Nataliegafford's Weblog

Update

nataliegafford — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 01:05:47 +0000

I never feel like I have anything exciting/fun/worthy of mentioning happening in my life. I just looked at the last thing that I posted and man, a lot has happened since then. Most people know most of this by now, but I will go ahead and type it all out anyway. Things that have happened in the past 2 and a half months:

~ I moved from Hawaii to the Houston area.

~ I had an interview and did not get the job.

~ From that job that I did not get, I got an interview for another position.

~ I got the job! On an OB/GYN floor at a hospital just 10-15 minutes from my house.

~ Thomas played in Houston and we had suite tickets. It was so stinking fun! All of our family and many friends were there to cheer him on and support him.

~ I have watched, become addicted to and completed numerous TV series. My latest being Veronica Mars…..I know, it is a crazy and time consuming addiction.

~ We went to one of Thomas’ games in Kansas City! They won, and it was so fun and such a fun game to be at. COLD, but still fun.

~ I am going to Belton/Temple this weekend. To spend time with Julie, Allye, Khang, and hopefully some other people that I haven’t seen in a while.

~I start my job on Monday! I am so excited about it! The first few days are probably going to be boring. Going through hospital orientation and learning policies.

I hardly ever remember my dreams, but the other day I very vividly remembered a crazy dream. I have always wanted to remember my dreams, I really like when I do

The End.

We did it!

nataliegafford — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 06:16:21 +0000

…… Well, almost anyway. One month glutten free. I kinda had some doubts, but I did it. There were a few mistakes here and there, mainly from just completely forgetting that something had glutten in it. It really wasn’t too bad. I think the worst part was realizing that SO MANY things have glutten in them! Like thinks like soy sauce, teriyaki sauce, any breads, noodles, most desserts, most cereals. But, you kinda start to get creative, or in our case, we are a lot of beans, rice and chicken on corn tortillas. There was only one time that I just really started to crave a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. (And let me tell ya, PB&J on a corn tortilla is just not the same!)

I was talking to Dani Beth today, and I really don’t think I am going to go totally back on glutten. Definitely not all at once. I really don’t think my body could handle that right now.Especially if I were to bring back dairy and glutten, that could be a dangerous combination. I am very excited about being able to eat ice cream again! Man, dessert just doesn’t get better than a good ‘ole bowl of ice cream!

Today we went up to the North Shore and ate a Luibuenos. It was MUI BUENO!! By far the best mexican food on the island! Then we went to Sunset beach and just relaxed and spent some good quality time with some sweet friends! It was a wonderful Sunday for sure!

Adios.

Glutten free!

nataliegafford — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 22:14:34 +0000

Wow, I just realize how sinking long it has been since I have been on here!

So much has happened, summer came and is almost over now, although I really don’t have summers any more, just work all the time. We had SO many visitors this summer! He have had at least 12 people stay at our house this summer, and I may be forgetting some. crazy.

Dani Beth and I have decided to go glutten free for a month! And I am going to go lactose free for the month too. We start today! So far, for breakfast, I had a banana and mango. and for lunch I tried to be really creative and it did not turn out so well! It was edible, but I’ll try something else next time! I baked some chicken, and thawed some shrimp. made rice noodles and chicken broth. Threw them all in a bowl and tried to add some garlic,dried onions, red pepper, and some salt. It was kind of like chicken noodle soup, but not really. I’ll have to look up some more recipes very soon.

If you are wondering why in the world we would be going glutten free for a month, I will tell you. One of our good friends is glutten intolerant and so, to be able to better understand what she is going through, and to walk through it with her, we are joining her in her glutten free diet for a month. I am kind of excited about it. I like new challenges.

I have realized that mornings go by way too fast! I get up, go for a run or hike and then think about what to eat for lunch and before I know it, I have to start getting ready for work! Oh well, on that note, I need to go get ready for work now.

Adios.

Runnin Runnin Runnin

nataliegafford — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 19:36:57 +0000

Sorry if I have already told you this….

Yesterday I ran my first Half Marathon. It was such a cool experience! To wake up SUPER early, and be at a park with hundreds of people, and run 13 miles with them! This may sound a little silly, but I was kinda proud of how I did. I was pretty much expecting to make it in 2 hours and 15 minutes. But my official time was 2:08:13. I also didn’t think I would be able to run the whole thing, but I never stopped! (well, except to slow down enough to take a few sips of water at the water stations. After the first one, my face learned it was better to slow down than to try and run and drink at the same time) I am actually feeling pretty good for just running it, Yesterday afternoon and today my right hip/groin area is hurting pretty bad, but other than that, I feel GREAT! Here are some pictures…

This was the tracking chip I wore that recorded my official time and pace and what place I came in.

(Before)This is me about 10 minutes before the race started. You can just barely see Diamond head to the right.(After) Here I am at the finish line! It felt so good to be done!

I think the only thing that I would have changed through this experience is to have someone to run with. Especially for the training! It gets kinda lonely and boring just running by yourself all the time. But I still had a lot of fun on this adventure!

Now that I am finished with my first race, I am thinking about my next one. And, I think I already know I will be doing one in New Braunfels in October! It is to raise money for adoption, and my cousins are in the process of adopting! A bunch of my family are already talking about going out to it! Which will be so much fun!

Today will be my first day of my my new schedule at work. I will be working Monday – Friday 2-10:30 PM. I am not sure how much I will like this, but we will see. It is sad that I will only see Dani Beth and the summer missionaries on the weekends now. They are all up at the church by the time I will get up, and I will already be at work when they get done at the church, and because they have such early mornings, they will be fast asleep by the time I get home. Thankfully I still have Deanna and the girls to spend time with some mornings. I am not sure if I am going to like this whole working 5 days a week thing. I mean, it just seems like such a drag……Why do so many people do it? That’s supposed to be one of the perks of being a nurse, only working 3 days a week. Oh well, I will survive, and who knows, I may really like it.

I guess that is all for now.

~Nat

Shout Out to Allie!

nataliegafford — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 04:46:26 +0000

It was brought to my attention earlier this week that I have not blogged in a very long time (Hence the shout out to Allie, Thanks!) So, here it goes.

I was trying to figure out what I have been doing the past few months, mainly just working and working out. But nothing too exciting. I have watched Band of Brothers (minus the 3rd and 4th episodes). I am going full time at work, starting next week, and I am going to be coming to Texas for 10 days in July!

I made some meaty cake and a cheese ball for a pot luck that I am about to go to. MMMmm, I love me some meaty cake! It is terrible for you , but oh so good. Ingredients = ice cream sandwiches, cool whip, caramel, magic shell, and a candy topping!

Meaty Cake and Cheeseball

Last night Dani Beth and I played banana grams. She won by one letter, it was a close game. Here is a picture of our puzzles.

Banana Grams!

Tomorrow I am going to go workout at the Crossfit Oahu gym. I hope I am still alive after to tell about it.

Well, I am off to a pot luck. Hopefully I can start blogging about more interesting things in the near future. I will be thinking about it!

Aloha and thanks for reading!

busy week!

nataliegafford — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 03:45:56 +0000

My family was here last week! It was so incredibly good to have them here! We did so much and were worn out every night! Here is a synopsis of what we did.

Saturday – pick them up from the airport, late night dinner, and bed

Sunday – church, spitting cave, china wall, waikiki.

Monday – Sunrise workout, Hanauma bay, Maunawili falls

Tuesday – Northshore, waimea falls, parent’s resort

Wednesday – Pearl Harbor, Swap meet at Aloha Stadium, Dukes, sunset run

Thursday – Dive day! me and dad= scuba diving, Mom and Mist= sky diving, Burgers at the beach, Dinner at the resort

Friday – Koko crater, Kailua Beach Park, Kayaking, Luau

Saturday – Judd trail, me busting my head on a rock, and then snorkeling at Hanauma again! then to the airport!

It is kind of weird not knowing exactly when I will be going back to Houston, or seeing any of my family. It will all come in time though!

Ready for some snorkeling!

Just sittin by Waimea falls!

Who wouldn't want to do hand stands at the top of a crater just a few feet from the edge?

Me, Momma and Daddy at the luau!

Houston!

nataliegafford — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 07:26:06 +0000

Man, it is so good to be home! I can’t even explain how refreshing it is to be around the people I love and miss! Being home has included:

~lunch with mom’s side of the family

~awesome worship with family and friends at church

~lunch and Tuna with Dad’s side of the family

~Tumble day at the studio

~Delicious food: Gringos, chick-fil-a, sonic, freebirds

~Trip to Katy Mills mall with Mom and Jess

~Spending time with dear friends and making homemade frappes

Yet To Come:

~ Getting to see more of friends

~ More family time with my incredible family

~ More great food!

~Trip to Belton/Temple

~ And much more!

Sorry, I just realized that I have not been taking any pictures of my adventures here in Houston, I will start to pull out the camera!

Time is Flying!

nataliegafford — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 02:18:00 +0000

Man, I have become TERRIBLE at updating this thing! Sorry!

I am now only one week and one day away from seeing my family in San Diego!! I am so stinking excited about this! I have never gone this long without being around family. It will be so nice to be around them! We don’t have much planned, but I told them the one thing that we have to do is to eat Bar-B-Q! Oh man, that brisket is going to be so good! haha.

I was just thinking the other day how it seems crazy to me that this ‘semester’ is almost over, I feel like this has been the quickest semester ever! This could be because my life isn’t in semesters anymore…I don’t know. But time is so weird, at the same time it feel like forever that I have not seen my family or close friends, but at the same time, I can’t believe it is almost Thanksgiving!

Speaking of Thanksgiving, I am very excited for our Hawaii Thanksgiving! Dani Beth’s mom is flying out, and we and out friends, the Burdetts are going to have Thanksgiving dinner together! As an added bonus, I got a $50 gift card to the grocery store from work! This means we got a free turkey!! Praise the Lord!

This weekend is going to be absolutely crazy! I have always wanted to go to a surf competition, so Dani Beth and I are going to go check it out on Saturday! The down side to this is that I work Friday night!! This means, Dani Beth will be driving up to the North Shore, and I will be drinking LOTS and LOTS of coffee!

I know, I have said this before, but I really am going to try to up-date more often. No promises, but I will try!

Just a cool tree that I like

Working girl!

nataliegafford — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 07:10:47 +0000

As promised, I am now updating my blog.

It has been a pretty crazy and busy time for me! Which I am very thankful for! Work is going very well. At first it was very overwhelming, but I think I am starting to get the hang of it! I have 2 more days of training and then I will be on my own! Ahh, so scary and exciting all at the same time! I have been learning so many new things I just don’t know where to start. I am learning how to chart things correctly and take phone calls and make phone calls and how to log everything. Man, there is a lot to learn when it comes to learning all of the policies and procedures for a facility! Unfortunately I had to learn what paperwork needs to be done when someone falls. There are like 4 different papers that need to be filled out and faxed and all put in different places. I am hoping that I will not have fill these papers out very often! I will be happy to start to get to know the residents better. This is one of the things that is holding me back and slowing me down the most. Every time I go to give a medication, I have to ask other people who everyone is, which really slows down the process of passing out medications and doing treatments. But, yesterday I started recognizing some of the residents and it made things go so much more smoothly! I know this is kind of strange, but I kind of like the night shift better than the day shift. With nights, I can work all night, come home go to sleep at about 7:30 or 8, sleep until about 12:30 or 1, or 2…and still have time in my day to get things done before going into work again or before it gets dark. But with day shift, I have to wake up at 4:30 AM, leave the house by 5:15, get to work before the sun actually rises, and then I don’t get off until 6:30 or 6:45 PM and by the time I get home it is completely dark, I am so incredibly tired, and I don’t want to do anything. But, since I will be working on-call, I should be able to pick up an equal amount of day and night shifts. Today we had a mandatory meeting, so I drove to work at 2:30 and then once I got there, I realized that I looked at the wrong time for the meeting and that the meeting really started at 5. So, I did what anyone would do when they had 2 1/2 hours to kill and didn’t want to drive the 40 minutes home and the 40 minutes back to work, I went and read at the beach for a while. (This is definitely one of the perks to living and working near the beach) It was an awesome beach too! There was a place to rent kayaks and some little islands to explore not too far off shore, and just a really cool place! I will definitely be going back to explore these as soon as I find someone to go with me!

A few evenings ago, Dani Beth took some family pictures for some of our friends. and we just happened to be going to this lady’s house where they sometimes shoot LOST! Apparently, they were going to be shooting so really dangerous stunts down there the next day, and so we got to see all the stuff set up for the filming! It was pretty cool! Unfortunately there wasn’t anyone there, but they did have security guards everywhere so nothing would happen to all of the props. This was just my first step….I am still hoping that I can be on one of the episodes! (I know I know, it probably won’t happen, but I can still dream can’t I?)

Things to look forward to….My birthday is in about 2 weeks and I get to see my family in about 6 weeks!!!! I am so excited! There are days that I get pretty home-sick, but I know that I can make it 6 weeks!!

Climbing one of the ladders on the set of LOST!

Coming Soon!

nataliegafford — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 07:23:27 +0000

I promise I will update soon! Hopefully tomorrow night…..