Happy Happy :Late: Birthday!!

Mama Monaghan...who I just happen to think might be the greatest woman on the planet...had her special day yesterday!

She seriously is amazing and I scored a Kitchenaid mixer with my Chase rewards points and my family gave it to her yesterday for me! I was so excited to get that for her and was super sad I wasn't there to be with her on her birthday!

I can't wait to get back to Ohio and spend time with her!!

Happy Birthday Mama!!

Super Quick!

Hey folks!

Still in Cali here...till Dec 15th...

Christie and Theresa came to play and we had a BLAST...I wanted to go back to Columbus with them!

I'm so sad I didn't get to see the Harry Potter movie tonight! I can't wait till Sunday!

I miss Ohio sooooo much right now and can't wait to go home for Christmas!

Biggest news.....

I'm moving to Austin, TX in Jan!!


Look how pretty my new skyline will be!

CAN'T WAIT!!

Annnd I'll be living a measly 3 hours away from Houston where Miss Rizzo lives!! YAYYY!!

I'll be there from Jan 10th to April 10th so anyone that would like to spend St. Pattys in Austin or come see the rodeo is welcome to!!

That's all for now kids!

Peace out!

Here I Am!

Well all you loyal readers I know you have probably been dying to know what I've been up to...

I've been work work workin and let me just tell you that I do love this travel nursing deal and I have no regrets doing what I'm doing...buuuut sometimes I feel like this hospital is just bananas!

Let me first say that the people at the hospital are freakin awesome. Super nice and extremely helpful. They have really welcomed us and showed us the rope and let us ask tons of questions. It's also nice that California has these staffing laws in place. There are never any crazy unsafe assignments and people are almost always available to help when you need it. They have these things called a buffer nurse who's sole job is to help with admissions, get people out on breaks, help you with patient care, etc, etc. Children's in Columbus was also starting to implement this but sometimes we just didn't have the staff available to make it happen! Let me tell you it makes a huge difference!

With all that being said I still don't know that I could see myself ever staying at this hospital. I just don't understand how they get by doing some of the things they do and not having some of the standards of practice that Columbus has...even just for simple things like trach and g-tube care. It just baffles me. I can't be that girl that goes around comparing LPCH to Columbus Chilren's so I just bite my tongue and do things the way they want me to, but a big part of me cannot wait to get back to Columbus to my unit and they way I like things.

We are however looking into jobs for January and right now are hoping for something in Ft. Myers Florida! We will see what happens!

Enough rambling though...I got some teevee to catch up on after my weekend in Vegas!

An update on that will come tomorrow!

For now..peace out kids!

Fill In The Blank Friday...again already?!?!

Holy crap I haven't posted on this thing in a week!?! It feels like just yesterday I answered some Friday questions! Here we go again!

1. Blogging is a fun way to keep track of people and see a peek into other people's worlds...my mama likes to read mine to see what I'm up to on my adventures...


2. A current fashion trend I wish I was brave enough to wear is maybe sweater dresses with leggings and boots?? Or is that so last fall??? Regardless it seems so comfy and fall like and my body just doesn't agree with it...


3. My greatest accomplishment in life thus far is thus far I think it would be going back to school for nursing and jumping out of my comfort zone into the world of travel nursing...nothing super fantastic but it's an accomplishment for me nonetheless!


4. If I had to choose between a mountain or a beach vacation I'd choose right now I'd say mountain...I still think about going back to Salt Lake City after driving through it and not getting to stop...it looks amazing!


5. A talent I wish I had is running...I want so badly to be good at it and like it and wake up on crisp fall mornings and go out for a long run before my day starts...ok maybe just do that last part like once but I really would like to be a good runner...or more athletic in general


6. A talent I do have is man I dunno...it's almost 3am and I can't think of a single talent I have...wow...well I can sing really well when I'm in the car or shower! Does that count?!?!


7. This week is is almost over and will end with a trip to San Fran to visit the OSU bar...and thanks goodness it's almost over cuz I'm Vegas bound next weekend!! WOOOO!!!

Fill In The Blank Friday!!

1. The first thing I do in the morning to start my day is welll I'm a night shifter so my days don't normally start in the morning...I usually get up and sit around and eat and stuff before I actually get ready for work...

2. Today I wish I was going on another Cali adventure but it's my first weekend to work here :(

3. If I had an extra $100 in my bank account today I'd transfer it to my savings account...I need to build that back up after my road trip!

4. Tomorrow I get to sleep all day and go back to work tomorrow night!

5. Two things that don't go together are warm weather and the Fall...This California Fall is weirding me out!

6. Something I can never pass up at the grocery store is the frozen food aisles...I'm a sucker for frozen pizza...hence the reason I weigh what I do!

7. The last time I tried something new was almost a month ago when I decided to drive across the country and become a travel nurse! Craziest thing I've done!

Big Basin Redwood National Park

Another adventure on our 6 nights off was heading up to the Big Basin Redwood National Park. It was a crazy winding road up to the top of the park complete with random mailboxes hanging out for who knows who to use...



We got to the park headquarters and picked a trail that was supposed to be an "easy" 4 mile round trip to a waterfall...And so the adventure begins...

We stopped quickly for a couple photo ops of just how ginormous these tress were!




Then it was off to more hiking and huge tree seeing...




When we made it to the waterfall it definitely was not as cool as we thought it would be...



We headed back the way we came to park headquarters and decided to go ahead and checked out the half mile redwood trail and check out some landmarks of the park...

Like this circle of trees...it was made by a huge "mama" tree that ended up dying and leaving behind these "younger" trees that sprouted up from the roots of the old tree....they remain in a circle around the spot where the big tree used to be...



Another cool tree was the Chimney tree...it was completely hollowed out by fire and only the outer rings remain. You can stand under it and see right up to the sky!




The last really interesting tree was the "Father of the Forest"...Super tall tree...with quite a phallic growth coming out of the front of it...do you agree???



Exhausted and driving out of the park we were still able to stop and take one last pic of the amazing scenery in Northern Cali...



So far I am just loving living here!!

You can also check out more pics of this adventure on facebook...

Nite kids!

Monterey Bay Aquarium and Carmel

So let's face it...for the next couple months this blog will pretty much be about my adventures in Cali...

Erin and I are in the middle of a 6 night stretch off work and have planned a couple short adventures...the first of which was to visit the Monterey Bay aquarium and take a peek at the city of Carmel...

Monterey is an adorable city...





The aquarium was pretty cool...not as completely awesome as it was cracked up to be but awesome nonetheless...here are some of my faves...


The octopus that hung out in the corner the whole time we watched it...


The adorable sea otter lounging in the water



The awesome jellyfish!!


Dori!!



Penguins and Sea Turtles!


And a beautiful sunset in Carmel!

We saw lots of other animals at the aquarium too and can't wait to go back to Carmel during the day to see the adorable town!

Of course you can all (and by all I mean the 3 of you that read this) check out the rest of my pics on facebook!

Peace out kids!

Weekend in Cali!

So this weekend we ventured out a bit to explore the cool stuff around us!

Saturday we watched the OSU game at the OSU bar in Palo Alto...not very exciting especially since the score of the game was 73-20. The bar wasn't really what I expected but still fun nonetheless. We need to check out the San Fran OSU bar for a bigger game!

Today Erin and I got together with the other traveling girls and headed to Santa Cruz to the beach boardwalk to have some fun in the sun!



It was the PERFECT day for our outing! ANDDDD I got to put my feet in this....for the first time!



THE PACIFIC OCEAN!!! WOOOO!!! Toes in the water and toes in the sand baby!

We wandered up and down the boardwalk and scoped out the amusement park...




Took some scenic portraits...




Found some Sea Lions...





And hung out on the beach in the sun!



All in all it was a great first weekend in Cali...

Tomorrow starts our first days on the unit and I have to say I'm kind of freaking out inside but at least I have someone here with me to complain to and get through this with!

Wish me luck peeps!!

The Finest Fro Yo in the World!!

Let me introduce you to Tutti Frutti...the worlds greatest frozen yogurt! Like seriously amazing!

Erin and I stumbled upon the grand opening of this place on the Sunday after we got here. It's on adorable little historic Murphy St.

It's self serve so you get your bowl....choose from about 8 different fro yo flavors and then make your way down the ridiculous toppings bar with anything from red velvet cake pieces, nuts, berries, cereal, candy, sauces, etc, etc, etc...

Heaven in a bowl I tell you!!

Come visit and we will get some!

California Here We Are!!

Well kids we officially finished our 4 day cross country road trip and have settled in to our awesome townhouse in Sunnyvale, CA!

What an adventure this was!

I started the journey crying before I even left the driveway...just thinking about all that lay ahead and all that was being left behind...holy emotions batman!

But alas we were on our way and before we knew it were leaving Ohio!



I didn't get a pic of Indiana's sign but by the middle of day one we made it to Illinois!



This is where we hit a bump in the road...I was driving down highway 74 talkin to my good friend Riz when all of the sudden I heard this crazy noise and looked in my rearview mirror to see this black circle thing roll across the highway. It couldn't be a piece to my car now could it?!?! Although my a/c was starting to feel a little warm....I called Erin to see what she thought and she wondered if it was a piece of my car too. Rut Roh...now I gotta call my dad...and get lectured about how I should have pulled over and found the piece...blah blah blah...long story short I just happened to find a Midas in the middle of nowhere Illinois and met Chris who tole me that I lost my clutch face...he could fix it but not till tomorrow...We decided to forge on to Iowa...



We found a Midas there and met Matt who got my car in first thing in the morning and thankfully had me fixed up and on my way by 1pm! Thanks Matt!

After spending the night in Iowa City we were on the road again heading into the awfulness that we call Nebraska...The Welcome to Nebraska sign was in the middle of construction so all I could get was Welcome to Omaha...



I have to say that I really dislike Nebraska...Don't get me wrong...all the people (even the Huskers fan mechanic that checked out Hank Jr and told us to go buy some University of Nebraska merchandise at Walmart) were lovely...I mean just over the top nice...but the state...terrible! The most awful 8 hours of my life that I will never get back! Thank goodness we made it through and Hank Jr didn't break down on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere America!

This is what got me through most of Nebraska...and the whole road trip in general...note the tissues, snacks, cooler with diet coke and water, walkie talkie to talk to Erin, cell phone, and overnight bag...




Oh and I forgot...Grand Island Nebraska did have an awesome pizza place that I can't forget about!

After a not so awesome stay in Sidney Nebraska (just yucky hotel...nothing major) we were off to Wyoming!



Wyoming is just beautiful! The mountains are hell to drive through with my car but looking out the windows is just fantastic!





After Wyoming we were on to the great state of Utah...



Utah was breath taking! Amazing!







We tried to stop in Salt Lake City so I could see the Mormon temple. Kate even gave me detailed instructions on how to get off the highway and park...let me just tell you that the sun setting behind the mountains makes it really hard to read the highway signs! And then there was tons of construction around the temple and lots of traffic so needless to say we got a bit frustrated and ended up back on the highway westward! It was also weird when some little kid picked up our radio signal and came across my walkie talkie! Freaky!!

Anyhow we stayed the night in a city about 2 hours west of Salt Lake and came the "back way" into Nevada so I didn't get a cool welcome to Nevada sign...it wasn't too exciting of a state...lots of hot dry desert and a some ok mountains...




There was a place called Pumpernickel Valley and if it wasn't in the middle of nowhere I prolly would have wanted to stop! lol



No more stops after this! It was onward and upward from the end of Utah on! Tpp bad Cali had some construction too...it was hard to get the sign...this was the best I could do...



Cali had some awesome scenery too!





After what feels like literally flying through the California mountains we hit some traffic and finally made it too our little abode! A lovely 2 bedroom 2.5 bathroom townhouse! So far so amazing!!

I have very good feelings about this decision so far and I can't wait to see what the next 3 months has in store for me!

I will say that this past weekend we went to Stanford to walk around and found the best fro yo place in all the land...blogs to come about those things tomorrow!

Peace out kids!