Almost There!

 I have just completed my medical transcription courses and will be taking the final exam within the next few days. Yay!

My current average is 99% which means if I score high on the final exam, I will qualify for graduating "with distinction." Shortly after, I will receive my diploma via mail.

I then have the option of sitting in and testing to become registered. I have to work a couple of years and then test to become certified. However, most companies don't require you to become certified, it just looks fancy on your resume.

I am glad to finally be done with this program. Now I have much studying to do to prepare for the final. Wish me luck!

The Weekend (and other things)

  So, the weekend was long but peaceful. Friday morning, I headed to Bakersfield by myself to attend Danni Lynn's funeral (for those of you who don't know, Danni was my brother Daniel's 18 month old daughter who lost her little life to Leukemia). The service, although a bit socially awkward  with so much family, was beautiful and well done. Her casket, though tiny, was beautiful, and there was a peace to the entire thing, knowing that our Heavenly Father is now taking perfect care of her.

 After the service, we all met at my parents' ward building where we had a lunch with everyone involved. I also experience my first case of heartburn (if that's what it was) after eating an onion from a salad. I eat onions with things all the time, but this was the first time it had an effect on me. My chest felt all tight and weird and I immediately lost my appetite. Nice, huh?

Anyway, I spent a night apart from husband while I slept at my parents' house (he's been working on a project at work, therefore he couldn't get the day off on such short notice). It really was nice spending so much time with family (even came up with a remedy to help my dad with pain after his surgery). That next morning, I went shopping with mum (mommy, mother, mom, etc). We first went to Target where we picked out the cutest presents for my niece, Kaydance's,  3rd birthday. My mom bought her the Tangled Rapunzel barbie doll who was wearing a cute, purple, lace up front dress, and I bought her the actual size dress so she could wear what her barbie is wearing. We then stopped at the post office where we sent off the presents, then headed to the grocery store where we went grocery shopping. After our shopping trip, we headed back, I cooked up lunch, and went on my way home. Luckily I left when I did because when I hit the Grapevine, it was way rainy and windy and was difficult to drive without slowing down and really paying attention to my surroundings.

So, I got home, hugged and kissed my man, and we headed to N. Hollywood where we went antique browsing and video game shopping. On the way home, we stopped by the Valencia Town Center mall/outdoor mall where we did some more shopping and ate dinner at 5 Guys Burgers. The Patios, the new outdoor extension to our mall, is just beautiful at night (I have some pictures posted from a Christmas/December post with the outdoor fireplaces, etc). It's so beautiful at night with all the fireplaces lit up, ponds lit up (with the HUGE Koi), and the liveliness of all the people and music. It was a wonderful evening and a nice weekend.

On another note, everything surrounding me lately has been regarding emergency preparedness since there seems to be a rumor involving a soon-to-be earthquake next month. So, Gary and I have been doing research, reading information, and ordering kits to prepare since I feel we are not even close to being prepared. Our ward has emergency preparedness nights and I need to start attending. We DO have a ward blog that keeps track of it though:  Valencia Preparedness.

So that's that for now. I've been working mornings this week and I'm glad. It's nice to have the rest of the days to myself. Anyway, time for dinner then D&D. Bye!

PS- On another quick note, I finished the BoM last night after reading it straight through for the past couple of months (not the mention all the studying involved). It felt marvelous to complete and I'm looking forward to doing it again. I always love when I finish the BoM. Such a great feeling of peace. I always learn something new since there's always so much!

Okay, I'll Share

 I'll go ahead and share what I found since I learned some good information.

 No, it wasn't a pearl, but that would have been pretty sweet. It's called sea glass. Sea glass is found along oceans and large lakes and have been tumbled and smoothed by the waves, water and sand. It creates smooth, frosted shards of glass. A lot of these pieces have been in the ocean for a hundred years, which you can usually tell by texture and frost.

 There are several different colors like white, brown, green, blue (all in different shades of those colors, too), yellow, gray, pink, red, etc. Pretty much any color.

 The rarest of all sea glass include orange and red. I found a red. The chance of finding a red is 1 in 5000. The reason it's so rare is because not many things were made with red glass. It could be from the warning light of an old ship, lantern, and stained glass way back when.

The quality of mine is really good. It's very smooth and frosted. I'm just not sure what I want to do with it.

Since it's extremely rare, I could always hang onto it. Some people say you can sell a single red piece up to $250. Others are saying a single piece isn't worth anything, you need more pieces of it. I checked out eBay but it's hard to tell what's real and what's not (people fake these things a lot using their own "sand tumbler").  Some aren't selling that high on eBay, some are. Maybe it's just something that you can't really put a price tag on?

A woman in my ward wants it for free. I was about ready to agree, but now I'm thinking I want to keep it. What do you think?

A Much Needed Trip

 Hey, people.

 The weekend was wonderful! On Saturday (which I happily had off), we had some family come to visit us (Gary's mom and a friend of hers). We took them around our outdoor mall/patios and went out to lunch. It was quite fun and it was nice to have company. After they had departed, I mentioned to Gary I was still interested in going to the beach sometime soon. He then said, "okay, let's go", found us a hotel, made a reservation, and drove us down there.

We stayed at the Hampton Inn on the Channel Island harbor. It was beautiful! The best part about our room? The view:

 

Random photo of Gary setting things up. But that was our bed.

 

Here was our desk area/tv

 

Our balcony

 

However, we didn't keep that specific room. At about 10-10:30 last night, after we had our pizza (which we drove around everywhere looking for the pizza place), our smoke alarm starting acting all kinds of strange and making buzzing noises. We called the front desk and they moved us to a new room. Luckily it was the same type of room with a marina view as well, AND they gave us a discount on our stay in apology for the smoke alarm issue. So this is the view from the room we spent the night in.

 

After we checked out of our lovely hotel, we headed over to the nearest beach which was quiet and peaceful and just beautiful. We played in sand, got our feet numb by the water and looked at washed-up clams and such. Gary loves playing the water. Haha. The weather was just perfect.

  Finally we headed home. It was a short vacation, but well worth it. It was a much needed getaway.

  There also was a nice bonus to the trip. I found some rare treasure. The chance of me finding something like this is 1 in 5000. Pretty awesome. I won't share yet, not until I get more information on the value.

Well, that's that. Time to spend the rest of the day with husband!

I Love My Life

 I have such a great life and I really love everything about it.

 Gary and I stumbled across this reality television show on VH1 (yes, I know) called You're Cut Off. For those who don't know much about the show, it's about these highly rich and spoiled brat women who become financially cut off by mom and/or dad or spouse because of their excessive spending habits and are placed in a several-week program to teach them what life really is about. Gary and I normally don't watch reality shows, but we couldn't help but find amusement from something like this. We don't have cable anymore, but like mentioned earlier, we have a Roku and a Hulu Plus account.

Anyway, it's amazing how women like this are and it very much reminds me of stories in the scriptures where the wicked are described as those who only care about riches and wealth. So the program they go through involves them getting jobs, cleaning up after themselves, doing chores and earning their own money (which is "poor people" money). We do find it rather amusing. One woman admits she refused to breastfeed her child because she didn't want to wake up in the night. She also admitted to never changing a diaper in her life because "that's what my housekeeper is for". She doesn't tend to her crying baby either because she needs beauty rest. None of the girls knew how to do chores, use a vacuum, do laundry, dishes, etc. One girl couldn't tell the difference between a dishwasher and oven. It was incredible how spoiled these women were. The only way they can earn anything is if they work for it, otherwise they're left out. They're also only given $200/week for groceries for 9 girls so they are forced to clip coupons and budget. It's hilarious. Anyway, every week they either receive a  passing grade or are failed and in the end, it will be decided whether they get their money back or are cut off permanently.

On that note, I feel sooo blessed to be where I am today in this world. I'm blessed to have a husband who finished school and works hard everyday to support our family. I'm glad I was raised in a good home where we learned responsibility. Things are so much more valuable when earned.

So yes, I love my life! 

In a few other notes:

I should be done with this school program by the end of the month. Now, finding a job to work from home should be interesting.

Our lease is up soon and we might move to a bigger place.

Gary and I have been called back into the primary and are currently teaching the Valiant 10 class.

 I am glad it's March! Spring will soon be here. I am ready for this cold weather to leave! It snowed again a few days ago and it was just too darn cold. I can't wait until it's sunny again.

And now, I have many things to get done today, so off I go. For those who don't have my fertility blog, I started a new medication and it has been doing wonders. So we are hopeful.

Have a great day!