Previous Post Was Incomplete

My previous post accidentally got published while I was only half way done with it, so if you read it before Saturday night, you may have noticed that I stopped mid-sentence. It's all done now though and ready to be read! Hope you all have a great weekend!

Start of a New School Year

I've finally made it to my 50th post and what perfect timing! I'm happy to announce that Robbie received notification that he passed the Part I Dental Boards! Part II of the Boards isn't until his 4th year so it's nice to have such a big test out of the way for awhile.

Here's a picture of the notice. I used Photoshop to highlight the important part.

Many of you may have a Dental Student starting their first year over the next few weeks so I just wanted to offer some encouragement today. Thinking back to one year ago, I had a lot of anxiety about what the coming months would bring. I didn't know what Dental School would be like for Robbie, how the time requirements would affect our marriage, and what specific challenges lay before us. If you're new to my blog, I recommend checking out my post on How to Thrive While Your Husband is in Dental School for a few concrete tips that could help you adjust to life with a Dental Student.

Robbie put so much hard work into his first year: weekend study sessions at Starbucks, hours and hours of lab practice, memorization, sweat, and a few tears. I'm realizing today what a special gift it is that I get to see this process unfolding. Yes, his friends and family likely notice how busy he is, but as his wife I bare a special witness to the sacrifice and endurance Dental School has required from him. I've been there when he was going through flash card after flash card of Dental Morphology and Pathology and Gross Anatomy. I heard his quiet mumblings as he recited things to himself to make sure he remembered what he studied. I've seen him when he's confident and seen him when he is in great need of encouragement. Most amazingly, I have been witness to the incredible power of praying together before tests and practicals, at the end of a long day, or just when we felt a little distant from one another due to busy schedules. I've seen God's truth and love obliterate lies, rejuvenate Robbie's spirit, adjust both our attitudes, and draw the two of us closer together in our marriage.

Your Dental Student will likely have days where they come home feeling like crap because of the overwhelming amount of information they need to study, because they feel like their lab work isn't improving quickly enough, or because they have two or three tests every week and just can't seem to catch up. One of your most important roles as the spouse of a Dental Student will be to find ways of setting up stones of remembrance. So many times in the Bible, God instituted ways for His people to be reminded of all He had done for them in the past. The Jewish holidays of Passover, Hanukkah, Purim, etc. and now the Christian holidays of Christmas and Resurrection Sunday are all dedicated to memorializing specific times when God came through for His people in miraculous ways. Another tradition from Biblical times is the building of stone memorials. Whenever God met someone or provided for them in a meaningful way, that person would gather stones into a pile wherever it had occurred so that every time they came back by that place, they would see the stones and remember what God had done.  [See Joshua 4 for a great example of this]

I would encourage you to find ways to memorialize the important moments of Dental School for you and your student. Take pictures, write in a journal, keep a blog, grab an actual stone and write the date on it-- whatever it takes to keep a record of those moments. In four years, you will look back and remember all that God has brought you through and agree with the Psalmist in saying:

"LORD, God of Hosts, who is strong like You, LORD? Your faithfulness surrounds you!" -Psalm 89:8

Back in Action and Puerto Rico Trip, Part 1

We're back from Puerto Rico and I just dropped Robbie off about an hour ago to officially start his second year! It felt great to get up this morning with him and have some breakfast together. We spent some time praying about the coming year before heading out. I'm definitely the type of person that likes having a routine so it was especially nice to be up instead of sleeping in so I could get some cleaning done around our apartment (I think we were still in vacation mode the last few days because it was a little messy!).

Puerto Rico was an absolute blast and I would definitely recommend it to anyone looking to travel somewhere tropical without spending a load of money. We decided to not rent a car while we were down there and did not have any problems getting around on the public transportation. I think we spent at the most $50 getting around. $40 of that was to pay for the taxi to our hotel from the airport and back only because you can't take luggage on the bus. The bus was only 75 cents per person and it went to all the areas where we were wanting to go in San Juan.

We stayed in Le Consulat which is a little boutique hotel about two blocks from the beach. Our first night there our airconditioner broke. We told them that morning before we went out for the day and when we got back it was already fixed! Talk about speedy! They also mopped the floors everyday in our room which was great because we dragged a lot of sand in from the beach. The room was a little small, but it was clean and comfortable and that's all we needed.

Our first full day there, we took the bus into Old San Juan and visited El Morro, a fort built by the Spanish in the 1500's to protect the port of San Juan.

It was only $3 per person to get inside the fort.

Here's the lighthouse that's within the fort walls.

This is looking back towards Old San Juan from inside the fort.

After touring El Morro, we walked back into Old San Juan and had lunch at a place called Mojitos. I had some delicious chicken with creole sauce and Robbie had the traditional Puerto Rican dish mofongo. Mofongo is a savory dish made with mashed plantains. He chose to have his stuffed with pork and it was absolutely wonderful! I also got a side of amarillos, fried sweet plantains which were our favorite part of the whole meal. You can see one of the amarillos towards the top left of Robbie's plate.

From Old San Juan, we took a ferry boat (50 cents each) to another part of San Juan called

Cataño to visit the Bacardi Distillery. We got there too late to go on the tour but they still gave us our two free drinks each!

I had rum punch and some sort of coconut rum something or other. They were quite tasty!

Robbie had rum punch and a Cuba libre (rum with coke and lime).

And that concluded our first full day in Puerto Rico. I'll write a couple more posts about the rest later.

Last Post Before Puerto Rico

We're leaving for Puerto Rico tomorrow night so I wanted to write one more post before we left.

Robbie took the Part I Boards this past Monday. I can't say he loved the experience (who would enjoy a 7 hour test?!) but it's nice to finally have them done after weeks of preparing. The day after he took the test, he seemed to have a bit of a mental hangover. Robbie felt the hardest part of the test was a section called "testlets" that described clinical scenarios and you had to diagnose what the patient had based off the description. All of his classmates that took the test before Robbie's group came out feeling like they completely failed and they have all passed so far. It takes about 2-3 weeks for them to give you your score so I will give an update when we hear back. I'm confident that Robbie passed just fine but I know he won't feel completely at ease until he gets it in writing.

We went up to visit our families in Fort Collins for a few days after the test. We also got to hang out with our friends, Dan and Chelsea (two of our favorite people!). I've known Dan since high school when we were in Student Council together and his dad is also the pastor of our home church in Fort Collins. He is like the brother I never had growing up and he's a huge nerd when it comes to animals and Disney. Dan met Chelsea in Hawaii and he seriously could not find a better girl. The first time I met Chelsea in person was when Robbie and I went to California and she was working at Disneyland so she got us in for free. Chelsea is sweet, intelligent, funny, easy to talk to, thoughtful, and wise beyond her years (not to mention she has hair like a Disney princess). Maybe that is why we get along with them so well... they remind us of Disney so much!

Here's Dan and Chelsea when we went with them to tour Celestial Seasonings Tea in Boulder, CO last year

Next time I write will be after we get back from our trip so hopefully I'll have a lot of fun pictures and stories to share! Robbie starts school back up on the 12th.

Painting for my Nephews

Last week I visited Robbie's sister and her family in Cheyenne, Wyoming to do a little more painting in my nephews' rooms. I have been up once before this to paint and they wanted me to add a few more images. Here's what I painted the first time:

A camouflage wall in Mason's room

The main characters from Ninjago for Avery: (left to right) Zane, Cole, Sensei Wu, Kai, and Jay

As you can guess, Mason loves all things military (probably stemming from his love for the Call of Duty videogames) so this time I was up he asked for a plane with paratroopers.

We decided to go with a cool silhouette effect which made it super easy!

Avery asked for some more Ninjago characters. He actually had quite a list of characters he would like me to paint but for the sake of time, I told him he had to pick three and then I could do a few more next time. He chose Fangtom, Skales, and Lord Garmadon this time and for my next visit he wants the Golden Dragon. I seriously have learned more about Ninjago than I ever thought I would. He sat with me most of the time I was painting and told me all about the characters and their powers/weapons/personalities/etc.

This is Fangtom. He's the General of the Fangpyre snakes. They build their armies by biting people and/or objects and turning them into snakes.

This is Skales. He's the General of the Hypnobrai snakes. They have the ability to hypnotize people by staring into their eyes. Avery made a special request for Skales to have the black circles in his eyes because that is his "hypnotizing face."

Finally, this is Lord Garmadon. He is Sensei Wu's brother (duh duh duh!) and he's always trying to take over the land of Ninjago. His son, Lloyd, becomes the green ninja and eventually has to face him in battle. It actually is a total rip off of the Darth Vader/Luke relationship in Star Wars.

I had a great time painting and hanging out with my nephews. Here are the final products:

Celebrating the Completion of Year One

As usual, I've got my little blogging buddy sleeping in my lap as I type this morning.

Lazy thing

Robbie is all done with his first year of Dental School! He has the Boards in 11 days, but once those are done we'll be on summer break. Woo hoo!! I'm glad his classes are over so he'll have some time to just focus on the Boards without having to study for all of his classes as well.

Here's some pictures from the school year:

I got this idea off pinterest.

His first lab assignment.

Working hard carving a single tooth from a chunk of wax.

Here's the final product.

An awesome flash card I made for him. Are those teeth or muffins? hmm....

I brought him some coffee while he studied.

He finally got his Dental loupes.

#14 carved from wax

Robbie hung out with my while I got a free Dental exam from the 4th years.

We went to Dental Prom with our friends

Photobombed by the other Rob

Looking a little bit creepy as he works on the dummy

Working in the lab some more

Class II preparation on #31

Creepy dummy head

Dental School will be over quicker than we realize but I know we will have so many great memories from the experience!

End of Year Trip

We are now in the final countdown of Robbie's first year of Dental School! His last finals are in one week and his last practical is on the 19th. Then he has a week and a half to devote completely to studying for the Part I boards. After that, he'll officially be a DS2!

In celebration of this milestone, we decided to go on a trip together. Since it will likely be our last trip before having kids we decided to make it a really exciting one by going somewhere neither of us has been before. We ended up finding a great flight and hotel deal on Priceline for 5 days/4 nights in San Juan, Puerto Rico!! This is especially exciting for me because I studied Spanish for 9 years and I have yet to visit a place where the chief language is Spanish. Puerto Rico was also a great option because my passport still has my maiden name on it (P.R. is a U.S. territory, so you don't need a passport to fly there). I just can't wait to chill on the beach with my hubby, drinking a pina colada and celebrating the end of the first chapter of Dental School.

I seriously can hardly wait!!! This gorgeous picture is originally from http://my.lulac.org/group/604

Technically we have lived in Denver for just over a year now. Looking back on all that has transpired puts me in complete awe of how good my God is! He provided us with a great apartment that we could afford that was also close to the school. He provided us with incredible friends to share the journey with. He used the difficult periods of Dental School to draw Robbie and I closer together in our prayer life. He gave me a close friend with kids so that I could receive wisdom from her about motherhood. Seeing and helping Robbie grow into the man God desires him to be brings me more fulfillment than any other relationship in my life. I have especially loved experiencing first hand the truth found in Proverbs 11:25 because every time I made it a point to refresh and encourage Robbie, it filled me to the brim with joy.

A generous person will be enriched, and the one who gives a drink of water will receive water. -Proverbs 11:25

What a great year! I wouldn't trade the lessons we've learned for anything in the world! It has been challenging and rough at times, but God has used the difficulty in amazing ways. I can't wait to see what next year brings!

Do not despise the Lord's instruction, my son, and do not loathe His discipline; for the Lord disciplines the one He loves, just as a father, the son he delights in. -Proverbs 3:11-12