Eight (ish) reasons my life in New Mexico is pretty awesome

I've failed a lot on the whole blogging thing lately but for the record I've been busy. Let me tell you 8 things about my life now.

1: You already know this, but when I'm home, I often don't wear pants. It's genetic. Don't judge. (Luckily,, the land lord came and fixed my blinds so they go down all the way now.)

2) I finally got a bed. I've been rocking the air mattress for WAY too long. My body loves me now.

2.5) I bought a desk for $5 at my favorite consignment shop (yes, you read that right, $5!) but it was ugly =(, so I fixed that! Here's the before (the green is tape, not the desk... fyi) (also, check out my cute ikea curtains in the back)

 And here it is finished! So cute, right? You wish you could study at a cute desk like this, don't you? Don't you? (I've got knobs that just need painting waiting for me to have time to pull out the paint and get-er done!)

 2.67) And this: is a shrine to the babies... (and by babies I mean nieces and nephews) (and yes.. there are 5 pictures of William, and 5 pictures of Amelia, Lucy and David all together... sue me, I had so many of William to choose from!) Someday I'll probably paint the clothespins... or at least stain them.

 2.75) Also at the consignment store (for $2!) I bought this sweet spice shelf to hang above my stove. It's pretty awesome, and will be awesome-r when I get around to painting it... someday. But I'm pretty happy with it for now.

3) I got a rocker-recliner for $20! Let me tell you, I have become a frequent of the local consignment store. (seriously, I LOVE IT!) and The rocker/recliner was originally $40, but was marked down 50%. I called my friend Dara and she brought her mini van and we loaded it in the back and the rocker is my BFF. Seriously. Every grad-student should have one. I didn't take a picture of it, but trust me. It's awesome.

4) Let's talk for a minute about weather. Most days it is HOT, like burn your hands on the steering wheel hot. But then sometimes, usually about 3 in the afternoon there are these crazy rainstorms. They have thunder and lightening, and sometimes hail, but LOTS of rain, quick. And this weird things happens that I've not really seen before to this degree. Drainage is crazy bad and there ends up being rivers through the streets (luckily not through houses, or rather, not through my house.)

Note: This is not my car, but I did call my dad and ask him what the deepest water I ought to drive through.  This isn't far from my cute little duplex.

5) Okay, these are all accessories to my prime directive for being here.

Enter: Lampy from Brave Little Toaster

My prime directive is to study/learn. I'm not here because I want to make friends or, heaven forbid, settle down here. My classes are pretty great. I'm glad I have enough background from my undergrad that I don't feel totally out of my depth. The teachers are all pretty great and know a whole lot. We're jumping right in, and I've been seeing clients, and we're starting our culminating research project, which is basically the equivalent of a thesis. There's no slowly wading into the shallow end down here, it's all about jumping in with both feet and sink or swim. And I'm swimming, Dory style.

 

6) Clinicals: I'd been in Grad School for ONE WEEK when they made clinical assignments. And poof! I'm put in front of real people! I've been assigned (abnormally) to an elementary school in Clovis (the town 20 miles north that has things like a mall, a good will, and a big lots.) The school is a private one that hasn't previously had services at all, so we are starting from the ground up. (We= two other student clinicians and one of our professors.) We're screening right now, which means we do a short test with every Pre-K, Kindergartner, First Grader and Second Grader. We started with the kids that the teachers thought needed services, but now we're doing general screening. 

This is pretty much what I look like. 

The test we're doing is called the FLUHARTY screener, and it involves me sitting in a chair that is made for 4 year olds (giving a terrible case of numb-bum) and asking the children to tell me what this is a picture of 

These are actual picture I show kids. 

Then I make them repeat sentences I say like : "My new dog has spots" and tell me how to wash their hands (checking for their ability to sequence things...). I ask them to tell me about their family and how they got there today (to check their receptive and expressive language-- do they understand and know how to respond to questions?) It's interesting because we just assume that kids can do these things, but it's interesting to see that some can't! Pretty much I'm the best screener that there is (mostly because I don't have any experience doing anything else.) 

6.5) I get to go to Idaho next summer to do a research project... on my family. Which is pretty sweet, right? I got Grandma's buy in... now I've just got to get the rest of them to agree to it... Maybe I"ll make delicious things-- see #7-- and bribe them...

7) I'm eating pretty delicious things... Snickerdoodle bars, pumpkin cinnamon rolls, no-bake cookies, molten chocolate cake, crock pot broccoli and beef, crock pot roast, crock pot honey chicken, smoked salmon and cream cheese omelets (YUM!) Frittata muffins are next on my list of 'fun things to bake' so I can have grab and go breakfasts. Also-- the list I came up with seems rather... not healthy. I should note that I take fruits and veggies to school with me every day. I eat less of these cookies/sweets than you think I do (I had the no-bakes go bad because I just never ate them after the first day-- not doing that again). I'm working on balance, and giving up my dr pepper habit. It's a bad one.

8) I have no time to blog-- this blog has been in progress for probably 10 days. I set this awesome timer on my google chrome and I have a limited amount of time on time wasting websites each day so I can focus on school. I think it's pretty awesome.

Speaking of which, my time is up.