NYC/Christmas/New Year

It's been awhile again since an update. We became very busy in December. I was finishing up with finals for school and Jeff was finishing his cardiology rotation which required q4 on call schedules. He has decided that he does not want to do internal medicine and would like to do something with surgery. He job shadowed an orthopedic surgeon while we were back in SD and really enjoyed it. His first rotation for 4th year will begin with an orthopedic rotation to ensure that this is what he will apply to residency programs for. His back up plan as of now is possibly vascular surgery. Orthopedics is extremely difficult to get in to, but Jeff has done extremely well in school and God has blessed us with many opportunities to get him on this track, so...as of now that will be our plan. However, right now he is just trying to finish up he internal medicine rotation strong (which is not easy when you really don't really enjoy it :) ). Next rotation is OB/GYN...which surprisingly he is excited for because many med students love this rotation and it means he is done with medicine rotations! In the meanwhile, I am trying to stay afloat with work, school, and fun. I am taking 13 credits this semester so I spend the majority of my days off doing school. We have decided that this will probably be my last full semester and will cut back to 6cr this summer, 9 cr in the fall, and finish up with 6 cr in the winter. Anyway, enough of the boring stuff...

We traveled to NYC with another couple the week of Christmas. With the exception of us almost getting hit by a semi, it taking 14hrs instead of nine, driving through one of the largest snow storms Penn./NY has ever had, and driving like Mario Cart through the city because people were stuck every direction on the freeway with 2 wheel drive vehicles...we had an amazingly good time :). We did a city pass, which I highly recommend, and were able to explore much of Manhattan in the three full days we were there. We really enjoyed the whole experience, but especially enjoyed getting to spend more time with our friends, Steve & Anne.

All the cars on the freeway...don't let it fool you, these cars are all spinning out...Jeff's mad driving skills had to swerve through them.

After working my four days, we drove to Lake Andes to see Grandmas, cousins, aunts, and uncles. On the way there, we were very thankful that I had to work over the holiday. The amount of cars in the ditch were unbelievable through Iowa...in 50 miles, we saw at least 50 cars in the ditch, 10 rollovers, and numerous areas where cars already had been pulled out. If I had not been working, there would've been a good chance we would've been one right there with them. The rest of our trip was spent with family and friends.

Once we were back, we received an e-mail that two spots had opened up for a mission trip we had wanted to go on but had already been filled. We e-mailed asking if I would be able to come since I was a nurse, not a med student. This e-mail was passed on and we received word from the head lady of the trip that they actually needed one more nurse that could work in pre-op and PACU, and had ICU experience. Coincidence, I think not :). So...off to Honduras we will go for a week in May. We will be preforming ENT related surgeries down in the the 3rd largest city, La Ciaba.

That's all of our news for now...