Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween! I love Halloween. I dream of throwing a big halloween party some day with lots of themed food and snacks and decorations. Growing up in the country, we never had trick-or-treaters, so ever since Ryan and I have had a house of our own, I looking forward to handing out candy. Every year since we've been homeowners, well longer than that actually, I've wanted to hand out full-sized candy bars to the trick-or-treaters but it has never panned out. So this year, I told Ryan that we had to stop by costco or Sam's club to by candy bars. Well, neither Ryan or I had a chance to make it to the store today, so I found myself stopping my Target on the way home from clinic this evening to pick up candy.

We had 103 trick-or-treaters tonight before we turned off our light. We started the night by giving the kids two little candy bars but had to scale that back to just one as our candy supply was rapidly starting to dwindle. I'd say the best costume of the night was one of our very first kids. He was young, probably 3 years old. He had a homemade SpongeBob character {I'm not up to snuff on SpongeBob} costume. It was the cutest thing ever because he couldn't see his feet and couldn't look down into the candy bowl to grab the candy. His parent's had to help him down the stairs too. We watched him walk down the street and, likely it is one of those gotta-be-there moments but I wish I would have had a video camera, he looked like if you gave him a little nudge, he'd fall over and not be able to get up. Ha! So cute. I also had a little kid ask, "Can I get another one of these for my dad?" Hey, at least he was being honest as he went reaching back into the candy bowl. Zoey sat at the top of the stairs the entire night and one little kids rang the doorbell and then yelled 'Woah, look at that fat cat!' before we even opened the door to give him candy. Oh Zoey, you bring so much joy to our lives.

I was reminiscing about Halloween of years past year Ryan tonight. I remember how when I was little, a lot of the Halloween costumes came in a box and consisted of a face mask and drape-like thing that covered your body. I also remember being a ballerina princess. I might have even been a ballerina princess on more than one Halloween. Either that, or I dressed up in that costume quite a bit - ha! I loved the crown and the sparkly wand and the fluffy skirt.  I also remember how we'd go to Grandma and Grandpa Frost's house and grandma would be in her cheese cloth ghost costume. There was we scary music playing from the window and Grandma would open the door and scare us. This happened every year without fail. I always got scared. I even specifically remember one year, I knew she would be coming to the door and scaring us, so I stared in the window along the side of the door thinking to myself 'If I know when she's coming, she can't scare me.' Wrong! She still got me that year! Most years I think my grandparent's handed out raisins. That's my Grandma, always thinking healthy :) I also remember also stopping by Misses Degonda's house. She always had treats for us and she would also give us plants too. I also remember trick-or-treating at Rosie's house and how she would remove the window from the screen door so when she opened the main door, she didn't have to take out little kids by opening the outside door. And how could we forget the Halloween Snow Storm. Halloween is such a fun holiday for kids and adults a like.

So, Happy Halloween! Don't eat too much candy!

~Ashley

Furry Friends

I love these guys!
Cooper is definitely my pal. He is by my side 24/7 when I'm at home. And Zoey, she is such a sweetheart.

Zoey is just so cuddable (I don't think that is a word). But look at her. I can't resist cuddling with her.

And Mr. Cooper....

Always helping me study at night.

Loves when I open the deck door for him to enjoy the fresh fall air.

Extreme Close UP! I think you call this a bad whisker day - lol! {This is what happens when he decides to sit on my chest when I'm trying to fall asleep.} LOL!

A little better - not as an extreme close up as the last. This is just proof that he is constantly stuck to me like glue - he'll stay on my chest regardless if I make a big flash go off right in his face or not :)

~Ashley

Defining a bad call shift.

I was on call last night. I was absolutely dreading this call shift as the prior call shift left me feeling completely defeated, frustrated, angry, and with little self confidence. I was in a funk all day Saturday morning in anticipation for heading in for the night shift. I prayed several times through out the day for a decent call shift without you-know-what hitting the fan every two seconds. Anyways, turns out my call shift wasn't that bad. And in fact, it was one of the best call shifts ever and I even got a couple hours of sleep (I think). At 3:00 am when I went to lay down, I got to thinking (agh! thinking will get me everytime!). All that I could think about was now that I was having a decent call shift, it made me realize even more just how crap-tastic my last few call shifts have been. Last night I actually got to eat dinner and I actually got to go to the bathroom which is a far cry from the prior call shift that was so stinkin crazy that I never even had a chance to sit down. 16+ straight hours (well in technicality, my last call shift was at the end of a 12 hour work day, gotta love residency) of running around and it took a call shift like last night to realize even more that, yep, I was right - I'm not over-exaggerating when I say life as a resident if absolutely crazy sometimes. Yeah, that prior call shift still ranks as the crappiest day of residency. Ever. So glad to have had a normal call shift last night. So, so thankful. I needed that to regain some sanity.

~Ashley

Personal History Making Day :)

I'm going to remember today for years and years to come. I got to primary my first abdominal hysterectomy today! I loved every single second of if. It may not sound like a big deal, but this is a huge day in the life of a budding OBGyn. It's days like today that make up for the days in residency where you're left wondering why in the world you are even doing what you are doing. Those days when you literally want to poke your eyeballs out. Those days when you swear if you pager goes off one more time, you'll throw it out the stinkin' window. Those days when you-know-what seems to constantly be hitting the fan. Those days when we just want to throw in the towel and call it quits. Ugh, those days seems to come all too often sometimes. Today is not one of those days. Today was a good day. In my program, first and second year residents rarely get to do hysters, as the primary normally goes to the third or forth year upper level on service. The glorious thing about being on my current rotation is that I'm it. I'm the only resident, so I get all the cases. I love it. Regardless of how many times I sit and wonder if I really chose the right career path and question why I put myself through the trenches of residency, today totally makes up for it. Here's to many more cases to come {and only 2.5 more years of residency!}.
~Ashley

A Day at the Pumpkin Patch

This past weekend, Ryan and I had some visitors from Minnesota. The weather on Thursday and Friday was rainy and cold but on Saturday when Kelsey, Sandi and Gabe arrived, the weather was perfect. It was such a nice fall day. We took every to Vala'a Pumpkin patch. Ryan and I went last year during the week so it wasn't very busy. Saturday was a different story - it was soooo busy! Lots and lots of people and lines everywhere you turned! But we still had fun. We raced eachother on peddle bikes (no pictures since we were all intense in the moment), we ate turkey legs, we watched the pumpkin chunking cannon fire away, we watched pig races, we ate corn dogs, we took a hayride out into the pumpkin patch, and we bought kettle corn and hot chocolate and of course you can't forget about the caramel apples. It was a lot of fun, but boy was I tired by the time we got home. {That and I think that I finally caught Ryan's cooties and have had a really bad sore throat for the past two days :/} I forgot to bring my camera so we only got cellphone pictures. Enjoy.

Being kids :)

Enjoying our caramel apples!

Ryan, Gabe, Sandi and Kelsey waiting for the pig races to start.

Turkey Leg!

Kelsey tackling her turkey leg!

That's all I have for pictures. Wish I would have taken more but we were all having fun.
~Ashley

All gone

We had two solid days of rain, wind and coldness. Our leaves are now gone for the winter :(

~Ashley

Fall is in the Air

The fall colors are just peeking down here. I absolutely love it. I have about a 20 minute drive to work and it's been fun watching all of the colors change this fall. After I got home from work this afternoon, I looked out our picture window and our front tree looked stunning.

So I decided I better take a look at our other foliage in the yard.

This bloomed quite nicely :)

Thought it would be kind of interesting to do some comparison pictures.

What I love about this picture is how the trees in the background have also changed.

And here are some comparisons to last year at this same point in time.

2011 (left) and 2012 (right). I don't remember the tree getting as vibrant last year as it is right now this year.

2011 (left) and 2012 (right). Even though these two pictures were taken at two different depths, the tree grew a lot over the past year.

I'm looking forward to heading to Vala's Pumpkin patch again this year. I love this time of year!

~Ashley

First Blog Video

Just a little video of Cooper being Cooper.

I don't understand Cooper but being patted on his back is one of his favorite things and he gets really crazy sometimes. Lol - Cooper, we love you!
~Ashley

Baking

I don't do it nearly enough. But when I do, our house smells delicious!
~Ashley

Battle Wounds

Ouch!

That old-man's hockey league can get a little crazy! Ryan took a puck to the inner-thigh and has this nice shiner to prove it. That's likely going to leave a mark!!

~Ashley

Obligatory Cat Post

Since these two cats are a big part of our lives, I can't neglect them on this blog :)

Every morning, about 10 minutes before my alarm goes off, Zoey jumps up into bed. While I'm getting ready, she takes over my side of the bed. This is a daily occurrence. She is so predictable!

A little kitty cuddle time.

Button nose!

Cooper helping me study for REI.

A little blurry, but this is Zoey destroying the top of our couch as she watches some Sunday night football and enjoys the open window.

This is the doorway to our bedroom and this is where Zoey tends to sleep at night. She unfortunately has gotten a boot to her gut a couple times when I've gotten up in the middle of the night. I secretly think she is trying to trip me on purpose.

More photos of the kiddos to come eventually.
~Ashley