Here we go...

I am leaving tomorrow for a quick trip to my favorite country, America. I will be in TN until Wednesday and then my parents and I are going to Miami to find a place for us to live. I'll be back in Dominica next Sunday. I was going to stay home for longer, but we are so close to being finished with Dominica and I miss Ryan when I'm home, so I decided to make it a quick little trip. Some spouses started a Bunko group a few weeks ago and this is a picture of the group (with a couple extra people). I love Bunko! I feel like I've been working out after we play because my heart is racing the whole time!

The first time we played I didn't win anything. Neither did Chika or Katy and we are sore losers!

This is how excited we get! Those are my arms behind Liz. :)

This was taken on the first night when everybody was trying to explain the rules of the game. Too many girls talking at the same time and asking lots of questions. I was feeling the stress!

Katy, Chika, Brianna, and me. I didn't win anything the second night either!

These are a couple of pictures from the birthday breakfast at my apt. a few weeks ago. I thought this was a very artistic shot (I didn't take it). It's of the Birthday Box of Questions I wrote about in a previous post. Lots of fun!

I knew my mom would appreciate this one because I went outside and cut a couple of fresh flowers. People made fun of me, but I think it makes the table, don't you??




This is of a cake I made for Sarah's surprise birthday party. It was huge (4 layers) and took a lot longer to make than I was expecting!

This is from one of Ryan's football games. It was raining, so I watched from the car. Rabbi is injured, so he was watching in his car too. You can hear us discussing the cows in the background. I was laughing because these cows kept coming onto the field. I didn't get a very good video of it.

I took this video as we were all hiding before Sarah arrived at the restaurant for her surprise party. We hid for a long time, took a break, and then had to rush back to our positions!

As I keep saying, the semester is flying by. At one time I thought we would never leave this island and now it seems to be approaching so fast! I'm going to really be sad to separate from our friends here (some staying in Dominica, some going to Michigan for 5th semester). I'm excited to be able to early vote on Monday! Honestly, I don't know why anybody wants to be President. Half the country hates you, you get blamed for everything that goes wrong, and you get no credit or "thank you" for the things that go right! Do you think if I sent a thank you note to a politician they would actually read it? Hmmm...I'm big on thank you notes, you know. I'll try to do a better job of updating the blog because people keep expressing disappointment in my lack of posts. It's just that everything that was so new and interesting when we first got here is now just part of our normal, everyday life. I have to tell you, Ryan was disappointed in the lack of comments on the Hurricane Omar blog! Hint. :) (Thanks for commenting Kathy & Theresa!)

I'm not sure who made this video, but the last minute is pretty amazing!

Hurricane Omar!

These steps start on campus and go down to the beach.
PBH on a normal day.
PBH today!

To be honest, I don't really know WHAT is going on! A big storm came through a few days ago, developed into Hurricane Omar (category 3), turned back around and got us again! It didn't actually hit us directly, but we sure are feeling the effects! Last night Ryan and I stood outside on our balcony for a long time and just watched the storm. It was AMAZING! It wasn't raining, but there was lightning over the sea and there was a bright, full moon. Huge clouds were just sailing by so fast. I was in awe. Last night I played bunko with a bunch of girls on the Subway deck (I'll have to blog about that later!) and we could hear the loud, loud ocean (which is usually quiet since we're on the Caribbean side). It wasn't the sound of crashing waves in rhythm, it was more like the sound of sloshing water constantly. So this morning the rain was coming down SO loudly, that I was getting completely under the covers just in case the roof tore open and the water came pouring in. Ryan called at 10:00 to say that campus had been CLOSED (that's never happened before) and that all of the businesses were closing for the day. Shortly after Ryan got home the power went out which, thankfully, doesn't affect us because we have a generator. Of course, when you turn on the water it looks like mud coming out of the faucet. Look at my friend's blog: http://www.lizandjustinvoris.com/1/post/2008/10/schools-out.html She posted a few videos of the beach right by campus. The barge is under water! And where she's standing is usually a pretty good size beach. I think our water is even browner than her video. Ralna just called to say that some small boats were washed up onto the roads in Portsmouth. We're fine, but this is definitely an unusual day weather-wise! I stayed home all day, so I stole all of the pictures from my friend's blog. :)

Island Life Countdown: 65 Days!

I just realized that it has been a while since I've written anything. Even though we've been busy, nothing too blog-worthy has happened in the last week. The first picture is of the cakes I made for Mary's baby shower last week. I made one for a girl and one for a boy because we don't know what she's having. These are the cakes I had to make with no running water, so I couldn't use more icing colors because I couldn't wash out the icing decorator containers. The next picture is of my wonderful Bible study group (minus Meg). Everyone came over last Friday for breakfast to celebrate 4 birthdays that will happen within 3 weeks of each other. We had so much fun. I'm so thankful for this group! I had a cute little box of birthday questions that I got at Hot Pink when I was home and we went through every question and had some great conversations...not to mention a great breakfast! I made cinnamon rolls and spinach quiche. Everybody brought something to contribute to the breakfast. The best part of my week came on Saturday when Ryan and I went to Roseau together and stayed at the Fort Young hotel. We had talked about doing this, but I didn't get excited because I just knew that Ryan would have too much going on with school to be able to go. We had so, so much fun! We ate at the Waterfront restaurant and we both had U.S. steaks! The third picture is of us at the Fort Young (Waterfront restaurant).

Sunday was Ralna's birthday, so I cooked dinner and baked a cake and Ryan and I took it over to their house Sunday night. The last picture was taken right after she blew out her candles. We've been looking at apartments online and trying to decide where we want to live in Miami. I'll be in Miami in 2 weeks with my parents to hopefully sign a contract and put a deposit down on an apartment! Yesterday I made a list of all of the things we want to sell before we leave the island and am very excited that we will have some money to buy Christmas presents this year! I've still been sick so I went to the doctor on Monday and she put me on an antibiotic, steroid, 2 different inhalers, ordered bloodwork, gave me a prescription cough medicine, and hooked me up to a nebulizer (breathing machine) for 20 minutes. It all seemed a bit extreme because the only problem I thought I had was an annoying cough. Anyway, last night was Bible study and tonight is Bunko! I'm very excited because tonight is the first Bunko night, but we are going to be playing the first and third Wednesday of every month. My days are busy and they are flying by! I'm trying to enjoy living on a deserted island as much as possible because our days here are numbered! Oh, to end this post I am going to have to scare my friends that eat sushi (Adam, Theresa, Julie...to name a few). I was looking at Ryan's notes and you can get tapeworms (google a picture!) from uncooked fish and the longest one recorded was somewhere between 50-60 feet!!! Something to think about next time you're craving Sakura! :)

Water Woes

Our last semester in Dominica is flying by! I've been consistently busy this semester, which is why it's flying! The first major exam of the semester was Monday and afterwards we went to "Beach Bash". People were swimming in the ocean, snorkeling, scuba diving, tubing, grilling out, and just basically enjoying island life! It was one of the first pretty days without rain and we had a ton of fun! They haven't emailed official grades yet, but they always email the answer keys and Ryan's answers and the breakdown of subjects and I always have a great time grading it for Ryan. He did unbelievably good and so we are thanking God! I'm still sick. I think I've got the whooping cough. Monday night we all went out to dinner for Katy's birthday. I was in charge of the cake. Tuesday morning I woke up and we had no water. I was really confused because it wasn't even raining. I later find out that it is only our apartment that doesn't have water. I know everybody reading this in America is thinking, "oh, that stinks", but let me tell you that it doesn't just stink, it completely interrupts everything that is normal in your day to day life. You get up and brush your teeth using bottled water (not a big deal) but then you want to use the toilet...and then you want to take a shower...and then you want to wash your hands....Finally you just sit down, put hand sanitizer all over your hands and arms and try to decide how to look decent when you've got that sweaty look and you can't take a shower. My Bible study meets at my apartment every Tuesday night, but we still had no water. I ran up to campus and took a shower at the gym. I had to flush the toilet (when we're having guests, I usually like to clean up a lot more than just flushing!) and it took me 20 minutes to fill the toilet up with enough water to flush. When everybody got to the house Ryan announced that we had a "no poop" rule. That's how you like to welcome people into your home. Oh well, everyone here understands. It's 35 hours since they turned the water off and we still have no water. I made a chocolate trifle for Bible study (= dirty dishes). After everyone left I had to make 2 cakes for a baby shower I went to this morning. This meant I had to make 2 batches of buttercream icing and I had no water to wash out my bowls, measuring cups, spoons, nothing. The kitchen was a disaster. I had food coloring stains all over my hands with no way of washing it off. Every time I wanted to change icing colors I had to clean the icing tips with napkins since there was no water. It was the hugest hassle! Of course, I couldn't leave dishes covered in sugar and chocolate sitting out all night because we would have had every bug in Dominica in our kitchen. So I stood at the sink for well over and hour and washed dishes with a sponge, soap, lysol wipes, and bottles of water. You know how when you're washing something that has butter or shortening on it it's really greasy? Imagine washing about 30 dishes covered in that with no hot running water - just room temperature bottled water. My back was killing me, I was burning up, and I was really, really wanting to take a shower (that wasn't happening)! Anyway, you get the point and you're tired of hearing me complain, so I'll move on. I'll post pictures of the baby shower cakes when I get them. Someone else took pictures for me. I'm really excited because I'm coming to Nashville in 2.5 weeks! I'll just be there for a couple of days and then Mom and I are going to Miami to apartment shop. I'm planning to early vote, which I'm very excited about! I look forward to voting every chance I get. :) I think I think my vote counts more than it actually does. Some people don't bother voting if they live in a county that always goes Republican/Democrat because they don't think their vote will make a difference. I have the opposite problem. I think my vote makes the difference! :) Ha! And you know how a lot of people always feel like they need to lose weight and always seem to be dieting? I've always been the opposite there too. Somehow, I haven't noticed how much weight I've gained. I was at the gym last week and I got on the scales and do you know how much weight I've gained since our wedding in July 2006? Well, I was shocked!!! How did I not notice? I knew I liked wearing sundresses, but I didn't realize it was probably because my pants weren't exactly fitting the same. I'm going to be working on that! I'm supposed to be baking bread for orders for tomorrow right now, but since I have no water (or clean dishes for that matter), I'm blogging instead. I'm also having our Bible study group over for breakfast Friday morning (12 people). I hope we have water by then so I don't have to cancel!!! Ryan and I are hopefully going to have fun this weekend since he just got a big test behind him! Well, I'm going to go dump 10 gallons of water in the back of the toilet so I can flush it! Oh, I forgot to mention that I gave my new neighbor a cooking lesson the other night. We made poppyseed chicken casserole, which calls for sour cream. Since that is difficult to find here, I showed her how we could make our own. 1 cup sour cream = 3/4 cup buttermilk and 1/4 cup butter. Before we could make our sour cream we had to make our buttermilk. 1 cup buttermilk = 1 cup whole milk and 1 T vinegar or lemon juice. If you're ever cooking and you don't have an ingredient, google it because you can probably make it yourself!

**If you checked this post earlier you may notice that I edited it. :) After we got water back and I took a shower I was feeling much happier and thought that maybe I was a little too grumpy in the original post. The newer version is meant to be a little lighter.

Being Married

It's all fun and games until somebody gets sick. I am very blessed to have a wonderful husband who goes out of his way to do things to make me happy. We have been married 2 years and 2 months now and when I get sick, I still want my mom. Because Ryan is in medical school, he can't afford to get sick. This means that he takes care of me from a safe 5 foot distance. Whenever I got sick growing up, my mom was able to stay home with me all day, lay beside me, bring me food, medicine, rub my back, whatever I needed. I know...I was very spoiled. Ryan has way too much going on with school to be able to stay here with me (which I completely understand), but I hate being sick and alone!!! Last night he kept asking "What can I do?" and I just got frustrated because my mom never had to ask that...she always knew what to do! I didn't know what to do either! So, I think that all moms should write down detailed instructions of how to take care of their sick child and give the instructions to their spouse. I'm not complaining about Ryan at all, in fact, he just came home and brought me 4 cans of soup, hot chocolate mix, a huge package of crackers, M&Ms, and oreos. :) All I'm saying is that when you have the same person taking care of you when you're sick for 24 years and then suddenly a person your own age is supposed to take over that job, it's a tough transition. Does anybody else feel that way?

On another topic, Ryan went to the hospital in Roseau yesterday for the first time. He did an OB rotation in the morning and an internal medicine rotation after lunch. He got to listen to a baby's heartbeat (still in the Mom's tummy) using his stethoscope. I didn't even know you could do that. I thought you had to have an ultrasound to be able to hear the baby's heart. He also got to witness some unpleasant stuff and he has announced that he does not want to be an OBGYN. :)