I'm restricted in my abilities due the necessary sleep requirements of Mono.
*Am getting really excited to see friends and family who can make the trip up/over to IL for the wedding!
*Felt profusely thankful that my parents (and later in the week, family) was willing to come early to help with all the things I can't do. They're cleaning out my old house, unpacking boxes, and they created a garden in the front yard!
*Thanked God for keeping us from being successful in our original plans for wedding day and honeymoon location. Now that I have mono, I'm immensely grateful for how our "plan B's" turned into plan A's.
*Am really excited to marry and start a new phase of life with this great guy, in a fun town, surrounded by good friends and a strong church. :)

So there's a not-so-short update.

Things are mostly done for the wedding.
Yet there are a million little things left to do!

I'm actually writing this because I'm not "allowed" to get out of bed until 8am (sleep at 10pm, that's 10 hours), but I woke up this morning and my brain wouldn't turn off, so there ya go. :-p I'm still obeying the letter of the law. . . .

Happiness

Happiness is a habit--cultivate it.
-Elbert Hubbard

Wedding website!

So Nick finished putting together our website awhile back. Wanted to share it with any of you who may not read his blog to have seen his post on there. We're not sending out Save-The-Dates anymore for various reasons and we wanted people to have a place to go for info before the invitations go out at the end of May.

Check out the wedding blog for a post on travel suggestions and make sure to check out the sub-menu under the "our wedding" section to get all the details.

Keep checking back (the blog especially) because we'll be adding info over the next few weeks. :)

Transition

So the last few weeks have led to me feeling pretty cut off from people. My internship has kept me more busy than I expected and definitely more tired. Wedding/marriage planning and church stuff have taken up much of the rest of my time. The big changes though from grad school are that now I am completely away from the computer from 7am-4:30pm or later most days and that it's no longer so easy to get time with the girls in my major. A ton of us have stayed in town, but it takes much more intention to get together now than when we all had the same classes, etc. So the number of friends I see on any given week has drastically decreased.

It's been an interesting transition, but overall, I love my "job", though sometimes I do wish for one that was slightly less challenging. :-p

Oh, but I have to say I'm enjoying no homework other than lesson planning!

A set of verses I found helpful today as a reminder of to whom I am responsible.

1 Peter 2:18-25 (New International Version)

¹⁸Slaves, submit yourselves to your masters with all respect, not only to those who are good and considerate, but also to those who are harsh. ¹⁹For it is commendable if a man bears up under the pain of unjust suffering because he is conscious of God. ²⁰But how is it to your credit if you receive a beating for doing wrong and endure it? But if you suffer for doing good and you endure it, this is commendable before God. ²¹To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps.
²²"He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth." ²³When they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats. Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly. ²⁴He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed. ²⁵For you were like sheep going astray, but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.

"A Classic Regency Romance - Now with Ultraviolent Zombie Mayhem!"

Whaa? Found this on Amazon. They took the real text of Pride and Prejudice and added "all-new scenes of bone-crunching zombie action."

" . . . Feisty heroine Elizabeth Bennet is determined to wipe out the zombie menace but she's soon distracted by the arrival of the haughty and arrogant Mr. Darcy. What ensues is a delightful comedy of manners with plenty of civilized sparring between the two young lovers and even more violent sparring on the blood-soaked battlefield as Elizabeth wages war against hordes of flesh-eating undead."

Not. sure. what. to. think. . .

A disjointed look at self

Yesterday I told Ash I'd bombed one of my interviews. Then I asked her how she liked working for this district in case I got an offer.

My original intent was the asking of her perspective on the district, yet I felt the need to tell her how poorly I'd done, which then makes no sense why I'd even need to consider working there because the offer probably wouldn't be forthcoming.

In truth, I did not bomb the interview. I walked away feeling that it was very intimidating and formal and that I could have done better, but also with the feeling that I could very well have just landed myself the job. But over the past week, I have talked myself into believing that they disliked me altogether and I performed incredibly poorly. Why do I do that to myself? Nick points it out a lot when I'm referring to how I've done on something or what others must have thought.

I think it comes down to a crippling attempt at self-preservation and protection from disappointment. If I can set my expectations (and the expectations of others for me) low and blame it on my performance, then if I don't get the job, it doesn't come as a surprise and doesn't feel as crushing because I tell myself it's what I was expecting all along.

In short, I need to quit this. My value doesn't come from my performance in the first place and talking myself from a positive attitude into a negative one steals joy. I've long been challenged by the concept that thinking too poorly of myself is as much vanity as being proud. God created me as I am and to say he should have done better is arrogant. Now just because God has lovingly made me doesn't mean I couldn't have done poorly at this interview, but it addresses my propensity to assume I will fail in my attempts through life. It also points to a lack of faith that I'm not the only one in control of my future. Three versions of a verse I am reminded of today.

Romans 12:3, emphasis added:

"Because of the privilege and authority God has given me, I give each of you this warning: Don’t think you are better than you really are. Be honest in your evaluation of yourselves, measuring yourselves by the faith God has given us." (New Living Translation)

"For through the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think; but to think so as to have sound judgment, as God has allotted to each a measure of faith." (New American Standard Bible)

And some thoughts pulled out of the Message's rendition:

"Living then, as every one of you does, in pure grace, it's important that you not misinterpret yourselves as people who are bringing this goodness to God. No, God brings it all to you. The only accurate way to understand ourselves is by what God is and by what he does for us, not by what we are and what we do for him."

This post is a little thrown together, as I'm worried less that it comes across polished and more about processing through my thoughts this morning and sharing them with you. I'm tempted to do a better job trying to provide a more airtight explanation of what I'm trying to say, but I think I'll just leave it as is and you can take it how you will. Besides, I have a paper I need to be writing, so now that I've processed, the need for polishing is surpassed by the need to crank out 11 pages of highly technical text. Thanks for joining me in my thoughts.