Stella!

Whenever I get a day off, I try to catch up on my hobbies and get in some blogging time.

I've realized that when I am dedicated to my blog, I am more likely to be more productive in my day and eat healthy. I think my blog just holds me more accountable to myself. Therefore, I am going to try and update this blog regularly.

I am happy to say there is a new addition to my furbaby family...and that is a 12 week kitten named Stella! She is absolutely darling and the sweetest kitten I could ask for! Anto is already obsessed with her, and she chooses his tummy to sleep on at night.

She definitely has added a ton of happiness to my life! I totally foresee myself with 10+ cats in the future, being a crazy cat lady ;)

Calm Before the Storm Part I

Before the craziness of my summer schedule happened, Anto (my boyfriend) took me to San Francisco as a birthday present! It was a well needed vacation and allowed me to get some much needed rest before the summer of no fun began.

I worked until 11:30 on Sunday night, and took a three hour nap. By 3:00am we were on the road! And yes, we drove the entire thing. Eight hours from San Diego to San Francisco! It was fun experiencing a long road trip with my boyfriend, even though there isn't a whole lot going on in the drive through Central California!

Seriously, the scenery for hours.

We took lots of mini breaks and ended up in SF around 12:00. Our hotel was delightfully cute and the perfect price for two struggling students.

Casa Loma Hotel!

I loved that it was in the middle of a neighborhood that wasn't directly in the middle of all the hustle and bustle tourist areas. Driving in SF was not my thing and definitely had to handled by Anto.

We took a super long nap, and I woke up to discover I had left ALL my toiletries and makeup at home! This was a disaster for me, so we had to walk to the nearest Walgreens so I could buy some cheapo makeup to use for the trip. Turns out, the cheapie makeup actually works almost as well as my expensive makeup. I've actually continued to use some of the cheapie products once I returned home after the trip.

Our first goal was to drive around the city and take it in. San Francisco is gorgeous and I absolutely adore the architecture there. Why can't there be cute buildings like this in San Diego?

After sightseeing for a bit, we decided to go to Chinatown to eat some delicious Chinese food. Unfortunately, the restaurant we ate at left us very disappointed and unsatisfied. It took us 40 minutes to get our food, we received horrible service, and they AUTO-GRATTED us! We were a party of two and they tried to autograt us. I get it, I was a server for almost three years, and I've worked in the restaurant industry for longer. I am a generous tipper because of this, but I expect my service to be decent...and I KNOW that autogratting a party of two is completely unacceptable. We looked at the menu, and sure enough, in writing, they said they would grat parties of 5 or more. THERE WERE TWO OF US.

Anyways, we received our food after waiting for 40 minutes. It was disappointingly bland, and THEN, the server comes and drops off our check about 5 minutes after we had gotten our food. She said, "Oh, you're not finished yet?" Well, no...considering we had just gotten our food 5 minutes beforehand.

Anyways, we took it in stride. We were there on vacation so we just let it go and enjoyed the fact that we were in SF!

"Free" Appetizer

Kung Pao Chicken

Lemongrass Chili Chicken

Chinatown!

Outside the restaurant.

After that, we decided to head to Ghiradelli's Square, and be, well, touristy :)

The Cable Car Sundae

Decadent Drinking Chocolate. SO SWEET.

Our goodies.

How they make chocolate!

Being a tourist!

 That concludes our first day in SF...I'm off to get ready for a twelve hour night shift at the hospital..hoping to get some study time in because I have a test on Monday!

Summer

This summer has been CRAZY busy.

Example of my weekly schedule:

Monday: Lecture 9-4, Support Group Meeting for Psych 6-8 (then tons of hw)
Tuesday: Hospital Clinical 11-7 (tons of hw)
Wednesday: Hospital Clinical 11-7 (tons of hw ;))
Thursday: Lecture 8-4, Support Group Meeting for Psych (6-8)
Friday: Work 7:00pm-7:30am (study/hw)
Saturday: Work 7:00pm-7:30am (study/hw)
Sunday: Work 3:00pm-11:30pm (study)

I just keep telling myself it will all be worth it once the summer is over.

It's pretty crazy! I'm planning a trip for the one week vacation I get between summer and fall, so I have something to look forward to, at the very least!

Blogging Fail

I haven't updated this blog in quite a while due to many reasons-school, work, exhaustion, etc. But the biggest reason I haven't updated is because I derailed from my journey to healthy and have been living a lifestyle of my journey to congestive heart failure!

Seriously, though.

I've been too exhausted to cook, let alone think about working out. I have been subsisting off instant cup o noodles alone, and I can literally feel the difference in my body.

So.

Finals are over and I have no excuse to continue to live this way. My biggest obstacle is just getting into a routine. Once I have my routine down, then it will make things easier. The only problem is that I work nights on the weekend, and go to school during the days during the week. That makes it pretty hard to create a regular schedule. And it's not doing wonders for my metabolism.

My biggest fear is getting burnt out. I can already feel it happening, so when I can make my work schedule for August, I'm definitely going to schedule less days in a row, and maybe switch over to 8 hour shifts. I need the money, but I also need my sanity.

Blogging resumes today!

It just so happens to be my 24th birthday, so what better beginning is there? 24 is the year of being healthy! :)

Getting back in the groooove

Whew! April has been a busy month and honestly, it's kicking my booty!

I've been overwhelmed with school, moving, financial & housekeeping issues, starting a new job, and finishing up my two weeks at my old job.

Not to mention, my dog has been an absolute terror these past couple of weeks and has chewed up SO much stuff. I thought he was over this phase, but apparently now. In fact, today I just lost my phone charger to his naughty ways. I only have two bars left, and since my phone is pretty old, I have to order the charger online unless I manage to find it at Wal Mart or something. There is no way I can be phone-less this entire weekend, especially since I will be working 4-5 shifts between my two jobs within three days.

Although my life has been crazy hectic, I have to say I've been enjoying every (almost) minute of it! I'm excited to begin a new career and move closer towards my dream of being a nurse. I'm excited to close one chapter in my life and open another. I'm excited to move into this new place with my boyfriend and friend. I'm excited to being closer to being finished with nursing school.

The one regret I have is that I haven't been eating healthy at all. Since we moved into our new place and didn't have many groceries, I've been buying fast food and eating junk. I'm talking donuts, oreos, chick fil a, milkshakes-you name it, I ate it.

That needs to change now! I haven't cooked in so long because I've been so busy, but I'm going to make time. My health shouldn't be put on the backburner, it should be a priority. Unfortunately, I haven't spent much time at the gym either. Especially since my new apartment complex doesn't have one :(. I do have a gym membership, but I miss the quietness and closeness of using the apartment complex gym.

I'm finishing up some online modules and then I have to run to Wal Mart right now (at 11pm, ugh) to run some errands, come home and print out some study material, and hopefully get some sleep before my 5am wakeup call.

This weekend will be crazy! I can't wait til Monday at 4pm when I can finally *breathe*, although it won't last for long!

Two Weeks Notice

I put my official two weeks notice in at my current job at the restaurant!

It definitely feels liberating, because I'll be moving on to a new job that should help jumpstart me into my future career.

However, it always sucks leaving a job that you are completely comfortable in and having to start over at a new job where no one really know you and you have to prove yourself all over again. I'm pretty nervous. But, definitely excited!

I'll also miss my coworkers, but the turnover at our restaurant has been so high that in a few months, I probably won't know many of the people.

My boyfriend grilled burgers for me and made strawberry margaritas to celebrate. I'll be sure to enjoy them after I finish writing my care plan for nursing school!

The stress has definitely decreased. I feel so lucky and blessed that some things just seem to work themselves out on their own, and I get lucky enough to just have some things go my way! I am starting to take the time to really appreciate these moments cause they can be few and far in between.

Agenda for today:
-Finish careplan
-Finish unpacking (ugh)
-Go back to the gym and continue C5K (finally!)
-Return some stuff.
-Enjoy strawberry margaritas and have a movie night.
-Go to bed early. I have to wake up at 5:00 tomorrow :(

I miss the carefree days of my undergrad! Nursing school is 1000x more intense than my undergrad experience! I miss spending time with my girlfriends, who I rarely see anymore.

Song on repeat: Heartache That Don't Stop Hurting-Jason Aldean

Stress Overload

I was reading one of my favorite blogs (I finally got internet installed at my new place), Peanut Butter Fingers, when I came across this post.

It's about stress.

Right now, I'd say my stress level is excessively high. There are constantly things on my mind weighing me down. I feel myself getting stress headaches. I can feel my heart rate going up, cortisol levels being released, etc. It's definitely the highest it has been in quite some time.

We are still in the process of moving, which helps contribute to the stress. But that's just a small part of it.

I could sit here and list all the things that are stressing me out and giving me a constant headache and interfering with my sleep and eating patterns, but instead I think I'll highlight recent things that have made me happy and things that I am looking forward to. Things that make me smile. :)

-The Jason Aldean concert was AWESOME. I heart him. Definitely a great concert with great seats, and better yet, completely free!
-I'm going to the midnight showing of Scream 4 tonight. The Scream series are my favorite movies EVER. I am so incredibly excited it's ridiculous.
-Just three more weeks of clinicals left for this semester!
-Reliving my childhood by reading old Babysitters Club books that I bought in a huge Ebay haul.
-Spending time with my furry babies. They are the ultimate destressor.
-Getting massages from my boyfriend.

These are just some of the things that keep me going. With all the stress that's been filling my life, I haven't been sticking to the C25K plan. I plan to restart tomorrow, but I'm a little nervous about how my stamina will be, but oh well, I just have to get back up and try!

Enjoying the concert!

Jason Aldean makes me smile!