Life's Been Busy....

Sorry I haven't posted anything in so long....but as this post title states, it's been a little nutso around here! My new job is going well, I didn't run across one 'evil step-mother' floor like I feared. Everyone was really nice and made sure that I had plenty of opportunities to reinforce old skills and learn plenty of new ones! I have decided that I will stick it out for my 3 months, and at the EARLIEST opportunity, I will ask to be cross trained into Maternity and then transfer into the Women's Float Pool from there. I have worked a variety of different floors already, and none of them have really grabbed my interest as somewhere I would want to stay. I really like the float pool and can't really see any reason as to why I would ever want to be on a fixed unit.

I have gone and enrolled myself at SLCC and signed up for a Chemistry lecture and lab, and I am now wondering if I really want to get into this. My lecture is online, which is cool, because I don't have to be anywhere at any fixed time, but I am already a week behind and have not yet been able to get the book...this will not bode well for me. My lab is Weds. evenings...that's tomorrow..so we will see if I have a snowball's chance of making this work!

I cannot believe how expensive community colleges have gotten! I thought that maybe things were up around $50 a unit...guess I live in the stone age...try $100 a unit! Here I was, blithely signing up for my Chemistry class, absolutely thrilled that there were openings...5 units..no big deal..I can make this work...until I looked at my account and saw the total *faint* $649.50!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! At least they were nice enough to break it down for me....$25 lab fee, $135.50 Student fees (since I'll just be the life of the campus activities..NOT!), and 499.00 for the classes.....DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANG! I immediately turned around and filled out the FAFSA, with some hope that I will get some financial something before the end of the semester, so far the process seems to be moving faster than I was told it would, but I am not getting my hopes up too high in that department!

My kiddos have returned to school! Brenna is in 5th grade, Jaron in 3rd, and Cade in 2nd. They have been in one full week already. Brenna has been placed in Advanced Spelling and Math, and is running for Student Council. I don't know where she gets it from. I was fairly bright in the language arts and was a basically good student, never the top of the class, but somewhere in the upper ranks. I most definitely was not EVER interested in school politics...in fact, I would run as hard and fast as I could (and I don't run) away from those types of opportunities. As far as I know, Rob was never involved with student leadership either. Now, she did mention something about treats, and I have a sneaking suspicion that that is a strong motivating factor, but she does seem really interested and excited - so I will let her have at it. It will really look good on her record if she is chosen and I am sure it will be an awesome learning opportunity for her. Jaron is plugging along and seems to be doing really well so far. He reads like a champ and is able to do most of his homework independently...YAY! I am assuming that Cade is having the same success...I haven't gotten any notes home to tell me otherwise. He is in a class that has no assigned homework..which has been the bane of his existence...I see all sorts of COMPLETED worksheets arriving home daily in his backpack with almost everything correct. He still doesn't like to read or tie his shoes...doesn't mean he can't..he just won't. "I'm just a seven year old! I can't know that yet!" or my all time favorite when I tell him he needs to make better choices and control himself..."Mom, I told you! I'm trying, but my brain won't let me!" Sometimes...I wish I could just pop the top off and do some re-wiring......he is the one kid that just isn't affected by anything...my little behavioral mystery, that one.

Quentin has been stepping up the antics lately. I had just finished a puppet show when my phone rang. It was Rob on the other end. I have told far too many stories that have started in this fashion...so y'all know it can't be good! Sure enough, Mr. Q had decided to make himself some chocolate milk with the brand new bottle of chocolate syrup I had just bought. I came home to a smallish pond of chocolate on my table, and a near lake of the stuff on my kitchen floor. Thank goodness he stuck to the kitchen and also that Rob came upon him within minutes of him starting this. He is an awfully quick little fellow, and within just a couple of minutes time, he made the said pools on the floor AND covered his entire front side with the stuff. He had a cup and everything all ready (it was covered too), he knew what he was doing, he just lacked the particular fine muscle control to have it work for him. He even recognized that he made a HUGE mess, and attempted to clean it up with one of my good kitchen towels, all the while saying, "Uh oh, MESS!" This time I didn't take pictures of it, I have enough of those..thank you very much (or little?) Plus, I just wanted to go to bed, I had just finished an 11p to 7 a.m shift followed by a puppet show at 9 a.m. - I was in no mood for nostalgic documentation.

So...that has been my life of late...busy, busy, busy. And goodness knows it's only going to get worse (or better????(seriously, folks)????) But, that's another post for another bat-time on another bat-channel...TTFN!!!

.Cade-isms

My seven year old is sure one unique little boy. He says the oddest things sometimes, and most of the time they get him out of a lot of hot water because one is usually laughing too hard to be mad at him....

Take yesterday, for instance, he had been outside messing with my hose and squirting himself. He can be rather hard on things in general, and a lot of things get broken while in his hands. My poor spray nozzle was yet another victim...come to think of it, he broke last years nozzle and my wand the year before that! Anyway, I found my busted spray nozzle and questioned him as to why he had broken yet another one. "I don't know! It wasn't strong enough! I'm just one little 7 year old boy with a pink eye!" He replied. I couldn't stop giggling long enough to really be upset, and he does have a mild case of pink eye. Poor little 7 year old with a pink eye....

WAHOOOOO!!!

I got the job I interviewed for last Friday!!! Part-time afternoons in the Acute Care Float Pool. I was jumping up and down and screeching like a loon afterwards...Rob said I was acting like a dork, but he was happy for me.

I start next Monday...I am so unbelievably excited!!

I also heard back from SLCC about my transcript evaluation. They said I had to be a registered student in order for them to evaluate any prior records. Whatever...so I applied and am now an official member of the SLCC student body. They said they would begin evaluating my transcripts immediately, as soon as they determined which one of the 6 Shannon Fox's that I was in their system. I had no idea my name was that popular.....

Back in the Saddle...

Well, I refuse to give up. I guess I owe my extreme stubborn streak to my wonderful Norwegian/Irish/Scottish heritage! I got my first CNA job at Placerville Pines out of sheer persistance, I sat in that nursing home lobby every day for almost a week until the staff director finally approached me and said,"You aren't going to go away, are you? You must really want to work here..." "No, I won't, and Yes, I do!", I replied. She said, "Okay..be here at 8 a.m. tomorrow." The rest is history...

IHC has rejected me twice now, but has also called me up for two more interviews. I completed one interview yesterday for an Acute Care Float Pool position. I got my hopes up really high the last time, so I am trying not to be too preoccupied by all of it this time. The interview went well, everyone was really nice just like last time, but I really connected with the two nurses who were making the decisions..so I have a small flicker of hope that that will keep me in the running.

I have another interview at Primary Children's on Tuesday for the Rapid Care Clinic in the ER there...we'll see how that goes.

I figure that if it worked once, it will work again. I will continue to apply for every available CNA position until they a) hire me to stop me from bombarding them with my applications, or b) block me from their site!

My boys come home later this morning, and our family will once again be complete and hopping with activity! Mostly sibling rivalry stuff...I think I might miss the quiet, but I will be glad to have everyone in one place!

Goin' On a Mouster Hunt....

My husband made a comment this evening about how we have suddenly become animal lovers because we suddenly have so many dang animals in our house. 1 temporary Gecko, a dog, and 5 hamsters....well we did have 5...

It is what every parent who allows a rodent into their home dreads. You go to check on said rodent (in our case rodentS) and it is missing, yes....MISSING!!!

Brenna had just returned home from her wonderful adventure in Virginia to find one of her furry friends absent from its home. We searched all over. These hamsters have escaped before, but that was because we thought a guinea pig cage made a good home. So....we looked, and looked, and looked some more...no 'mouster'.

The rest of the family had given up, I was still poking around. I was checking the caller ID in my husband's office when I heard some faint scratching coming from the air vent in the floor. I shined a flashlight down there, but couldn't see anything, so I went down to my craft room which is directly underneath. I was listening for more scratching and scurrying so that I could locate where the hamster was hidden. As I walked over to flip on the light, I saw a set of whiskers sticking out of our air intake/furnace setup....

Can you say "lucky"???? She still was having an incredibly hard time getting out of the hole, so we had to enlarge it a bit and pull back the sharp edges with a pair of needlenose pliers. I went up and grabbed her baby, some food, and of course...my camera! I was able to coax her out with her baby and the food bowl, which she gladly jumped into!


So....I have absolutely no idea how long she had been missing, or WHO helped her into her predicament. Noone in my house is 'fessing up. I am just grateful she was easy to find and that I didn't have to 'smell' her out if she ended up dying in our vents..................ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww...that would have made scrapping extremely unpleasant!

You Can't Win Them All...

Well folks, I guess it just isn't meant to be right now...The interview went awesome yesterday, everyone was really nice. But I guess it wasn't awesome enough because they sent me a rejection e-mail this morning. There were five positions open and six of us interviewing and what it came down to was that I hadn't worked in the medical field for 10 years and the other (very) young ladies had all just gotten their CNA's within the last year and were currently working in one facility or another. So....I've been sulking a bit, but I'll get over it! Someone in this town will see that just because I've been out of the field for 10 years doesn't mean I am out of the loop!!!

It's Finally Happening....

I have an interview scheduled with the Murray Women's Center at the new IHC hospital at 1:30 p.m.!!!!! After weeks of waiting, a position finally became available in the Maternal/Newborn unit. It is full-time, and I am hoping they need mostly nights. I have been reassured by my good friend Kim..who is a nurse there..that the nurse managers are wonderful to work with, very kind, and flexible with scheduling and such. I am very excited and extremely nervous at the same time...so I am just going to concentrate on not being a total blithering idiot tomorrow! Wish me luck! I'm sure I'll need it!

The best part about this whole thing is (besides being immersed with new moms and newborns)that in January they are opening a new nursing program through the local community college here. All I really need to do is take Chemistry this Fall (ICK!) and all my pre-requisites should be covered.....

So.....new path opened up, tons of new opportunities - nervewracking? Somewhat...Exciting? You betcha!!!