Posts filed under 'Uncategorized'
So Will turned 4 last month. Angie and I’s planning abilities (or lack-there-of) really showed through with a haphazard camping trip that resulted in almost 4 meltdowns and a trip to an exciting pool that wasn’t so exciting. Will got a new bike which he promptly fell off of twice, a spiderman comforter and pillowcase (which he probably wishes was Iron Man now), and lots of delicious cash.
In the mean time, lots of other stuff has been happening. Leo, apparently thoroughly impressed with his cousin Conner’s skills at walking, just decided after Easter was when he would stand up from now on. He can now walk around the house, but his butt still does some slamming into the floor. Leo has also increased his words and I think “Daddy” is finally getting a rest. At this point he’s saying, daddy, mommy, Will, hank, dog, ball, uh-oh, hi, bye, various animal sounds (he barks like Hank), and I am sure a few more I’ve forgotten.
I’ve finished a few more projects out in the shop too. The first is our tv stand. I think I mentioned it in the last post. It isn’t exaclty 100% done, but it is done “enough” to get it out of the shop. 
I still need to add doors to either side and then add the back to those same areas. It would also probably look a lot better without a big tube tv on it, but tv just isn’t a priority in this house.
The next project is a coffee table for the living room. A long time ago, I saw restoration hardware had these reconditioned factory carts turned coffee tables for, I think, around $900. The carts are cheap if you can find them, so their price must include some substantial profit margin. Either way, I thought it looked cool and showed it to Angie, she thought it looked cool too. I finally came up with a cart (or 3) and picked the best one to sand down and oil. I the cast iron was lightly cleaned and clear coated to prevent further rust. It was actually a relatively quick project. Just another big space sucker I am happy to have out of the shop. Most importantly, I didn’t spend a ton of time on it, so the first time Will takes something and starts digging at one of the holes, I won’t be too mad.
As far as cars go, let me just say that if safety latch on your hood isn’t working, I highly recommend you address the issue.
May 13th, 2010
So Will and I decorated it, obviously.
October 11th, 2009
This could be the first peice of furniture that I have actually finished for myself. Everything else has been shipped up to my parents house or left in the old house. At any rate, it wasn’t too bad of a project and allowed me to test out the machines after moving them 500+ miles.
Outdoor Morris Chair
http://niblet.us/?page_id=451&g2_itemId=10463
September 1st, 2009
Well, that was difficult. I have to get over a huge hurdle in writing this post in that so much time has elapsed it becomes difficult to start again. Very similar when you get gung-ho to go to the gym and then you stop for a few weeks and it becomes easier and easier to ignore it and rationalize with yourself that you’ll start fresh the next week. Then about 5-6 weeks later, you realize nothing has changed and you’ve got even more work to do. So it is time for me to put in some of that work, so recapping the changes:
niblet.us
So after the move to IN, niblet.us hit some road blocks. I bought a new wireless router and the connection to the server would go down 2-3 times per day and only a power cycle of the router would fix the problem. So I returned the router and bought a different brand and that one seemed to grab a new IP address every night (for the none techies, lets just say it causes issues too). So while talking about all of this with Angie, she re-iterated she would be sorely disappointed if something happened to niblet.us. That comment finally pushed me over the edge to move the site over to a hosted service.
So after a long drawn out process, niblet.us was moved. Uploading the 6000 photos took some time and getting everything setup correctly just added more time. I finally got the major things right, but there are still numerous smaller things that I will try to tweak over time. I don’t like the color of the links in the photos section and all photos that were in the blogs have to be relinked. Not a big deal, but it will take some scrubbing. Nevertheless, it is close enough now.
The House
Well obviously we’re in a new house now too. We didn’t buy it as we were short of time to look for a house and at the time, our St Paul house had no hope of selling. In the end, it is not a bad house. It is much larger and has a huge yard which takes me about 4-5x to mow than the old yard. Will has a real room now and my office is in Leo’s room (he’s rarely in it anyway). Angie and I even have a half bath off the bedroom which I have pretty much claimed as my own.
We were given a nice swing set for the backyard and so far that is the highlight for Will. Although he claims this house has too many closets and he doesn’t like it, I think he’d miss his swing if we left for too long. Angie did all the painting in the house so when I eventually upload some photos, you’ll see it (I have to go through a process of re-arranging the albums as The House isn’t THE House anymore). I still have numerous things laying around that I think Angie wants me to hang up, but she is too busy working nights to ask anymore. There are also still boxes sitting around that need emptied or thrown out, so officially, we haven’t finished unpacking.
The Jobs
I can put jobs in the plural form now as Angie has officially started her residency. The downside is she started on nights in the ICU. Not fun for her or the family, but we only have two nights left and then she’ll switch back to days. I’ve been with the boys at night and during the weekends and with some help from the family the time with them hasn’t been too stressful. Bedtime is usually the most difficult as Will becomes very needed and usually has to go to the bathroom, have a story read, have toys found for him, and generally stays up too late playing in his bed.
As for me, I left 3M at the end of May. It was weird. I heard the door click and suddenly, I felt the weight of the decision. I realized I would never walk in those doors again and when I saw my house again it would likely be for the last time. I went home, checked every inch of the house and walked out another door. We signed our papers and before 4 o’clock we were on the road leaving MN for the last time. Every beginning has an ending and every ending brings another beginning. For me, that beginning is Alliance Cost Containment. The whole change was a big leap for me, but so far I am very glad I did it. I am really looking forward to the work I will be doing.
Misc.
So our new house is much like most of Indy and there aren’t a lot of sidewalks to walk on and certainly the road is busy enough to keep a lot of cycling out of my mind.
My new shop is tiny, but I have managed to cram even more machines in (which were the only things that caused the move to be any real issue).
I am really enjoying being so close to family and friends, but I do miss some people from MN. I also miss having the Menards 3 miles away and knowing exactly where I could find anything in the local Target.
I am happy to know I can have Steak n Shake anytime I want, but Texas Roadhouse excitement quickly wore off for me.
There is a Famous Dave’s here, but it seems to suck compared to its MN counterparts.
There are some pretty cool parks around us, but nothing like the Como Zoo and Como lake.
One of our neighbors made us an excellent peach pie, but they are older and I am not sure if they have any kids. Our other neighbor is really old. A vast change from our MN neighbors.
I kind of like not having to work on a house or look at all my unfinished work.
Leo is almost crawling. He has the leg thing down, but hasn’t figured out how to move his arms with his legs.
Since we won’t be away from our house for a week this Christmas, we will probably get a real tree this year.
This house has issues with ants.
Indy is kind of behind with the whole recycling thing.
Although I hound Angie about it all the time, I think the house does look nicer with paint.
We don’t have enough furniture to fill this house, so I am really eager to make a few things to fill the holes.
That’s it, I am calling it a post. Thanks for reading.
July 10th, 2009
Just wanted to document this wonderful day! I got my first choice for Ob/Gyn residency which was St. Vincent hospital in Indianapolis. Jon and I were anxious for this day since oh, last summer, when I started seriously thinking about residency and where the best place would be. I happened to look at Ob/Gyn programs in Indiana and liked what I saw from St. Vincent’s website, but also noticed they only took 4 students (now 5) per year. So I decided I would probably have to do a rotation there to a) figure out if it was a good place to train and b) help them know me from Eve so I would have at least SOME chance at one of their spots. The only open time in my schedule was August and, of course, they told me they didn’t have any openings for an away student in August. I could have given up at that point, and part of me wanted to because I couldn’t IMAGINE leaving Jon and Will for a whole month to live in Indy and I didn’t know where the heck I would live there anyway. But I sent one last pleading email to the residency coordinator stating my case and to my surprise, she created an opening for me. I was shocked and realized it would be very impolite to now say “I don’t have the kahunas to come!”
Then, fate paved the way again. My sister-in-law Laura is a nurse and decided to do a little away rotation herself in Colorado and her apartment in Indy would be sitting empty in August. That was definitely a big sign that this was meant to be. Anyway, I got it all arranged and the day finally came for me to head to Indy. To think back to that day STILL makes my stomach churn. I literally vomited on the side of the interstate somewhere in Wisconsin because I was SO sad to leave my little Will who was 2 years 3 months at the time (plus I was 3 months pregnant and still a little nauseated). I cried and cried so much that I was a hazard on the road, and I had to call Jon at least 5 times to have him convince me not to do a U-turn. But eventually I arrived in Indy, eyes nearly swollen shut from crying, and I at least found a little piece of comfort in Laura’s apartment – pictures of Jon as a baby:)
The next day I headed to St. Vincent’s main hospital and the minute I walked through the doors I felt better. It felt like home. Statues of cute little nuns made me smile and feel at peace with my decision. The day kept getting better, too, as I met more of the residents who all seemed very much, well, like me. It was still an incredibly difficult month (Jon and Will came down for about 10 of the 30 days), but even though I felt so lost without my boys, I was excited to be “at work” everyday, learning from the residents, delivering babies, doing surgeries with the high-risk team, rounding, and seeing my Indiana friends in the evenings. I had a good feeling St. Vincent would take the cake in the end…
But for some reason, I still felt compelled to apply to lotsa programs and interview at 8. That’s not a ton – I think the average medical student interviews at around 5-12 places depending on how competitive their chosen specialty is – but it was again very difficult to travel all over pregnant and alone. A few places seemed promising but I always felt like I was cheating on St. V’s to even think about ranking them first.
Then came my St. Vincent interview. The night-before dinner was at one of the resident’s homes and as I headed there I said a little prayer that God would give me a sign if this was the place for me. I parked in front of his home and sat for a second in the dark and glanced up to see a bright shooting star. So God is cheesy, but I was thankful for what I considered glorious confirmation!! The next day I headed to the hospital for the interviews thinking it would be low-key considering everyone knew me….think again Ang! I was asked the TOUGHEST questions I’d been asked anywhere. Lots of ethical questions that I really wasn’t prepared for. Everyone was nice as could be, but they meant business. And you know what? That made me want to go there more. They challenged me when I thought I could be lazy, and if they do that for the next 4 years, I know I will be as well trained as I can be. I left there wondering if I had any shot after my bumbling replies to questions like “do you think children should be allowed in the room during childbirth?” and “how do you feel about prescribing contraceptives….what about abortion?” But I had faith that all the hard work and signs from above meant something. And today, I got my reward. Funny – my reward is going to suck around 80 hours out of me per week, but I strongly believe that I couldn’t be happy doing anything else. Hopefully my boys will realize that I’m not putting them second by accepting such an all-consuming career, I’m simply leading them by example. Go for what you want, pray and listen when God sends you signs, and challenge yourself to see how far you can go….but don’t worry, I’m looking for a home within 10 minutes of the hospital so Jon and the boys have NO excuse for not coming to see me on those long days and overnight stays!!
I also can’t end this without saying thanks to everyone who has helped me along the way, especially Jon. I don’t know how many times throughout the last 4 years I’ve said, “I just don’t know if I can DO this” and he always reassured me that I could. And that we, as a family, would make it through just fine. I can’t say that he is a patient person, but somehow he mustered the strength to be patient enough over the past 4 years as I did rotations with call every 4th night and spent most weekends studying only to fret for 2 days after the test and then repeat the whole process again…I’m so grateful, and I hope the support we receive from family and friends in Indiana will help him remain patient through the next 4 years as well!!
March 19th, 2009
Angie matched to St Vincent’s in Indianapolis. More to come.
March 19th, 2009
Its coming. It really is.
December 6th, 2008
They pull me back in…
September 9th, 2008
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