The past year has been quite a whirlwind! I think I will update you on each of the three people in our little family one at a time. Here we go!
Hannah
This last year has been a wild one! I have officially completed 3 of my 5 semesters in graduate school! Very exciting. I'm not sure what I was expecting when I started. I guess I didn't really go in with any expectations, besides the expectation that the next two years of my life were likely going to be hellish as Scott and I attempted to coordinate our school schedules and somehow manage to keep our little
I'm happy to report, however, that my expectations were totally wrong. The past year has definitely been crazy, but I have really loved it. By no means has it been easy. With Scott finishing up Pharmacy School and me completing my Master's degree, life is nuts. Throw a baby into the mix, and it is pretty much complete chaos. However, I really love my program. I love what I am learning, and I love that I will be able to have this be my career when I finish classes!
In oder to make everything feasible, schedule-wise, we had some amazing help from some families in our ward, and we made it! I traded babysitting for the first year of graduate school with some friends of ours. They watched Lilli during the day with their girls, and I watched their girls at night in the evenings. It was a blessing for both of us, I think. And there is no way we could have possibly made it through the first year without them. Lilli had some feeding issues that would have made full-time daycare virtually impossible, and the cost of daycare was just out of our price range at the time. Lilli had a great time, and I enjoyed watching their girls as well. Scott sometimes did the babysitting as well. We traded off, and we made an excellent team. During Spring and Summer, we had some help from some other awesome ladies in our ward, as well. We also had some major help from Scott's dad and step-mom, who drove about 45 minutes to watch Lilli at our apartment at least one night every week for our first two semesters. We also couldn't have survived without their help! And our parents in Heber watching Lilli during emergencies when she was sick. Lifesavers.
We decided for our last year of school that we would enroll Lilli in full-time daycare since Scott started his rotations in June and would not be able to help with any childcare during the day, and would also be unavailable many nights to help me out. So, she has started there at the end of June. Its been a life-saver.
I have two semesters left. One semester of classes (from August-December), and my last semester (January-May) is going to consist of externships. And don't ask me why they are called "externships" instead of "internships". I have noooo idea. Despite the weird title, however, I am VERY excited to do them. From January-March I will be working full-time at the University Hospital, and from March-May I will be working full-time in a school. Sometime in the Spring I will take my certification exam that covers all the coursework I have had and assesses my competence as a Speech-Language Pathologist.
I may or may not have started a countdown to graduation for Scott and I today. And we may or may not have 265 days left of this insanity. That's less than 9 months. I've waited 9 months before for major life events. I can totally do it again. Its like being pregnant with a college degree! After I receive the degree, I will have to work about one year as a Clinical Fellow before I am actually licensed. But, I get a full salary and benefits and all those great things. So that's pretty fantastic news!
Scott
Some of what I've already talked about obviously applies to Scott. I will expound, however, on his current school situation. Scott has finished all of his classes, and the last year of his schooling consists of rotations. That means he has 6-week blocks at various hospitals/pharmacies, in which he works full-time. These rotations go all the way until graduation in May. On top of this, he is still working as an intern at the University Hospital. This means he's working about 60 hours a week. We don't get to see him much. HOWEVER, when we DO get to see him, he's generally not studying for an exam. So that's an excellent development.
At the end of this year Scott will be applying for residencies around the country. Just like Medical School, if Scott wants to work in a hospital, he has to do a residency. This means he will be working full-time as a pharmacist, but will continue to be trained in the hospital, specifically. He will have to do a 2-year residency program because he wants to specialize in Critical Care. So, his first year he will do a residency that trains him in a general hospital setting. His second year will train him specifically in critical care. During these, Scott will get around half-salary, or less. So.... not stellar. But hey... at least we won't be paying for tuition anymore!
Scott will not get to choose where he goes to residency. He gets to choose all the places he applies to. So far he's looking at places in Utah, California, Arizona, Texas, Pittsburgh, and a few others I can't remember off the top of my head. And we're toying with the idea of applying to Hawaii (because living in Hawaii for a couple of years would be awesome!).
He will apply to all these places in December, and during January and February he will find out if he gets interviews anywhere. He will then interview at all the locations that invite him to interview, and then he will rank the places he interviewed from most-to-least preferred. The schools then rank their choices of the candidates they interviewed. It's all put into a magical computer application, and the candidates are "matched" with their program. On a particular day in March (I want to say mid-March), called "Match Day," all the potential pharmacy resident candidates find out IF they "matched" with a residency. On that day, we hope to match. We are happy to go anywhere. It would be fun to move away and have our own little adventure for a few years. It would also be awesome not to have to move across the country, because moving sucks. So either way, we will be happy.
Lilli
Lilli. Oh, our little monster. (I hope we all understand that I use this term endearingly). She's the best thing that has every happened to us. She's definitely made the last year much more challenging as we try to excel in our school work and be good parents at the same time, but she's also made it infinitely more joyous and enjoyable. I honestly don't even know what we'd do without her. The last 15.5 months have been the best of our lives.
At the end of June, she started full-day daycare. We finally bit the bullet (cost-wise) and enrolled her so that we could get in adequate study time. With Scott working 60 hours a week and me having a full class-load and part-time job, we just couldn't trade babysitting anymore. I was a little sad when I dropped her off the first day, and I felt like I was abandoning her. I seriously felt so guilty. I might have cried when I drove away. But... she has totally thrived! They have already bumped her up to the Toddler's class. They did this a little early since she's running around with the best of 'em. She LOVES it. And I LOVE our childcare center. Its on campus and the teachers are great. So... even though we pay more for childcare than we do for rent (no joke... yikes!), it is totally the best situation for us right now. And we will end up only using it for 9 months until we graduate. I wouldn't have it any other way.
Right now, Lilli is literally running around. She is SO busy. She seriously never stops. If we didn't make her take a nap in the afternoon, she'd go the whole day without one. She's so curious and loves exploring and climbing everything. She has no sense of danger and is completely fearless when it comes to physical challenges. haha.
She is also very passionate about everything. It's funny how you can see her little personality so much already. When she's mad, she's MAD. And when she's happy, she's totally delightful. She is quick to anger. haha. She knows what she wants, and will let you know if she doesn't agree with whatever you are doing by yelling. She's not talking a whole lot yet. Just the basic "mama," "dada," "more," "basketball" (seriously. It was her first word "ba ba," while she simultaneously pretends to dribble. Scott was so proud. haha.). But she does sign more words than that, like "please," "eat," "more," "thank you," etc. And she can throw a tantrum with the best of 'em.
Since I have been a HUGE slacker, I tried to add a nice little slideshow with a month-by-month glance at Lilli. Plus a few, cute extras at the end. But I am inept, and I couldn't get it to work... haha. So, I am posting a link to the album so you can click on it and look at some nice photos. :)
https://picasaweb.google.com/116071984142898767432/SlideshowPics?authuser=0&feat=directlink
Perhaps you will hear from me during the next semester break. Or, perhaps you won't hear from me until closer to graduation. Regardless, I will do my best to keep everyone updated on where and when we will be going in the next year. :)
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