HOPE Group Love

This kid. I was going through a photo album of mine entitled "HOPE group" and I started laughing so hard that I decided to share. Most of the pictures in the album were taken by Hayden, thus most of the pictures are self-portraits.

There is also an entire series of photos of people from the neck down. I asked Hayden about these the day he took them and he said "I cut their heads off!" So funny.


I miss this floor.


Luke and D.O. gettin' schooled.


Fabulous faces.

If you thought those face-making skills were strictly from Heather, you were wrong.


These next ones are just cute...





Notice D.O.'s right pant leg...


One more self portrait.


Oh, HOPE group. I miss you guys. Terribly.

Option Adoption

Most of you know I hope to have a large, multi-cultural family one day through the joy of adoption. There is something so beautiful and amazing about taking a child in as your own, just as God has chosen to make us sons and daughters.

Well this week, "option adoption" has become more and more appealing to me, mostly because option "push a baby out your hoo-ha" has become more frightening and disturbing.

I don't care what any of you have to say about child birth being so "natural" and wonderful, there is nothing natural or wonderful about a 10lb 3oz baby coming out of you know where. That's how big the baby I delivered today was and no, she did not have an epidural. I wondered why it was taking so long (this was her third) until I saw the head of that baby. When we weighed the baby I looked over at mom, held up both hands and said "diez!" She looked at me and said "DIEZ?!" and then promptly dropped her head back down into the bed and gave me a "no wonder I thought I was going to die" look.

And let's not forget about the alternative, option "rip your baby straight out through your abdomen." Even if childbirth is natural, having your uterus ON TOP of your abdomen, is not. Your internal organs should never be on the outside of your body. Ever.

One more thing and then I will end my freak out session on childbirth.

No matter how beautiful or cute a baby is going to be in a few days, it will always come out looking like an alien. Don't act like you don't know what I'm talking about. Unless it belongs to you and you are blinded by your overwhelming and unconditional love, you know it looks like an alien. A slimy, cone-headed, still attached to grossness alien.

I think I'll take mine clean with a nice round head, and hopefully with none of that weird left-over cord nastiness still attached to their belly buttons.


PS Brandon Rogers says I don't update my blog enough to make it onto his blog list. I say that is trash. I just wanted everyone to be aware.

Back From The Dead!

After hearing "you need to update your blog!" about 6 times over the past couple of days (crazy LH blog-fanatics), I figured it must be time... this one's for you, LH bloggers.

So here are some of the things that have happened since my last post:

I went to Kentucky and saw these great people:


I stayed at with Bethan and Brandon and spent some time with my cousin Daniel, his wife Joy, and their baby Reid. It was a time of sweet fellowship and lots of laughs. I even got to go to the famous Monday Night Dinner at Beth and Lee Wilsons house and let me just say Lee was not lying about how good Beth's cooking is. It was incredible. We also ate at this fun restaurant with lots of stuff to pose with, which we of course took full advantage of.

Oh how I love these two.


I accomplished my goal of stealing baby Reid for a good portion of the week.


Then I went to Nashville! I went to see my dear friend Allison from highschool.


Where Allison at in this picture? The Parthenon. No joke. A life-size replica of the Parthenon is right in the middle of Nashville. See for yourself.



Back here in Texas, Lauren Shary became Mrs. Colin Miles!



Here are some of us girls that were in the wedding. Notice what cruelty she made us wear on our heads. Only for you, Lauren... only for you.



It was such a fun wedding and we had some amazing girl time beforehand. I miss you girls!

Since then I finished out my first year of school and had a great week off to rest and fellowship. I spent a few days in Houston with my family and then headed off to College Station to see my other family before things get crazy here.

I stayed with this sweet girl



We went to It's A Grind, where I got to see the Chad, the Smith family, and meet the Bacaks for the first time! Now I can legitimately blog-stalk them and not just pretend like I know them. Rusty and I talked about him perhaps needing a PA in a year in a half so maybe I'll get to come back to my beloved College Station afterall. We'll see :)

Ashley and I went to La Bodega (mmm cilantro lime sauce), church, and Blue Baker all in one day. It was fabulous.

I also got to check out the new Hendrick house which is, let me just say, incredible. It has these great high ceilings, storage everywhere, and great paint colors. It already looks like they've lived there forever. Just perfect.

Anson always gives me a hug when I come over, but on Saturday night after church he yelled my name and ran over to give me another hug. It made me miss those crazy kids so much! Hayden doesn't even ask me "you got your camera?" anymore. I seriously need to come back before they all forget who I am and how great my peanut butter cookies are.

My whole time in College Station was so refreshing. In so many ways, it is still home to me, and I struggle so much with finding community here. My church is an hour away and my schedule will be nuts starting tomorrow. Please pray that I can find fellowship here in Galveston.

Well, I think that pretty much brings you up to speed.

Tomorrow is my first day of rotations, and I'm starting on OB/GYN here in Galveston. I have a feeling after a few days of waking up crazy early and frantically trying to remember what to do this is what I'm going to be feeling like:


The gingerbread snowman, not me.

Anyway, I'm sure lots of insane stories will be taking place over the next few months so I will do my best to post them for your reading enjoyment.

Other posts coming soon:

-Virtual tour of the LD house

-The story of Marco Polo - the neighbor, not the explorer. I'm trying to get a picture of him for you that doesn't involve me
getting harrassed by him... this could be interesting.

Love you guys!

I Have Baby Envy

I admit it. I want one. But for now I'm just going to Kentucky to steal this one for a few days.

My White Coat Life

Don't I look professional? Hah. I still have no idea what I'm doing. I'm sorry for the lack of posts recently, but school pretty much owns me these days. I spend my days in class getting flooded with information, and I spend my nights trying to process that information into something I can understand and retain. We have 2-3 tests every week, which is pretty much terrible, but at least it forces me to study.

I recently found out where I will be spending June 2007-June 2008. I will not be coming to College Station (sad day, everyone), but I did end up with some pretty incredible rotations.

I will be spending my first 3 months doing OB/GYN and pediatrics, during which time I get to spend 2 weeks at LBJ's pediatric ER, and time in the nursery with the babies!

Then I get go to prison! Just kidding... kind of. I'll be spending a month doing general surgery on prisoners here at UTMB. It turns out UTMB is the only medical campus that's associated with a prison hospital, so we spend a lot of time with inmates. Yay for us. I've never had to walk through so many gates and doors in my life. We had an orientation about why you shouldn't leave anything in the room after you leave. It went something like this:

Prison Guard: "What does this look like to you?"
Us: "A toothbrush?"
Prison Guard, turning the toothbrush over: "WRONG! It's a weapon to kill you with!"

Yep. There was a razorblade on the other end of that toothbrush.

Apparently a couple of tongue depressors, some tape, and a razoblade broken out of your shaving razor can make a pretty deadly weapon.

My favorite line was this, "watch out for that IV tubing - they might strangle you with it!"

What are we supposed to do? Take the IV out? Please.

Anyway, I'm still excited about getting to do surgery and prisoners are people too, even if they do try to kill you with some IV tubing.

My next month will be spend at the VA hospital in the medical center, doing reconstructive plastic surgery. I'm really excited about getting to do this rotation. It's an elective that I had asked for, and I think it will be really interesting.

Then I've got ER and then psychiatry in my hometown of Kingwood. Probably sending someone to their hometown to do psychiatry is not a good idea, but I'll take it because it means free housing. Let's just see how awkward it can be when someone I know comes in.

The month of February I'll be back here, working in the HIV clinic on campus. I kind of freaked out when I got this rotation, because I certainly didn't ask for it. And then I remembered that the Lord is completely in control of everything, and it occurred to me that this could be an incredible opportunity for me. A huge part of me going to PA school was my desire for missions. On my trips one of the things I noticed was the incredible need for healthcare in third world countries. I'm not sure what that's going to look like in my life later, but I know that I want missions to be some part of my life. That being said, what's one of the most prevalent diseases in third world country? HIV. Incredible.

After that I've got my family medicine, internal medicine, and geriatrics rotations. I'll be spending May in Tyler, and that's really my only rotation that I won't be in the Galveston/Houston area. I've got some friends that live there, so I shouldn't have any problems finding housing.

These rotations are an answer to prayer on so many levels. Besides the incredible opportunity with the HIV clinic, I'll be spending almost all of my time here in Galveston or in Houston. That is such a blessing because I've been so worried about joining a church that I wasn't going to be around for. Sooo.. I'm joining Houston First Baptist! I visited the singles Bible study class last weekend and I felt so at home. It's so wonderful to feel like a part of a church again instead of just a visitor.

Well, that's the update, folks. I've got another week here of school before Spring Break and then I'm headed up to Kentucky! I'll be sure and post pictures and stories when I get back. Love you all!

That's tagtastic!

Alright here you go, Kendra. I'm pretty sure you're the only one who will read this, but that's ok. One of these days I'll start posting for real and make it into the LH blogger community.



Number One... I have a problem with tweezers. No seriously, it's bad.

It's my eyebrows.

I just can't not tweeze them.

I have to.

Everyday.

Someone once suggested that I get them waxed. The THOUGHT alone of letting my eyebrows get unruly enough to wax makes me sick. I can't handle that.

It's not just my eyebrows either, it's everyone's. It's probably the first thing I notice when I look at someone. I have to fight the urge not to go up to strangers and ask them if I can fix their eyebrows.

Two summers ago I was getting on the plane to come back from Kenya with my carry-on. As my backpack went through the X-ray I got "the look." "The look" is really bad in a foreign country. The not-so-nice lady looked at me and said, "do you have tweezers in your backpack?"

I panicked.

I lied. "Ummm no, no I don't think so, it must be some other metal object shaped like tweezers?"

Right.

It took them all of 2 seconds to rip open my bag and hand me the tweezers. "We don't allow these on the plane."

Then I am pointed to the most horrifying thing I've ever seen. A huge plastic box filled with tweezers and fingernail clippers.
I see the slit in the top.

I know what I have to do.

I took a moment.

Those were my favorite pair of tweezers.

I had to fight back the tears as I walked away, leaving them in tweezer hell with all those other tweezers.

Ok enough. Now that you all know I'm psycho, you might want to hide your eyebrows. I once tweezed and entire wedding party the night before the big day. I'm obsessed with perfect eyebrows. Those of you who think you have naturally shapely eyebrows, think again. They don't exist.

Number two... I hate breakfast.

I have no idea what it is with you people and breakfast. When I get up in the morning, I'm hungry - I don't want a piece of half-burnt bread. I don't want some sugary cereal that's going to leave me hungry again in an hour. I need protein. I used to be able to eat eggs in the morning, key words there: used to.

Last Christmas we went on a cruise and I mistakenly ordered eggs for breakfast one morning. Let me just say that food-poisoning + sea-sickness is a really bad combination. I won't be eating eggs again for a long time.

So what do I eat?

Whatever I want.

Pizza, a sandwich, peanut butter crackers if I'm in a hurry, whatever.

That really grosses a lot of people out, but why should it matter what time of day it is? Why is it ok to eat Taco Bell at 11 and not at 9? And at what minute that does rule suddenly change? I've never understood this.

Number three... I read all of the LH blogs religiously.

If you go to LH and you have a blog, chances are I'm the first person to read your new posts. I am so serious. I don't even know a good portion of the people whose blogs I read. If you are linked from the Hendricks blog, I have read your blog.

Bacaks? How did I not know these people when I was in College Station? My youth minister growing up is one of the elders at Ecclesia. In highschool I helped remodel the Taft building. I've even read one of Chris' books. And then I find out randomly that they have this incredible sister who goes to Living Hope? How random.

So now when I go to Ecclesia and I see Chris and Robby I can say, "so what do you think of Jenn and Rusty's new foster child?" and they'll say, "oh you know my sister?" and I'll say, "no, I just read her blog."

Number four... I have a gecko.

His name is Scott.

I bought him on a whim in MIDDLE SCHOOL.

I swear these things live forever.

He eats live worms. Yes Heather, I keep live worms in my house.

Meet Scott.

And finally, number five... I LOVE fireworks.

Or anything else that blows up, really.

In highschool, we used to have fireworks wars.

Ever launched a bottle rocket at someone through a PVC pipe? I have.

My favorite fireworks though, only blow up when defective.

They are the chickens.

I have no earthly idea why I think these are so funny, but I do. They lay fire eggs and then make this awful screeching noise. The thing that gets me though, is sometimes they are defective and they explode, catch on fire, or go flying away. I think maybe I just like the mystery of what will happen after they poop out all of their eggs.


Ok that is all. I would tag 5 people, but I'm pretty sure everyone I know has already been tagged. If you somehow come across this and you have not been tagged, tag yourself. You know you want to.

Blast! I've been tagged!

So Kendra tagged me and I promise to come out of my blogger coma and post on Friday after my last final. Until then, I live in the land of studying (2 finals down, 5 to go!). That is all for now.

LD