Two weeks notice

Yep, thats right. This is my two weeks notice, that is, I have two weeks left of my internship in DC. I know it has been forever since I last posted, but that's how crazy my life has been since I got up here. I haven't done anything picture worthy, so I don't have any to post.

As of right now I do not have anything lined up after my time here is done. I have applied to about eight places around the US including up and down the east coast, Kentucky, Ohio, Texas, and more. Now I'm praying God gives me direction and that He puts me where I will best serve Him. After my last day here, the 21st, I will probably be making the trip back to Texas with my mother and I'll stay there for a couple weeks and hopefully start work somewhere shortly there after. If no job presents itself I'll probably work at a child development center for a while and go from there...I'm really praying for a job though. For me and two of my friends that will be finishing their internships that same day.

Though I've had fun up here I am ready to be home for a bit, I'm getting really sentimental that I'm not headed back to Baylor. I already miss it terribly. I'm glad to be done with the studying, tests, and papers, but I miss all of the people. Friends, church, even my professors. I so do not feel old enough to be done with it. The little piece of paper with the Baylor seal begs to differ.

Hope I'll have more to write about soon. Pray that I post something about a job soon.

Children's National Medical Center

CNMC, as it is affectionately abbreviated, is the hospital that I am doing my Child Life Internship at until August 21st. So far so good. The first week and three days was orientation, boring.

I started on my first unit on Friday. The neuroscience unit is where I will be for the next six weeks. Currently I am pretty intimidated, I hope that I am able to live up to how good it seems everyone thinks I am. This is going to be a challenging unit due to the nature of the population. Many patients will have physical limitations and developmental delays. A lot of the patients have seizures, which kind of scares me. I am looking forward to learning everything I can for the next six weeks, after which I will start my next rotation, most likely on the medical care unit working with patients 0-11 years old.

I am also working on getting Child Life into the NICU, especially since they just moved the precious babies up to the NICU's new home on the 6th floor of the new inpatient East Tower. I am really excited about the prospect that the NICU holds. I hope to end up as a Certified Child Life Specialist working in a NICU somewhere someday...

I will update more as it happens. Probably will come in one-week batches :)

Here is a great slideshow about CNMC

Since Graduation

The week before graduation mom, dad and I headed to Fort Walton Beach, FL to relax before graduation and the start of my internship in DC. The pictures from that wonderful trip are all on dad's laptop, so they'll have to come later...

The morning after graduation mom and I loaded up my car and drove to DC. We took two days to drive the nearly 22 hours, we spent Saturday night just outside of Nashville and made it to my aunts house on Sunday night. I started my internship the next morning.

Here are some pictures from the road:

(there aren't many because we didn't have time to make it tons of fun...)

I plan on making it a much longer and much funner trip back to Texas, then to wherever it is that I will be going to work!

Graduation

Wow, it actually happened. I made it to graduation from Baylor University. I used to think that it was never going to happen, and now it's been two weeks since it did. Weird.

Here are some highlight photos from the event:

See me walking in :)

There I am walking across the stage:

After the ceremony the photoshoot extravaganza began

There's the proof from the magic little green tube!!

Yikes

So, I know it's been quite a while since my last post, and it will probably be a week before the next exciting one.

This week is finals week and I have the most major final of my college career on Friday--Medical Terminology. I've been studying for about three hours a day for the last four days, and will continue to do so till Thursday, when I will study all day. On Friday I take that final, my last undergraduate final, at 2:00. Then I am moving out of my apartment to head home. Saturday me and my lovely parents are heading to Fort Walton Beach Florida to celebrate my 22nd birthday and graduation. We will get back Wednesday, two days before Graduation. I will walk the stage that Friday afternoon and Saturday Mom and I will begin the drive to Virginia. We'll arrive Sunday evening and I start my internship that Monday, the 18th.

So I promise to have tons of pictures soon, but you'll just have to wait for them :P

Help!!

Would you please help me raise money for the March of Dimes by either donating HERE or by purchasing one of those really cool shirts above for $12??? I really need your help with both!

Thanks :)

March for Babies

Okay everyone, I need your help.

For the third year in a row I am participating in the March of Dimes premiere event, the March for Babies. This march is to raise funds for research for and awareness about premature births as well as birth defects. I know that this is an extremely hard economic time for everyone, but all I ask is that you take a few minutes and donate five or ten dollars to my walk. I am currently only seventy dollars from my personal goal of $250, but wouldn't it be great if you helped me surpass my goal?

I want you to be thankful for the healthy babies that you have in your life, and mindful of those who were not as fortunate as you. This money goes to great research efforts to end premature birth--wouldn't it be humourous if through this we could get rid of Neonatal Intensive Care Units around the US? (Ironic because that is the place that I want to work!)

Please help me out by visiting my site HERE

Thank you and God bless

Pictures!!

Here are some pictures from my amazingly fun Spring Break Ski Trip!

It was 8 degrees the last day there, so we needed some Starbucks to warm us back up!

We skied primarily with these two guys :)
Don't worry, they were on the trip with the same group I was, it's not like I met them randomly and decided to ski with them!


He was just pretending, he didn't actually hit the tree...

I'm going back to Washington DC

Well, it's official. I will be doing my internship at Children's National Medical Center in Washington, D.C.!! I'm getting more and more excited about it, yet I'm still nervous--of course, it's my first big step into grown-up-world. I start two, yes TWO, days after I graduate from Baylor. Yikes. It's a three day drive up there...hmm, I wonder how that's going to work...

Other than that nothing too interesting has been going on lately, just a bunch of work and class. Actually, I really shouldn't be on here right now, I should be studying for my Medical Terminology test that is on Wednesday morning because I'm thinking it's going to kick my butt. I have about 400 words that I have to know the definition for...it's pretty intimidating! Hopefully I'll study well though...I mean, I started studying on Saturday and studied at least 4 hours Sunday and today, tomorrow I have even more time to study between work and after work...sounds like fun right? I work in the morning, will study in my three hour break, work again, and then study more until my brain hurts again...ah the joys of college...glad (yet scared) that it will be over in like 75 days now.

Hope to have pictures sometime next week...they will be beautiful and snowy!!

Wow

There are now 85 days until graduation. In less than three months my college days will be behind me. Soon thereafter I will be off doing an internship.

Tomorrow may be the day I learn where I am going for the summer to do said internship. I had my last interview today, and while I was at the interview I got a voicemail from Yale that sounded promising...I'm trying to talk myself down in case I don't get it, but I'm really hopeful.


Fun thing to come...

Internships

This process is driving me crazy!

I am super appriciative that I have been given the opportunity to interview with five excellent hospitals. I know it's something that I didn't do on my own, all of this is for Gods glory and because of his grace.

However, why can't everyone follow the same deadline schedule?! It is absolutely nuts for a hospital to expect me to give them an answer before I have all of my offers in. I would be lucky to be at either of the two hospitals that have offered me positions, they are excellent institutions and I know I would learn a lot at either hospital, but neither is my first choice. I want to wait for my number one hospital to give me a response before I decide where I want to go, is that too much to ask? Child life internships are extremely competitive, there can be 20-30 applicants for 10-15 interviews for 1-4 internship positions. Its crazy. I only need one, but I want it to be the one that I feel like would be the best for me. Obviously if my number one doesn't offer me the position I'll go down the list to the first hospital that does, but If I'm not supposed to hear from numbers one and two for another week how am I supposed to give number three an answer in four days??

The child life council even sets recommended dates so this doesn't happen, but apparently hospitals can choose to follow the recommendations or not. The CLC says that offers should be out no later than the 20th and that students have one week, until the 27th, to accept or decline. Now obviously if there is a hospital that offers me an internship and they're low on my list I want to tell them "thanks for the opportunity, but go ahead and offer to someone else" before said offer deadline so that they can offer it to someone else, but I don't want to say that before all the cards are on the table...

Oiy vey.

Any suggestions??

March of Dimes

I'm going to be walking in the March of Dimes fundraiser event, the March for Babies, again this year!

It is a great thing that I have been doing for two years now. In case you don't know, the March of Dimes is a non-profit organization that raises money to fund research to attempt to find reasons for and stop premature birth. You can find out more at http://www.marchofdimes.com if you would like--there might be a march in your area that you can participate in!

I need your help though. I am trying to raise $250 for the cause! Please, even if you can only give $5 because of these hard economic times, help me out :) There is a fundraiser link to the side that you can click to support me, and to make it even easier you can donate online by credit card!

The march isn't until April, so I'll keep posting about it as it nears...

Have a great week :)

Internship

Well, I got one. I have been offered an internship position at Children's in Dallas.

I had a phone interview with Inova Fairfax Hospital for Children on Thursday, I felt like it went really really well. Now I am waiting to see if they want an in person interview sometime in February.

I am still waiting to hear back from Nebraska after my phone interview with them last Thursday. I though it went pretty well.

So far I've heard "we're not going to offer you an interview" from two hospitals, Greenville SC and Memorial in Chicago. I have yet to hear one way or the other from Yale (I know they have and are reviewing my application, I got an email telling me that, but no communication since then), Children's National in DC, Rush Children's in Chicago, and Denver Children's.

I know that the opportunities and training that I would recieve at Dallas would be excellent, it would be top-notch, and I would really be luck to be there. Yet, I am still apprehensive about accepting the position. Children's is a HUGE hospital and it is only getting bigger. There are between 35 and 40 Child Life Specialists on staff there. Though I know that it would be a great place to learn, it intimidates me. I don't know if I could flourish in that environment, all those 

people constantly trying to tell me things and show me stuff, I feel like it might be overwhelming. I would prefer to work at a smaller hospital where the program is small but excellent. But then again, it doesn't matter what I prefer, it matters what God wants for me. Oiy Vey.

On a lighter note, I got to see President Bush at his first public outing since leaving office!! He and Laura came to the Lady Bears game vs. Oklahoma. Sadly we lost the game in the final seconds, but hey, I was in the same place as President Bush!!

Layout

I know, I just had a post about my new layout and I've changed it yet again...
I was tired of the Valentine's day-ness of the other one. I like this one better :)

Interviews

So far I've got three interviews:
2:00 Tuesday in Dallas
1:00 Thursday phone interview with Nebraska
2:30 the next Thursday phone interview with Inova Fairfax

Pray that I do well.

Still waiting to hear from six.
Pray that I know where God wants me.

Beginning of the end

This week marks the beginning of the end of my undergraduate career. I am at Baylor for my last semester, in May I will have earned my bachelors degree and I will walk across the stage to begin a new chapter in my life. It's a pretty scary and exciting thought for me; I know what I hope to be doing after graduation, but it's ultimately up to God in deciding where I will actually be and what I really will be doing. I have applied to nine children's hospitals for Child Life internships--Yale New Haven CT, Children's National DC, Inova Fairfax VA, Greenville SC, Nebraska, Denver, Chicago Memorial, Rush IL, and Dallas Children's. I have no idea where God wants me, but I'm willing to go just about anywhere.

If you've noticed my new template, no there is no boyfriend or relationship to speak of, I choose this layout because it has my favorite flower. Though it does anger me that the only layout I though was cute on that particular website had that phrase on it. I know that Valentines is next week, but are all of us who are single just supposed to hide out and act like we don't exist so that those who are in relationships can be all lovey-dovey? Now don't get me wrong, I don't want to begrudge anyone of their lovey-doveyness, but I also don't think that everything valentines should be about love between two people. Can't it celebrate goodness in all people? I am content in my singleness, I want to be able to do things before I meet and marry the man God has choosen for me. Why can't I have a cute valentines layout that has nothing to do with being in love?
I'll just take that saying as He, God, Loves me :)