The Land of Snow and Tundra

Looks picturesque, right? Not if you are continually digging yourself out of it and praying to get in the driveway!! We have had over a foot of snow already this year which has led Ari and I to be even more ready to move to Cincinnati... and hopefully get a house with an attached garage!

We bit the bullet this year and found someone to plow our driveway for us. The problem is they only come when the snowfall is finished. That's why there are pictures of Ari shoveling away. The guy who does our driveway was shocked to hear we have been clearing it by hand for the last three years!

Peds Holiday Party

For the first time in 3 years, I was actually NOT on call the evening of the Pediatric Department holiday party. I was beginning to feel left out... but I should not have. We went for about 3 hours (before Ari had to go in for his overnight shift) and it was actually kind of dull. We sat, ate, and chatted with the people we usually hang out with... just a little more dressed up. Oh well, at least it got us out of the house (which I have been reluctant to do since it is so cold and snowy). The holiday season can only get better from here!

Trimming the Tree

Last week Ari and I put up our Christmas tree. Originally, we were going to pick it out over the weekend but the weather report said snow so we went a little earlier. We were a little over zealous this year - the tree touches the ceiling and there is no room for the star! It didn't seem that big on the lot :)

Saturday I made homemade bean soup... enough for an army and served it in my tureen. I took pictures to show off the tureen since I had to fight really hard to get it; Ari seems to think it is a superfluous serving piece but I disagree. Luckily, the soup was delicious because we are still eating the leftovers! I turned on my favorite christmas cds and we were off. We got a new tree stand this year that lets you spin the tree; it made putting on the lights so much easier... there are about 800 lights on our tree! Unfortunately, it is hard to capture the detail of the ornaments on film so you'll have to trust me when I say it looks great. So far there haven't been any mishaps with the cats and the tree, but I anticipate at least one before the tree comes down. Happy Holidays!

Belated Thanksgiving

Although I was on call Thanksgiving Day (but luckily did not get called in), I was still able to celebrate with mom, Kristen, and John the next day. Unfortunately, Ari was scheduled for a week of overnights and then was off to Cincinnati for three interviews in three days. Because we decided to go so late, we decided it would be best to drive so I picked Kristen up on Friday morning and we were off. The trip was long but at least the weather was okay. We were starving but we waited until Springfield to eat so that we could have the best sandwiches in the world at Head West. I must have eaten there at least once a week while I was in med school. After her tummy was full, Kristen fell asleep until we go to mom's house. Mom was cooking like a fiend when we got there and the house smelled wonderful. We cracked open some wine and enjoyed each other's company then stuffed ourselves with all of the Thanksgiving staples: turkey and gravy, mash potatoes, stuffing, cranberries and green bean casserole mmm... we rolled ourselves in front of the TV to watch some football and then headed to bed.

Saturday, we slept until 9am... what a treat! We went off to the gym to work off a fraction of the meal the night before and then it was time for Kristen and I to get ready for Hollie's baby shower. Hollie is our cousin Martin's wife on our dad's side. She is expecting a baby boy whom they plan to name Braden in January. At the shower they had the most adorable center pieces which all had clues to a nursery rhyme that you had to guess. We also had to guess different baby foods in jars and finish lines of nursery rhymes. Kristen and I totally lost these games. Not being mommies ourselves was a huge disadvantage. It was wonderful to see our family; Aunt Camille is simply glowing at the prospect of being a grandma and Aunt Kathy was in great spirits. Baby Braden totally made out at this shower and it was fun to see all of the baby things. After the shower, we headed to Aunt Camille's to visit with the rest of the Pope/Caupp clan before going back to mom's. As usual, mom made a fabulous dinner and we had to be rolled to bed.

Sunday morning we slept in! Kristen and I left at noon so we would get back at a decent hour... which happened to be 9pm for me. The freezing rain started somewhere around Bloomington and it was stop and go around Chicago. What a mess! I was so thankful when I finally made it to our house. Despite the long trip, I am so glad I got to celebrate Thanksgiving!

Mommy Time

Two weeks ago... where does the time go?... My mom came up to visit for the weekend. Ari was diligently studying for his board exams so it was perfect timing; plus, sometimes you just need a hug from your mom! She flew in on Friday and she, Ari, and I went to eat at the Pasta Tree. We discovered a new wine and had wonderful meals, they practically had to roll us out of there. Then we headed for the casino. Potawatomi has not been good to me in the past but I was up for a challenge. I started off on the craps table, mom wandered toward the slots, and Ari watched me for a while and then decided to try his hand at roulette. My winnings were slow and steady but mom found me quickly when she was down to her last few dollars. She was so bummed! She decided, she would risk the last of it and won $250!! Both Ari and I walked away winners too! Take that Potawatomi!! Saturday, we headed up to Cedarburg for some pottery painting (I am addicted). I think mom was more stressed than enjoying it... she is such a perfectionist! We painted little holiday plates. Then we shopped down the main street. We both found fun holiday items. Finally, it was time to head back to Milwaukee. For dinner we decided to try McCormick and Schmidt's Fish Market. We had the best meal. The crab cakes were sensational and our steak was cooked perfectly. When we got home Ari was done studying for the day so we played a few rounds of dominoes. Sunday we slept in and went to the gym. Before long it was time for mom to go. I am so glad she came!

Halloween...finally

After years of avoiding dressing up (I don't think I have celebrated Halloween since my third year of medical school) Ari finally got to get into the Halloween spirit this year. There was some debate but we finally decided on King Arthur and the Black Knight from Monty Python. We should have taken better pictures so you could see that one of my arms was detachable! Just a flesh wound!! Ari even had fake coconuts to hit together like they do in the movie.

So after a short call day, I left the hospital at 9pm to meet Ari at Aaron and Ann's house. Everyone was dressed up and having a great time. Aaron provided entertainment by dancing like Napoleon Dynamite. Then in true Wisconsin drinking game fashion, the old stump came out. The Stump Game is this silly drinking game where you have to pound nails into a stump with a hammer. I have never played and it certainly seems dangerous to mix alcohol with hammers, but it always is fun to watch others. At about 11, I couldn't keep my eyes open so we headed home.

Ward Senior

Believe it or not, for the past month I have been the Green Team wards senior. For those of you who do not know the ins and outs of Children's Hospital, that essentially means that I supervise 4 interns and 4 medical students while they care for patients on the 7th floor... the baby floor. I just cannot believe that I am the senior because it seems like just yesterday that I was the intern! Time flies when you never sleep! I had a great group of residents and students so on the last day we played "Stump the Attending." I basically made the game like Stump the Schwab on ESPN and the residents and medical students tried to be the last one standing so they could face the attendings in the final round. One of the medical students, Mike, faced off with the attendings and just came a little short! I had made a crown for the victor, however, and he wore it proudly during our rounds. The categories of questions ranged from developmental milestones to rashes to rheumatologic and infectious diseases. I was so impressed by how much everyone learned this month!

Welcome Baby Emily!!

On October 14, a new addition arrived to our family. We have a new cousin; my Uncle Ron and his wife Mai welcomed Emily Jordan Droegmyer into the world after waiting 4 days past her due date. She was born in Portland, Oregon so we haven't met her just yet but we are certainly hoping to meet her soon (maybe around Christmas). Congratulations Uncle Ron and Mai! Welcome, Emily, we can't wait to watch you grow!!

Ari's Birthday, Part II

To keep the celebration going, Saturday the 13th Dan, Amber, Jason and Jen came to town. We joined them, Tom, and Sarah for a bike ride along the intraurban trail that is just a few miles from our house. It was a perfect day for a bike ride and we completed 20 miles round-trip. After we got back, it was time to get cleaned up and have some celebratory libations. Andy, Tara, Corey (yes, Corey!), and his girlfriend Angie arrived as well. We rented a chauffeured van to drive us around so we could enjoy the evening. Once it arrived we went to pick up Tomer and Michelle and we headed to Buca di Beppo. Brian and Rob met us there... are you keeping track? We all enjoyed a delicious, family-style Italian dinner. We even embarrassed Ari by singing and the brought a candelabra to the table! We then headed to the Hi Hat Lounge and Garage for libations. The martinis were delicious but the company was better. Before we knew it, it was time to head home. Some of our guests stayed up, but this old lady headed to bed. 2:30 am is WAY past my bedtime! Thank you everyone for coming to celebrate!!

Ari's Birthday, Part 1

On Ari's true birthday, last Friday, we celebrated at home by opening presents and carving pumpkins. Since Ari's favorite holiday is Halloween, he got many Department 56 pieces to put together a miniature Spooktown. (See pictures). He loved the gift and had a great time setting it up on our console table. We then went to pick our pumpkins. We picked 4 very large pumpkins so that we could use stencils to make more intricate carvings. While I ruined dinner... my second attempt at gnocchi was better than the first but I am definitely finished trying to prepare it, thank goodness I made good asparagus... Ari prepped the pumpkins. After dinner we got down to business with Ari carving a bat and I chose a cat. I think they turned out awesome. We have two pumpkins each still to carve when we get a free moment. It was a low key night in preparation for more festivities the next day, more soon...

Cheeseheads

After the marathon, when Ari was feeling rehydrated and refreshed... which amazingly didn't take long, we headed to Tara and Andy's for dinner and to watch the Packer v. Bears game. Since we moved to Wisconsin, I have become a bit of a Green Bay fan so I brought along my cheesehead. We ate Wisconsin fare: brats, baked beans, cole slaw, and at first were enjoying the game. Then things took a turn for the worse and the Bears won! Ari was thrilled but the rest of us were disappointed.

Run Ari run!!

This past Sunday, Ari completed a huge fete: he ran the Milwaukee Marathon! The enormity of this accomplishment was increased due to the fact that it was 86 degrees on race day... the average temperature for the day is 54 degrees! You may have heard that the Chicago marathon was cancelled due to these extreme conditions. The morning started early as we met Tom, Sarah, Conner, and Tom's work colleague Doug to drive up to Grafton, Wi together. There was so much excitement and nervous energy at the start line. Nearly 2500 people were registered to race and then additional people were running the marathon as a relay. We cheered the boys on as the started off and then went to grab a quick breakfast in nearby Cedarburg. We caught up with them again at about mile 14. I was amazed at Ari's split time... just 2 hours! We caught up to Ari again at about mile 17 and he was lookin' a bit exhausted. We then made our way down to the lakefront for the finish. Sarah and I were getting nervous waiting; it was so hot and the medical tent was filling up. Luckily, Ari, Tom, and Doug finished without major incident. Ari's time was 4 hours and 50 minutes... a bit longer than he had hoped because of the heat. I was just proud of him for finishing!! I also told him not to worry about his time... that he would do better next time! To which he replied, "There will be no next time!" I think that was just the lactic acid talking. I want him to run another just because I was so unprepared for this one... next time I will definitely have to make a shirt and get a cow bell! Way to go Ari!!

Pottery Glazing

Yesterday, Jackie and I headed up to Cedarburg, Wisconsin to paint pottery. Cedarburg is this really quaint area with shopping, bed and breakfasts, and even a local coffee roaster. My preceptor had told me what a great time she had there, so we decided to flex our creative muscles. Which, as you can imagine, are quite stiff from disuse. Glaze is this fantastic shop where you can pick from hundreds of pieces what you would like to glaze; they have everything from seasonal items to piggy banks to dishware to magnets. It was a hard decision, but I decided on the travel coffee mug and Jackie chose a pumpkin candy dish. For my delta zeta girls reading this... I chose to glaze my cup gray with green and pink polka dots! So after about an hour and a half of painting, we were finished (thank goodness because the shop was closing). The pieces don't quite look like they will until they are fired but we are excited to see the finished projects next week!

Something Other Than Kickball

By now you all must be wondering why there have been very few posts and why they have all been about kickball. This past month has been a busy one while I finish my last month of Q4 (every fourth night) call and Ari has been working hard. Our only real social escape, besides the occasional dinner out, has been our Tuesday night kickball games. This past Friday, however, we joined our friends to celebrate Andy's birthday. We started off at Mo's for dinner and then went downtown to Hotel Metro for martinis. We picked Hotel Metro because it has a very chic bar on the roof called Zen on 7. As luck would have it, the rain began to fall as we headed downtown. This first round of martinis were inside, but then the weather cooperated and we moved the group outside. It was a super fun coincidence that some of the interns were having a night out there as well. Not being quite the party girl that I used to be, we called it a night at about midnight.

Kickball Week 2

Another Tuesday, another week of kickball. We battled nature and the other team valiantly, but came up short on both accounts in the end. Due to seemingly unending rain the past couple of weeks in Milwaukee, we are experiencing a plague of mosquitos. I would go as far as saying mutant mosquitos because despite spraying ourselves with Off or Cutter EVERY inning, none of us walked away with fewer than 10 mosquito bites. I have never seen swarms of mosquitos before. We literally were swatting every free moment. The game itself was good... we lost 0-6 but only because we had a lapse in defense one inning and just couldn't get our offense going. We went to O'Brien's afterward to get away from the bugs and enjoy each other's company.

Quick Trip to Madison

Our friends Andy and Tara have been hounding us for some time to take a trip to Madison with them and experience the farmer's market there. Amazingly, we were able to coordinate our four schedules last weekend... not perfectly since we went when I was post-call and the day we came back Ari had to work the overnight shift, but if we kept waiting for a better time it probably wouldn't have happened. Regardless, we made the 90 minute trek west to the home of my nemesis the Wisconsin Badgers. I love Tara and Andy but they are HUGE Badger fans... I try not to hold that against them. We checked in to our hotel where we got the priceline view of the roof and headed into town. We ate at a fabulous Italian restaurant whose name I can't seem to remember. While the food and company was great... the service certainly left something to be desired. We were immediately greeted by the waiter but hadn't picked our drinks yet. He came back about fifteen minutes later and took our whole order. Then the appetizers came out and we still didn't have our drinks. From our vantage point the bartender surely wasn't backed up either. FINALLY, after the appetizer was finished our drinks came. When he brought us our meals he said he would bring more bread... which never happened. He actually never returned to our table until he brought the check. He definitely did not win server of the night. With full stomach's we made our way to the student union (and I amazingly did not spontaneously combust) to have a drink and listen to live music. We bar hopped with a couple of Tara and Andy's friends until we were about to drop dead tired and then crashed.

The next day we met Tara's parents for breakfast and then headed to the farmer's market. Ari was joking around because they kept telling us you could get ANYTHING there so Ari said he bet he wouldn't see jicama... which we actually did! Needless to say the market was huge and wrapped around the capital building. From fresh fruits and veggies, to cheese, to baked items, spices, sauces, meats, and flowers the place was a cornicopia of yumminess! This picture is the crazy guy selling honey (sorry there aren't more pictures). Finally it was time for us to part ways. Andy, Tara, and her parents were off to the game and we went home to catch up on some much needed sleep.

Season Opener

The Q4 Kickers are back and better than ever after the summer hiatus. Reivigorated by enthusiastic interns and strengthened by returning veterans, the team got off to a good start Tuesday night in the season opener. Though we were short some Y chromosomes we made a run for it (literally) and lost in the bottom of the ninth. Congratulations go to all the new players who quickly acclaimated to the game and played some great defense. Special honors go to Brian Branchford, clearly the MVP after turning not one but two one man double plays then kicking a two run home run... and nearly having to push me into home plate! Other honors go to Matt and Maraty Gray for his clutch catches and her quick feet. Can't wait until next week!

Meeting Addison

Long time, no blog! For the past four weeks we have been working nights and it has reeked havoc on our social lives! Now that we are finished, we decided to take a trip down to Rockford, IL to meet Jason and Jen's new addition. Addison Nathan Clark (by name alone destined to be a great Cub fan) is now 5 weeks old. He was born on the luckiest day ever 7/7/07! Hopefully that luck won't spill over to the Cubs!! Addison slept through the first half of our visit... through both lunch and two games of bowling. It was pretty impressive that the bowling alley has smoke free afternoons; good for young babies' lungs and for adults that don't want to stink! Ari let the lead slip away to Jason both games and Jen and I split the wins. We went back to their place to catch the end of the Cubs/Cardinals game, we won't talk about the result because this is a happy blog entry! We also played Balderdash, which is always a ton of fun... I am not just saying that because I won. Finally, it was time for us to go. I was so exhausted that I passed out as soon as we got on the highway. Poor Ari had to drive through monsoon conditions to get us home safely... but not before we stopped at Fazoli's for a late dinner. (That one was for you Laura!!) We really enjoyed meeting Addison and can't wait to watch him grow... into a Cardinals fan?!

A Delta Zeta Mini Reunion

After both of us working over night last Thursday and into Friday, Ari and I went straight to the airport to fly out east to visit my sorority sisters Lynne and Jenn. Despite our lack of sleep, we were anxious to go because Lynne, her husband Matt, and their son Joseph are finally living back in the states. None of them have met Ari since they couldn't come back for our wedding and I hadn't met Joseph. On the plane, Ari slept, but I just couldn't get comfortable. We then hopped a train to meet Lynne and Jenn in Bethesda. After socializing for a bit, I took a nap when Joseph laid down. When I woke up 3 hours later, I felt much more like myself! We were all starving so we headed to downtown Bethesda for dinner. We ate delicious Mexican food and had to hide the margaritas since they looked so good to Joe. Afterward we crossed the street for some ice cream... perfect on such a hot day. Lynne and Matt then took Joe home for bed while Jenn, Ari, and I explored the downtown area. We had some fun shopping and then went back to Lynne's to sleep.

They let Ari and I sleep in and we finally woke up at 11am!! Matt is very busy with his dental fellowship so he took Joe to Annapolis to be watched by Lynne's mom and he could study. Jenn, Lynne, Ari, and I then headed into Baltimore. We wanted to go to the National Aquarium but the next available tickets were for 5pm so we headed to Obrycki's for a late lunch first. The girls all got cream of crab and asparagus soup which was amazing and I had a crab cake melt which was delicious! Ari was a good sport and found a veggie wrap on the menu. We then walked through a very shady neighborhood and over to Fell's point for some more browsing in some very fun shops. Finally, it was time to get out of the heat and hit the aquarium. The dolphin show was fun but I think my favorite part was the frogs... I love that blue poison dart frog! He is so cute!! The sharks were really creepy. Hours later when we emerged from the aquarium, Jenn and Lynne took us to Vicaro's in little Italy for gelato... and that is an understatement. They have these giant gelato sundaes that are enormous. Since we had only really eaten lunch, we all got our own and we looked like such piggies!! Hyped up by all the sugar and caffeine from my coffee I started telling my stories faster and faster... it was a riot! We then took a quick peek at Jenn's apartment and headed back to Bethesda.

Sunday Matt went and got lox and bagels for breakfast...mmm... and we sat around in our PJ's playing with Joseph. If you ask him to show you his eyes, he squints them and it is so funny! Soon it was time to go and Jenn drove us down to the airport. I got back in plenty of time for my over night shift.

The Golf and Tennis Outing

August 1st was the annual Pediatric Housestaff Golf and Tennis Outing. For the past two years I have played tennis because I am clearly better at that than golf but this year my friends persuaded me to hit the links. Jackie, Sarah, Tara and I played nine holes of golf during my usual nap time. I have been working nights for two weeks so I sleep from 8am-6pm... our tee time was 2pm! It was boiling hot but we had a great time golfing. I actually was driving pretty well... the golf ball, not the cart! My putting left something to be desired, however. Afterward we joined the other housestaff at the country club for dinner and prizes. I went home just in time to get a quick nap and return to the hospital. Thankfully it was a quiet night. *** Special note, this picture is me and Aaron, he wanted to make the blog!!***