I got a job!!

On August 31st I will offically be a practicing occupational therapist! Last week I had a phone interview, and this past Thursday I went to the facility for an interview. They called me on Friday and offered me the job! The name of the facility is Golding Living Center. They are a sub-acute care unit. They serve the geriatric (older) population and have only 17 long term care beds, and approximately 150 rehabilitation beds. The patients are sent to Golden Living Center from Northside Hospital, located accross the street. It is located north, outside of the city, in a safe area (the exact opposite of where my fieldwork is now). The patients have the most common diagnosis of stroke, orthopedic injuries/replacements, and neurological defecits. Their goal is to have 100% rehabilitation beds and no longer have any long term care beds. It is not your typical site but will be a wonderful entry level position for me as a new graduate. My boss has been known to be a fantastic teacher and the organization will offer me an incredible amount of learning and career advancing opportunities. If you know me well, you know that the geriatric population was the last population I wanted to work with, this place is not your typical geriatric setting and I think it will be a good fit for my first job. I am VERY excited and relieved that I now have a job, and know when/what I am doing in three months!! Yay!

Mom, Lauren, Lisa, and Jess (Ben's mom and sister) went to see a possible reception site for our wedding, it didn't turn out too well, so we are now strongly considering Felicita. We are excited to check places off our list and work closer to finding our ceremony and reception site! We have officially decided to get married in October of 2011. We aren't sure of the exact date yet, it will ultimately be decided upon what dates are available at the location that we choose. We are loving our engagement and time with eachother! I will be sure to keep posting about the progression of our wedding plans.

Miss and love you all <3

Christine and Rob Tie the Knot!

That is the new Mrs. Bozart!

Ben and I got to travel back to PA for her wedding. It was a lovely weekend, but it went very quickly. Friday was the rehersal and dinner at the West Shore Country Club, then Saturday was the big day! It was a great time because all of the bridesmaids were my friends so I basically got to hang out with my friends for the weekend, which is something I miss terribly. The wedding went as planned with no major problems! The bride was as calm as a cucumber and everyone looked sharp. It rained in the morning but by the time they got hiched, the rain had stopped. It was great to let loose and have a blast with my buddies.

Sunday, luckily, was father's day and I got to spend it with my dad! I was glad that I was in PA because there was no other place I would have rather been than with my dad. He went fishing in the morning and caught a huge trout. Then we went out to breakfast at Perkins, and later he went and played golf with his neighbors. Overall it was another fantastic weekend... if only they could last longer!















(Update on my dad: his chemo is over half way done, only 4 more treatments left. His platelet count continues to be low, forcing him to wait 3 weeks in between treatments, which results in the chemo being drawn out longer. His nausea and achy-ness continues to get progressively worse with each treatment but he is a trooper and is hanging in there. He just wants it all to be over and done with, please keep him in your prayers as we are not sure how much worse it will get before he finishes his chemo).

Much love

Keith Urban/Taylor Swift and The Fray

The great weekend all started out by seeing The Fray at Chastain Park. The venue was awesome and they played a great show. The only catch was that it was pouring down rain!! Thats right, I stayed out in the pouring rain, in a sun dress, and watched The Fray. Not many people left, and they said that as long as we stayed they were going to keep playing. It proved to be a great show and an experience to remember!

Then Saturday night we got to see Keith Urban and Taylor Swift at the Philips Arena (kinda like the Giant Center). Taylor sounded great, but Keith took the show. While Taylor was playing, I turned around and noticed Keith's drummer just standing watching the show, so what did I do??... Of course I walked right up to him and introduced myself and got a picture! Once Ben got back from a beer/pretzle run, he did the same :o) From researching previous shows... we knew that he would walk out into the crowd and stand up on a platform to play at one point. As my GREAT concert luck would have it, the platfrom was right by our seats! So before the show even started, I planted myself right next to the platfrom and sure enough, after a few songs, he came out into the crowd and up onto the platform! I touched his leg and Ben and I both touched his acoustic guitar! It was so weird, we could even hear him strum his electric guitar strings! We didn't get his guitar this time but it was the next best thing! Do I have great luck at concerts or what!? What an awesome weekend...

(check out the pictures... up close and personal- no zoom needed)

2nd week at AMC

Well its only Tuesday of my second week and I already officially have 3 patients of my own! My supervisor for the first half (Josh) said that he would like me to keep 3 and no more. So I guess I must be doing o.k. if it's only the second week and I already have my "full" case load. One of them is a stroke patient, another had almost a total pelvic reconstruction, and my second one also had a stroke. He said he wants me to get as much neuro. (stroke) as possible during my time with him because once I start my second half, I will be seeing a lot of trauma (things like the pelvic reconstruction). I'm doing more of the initial evaluation of new patients which is exciting, I'm learning to become more confident in what my judgements are. I need the most guidance, as of right now, with documentation, and getting all the medical terminology correct.

My days are very long but having fun things to do on the weekend is helping... We will hopefully get a chance to lay out at the pool again this weekend but I can't wait for The Fray and Keith Urban & Taylor Swift this weekend!

Three Sisters Vineyard's Wine Festival

This weekend Ben and I decided to go to a wine tasting festival. It was quite smaller than we anticipated but it was a huge relief to get out into the mountainside once again. As you can see it was a beautiful view and just some good-old-country fun. I chose to be the taster (since I like wine) and Ben chose to be the DD. We bought one bottle of southern rose as well as some chocolate peanut butter fudge- can you guess who bought what?? (I bought the wine, Ben bought the fudge). There was supposed to be a famous chef there... from Jimmy Buffet's yacht... cooking pulled pork BBQ and chips, but by the time we got there it was sold out :( It was a wonderful afternoon with great weather and we are glad that we went.- additional pictures are below...

My first week at fieldwork went well. I already have one patient and am gradually getting another one. I am gaining independence quickly and hope to be impressing my supervisor. I am starting to become more independent in my documentation, which is the hardest part to get used to (all the abbreviations and formatting of the computer programs). But I'm excited to start my second half... I got to go where I'll be the second half for about an hour on Friday. Crazy stuff in the ICU- but I can't wait to get up there and learn more. I also hope to sit in on a few surgeries, and the woman I will be with said she would try to get me into seeing surgeries soon.

What tops off the weekend is the fact that Ben and I are sitting here on the couch watching the Phillies! And better yet, they're winning. I don't want to start another week, but I know we will have more fun this upcoming weekend... we get to see The Fray on Friday and Keith Urban & Taylor Swift on Saturday!! :o)

June 1st happenings/1st day of fieldwork

The roommate is gone!!!! :o) Ben is standing in the (almost) empty room that is soon to be our office. After he comes by and takes his posters off the wall and gives us his keys we plan to rapidly invade his room and bathroom- now to be the office and guest bathroom. Needless to say we are both very excited!

Below are some updated pictures of our condo. Ben's parents were gracious enough to purchase beautiful patio furniture for us. We also plan to put in tile in the screened in porch next time my dad comes to visit. The living room photos look very similar to the ones posted not too long ago, but we bought drapes and hung them, so check them out below...

Today was also my first day of fieldwork at Atlanta Medical Center (AMC). I am starting my first six weeks in the inpatient rehab unit, then my second six weeks in the acute care admissions unit. I have already seen one trauma patient and am going to see another one tomorrow. I will actually get to complete part of an evaluation tomorrow and am very excited. The documentation used in GA is a little different than what I learned in PA but I am learning very quickly. I think it will turn out to be a great experience and am eager to learn what will happen in the future! My supervisor already commented that she saw my application for a position and was pleased to see that I had already applied. Keep your fingers crossed!

Miss and love you all.