Updates cont.

This is my first time adding pictures and I was messing everything up in the last post. So, I thought I would just put most of my pics in this post.



Grandpa and Grandma with the boys



Sharlow family


Granny and her girls


Sis and John

M & D

Kriegers



Harrbear

Grays/Sharlows/Kriegers


My sweet new apron

Hunter in his snuggie



Don't ask :)

Chris' turn



Chris and me

Breaking the wishbone from Thanksgiving. I won!

Updates galore

Once again, it has been forever since I have updated my blog. But, I have somewhat of an excuse. We were without a computer for over a month! It was terrible! A few days before Christmas, the computer just completely froze. I tried to troubleshoot it, and nothing worked. We ended up taking it to the Geek Squad at Best Buy the day after Christmas and they said that it was pretty much toast and that they needed to send it off to the manufacturer. Luckily, we had bought it less than a year ago so it was still under warranty. Chris blamed me though since I have a tiny tendency to download games off the Internet. I like to remind him that he has no proof that this was my fault :) Anyway, when the computer finally was shipped back to Best Buy, we then had to wait an extra week or two because we couldn't find the CDs that come with the computer or something like that. We set up out ancient laptop while our computer was out of commission, but let me tell you that using that computer makes you want to pull your hair out. It was sooo slow! To make matters worse, my phone then decided to die for no apparent reason and so I was phoneless for 2 days as well while waiting for a new phone to be shipped. $200 later, I have a new iphone. Let me just tell you how ridiculous it is that I am dependent on technology. Anyway, all is well now in the Krieger household.

Work is going really well. I really like my co-workers and feel like I am learning a lot. I kind of feel like a real nurse now! One thing I like about working on Neurology is that I have a lot of opportunities to practice my skills that I learned in nursing school. That was really important to me as a new grad to try to solidify my skills early on. A few nights ago I got to put in my first NG tube. This is a tube that is inserted through the nose down into the stomach. I must really be a nerd because stuff like that gets me really excited. I recently had an informal 3 month review and there wasn't anything that I needed to improve on. Score!

In November, Holly the Honda started to act up a bit. I was planning on getting a new car in the near future now that I had finally landed myself a respectable paying job, but she decided that I needed a new car sooner rather than later. She never once died on me in all of the years that I owned her and was pretty dependable for having close to 180,000 miles. Gotta love those Japanese made cars! Chris had previously looked at 4-Runners at the Honda dealership and had left his contact info with one of the salesman. Well, right when Holly was starting to show signs of distress, Chris got a call from the dealership that they just got a 2007 4-Runner in with 17,000 miles on it. Want to know what my only drawback was? It wasn't galactic gray like I was hoping for. Instead it was silver. Silly huh? But that reason alone caused me great turmoil for a couple of days. This 4-Runner was perfect besides and came with lots of bells and whistles including DVD players in the headrests (perfect for future Krieger kids). I finally stopped being silly and we welcomed Trixie the Toyota into the family.

Well shortly after we bought Trixie, Chris' truck started giving him trouble. He had a 2002 Ford F-150. We were not planning on him getting a new car anytime soon, believe me. When he was taking his truck to the shop, he drove by the Ford dealership and saw his perfect truck. It was like a sign from God. So after much debate, we decided that we could afford to go from no car payments to two. Yikes! Especially since Chris still has a motorcycle payment! But it was seriously too good to pass up and we thought about it long and hard. So, we now have added Tank the Tundra to the family as well.

Let's see. What else? Christmas was great considering there were a few bumps in the road. Being a new employee, I didn't quite understand the schedule and had thought that I had Christmas Eve and Christmas off since they fell on my normal days off. Chris and I had planned on going down to Klamath for a few days and then coming back on Christmas. Luckily I discovered about a week before Christmas that I indeed did have to work both Christmas Eve and Christmas. Wouldn't that have been horrible had I been down in Klamath? But, everything worked out and we spent Christmas day with my family and went down to Klamath for New Years. Here is the annual family picture:

Work update

Well, I have survived. I survived the tedious week of orientation, the two days that I spent hours on the computer, and 6 days orienting to day shift. Tomorrow I start a new journey. It is called graveyard. I have never worked a graveyard shift and I am starting to get a little nervous. I have been trying to stay up as late as possible these past two nights to try to adjust, but I only made it to 2:30 am. Tonight I am going to ride with Chris and try to stay up even later. Hopefully I don't completely die my first night working. I still have about 10 days left to orient to neuro before I get cut loose. I am starting to really enjoy my job and getting my first paycheck definitely made it all worth it! I think nights will be a great place for me to start off as a new nurse because they should be a little bit slower than the hustle and bustle of days and I should be able to ask a lot of questions when they arise.

Nothing else has really been new here in the Krieger household. Chris and I are trying to figure out where our next vacation will be. We have some free ticket vouchers that we received when we volunteered to take a later flight out to North Carolina this past July. We also think this will probably be out last "hurrah" before we have kids. The good news is that with my work pattern, I will only have to take 2 days off from work and be able to have 1o days off in a row. My work schedule will be (once I am on my own) Sunday and Monday night and then Saturday through Tuesday. This will rotate back and forth so I will work 2 days, have 4 days off, work 4 days, and have 4 days off. Not too shabby. Anyway, we are thinking about taking a vacation in February or March which will be right when we are about to have a nervous breakdown from the rainy Oregon weather. We were thinking it would be really easy to go to Hawaii but then again we have already been to Hawaii and would love to try someplace new like Tahiti or Fiji. Hawaii would be much much cheaper but guess what? I'm a nurse now! Yesss!!!

Chris and I did just celebrate our 3 year anniversary as well. I had to work that day and the next so we just went to our usual anniversary spot ( Outback) and had a nice evening together. Unfortunately the service at Outback was unusually crappy and I was just getting over a terrible cold so I couldn't taste much of the food. My taste was really off because the Coke tasted like Diet to me, even after they brought me a new glass. I just ended up drinking water instead. We are planning on going over to Bend this week for a few days to celebrate as well. My parents agreed to let us stay in their condo in Sunriver which will be nice. We will probably hit up the outlet mall and just spend a few days relaxing.

Neuro Nurse

Well, I finally got a real job! I was offered a graveyard position at the new hospital on Neuro. I will be working 24 hours a week. Perfect! The nurse manager for neuro/ortho basically let me hand choose my own job. She unfortunately did not have any ortho positions available, which would have been my first choice, but I was able to choose what shift I wanted on neuro as well as how many hours I wanted. I chose graveyard because Chris is on graveyard and it pays 4 more dollars an hour. Score! I didn't even have to interview. I go in for my pre-employment health screen on September 22 as well as renew my CPR certification. My first day of orientation is on September 25. I will then have another day of general orientation on the 28 and then go right into my clinical orientation the rest of the week. I am very excited but extremely nervous. I don't have much neuro experience so I will have to make sure that I crack open my nursing textbooks to review.

I am keeping busy coaching up at OSU. The team is in the middle of summer practices which are from 8-3 Monday through Friday. I try to make it to a few practices a week but have been working still at PCO. The team is really starting to improve which is very exciting. We have only had one football game and one volleyball game so far. I am also in charge of planning and organizing the alumni team which will cheer at the alumni game.

Chris and I went down to Klamath Falls this past weekend to visit his parents. Camille and I had a lot of girl time which included Cam getting her nails done while I got a pedicure, getting our rings cleaned, and scrapbook shopping. Camille showed me how to make cards which is a lot of fun. I am not sure what my work schedule is going to be but if I only have a day or two off in between shifts, I probably won't transition back to day shift on my days off. Therefore, there won't be anything for me to do in the middle of the night while I am awake other than clean or be crafty. We also played a few hands of Phase 10 (such a fun game!) while watching the Beaver and Duck games. Unfortunately the Ducks pulled off a win. The Beavers were beating UNLV the whole game until the 4th quarter when UNLV took the lead. I was on the edge of my seat but luckily the Beavs pulled through. We are now 2-0! Let's hope we keep this winning streak up!

Brittany Krieger, RN

Once again, it has been so long between posts that I had to go back and read my last one to see where I left off. I took the NCLEX near the end of July and am proud to say that I am officially a nurse now! The NCLEX is a very weird test and most people who take it think they failed miserably. I had absolutely NO CLUE how I did. Luckily I took the minimum amount of questions which means that I passed easily or bombed it. I didn't feel like I bombed it so I was hopeful. The next day I was able to receive confirmation online that I am officially an RN. I was offered a per diem job at my current doctors office where I have been working for almost 3 years. I will be starting IVs and doing the pre and post procedure care when patients come in for epidural steroid injections and other various procedures that we perform. I had my first day of training last Friday and it was a lot of fun! I had to successfully start three IVs on coworkers before I could try on patients. I got my first nursing paycheck yesterday and let me tell you how nice it was getting paid a nurse wage, even for only working 5 hours! I am in limbo with a job at the hospital right now. I spoke with the nurse manager for neuro/ortho last week and she made it sound like she would give me a job. Now I am just waiting. We will see.

This week daily doubles started for OSU cheerleading. Do I tend to put too much on my plate? Definitely. I worked a lot this week so I wasn't able to attend very many practices. But I am excited for the first beaver football game in one week. I am one of the orange squad coaches. Orange squad is the "JV" team and cheers at volleyball and women's basketball games. I will still get to coach on the field at the football games though which I am very excited about.

I don't think there is much else going on in the Krieger household. We had so much fun on our trip out east. We had a lot of fun in North Carolina with Chris' family and I actually did really well on the 10-12 hour drive to Kentucky. It was so fun seeing a lot of extended family. On our way out to North Carolina, we volunteered to take a flight 40 minutes later and in turn received two flying vouchers. We want to use them for Hawaii but I need to get a job established first. On our way home, we stopped in Vegas for UFC 100. That was fun since we got to meet up with two of our good friends, Tre and Jordan, who were on their honeymoon. I have to admit that Vegas is not my favorite place though because of all of the smoking and I wouldn't consider myself a party animal at all. I also did fairly well at the Blackjack table and ended up tripling my money! Not too shabby for a once addicted gambler (just kidding).

Time flies

Wow! It sure has been awhile since I have last updated! I am not sure if anybody even reads this anymore but since my sister started blogging, I decided to try to get back into it. Now let's see. What is going on now? First, I just finished nursing school. Funny how my last post is about starting nursing school. These past 2 years just flew by and before I knew it, I was getting pinned at the pinning ceremony. I have applied for numerous jobs but have yet to hear back on any of them. I am getting a bit frustrated as I was pretty hopeful that I would land a job fairly easily. But here I am and I have not even had the chance to interview yet. I am trying to be patient as I wouldn't be able to start working yet anyway. I am scheduled to take the NCLEX next month.

Tomorrow Chris and I are flying out to North Carolina to visit Chris' brother and his family. We are going to stay for about a week and then drive over to Kentucky to visit the rest of the Krieger clan. We are only going to stay for about a week and then we will drive back to North Carolina. On our way home, we are going to make a pit stop in Las Vegas. I bought Chris tickets to go to UFC 100. So we are going to stay at the Luxor for a few nights, watch the fight, and then come home after a long 2 weeks away. It should be a fun time!

Well, I think that is all for now. I will try to post more frequently than once every two years!

First week of school

Well, the trip to Mexico was awesome to say the least. We did have a few bumps in the road but nothing too bad. We had a blast hanging out with Chris' friend Kenny and his girlfriend Kelly. After a long day at Six Flags, we went out to dinner that night at a restaurant called Claim Jumper. It was really yummy and I am pretty sure I could make millions if I opened one up in this area. The next day they dropped us off at the loading dock for the cruise. We were able to check our luggage but we didn't have a boarding pass like all of the other passengers. Luckily it wasn't a problem.

The first day on the water, Chris and I somehow forgot to put on sunscreen. Needless to say, our Oregon bodies did not do well with the sun. We both got fried and spent the next few days suffering. Our first port was Puerto Vallarta where we swam with dolphins. I HIGHLY recommend this to anyone. It was an experience of a lifetime and something we will never forget. We spent way too much money on a DVD and pictures of our experience, but it was well worth it. Unfortunately it did rain a bit at this port and our next port, Mazatlan, but it didn't affect us too much. In Mazatlan, we rode ATVs on a little island called Stone Island. The "island" was really beautiful but it was a little shocking to see the living conditions that the locals live in. Our final stop was Cabo San Lucas. This was probably my favorite port in Mexico. We walked to the beach and spent the day playing in the water and riding jet skis. It was very fun although we had to head back to the ship pretty early in the afternoon. We ate dinner with two other couples every night. One couple was from Salem and actually had quite a bit in common with Chris and myself. We ended up hanging out with them a bunch on the ship and in Cabo.

Chris and I did happen to catch some colds while on vacation. Unfortunately, I think I am still a little bit sick. We were surprised to find out that you can buy an prescription medication over-the-counter in Mexico. When Chris gets a sore throat, it usually turns into tonsilitis or strep. He has found out that Augmenten is something that usually helps. We were able to buy some ashore which I think prevented him from getting really sick. On the way home, we ran into a little bit of trouble as well. Our flight from Seattle from Eugene was cancelled due to technical maintenance. In LA, we were offered a flight to Portland and then Eugene that left earlier and would put us in Eugene earlier, or a flight straight to Eugene from LA that left at 9 pm. We chose to fly to Portland first but were warned that the flight to Eugene could be cancelled as well. After waiting in the Portland airport for 3 hours and right before we were supposed to start boarding, we found out that our flight had been cancelled again! They were either going to shuttle us home on a bus or put us in a hotel. Chris and I were annoyed and so we decided to get a refund on our tickets and rent a car to drive home. We were able to pair up with a fellow passenger and his daughter and split the cost of the car. Despite a few minor setbacks, Chris and I had a blast on our vacation.

Well, it has been 3 days now since I have started nursing school. So far, so good. I have been doing a good job keeping up on the endless amounts of reading. I just can't believe that I am finally in nursing school. I haven't leaned a whole lot yet but next week I will start working in the nursing home for 3 weeks which should be educations. I will keep ya'll updated on that!

Well, I think that is all for now. Chris and I finally put together our desk last night so no more typing on the ground. Tootles!