Las Vegas

Robb and I decided during winter semester (when there seemed to be no end to snow or studying) that this will be our summer of adventure. First stop was a trip to Las Vegas for our friends, Alex and Troy's, sealing in the Las Vegas Temple. We took a quick stroll through the strip and made a stop at the Hoover Dam on the way home. I love being done with school!

I'm sad their eyes are shut, but don't they look happy?

I love to see the Temple

...especially when all of Hays clan is there. Robb's older brother, Brett got sealed to his sweetheart on April 24th, 2010 in the Timpanogos Temple. Here are some of my pictures (except for the first one, that was definitely Heather...you can tell by the superior quality of the picture, lighting, position, etc. :) ).

Congratulations, Brett and Megan!!!

At 8:00, while sitting around at the reception, we learned that no one had any plans to attack their car. Naturally, being the good brother and sister-in-law that we are, Robb and I rushed off to find supplies. This was the result:

He's going to be such a good daddy someday.

Guess Who's An Alumna?

I recently discovered the word alumni is plural and that one graduate is an alumnus. Then while googling it today to make sure I spelled it right (because misspelling it would a) be embarrassing and b) might make BYU rethink sending me that diploma), I learned that female grads are alumae or in other words, I'm an alumna (if that was confusing see here).

Obviously I didn't major in English :)

BYU has a two part graduation ceremony. Convocation was on the 22nd and involved the entire graduating class of 2010 (so naturally the majority of the ceremony was spent getting everyone in and then filing them out). The highlight of the ceremony (beyond actually walking in, which was pretty amazing...surrounded in that sea of blue, I felt like part of an army about to go out and change the world) was our key note speaker, Elder D. Todd Christofferson...

...and I fell asleep during his talk. So I'm entering the real world with only 2/3rds of whatever words of wisdom he decided to share and I have no one to blame but myself.

The next day was our own little College of Nursing graduation. Utah decided to honor the occasion by supplying overcast skies that dumped a mixture of freezing rain and mushy snow on us as we sprinted into the building. The ceremony was wonderful. I was a little nervous about making it across the stage due to scarring memories from my high school ceremony (where my cap feel off and the head off my rose ended up flying across the room), but I managed to stay vertical with my cap in place during my three minutes of glory :)

And now it's over. I've worked, studied, carpooled, and commiserated with this same group of sixty-some girls and three guys for the last two years and I can't really comprehend that we'll never be in the same class again, and in some cases, that we'll never see each other again. Life can be bitter-sweet sometimes.

Here's us after the Convocation ceremony

(see how well rested I look :) ).

I stole the picture from my talented sister-in-law's blog because as of yet it is the only picture I have of graduation. In fact, apart from this picture, the only proof I have of graduation is an empty BYU diploma case :) If any family or friends have any pictures, please send them to me! I would love to have them (my email is lakinmarie@gmail.com)!

Guess what? I'm done!!!

Love,

Lakin

Finals are almost over...

Lakin and I have been enjoying the lack of schoolwork this past week. What we have not been enjoying is the overabundance of finals. Lakin just has one more exam to take before she's free of the grasp of school forever. I, however, have three more finals, and school is far from over. In fact, I start again next Monday. Luckily, I have only one class, so it shouldn't be too bad.

Despite the lack of schoolwork, Lakin and I have been pretty busy this last week. We did manage to take the time to watch the movie "Funny Face." It stars Audrey Hepburn and Fred Astaire. It was probably the most mediocre movie I've seen with either actor, but it was still okay. The music is done by George and Ira Gershwin, so it's not that bad, but Hepburn's character is a little on the annoying side (she's obsessed with this weird philosophy called empathicalism). Anyways, it would have been better if there were more crazy Fred Astaire dance moves. Well, we can cross it off our list anyways...

This week promises to be more exciting as finals will be finally final, Lakin is graduating, and Brett is getting married. Once we get past Monday and Tuesday anyways...

Snow in April

In my mind's eye Easter should be the epitome of Spring. The sun should be shining, maybe a couple of flowers blooming here and there. This is what we woke up to:

Utah's weather patterns are about as unpredictable as it gets :)

There are about two weeks left of school for me and all I want to do is organize our fairly spotless apartment and start working on massive amounts of craft projects...I must be in the nesting phase of life. Alas, school and the NCLEX (still don't want to talk about it yet) are in my way.

Robb is learning to speak Mandarin Chinese through a set of CD's from Provo library. He served a two year mission for our Church in the Philippines and he learned to speak several languages there and after dabbling in Spanish for a bit, he felt like tackling Mandarin (and we're listening to War and Peace at the moment...I'm going to get smarter just by being in his general vicinity).

I started work again this week after a three week break. It's wonderful to be back. I missed my patients so much and surprisingly they missed me too. While going through morning report with the night shift, I noticed a name missing from the sheet. A couple days earlier one of our residents passed away. She was a sweet, frail woman who addressed everyone as "honey" or "darling" and she had been in considerable pain despite our attempts to make her comfortable. While working in the healthcare setting I've learned to regard death differently. I've seen it remove the lines of pain off weary faces and felt their peace as they've moved from one world to the next. It can be a beautiful thing. I am so grateful for our Savior whose sacrifice and resurrection removed the fear from death. She's beyond the pain now and as much as I will miss her, I know where she's gone and she will be happier there by far.

Happy Easter.

Love,

Lakin

Another Week Bites the Dust...

This last week wasn't the greatest week ever in Hays family history. I had a test and a paper due, and Lakin had a paper of her own to do (though hers was significantly more monstrous than mine). But, we survived, a testament to our resiliency. This week should be a little better, especially now that I've gotten caught up to Friday on my homework and studying.

Lakin just finished her last day of clinical EVER! That's pretty exciting in and of itself, but it also means she doesn't have to wear those hideous BYU issue scrubs any more. I really think we should perform a ceremonial burning... Lakin's excited to be done and enter the "real" world. She'll unfortunately still have one leg in Babylon (which in this case is BYU), as I won't be done with school for a LOOOONG time.

We didn't have much time for fun stuff this week, so grocery shopping was the highlight of our week. You know you're ready for summer when you're excited to buy milk for $1 at Smith's... Anyways, hopefully next time we post it'll be something a little more exciting than school, school, school, cheap milk.

Here at the End of All Things

I have 26 days until my last final is due...26 days. That seems a ridiculously short amount of time...I mean in 26 days I will never have another reading assignment, another paper, another midterm...I could sit on my couch and be illiterate for the rest of my life.

Actually, one of the things I'm most excited about graduating is that I can start learning whatever I want. I have this huge pathophysiology book I want to read cover to cover and I want to learn about economics, history, politics...basically all the electives I didn't have time for in college. I have this long mental list of everything I want to learn about (and classics I want to read and domestic qualities I want to develop) and I can almost start...just 26 days...and the NCLEX (the exam that determines whether or not the last four years of college are worth anything...I will expound at a later point...right now I'm trying not to think about it too much :) ).

It's going to be amazing.

Here in Provo Robb is just trying to survive this semester. He spent all Saturday doing homework and there's still more to do. I'm just plugging away at my to-do list. When the shifts were assigned at work this month I only ended up with 30 hours (and 24 were in the first week). So I suddenly have way more free time to focus on the papers, projects, and clinical hours that are all due on April 8th. We are going to try our hand at gardening this summer from a window box that we can hang from our chunk of railing. We bought seeds, fluffy potting soil (because according to the internet, tomatoes like it that way), and fertilizer on Friday and planting will commence tomorrow with any luck.

I'm happy, the sun's out, and if BYU had managed

to make through the second round, life would be pretty much perfect.

P.S. Robb made chicken pot pie tonight (he comes from a line of great pie makers and if he decided to be a stay at home dad, we would probably eat better :) ) and he got flour on his face in the process. I think there are few things more endearing than when a guy gets covered with flour while making you dinner.

P.P.S. I asked my Capstone if there were any jobs available and they strongly indicated that they would like to hire me...woot!!!