Birthday Girl

I love birthdays so much, and this year's was especially good. Probably because my family and friends spoil me. Okay definitely that's why. Favorite things about my 23rd birthday, in no particular order:

•  Pre-birthday celebration Saturday night at Cheesecake Factory slash Fashion Place shopping with Elizabeth and John. 

• Breakfast at Chick-fil-A. (Lowlight, having to leave the house at 6:15 and drive to Sandy, but hey! At least it's not Ogden. Months til the internship is over: 3) I miss the mornings when Evan would wake me up at 10:15 and ask if I wanted to go get a chicken biscuit and a Diet Coke. Those were the days. I miss the South...

• Phone calls. Starting with my annual midnight call from Caisa. I thought when I got married those might stop. Guess not! Good thing I'm really lucid when I'm half awake :) Call from Sam in Jru, Kelli in DC and Kristan in Connecticut. They love me. Also got some beautiful musical numbers from my very talented parents, aunt, uncle, cousins and children complete with "cha cha cha"s. 
• Monday night Evan and I were planning on going to dinner then meeting our friends for Yogurtland. Buuut, he surprised me and invited everyone to Happy Sumo. I love him. Sushi + favorite people = happiness. (Shout out to Caisa for eating Happy Sumo despite her aversion to sushi.)

Also to this girl for filling in for Sam while she is out-of-country:

• Also shout out to Melissa for tweeting @YogurtlandOrem and getting me a second punch for my birthday. And then for giving me her punch. And also the nice stranger behind me who offered me his punch, and Evan and Candice for giving me their punches. And to Tiff for buying me Yogurtland. I am officially in the drawing for the Hunger Games premier tickets. #futurewinner

Basically, my birthday was the bomb. My family spoiled me with presents and phone calls and I got to play with all my friends. Favorite quote of the day from Dave Brooks "23! Time to start making babies!" Subtle dad, subtle.

I Heart February

Naturally February rocks because there is a whole day devoted to celebrating my entrance into the world, but it has been an especially good February, and we haven't even made it to the let's-celebrate-shannan's-existence day yet. Reasons why I heart this month:

1. I had a FABULOUS weekend in DC with this girl...

We ate our little hearts through Georgetown (including Georgetown Cupcakes AND Sprinkles), shopped Barneys New York, Kate Spade, Anthro, Jcrew... and then topped it all off with a cheesy Katherine Heigl chik-flic and Serendipity desserts. Thank you Georgetown for giving me an excuse for a sisters weekend in Bethesda. Oh, and thanks for accepting me :)

2. 2 out of 2 grad school acceptance letters. We're moving to DC! Which is already very exciting, but to top things off I got a text from one Mrs Whitney Davis saying Paul quit his job and they're moving to DC! Obviously I can't wait to be reunited, make no bake cookies, run until we're so skinny we disappear when we turn to the side, and tan until Whitney is burnt :) We've been apart entirely too long.

3. Also, I am finally done with my daily Ogden commute. I never have to write another chart note, nutrition diagnosis, or PES statement again. Ever. This is definitely cause for celebration. Clinical rotation: check! Just over 3 months and I will be Shannan Monson, RD, CD, MHA candidate. Can you tell I like letters? Evan and I celebrated by having cheesecake and Vday cookies for dinner. Unfortunately for my parents, all this grad school stuff means the only child we're having for a few years is Diet Coke. The gift that keeps on giving...

Happy February people. I'm sure you all can hardly wait until March... National Nutrition Month AND Registered Dietitian day all in a few weeks. Time to get your plate in shape! Woot woot! What do you think Emily Vaterlaus, MS, RD, CD, purple milk again this year?

Fake Diabetes

I should really just go back to updating my personal blog because my attempts at a funny couple blog are kinda an epic fail. Oh well, that's a lot of work considering I maybe have 3 followers. Moving on...given that I whined for months about how much I hated my internship, I feel like its appropriate to now brag about how awesome my life is. My life is awesome! (Although a paycheck would still be nice. That's what my sugar daddy is for right?)

I am LOVING my rotation at McKay Dee hospital. Seriously. My preceptors are so fun, they take me to fancy restaurants for food tastings, I get to write TPN's (total parenteral nutrition) all by myself, and the Diet Coke is UNLIMITED at every nurse's station on EVERY unit. Yes, this is real life. Oh and there are free graham crackers.

Favorite quote of the week from my preceptor: "You know, we've only had a few interns who have just blown me away with their knowledge. But we've all loved having your fun personality around! Seriously, it's a nice change." Bahahaha. I loved it so much. Read: "You're not very smart but we love having you around!" How I'm getting places in life...

Also, today we all got insulin pumps! For realsies. We're all hooked up and everything. Of course we're injecting saline into ourselves and not insulin, but it's still pretty fun to count our carbs and "insulin" dose. Today I counted my lunch carbs and gave myself a bolus, and then I ran into a real diabetic friend and asked her how many carbs I ate. Turns out I could use a refresher course. I only gave myself 1/2 enough insulin. Good thing I'm not diabetic or I'd probably be dead. JK. How cute are we with our pumps?

2012 Happenings

January highlights: 

Evan sent me this picture on his first day of school. It made me so happy. Love that we still get excited about first day of school outfits. Some things are ALWAYS important. Since I've been living in Ogden during the week for the internship and Evan's at home by himself, I'm so glad I convinced him to buy himself a post-Christmas iphone. It's drastically improved our relationship. (Although I am a little worried about how much time he spends with Siri. That chick better watch it...)

We are starting to get our hopes up that we will be East Coast bound in June... Evan's working on his NIH applications... and... (get excited please) I got an interview at Georgetown for their MHA program!  It's like we're adults or something. I'm off to D.C. first weekend of February. Can't wait to see Kelli and run around the city. I mean really, who wouldn't want to go to school here? Just look at it please.

Happy New Year friends!

Just a couple of cotton headed ninny muggins

For the past 6 weeks, this is what I've been doing from 8 to 3 everyday.  I'm getting really good at it too. For example, (an abbreviated version obvi):

Past medical history: appe, chole, CAD, AKD, HTN
Evaluation of data: Pt at mild nutritional risk related to mildly depleted albumin suggestive of metabolic stress. Will continue to monitor for nutrition trends.
PES Statement: Altered nutrition related lab values related to diagnosis
Goals: PO intake > 65% to meet kcal and protein needs

Don't worry that today I finally found out that appe stands for appendectomy and chole stands for cholecystectomy.  I've probably written that on a bagillion charts too. CLEARLY I am very bright. And very good at B.S. ing given that my preceptor said I "have good knowledge base" in my evals.  I'm so glad that the night before I present my case study I'm actually learning what all these abbreviations stand for and which lab values are indicative of nutritional status ha. It's been a productive rotation.

On a brighter note, how cute and Christmas-y is our apartment? I'm becoming quite the DIY-er, although I may be about the most expensive DIYer I know. I can't help it, I have good taste.  Shout out to Evan for making the adorable glitter Christmas trees on our shelf. He LOVES glitter. And crafts. HA. I Am so lucky he puts up with me.  I'm pretty sure he would've died if I asked him to spray paint or hot glue one more thing :) Don't you love our wall art? Thanks to our classy friend Jenny Willardson Rose, we had a fabulous mid-semester trip to Balboa Island where we stumbled upon this little gem. I fell in love. Then I DIYed it. (Told you. Obsessed.) And still need to figure out how to distress the wood. I'm a work in progress peeps. Housewifing is hard.

It will be weird having a Utah Christmas but I'm super excited I convinced Ev to get a tree.  And even more excited that we picked a 6 foot tree from the 3 to 5 foot tree section. We really did intend on getting something that fit in our apartment...Notice the one present under the tree.  Over Thanksgiving my dad thought it was hysterical that I responded when he asked my sisters if we'd written our letters to Santa. (Yes, we are 19 to 30 and still write letters to Santa). After he laughed his head off he introduced me to Santa (who looks mysteriously like Evan). Apparently my Santa-writing time is over. Whatever. That present is addressed to Mrs. Claus from Santa, which I'm pretty sure is a step up. Take that Dad.

Also, in ONE WEEK from Saturday Evan and I will be on our way to one of my favorite vacation spots of all time: CABO. Happy late honeymoon to me :) And THANK YOU SANTA. My life is so hard, I know.

Clearly I'm LOVING my clinical rotation...

...slash NOT.

Best advice my dad ever gave me: "You're like me. People will either love you or they'll hate you." I just wish it wasn't so true. Stupid strong personality...why can't everyone just love me??

I'M AWESOME, right?

Playing videographer

Meet my most recent Utah Dietetic Association project--thanks to Emily K. Vaterlaus, RD, CD, (almost) MS, UDA Public Policy Representative. I'm sure you aren't surprised to know we had a BLAST filming this. Talk to random strangers in awkward settings? Hello! Our forte right? Thanks to Paige Smith for taking one for the team most of the time. What would we do without her enthusiasm?

My absolute favorite part of this, "Usually I go to Susan Sommers." Glad to know America is in safe hands. She did raise 6 children step-by-step after all...