TSHA 2010

Here's me with my nose on outside the Ft. Worth Convention Center.  After Patch Adams there was a mad rush for the exhibit hall to get all the freebies at the booths.  Super Duper is a company that makes all sorts of speech games and books and stuff.  They are known to have THE BEST freebies so everyone swarmed their booth.  This year they gave out clipboards with a calculator at the top.  I got one!  It is super cool.  :)  After getting our clipboards, my friend and I made our way around the exhibit hall gathering freebies.  It felt like we should say "Trick or Treat!" or something.  :)  One of the other cool freebies was this booth that would take your picture with their mascot and then give you a framed copy of it.  A group of us got together and had our picture taken.

When we went back to pick up our picture they had printed and framed a copy for each of us!  It was a nice surprise.

I went to some very informative seminars that afternoon, some more then others.

That evening a friends dad treated us all to dinner.  He was unable to join us at the last minute but told us we could go to the restaurant in the hotel and charge it to the room he had gotten for her.  We had soooooo much fun.  Our waiter was great and the company was fantastic.  We laughed and laughed.  Sigh... good times.  :)

The next day, Friday, I got roped into going to a vegan restaurant with my friends.

I have to admit, I ended up getting a PB&J with apple slices so it wasn't too adventurous but the atmosphere was VERY vegan!  :)  As we were checking out we saw this little statue of Jesus standing over the stuffed animals, I guess to prove to us that Jesus wants us to eat vegan.

It reminded us of a funny thing Patch Adams had said.  "Jesus wants you to get off your butt and love people!"

Friday night was the Praxis Bowl.  We have to take a big test at the end of graduate school to prove we know all we need to know to become a Speech Pathologist.  Every year at TSHA schools compete in a game show style competition with questions from that test.  It is called the Praxis Bowl.  Each school picks 4 of their soon to be graduates and they represent the school in the competition.  Our school won last year so we have had this lovely trophy in our student work room as long as I have been attending school here.

Isn't is pretty?! :)  Anyways, we had to bring it to TSHA this year and were hoping to be able to take it back with us again.  Our team got every question except the last one right in the first round.  They advanced to the second round where they got most of the questions right but missed a few.  Our team went into the final round with a 1,300 point lead.

They got the final jeopardy question wrong.

But so did the other team so we still won!!!!  It was so exciting!!!

It was humbling reading the questions for the game because I realized there is still a lot left for me to learn.  Next year it will be someone from my class up there competing.  Probably not me because I would choke under that kind of pressure but I will totally be there cheering them on!

This is a picture of all the students from UNT that attended the Praxis Bowl.  Our winning team is the 4 students in the front holding the trophy.  This picture will be in the official TSHA publication sent to all of the great state of Texas!  We are so cool. :)

After the Praxis Bowl, a classmate had us all over to her home and fed us Chipotle style dinner followed by a rousing game of catch phrase.  We played 3 times and my team lost all 3. My cheeks and abs hurt from all the laughing by the time I left though so the night was a total success.   The food was delicious, the company fantastic, it was the perfect way to end the conference.  I can't wait for TSHA next year, in Houston!

TSHA 2010 - Patch Adams

This past week was the TSHA (Texas Speech Hearing Association) Conference in Ft. Worth.  It was held Thursday - Saturday.  I had so much fun and learned a lot!

Thursday morning we gathered for the opening with the keynote speaker, who was...

PATCH ADAMS!!!!

He was awesome!  Funny and yet pulled at the heart strings.  I'm getting ahead of myself though.

We got there early and some of our friends, who were even earlier then us, had saved us seats.  We sat on the front row!  TSHA gave us a sack breakfast that had a clown nose in the bottom of it.  We had a lot of fun playing around with those noses.  Here is me with my clown nose waiting for Patch Adams to come.

I had to tweak the color in this picture because the lighting in the arena was terrible.  Every picture we took was green!  Back to the point, so we waited for a while, getting more and more excited and then we noticed Dr. Adams had entered the arena.

It's kind of hard to see him because my phone had no zoom and that is what I was taking pictures with but I wanted to include this picture so you can see how tall Patch Adams is.  Look at how he is a whole head taller then all the women around him.  I know a couple of those ladies and they are not especially short.  I tried to find out how tall he is but Wikipedia didn't know. :)

He talked for a while about finding joy in our work and acknowledging the difference we make in a client's life.  He had us shout "I am a Hero!" and urged us to keep that in mind.  

Dr. Adams told us about the clowning trips they take several times a year to areas of the world that need to laugh.  He had just come, the night before, from Haiti.  They go to Russia every year and visit orphanages there and had even taken several trips to the war front to bring joy to our soldiers.  

He explained his clothing choice by saying he never made a person smile by wearing a suit so he always wears his clowning clothes.

He dyes his hair blue and wears a fork earring in his ear.  Someone asked, during the question and answer period, why he wears a fork earring.  He said he wears it for two reasons, the first is because it makes the most people smile and ask questions.  He said he tried a whole assortment of earrings and the fork won out, even more then a spoon or a butter knife.  The second reason is because the are inexpensive and because he often gives the earring away cost is a big factor.

I know this is a picture from the movie but it depicts a moving clip that he showed us.  Like I said earlier, Patch Adams takes a group and goes to Russia every year.  He showed us a clip from when he went to a hospital pediatric wing.  The hospital had no pain killers.  There was a boy there that had bone spurs that were so painful that he screamed every waking hour.  He would scream until exhaustion overcame him then he would fall asleep.  The exhaustion would wear off and he would wake up screaming.  When Patch went to go see him the little boy had had a brain surgery 3 weeks before and since had stopped eating, refused to take his antibiotics and basically given up.  Patch said for the 3 hours he was there the boy didn't scream, he eventually was able to sit up in his bed and actually ate and took his meds while Patch was there.  He showed us a clip where Patch gave the boy a rubber fish and pulled out a second fish so they both had one.  Patch had the interpreter tell the little boy "this is two fish having a conversation."  Dr. Adams started in with "Blub blub blub, bluh, blu blub" and the boy responded in kind, with giggles interspersed.  :)  It was really sweet to watch.  He ended the session with the boy by giving him a fish keychain and told the boy that anytime he needed to talk to Patch he should tell the fish and the fish would send him the message.

This is what he looks like when he goes out and clowns.  :)  He read us this fantastic letter, he said it is his favorite letter out of all the letters he had ever received.  (On a side note he hand writes responses to 400 letters a month!  He responds to every letter except ones asking for an autograph. :)  So his favorite letter was written by a 10 year old.  It started with "If you are reading this that means I am dead."  It went on to talk about how he was being raised by a single mom, they had recently relocated to be closer to family so he had no friends in the area.  He stayed home in bed all day every day.  He befriended the janitor of the building and with his mom's permission the janitor would come by often to visit.  The janitor encouraged him to write letters to people that the boy thought were cool.  The boy said he was writing to Patch, Oprah, Mr. Rogers and Kermit the frog.  He said he knew that Kermit was a puppet but he is still really cool.  The boy went on to talk about how amazing the janitor is and that Patch should contact him.  The boy said the janitor had promised to mail the letters when the boy died and the joke was on him because the letters were all about how great the janitor is. :)  It was a very sweet letter and we all smiled through our tears.

I think that pretty much covers it.  Patch Adams was everything I dreamed he would be. :)  More from TSHA soon.

Progress

As some of you know I have been going to Weight Watchers for about 2 months now.  I have lost 30 pounds (yeah!) but haven't really noticed any changes.  My clothes still fit the same.  I look the same in the mirror every morning.  I still struggle a bit during my walks to class.  BUT a few people have said they have noticed a change.  I thought they were just being nice and trying to encourage me.  Today I was going through some pictures and I found this picture from Christmas time...

and I had just imported some pictures from Stake Conference weekend including this picture...

I can see a difference!  (as with all good before and after pictures my hair is styled and I have makeup on in the "after" picture)  Finally some proof (as if the scale was lying).  :)  Ok, I'll keep on keeping on.  I guess it is working.  :)  I'm off to calculate some points.  Happy eating.

Elder Dallin H. Oaks

As I'm sitting here, snuggled under my covers on my bed, on a beautiful sunday afternoon waiting for my lunch to cook, my heart is going to burst if I don't take some time and write about today. Today I shook hands with an Apostle of the Lord! I'm getting ahead of myself, let me start at the beginning.

I have known that Elder Dallin H. Oaks was going to come to our Stake Conference here in Denton, TX for about 6 weeks. I have been going to choir practice at the Institute for that meeting. I enjoy singing and I figured I would be saved a seat at the conference that was sure to be packed if I was in the choir.

I stayed out late last night and as I was setting my alarm I thought "maybe I don't really want to get up and go to Stake Conference in the morning". I decided that if I woke up when the alarm went off then I would go. When I woke to my alarm this morning I had the same thought and considered staying home in bed. I decided to get up and shower and then make a decision. Even as I gathered my things to leave this morning, as I was opening my door to walk to the car, the thought's of skipping the meeting persisted, but I went.


I got to the Stake Center early because the choir was going to practice, which we did. After the practice, as I sat on the stand visiting with some of my friends I noticed that Elder Oaks had just entered the chapel. My heart skipped a beat. There was still and hour until the meeting was to begin but there he was. He began to work his way through the chapel shaking hands with each member of the congregation. It was so fun to watch people's expressions as they looked up to see who they were shaking hands with and were startled to see Elder Oaks. I couldn't take my eyes off him. My heart was full and I knew that I was in the presence of an Apostle. It was awesome! He came up and shook hands with each of us in the choir. As he took my hand he paused for just a second and looked my right in the eye as he greeted me. We wished each other a good morning and he moved on to the next person. He hugged the guys in the choir saying he was happy to give hugs as long as it wasn't to pretty girls. :)

The meeting began, the speakers were good. There were some humorous stories told and lessons shared. There were congregational hymns and the choir performed one of our prepared selections. Finally, Elder Oaks was at the pulpit. He began by testifying to the truthfulness of the previous speakers messages. He then spoke to the youth about the messages they choose to have up in their rooms and look at often, giving them a suggestion for what they might put up and look at instead. Then came the part of the talk that was just for me. He read from a letter that a sister had written him after she had heard him speak in a conference. He prefaced the letter by saying that it was from a single sister, one of the tens of thousands of women in the church eager to find the person they can spend all eternity with. He said he wished the "cowboys" would hurry up and get on with marrying. :) He blamed the men, which got more then a few chuckles out of the audience. He read from the letter that this sister had been pondering on the teachings he had shared from Mosiah 24:13-15 about how sometimes God does not remove our burdens when we pray to Him. Sometimes He helps carry them so the load is lighter and sometimes He makes us stronger so we can carry it. She had been pouring her heart out to the Lord sharing with Him that the deepest desire of her heart was to be a wife and mother when she was struck with the undeniable feeling that her desires were wrong. At this point in the talk Elder Oaks said he was shocked when he got to that part of the letter. He said, "How could it be wrong for a woman's deepest desire of her heart to be a wife and a mother?" The letter went on to explain that she was impressed that her deepest desire needed to be to be a disciple of Christ and then second to be a wife and a mother. Elder Oaks taught us that we need to first focus on following Christ, be as good as we can be in our callings right now and have faith in the Lord and His timing. My heart was full and I knew that what he said was true. He shared some other things with us and then the choir stood to sing the closing hymn. When we got to the climax of the number, and our choir director (Brother Ritchie) got choked up and teary, the thought came to me "I almost missed this. I almost didn't come." At that point I knew that the promptings to skip the meeting were from the adversary. He didn't want me to come. He didn't want me to hear those messages that day. Then my tears came as I realized how grateful I was for the love of the Lord and his divine hand in guiding an Apostle of the Lord in sharing the exact message I needed to hear.

I rushed home to get these things written down while they were still so fresh. As my stomach grumbles I am at peace. Today I shook hands with an Apostle of the Lord! It was AMAZING!!!!

- On the go post from my iPhone

More birthday

Today I got to enjoy yet another birthday celebration.



We had a lovely girls lunch. Mom, me, Kinsington, Lauren, and Aubrey. The food was great and the company was priceless. They brought me this lovely piece of cheesecake.


It was more delicious then it looks, if you can believe it. Thanks for a wonderful birthday, girls! I love you!
- On the go post from my iPhone

Flush

Yesterday morning my toilet worked fine. Yesterday afternoon it wouldn't flush. I tried plunging it but it made no difference. So I called my leasing company to come fix it.


When I got the leasing office on the phone and we got past the initial hello and stuff the conversation went something like this...

Leasing office: So what's wrong with your toilet?

Me: I don't know. It just won't flush.

L: What is keeping it from flushing?

Me: I don't know. I just peed and now it won't flush.

L: Well what did you put down your toilet?

Me: Nothing. It just won't flush.

L: Well if we find anything down there, even a tampon, you will be charged for the service call.

Me: I didn't put anything down my toilet.

L: Ok. I'll send someone right out.

So my toilet has acted up in the past and fixed itself before the maintenance guy could come. I decided to just make sure it was still broken. I went in and flushed my toilet and it worked perfectly. I called the leasing office back and told them it was working fine now but they said they were still going to send someone out. Whatever.
- On the go post from my iPhone

Do you smell something burning?

I have this cute little kitchen. Because it is small, spaces get used for more then one purpose.



My dad mom (thanks for the reminder mom) had this great idea when I first moved in to use some extra shelves that I had to create more counter space over the stove top.

You can probably guess by now where this story is going but I am going to tell it anyways. The other day I moved the boards from the front to put a pot of soup on the stove. I was busy working in the kitchen when I smelled something burning. I turned back to the stove to see flames coming from the back of my stove.

I had turned on the wrong burner!

I quickly removed the boards from the stove top, put them in the sink, and ran water over them.



Thankfully this was the only damage.

I still use my stove top counter surface but I am much more careful about which burner I turn on. Don't try this at home. I'm a trained professional. :)

- On the go post from my iPhone