Just Call Me Martha...

So I guess I got a little Martha Stewart fever this past week. I have been eying some curtains in the Pottery Barn catalog for over a month now. I have been waiting and waiting to put up curtains in my living room because I wanted the perfect ones. I have looked a lot of other places, but just kept coming back to these curtains. But once again, there was a small problem... the price. As you might can tell from some of my recent post, I have expensive taste at times. The drapes I wanted were way to expensive. I searched and searched and found the fabric at Calico Corner, but it was still pretty expensive. Luckily though, it went on sale in March and so Smith and I went to look at it. Guess what... Smith loved how much I loved it so we bought the fabric and I set off on the adventure of making my first ever curtains. Thankfully my mom is quite handy in these kind of situations and was definitely my right hand woman- guiding me every step of the way. My curtains turned out GORGEOUS! I was so excited. My resident handy-man, Smith, hung them for me soon after. I know you must be dying to see how great they look...

My living room still isn't finished. We need to move over that clock on the wall obviously. I plan on making more throw pillows and getting a new rug for starters, but its much closer to being how I imagine it! If you have any suggestions of cute and inexpensive decorating ideas please share! I am always looking for new ideas and projects!

Hope you had a great Tuesday!

Fun in the Sun (finally!)

We have been waiting and waiting for this! I HATE the cold weather. Saturday was such a gorgeous day so Smith and I decided to enjoy some of this warm, beautiful weather we have been waiting. We headed around the corner (literally) from our new house to Shelby Farms for some Frisbee Golf. Smith hesitated at the idea at first because its hard on him to be so badly beaten at Frisbee by his wife, but he finally came around. Ok... so maybe that is totally not true and maybe I have to throw about 3 times for his 1 throw... but we still have fun being outdoors and active together. :) Here we are after a couple of holes!

Smith acting crazy, keeping me entertained while we were out on the course. He's so funny :)

Logan and Jennee joined us about 1/2 way through the course. Logan actually was a little hesitant to play because he thought he wouldn't be bad. I quickly made him feel good about himself by going first and getting about a 6 on a par 3 whole. I quickly had to retire because my arm was getting too tired. Jennee and I just cheered on the boys instead.

Logan and Smith showing off their sweet throwing skills.

We had such a great time and really enjoyed being outside for the day. After our hard work, we headed to sonic to refresh ourselves! It was fun to have some time with Logan and Jennee before he leaves for Chile for 3 months! We are really going to miss Logan!

I hope everyone else is enjoying this beautiful weather, too!

Stay tuned in. I recently made curtains for my living room and will be posting them soon!

Something New

So while this last week was very boring work wise (I had an 8-5 schedule of more classroom orientation everyday and did not get to spend ANY time on the actual unit!), we had some good times with family and friends.

Friday Night

We went bowling with 2 other couples and had the best time! Hunter and Maggie Mitchell go to Germantown C of C with us and we are really enjoying getting to know them. Hunter always has something clever to say and Maggie is always so sweet and encouraging! Brandon Edwards and his sweet fiance' Elizabeth came as well. Its been a while since I got to hang out with Brandon (one of my best friends from HS). We had a great time with both of them and hope to continue to do things with them both. We also were babysitting Neesha this weekend, which is always fun. She LOVED bowling and did surprisingly well. I guess all her WII bowling paid off :)

Saturday

So this was definitely not a relaxing Saturday, but overall it was extremely exciting because we bought a...

NEW CAR!

Smith's truck was getting on up there in miles (125,000) so we decided it was time to trade it in for something in a little bit better shape. It was somewhat sad to see the good ole truck go considering we went on all our dates, trips, etc in that truck, but we are so excited about our new SUV. We got a 2007 Ford Edge with less than 30,000 miles (big change). Its fully-loaded which Smith isn't used to. He's loving his new ride :) He was quite the negotiator and got us an incredible deal. This is the only picture of it I have right now and it's off my phone so sorry if it isn't the best!

Sunday

We had a wonderful day at church. I went with Neesha to her Volleyball practice. She is doing so well and working so hard. My mom and dad got home from their trip to Arizona and we were all glad to see them back.

Monday

Mostly I did laundry, cleaned the house, and worked on some projects for people that I needed to catch up on. But I did take a break to go eat with my best friends from Nursing school. Lauren Flatt, Katie Soldevila, and I met at Bahama Breeze for a girls lunch. It was so great to spend some time with them. We were used to spending each and every day together in school sharing multiple lunch dates a week. Now, with my job, Lauren's interviews, and Katie's new sweet baby, it is much more difficult to get together. It was so great to see Campbell, Katie's 2month old baby boy. He is so precious and she is doing such a great job with him! We definitely missed Sarah and Jenny... the other two girls who complete our little group. Hopefully a girls trip out to TX will be in the works soon to visit ole Jennster!

Well that brings us up to date... sorry if my life isn't all that interesting haha. I hope everyone's week is off to a great start!

Pricey VS. Priceless

One of my favorite stores around Memphis is Bella Vita. Thanks to my wonderful friend, Lauren Flatt, I discovered this amazing sanctuary of adorable furniture and household items in Collierville. Unfortunately, this adorable boutique is just a tad out of my price range these days (or ever). This normally does not pose a problem. Instead of buying all the super cute items I spot at Bella Vita... I use the store as a source of inspiration and ideas for my own projects. This saves me a lot of time and is a super fun hobby (some of my own projects will be exhibited on the blog in the near future). Lately, though, I have been in a small bind. I found the most beautiful paintings there that would be just PERFECT for my living room. Unfortunately again... they were a bit to pricey. The big one that I wanted was priced at $800 and the smaller 2 were somewhere between $300 and $400. Even if I were up for spending that much for a painting (which I'm not), there is no way in the world my thrifty hubby would ever go for it. This was all a problem because while I can make and decorate furniture and other household items all day long... I am definitely NOT a painter! So normally the story would simply end here...and I would have to settle for some lesser decor for above my couch. Lucky for me... it doesn't end here.

I have an incredibly talented brother that turned my pricey dilemma into a priceless experience! After seeing the paintings I had my eye on, he created gorgeous replicas that are practically identical! See if you can tell the difference!!!

Isn't that crazy? If the picture of mine was a closer shot, you would see the detailed texture that is present on the Bella Vita paintings as well. I still am in shock at how incredible they turned out! So I am happy to say that I have some priceless (instead of pricey) paintings hanging above my couch that make my living room look all the more gorgeous!!!!

THANKS, LOGAN!!!!!

Wishful thinking...

So I guess that maybe it was wishful thinking on my part when I said I would be posting more often. Technically, this is still "more often" but once every month or two isn't that great of a track record. I'll keep working on that...

Now, for all of you that have been hanging by a string waiting to hear about my boards... good news... I PASSED. I'm now officially-

KELSEY HOPKINS, RN

It was one stressful experience. For those of you who are not nurses, you can get between 75 and 250ish questions. Every person gets 75. The testing program continues to give you questions until it has enough info to determine if you actually know what you are doing or until it knows that no matter how many questions it gives you, you are going to fail. SO, you can get 150 questions and pass or 150 questions and fail. I got 75 questions, which meant that I either did great or did absolutely terrible- which would be totally embarrassing. Thankfully, I came out on top! Take that NCLEX! I apparently am a "safe practioner" which is still debatable... I have a lot to still learn before anyone should be setting me loose with my own ICU patients!!! :) Thankfully I have wonderful teachers at work that really want me to learn as much as possible and to become a wonderful nurse! I just can't wait to actually know what I am doing!!!

Thanks for the prayers and encouragement!!!

I FINISHED!

So I'm not sure what is more shocking, the fact that I am making a new post, or that I actually survived Nursing School?!?

So here is the first of hopefully (fingers crossed) many more posts to follow in my new found free time.

On Dec. 12, 2009 I graduated Summa Cum Laude with my BSN and here are some pictures to prove it!

Me and my wonderful, helpful, supportive husband. I really don't know what I would have done without him cheering my along the whole way! What a wondeful man!




My amazing sister who flew in just for the occasion.




Marci (Smith's mom) came in all the way from South Carolina to support me.



Erin brought along some special cargo to support Aunt Kelsey. I was happy to share the spotlight with such a precious boy!

Even with the long hours, boring reading, bed baths, foley care, sushi lunches, white marshmellow uniforms, the "i don't know ANYTHING" freak out moments, contraction counting, med calculations, test questions with 4 right answers, ATIs, ENDLESS paper work and care plans, group projects, ugly white shoes, pockets so full my pants almost fell down, and dreams of IVs, catherizations, and NG tubes... I can say it was TOTALLY worth it and I am so glad to be a NURSE!

I started a job at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in January and I am loving it. Such a wonderful place to work!

I take my NCLEX boards this Wednesday so please keep my in your thoughts and prayers as I take this last step in becoming an RN!

Thanks to everyone that encouraged and supported me through the past year. Thanks to my family for always providing a fun distraction from all my stress. Thanks to Erin for calming my fears with each new step of nursing. Thanks to Smith for constantly loving me even when I was riduculous, for being the "house wife" when I couldn't, and working so hard so that we could have a great year.

Hopefully in a few days I will be sharing the good news of passing the boards!!!! Stay tuned! (but not too close incase it takes me a couple weeks to actually make a post haha!)

** SURPRISE! **

A couple weekends ago we threw Erin a SURPRISE baby shower to get her ready for Cole's big arrival. Amazingly, I think she really was surprised (a big accomplishment to keep it a secret from my perpetually nosey sister :D ). We had such a great turn out of old friends, church friends, and lots of family. Everyone was so excited to shower Erin with love and gifts. I couldn't have done it without Reena, Adrienne, Becca, and Amanda. They are all such wonderful friends to Erin and were more than happy to help me out with all the planning. Here are some pictues from the fun day!

She really did look surprised.

I'm sure she had some idea from all the cars lining Reena's street though :)

So happy (and overwhelmed) to see everyone there.

She was looking so cute in her summer dress!

Some of the decorations. I made the COLE letters for his nursery.

Erin got lots of great stuff from everyone!

The bookcase I refinished for Cole's nursery.

I was really nervous about how Erin would like it, but when I saw her tears (happy tears) I knew she loved it! It looks perfect in his nursery, too!

Amanda brought a great game for us to play! It was a lot of fun!

Erin opening all of her gifts.

Super cute diaper cake and table decorations.

Reena made Erin cookie cakes that were so cute!