Flat Stanley, meet Rock E. Hawk?

So in the mail yesterday we received an interesting letter from school saying they changed the Hawks name (mascot) to Rock E. Hawk.  Along with this was a punch out of the Hawk and instructions to take him on our daily errands and tasks, take pictures with him and upload them to Rockhurst...similar to the flat Stanley concept used in many elementary schools.  So, in good spirit, I took a pic with my Flat Rock E. Hawk.  We will see if he actually makes it off the refrigerator after this point. :)

This week has been a fun one!  On Thursday me and ten of my friends and classmates stood in line for the midnight showing of the Hunger Games and it was a great time and fantastic movie!  I have been waiting for this movie for over a year and I was beyond excited for its premiere!  I am sure some of my friends temporarily disowned me for the week :)

The campus' infamous tulips have also started to bloom, which after a whole week of clouds and rain is an even more beautiful sight!  Every spring the campus plants hundreds of tulip bulbs ever since I was a freshman in the dark ages, I have loved when they bloom! It is a great start to my most favorite time of the year.

Yesterday the class went to a library in Northern Kansas City and did free health screening for kids ages 7-18.  It was a really great experience and it was nice to be able to reach out into a part of the community that doesn't usually get that kind of information or feedback and help introduce them to healthier lifestyle options.  (and the kids are always super cute!)





Outside of my small run I will be taking later to enjoy this amazing day, my and a majority of my classmates will be studying for the 3 tests we have this week....joyful?  My roommates and I have been dog sitting Zoe, my friends adorable little dog for the weekend and from the pic I took when I was studying yesterday, it seems we have the same views on reading through notes. :)

 Have a blessed week!

and the rivers ran green

St. Patrick's Day in Westport

Top of the Mornin'!  Since I am slightly Irish and yesterday was the lovely St. Patricks day, it is a pretty appropriate gesture (minus the fact it is afternoon).  So while many of you are probably broken hearted and depressed because of your shattered bracket (my roommates are Mizzou fans so it is a common theme here), I have been spending my weekend babysitting my friend's adorable dog: 5 pound beyond adorable Zoe.  She is the cutest gem of a cuddle bug and we have loved having her this weekend! 

This week also brought a tide of warm and beautiful weather!  While it made the classrooms warm and unbearable it made for a few outsides runs around the lake at Bass Pro Shops perfect and beautiful.  It was amazing to be able to be with my thoughts and music in the sunshine.  We won't mention how I am so pale I was reflecting the sunlight.  And it wasn't all the weather's fault about making it tough to focus in class...the week after spring break is always difficult to focus again.

In the world of school we ran statistics on our research project and we have great news!  Our data showed a significant difference between the different breathing conditions!  It was a huge relief to my group to have some good results from our long hours of data collection!

Yesterday my roommates, friends, and I went and celebrated St. Patrick's day down at Westport, which is a bar and restaurant area of Kansas City.  It is similar to the Plaza or Brookside or Power and Light districts, for those of you who might be familiar with one of those areas.  We enjoyed the sunshine to the point of red shoulders, good laughs and great music!  So today to pamper our tired feet a few of us went and got pedicures!

The best part of this upcoming week is that the Hunger Games is out!  I am a huge fan of my Kindle and therefore a big dork who reads a bunch.  Last year I read the Hunger Games Trilogy and was hooked.  I have since convinced probably a dozen people to the point of annoyance to read them and now we are all going to the midnight premiere on Thursday.  It is going to be divine! If you asked us, you would think that Harry Potter is back or something :)

May the odds ever be in your favor this week! (again, Hunger Games.  I am not at all excited about this haha)

Listening to Neil McCoy in Westport!

Ain't in no hurry today

Spring Break is officially over and even mother nature is upset.  The rain and springing forward last night for daylight savings time has officially made me drowsy and highly unmotivated to do a few last minute things before school starts back up tomorrow. 

I do plan on actually cooking before I go back to the nights that mostly consist of chicken, salads, grilled cheese, and frozen pizzas.  I also have to pick up my friend from the airport after he spent the weekend in Vegas for our friend's bachelor party.  We can't wait to fly out to New Jersey in June to celebrate his wedding! 

Viola!

My spring break was pretty fabulous!  While the mornings were usually devoted to something school related, I got to get to gym and spend my evenings with family and friends.  I was able to see my former high school's musical "Fiddler on the Roof", go shooting with my dad/sister/grandpa, and have some delicious dinners.  I spent a large chunk of my invisible money tree on clothes which resulted in having to donate a trash bag full of clothes when I got back to KC.  However, my greatest accomplishment came from buying a nail art pen and polka dotting my nails....can anyone say "winning"?!

But now that we are technically on the "downhill" of the semester (if it is it is going to be incredibly rough and slow moving), there are some fun things to look forward to like my birthday party extravaganza, Easter break, habitat for humanity, white coat ceremony, and the not so fun comprehensive exam.  Believe it or not, all of this (which is about 20 percent of my life) has to happen in TEN WEEKS!  Then it is time to pack up and move onward to rotations!

Don't Let the Sound of Your Own Wheels Drive you Crazy

All signs point to home sweet home!

Spring Break is finally here! After a stressful week of midterms and practicals it is safe to take a few days to breathe.  The week was mostly spent at school but I got a few quiet moments to step back.  First Emily and I had dinner with our friend Kate, who we lived with for a few years in an OCH.  She is now going to graduate school in Texas and was visiting her boyfriend for a few days.  It was lovely to see her and catch up!

I also got to play with the choir for Taize prayer on Wednesday.  I played for Rockhurst for a few years but my schedule in graduate school started interfering.  So I was very excited to play for St. Marks.  For those of you who don't know Taize prayer is a form of reflection and uses repetition of songs as a form of meditation.  It was wonderful to take a minute and just be quiet.

The storm clouds heading to Kentucky as I was heading home

Friday I finally got to come home!  It is crazy weird and cheesy how much you grow to love your "boring" hometown as you grow up.  There was a lot of serious weather that day in my neck of the woods but thankfully there weren't tornadoes that touched down in our area and I missed the storm when I was driving in.  There was also some snow showers in Kansas City that I missed when leaving in the morning.  I was very thankful to not cross either of those storm's paths!

I have spent the last few days loving the simplicity of life!  I went to the shooting range with dad, Grandpa, and my sister yesterday afternoon and laughed until my stomach hurt last night with my close friends that still live in Cape! 

Chleo and I heading to the gun range with dad and grandpa!

The rest of my spring break is mostly unplanned (outside of going to see my high school's musical, some shopping, and more time with great people) and I am very much looking forward to it!  Have a blessed week!

If only I had superhero powers...

Allie and my's weekend...studying for musculo practical

Next week starts mid-terms so what better way to prepare than to camp out at school all weekend?!  Okay, we aren't all crashing here at night but large chucks of Friday, Saturday, and Sunday are being spend brushing up on Musculoskeletal Techniques, Neuromuscular lab concepts, and then stuffing what's left of our brains with information for our few written tests we have.  Spring Break 4 days away and counting!


No it is not near as bad as it sounds, considering every week I post about always doing schoolwork or tests or drowning in Times New Roman font on things about PT.  I guess since this is our last full semester that the teachers get their hands on us until clinicals they except a lot out of us and are trying to get in as much as possible.  It is stressful and at times a feat that looks near impossible but as always, we will make it out of this semester alive and with minor flesh wounds.


One unique thing we did this week was venture to a homeless shelter that helps families get back on their feet and do a development screen on the children there.  My groups child was beyond adorable and almost 2 years old.  Our child had to do tasks like throw a ball, scribble, stack blocks, and pull pegs out of a board.  After doing the screening my group determined that the child is developming normally and our only concern was with their sitting leg posture. 


My research group also FINISHED our data collection!  What a releif!  Next step: run statistics on our data to see if there was a significant difference between breathing conitions. 


In the small social slice of my pie I was able to visit with my friend Ali and Lindsey breifly since they were in town visiting family.  Well worth the few study breaks at the beginning of the week!

Break free from reality

This past week was full of information and studying!

Kelly practicing wrapping Kim's arm

In medical conditions lab we had a guest speaker who is a physical therapist in wound care.  She talked about and showed us all the different bandages and dressing used with various types of burns and wounds.   We then practiced wrapping and correctly unwinding the bandages.  Then on Thursday we worked with pigs feet.  No that was not a mis typing, we worked with pigs feet.  We had to document the wounds that were present on the feet (our teacher created them) by measuring, poking and prodding.  Then we were welcome to cut around for giggles....if you could guess, I didn't do much excess cutting!

In musculo we continued to learn about muscle massage techniques and tapping procedures for the shoulders.  After only a few minutes we all realized that all of us have terrible "hunching over notes and books" posture that is in need of some serious attention!

A picture my teacher took during Baby Lab a few weeks ago
that she released to the class, he's adorable!

We also took a few exams and are currently prepping for a few more this coming week.  But no worries, spring break is 2 weeks away, which is pretty mind blowing! 

In the physics lab Emily and I teach we learned about the third class lever the resistance arm is longer that the effort arm and the fulcrum is not in between these 2 arms) that is the elbow and used models to demonstrate the resistance torque to weight in the hand and gravity and the effort torque that the muscle uses to lift the arm.  Next week we are looking at he second class level of the ankle. 

A picture of the flowers we got my sister
since the pics from the state meet are on her
camera!

I went to St Louis on Friday to watch my sister dive at the State competition on Saturday and she did great!  It was a short trip with a lot of road time but worth every mile.  Some down time with my parents was exactly what I needed after a rough week!

Onto another week!  Have a blessed day!

Blown away by the Windy City

We landed back in Kansas City a few hours ago and I am not at all wanting to go back to school tomorrow!

I adore this photo! Us on the SkyDeck at Willis Tower!

We flew out Wednesday to Chicago for the 2012 APTA (American physical therapy association) Combined Sections Meeting!  After learning our compass directions and figuring out public transit in a big city we settled into our awesome hotel!

We attended various meetings and lectures that were hosted by different fields of APTA (othro, neuro, aquatics, women's health, etc).  My favorites from the conference was the one about Rotator Cuff surgery and rehab strategy and then the running mechanics lecture.  They were intriguing, informative and taught some new things to better me as a therapist!  There were over 12,000 (yes that is THOUSAND!) physical therapists and student physical therapists from all over the country.  It was amazing to see how many people are in our profession.  About 30 of my classmates went to the conference. 

Lauren and Molly walking around
Grant Park

Of course we took some time for site seeing and being a tourist.  We visited Willis (Sears) Tower, the Bean, Michigan Ave, and Grant park.  At Willis Tower we stood/sat on the skydeck 103 stories up with only a sheet of super thick glass beneath our feet, it was amazing!

Some other things I learned about Chicago:

• While I had wind burnt cheeks to prove it, Chicago is actually called the Windy City because of it history of politics and mafia
• Revolving doors are essential in a city of brisk winds
• Boat shoes are not the best option when it is snowing
• Public transit is not my first choice in transportation...but essential in a city that size
• The great Chicago fire of 1871 burned 1/3 of the city: Wowza! (I am a bit of a history geek)

Overall it was a great trip!  Time to get back to a crazy week!

Emily and I in front of the Bean!

Bean reflection picture!