Snow Day!

We finally got some much needed vitamin D today! Other than building AGW's first snow princess, we didn't do much. Carey is almost finished painting the bathroom and you'll see that his little girl gave him lots of advice! Oh, we also submitted our rank list. I'm not sure that it's final though, so I won't discuss it yet. Enjoy the pictures!

Everyday Fun!

I set a goal tonight to post more photos of our everyday life. Most of them will come from my iphone because it's usually handy, so they may not be the best quality, but y'all will get a glimps into our everyday fun! Enjoy!

A rare occasion and AGW's tragedy

We've had a bit of bad weather the last few days. So today we stayed home and did nothing. ALL DAY! This rarely happens and we definitely took advantage of it. After breakfast we sat on the couch reading and messing around on the computer. We did this until 11:30. That is unheard of! Then after lunch we were so exhausted from our laziness that we all laid down for a nap! Even AGW was still long enough to cuddle with us today. By 6:00 I thought I was going to go crazy though. Cabin fever set in for all of us. I learned today that I will have to suck it up if we go north and take AGW out in the cold. Otherwise cabin fever could be the end of me!

AGW may want to kill me one day for sharing this next little story, but it was the highlight of my day! Two nights ago she had a very traumatic experience: she pooped in the tub. Luckily, Carey jumped in and took care of the tub, toys, and turds and I attempted to calm a horrified little girl. She really didn't handle it very well at all. The whole event was:

A.) Shocking- she hasn't actually seen what comes out of a diaper

B.) Dirty- she is very much like her Daddy and a clean freak! She doesn't like anything on her hands, feet, ect so this was extremely difficult to handle

C.) A hard lesson learned about cause and effect.

Which brings me back to the highlight of my day. It was bath time again and I was really hoping she had forgotten about the tragedy. Instead, she wrapped every limb around me and clung to me like a monkey. I couldn't shake her loose. We eased into the tub and over-exaggerated the bubbles and toys to make it a positive experience. Finally, she relaxed... a little too much. All of a sudden she let out a scream and began panicking. I could see the horror in her eyes as tears streamed down her beat-red face. She had farted! That hard lesson on cause and effect was haunting her again and she just knew it would be floating up beside her!

Is it cruel that this was the highlight of my day? I hate that she was terrified, but I laughed until I cried and I'm still laughing now. It's all out of love for her though. My poor monkey girl. She may never take a bath again!

Already checked out....

I've stopped worrying about where we are going. I even stopped worrying about our next house. I already moved in, sort of. You see, I'm at a stand-still in this house. If I pack up anything else Carey might flip (he says he has other things to do first. Imagine that!) Plus I'm running out of room in the garage. By packing, I mean taking things out to the garage and piling them as high as possible. So I went ahead and checked out of this house and into my new house.

Most people have inspiration folders or even notebooks. I have an inspiration suitcase. I've decided to share some of my favorite inspiration rooms and hopefully in the years to come I'll be able to to mix and match and create our own!
I started with AGW. Her new bedroom is so much fun!

 

I also started dreaming about the nursery!

And finally, just a few ideas for the playroom. I really hope we get one!

So yes, I've been useless tonight. But it was fun dreaming! Hopefully I'll know more about our rank list next week. Carey has pushed everything except anatomy from his mind this week and is focusing on his wrapping up this block tomorrow. He plans on working on the bathroom a little this weekend and starts Geriatrics next week. Should be exciting!

Weekend Warriors

There's some major tension around the house tonight! I'm driving Carey nuts with my "crunching" of dry cereal. My favorite snack happens to be his biggest pet peeve. The real issue though, has to do with the long list of touch ups and repairs that we've started tackling around the house. You already saw the plumbing problem, add to it wall paper, linoleum flooring, and a complete change of color, and you have tension. I took on the wall paper during AGW's afternoon nap. To my surprise, it came off easily and I had half of it off before I realized it! As I ripped and pulled I thought "Man. I rock! I'll have all of the wall paper off before she wakes up! I really rock! I am a wall paper rockstar!" Then the vanity light bulb exploded just inches from my face and I was jolted back into reality. I'm pretty sure God was saying "By the way, you're doing a pretty good job, but I rock!" Point taken. Humility in check.

Now it's Carey's turn for a lesson in humility. He's battling it out with the paint and from the mumbling and grumbling, I'm guessing he might be on the losing end. Did I mention that we just started the touch ups and repairs? We still have to paint every single wall, door, and baseboard in this house. Not to mention tile the bathroom, kitchen, and entry. On the bright side, we should be very humble by the time we pack up our paintbrushes and tools!

Type A Behavioral Patterns

A year ago my sweet husband bought me a book to help prepare me for residency. I loved it. Last week he surprised me with a new book, The Medical Marriage. I have mixed feelings so far. About myself, not the book :) Carey and I spent time this morning unraveling are personalities so that we will survive residency without killing each other. Here's what we've learned so far:

1. We both have narcissistic traits.
2. We both have major control issues that stem from major insecurities.
3. Carey is more messed up than me because he has many more of the Type A traits than I do.
4. Ok, I made the last one up! Could my multiple personalities make me the messed up one? :)
5. We are never satisfied, impatient, hurried, anxious, and have overly reactive central nervous systems.

All of the above pitfalls (and others) are things that hinder successful medical marriages. The book emphasizes the importance of learning to highlight the strengths of these personality behaviors and minimize the weaknesses so that we both cope with the intense stress of residency in a constructive way. Behavior modification is tough. Especially for two narcissists. Pray for us. Please!

This was all during breakfast. Needless to say, AGW was not interested. The rest of our day made up for it though. The office is now an office/bedroom and amost all of AGW's toys fit in her room! Yeah!

Happy Day!

The Watson household is filled with joy today! Carey is home! This time he'll get to stay more than six hours with us before rushing off to another interview. He's exhausted from traveling and tired of interviews and said that at this point in the game, you can tell that everyone else is too. The residents and other interviewers have been asking and answering the the same questions for dozens of future doctors since November. I don't think any of them care any more! For up and coming MSIV's, I would definitely suggest scheduling your least favorite programs in late January and early February and your top programs in November, December so that your fresh. His last interview is in Pittsburgh next week. I can't wait for them to be over, but I'm trying to remain optimistic for him! Because our rank list can be submitted any time now and I think I can predict where we will end up, my impatience has increased dramatically! That's a huge prayer request for me: PATINCE!

Proof! To be used in future discussions...

Tonight Carey made a huge mistake and I saved the proof! :) He's in North Carolina for an interview so we were talking on messenger before bed.  I found an example of a way to change a cookie-cutter kitchen into one that is worn and weathered. We hadn't discussed interviews or moving today, so this was out of the blue. Now he's stuck though and you better believe that I'll hold him to it!

Watson says:

I will let you do anything you want to the house (as long as we can afford it and it's feasible) if we go to Ohio...that way you are happier about being inside



Mrs. Watson says:


yeah!!!! should i save that or something?

And I did. Hehe! Oh the messes I will make and the fun I will have!

my newest project

Carey's latest project: Yep. That's a giant hole in the wall behind our shower. Good thing he's getting in some practice now, looks like I'll get to have lots of remodeling projects when we move! :)

the puppies

AGW too cool for school!

Where we are now

Before I catch you up on where we are today, here are a few extra thoughts:
1. I have set a goal to update my blog as often as possible, but no guarentees! Some weeks will be better than others. I have so many different ways of sending out info (text, email, myspace, facebook, twitter, snail mail!) that I'm having a hard time keeping up! Plus not everyone is interested in those methods of communication so if you're waiting for pictures and updates, wait no more! It is now up to you to check our blog for updates!
2. Luckily, this thing has spellcheck. But that's it. Please excuse grammatical errors. There will be many!
3. I'll make this thing as flashy and pretty as I can when I figure out how. Hopefully soon!

Moving on!
Carey: Poor guy is sick of traveling! He has been across the country and back several times for General Surgery Residency interviews and is exhausted. He's also missing his little girl quite a bit! This is his 4th and final year of medical school and he will start his intern year this summer. We won't know where he will do his residency until March 18th. That's Match Day, a HUGE day in our lives! This semester he is focusing on finishing up the last few blocks (classes) so that he can graduate in May. Then he will actually be a doctor! His interviews have all gone very well and he will have a really hard time deciding how to rank the programs. The match works like this: we rank all of  the programs that we applied to, the programs rank all of the students who applied there and you match accordingly. That was a very simplified explaination, but that's how it works in a nutshel. February 14th is the day that we submit our list and we will know nothing until March. Ideally, we will immediately start our real estate hunt and be able to move to our home for the next 7-9 years by May. We'll see if that happens! Carey has just a few more places to interview but we have started narrowing down our list. Here is a RANDOM list: Houston, Dallas, Charleston, Birmingham, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, Little Rock, Chapel Hill. I'll send out our final list when he decides more about each program and we rank them. So exciting!

Aisley Grace: This girl is a wild child! She is 17 months old starting to develop a strong personality. I love it! She is very verbal and communicates well. Books, baby dolls, and race cars are on her list of favorites. We read every day at breakfast and lunch and have "special time" built in throughout the day for reading. Her interest in reading has made that part of my job easy! Aisley is also very much an outdoors girl. I'm so grateful for that! We make sure to play outside as much as possible and you can see a difference in her mood when we do!

Me: I'm loving staying home with AGW! I think it's helped Carey a lot too because he's so busy lately. It's really nice to be home during the day when he is. After Christmas I began decluttering. This is the 1st step to packing. I'm suppose to be thinning out, but those of you who know me well, know better than that! It's a long process with a toddler as a helper! Very soon we will move out excess furniture and only keep the daily essentials. Then the real work begins: cleaning, repairing, painting, and staging. We will be very busy over the next few months! Exciting months!!!
 

Hello!

Hi friends and Welcome! Here you will share in our laughter and tears as we begin our residency journey. I'll do my best to keep everyone updated on how Carey is surviving, try not to complain too much about being a surgeon's wife, and of course, report often on the one you are really here to see: Miss Aisley Grace. I hope this serves as a way to keep all of our family and friends informed, but it will also be my personal journal and a way for me to express my joys, worries, and frustrations (and there will be many!). So consider yourselves warned: this is the good, the bad, and the ugly of the Watson family!