Planes Trains & Automobiles (part 2, the story)

Well now thats its been a few days since the whole ordeal happened, I can't tell the story quite as expressively, but here goes.

So we started out leaving Omaha on time on Sunday the 21st... we made it to Denver, early in fact. We go to our next gate, all looks well, the plane is slightly delayed about 20 minutes but thats all, so we head upstairs to get some food. While in line, I get a phone call from a 1800 number, which seems odd, so I answer it (already having a bad feeling). Of course it is United Airlines automated call telling me that our flight has been canceled and we HAVE NOT been rebooked on another flight. Ick. A few phone calls to my dad and we pretty much can do nothing but get in the customer service line with the other 5 million people who are now stuck in Denver. After about 45 minutes on the phone but NOT getting ahold of United (I was on hold) and about two hours in line... we make friends with the people in front of us, and luckily, one of them gets a hold of a United ticket agent on the phone. She is told there are seats available on the flight to San Fransisco that leaves in like 20 minutes but that is all - None to Portland or Seattle. So she takes 5 seats, hands the phone to me and I take 2 more. We literally RUN to the gate and are the last two groups of people getting on. Okay, great, now we're in San Fran... Basically all there is to do is get on the standby lists for all outgoing planes to both Seattle and Portland and hope those flights don't get cancelled so that the standby list doesn't get any bigger then it already is! Nightmare is the only way to sum that experience up. We started at number 50 out of 150 for all the flights going to Portland and number 227 out of 350 to Seattle. Clearly PDX was the better chance! We didn't get on the two flights left that night, so curled up behind some gate and attempted to sleep for a few hours before the next flights to Portland left at like 7am... Many many many hours later, we got on a tiny plane out of San Fran to PDX and arrived in snowy icy Portland at like 9pm! Jeremys parents met us, and after arriving at their house we quickly fell asleep! Thats where Jeremys story ends, but mine continued to the next day where I had about 3 different train tickets booked (which got cancelled) and a couple plane tickets (which got cancelled). Thanks to my dad who was constantly on the phone finding ways to get me home.... I got a seat on a plane that was suppost to leave PDX at like 9pm.... so I went to the airport and held my breath that it didn't get cancelled. I still am thanking God that it didn't! My mom, aunt, and sister were at SeaTac to pick me up around 10pm and you can ask them, I was beyond exhausted and happy to see them!

Pretty fun sounding right?
Not really, but we made it home safe and in time to celebrate Christmas with our families.
I hope everyone else did as well :)




Me being held up by my wonderful Westbrook cousins!

PLANES, TRAINS, & AUTOMOBILES

... That pretty much sum up Jeremy and I getting to the west coast, but more details to come later :) Time to finally celebrate and feel like its Christmas time- I love being home with my family, eating tons of food, wrapping presents, going to church, and more! I hope everyone is safe and enjoying the snow with their friends and family. Merry Christmas!

DONE WITH SEMESTER ONE

Well the title pretty much sums it up, but I finished my 3rd final today and am officially done with the first semester of nursing school at Creighton University. SO excited. Tonight about 30 of us girls are going on a rented "party bus" to a few bars around here - a much deserved celebration we feel :)

I have heard the weather has been kinda crazy all over, today was quite nice and warm for us - a whole 12 degrees! Tomorrow they are predicting an ice storm and/or winter storm weather! I just hope everything is good for Sunday when we fly home!













(These are images from wintertime on my old college campus, Western Washington University... loved these little green men all over!)

Baby its COLD Outside!

Well we woke up to a tiny bit of snow today.... and a lot of wind and VERY cold temperatures! The computer said it was about 10 degrees but -6 with the wind chill. Yes, NEGATIVE six! When we left the apartment to go to Starbucks it definitely felt really really cold! Probably the coldest weather I've ever felt... or at least comparable to being at the top of the mountain in Whistler, Canada! We were literally running to and from the car :) I'm not too excited to see how bad it gets in January and February, which we have been told is the worst months! Speaking of cold weather... heard it snowed in WA and OR today... figures! We move to the midwest, but it snows out west first?! Thats okay with me, although I do enjoy the snow and think its beautiful, I do prefer it stay in the mountains!

Back to studying for me, finals on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday... and then the first semester of nursing school is OVER! I am so so so excited for break and being back home with my family... I haven't been back to Seattle since we moved here in April! I am also excited to get this school year over with... only like 242 days left, but who's counting!

Hope everyone is staying warm,
See most of you soon!


((the picture of the awful temperature is from my car after leaving my work christmas party... we went bowling and then out to dinner, thanks Equitable Bank!))

Its That Time of Year Again... ELF YOURSELF!

Yes I know I spent way too much time last year doing it, but its back again, and there are even more options! So anyways, here are a few for you to enjoy, then go make your own - you know you can't resist! :)

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Jeremy, Matt and I - COUNTRY version!

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

and this is my lovely family! haha!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

Well, I have just about everything ready to go - I did all the preperation work, and now it all just needs to be thrown in the oven for various amounts of time :) I think I'm doing well for my first time cooking Thanksgiving dinner!
(hopefully thats not me!!) (this is more like it... haha....)


Jeremy and his younger brother Matt are in charge of the turkey... they plan on frying it up soon, but it only takes about 30 minutes I guess. No turkey smell throughout the apartment all day, but thats okay, we'll smell everything that I'm cooking eventually....
I hope everyone is well, and enjoying their Thanksgiving. This is my first time away from family, so I am thinking of all of them and wishing I could be there. Only a few more months here in Nebraska though....!

Love to all.

School Screening...

Well today was the first day of screening school kids for various problems... It was not too bad, and I thought it went by pretty quick. I started the day out by taking blood pressure readings, which was a lot harder to do then normally. There were four of us doing it, on the same table so there was a ton of background noise as well as the kids being a little shaky/jumpy. Overall they were VERY polite and cooperative though. I then go to do some hearing tests, which was cool. We use a laptop computer to send tones at various frequencies to the headphones worn by the kids and they press a little joystick when they hear the noise. You could tell which kids played video games because they were very comfortable with pressing the button and had quick reflexes! I did a quick stint at oral care screening but didn't enjoy it, nor did I know really what to look for and what to request referrals for so I got out of there as quick as I could - hey, I didn't sign up for dental school! All we were suppost to look for was obvious cavities and open sores and stuff, but no thanks :) The last thing I did the screening for was color vision - it was pretty easy, just used a little book that had "hidden" objects in different colors - I only had one child that couldn't tell what the objects were and it was actually interesting to realize he was red-green color blind (well, not officially!)

Hmm well, I know that was a pretty bland blog, but that was pretty much my bland day :) It went quick and we got free salad bar school lunch so it was okay - we go back tomorrow for the same thing but different age groups...

Hope everyone is having a great week and getting ready for Thanksgiving....
Its getting a lot colder here, possible snow this Friday - not too excited. I keep hoping the snow stays away until I am back on the west coast for break! Only a month away!

Start of November!

I finally have a few minutes to sit and relax, it has been a crazy last few days... As I mentioned before, we had visitors from Oregon this past weekend which was awesome. Although Omaha is nothing special (we think) it was fun to show Jason and Nicole around, take them to our favorite happy hour and bars and of course drove through downtown a little. They made it to the zoo while I stayed home and studied.. This Monday and Tuesday I had big exams - the first one went great, and I haven't heard about the second but I think/hope it went at least okay :)

Today I had 10 hours of clinical at the hospital. My last day of OB rotation, sadly, nothing too exciting. I did get to see a C/S from pretty close up. Not the same room, but right nearby in the "scrub room"... you know, where the doctors scrub in before surgery? Yeah, pretty much just like on Grey's Anatomy, they sit and chat while cleaning their hands to the elbow! We had to put on the sterile scrubs and hat and masks (see picture!), but not do the actual scrubbing in since we never entered the OR... Anyways, I had seen one from farther away while working at Overlake, but this was amazing. Myself and the few other students in the room could see just about everything! It makes sense now how much longer it takes to recover from that versus a regular birth! Lots of pulling and stretching and cutting...

I also got to give a couple flu shots to new moms, and a couple baby vaccines to a newborn. Such tiny little legs, and of course she cried (normal, but sad!). Other then that, we did a lot of standing and sitting around talking to our instructor... tomorrow is the official last day of OB rotation, we end with a simulation of pre. eclampsia (google it if you don't know!) and next week I move into "School Health" rotation... From what I have heard from other students, sounds not exciting at all. Lots of filling out paperwork and checking kids ears. We'll see.

Someone is Another Year Older....

HAPPY 26th BIRTHDAY JEREMY



Although this time last year we were in Hawaii in the warm sun, this year finds us in Omaha in the freezing cold! The weather has definitely turned... We had 80 degrees and sun earlier in the week, and now, its 33 and feels like 20 because of the wind! Ick! Anyways, friends of ours, Nicole and Jason, flew into Omaha yesterday afternoon so we have been all around town eating and drinking! Everyone is slow to wake up today, I am up early knowing I need to be studying.... But just wanted to make sure everyone knows they should wish Jeremy a happy birthday today! More about our celebrations and fun filled friend visiting weekend later :)

Loved My Day in OB!

I'm taking a quick break from studying for my Postpartum Hemmorhage simulation tomorrow to talk about my day at the CUMC Family Birth Center.... Because of my not so exciting experience a couple weeks ago, I did not come into today expecting much. I even brought notes to study for my next exam, thinking I would have time to stand around... That was a very wrong assumption! Today was filled with so many new activities for me, I can barely remember them all to tell everyone about!

(I have to be careful because of HIPPA but here is a quick run down of my day)
My two assigned patients today were special cases in Post Partum... both were very young girls, who luckily for me spoke english. One was in the hospital because she had a missed abortion, meaning there was still fetal material in her uterus which obviously needed to come out - she did not do this while I was there, and was scheduled for surgery for this afternoon after I left. I'll spare people the details of what that procedure would have been like - but what I DID get to do for her was give lots of IV meds, as well as take out her IV (because it was not working properly). I also took lots of vital signs, which is easy, but still hands on experience.

My next patient was what kept me quite busy all day. She had a crash c/s early the night before, due to severe abruption... basically the placenta which holds the baby was tearing away from the uterus. Not good, at all, especially since she was only at 26 weeks gestation. Her baby survived and was in the NICU, weighing about 1 pound and of course needing a lot of care. The patient complained of pain all day and at one point when I walked into the room my nurse just looked at me with wide eyes and said calmly "Meaghan I need you to go get a nurse for me. ANY NURSE. Please go get another nurse for me". Of course I went running to the nearest nurse I could find and brought her back ... long story short it was thought they were worried she would have a stroke or stop breathing or her heart would beat incorrectly. The patient panicked from teh extreme pain in her neck and chest area and then began hyperventilating.. Emergency oxygen was given as well as an immediate ECG done and then a chest xray and blood work were done. At the time I left, it was not known what had caused this episode of extreme pain. I forgot to mention one factor in all of this... cocaine. Both mom and baby were found to be positive for it...

On a happier note, I got to see my first vaginal delivery today! It was very quick but very interesting to watch. Teaching hospitals are crazy - there must have been about 15 people in the room with all the nursing students, nurses, med students, residents, and doctors! But everything was done quickly and efficiently, and wow did that baby pop out fast! I was told that is not common :) After the baby did come out, I got to assist with its first newborn assessment which means taking vital signs and blood sugar levels and an initial weight. Very healthy pink baby girl!


If that wasn't enough for ya, just want to mention that I did take care of 2 OTHER patients that my nurse had, just gave meds and took vitals and helped keep them comfortable....

Overall, an INCREDIBLE day. I am still smiling as I type this because I can't believe I got to do and see all that - It really makes me think this is an area I could definitely see myself working in! We'll see in a few months after I have other cool experiences at other clinical rotations though :)

Happy Halloween!

Well... its FRIDAY and HALLOWEEN! YAY!

Jeremy and I have been sooo busy the last week, he is working tons of hours at his new job and of course the teaching job, and I have been spending time at school and school related activities! This week I got to observe in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at Creighton hospital for about 4 hours.

Because it is a specialty field and because my instructor was not there to observe, I didn't get to do much. I mostly walked around and asked questions while watching the nurses do assessments and give report... There was a creighton accelerated grad, who just graduated in August working for the first hour I was there, so it was fun to talk to her about her experience (and it made me feel a little better about feeling like I would never be able to remember everything I had learned!) she was very helpful and let me watch everything she was doing and explained it all as well... Another nurse was very nice and also explained everything and even let me listen to the babys heart and help give one little one a bath - I even got to hold one for a few minutes... A very fussy one that is! She kept turning her head looking for food and got all her tubes wrapped up (she was on oxygen nasal cannulas that kept falling out) but it was fun to hold her :)

Last night, I had to miss Greys Anatomy to go observe a Childbirth Education Class... It was the class's 6th and last session, so they were pretty knowledgeable, the information was very basic to me and I was happy to realize I knew almost all the answers to the instructors questions - NO that does not mean I want to have a baby anytime soon! It was so funny watching the [almost] new dads play with the dolls, learning how to "swaddle" and the proper positions for burping, etc.



Well, thats all for now - hope everyone has a safe and Happy Halloween!

If We Were Dogs....

killing time on a cloudy friday with some dorky online "quizzes"...
this is meaghan:

You Are a Labrador Retriever

You are very optimistic. You approach life with enthusiasm and vigor. You aim to please, and you are a very quick learner. You can be a bit rowdy and unruly, especially when you don't get enough exercise. While you are a bit wild, you're never dangerous. You are a truly gentle creature.

What Breed of Dog Are You?

and this is jeremy...

You Are an American Bulldog

You are a very imposing, powerful creature... but deep down, you're generally good natured. You are incredibly energetic, and you like to blow off steam with sports and horsing around. You are naturally courageous. You would run into a burning building to save someone you loved. You intimidate people without trying to. Some people assume the worst of you when they first meet you.

What Breed of Dog Are You?

Disappointing

Well day one was okay, but nothing special.... I pretty much did not get to do any assessments, or anything, because there were 2 other nurses working with my patient (who actually wanted to sleep most of the day).   Disappointing;  Mostly because my friend Angela got to see and do SO MUCH today!  I am so jealous of her :)   I did get to watch her patient get an epidural - which was cool, and not as horrible as I had imagined it would look like... But she got to place a catheter, give IV meds, AND the baby be delivered!  Granted, she spent an extra 2 hours at the hospital, but still - how cool!    I just hope I get to experience those things sometime in the next 3 weeks!

Tommorrow... Thursday

Tomorrow is my first day of OB clinical at Creighton University Medical Center....   If you have been watching national news then you may recognize that hospital as the one where kids keep getting dropped off at because of Nebraska's "Safe Haven" law. If you haven't heard of this, look it up, its crazy.     Anyways, pretty excited for the experience since I did my nursing assistant work in postpartum care back home in Bellevue but also nervous/not excited because the students at this rotation before me did not have the best time.  Oh well, we will see starting tomorrow I guess :)

Thursday = my mom coming to visit!  Yay!  Can't wait to see you mom.

3rd Week of Long Term Care

Tomorrow brings the last 2 days of clinicals at long term care... which I'm pretty excited about! I love the instructors in this rotation, but just not the work. Anyways, just wanted to share a story from last week...  

I was caring for a resident who was mostly independent. She suffered a stroke about 10 years ago, and has been living with its consequences ever since. Like I said before, she is mostly dependent, which means she can do activities of daily life mostly on her own (in the long term care setting - not at a house) so I found myself spending most of my time with her just talking to her and her husband, whom she shared a room with.  Besides that I was so thrilled to see this couple still in love and caring for each other so strongly after so many years of life, it was great getting to watch their interactions. Because of her stroke, my resident was

 unable to speak well - she could say some things, and her husband seemed to understand her quite well. A favorite phrase of hers when she was not understood was "oh piss" so as you can imagine, the days were filled with quite a few laughs :)  She also liked to make humming and clicking noises when I was listening to her lungs... Oh and moaned when I gave her insulin shots!  It was funny, but not as funny to my instructor since I didn't get all my assessments done!  Haha, anyways.... 

The BEST part of this story was last Thursday, my last day with her, when it happened to be "Oktoberfest" during lunch at the facility... The tables had beer mugs on them, they served brats, and even tastes of O'Douls beer!  They also had an accordion player singing and playing sauerkraut traditional German music... Now remember how I mentioned above that my resident could not speak very well?   

WELL when I visited her at the lunch table, imagine my surprise to hear her SINGING ALONG with the music.  She knew/said a lot of the words, not to mention was clapping her hands, and had the biggest smile on her face!   Her husband even told me that she had previously

 been standing in front of her wheelchair "dancing"!  I wish I would have seen it - but still, this really touched me and hit home for me the damage a stroke can do.  In her case, the stroke had damaged the speech part of her brain (Left) and because the right side was still intact, she was able to sing almost perfectly!    

I am amazed at what the body can do and can not wait to see what else I will learn from my patients throughout the rest of this 8 months of nursing school!! 

P.S.

LoTs of new pictures up on my shutterfly site! 

      State fair, August trip to Oregon, Scrub pics, ANC Cocktail Party, etc. etc.!

Medical Humor

Maybe its the long hours in lectures, staring at computer screens, memorizing endless terminology or a little bit of everything but these clips from YouTube are funny to us nursing students. Today on our lunch hour, I was shown these two clips so I had to pass them on....!

This first one is called "Bringing Nursing Back"... the beginning is long and boring, so skip ahead about a minute....  The second is self-explanatory, and shorter.... Sorry if you think these are not funny at all :)

Bringing Nursing Back

Anesthesiologist Hymn

First Time

Second week of clinicals started today, still long term care, but today I got to care for a patient who needs blood glucose checks before meals so I got to do that a couple times, and then give insulin injections twice as well! It was actually a lot easier then I expected, but the needle wasn't too big or anything :)  It just slid into the skin nice and easy, no .... haha thats about all the description I can give without freaking people out (like Jeremy!) so I'll stop.   Today I also got to pass meds, which was pretty cool as well.  My patient was on quite a few (24) so it took a few minutes!  It helped me start to realize more what the role of a nurse is versus a nursing assistant in the long term care setting.   

Enough about me for now -- I keep trying to get Jeremy to blog, he's not quite convinced yet though, so I'll do it for him... He is starting  a new job tonight, well, today he is observing the group of students he will be teaching starting next week (I think thats when).   I think the job sounds perfect for him, its an anatomy/physiology class for personal trainers going to this tech-school type college for their Personal Fitness Trainer Diploma.  So basically he teaches basic level anatomy and also a "lab" where he gets to teach them about how to personal train!   We'll see how it goes - maybe in a week or two he'll be typing here and telling us all how it went :)

First Days of Clinical Rotations...

Well I survived my first 2 days of clinicals!  I was placed into long-term care for the first four weeks, and man will I be happy to get them over with and out of the way!   Without violating HIPPA I'll keep it simple and say that the resident I was to take care of was essentially okay besides having severe dementia and impaired short and long term memory.. I did have to change a few briefs which is well, NOT very fun.     Although some students got to pass meds this week, I did not, which was disappointing. Next week though!  That means hopefully I will be giving  insulin and or other injection based drugs... no I have not done this yet, but I'm excited/nervous to try :) 

First Day of School!

Well as most of you know, Monday was my first day of nursing school.... It went well... Despite having several minor heart attacks worrying about traffic, I made it there in only 30 mins and was plenty early enough :)  Most of the day was spent listening to different faculty members introduce themselves and tell us about different aspects of the school and program.  We had a long lunch hour which I spent wondering around campus with a group of classmates. It was a very hot and sunny day, so it was nice to be outside for a bit. 

Tomorrow our first real class/lab happens, its from 8-noon and 1-5.  We'll see how it goes!  

Time to find my stethoscope and watch with a second hand (we're doing vital signs tomorrow)

Oh and if you couldn't figure it out, the picture is of me on my first day of school, couldn't let my mom down who was sad to not see me off on this adventure - you got to watch me leave for almost all my other first days though!   

A Month Later

July was a fun month - it flew by though!   August has been flying by as well - I can not believe it is already the 20th... I start school in like 4 days on Monday the 25th!   I am sooo nervous, and excited at the same time.  As I have mentioned to some of you, it is already a tough program, I already took two mini quizzes online and have another two due the first week of school!   I guess thats what I get for doing a full BSN/RN program in a year :) 

So, what have we been up to lately?   Just trying to make the most of our days, most days. Sometimes its best just to be lazy and hang out by the pool, or at the apartment watching the Olympics....

*We definitely have Olympic fever!  I have stayed up almost every night until midnight watching the coverage -- my favorite being the girl gymnasts and my swimming phenom. Michael Phelps!  He was amazing!  We actually were at a bar right down the road (trying to watch the Seahawks vs. Bears preseason NFL game - which was NOT on any channels here in the midwest) when Phelps won #8.  It was great, everyone in the whole place, including the cooks who were NOT in the kitchen, was cheering the relay on... Very cool atmosphere! 

We also took a quick trip back to Forest Grove, Oregon thanks to Jeremy's parents (THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU AGAIN).  The first part of the trip we spent camping near Bend.  Despite a little bit of resistance (and a tiny tiny bit of crankiness) I managed to reach the summit of South Sister... what a hike!   Actually, more like climbing a mountain!  It was both a physical and emotional challenge.  Jeremy, his younger brother Matt, his parents, and myself, were climbing for about 9 hours - it was around 6.5 miles up.  Needless to say, I was VERY sore then next two days!   Jeremy was a little sore, his mom got a bit sunburnt, his dad broke his hiking shoes,

 and well, Matt didn't even notice we had done a hike!   Ah well, I got some good pictures so check them out on Shutterfly soon....    

After the couple days of camping, we got to spend the rest of the vacation just relaxing at the house in Forest Grove.  I finally got to meet some good friends of Jeremys that he grew up with it at a little BBQ we held at his parents. Lynn and Geoff came down from Redmond, THANK YOU AGAIN AS WELL, it was great to see you both!   Congrats on the baby bump being a girl ;)     

One disappointment was that we did not get to visit my family (and parents) who were in Boston while we were in Oregon. I was, and am, thinking of you all and miss you lots! 

Okay well, that about sums up the last month or so. I hope that everyone is well.... Here in the midwest everyone is heading back to school now - back home you all have a little while, so enjoy the rest of summer!     Lots of love!

Behind...

I'm way behind on the blogging right now, I wish I had a good excuse but I don't really :)

I did add quite a few pictures to my shutterfly site, but not fully up to date... Check out all those pictures here: www.msaunders.shutterfly.com

Thanks to everyone for the birthday cards, text messages, emails, etc. Very much appreciated! It was a great 24th birthday.. Jeremy took me to Worlds of Fun and Oceans of fun in Kansas City, Missouri. Its like a big, better version of Wild Waves! Again, I'll post pics of that soon.

A Wedding in Redding!

Jeremy and I recently returned from Redding California where we attended Lynn and Geoff Radtke's wedding. It was a gorgeous ceremony despite the chance of rain and the smokey-ness from the nearby forest fires. The wedding went off perfectly!  Lynn made a beautiful bride, and Geoff was a perfect groom who got a little teary eyed, but held it together the whole time. You should have seen the smiles on their faces as the pastor announced them husband and wife! So precious!   Here are just a few pictures, I will be posting the rest to my shutterfly site and will post the link here after I do!  Enjoy :)

bridesmaid pictures before the wedding! 

"You may now kiss the bride...."

More pictures... after the wedding!

Love this picture :)
   

Clouds and College Baseball

Just another quick update, in picture form of course!

*driving along Dodge.... the clouds were too amazing not to take a picture of!

College World Series game, at Rosenblatt Stadium!

Florida State vs. University of Miami

Rosenblatt.... not crowded yet- Florida State warming up

Jeremy and I in the hot hot sunshine

Had to cover my shoulders because I was getting so fried! Love the sun though :)

Cool statue outside the stadium

again, early, but nevertheless...

dear dad:

thanks for everything you do!

TORNADO

Late Saturday, or rather early Sunday, a tornado hit down right near our apartment complex.  Both Jeremy and I were fast asleep when I woke up to a strange noise as well as my cell phone ringing. I quickly jumped (literally) out of bed realizing it was the tornado sirens!  The person calling my phone was a co-worker from Red Robin that knew how nervous I was about the crazy weather. Anyways, after sleepily trying to get dressed and turn on the tv (and convincing Jeremy to wake up and get up too) we realized there had been a tornado spotted in our area. The sirens turned off after about 5 minutes, but came back on about 15 minutes later.   So despite the sirens going off a couple of times we never went to the shelter, but we were being cautious and ready if needed.  The storm moved quickly passed us and thankfully never did any damage to our apartment complex - however, I stayed up watching the news for another few hours just to make sure :)  On the news I found out that a tornado hit a neighborhood about fifty blocks away - but did some damage to areas ALL around us... Check out the news story here if you want: http://www.ketv.com/weather/16541636/detail.html

Our First Major Storm!

WOW.. Its hard to describe the intense storm we experienced last night. Luckily no tornados, but a few tense hours of tornado watches and near warnings (watch = perfect conditions, warning = tornado has been spotted).  Both Jeremy and I agreed that we had never seen anything like it... It started as fluffy marsh-mellow-like clouds and some wind and turned into strange colored clouds moving in different directions, golf ball size hail, heavy rain, loud and long thunder and A LOT of lightning!  We tried to capture a few pictures but they do not give it justice.  Another storm is currently brewing so hopefully all goes well tonight as well.  

Updating

You may have noticed the blog looks a little different, well, it was mostly not on purpose but when I was adding all those zoo pictures they kept overlapping and not fitting and I got really annoyed and just made this thing as simple as possible :)  I also added those weather bars so everyone could see what the weather is like here (LOTS more sun then Seattle), home, and also Jeremy's hometown (Forest Grove, OR).  I'm kind of a weather nerd so I think its cool! 

Not much new to report from Omaha, we've just been up to mostly the same old things... working, and enjoying the weather.  Our schedules have not been matching lately so its kinda been rough not seeing each other much - but we make it work. I took Sundays off from the waitress-ing job so at least we always have that day together. This past Sunday, June 1st, our apt complex hosted a reggae band at our pool... it was awesome!  Free live music, pop, snacks, and it was SO sunny!   

 

This is Jeremy in the pool, just enjoying the sunshine.... check out his new haircut... its sorta a mohawk :) 

Other pictures from the same day.... 

Zoo Pictures!