gratitude day twelve: thanksgiving food.

yes. i know it is not thanksgiving yet. but tonight it was a pre-thanksgiving dinner to my thanksgiving dinner in less then two weeks.

why am i grateful for this.

because the last two years i have not had a real thanksgiving

because i was the lucky one to work the last two years.

but that aint the case this year.

and this year i got two dinners to make up for the last two years.

tonight my old roommates threw a thanksgiving dinner.

i saw all my old coworkers and it just made me miss all of them.

grate people, grate food.

oh the food was soooooo delicous!

and have you ever had a deep fried turkey?

no this is not anything like KFC.

but oh my heavens. so yummy. so yummy.

tonight just made me realize i have missed out on some good fall food.

i think thanksgiving will be one of my favorite holidays.

thanks laura and melina for opening your house.

it made me miss living in good ole sojo. and it made me miss you two as my roomies.

gratitude day 11: veterans

today i am grateful for the men and woman how have fought for my freedom.

i can not even imagine going out and fighting for my country

putting my life on the line and even ending someone elses life.

i think i would try to bring them back to life.

for that

 i thank you, thank you and thank you again.

for what you do for us everyday the people of this county cannot say thank you enough.

god bless america.

happy veterans day

and

11/11/11

(though it is now, 11/12/11)

gratitude day nine and ten: the snooze button and my coworkers

day nine: nothing is better then getting an extra little snooze in before you have to get up and go to work. especially when its winter time.

day ten: today i was having a very very very rough day and my coworkers just kept me smiling, laughing and kept me motivated with what was getting me down.

gratitude day 8: car heaters

makes my morning drives to work bearable during the winter months.

gratitude day 7: my work mom

when i worked in the cardiac intensive care unit, i became close to a certain nurse.

when i worked the evening shift, she would sometime bring me in cafe rio. 

which turned into doing that maybe 2-3 times a month. not so much now since i dont work in ccu

but from then on she was known as
 "work" mom.

now we go to the gym, midnight premieres, and such. 

she also came to the temple when i got endowed.

i confide in her like my own mom.
she defends me like my own mom.

i tell her my struggles like i do with my own mom.

i laugh with her like i do with my own mom.

i tell her crazy situations ive been in like i do with my own mom.

she is my work mom.

and i am so grateful to have her in my life.

and

i seriously miss working with her.

good thing i have her number and know where she lives :)

gratitude day 6: the sabbath day

i love waking up on sundays. making breakfast, an actually breakfast. yes i totally forgot today was fast sunday.

head to church.

feeling the spirit and reaffirming my beliefs to gear myself for another crazy week.

head to my parents after church and to have our weekly bagels and homemade salsa. 

oh so good.

then just relax. enjoy each others company. eat dinner and dessert.

watch some football games.

then head home for the night.

i love the sabbath day.

gratitude day 5: warm showers.

silly?

i know

but after a sweaty workout at the gym then freezing to death on the drive home with the fresh fallin snow.

nothing sounded better than a warm/hot shower.

i think my shower was probably 20 minutes today.

5 mintues washing my hair.

15 mintues just standing there.

ill be paying for that at the end of the month...

gratitude day 4: my job

with all the craziness that i go through day in and day out at work. sometimes i forget why i really really like my job. yes i work with some pretty awesome people. but that isnt the main reason why i love nursing.

today

a patient who was nervous about their procedure was given extra sedation.

when this patient came to our unit to recover i remembered them from the previous day.

(you can understand why they were nervous, two surgeries. two days. i would be)

with that extra sedation, they were really really out of it. trying to get up and extremely emotional.

the nurse asked me to stay in the room to make sure the patient would be safe.

they remembered me from the day before and reached for my hand and asked me to not leave.

they kept asking me questions about the surgery, that if they were okay, if they were alive, if they were dead. then kept asking for their mom. the family came in and the patient asked me to not leave.

the patient kept going in and out of it. crying, smiling, sleeping.

and as they started to calm down, they told us that there father, grandma and others were here. but arent here anymore.

thats when it finally clicked.

these people that the patient was mentioning were people that have passed.

this just reaffirms my belief of when you are dealing with an extreme situation, in this case surgery. your loved ones that are no longer on earth are watching over you. then when your surgery is done your loved ones on earth are taking over and watching you.

(like when wilson my little brother was born. we knew lauren, my little sister was watching over wilson for the first few weeks. ill have to share this story another time with you)

for about 30 minutes this patient asked me not to leave. i kept telling them to relax. you are here. you are alive. and you are all done.

then the patient just snapped out of it. like nothing had happened. 

they looked at me asked me what happened. i told her.

 later i took the patient up to there room and told me that i am soothing, comforting person and that i was meant to be there when she came out of surgery and thanked me for being there.

its patients like this, where i feel like i am making a difference in there stay at the hospital what makes my love my job.

gratitude day 3: movies

especially harry potter. It gives me a few hours to escape my life and pretend to be in another.

come on who wouldnt want to be a wizard, have duels, send letters by owls, go to school in a castle, ride a broom, and have magic everywhere 

gratitude day 2: utah

today i am grateful for utah.

today i went out on a bike ride with my dad. we went down to big cottonwood and back up through wasatch. the view of salt lake never look more beautiful. and i am so grateful that i live here. sometimes i take this place for granted and wished i lived near a beach. but i would pick out mountains over any beach especially in the autumn.

to many more rides with different views of salt lake. 

one day i will snap a picture and put it up here.

Gratitude.

its November, which means gratitude month. everyday for the month of November i will be expressing my gratitude for different things. 

Today i am grateful for my sister meghann.

my sister is 6 years older than. growing up she was like a second mother, i hated it. growing up i felt like i had to follow her footsteps. BYU, married in the temple, kids. of course this was during my rebellious, immature years. we never got along that is until about 3 years ago. Now i talk to her almost everyday almost more than our mom. I love that i can talk to her just about anything running, shoes, her kids, biking, food, church, boys that take my on awkward dates. She is such a good example to me now that i know what i want in life. Im crossing my fingers that she will be able to come up for wilsons farewell. I cant wait to have the whole family to go through the temple together. I love my sister. not to brag, but she is pretty much the coolest sister. we have had our rough patches, but because of those i think we wouldnt be where we are today. Meg thanks for the being there for me, for being such a great example. LOVE YOU!