One year ago yesterday I started working overnights.

I cannot believe how fast the year went.

I have worked 26 of the past 52 weeks.

Last night was a slow night. I had lots of busy work to make the night go by fast but I spent a lot of it thinking about the past year. How much life has changed.

Now…

instead of getting yelled at for someone being on hold too long…..people thank me for being there to answer their questions at 3am.

instead of being too busy to even think of going to the bathroom….I actually go.

instead of knowing Lovenox dosages off the top of my head….I can now know how many bottles of alprazolam can effectively fit in the Parata cell.

instead of having the Medicaid formulary memorized…I now have memorized how many desiccant packs are in every stock bottle that gets loaded in the Parata.

instead of talking to patients…..I talk to myself (sometimes).

instead of making schedules in my free time….I spend time with my family.

instead of staying late every night….I go home on time.

instead of seeing my children 2 evenings a week….I see them every night.

It is definitely a different life working nights, but I wouldn’t trade it for anything right now. I love the consistency of my schedule, the availability it gives me, and the sanity it provides.

I don’t know if I would love the job as much if I hadn’t managed Medical for so long. It is my daily goal to make everyone’s lives easier during the day. Since I know what its like during the day at a crazy busy store, and because I’m a type A-perfectioinist-control freak- I love doing everything possible for them!

Anything that allows me to use different color highlighters and post-its makes me happy.

Any new improvement I can make towards my nightly efficiency thrills me. (I’ve changed the way I “fill the queue” about 20 times in the past year and I must say that I have pretty much mastered maximum efficiency as of right now).

And while every week has not been a bundle of joy, overall it has been an awesome experience.

I am so thankful.

Kara and Ian came over to have dinner and stayed with the kids so we could go see Avatar in IMAX 3-D. It was totally awesome!

E and I went grocery shopping together. On the way to school he put the extra underwear we had in the car on his head and told me he was  a pirate.

I did this to E’s hair the other day after his bath and when he looked in the mirror he said, “My hair’s a train wreck!”

At Leon Springs Elementary they have this cool program called the Birthday Book Club. You buy the book and they put a note on the inside cover stating whose “birthday book” it is.

X just brought her book home for the first time.

I love that its Judy Blume. I remember reading Judy Blume as a kid.

And now the inside cover is forever graced with X’s picture (and a good one at that!)

Super cool.

Also, she now has 100.4 AR points. Which meant she got her 5th dog tag today. Very exciting.

“Dog tags” (if I’ve not explained them before) are literally just that-a dog tag- that has engraved how many Accelerate Reader points they’ve achieved. All the second graders get to where their chains with tags attached every Friday. They jingle all down the hallways-they think it’s the coolest thing ever. Whoever thought of it is brilliant because it is an awesome motivator for the kids to read.

And now that she is above 100 she gets a special treat. Lunch out, movie, and since she did it way before Spring Break – she also gets a little shopping too.

I’m so proud of her!

In the battle of Kelly vs. Hives, the hives are winning.

After an afternoon nap to prepare for my first night back on shift I woke to find my ENTIRE body covered in hives. I high tailed it to the Texas MedClinic so I could get some steroids to help me through the night.

I panicked because I didn’t have any coffee (or dinner) as I was racing to get out the door at 8:30 (planning to go straight to work). Ryan rounded the kids in their pajamas for a trip to Starbucks for me. They all came into the clinic to bring it to me as I was waiting to be seen.

It was like Christmas morning for them. Getting to leave the house in their pajamas and go to Starbucks way past bedtime.

You can see the hives on my wrist as I hold my Venti non-fat latte with 2 raw sugars.

I pulled some strings letting them know that I was the overnight pharmacist in Boerne (where they send all their scripts) and that if wasn’t there by 10pm they would close the pharmacy down and none of their other patient’s would be able to get their scripts.

I was in and out in 45 minutes!

The doctor didn’t even look at my hives (well…it was all over so I guess it was kinda hard to miss even if you just glanced at me). He ordered a steroid shot (in the butt) and sent an Rx in for some more steroids.

By 2am the hives were gone. The best part of getting the steroid shot was that it totally kept me awake all night long.

By 10am (as I lie in bed completely wide awake from the corticosteroid stimulation) the hives came back.

I wanted to cry.

I took 50mg of Benadryl and 2 oral steroids and finally fell asleep around 11am.

I woke up and they were all over my legs and stomach.

I wanted to cry.

I took 2 more of my oral steroids and a (not as sedating) antihistamine.

As of right now, the hives are gone. I’m heading back into work and am praying hard that they don’t return during the night. If so, I probably will break down and cry.

Just in case you wanted to see some more.

I am going back to work tonight, 2 days earlier than normal. It was going to be 3 days early but I didn’t think I could manage a sorority meeting in San Marcos, driving home and going straight to work so my dear friend Yvonne worked last night for me.

My counterpart, Jim, (the Pharmacist who works the 7 days I am off) is having some major surgery to remove some cancer that is dangerously close to his pancreas. Please pray for him.

I am going to try and work as many of his shifts as Walgreens and my body will allow over the next 6 weeks in hopes to save extra money for a NYC trip this summer and Ryan and I’s potential Italy trip this fall.

So my to-do list today is HUGE. Lots to get done as it will be a very long 9 days.

X showing off her nails that say “Fab!” printed on her uber-cool nail printer. She does not think it’s super “Fab” that I’m going back to work tonight. She thinks I’m working extra to afford her 3 dance recital costumes that are about $100 a piece (because I joked I’d have to work extra to afford them). I think I’ll let her keep believing that.

I woke up yesterday morning with hives all over my body.

Not the best way to start the day.

After some Benadryl (and unavoidably – a nap) it went away but only to come back with more vengeance yesterday evening.

I had went up to San Marcos for the Alpha Xi Delta chapter meeting, which went wonderfully.

I felt the rash coming back as I ate dinner with the new President of the chapter.  It was so bad by the time I started to drive home that I stopped to get some Benadryl at a gas station (then a coffee at Starbucks in attempt to avoid falling asleep at the wheel).

I’ve pretty much pinpointed the culprit of the hives to be my nails. It’s the only thing that is “new” to my body. No new food, detergent, make-up, etc. I did get my nails done on Monday afternoon though so the timing seems right on with my theory.

And since the rash/hives are still here this morning, I need to go and have my nails taken off today. A friend in our small group is in Cosmetology school and says that the allergic reaction is quite common and that I should definitely have them taken off.

Bummer.

Super laid pack day today.

No, we didn’t watch football (which is apparently very un-American of us).  The television only came on for some Wii action this afternoon.

After church, lunch, and meal planning/grocery list making (for the next 2 weeks), Ryan and I set our eyes on cleaning the Office/Scrapbook Room. Not just straightening it – but cleaning it.

Luckily, the room is big enough for the 4 of us; the kids happily entertained themselves at their desk.

X had asked to look at her scrapbook (which technically can’t really be classified as a scrapbook since it is only pictures in an album). E wanted to look too (which, of course started an argument) so I set him up with his scrapbook.

[Be still my heart - this is why I spend so much time doing this.]

They spent the longest time analyzing each and every picture. E was very intrigued to see himself as a baby and you can (kinda) see that X is looking at the pictures when there were 4 kids in our home (I think she blocked a lot of those memories out already so seeing those pictures was very intriguing to her).

E wanted to see more when he was a baby so I showed him his 1st Birthday album.

Every time Ryan or I would find something while cleaning that we thought the kids would like to play with we passed it on to them.

Such as a headset and my old Pharmacy Manager nametag.

Good thing I had 2 because what one has the other must have as well.

The day flew by and before we knew it it was 5:30 (and with 7:00 pm bedtime on Sundays that meant it was definitely dinner time). But the room was finished and boy-does it look brilliant!

I probably should have taken a “before” picture but even then I wouldn’t have been able to capture the amount of dust and cat hair that was all of my desk.

And Ryan finally got these bulletin boards hung up on each of the kids’ walls. He started building them last March but it was one of those projects that just never made it high enough on the priority list. Today it did. Now the kids can hang up all their artwork here instead of laying it on our desks amidst the other clutter.

When all the week’s drama started.

I can too easily recall the pain of 2006. The memories and emotions come flooding back with far too much ease.

Memories such as sitting on top the sheet rock piles that lay untouched inside the wood frame of our house sobbing for an hour because the intense loneliness and the unquenchable longing for a child was just too much for my soul to take.

…breaking down what little strength time had given me whenever I found out someone else close to me was pregnant.

Just the mere recollection of these moments in time starts to bring tears to my eyes.

But the story is amazing.

It was then I discovered what it truly meant to surrender everything to Christ.

When I allowed Him to break me down so that I could be built up again in Him.

It was then, in those moments of emotional agony, I realized how wonderful it is to have a personal relationship with the Savior.

And now, every one of those painful memories is knitted closely with trust, joy, and understanding.

“For the I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans to prosper you and not harm you; plans to give you hope and a future” [Jeremiah 29:11]

I take this trip down memory lane because I was reminded this week how far I’ve come from those miserable (yet necessary) days.

I found out a friend was pregnant. While I’ve had lots of friends get pregnant in the past several years, this time I had happiness and praise hit me at once. I felt so genuinely excited for her and at the same time felt overwhelmed with appreciation to be able to feel that excitement.

An amazing reversal of destiny. [For my Esther sisters out there.]

How good is the Lord, who can so wonderfully knit together all my brokenness into a most beautiful story; who can turn sorrow into joy, fear into understanding, and discontent into peacefulness.

So things are looking better around here.

Last night X and I finished Harry Potter & The Sorcer’s Stone.

We read until nearly 9 pm because she couldn’t bare go to bed without knowing the ending.

Finally! a little passion from her.

She went to school super excited to take the Accelerated Reader test for the book (which would earn her 12 points). She did indeed pass the test which brought her AR total to 94. Super exciting! She took the entire first semester to get to 50 points so the fact that it’s not even February and she is at 94 is huge!

I offered her up a special date of dinner and a movie if she could get to 100 by Spring Break. Not going to be a problem!

I am thrilled that she enjoyed the book and developed the “I can’t go to sleep until I finish it” passion that I often have for books. I’m also coming to realize that she does much better with the offer of future rewards than she does with punishments at that moment.

My new thought is to hit her right at the heart  of what is most important to her.

Later bedtimes. She could earn them for time spent practicing piano, dance, homework, reading, etc. Seems simple enough….I’ll keep you posted how that goes.

Tomorrow she is having a “slumber party” with her 2 BFFs from school (one of them is moving away next week). There will be lots of screaming, giggling and generalized mania here in the Newcom house. But after this week I think we could all use a little laughter and fun.