Here are a few of the shots from my amazing birthday and party. I had a backyard BBQ, which was perfect in every way. I had all of my friends from different time periods of my life all in one place, celebrating with me. We all had such a great time socializing, eating hamburgers and my famous meatballs, playing ladder golf and engorging in the yummy cake Robin generously brought. I think this was the best birthday I have ever had. It is one that I will remember forever, especially the feelings it brought out. 28!! What an exciting year in my life. I will graduating THIS year!! OMG!! I still can't believe it, but it is still too far away..haha! I am so ready right now to be finished! I am sick and tired of stressing...ahhh!! But it will all be worth it soon. It is so hard to be motivated right now for some reason. I guess I am just ready to push the books aside and head out into the real world of nursing. I am working two days in the office at the Home Health agency because I don't have enough time to see patients because of school. And the Clinical Trials job was way too much work than I could handle for now. Unfortunately, my patient is being transferred to hospice, so my services are no longer needed. It is so sad to hear of this bad news. Even though I only met him twice, he was my very first patient ever and I will always remember him and his wife. They were two sweet souls.

So for now, I have just been hanging onto the fact that the semester will be over in approximately one month. I am seriously having a rough time finishing. I am just ready to relax and not worry about tests, papers, projects, clinicals....and on and on....I can do this, I know I can! I have been doing it my whole life. Maybe that is why I am so ready to focus on a new phase in my life for once, besides school. Che and I both can't wait to settle down and get a house and space just for us. To create our life together in each moment. I am so ready to plan a wedding and marry the most amazing person I have ever met. Last night we went to a basketball tournament for Che's school, which by the way was so awesome. Those kids can PLAY! Anyway, one of his coworkers told me that had a group with some of the students and they had to say their name and who their favorite person was. She said Che stood and said, "My name is Che Manuel Trillo and my favorite person is my girlfriend". Awwww....he is soooo sweet! He is my favorite person too!! Can I also say that I am so ready to meet our babies!!!! I know I should probably cherish this time that Che and I have alone together for as long as possible, and I do every single day. But I just can't help thinking about OUR babie(s). haha...Who knows how many we will have. But for now, I will ruminate in the excitement of our soon to be vacation. We leave this Thursday, April 15 for COACHELLA!!! I can't wait. This will be my second time and Che's fifth or sixth. We are going to have a BLAST!!! This is a much needed adventure!! But before that, I must get 2 papers out of the way. Adios...it's paper writing time :)

What an amazing birthday!

Yesterday, March 10, 2010, was an amazing day!! I just love my birthdays, I always feel so special and loved. I get to talk my friends and family and just get to do whatever my heart desires. I woke up early and immediately ran to my closet to put on one of my new shirts that I was saving for this joyful day. I got dressed and then cleaned the apartment, because I hate relaxing in a messy place. I kept the door open most of the day as the weather has been absolutely gorgeous! I then sped off to buy some make-up at Origins and get myself pampered with a pedicure. It was so relaxing and I enjoyed every minute of it. Then I came home and had a phone training for one of my jobs and it seems very interesting, sorta complicated, but I will get the hang of it as time goes on. No worries. As I was on the phone with my grandma, I noticed someone had put something on my door. I saw a person walk by my window and then the walked away. I opened the door and found a little gift sparkling on my doorstep. My first thought was, "ANNE"!! I just knew it was from her. She left the sweetest card and the most beautiful blue glass heart necklace from Venice. It is perfect! I love it so much!! Oh and the night before my birthday, we were going to bed and for some reason I put my hands underneath my pillow and felt something odd. I pulled out a gold box with a purple bow on it. I was so surprised! It was a beautiful pair of earings with aquamarine stones. Perfect!! Che is so amazing when it comes to surprises. He always takes my breath away with how creative he gets.

Once Che got  home from work we went out to eat sushi. It was so yummy, but we could hardly eat any of it for some reason, we were stuffed. So we have lots of left over rolls...mmmm! Then we went to Central Market to get some wine and a dessert. I picked a chocolate mousse mini cake and Che got a brownie. They were morsels of heaven! The rest of the evening was spent listening to our favorite songs and new songs from bands that will be at Coachella in April, can't wait. Needless to say, it was one of the best birthdays ever. I loved having the day to myself to relax and enjoy myself!  So here is to my 28th year! I can feel it...it's going to be the best year ever!!

The windows of opportunity are wide open!

I got a job!! Not just one but two!! I think it is amazing that I have been waiting 3 months to say that! After all of the hunting I did and the patience that I endured I received 5 phone calls for jobs the other day, haha! Well, I accepted a home health position and will be caring for patients 3x a week for 2 months and I also accepted a position as a clinical trial nurse and will be seeing my first patient 2x a week for 6 weeks, then 1x per week for 6 months!! That is awesome, I really think these jobs will perfect for me right now at this point in my life. It will be so nice to be able to have my own time to spend with patients instead of worrying about hospital life and stressing over 6 patients at a time. I am excited to give individualized care to my patients, it is going to be an adventure.

On another note: I am finally discovering the TRUTH to my world. I guess I will go back to my amazing Valentine's weekend to explain. First of all, me and Che decided to make no plans and just see what happens. Saturday we headed downtown for happy hour sushi and since we arrived a little early we went to Fado's, an Irish Pub, to have a beer. We ordered our beers and picked a very quiet, dark and romantic spot and just talked and laughed, it was sooo nice! I love our talks! Then we headed over to wait in line at the sushi place, it is so good that people line up outside the door for happy hour. We sat down to eat our delectable longhorn and barton springs rolls and took a look at the Austin Chronicle. Turns out RJD2, a DJ, was playing that night at Emo's. It was still early and I remembered that my friend Amber from school was celebrating her birthday at The Dog and Duck Pub, so we headed over and played pool and darts before everyone arrived. We got to hang out with everyone for a little while before we headed over to Emo's for the amazing show. We had sooo much fun!! He was incredible! We finally made it home around 2am and then we were up early for the one plan for the weekend. CHURCH! Che suggested that we go to church on Valentine's day and so it was my job to find one to go to. Well, needless to say I found the perfect one for us. I was searching on the internet and came across The Austin Center for Spiritual Living and read the section on 'what we believe' and it aligned perfectly with what I believe. So there we were bright and early for the 9:30am service and it was incredible, so much so that we have been going for the past 3 weeks. I just love it! Everything makes perfect sense to me as the believe is that there is ONE source for life and we are all a part of that. People call that source all kinds of things, God, Buddha, Allah, but there is only one and it is infinitely beautiful and good and amazing. I recently came to the realization that "god" is just life, from watching a documentary about Viruses. They were combining 2 different parts of genes together and then they had to give it the juice to turn it on and make it living. That shook my world. What is this essence of life that we have? What is it that allows us to breath, love, and create? So now it all comes together...it is the life source. I am absolutely loving the church that I am becoming a part of. They talk how to live in unity with this life source and I find myself living differently, with my consciousness wide open and aware of my actions and my words. I am learning so much about myself and life and how to just be. The last sermon was about the godly nature of giving and creating. It was beautiful and inspired me to act, so a few friends got some surprises and I can't wait to keep on giving!

After that first day of going to church, we decided to take a road trip and drive out on 183 to see what we find. We drove and drove and we finally came across a creek. After turning around about 5 times to try to go down and see it, we came upon the most beautiful clear blue water under the bridge. It was amazing! I took so many pictures and can't wait to play with them. It was such a beautiful day of exploring.

One more little tid bit.....I was watching another documentary called "Pluto and beyond". Just when I think my mind can't expand any further it pushes through those boundaries. My heart was overjoyed while watching it. It is so amazing to me how much the universe feels like home. Another interesting thing on that show is that they found out the make-up of comets. CARBON! The very building blocks that make us. It is incredible to know that we are a part of it all and I am at PEACE.......

Sleep tight!

After!! (1904 coils!)

                                                      Before....(estimated at 25 years old!)

We finally got a new mattress!! It has been a long time coming. My old mattress belonged to my parents and when I moved to Austin I took it with me, with intentions to buy a new one when I had the money. Well, it never really seemed like a priority, until now. Che and I had been searching for a while and finally one day we decided to just go for it and buy the one we had been eyeing for a while. It is super comfortable and hope it lasts us for the next 25 years :)

Pay it forward...

Yesterday evening Che and I manuvered around the heavy traffic together so he could do some home visits for work. It was nice to be able to spend some extra time together, even if it was just driving. Well, on the way home we decided to stop at P. Terry's to pick up some dinner. So we ordered our food, then drove up to the window and the girl told us it was paid for by the car up ahead who had paid for the next two cars in line. How amazing was that!! I had never had that happen before and thought it was the sweetest gesture! So now it is my time to pay it forward. I wonder what I will do??

Memories

Michael, Me and David during one of our crazy happy hours at Baby A's. This was the place to be on Thursday nights! So many drinks, laughter and tears (after waking up in pain from the night before)! This place will forever be a part of my incredible journey of becoming the woman I am today. I can definitely say we lived it UP!!!

This was the reaction from the screaming Asian who I accidently flashed. Oops....

This is us now! My, my..... how much we have grown!

I was thinking about how perfectly things have always worked out in my life, or maybe they became perfect because those were the events perfect for my life. Anyway...I was thinking about the time I applied to work at Sunglass Hut and I was so upset that I didn't pass this ridiculous telephone survey about stealing and lying, yes I totally failed it, go figure. Well, it was a blessing in disguise because I began working for Bombay in Lafayette and had such a blast working and getting to know the other employees. Not to mention Sheri worked there and we always had so much fun working together no matter what we were doing. We use to work together at Learning Express before it went under. I remember us making fun of one of our customers who spoke Spanish, because we had no idea what she was saying, and pretty much because we had never even heard Spanish before, crazy i know. So we would pretend we were her and would say "machalacha -hi, macha-hiney-ho" to sound like her. So, back to Bombay. I ended up transferring to the Bombay when I moved to Austin and ended up making so many amazing friends, like David and Michael. We have had soooo many amazing and fun times together and they really helped me to live out my wild times, to say the least! We have all grown so much from those crazy days and even though I don't see or talk to them as much as I would like, we still treasure the friendship that we have gained throughout the years. Me and David even backpacked through Europe together, which was such a breath-taking and eye-opening experience! It is so amazing how you meet such wonderful people that come into your life...and to think it all started with me failing an honesty test...ha!

Denied...

So I just received an e-mail from the girl at CommUnity Care and much to my dismay, she told me they are going to pursue other applicants because my schedule does not work with their training. That stinks, but I guess it was not the right job for me at this time. I am huge believer in the serendipitous fate that what is the best for me will work out perfectly at the right moment, so that makes me feel a little better. She said that I could reapply when my schedule fits better with theirs. Even though it is disappointing, I will continue to search for something else. I guess I will wait for the people at the Pediatric Home Health Agency to contact me. I am just tired of waiting.....oh well.....I will find something, I just know it! In the mean time, I am off to go run with Amena :)