Friday, September 12, 2008

The Week

This week has been full. I have felt like I've been in a cloud, being led along by somebody else. LOTS of information, and LOTS of boring training. It started out with a full day of being scared out of my pants at all of the hard work I'm in for, not to mention all of the rules and stipulations that could mean "termination from the program," etc.....I am in a class of 18, and I feel like I am surrounded by some quality people. It's going to be great....I also learned that our clinicals are chosen for us, and not based on where we live. This means that there is a possibility we might have to commute up to 2 hours each way. Our clinicals start Spring Quarter and then our whole second year is completely clinicals.

I had a SEVEN HOUR day of boring HIV/AIDS training. My rear end was ACHING from sitting so long. And, afterwards, I was so creeped out, that all I wanted to do was keeping putting on hand sanitizer.

I had another half day of HIPAA training (privacy laws) followed by a talk given by one of the counselors. She talked about communication skills and the stages that our classroom will go through (forming, storming, norming, etc.).

On Thursday, we were supposed to be at the school from 8 to 4, but our CPR class ended up only being an hour and a half, and we got to go home!! It was a nice surprise. It was a big adjustment being gone all day, and managing the family. But, when I got home, my husband was deep cleaning my kitchen as well as dusting and vacuuming the whole house. It was a great help indeed!

I'm trying to stay really organized with a "week-at-a-glance" calendar for our fridge that I typed up for everybody. I also make lunches the night before, as well as set things out that we will need the next day. I also am committed to cooking dinner by 5:00, so we can get that out of the way for any evening activities, and we're less prone to order pizza or eat out. Once I start studying, I'm sure we'll have to eat out a little more, but I'm going to try hard to cook. I went through all of my cookbooks for easy meals, and made menus good for a whole month. Then, I split it up into two week blocks, and made shopping lists for each two week block. Every two weeks, I will do a big Wal-Mart run, and all I have to do is print out my list! I'll still have to visit the store every week to get milk and fresh fruit, but no big shopping. I'm even going to see if I can get Joe to try out some cooking!

I start my actual classes on the 22nd, so it's nice to have a little breather before the hard work begins. It's also nice, because our weather has been so AWESOMELY warm and sunny!!

5 comments:

Chelle said...

So proud of you! I still remember you talking about trying to get into the program, and here you are! WHOOPPEE! Hope it is wonderful :)

Jodi said...

You're such a great encourager - thank you. :)

Ro said...

Wow! You sound busy. You might want to try freezer meals also. It involves a lot of prep work, but very little work on cooking day. I have the book "Don't Panic, Dinner's in the Freezer", which I like. The meals are frozen raw (prepared and together, but raw),then thawed and cooked. There's no mush-factor when you're eating (yeah!). Anyway, this is going long, but they save my sanity some days. I can e-mail you a few recipes if you're interested.

Jodi said...

Thanks Rochelle! I don't even know if I would have enough time to do all of the prep work. I have done it once before. It sure is awesome to have all of those meals afterwards! :)

Ro said...

It can be a little crazy. I tend to do 2-3 of the same meals at the same time, as I'm cooking the same one. You do have to really budget time. My life is different, too! I'm hoping to get it all down before the teenage years come!