A year gone by...

Yesterday was our 1-year anniversary! We celebrated by eating a 4-course dinner at a fondue restaurant on 280 called The Melting Pot. It was a lot of fun! My favorite part, of course, was the dessert. They gave us brownies, pound cake, cheesecake, marshmellows, strawberries, bananas, and Rice Krispy treats to dip in the melted chocolate. It was awesome! All in all, it took us close to 3 hours to eat, which was probably a good thing, since we couldn't have eaten that much food in the amt of time you spend eating at a normal restaurant.



When we got back from the restaurant, we ate some more! Actually, only a bite more. My mom had frozen the top tier of our wedding cake last year, so we pulled it out of the freezer Sunday night to let it thaw out on the counter. I was afraid it was going to taste nasty, but it was actually really good! It tasted pretty much the same as it did on our wedding day.



We decided to reenact the wedding day by put a bite in each other's mouth. This time around, there was no smearing icing and cake crumbs all over each other's face though!



Then, we watched our wedding video, which we'll probably do every year on our anniversary. I never get tired of watching it! We also watched the video of my parents' wedding. It was fun to see how different people looked back then and to hear some of the advice they gave "the new couple." I'm sure in twenty years all of the things we wore and said will be outdated too! That will be weird...

All in all, it was a great day! Hopefully we'll have many more anniversaries to celebrate together :)

Yay!!

It's so great to be home!!!

Over the next week and a half, we're planning to:

- Be professional bums (no studying!!!)
- Go look at Christmas lights around town
- Finish Christmas shopping
- Buy Travis a coat and some new jeans (he left the only coat he has in t-town somehow)
- Spend time with my family
- Watch several Christmas movies on TV
- Go running several times - Alisha, you better be running too! :)
- Watch lots of football
- Etc. Etc. Etc.

Hope everyone has a wonderful week!

Finals are upon us...

Well, I've already taken 1 final out of 3, and Travis has taken 2 out of 4. We are so close to being through for the semester!! I've done a lot of things BESIDES studying this week, so it hasn't really been that bad. Alisha and I have been running and working out almost every day recently (including a 4 MILE run on Sunday afternoon)! I can tell that I'm slowly getting back in shape!

Today I ate lunch at Cypress Inn with a big group of people from my mom's extended family. We were celebrating my great aunt's 90th birthday! You would never guess she is 90 years old from the way she looks though. She's in great health! I need to figure out her secrets so I can start putting them into practice...haha :)

We had fun watching the SEC championship game this weekend. Nate came into town, and several of us watched the game at Mollie's. I spent 4 or 5 hours on Friday baking cookies, brownies, and fudge to take with us! Needless to say, we still have fudge and cookies left over. And Travis isn't helping me eat it...AAHH! Even though we lost, we're still excited that the team did so good this season. We'll find out tomorrow whether we get the chance to buy tickets to the Sugar Bowl, so we're keeping our fingers crossed. Football, baking, running...anything to distract me from studying sounds really good right now!

We love the holidays!

Last week was great! We only had 2 days of class (well, I only had 1), and then we were able to go to Trussville for a few days to spend time with my family. Of course, the food was amazing. Anyone who hasn't had my mom's sweet potato casserole is REALLY missing out. She also tried Paula Deen's dressing recipe this year, and it was really good.

We also discovered an awesome new store called Garden Ridge in Irondale. Mom told us about it, so Jenn, Daniel, Travis, and I went to check it out. They had a TON of Christmas stuff....rows and rows of ornaments organized by color! I bought some gold and red balls for our tree, plus a couple of cute snowmen ornaments. They also sell furniture, artwork, lamps, candles, books, etc. It is an amazing place! It's in a building that used to be Walmart, so that tells you how big it is!

Travis and I got up at 4 A.M. Friday morning to take part in the Black Friday madness. I always dread going when I think about getting up that early, but it's always worth it after the fact. We bought a bunch of movies that were only sale for $5-6 or less. We also bought a few Christmas presents, so at least we've gotten started!

We came back to Tuscaloosa Friday night in time to beat the traffic coming for the Iron Bowl. Wow, what a game it was! Probably the best game I've ever been to! Everyone was so excited! Now, we're all looking forward to the game this weekend against Florida. I think Mollie and I are going to try to decorate a cake in a Houndstooth pattern, so that should be fun. It may just turn out looking like black and white polkadots...who knows!





I passed my first HESI test that I took this morning. HESI is an exit exam we have to take at the end of every semester. It doesn't count as part of our grade, but if you pass, you get 3 points added to your average. It also helps you get the preceptorship you want in 5th semester if you've passed all your HESIs, so I'm excited. I have another one to take on Thursday, so hopefully I can do good on that one too.

We're almost through with classes, and then it's on to Christmas break! I can't wait!

A weekend full of fun!

We had a lot of fun this past weekend! Here's the recap:


Friday: My clinical instructor let us leave the hospital early, so I was home by 12:30 instead of 2:30!! Yay! I also got to go down to the OR and watch a surgery (it was something called a pericardial window where they drain excess fluid off of your heart to help it pump easier). That night, Travis and I went to Chili's with Josh, Bonnie, Meagan, Jason, Nate, and Mollie. It was a long wait for our food, but it was definitely worth it. Then we played Cranium over at Josh and Jason's house. It was girls vs. guys...and the girls won, of course! We had a blast!

Saturday: Being able to sleep past 5:45 AM automatically makes any day better. My parents came down for the game, so we went to a tailgate with them over by the Quad. My mom made taco soup and her famous fudge, and it was awesome! The game wasn't until 6:45, and it was COLD! Actually, cold is an understatement. I can't ever remember wearing more layers to a football game. We still had fun though! Bama is now 11-0, and I can't wait for the Iron Bowl in 2 weeks. Hopefully we can snap this 6 game losing streak!

Sunday: We decorated our Christmas tree!! I bought some colored lights at Walmart and a tree skirt, so we decided to go ahead and decorate since we'll only be in t-town a few more weeks before we leave for the break. It looks pretty good! I was lucky to have an ornament shower last fall, so we probably have about 20 ornaments already on the tree. We're planning to buy a new ornament every year that has the year on it, so we still need to get a 2008 ornament. We also hung a wreath on our door and put "Christmas bears" in our window. I'm definitely feeling the Christmas spirit, and it isn't even Thanksgiving yet! Now I just need to start my shopping...

Nearing the end of the semester...

I can't wait until Travis gets home! He's been gone since Monday night, but it feels like forever! He went to a Coldplay concert last night in Atlanta with Nate. They got to go backstage before the concert and watch the band warm up. I think they had a lot of fun, and he said he got some good pictures!

Yesterday, I went shopping to finally spend some of my birthday money, but I didn't have very much luck. I bought one shirt from The Limited that I really like, but I was hoping to find some "winter" dress clothes. Guess I'll just have to keep looking!

We didn't get tickets to the SEC championship game in Atlanta. We were really hoping to go too! Apparently, there were only a little over 1000 tickets available to UA students, and each student got 2 tickets, so only about 500-600 students got tickets. I heard someone saying that their friend who has 152 hours at the University didn't even get tickets, so I guess Travis and I didn't even have a chance (they gave tickets to the students with the most hours taken at UA). I checked online to see what tickets were going for, and the cheapest I saw was $300 a ticket. That equals us watching it at home on TV. Although, we had a lot of fun watching the LSU game here at the apartment with friends. I made several snacks, and we crammed about 9 people in here somehow!

Celebrating with our sparkling grape juice after the big win!

Girl picture (someday we'll get Emily to wear a UA shirt!)

I only have 2 more weeks of clinicals this semester! I'm so excited!!! Thanksgiving and Christmas will be here soon!!!!

ROOOOOLLLLLLL TIDE ROLL!

The bonfire and Halloween party were a lot of fun last weekend! My costume wasn't very original...but, at least it was free!

Here we are at the bonfire on the Quad

The two nurses at the party...Jess and me!

I didn't realized until AFTER the party that Travis and I didn't even get a picture together as doctor and nurse. Oh well :(

In other news, tomorrow is the big game with LSU. We're having a few friends over to watch the game and eat some good food. On the menu: gumbo (courtesy of Alan), rotel cheese dip and Tostitos, Chex Mix, Hello Dollies, and jalapeno poppers (I think). Should be a lot of fun...especially if we're 10-0 by the end of the night!! SEC championship game...here we come!!!