"The Beach"

I miss living by the beach but it is fun to go to the lake and pretend.  So the kids and I went last weekend with some of our island friends to Sanford Lake, about 30 minutes from us. 

As soon as we got there Marissa headed straight for the water.  The nice thing is, she could have kept on walking a good long ways before it would be a problem.

The moms chatted while the kids played in the sand and water.  It was fun to reminisce about island times and compare to now.  (L to R: Cristina, Carolyn, Shane, Robin, Elisabeth, Jacob, Jen, and Marissa)

and we got our sandcastle building (or... knocking down...) fix. 

It was a beautiful day and we loved this place.  The best part was there was a splash pad there too so when we were done on the beach the kids played at the splash pad and were washing off all their sand in the meantime.  Both my kids had the time of their lives running around, you can see Marissa touching that fountain and Shane is in the background just behind her getting dumped on by those buckets. 

There's Shane's proud big brother face :)

There was even a big playground there that we didn't get to.  I think we will definitely be taking Josh back with us!

The Fourth

We had a very low-key but fun Fourth of July this year. I took the kids running that morning and quickly realized it was too dang hot to do anything outside for awhile.  Luckily Josh had the day off so we hung out with him and ended up giving the house a much-needed deep cleaning.  Then we grilled burgers and hung out til it was time to go the fireworks.  It gets dark super late here so our fireworks don't go off until 10:15.

But we headed out a little early to get our spot and the kids had the time of their lives running all around, this was the best picture I got because the little miss would not sit for more than a second

She did finally sit for the fireworks and was narrating them for us with "ow!"  (wow) and all kinds of other sound effects.  Shane had been waiting for days for this and it did not disappoint. 

They weren't over until 11 and you would have never known they were tired until we hit the car and then of course they were both out within seconds. 

The Kids

You know I can't go too long without posting about the kids!  They are both at such fun ages and get cuter every day as I can interact with them more and on deeper levels.

Marissa is my little sponge, watching everything we do and trying to figure out the world.

Between signing and words she can communicate pretty well these days.  Her favorite word is "yeah" and she will answer it to almost anything you ask her.  Shane loves to come up to her and ask her "Do you love me Marissa?" and she is usually good for an enthusiastic "yeah!"  I tried to recreate it on video, which is never as cute but you get the idea. 


She has found her picky bone, unfortunately, though usually that means she just wants to eat fruit and nothing else, which is a new experience for me.   

And as her attention span gets longer I have been finding this sight more and more often:

Shaners finished his first session of swim lessons and had a lot of fun.  He is far from being a "swimmer" but made some good progress.  He is done with naps and he and I do "activity time" while Marissa sleeps which is basically my way of getting him to do things he normally wouldn't choose to do on his own.  He's been having fun though and working on his fine motor skills without realizing it most days.  He will have quiet time on my bed for a little bit after which gives me a little break.

One of his favorite things to play with is still dirt, unfortunately.  He sure has a good time in it though!

He is anxiously awaiting going on an airplane to see all his grandparents in a couple weeks.  For awhile I was telling him we were going "in summer" and the other day some man said to me "have a good summer" and Shane said, "but mommy, it's not summer yet!"  So I had to break it to him that it was, but we weren't going yet.  And today when I was doing airplane rides with him on my legs we were pretending he was taking off for California and utah and he went and got a couple pillows and put them next to me and said "these are my cousins.  I need to get to my cousins!"

And the kid has got a memory, he has been havig fun memorizing the articles of faith and getting a block at church for passing them off.  Here is number 3, one of my favorites:


Oh they are cute.  Don't get me wrong, they sometimes make me wanna pull out my hair- Shane has learned how to sass and Marissa is starting to try out hitting me when she doesn't get what she wants, but at the end of the day I can't help but think of all the cute things they did and smile. I'm so happy to be their mom!

A Lengthy Update

Thought I would give a little update now that we have a firm idea of what the next few months will bring.  First, Josh has finished 4 weeks of his internal medicine core and is enjoying it. This is his last core, which means when he is done in August he will be a 4th year, woohoo!  He will take a few weeks off to study for the Step 2 Clinical Knowledge test, which he will take September 14th.  He will do a 2 week rotation here, then he is off to Columbus, Ohio for a 4 week rotation in October and Fort Wayne, Indiana for a 4 week rotation in November.   Both of those places have family medicine residencies he is interested in so he wanted to spend some time there so that 1) he can see if they are a good fit for him and if he would like working and living there and 2) so that they can get to know him and see how lucky they would be to have him in their program!  So while it stinks that he will be gone, I fully support him and am excited for him.  I am not completely sure what those months will look like for us, but Shane will be starting preschool on Tuesdays and Thursdays and I would like to be here for that, so I am sure we will be here during the week and make a couple long weekends of visiting Josh and checking the towns out.  Wish me luck!  After that should be interviews and he will do the rest of his rotations here and finish at the end of April, and start residency next summer!  At least that is the plan! 

As I type he is in Houston having just taken his Step 2 Clinical Skills test, an 8 hour practical exam where he interviewed fake patients.  I have been the fake patient for the past few weeks, there is a cool book that outlines for you different cases and what the patient is supposed to say/have and gives you a checklist for the things he is supposed to ask and do and then what the possible diagnoses are.  It has been kind of fun for me, and I will say I think he will make a great family doctor.   

The hardest part for him has been typing the soap note quickly afterward, you try typing without a pinkie ha ha.   

Anyway, the test is done and over thankfully and I am confident that he passed but it ended up being a little nightmarish- his flight was 3 hours late and he didn't get into his hotel room til midnight, and the worst part, he lost his voice the day before!  And he had 12 fifteen minute interviews to do, that is a lot of talking!  I knew they would let him reschedule if it was really a problem but it is a big pain because this test is only given in 6 cities in the whole country and the dates are booking quickly so he really didn't want to do that.  So I was on pins and needles the whole day wondering if his voice was going to hold out enough to do it, but thankfully it did.  I thought it was funny that what he said really helped him was in between each room he drank the hot water that was meant for the coffee.  Gross, but I'm glad he thought of it and I'm glad it helped!  He won't get the scores back for a few months so any prayers in the meantime are appreciated!

Wow, I was going to do a little update on the kids but I think this post is already long enough so I will do one on them next.

*For any Rossies out there (which lets face it, are probably the only ones still reading all of this med school mumbo jumbo) a good thing to know if you are wanting to schedule non-affiliate electives- it took Ross more than 60 days to do anything, and that was when he already had it confirmed with the programs and all Ross had do was approve it.  So if you are wanting to do some, plan waaaayyyy ahead and feel free to ask me any questions. 

I Love This House

A month or so ago we got a little scare when I told my landlord we were planning on being here through next spring (our contract goes til September) and he told me that he had broken up with his girlfriend he was living with and had been planning on moving back in but would think about letting us stay.  What?  I had just assumed we would be able to stay, and was not excited about another move just yet.  And I started thinking about how much I love this house, and all the things I have been taking for granted-

I love having a yard of our own for the kids to play in whenever they want

I love our neighborhood and all our neighbors are so nice, that little pool they are playing in was given to us by one of them.

I love how it is small enough that I don't feel overwhelmed by cleaning, but that there are three different levels in it so when the kids get bored in one area they just head upstairs or downstairs and it is like a whole new place. 

I love having a basement for them to run around in and make a mess when we're cooped up in the winter and a cool place to go when it starts to get hot out.  Along with an area for food storage and laundry.

I love how bright and cheery the kitchen is.

I love how you can hear the church bells ringing when you are outside, but not when you are inside.

I love the location and how central it is to all our favorite places.

The price is right.

So I freaked for a few days then realized there was nothing I could do about it and decided to just roll with it and wait. And, thankfully, last week he told us that we could stay as long as we needed!  Phew!  It was a good reminder I guess of how lucky we are to be living here.  Now if I could just relax and roll with all the big things we have going on the next year with residency applications, big tests, etc. I will be good ;)

On Hiking With a 3 Year Old and 1 Year Old

Now that Josh is in his internal medicine rotation and is done with surgery (woohoo!) he has every weekend off, which seems like a real treat now!  Yesterday we decided to go do something and went for a hike at the Shiawassee Wildlife Refuge here in Saginaw.  We brought our hiking backpack back from Dominica so we put Marissa in there, but this was the first hike we set out to do with Shane actually hiking.  Josh wanted to bring the stroller for him, but I told him that if we wanted to be able to do these things we just needed to start doing it.  And I'm so glad we didn't bring it, because (after a lot of encouragement) he hiked the whole 2+ miles by himself!  And Marissa had a lot of fun in the pack too, so I'm excited and hopeful for more hikes in our future!  Here's what we learned about how to get a 3 year old to keep walking for over 2 miles and a 1 year old to stay happy for the length of time it takes for him to do it!

Make sure to give Marissa a hat to wear- not only will it protect her from the sun, it will keep her occupied taking it on and off of both her and daddy's heads and you won't even be annoyed because it will make her so happy.

Tell Shane there's a really cool creature just ahead for him to see, and when he scares them away applaud him on his scariness (he is very into that right now).

When he starts to get tired, tell him you want to stop and take his picture with you.

 Set him on the continual quest for the perfect walking stick.  Make a game out of throwing them into the river or crevices in trees.

 And make sure to give her one too so she can entertain herself by chewing on it and poking her dad in the back of the head

Constantly tell him what a big boy he is and that only babies need to be carried.

And when all else fails, tell him that he can stay in the forest if he wants but we are going to keep walking.  Works like a charm.  Then do the happy dance with him when he's done and go to the splash pad afterwards to cool off.

A Change Will Do You Good

(Do you have that Sheryl Crow song going through your head like I do right now?)  I got brave yesterday, or maybe just sick enough of my same old hair that with a little encouragement from Josh I decided to do something different with it.  I kind of had a vague idea in my head of what I wanted but wasn't sure how it would actually turn out or look on  me but luckily the girl who did it (at Walmart by the way, yes I am that white trash ha ha) seemed to know exactly what I wanted and I am SO glad I did it.  I love it, it is easy to do, and I think it will be just the boost I need to get me to do my hair and feel good about myself.