May 14-May 25

So I was still not feeling well come Monday morning and I decided to take a sick day and go to the doctor. We had a lot of activities planned in the coming months and I did not want to be sick. Plus several people I work with all had strep throat and this was looking mighty suspicious.

I also did not feel bad about taking a sick day since I am trying to use up some of my paid time off at work. Unfortunately(or fortunately), my nursing home was bought out by a company out of Ohio. Everyone in the building has a guaranteed job, with no changes in benefits or their accrued time off. Except for rehab. Our department is going to be run by a contract company. I have always tried to avoid contract companies since they can ask you to go anywhere they want and the facility can always dump the contract company(it happened to me once while working at St Agnes). So I decided since I can keep the same work hours and pay that I would go ahead and apply for the job. However, I lose my benefits and all my paid time off. So all of us are trying to use some up since it will not all be paid out.

Unfortunately it was really busy at work but I could not get an appointment until late in the afternoon. I was happy sitting on the couch filling out Scott's graduation announcements. And after my appointment, I started on the 10 day antibiotics. So now I feel great, but everyone else in the family is fighting allergies this spring. And they have been pretty bad. At least I was feeling better by Weds evening. I was scheduled to sing with the GS choir at the annual GS Board Meeting. We usually start the program off with a few GS songs and the flag ceremony. This year our director asked me and another mom to sing a duet, leading the congregation along in our song(several hundred people!). No pressure. I was just happy my voice did not crack from the strep throat!

Allison was busy getting through her finals. Mostly projects and papers, but a few written exams as well. Fortunately, in the class that they had the horrible failure with the presentation that apparently offended everyone on the planet, they were able to turn it around and get an A on the second go round. Allison was so relieved. Turned out she managed to earn two more As in the other two classes and ended up graduating from the MBA program with a perfect 4.0! She was ecstatic! And so were we!

On May 23rd, Weds,  I was  off work so we could drive to Salisbury to attend Allison's MBA graduation ceremony. I decided to work on Sunday to take off Weds. I wish I had known our company was sold before then. I would have taken off another day. Of course I had to squeeze in several more activities in the morning before heading out to Salisbury. I scheduled a Care Plan meeting for my mom in the morning. The team only meets on Weds mornings, so the timing was good. I sat and chatted with the nursing staff for 1 hr to cover some basic needs for mom. So far we are very happy with her living situation and she seems to enjoy it too. Lots of activities. If I could just get her on a regular schedule for hair appointments. Their salon is too busy, so I have been trying to take mom out to get her hair done each week which can be tricky with the timing and my busy schedule. I also requested for transportation from the facility to take mom to the Sr Center program again on Thursdays. And it is FREE!

Besides meeting with the staff for mom, I had to drop Cookie off at the doggy day care for a play date! We decided to go down to Busch Gardens for the Memorial Day Weekend at the last minute since we were all going to be available and home. We had planned on staying home and having visitors for the holiday. My brother Dan and his wife Sheila were going to visit from Pittsburgh. Dan has relocated for work and both are living in an apartment in Pittsburgh for the next few years. However, they had a change of plans as Dan needed to help his two kids move out of college. His daughter Caroline graduated this Spring as well with a Psychology degree from Oklahoma. Congrats Caroline! Her brother Clayton still has another semester at Texas A and M in Mechanical Engineering. Caroline is now off to Scotland for international classes. We actually looked into Scott taking a freshman engineering class in Scotland this summer as well, but the cost was a bit much on top of regular tuition. And Tom is so happy to have finally finished his recent online class. This one kept him very busy every night writing papers and having online discussions. But he plans on taking the summer off of school since we will be traveling quite a bit.

And speaking of travel, we planned on heading to  Busch Gardens for Memorial Day weekend to enjoy the opening of the Food and Wine festival. We did not want to bother our neighbors with puppy sitting since Cookie will be with them for a few weeks while we travel this summer, so Tom thought we should drop her off at Camp Bow Wow dog kennel. However, she has not been there in awhile, so I had to send in all her veterinary paperwork and bring her in for a play date to get reacquainted with the place and the staff. So I dropped her off Weds morning, went to Mom's care plan with a quick visit and then back to pick up Cookie before going home and changing, getting lunch and heading to Salisbury for Allison's graduation. Scott decided to stay home since he was finishing up his high school finals and had mandatory graduation practice. He was also spending some extra time with his friends with lunch and dinner outings as they neared the end of their high school careers!

We arrived in Salisbury late in the afternoon and took Allison shopping at the bookstore and onto campus for some graduation photos. Then we headed over to their local arena for the early evening Masters and PhD graduation ceremony. It was a very nice ceremony(and air conditioned!). We enjoyed watching them place their Master's stole over their heads when they were called onto stage. Since there are a bit less people at this ceremony than the undergrad program, we finished in 1.5 hrs as opposed to 2.5 hrs and went out to dinner afterwards at Longhorn Steakhouse. Then we headed back to Allison's condo to load up the van with some of her things. She had been bringing back lots of clothes on trips home, but now we were moving kitchen items and furniture. Turns out her roommate Helena from Venezuala was hosting a graduation party of her own at the condo. Her family was in town and her father insisted that everyone have champagne! He bought a bottle for Allison, shook it up and made her open it! Fortunately outside on the deck. We had a wonderful time visiting with Helena's family and all their friends, but really needed to get going since it was after 10pm and we had about a 2.5 hr drive home. Plus Tom and I were working the next day. Allison stayed and they kept her at the party until 1am and then she crashed. She had to get up early the next morning and pack up some more items in her car and get home for a dentist appointment! 

One Graduation ceremony down, one to go!  Also sending out a Belated Happy Birthday to Stacey(Seitz)Draper. The Big 3-0! Can't be!

And another Belated Happy Birthday to Christopher Bozyk who celebrated his 21st Bday!