Here We Go!

Well, I guess I've jumped on the blogging bandwagon. Hopefully this will be somewhat interesting for others to read. I suppose this will make my life easier when it comes to updating family about what I've been up to - especially with a baby who thinks she needs to be held on my lap when I'm on the computer. FYI it takes a lot longer to type when you have to do it one-handed... I tend to be really wordy so bear with me!

I guess we'll start off with a little history about myself. I was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts. My mom comes from a long line of Eastern-European Jewish descent. My dad is a concoction of Dutch, German, and Japanese. I have been called a "melting pot," and for pretty good reason I think! We moved to California when I was about 2 years old, then a couple years later we moved to Tennessee. People are always surprised when I say I grew up on a 10 acre farm in the Appalachian Mountains. I think that's mostly because I don't have an accent (but I can fake one really well!). We lived on that farm until I was about 15 and then we moved to Salt Lake City. All the moving was due to my dad's job. I was homeschooled from 6th grade onwards, although I pretty much taught myself. In high school I took AP classes to get some college credit. I have worked as a CNA, an LPN and now an RN and I've done a few different areas of health care - long term care, adult ICU, adult med-surg (that sucked, by the way), and now pediatric ICU. I used to think I would go back to school pretty quick to become an NP but now I'm not sure I want to do that. I absolutely love my job and I really see no reason to change my job description when I love what I do already.

Mark @ Snowbird Mountain Resort

Me @ Snowbird Mountain Resort

Personal life: I met Mark right before I started college and we've been together ever since. Now, some of you will notice I'm not mentioning a marriage date - well, technically we're not "married." We don't have that piece of paper from the government acknowledging that we have a relationship, anyway. Frankly, we don't see the need for one. However, if you ask me a question about my husband I won't correct you. We say we're married because there really isn't a good word in the English language to convey our level of commitment besides that one. Saying "boyfriend" and "girlfriend" sounds too casual for a couple that's been together for 9 years and "partner" doesn't sound right either. So there you go. Anyway, we talked for years about having a baby - actually our discussions mostly involved Mark trying to convince me to have a kid. I was always the person who was always emphatic about NOT wanting kids. I put Mark off as long as I could but finally ran out of excuses last year. Now that our little girl is here, it seems hard to believe I was ever opposed to this! I guess all those cheesy cliches are true after all.

Our little family