Finished!

Remember back on Superbowl Sunday when I told you about the pillow I wanted to sew? Well 4 months, 1 week, and 3 days later... I finally finished it!

I only spent about 4 days total working on it, but there was a lot of time in between when I didn't feel motivated to sew. But it's finally done, and I'm proud of the result!

Here's the front:

The back is very plain, but the fabric has a pretty flower design on it that I really like:


It turned out bigger than I expected, and I even had to buy a bigger pillow form so it would fit!

It was fun to make, but I realized that I'm not a big fan of sewing machines. I prefer sewing by hand, like my cross-stitch, because it's easier to get out and work on for a few minutes at a time. Getting out the sewing machine took a lot more effort, and I had to spend all day working on the project to make it worthwhile. I don't see many more pillows or quilts in my future, at least for a while.


P.S. I've been making more progress on my cross-stitch also. The background is coming together nicely. Just another month or two, and it should be finished as well!

Updates

Sorry I haven't been keeping up on blogging lately. I'll try to post things more often from now on. I don't have anything particularly interesting to share today, just some updates on what's been going on for me lately.

I just found out today that I have my PHN certification now! That stands for Public Health Nurse. I didn't have to do anything special to get certified, though, so it's not really a big deal. My nursing school is set up so that anyone who takes the community health class (which is mandatory for all nursing majors) will be eligible to get their PHN upon graduation. Although I don't plan on using it, I figured I should get it just because I can.

I've been house-sitting for my grandpa for the past couple of weeks. He's taking a cruise with his brother from Rome to Greece to Israel to tour the Holy Land and many of the cities from the New Testament. I think it's so cute that they're going now that they're in their 80's!

This is me teaching him how to work the digital camera he was going to take on the trip. Hopefully he remembers how to use it!

My cousin Felisha and my friend Johanna have been staying with me at his house some of the nights. It's been fun hanging out with them. Felisha and I found a family of raccoons living in the attic last week. Sometimes we can hear them walking around up there. The other day it even sounded like the babies were wrestling! They're so cute! I wish I could keep one as a pet.

The adorable babies!

I saw Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides on opening day with my friends Damaris, Becky, and Courtney. We had all seen the 1st Pirates together when it first came out back when we were freshmen in high school. We also went to the midnight showing of the 3rd one when it was released, so it was very fun to go see the newest movie with them as well.

My best friends- you gotta love them.

Oh, and the biggest update of my life right now is that I started my job as an RN a month ago!!! It's going great so far! I'm on orientation for the first 3 months, which means that I'm paired up with another nurse who helps me slowly take on more patients and more responsibilities until I'm ready to work on my own. I was on days for the first 4 weeks and I loved my preceptor. I worked my way up to taking care of 4 patients, doing all of the charting, giving all of the meds, starting IVs, calling the doctor for new orders, etc.

I've just now started on the night shift, and I'm not sure how I feel about it yet. It's very different than days and a lot slower pace, but it has its benefits. There aren't any doctors or family members to deal with, no meals to serve, fewer meds to give, and the patients sleep through most of the shift (hopefully!). In fact, it's been so slow the last 2 shifts that despite taking on 5 patients for the first time (the maximum load for a med/surg nurse), I had absolutely nothing to do for at least 3 hours, and I was falling asleep while just waiting around for the sun to rise! So far it hasn't been too hard to adjust to sleeping during the day, but it might get a little more difficult as I start doing 2 shifts in a row.

Ready for my first day of work!

Well that's about it for now. I'm going to try my best to keep this up. Hopefully more interesting things will start happening!