Just do it!!! Monday Funday!

     I have been CRAVING the beach. I am a beach girl, love, love, love being there. Other than a waaayyyy too quick trip to the beach while in the Bahama's I haven't been since I had Raelee. So obviously Rae has never been. How sad that our Florida baby had never seen the beach! Well, schedule's have just not worked out for us to go as a family, so finally I decided to just do it and go with Rae the next time I could. Brad was okay with us going without him. I begged, bribed, nicely asked my little bro to go with us for safety's sake and we hit the road this morning. Well, the plan was to leave at 9am, but as it always ends up, we didn't leave Tally until after 10am. That was okay though, cause it worked well with Rae's nap time and she slept the whole way there. It was so nice to be on the road. It has been forever since I've driven through Crawfordville, Panacea, Carribel, and Lanark Village just to name a few of the little towns on the way to St. George Island. I grew up driving on these roads, all the time, many days a week, and its very relaxing to be surrounded by the greenry on the two lane roads, listing to country music, and not seeing too many other cars. I could feel the stress leaving me as we drove. We made good time, less than 2 hours to the beach, and we arrived just in time for lunch. Raelee was in love with the seagulls. Matthew threw some food to them(big mistake cause then they wouldn't leave us alone) and they came flying in. Raelee was soooo excited, it was so cute to watch.
     The water was gorgeous! It was the perfect temperature, and the beach wasn't too crowded, just enough people, I don't like it to be super crowded, but I like to have other peeps in my sights. Raelee liked the water, she mostly enjoyed it, every now and then she would act like she thought she was supposed to be scared, but the rest of the time she was laughing and squealing, and kicking her legs in the water.
     Matthew found a bunch of sand dollars, which was pretty cool, cause I've never found one before that wasn't broken. The sad part was Matt and I did not put sunblock on, because we were only there a couple hours, and whew we got burnt! Matt worse than me, but still!
     Driving back home was super relaxing too. We took the shortcut and drove on some back roads, so it was pretty much all woods back to my parents house. I really needed that, it was so peaceful. I'm so glad we went to the beach today, and I'm going to try to have many more adventures this summer,even though its hard to pack up the car and all the supplies for Raelee without Brad. I need to feed that adventure side of me. I've missed it the last few years. Hopefully it will help me deal with the stress at work better.

lunch time

    

sand dollars

Saturday

     What a fun weekend we had!!! Now that Brad's out of school, we are all pumped and excited to get our life in order. Sooooo...yesterday was laundry day! Dun dun dun! Sadly, the laundry frequently piles up around here, as does some other non-essential housework. When the wife is working 12 hour days at a hospital taking care of others all day, and the husband is working full-time and in school full time at night , just taking care of the child and making sure everyone is fed is about all that can be accomplished. So we are super excited now to catch up on the house. Anyway, back to laundry, I do make sure its clean, its just the putting away part that gets hard. But we put away all the laundry AND cleaned out our closets and drawers(you are welcome goodwill). We even made it through the sock pile! I am super proud of us! Next week...organizing the office!
    After the housework was done, we went and visiting with Brads parents and brother. It was good to be able to spend some time at their house. Brad's mom had put together a video of Raelee's video's she taken, it was super fun to watch. Raelee LOVES to watch herself be a star!
     Then date night!!! Whoooohoooo! We went to see the new Pirates of the Caribbean movie. You know what? I didn't really want to see it at first, buuutttt over the last few weeks as I've seen previews, I decided that it actually looked interesting, and it was! I really, really enjoyed it! Good plot, not too crazy, scary mermaids. I say its worth seeing. I was kinda bummed, cause we got there early to make sure we got good seats and were going to take Cold Stone ice cream in(which they've let us do before when we've gotten there early) but it was a no go this time :(   Soo we got Dairy Queen instead after the movie. A good friend came to see it with us, and we walked her to her car after, cause parking lots+dark=dangerous! When we were walking back to our car, we got to observe some of the ghetto potty mouths that Tallahassee has to offer. I forget now that we live on a nicer side of town how not nice and uncaring some people are. Then I got a blister on my heel, so Brad tried to piggy back me, which made us both decide we have GOT to start exercising and get in better shape. I'm sure we were pretty entertaining to those around us! So goals of the week: Stay up on the laundry and exercise!

videos of Raelee

Here's some videos we took of Raelee in the last few weeks. The slide video is from today. Today's the first time she's climbed it by herself.

nominee

     Last week I found out that I was my departments nominee for nurse of excellence 2011. What!!! I was shocked! Now I know that I am an excellent nurse, not being conceited just true, but I'm more the quiet, fly under the radar kinda coworker. I work with some awesome women, who have taught me soooo much. I still view myself as the newbie, but I've been working there 6 years now, and trained probably half then nurses there now. Anyway, I was surprised, but happy that my coworkers felt that way. The hospital had an awards ceromony last Friday afternoon to kick off nurses week, and they announced of the nominees of every dept. It was so fun. It worked out well that my dad is an RT at the hospital cause he was able to hold Raelee while the awards were being handed out. And Raelee was a hit!!! She was hamming it up, clapping and cheering, so cute!
     Last night was the banquet. All the big places in town that employee nurses were there to announce their winners of their facility's nurse of excellence. It was held at the University Club, which was super nice. I started getting nervous as the winners were announced and were giving speeches. I wasn't told about that part! Anyway, CRMC's winner was TBA, I think there were 17 nominees including me. I didn't win, but thats okay, it was still nice to be the winner of my dept.and to have a night out with Brad.
     We actually had two date nights in a row. The night before was our 5 year anniversary. Crazy that we've been married that long! My dad watched Raelee and we went out for dinner at the outback, and then went to see Thor after. Pretty good movie AND we found out that Governors Regal Cinima has movie's mon-thurs for $5.00. Pretty good deal! It was kinda weird though because the actor who plays Thor looks alot like Heath Ledger, the way he smiled and talked. It made us sad that Heath has passed on. A Knights Tale is one of our fave movies. Anyway, back to happy, I was sooooo surprised that Brad bought me a Pandora bracelet! I love it! I only have one charm bead to start with, it's a shell with a little gold star fish on it. Brad picked this one cause he calls me shell and because I LOVE the beach so much. I have been wanting the bracelet for awhile, but never said anything to Brad about it, but one of his coworkers told him he should buy me one and he was like, "Shelley would love that!" and I do! It'll be fun to add charms for occasions in life :)
     So its been a very fun week, but sooooo tiring too! I worked Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, and I'll be working this weekend. FYI I work 12 hour shifts, they make for very long and tiring days. Wed and Thurs I was able to leave early to celebrate our anniversary and the banquet, but I still had to wake up at 5am those days. I am sooooo tired today! I probably would have slept all day if not for Raelee. Thankfully she slept in unitl 9am today. Thank you baby!

This is how we found Rae in her crib Monday night

Anniversary!

Rae in her carseat getting ready to go see Grandpa

Tomorrow is here!!!

Tomorrow is the day Brad and I have been waiting for since 2006. Brad is GRADUATING!!! I am so so so excited!!! We were talking tonight about all the changes in our lives since he started college and I though I'd share:
1. Brad was the manager at ChuckECheese's and I started working as a nurse(RN).
2. Brad started working at Mathers Electric as an apprentice electrician. 3. We got married!
4. Brad cut his hand at work and almost lost a finger. Had surgery and lots of stitches and couldn't work for three months while his hand healed. Big time blessing from the Lord that it did heal, the surgeon wasn't sure if the surgery would work.
5. A few months after starting back at Mathers, Brad decided that the risk of injury wasn't worth it, and started working at Nature's Finest as a Pest Technician.
6. Brad was in a wreck that was a hit and run( he was okay), but from this we decided to buy our Honda CR-V.
7.We bought a house!
8.Our house flooded and we had to move in with my parents for almost 2 months while it was being repaired.
9. Brad tore something in his knee playing baseball and almost had another surgery.
10. Brad was promoted to manager at Nature's Finest.
11. We became parents.
12. Brad started working as a Financial Accountant at Canopy Oaks Elementary School.
13. Leaving Grad rehearsal Brad was hit by another car on Capital Circle. Had it happened less than an hour earlier during rush hour there would have been injuries for sure. Thank you Lord that Brad and the other driver are okay and that Raelee wasn't in the car with Brad. Oh and that he was driving his beat up car and not the CR-V.
      Also in during this time, Brad's dad had two heart bypasses done and many other surgeries on his heart. We had deaths in the family. Two of my siblings got married. Our well broke. Our AC unit for our house was stolen. Friends came home from missions. We went on a cruise. Our BFF's had babies...I could keep typing all night I think!
     Quote by Brad "All in all, it's been an awesome experience"
     I just want to say how proud I am of Brad. He's the first in his family to go to college and it wasn't really something that he had planned on when he graduated high school. I am so proud of all he has juggled during this time. He has been an amazing husband and friend. He is a great father. I am most proud of Brad because he has worked full time all these years, and for most of them he was also taking a full time load at college. That was not easy. We've felt bad cause we've had to tell family and friends over and over again, "we can't do (fill in the blank) cause our schedules are too busy". We weren't just saying that, they really were! We're excited to start on this new chapter of our lives and be able to spend more time with family and friends. Congrats Bradley!!!xoxoxo