Summer 2014

I love summer, but 2014 is going to be a big one!

This summertime, I am a bride, having the experience of a lifetime, surrounded by my family and friends and overwhelmed with the unconditional love that has been so prevalent during the wedding planning process.  

Our wedding is set for August and so far almost everything we've experienced has been fun - at least to some degree!  We're planning our wedding, one of the sweetest chapters in our love story, and looking toward the future.  Yes, wedding planning has been hard work, but life is full of hard work!  That's what makes us appreciate the fun times!  

Over the past 10 months of our engagement, Sam and I have done a lot of growing up.  We've really begun to make plans for our future together as our own little family unit and I am so excited to see what's in store for us!  

Summer Rain

Yesterday was humid.  Very humid.  I was not surprised in the least when, to my delight, it started raining on my drive home.  It rained again when we walked Hunter in the evening.

This morning, when I woke up, it was overcast and the air was heavy - indicators that it's likely to be rainy.  Sure enough, as I lay in bed checking the weather, I noticed that we were supposed to get showers.

When Hunter and I walked this morning it started raining, and it rained my whole drive to work.  So much for the carwash I got after our road trip last weekend!  

I love a good summer rain storm.  It smells so good on the warm asphalt.  It sounds so nice coming down on the leaves and trickling down the side of the building.

It reminds me of being home in Northern California.

Spray-On Suntan Lotion

This past weekend I decided I should take advantage of the amazing weather - June gloom finally ended and summer is officially here in Southern California.  The downside of this plan, was that Sam was working and I had nobody to prevent my poor pale skin from crisping.  Enter my brilliant solution: spray-on sun screen!  This invention has pretty much enabled us sun-seekers to protect our largest organ from too much exposure even when we're laying out solo.

So I stopped at CVS and purchased a bottle of CVS-brand aerosol spray suntan lotion and headed down to our pool.  On the upside, I was able to quickly and easily apply the sun screen to my body.  Major upside: I didn't have greasy hands when it came time to read The Hobbit on my nook.  Side note- yes I am still working on finishing the story... I didn't think 350 pages would take me a week, but it's been tough to find time to read during all my activities!

Anyway, things were going very smoothly the first hour and half I was baking.  I was laying on my back, propped up a bit, reading.  I had put on SPF 30 in the morning before Hunter and I met up with his trainer and her dog, Junie, so I was really re-applying to my arms and chest.  That said, I was able to easily apply and reapply suntan lotion to my legs and stomach with very little effort. 

The trouble came when it was time to lay on my back.  I had applied sun screen to my back before I laid down, but in hindsight, that probably rubbed off on my towel during the 90 minutes I was tanning my front-side.  I never reapplied the lotion to my backside when I turned over.  Oops.  Thankfully, I took a nap and decided 60 minutes was okay for my back rather than going until 90 like I did with my front side.

Boy was that a good decision!  As I was getting ready for bed I noticed that my back was feeling a little tender and looked in the mirror to check out the damage.  It's definitely not as bad as it would have been had I not applied ANYTHING to my back, but I am pretty pink between my shoulder blades and in the middle of my back.  The lower part of my back is great, and that was the place I think I got the most coverage when I was spraying so clearly I need to adjust my application techniques.  

Independence Day

Last night Hunter & I were home alone because it was Sam's first overnight call of his 2nd year of residency.  As much as I used to hate being home along, having Hunter to spend my evenings with made it so much less lonely... even when Sam's on vacation I notice that I'm not as anxious, I sleep much better, and overall I'm a lot happier.  Looks like Dr. Galle was on to something when he suggested we get the puppy back in January...

Since Sam was overnight in the hospital, and the weather was overcast and misty, I kicked off the 4th of July by attending a spin class at the gym- it was so nice to be back in the saddle after 2 months off focusing on school and work.  I need to keep that up to help my stress level stay down.  

After the gym, I spent some time on my homework and touched base with my teacher and my classmates to clarify some questions I'd had.  Good news: she decided to cut WAY back on our assignments and make a lot of stuff optional, and basically everything else into group work.  Our class size has diminished to 4 so we're going to work as a group on ALL of our projects and the homework questions from the reading are our only individual assignments.  Yay!  I guess it pays off to talk to the instructors after all... and in her defense, she had planned for an 11 week class that was cut down to 8.  She told us she wants us to give her feedback and make sure that it's not an overwhelming about of work.  Awesome lady!

Sam got home around 2, and we hosted a bunch of the general surgery lady residents for a BBQ from 5-9.  We had originally thought we'd do a pool party but the weather wasn't cooperating and though the sun did finally come out, we stayed in the apartment.  It was really, really fun!  We had bratwurst, 1/2 of which we BBQ'ed and 1/2 of which I cooked in beer on the stove, and we also had Adele's special Jalapeno & cheese sausage- limited time offer at Costco.  Oh-so-good!  I also made a fruit salad, caramelized onions, and cooked bell peppers to go with our dogs.  Hunter was dressed for the party, and he was a BIG hit with the ladies (as always).  He was really, really well behaved and I was very proud of all of our hard work paying off.  I got a bunch of compliments on his shirt!


At about 9 everyone started filing out- they have M&M tomorrow morning (Morbidity & Mortality) where they have to talk about the patients that had complications to learn from the mistakes and situations.  Sam and I took Hunter for a short walk, and then headed to the balcony where we watched 2 sets of fireworks before crawling onto our bed.  Sam's got In the Army playing on his laptop, Hunter is chewing his bone, and I'm obviously blogging.  


I have to say, this 4th of July I am aware of how very lucky I am.  I am so thankful for Sam & how supportive he is of me despite his own busy schedule.  I am thankful that we have our little puppy, even if he is a LOT of work.  I am thankful for our supportive family made up of Santis, Galles, Burkharts, Hunters, & Celnikers.  I am so very, very thankful that I have a job I love and coworkers I enjoy spending time with.  And I am so thankful for my amazing friends.  This life keeps getting better and better, and I am looking forward to a very bright future!