Graduation Weekend

So evidently I have been slackin' on this writing blogs business, my apologies. Life has been a little bit of crazy since we last talked in April. Where to start? Well I graduated pharmacy school, moved to a different state, became a certified pharmacist and started working for a great company. I guess I will slowly start my recaps chronologically, so here we go . . .

Graduation Weekend

Back in May I accomplished something that I am pretty sure I thought was impossible at different times during my academic career. It only took me 6 years, two colleges, many miles down the road, countless hours studying, and the best support systems a girl could ask for, but I graduated pharmacy school with my Doctorate of Pharmacy. This is by far one of the greatest accomplishments at this point in my life and I just wanted to say THANK YOU to everybody who helped along the way. I know I may be a little partial, but I really am blessed with the best family/friends/classmates/colleagues! Before I get all sappy, I better start sharing the fun of graduation weekend.

Thursday night before graduation, our class put on a graduation banquet for our class and our family/friends. It was a fun, carefree night with the family. My parents, brother, his girlfriend and my Mom's parents all attended. Now mind you, we got stuck at the back of the banquet, could only hear every fifth word that was said, but we had a ball! Laker Lover's posse (yes posse, because she took up 2 tables at the banquet) were in town for the festivities too and we all had a blast together that night.

Friday morning, bright and early, Laker Lover and I headed downtown to start getting ready for the pre-graduation ceremony obligations (class pictures, etc.). The rest of our crew showed up just in time to save seats and snap a few pictures beforehand. Luckily for me, I had my own personal photographer aka mother to document the weekend. By eleven o'clock the ceremony started and an hour and a half later, we were officially PharmD's!

My favorite part of the outfit was definitely my shoes!

The original study crew minus one!
I couldn't have done it without them!

My two biggest supporters!
I would be lost without all their love support!

My two favorite Kansasians made the trip down!

After graduation festivities were over, we all shifted into party mode. Laker Lover and I rented out a room at the hotel we were all staying at for a graduation party. The party was a complete success if you ask me! We had about 100 family members, long time friends, classmates, and anybody else who wanted to stop by to enjoy the brisket dinner, cake and drinks. Times like these really reinforce my thoughts on how extremely blessed I am! Between Laker Lover and I, we had people there from at least 5 different states supporting us. It was a great weekend celebrating our accomplishment as well as catching up with everybody. It ALMOST made the idea of going back to school for something worth while if I could repeat the graduation weekend. ;)

Whew, that was kind of picture overload....

Happy Weekend Friends!

Pinning Ceremony

April 25, 2013 was a big step in my pharmacy career. Myself, as well as my fellow third year students, had our pinning ceremony signifying the completion of our didactic portion of our career. What a relief it was.

The ceremony was very simple and nice. The dean and two other speakers gave their little spiel then each student was presented with UNM College of pharmacy pin. Each student was allowed to invite all their friends and family and we had well over 400 people in attendance. Here are a few of my favorite snaps from the night to demonstrate the ceremony better than I could describe.

My main crew in the upper left corner.
My lovely parents in the upper right corner.
My sweet grandparents in the lower left corner.
All of us reciting the oath of a pharmacist in the bottom right corner.

The Dean presenting me with my pin.
Dr. Ray pinning me.
The lovely cake my mother brought 225 miles from home!

A few of my favorites!

Miss Artesia, Laker Lover, and myself!
The top picture is from our white coat ceremony before our first year.
The bottom is the trio from our pinning ceremony.

Now off to the next step, rotations!

Friday F.U.N.

Our last semester of pharmacy school is filled with tests and LOTS of group work. Seriously it takes over your life with all the group meetings. Lucky for us, our main project, in public health we had to create a video raising awareness to a public health topic, so that was a nice change of pace anyways.

Immediately we started planning. Laker Lover, Miss Artesia, and I wanted to do a fun video. We decided to remake the Spice Girls song Wanna Be. For those of you who are not aware of the song you can check out the original here. Our version is kind of silly, but was a lot of fun to do. Oh and a BIG shout out to You I Am for his help with vocals and editing! Seriously y'all he is awesome, go check out his music. Oh and did I mention he is also in med school right now. He is a rockstar! I hope y'all enjoy it and get a laugh out of it this beautiful Friday!

Miss Artesia's Birthday Gift

Miss Artesia's birthday was this past weekend! In preparation for this grand occasion, I decided to make her gift this year. Lucky for me I was actually on top of my game and remembered to take pictures along the way, so y'all can repeat the process if ya want. So here we go, step by step instructions on making a stacked cross similar to this one.

First thing you need to purchase the supplies: 1 large cross, 1 smaller cross, 1 letter, paint, accent paint, scrapbook paper, mod podge, and glitter of course.

Step 1: Paint the big cross your main color.

Step 2: Paint the edges of the smaller cross the accent color.

Step 3: Trace the smaller cross on the scrapbook paper and cut it out. Glue the paper on with mod podge.

Step 4: Paint the letter your main color. Then stack up the pieces & realize you don't like the colors you chose. Start planning how to fix this problem.

Step 5: Add the accent color on top of the letter with your desired painting technique that still allows the turquoise to peak thru. Realize you still do not like the color scheme and start planning how to fix this problem again.

Step 6: Remember that glitter solves almost all crafting problems & decide to add glitter. Cover the top surface of the letter with glue, then add the sparkles! I added a top coat of clear spray paint to help seal the glitter. Re-stack up the crosses and letter, realize hey you finally got what you wanted and glue everything together. Voilà it is done! Enjoy your creation :)

Oh and if you are giving this as a birthday gift, adding a homemade card can be a nice touch!

Happy Wednesday friends!

Soldier's Angel: Letter Box

First off sorry for being MIA lately and this post has been a little delayed as well, my apologies!

This is by far my favorite Soldier's Angel box I have sent! As y'all heard, I was recruiting friends to help me write letters to send to my soldier and his medical unit. Lucky for me I have the best friends in the world and was able to recruit several letters to send! A big shout out to Laker Lover, Miss Artesia, My Little B, and Bob for getting me letters to send. I also wanted to thank A Desert Girl, Miss Football, and Lovely Country Mess for trying their best to make our schedules conicide to get me their letters as well!

Now on to the goodies! In my letter I received from my soldier he told me about the 5 other guys in his medical unit. I was already planning on sending him a box of letters for him to hand out to his unit, so when I heard about his medical team I thought, "PERFECT"! I was even able to get a list of their names, how cool was that? I was able to send 16 letters total in this box! I was thrilled!!

My cards! Not my best work, but they are all personalized at least.

For my contribution to the box I added an individual personalized cards to all 6 soldiers, along with an goodie bag for each, and fun stuff for them to share as well. This box included a bunch of stuff I enjoyed as a kid and thought would be good for them to all share around; Play-Doh, little sports balls, cards, dominos, dice, frisbee, pen and paper, and socks (well don't share these)! I also added a typed out letter on the top of the box explaining everything that was added and what not.

The soldier's individual goodie bags!
Something to keep your mind active, hands busy,
stomach full and mouth clean wherever you may be!

Laker Lover's cards!

The contents of the box, minus a few letters.

Up close picture of the goodies, minus the socks!

The day I left to go mail the box was kind of a hectic one, oh and it was also raining. Before I could mail the box I had to go pick up some socks to completely fill up the box. Lucky for me I was able to find a pack of 6 at Walgreens and killed two birds with one stone on my to do list. After I had the socks I was able to tape up the box and send it on its merry way. I don't know if y'all have ever tried to tape up a box in the driver's seat of a Nissan Altima, but it's not easy! Lucky for me I was able to get it done, and just as I was reaching for the customs form and my purse to go inside I realized I forgot to add my explanation letter. Crap! I had no other choice but to cut open the box and repeat the charade. I was able to get it done and run thru the rain to go mail the box! Thank goodness!

The box double taped up with ALL the letters included and ready to ship!

My soldier's deployment ends June 1, so I am sending my final care package in the next few weeks! If you missed out on the first rounds of letters or are interested in sending something in my "New Mexico Thanks You" care package let me know!

Hope you guys are having a lovely week!

Photo Friday Flashback

My friend Amy from over at A Desert Girl does a Photo Friday Flashback, so I thought I would give it a shot!

Back in January 2011, we got a serious snow storm. I am talking "cancelled 4 days of pharmacy school" snow storm, it was awesome! Even though we had only been back in school a couple week since winter break, it was just at the perfect time! Of course what do Laker Lover, Miss Artesia, and I decide that we should do?? We decided to dress up and go take pictures in the snow. I know smart and to make things even better, I was already sick! Well luckily for me I didn't get any sicker and the pictures turned out fabulous.

Dressed up in satin dresses with our make up on, hair fixed, and converses laced up tight, we were on a mission. The neighborhood we were living in at the time had a small playground just a few houses down from ours and we decided that was our location of choice. In between all pose changes, chattering teeth, and snow fights, we got several laughs, priceless memories, and a few pictures to document the fun.

Laker Lover

Miss Artesia

What are some of your "not so wise" decisions, that turned out remarkable stories?!?