A New Love of My Life ...

It's been another long while since I've posted, and to save Erin from asking me again ... I figured I should get another post up!

My life changed for the better on Tuesday, March 25th! Kristen brought my very first NIECE into the world, Jennifer Alexis! I drove home Wednesday after work to meet her, and got to hold her, and the world seemed right! Since then, I've been home for two different weekends, and she's grown, and can do new things each time I see her. She amazes me ... God indeed makes things perfect! I get to be the proud aunt, who can spoil and then hand back to Mom or Dad :)

Other than my new niece, I'm in my 5th out of 9 weeks at my FINAL internship!! I remember my first 9 weeks seeming to take 9 weeks to get through ... granted it was my first one, so it was a little dizzy and overwhelming at times, and it was in the summer, so I wanted to be in the sunshine. My second internship again seemed like a solid 9 weeks. My third one, the one at the school that I just finished, seemed to fly by ... but geeze-louise, this last nine weeks I feel JUST started and here I am over halfway done!!!! May 17th is getting closer and closer!

So, the next few months of my life are planned ... through August for certain, and hypothetically through next May. I am excited to share that my second CI offered me a part time temporary job this summer to cover while another staff is on maternity leave (babies are everywhere!) My papers for a temp license are into the state, and my paperwork at this second internship site has cleared HR. It's a 9-2 job, which should give me time to study as well as work a bit! I'm really excited about this, as I know and love the staff there, as well as am familiar with paperwork and billing and such things ... AND ... one of my very good friends is actually doing her internship there, so we'll get to work together! After those few months, which will last until mid-August, I plan to sign with Core, which is a travel agency, and then my hope are to hit Cleveland, Columbus, or Pitts from mid-August through Thanksgiving. After that, I want to hit San Diego from December-end of February. Then, ideally, I'd like to hit Indianapolis which will last me through the end of May. If all goes well, that will be where I'll be at, but I will keep this updated as I learn more.

All good news from this end. I hope this post finds everyone doing well and that everyone is getting excited with the coming of spring and nice weather!!

Have a fabulous day!
Julie

For You, Erin :)

In Honor of this being St. Patrick's Day weekend, and the fact that my friend Erin mentioned last night that I haven't blogged in awhile, and she is a proud Irish (democratic, Red Sox, Pats fan) woman, I figured I would dedicate this post to her and make it green! Friend, I miss you!

Let's see ... I have had one of the best weekends that I've had in awhile. Let's start with Friday night. I had to cancel a dinner date with my roommate because I had a chance to go to the Sabres game against the Carolina Hurricanes - and we WON 7-1!!!! After the game, I met up with a some friends at Loughrins for a few drinks. That turned into a late night breakfast with a friend at Denny's catching up on our clinicals that we just finished. On Saturday, my best friend came up to visit me and we had a girls night! We did some wedding planning for her, had a few drinks, and some heart-to-hearts! Sunday started at church (Palm Sunday) and then the two of us went out otobreakfast at Manhattan Bagel (delicious) and then headed to Kohls. ... Lots of money later, we each walked out with a large bag full of new clothes and matching wallets! She just left to head back to Erie and I decided I'd blog :)

Plans are in the works for the next 18 or so months of my life ... but I'll leave it at that for now until plans become more solidified ... but suffice it to say that I've been thinking about where I'll be and think I've come up with a few good options!

I've put in 1 of 9 weeks into my last clinical ever!! That seems ridiculous and fabulous all at the same time. I've been enjoying my time there - it's a change from working with little kiddos but many of my patients are older versions of my kiddos so it's the same diagnosis population, which is good and I am comfortable around this population. Right now I'm working a 4 day week (Tues - Fri) with two days (Tues and Thurs) being 12 hour days. However, those 12 hour days really go by fast. My plans are to take my Mondays and begin to study for my boards. Wish me luck with that!!

My next post will be after I am officially an aunt ... and I need to put the finishing touches on my niece's cross-stitch so it is finished before she comes (due date: March 28th ... Aunt Julie's predicted date: March 18th ... Mommy's predicted date: March 21) We'll see what happens!

Have a fabulous day and an Blessed Easter! Erin ... here you go :) I hope you enjoyed reading!

Love you all,
Julie

A Little of Everything

Hey Friends! A bunch of little things have been happening, so I decided to get on and blog about them. Let's start with today's to do list: Tonight I'm making party favors for my sister's Baby Shower that is this weekend. I'm also putting some final touches on a surprise, which I'll have to reveal at a later point. I have my inservice at my internship tomorrow, so I need to finalize that and then print out copies for everyone, which is going to require a trip up to school. Call me lazy, but I'm driving ... it's snowing and I don't want the copies of my inservice to get wet (never mind the fact that a book bag would keep them dry). I'm trying my hands at Chicken Enchilladas (spelling?) tonight, so I hope those turn out delicious. Going right along with the cooking - and the fact that I have my inservice tomorrow, I'm also making Oreo Pudding Pie tonight to take with me tomorrow. I think that about ends it with my to do list for tonight. And .... unfortunately, I skipped the gym today.

This past weekend I went home to see my sister. Lesson #1, don't drink heavily the night before you want to go home. Friday night was AirBand, and needless to say, I drank a lot that night. I even decided that drinking should become part of the developmental sequence!! Anyhow, I took a nap Saturday when I got home, and then helped my sister start creating the nursery, and then Mom and I went shopping for a bunch of odds and ends! Sunday I went to church with my family, and then Kristen took me ice fishing with her friend Issac. It was not a good day to fish, as the fish didn't want to bite. We didn't get any bites in the almost 5 hours that we were out - and we went to two different locations! I can feel the muscles in my back that I used to drill the holes in the ice.

This internship is almost over - March 7th is my last day. That means after that I have 9 weeks until GRADUATION!!!! I guess that means I have to start thinking about where I want to travel to within the next year. Any suggestions from anyone? Any places people want to go and visit, and if I happen to be there, it would provide you with an excuse to come and visit?

Ok, time to sign off now. I need to get crack-a-lacking (yes, I DID just use that word) on my to-do list for this evening!

Have a great day friends! Keep smiling!
Julie

Lots Of Happenings!

Good Morning Friends!

I say good morning because it's only 7:20-ish right now. I woke up without an alarm - my body's just programmed I guess. But that's ok, Jen's coming to visit me today, and she's bringing Joe, and I have some stuff I want to get done before they get here.

Let's re-wind my life a few weeks, so you can all know what's going on. On February 2 (two weeks ago today) KRISTEN GOT MARRIED!! I'm sure most of you reading this know this already, and to those of you with Facebook, I've got two albums of pictures up. It was a perfect day. She looked so beautiful and things ran seamlessly. Well, other than the surprise of Vince showing up - which shocked her, to put it mildly! Pictures from the photographer are up on his website www.lorei.com and the event code: schnepp needs to be in all lower case letters. I'm not sure how long they will be up, but you can go there now and look at them. Jory's sister secretly got everyone involved in the wedding shirts made for the rehearsal dinner ... camo t-shirts with our role on the front and the date on the back. Needless to say, Jory and Kristen were excited to see those! AND, they will be worn again in the fall. I'm not sure how to include "pictures" in this blog, but I'll try when I'm done with this entry, so you may / may not have a pic or two to look at at the end.

I got back from Erie Monday morning in time to go to work, and worked three days. Wednesday night I left Buffalo for Nashville for the annual CSM (big conference for PT's and PTA's and students). I had some traveling difficulty both there (I spent the night in Charlotte because my plane out of Buffalo was delayed and I missed my connector flight) and on the way home (they over-booked my flight, and there was a delay and I would have missed the connector AGAIN back to Buffalo). Going down, I was pretty much on my own, USAirways gave me a voucher for 10% off a hotel - BUT coming back, I was put up in a Marriott hotel with a wonderful king sized bed, had meal vouchers, received a USAirways credit, AND got to fly first class from Nashville to Charlotte. I'd never done that before, and got a rum and coke just for the sake that I was flying first class and didn't have to pay for it! Overall it was a really good conference, but I wish we had more time to see the city. We've come to the decision that we need to spend more than just the conference days in the city where CSM is being held every year! My biggest surprise was when I ran into one of my mentors that I didn't think was going to be in Nashville. It was absolutely wonderful to see her and have a few minutes to catch up with her.

I only have 3 weeks left of my current internship. This one has gone by so fast. Being in a school setting, in Buffalo, during the winter .... leads to snow days, and holidays, and long weekends. So, I'm thinking that has some to do with the speed that this internship seems to have. I'm so excited to be almost done. I've started talking with some friends and I'm starting to make some contacts with some recruiters from various traveling agencies to line up a job after I graduate. Traveling leads me to point out my new picture that I have up. This was a sign behind one of the traveling tables that was set up at Nashville in the exhibition hall. Of course I had to show Erin and Vince, and we had to take a picture of it. I know I'm not traveling now, but it's so close I can almost taste it, and wanted to put it up!

I'm going to end this one now, and get my day started with a cup of coffee! YUM! My new creamer of choice is Coffee Mate Vanilla Caramel!! Becky, I know you had another suggestion, and I'll have to try that one next! This Vanilla Caramel is a a little different from my traditional French Vanilla, or even the Hazelnut that I also like, but needless to say, it's delicious ... and calling my name!

Have a fabulous long weekend (President's Day on Monday)!!
Julie

Football Is Almost Over!

Hi Friends! It's been awhile since I've posted ... I'm not as good at this as I originally wanted to be ... but that's ok, because as long as I keep it somewhat updated it's better than nothing at all.

I'm officially done with two weeks of my internship and am still enjoying it! This past week I've started picking up students from my CI's caseload, and actually running the sessions. Thursday and Friday both held significant highlights for me, which reinforced to me how great PT can be! Let's just say that on Thursday I caught a little 6 year old mid air who vaulted herself off of a large physioball, I saw a younger version of myself in another student that I put on a large physioball (she was scared of being on a dynamic surface, just like me!) and then I coached an 11th grader on how to roll from his stomach to his back, and then back again to his stomach ... he hadn't been able to do that in 5 years!! Then, on Friday, some quick thinking on my part turned an unsuccessful therapy session into a successful one for a 14 year old girl trying to get herself from the ground into her wheelchair. Needless to say, I entered into a three day weekend (schools do not have classes on Martin Luther King Day).

My three day weekend has been wonderful so far. I was able to catch up with my friend, Lisa, on Friday, and ended up going out to dinner with her, her sister, her Mom, and her grandparents. We played dominoes after dinner, which was really fun (too bad the highest score doesn't win dominoes because if it did, I would have won by a landslide!) Lisa and I ended the night watching the end of the Sabres game (they won 10-1!!!!) and grabbing a few drinks with the ever famous Denise! Lisa's sister, Laura, let me borrow her book, P.S. I Love You. And I spent Saturday and part of Sunday reading that book. Now that I'm done, I'm ready to go see the movie. I spent Saturday night reliving my days as an RA as I helped Rebecca cut out things for her bulletin board as we watched the Sabres game (they lost 1-2). Sunday morning = church and then I treated myself to some Timmy Ho's Hazelnut Coffee and the Sunday paper! Now I'm just watching the second football game of the day. Once this is over, we've only got the Superbowl and the Pro Bowl left for this football season.

I'm really missing some important people in my life this week ... so if you're reading this, could you please pray for strength for me? AND, my Grandma is going in for cardiac tests tomorrow thru Wednesday ... and I would love prayers for her too.

I spent this past week re-arranging my room and cleaned it out a lot. I'm planning on cleaning the rest of the apt tomorrow. Half time of the game now, so I'm going to end this, and take a shower.

I hope everyone has a wonderful day!

Julie

A Wonderful Weekend!

So, I'm now 4 days into my internship, and have enjoyed each of my days at the school. Each day provides me with children who make me smile and opportunities to learn! I'm still learning all the kiddos' names, and not having them all down makes documentation at the end of the day difficult! One of the two pregnant PTs on staff went into labor today at work!

I spent 4 wonderful days and 3 wonderful nights with some fabulous friends down in Fairfax Co! It was great getting to see Vince for his birthday, and to see Kelly and her new apt, and Erin after driving so long to surprise Vince, and Geoff and meet his new fiance, and last but certainly not least Becky and getting to talk to her and having her HEAR my voice!!!! Vince was completely speechless when Erin walked into the restaurant and he just handed her a chip! He also let me come in and volunteer for an afternoon at his clinic, which was amazing because it was an outpatient ortho clinic. Boy do I miss that setting! Kelly and I had wonderful talks about growing up and well as continued to surprise Vince throughout the weekend! Erin and I had quite an adventure with Vince's GPS, but safely got back to Kelly's apt with the Dunkin' Donuts that we set out to get!! Becky unknowingly gave me a motto: work to live, don't live to work.

Vince, Kelly and I found ourselves going through a tunnel that led us nowhere in the southeast side of DC ... but thanks to advanced technology, we were able to get ourselves back to where we needed to go. Also, I found a really nice VA state park on Friday, and then took Vince and Kelly there Sunday afternoon. We ended up getting kicked out at dusk!

Its time to get going, but I hope everyone has a wonderful day!

Julie

Friday Morning in Woodbridge!

Hey Guys! So, I didn't blog after my first day at School 84 - I was too tired! But, now I've got two days under my belt, which means I can say a little bit more about it! I think I'm really going to enjoy this placement, as well as learn a lot - which is always a good thing! The kids that I'm going to be working with are all adorable and have a variety of common and not so common diagnoses. I'm working 7:30-3:00, which gives me a nice early ending time, and enough time to get to the gym before it gets too busy with people getting off work from 4-5-ish.

As the title of this says, "Friday Morning in Woodbridge" ... I am in Woodbridge, VA today. Well, I flew into Baltimore last night, and had a mini Daemen reunion at the Cheesecake Factory with Geoff (and his cousin who both picked me up from the airport) and Vince and Kelly drove up and met us there. I'm sitting in Vince's apt now, he's at work, and let me drive the Pathfinder. Perhaps I will have to do some exploring here after a little while. I'm being introduced to SWIRLS tonight at Happy Hour with Vince and Kelly.

Ok, time to go get ready for my day. I'll probably post again sometime next week. I get back into Buffalo on Sunday night, and Monday night Amanda and I will be taking a major trip to Wegmans, as our apt's food selection is relatively low right now.

Have a fabulous day, friends!

Julie