Holiday Cards 2011

Thank you for all the beautiful holiday cards this year!  We loved reading each one of them :)

   

Christmas in Pittsburgh

Alex and I spent this Christmas with Alex's family in Pittsburgh.  Alex only had Christmas Eve and Day off from work, so our visit was a short one.  We drove over to Pittsburgh as soon as Alex got off on the 23rd and left early in the morning on the 26th.  The visit was quick, but we had a wonderful time.  It was my first Christmas away from my family, but the Scheers made me feel right at home :)

 
Christmas Eve is Dave's birthday.  We had a super yummy raclette cheese dinner to celebrate.  For this dinner, you use little pans to heat sliced raclette cheese by sticking them onto the bottom shelf of the raclette maker (in the picture).  You use the surface of the raclette maker to cook ham or other meats, bread, fruits, or vegetables.  It is a very yummy dinner.

 

The gluten-free, sugar-free cake so that all party-goers could enjoy it!

 

Woo hoo!!! Santa strikes again!!

  

Alex got a new computer!

      

My big present was this beautiful ottoman!

    
I love it!

  

Rain boots for all those rainy Philly days!

   

Christmas dinner!

  

Merry Christmas!

Christmas in Philly

Alex and I opened our presents from my family last night in Philly.  It was our first time opening Christmas presents in the apartment.  We got in our pj's, turned the Christmas music on, set out a plate of Christmas cookies, and opened all of the pretty packages!  We made out like bandits! 

 
Santa came! 

    

Grandma's present!!

 

NC State biking shirt!! 

  

Moo got some tasty mice :)

 

And a box!

An entire bouquet of flats for work!!

 

My cute boots!

 

Opening his surprise guitar petal!!!

  

Merry Christmas!

Christmas Village

Alex and I have been trying to go to Christmas Village in center city for the past two and a half years and we finally went!  Christmas Village is an outdoor holiday market event modeled after traditional German Christmas markets.  There are vendors from all over selling European drinks, sweets, and foods.  We ate crepe nutellas and German pretzels and drank mulled wine.  I am glad we were finally able to make it!

  

Christmas Village!

 

The big tree

  

Pretzel shop!

 

Alex had a yummy cheese strudel.

  

Mulled wine and pretzel :)

Christmas Visitors

We had a little visit today from Aunt Bay, Aunt Barbara, and Tessa!  Aunt Bay and Tessa were up in NYC celebrating Tessa's birthday and are now flying down to NC for Christmas.  We all went out to Manayunk for a nice lunch.  I am so glad I got so see everybody since I won't be home for the Christmas Eve party!!

  

By the tree!!  Tessa's friend Sarah came with them for the trip!

  

Lunch at Kildare's

  

Home for the Holidays

I finished my surgery oral exams last Friday morning and snuck off to North Carolina for a quick holiday trip.  We are spending this Christmas with Alex's family in Pittsburgh so I wanted to have a few days with my family.  It was a fast visit, but I was able to finally hang up the wedding pictures with Dad, spend many hours wrapping pretty presents with Mommy, and hang out in Chapel Hill with Lisa.  Grandma had us over for her annual Christmastime dinner, which was perfect as usual.  Moosie came along for the ride and enjoyed playing around the enormous Christmas tree.

  

Dinner at Grandma's house!

  

Grandma's tree

  

Moo and I watched Mommy wrap beautiful packages.

  

Moo paid very close attention.

  

  

The most enormous Christmas tree I have ever seen in a house!

 

Two and a half years later, they are up!

Moo's Day Outside

Alex had the day off yesterday and decided to take Moo for a little trip to the park across the street.  Moo never gets to use her cute little harness and leash so it was the perfect excuse!  Despite all the fun leaves to run in and the yummy squirrels to chase, Moo did not like her field trip.  Stinker.

  

Not quite sure what to think

  

  

Exploring the plants and spotting squirrels

 

Ready to go inside

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

Alex and I got our Christmas tree today!!  We did not get one last year because our first Christmas tree in Philly tripled the electric bill.  We decided to bite the bullet this year and just get a pretty little tree with pretty little Christmas lights :)  We didn't realize how tall the tree was until we put it up in the apartment.  After all of the decorations and lights went on it though, it was beautiful!!

  

Picking up our tree!

  

All ready to be decorated!

 

Lights

  

A very sleepy kitty...

   

All decorated!

  

Alex was working today so I made cream cheese filled pumpkin muffins!  Now the house looks and smells like Christmas should!

Thanksgiving 2011

Happy Thanksgiving!!  Alex and I both have many things to be thankful for this year.  Alex's job making him work on Thanksgiving is not one of them :)  Because of the turkey day shift Alex had to take, we were forced to stay in Philly and miss out on our family's celebrations.  Luckily for us, the Groundwaters were kind enough to invite us to their Thanksgiving dinner.  The dinner was wonderful and it was ever so nice to spend the evening with family when we thought we were going to have to spend it alone.

   

The beautiful table!  We started off the dinner with a yummy pumpkin bisque.

  

The dinner was so good that we forgot to take pictures until it was time to go.

 

So thankful for my Philly family (and only three weeks left of surgery)!

On Call

I had my first night on call last week!  I was really excited to spend my first night in the hospital, especially because I was with two other fun medical students.  We are required to have several call days/nights so that we can see what happens in the hospital over night and on the weekends.  We are on our surgery rotation so while on call, we are responsible for responding to all traumas and assisting the residents with the floor work.  For a weekday call, you have your normal day starting at 5:15am and then stay overnight until the conference is finished the next morning around 8 or 9.  I figured we would get a few hours to study and a few hours to sleep... not so much.  My intern was covering for all of the surgery teams and had a total of ninety-six patients!!  We were busy running around the entire night!!  I did not get to even crack my book or take a nap!  I learned the only good thing about a call is getting the next day off to sleep :)

  

The female medical student call room where Margarita and I thought we would be having a sleepover...

  

My untouched bed :(

Happy Halloween!!!

Happy Halloween!!  Moo has enjoyed hearing all of the stories from my surgery rotation and decided to be a surgeon this year for Halloween.  She even learned an instrument tie and will be assisting on Frankenstein's surgery tonight!

    

Surgeon Moo

    

Ready to scrub in!

       

Examining her sutures :)

  

Happy Halloween!!!