It's wedding season!

Well the past 3 weeks have been as busy as ever. The usual craziness of school, work and life were going on, but I was out of town for the past 2 weekends. Luckily I don't have a major test for another 11 days, so I can catch up on my studying!

Getting out of town was nice though and I had a lot of fun. Last weekend I headed south to D.C. for Rachel's bachelorette party and then this past weekend I headed even farther south to my friend's wedding in central Virginia. The ceremony was beautiful and emotional and the reception was elegant and fun. J and I had a great time and were able to reminisce about wedding over a year ago.

We were invited to another wedding last month, but unfortunately unable to attend because of school and work. However, my best friend gets married next month, so I'll get my wedding fix in for the year.

The reception took place near the water and the sunset was breath taking. The weather turned out to be perfect and was in the mid 70s.

They had a signature drink with delicious champagne.

Ever since we've moved to Philly J has discovered his new favorite beer is Yuengling. He was excited to see that it was offered at the wedding. I stuck with Pinot Grigio and champagne for the night :)

We danced the night away and J even got on the dance floor with me.

For Rachel's bachelorette party we headed to D.C. for the weekend. We had a great time going out in the Dupont Circle area. We did the "typical" bachelorette thing and went out to dinner, got drinks and danced the night away. Last year Rachel was my maid of honor and we had a great time, so I had to return the favor. I didn't make her wear anything too extreme, but she did have a list of tasks to complete throughout the night :) It was fun and everyone made it home safely!

The wedding is in 3 weeks, so I'll be headed back to central Virginia for the weekend to see my best friend get married. I'm so happy for her!

The bridal party and a few other friends were able to join us in D.C. I can't believe I've known both of them for over 10 years. How time flies!

We won't be going anywhere this weekend as I will probably be in the library all weekend, but I hope we can find a couple of hours to do something around the city....

I keep telling myself "Work hard. Play hard"

The first 3 weeks of med school

Well I survived! J survived and things are going well. But wow life has changed! I think J and I are adjusting because he has a pretty busy schedule too (he didn't get home from a meeting until 11 pm one night) and making the most of things.

I typically have class and anatomy lab from 8-4 every day. I take the bus to school which allows me to nap or study and not stress about traffic. It takes about 20 minutes to get to school. I find myself taking every opportunity I can to review flash cards or review my notes. I'll be standing at the bus stop or waiting in line at the post office reviewing information.

Once I get home from class around 5 I begin studying for about an hour until J gets home. We eat dinner together (I've been cooking and freezing meals during the weekend) and then I get back to studying by 8 or so. I try and go to bed before midnight, but a couple of nights I was up until 1, which isn't always ideal when J gets up at 5 and I get up at 6 the next morning. I got sick after the first week with a slight fever and typical cold symptoms, that are just now going away. This reminded me how important it is to take care of my body. I typically don't study on Friday nights as J and I go out to dinner or watch tv together at home. But it's back to studying all day Saturday and Sunday.

I really enjoy anatomy lab. There are 5 of us to a body and I really like my partners. In the 1st 3 weeks we've dissected the entire back, down to the spinal cord, the shoulder, neck, chest, arm, forearm and hand regions. At the end of the trimester we have to present any abnormal findings about our body and a possible cause of death. So far we haven't found too many abnormalities, except what we assume to be poor circulation, which lead to some decay in her arm muscles. Other groups have found breast implants, colonoscopy bags, stitches from heart surgery and various scars.

On Friday we had our first test. I think it went ok. I don't feel doomed, but I wouldn't say I'm confident that I got an amazing grade. The test was 2 parts....one practical part in which we had to identify nerves, arteries, body parts, etc on the bodies, as well as look at xrays. The other part was written with about 80 questions.

Thankfully we don't have class the day before tests, so on Thursday I woke up at 8 am and studied until 12:30 am. I typically set a timer for 60 minutes and study that entire time and then take a 15 minute break.

This is my binder for the 1st 3 weeks filled with notes and powerpoints. Most of the pages are printed double sided too! It's a 2 inch binder and yep it's already full. I'll be buying a new one tomorrow.

I got creative with my studying by the end of the night. In order to remember which nerves innervate which muscles in the hand I drew it out on my hand. I'm a very visual learner and I think it was effective as it helped me not get confused to which nerves run on which side of the arm.

A few people asked me to take pictures in my scrubs :) I was home alone and didn't know how to make the self timer setting work, so this is as good as it gets.

I'm enjoying Labor Day weekend, as I didn't study at all yesterday :) I'll do some studying today, but tomorrow J and I are going to head to the mall, so that will be a nice treat on our day off.

More Adventures with Rachel

Although I'm a little behind I want to finish blogging about the rest of Rachel's visit since we had so much fun and packed a lot into 3 days. The same day that we visited Eastern State Penitentiary we also visited the Philadelphia Museum of Art. I must admit I haven't been to an art museum in a few years, so it was a nice treat. I loved the variety they have in the museum. Sculptures, stained glass, paintings from various eras, furniture, clothes, etc. One of my favorite rooms contained modern art, however you are not allowed to take pictures in that room. I also really enjoyed the stained glass and they had a display of uniforms from knights, which was very interesting.

This is the view of the city as we're leaving the museum. Of course I had to take pictures of the infamous Rocky steps. There were kids running up and down them pretending they were Rocky :)

Rittenhouse Square is always a good people watching spot. We grabbed coffee and croissants one morning and enjoyed the sights. This guy was a serious acrobat. He was collecting a decent amount of money from on lookers.

This band was probably my favorite! I'm assuming they are a family and they were really entertaining. As you can see there are young kids all the way up to adults. They were playing upbeat jazz music that made me want to dance. It kind of reminded me of the music hear at parades in New Orleans.

They were also offering free Tango lessons in the square. A lot of people gathered and were having a good time.

City Hall has wonderful architecture. I walk by and through it frequently, but hadn't taken the time to really appreciate all the details until then. I definitely want to take a tour of City Hall to learn more about it because there is so much history there.

We went on a food tour. It was great! We ate cheesesteaks (I had a veggie one), pizza, pretzels, hoagies, and chocolate chip cookies. It was nice to learn a little more about the city and eat along the way. The tour culminated in Reading Terminal Market (which I blogged about previously) and we were so full at the end. Rachel and I also won a Tasty Kake for answering the most trivia questions at the end of the tour. I didn't know that Tasty Kakes were made in Philly and they have sooo many different flavors.

Lastly, we had to go to Love Park to see the Love sign. This was my first visit and I didn't know they had other statures there. They were all game pieces, which I thought was really fun.