I knew we were too busy to make good bloggers! Life has been crazy hectic busy for both Jim and I (nothing new.) Jim is wrapping up the spring semester of his second year teaching - lots going on in the classroom, at the building trades house (where Jim's students are landscaping) and with the FFA (banquet, getting ready for State Convention, Fair, etc.) I finished up my first 3 years of vet school this spring and am now in the clinics in the Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital at the vet school. We spend 4th year doing 12 months of clinical rotations (in 2 week blocks at a time with a maximum of 4 weeks vacation.) Clinics are 100 times better than sitting on your butt falling alseep in class, even though I've had plenty of exhausting, emotional, and embarassing moments in just 3 weeks. My very first rotation was Small Animal Surgery, which is one of the more intense rotations (when it comes to hours put in) they require us to do. Intense it was - my days were never less than 12 hours (more like 15-16) not counting the commute to & from school, and because I had patients in the hospital's Critical Care Unit, I was there most of the weekends, too! This block, I'm on Primary Care (which is for the routine stuff - annual exams, vaccinations, and the usual problems you'd see in a regular vet clinic.) The hours are WAY better and I actually get to eat meals...but I have to admit I may have enjoyed surgery more - never a dull moment!

No more summer vacations for me, but Jim will start his after next week. His summer contract will keep him plenty busy though. I am taking 2 weeks of vacation (the second half of June) and we're going to take a road trip to Las Vegas to visit Jim's brother Mike and his wife Jenna. We plan to make a big trip out of it and see all of the sights I've always wanted to see (Yellowstone, Grand Canyon, and anything else we feel like!) Still tons to do before then, including finish those wedding thank you notes (yikes, we know how bad that is - but we promise, we WILL finish!)

Here are some photos of what we've been up to when we AREN'T working (which seems like never!)

Dad, Mom, Jim, Tyler, and I at my Blue Coat Ceremony in April. (It's a ceremony to celebrate our transition into the clinics, and it's when we get our "blue coats," the outfit that identifies us as Senior students in the Teaching Hospital..)

Jim posing with the bones of a cow's lower leg. He's helping me put together a collection of teaching materials that will go out to high school teachers (a project for a club I am involved in through the vet school.)

The cats doing their usual. (Cleo left, Alibi right.)

Marney doing HER usual - shredding up her toys or blankets...

We are almost finished with the bathroom remodel! Here's before photo. It's hard to photograph because it's so tiny, but you can see how plain it was...

The nasty, nasty mold we discovered after ripping out the old tub & shower.

Me assuming one of the contorted positions required to paint the odd corners in the bathroom.

End result! New tub, shower, toilet, vanity, cupboard, towel rack, floor tiles, paint, and wainscoting!

My first patient! I'm probably not supposed to share too much about client animals, but this sweet kitty donated one of his kidneys to another cat in chronic renal failure (yes, they do transplants in cats!) I am really attached to this guy!

And from today, some of the band members entertaining on the Capitol square at the farmer's market. The Soggy Prairie Boys are still playing a few gigs now and then, along with some help from new friends to fill in. Ben (on fiddle) has done a few gigs so far. Jim and Kodey are to his right.

That's all for now! Look for another update this summer - hopefully soon we'll have time to post photos from our road trip!

Love,

Steph and Jim

In like a Lion

This week has been busy as usual. Jim doesn't get fair coverage on this blog, but he doesn't usually give me pictures from school and he doesn't do the writing! If you're curious, so far this week he had an FFA meeting, practiced with some members from the Soggy Prairie Boys, practiced with the UW Russian Folk Orchestra, cooked a full breakfast for 25 (a prize for the class who won the FFA food drive) andperformed a necropsy on a degu (autopsy on a small South American rodent.) Tomorrow he's taking one of his classes trout fishing, and Friday he'll be up all night at school for the FFA lock-in.

I've been busy too! Monday I performed my second spay surgery ever on a kitty named "Boo." Third year vet students do this as part of a class where Humane Societies "lend" us female cats and dogs - the dogs benefit because they are spayed (free!) which makes them more adoptable, and we get the practice of doing surgery.

Tuesday Marney and I participated in a lab where students got to practice applying leg bandages. We all definitely need more practice, but you can see Marney and my friend Erin's dog Emma sporting a few different types of bandages.

March definitely came in like a lion! Last night after I got home, I heard a loud crash. I assumed it was our kitties up to no good, but couldn't find anything out of place so I decided it must have been a branch falling outside on the porch. Well, this morning we figured out what the loud crash was - it was our backyard fence landing in the neighbor's yard, thanks to last night's 50mph winds! Jim and I were able to fix the fence tonight (fortunately only one post was broken) although we almost froze in the cold wind!

That's all for now - until next time,

Love, Steph and Jim

What we've been up to lately...

Time for another blog entry! Lately, we've been busy as usual. Jim is teaching and spring is a busy time for FFA, especially February, with FFA week, speaking contests, judging contests, etc. I am busy with my last semester of actual classes and planning my 12 months of clinical rotations, which start in May.

On January 11th, Jim and I were sponsors at the baptism of our first godchild! Bekk is Jim's cousin and we are so proud to be his godparents!

Laura with Elling, Jim and I with Bekk, and Jim with Dane.

The third year of veterinary school has included some really amazing experiences so far. My absolute favorite has been the Bovine Surgery Elective, affectionately known as "Cut-A-Cow." The nickname might sound a little crude, but basically what happens is this:

The school purchases cows already on their way to slaughter. We don't get any history on the animals, but they are usually dairy cows being culled for reasons likely related to poor production. The cows spend a week at the vet school's facilities (a regular bovine resort!) and 3rd year students in the elective course get to perform an exploratory abdominal surgery. This can be done when the cow is standing and she isn't sedated (usually) but we do inject anesthetic around the spinal nerves so she can't feel what we're doing. We opened the abdomen, got to have a feel around inside, and then practice an opentopexy. An omentopexy is done by suturing some of the tissue around the cow's abomasum (4th stomach compartment) to the body wall and is often done to correct and prevent a twisted stomach (displaced abomasum or DA.) The we sutured up our incision and after a few days of rest, the cow is back on her way to her original destination - slaughter. Not a happy ending for the cow I guess, but since they are going there anyway, they get to do us a favor by taking a little detour first to help us learn some surgical skills.

My partner Kaitlin and I with our cow

Our incision (has to be big enough to fit an arm through - good thing for the cow we both have spaghetti arms!)

Having a feel around on the inside (amazing!)

All stitched up and in one piece!

That's all for now, until next time!

Love, Steph and Jim

I'm a bad blogger!

Even though six more weeks of winter are apparently on their way, today felt springlike so I decided to put up some photos from springtime in our yard last year. Also, I'll include some recent photos of Marney, our coonhound mix we adopted in November.

(Actually, half the reason for these photos is that I haven't posted in a while and we've taken a time-out from house projects, so I had to pick something else!)

Spring Flowers

Spoiled, lazy Marney, ready for a nap

Out in the yard

Enjoying a good stick

Going crazy with my mitten!

Until next time...

Love,

Steph & Jim

Master bedroom - during & after!

Finally, our bedroom is finished and we stayed in it last night!

***Warning! If you haven't read any of our posts yet, scroll down the page to start at the beginning! It is more fun to see the photos in order from start to finish!***

This has been our biggest project so far, and it's taken a long time (mainly because we just didn't spend every spare moment on it.) And, we've had a TON of help and a lot of borrowed tools - my brother Tyler and his friend Jon did most of the rewiring, Jim's parents Dan & Lori helped us jack the whole house up from the basement, redo the floor joists and new subfloor, make the entry to the attic for storage, build the closet, hang drywall, install trim, etc (all under supervision of Sadie the dog, of course.) Jim's brother Mike and his wife Jenna helped with the drywall, as did our friend Nikki. Jim's brother Krist was here helping pretty much every time Dan & Lori came, except when he was away at college - he spent many hours and a few late nights here when he likely had more exciting things to be doing! My mom did much of the drywall taping and mudding (man I hate that job!) I'm sure I'm forgetting more helpers but I'll add them as they come to me. Anyhow...

The room without lath & plaster. The weird hole in the wall would eventually become a small entry into the attic space above the dining room/kitchen (for storage.) My brother thought it would be a good place for a hot tub...sadly we decided against this ;) You can see some of his wiring and that the subfloor isn't in yet. We discovered that the joists had been cut at the ends in order to make new additions to the house, so the old floor was very poorly supported. Jim and his dad added new supports to the joists to support and level the floor. (We had a nearly 2 inch drop in part of the floor due to settling and bad joists!)

Other side of the room looking into the hallway and small bedroom. I pulled out the remnants of that old chimney between the doors.

Now with some of the drywall up...you can also see the ceiling fan and recessed lights (on a dimmer switch) we put in.

Building the wall for the closet...

Mirrored sliding closet doors.

Paint! Window trim! Crown molding! Some of the laminate floor!


Finished!

Other side


Closet. Still a bit to do in here - like add lights & shelves at each end, and finish up the storage doors.

Small trim details...aka Jim's more affordable alternative to buying a compound miter saw

Oh no a scratch already! Oops...we'll fix that.

Alibi helping Jim put together our new bed.

Voila! New bed (with split box springs because there's no way a regular one would go up the stairs) and our fancy new bedding which was a wedding gift from Mike & Jenna.

I think we plan to take a break before starting any major new projects, but stay tuned - we have photos from the bathroom and other stuff when I get around to posting!

Love,

Steph and Jim

Photo tour of the house

Before I write about our big project just completed - the bedroom - I figured I should put up some pictures of the house from before we moved in.

It looks so big and empty without all of our stuff!
Inside the entry/front porch. Haha this is stuffed with piles of our things STILL!


A view of the living room. You can see into the dining room/kitchen, the door to the upstairs, and into the room which has been our bedroom up until last night! (Soon to be home to the desk, guitars, and futon.)

The picture window in our living room.

Two views of the dining room/kitchen area. We believe this part of the house was added at some point in a lean-to fashion (note the slanted ceiling.)

In the kitchen, views of the doors to the side porch, bathroom (yes, only one tiny bathroom in the whole house and it's right in the middle of the kitchen) and basement.) More photos of the bathroom to come in a different post - we have made some big changes in there!

Kitchen as viewed from the other side, from the side porch. The old stove and fridge are gone now (well by gone I mean taking up space in the garage) and we now have nice, new-to-us appliances from my aunt and uncle, Barbie and Rick.

Side porch/laundry room (with the free washer and dryer from the neighbor of some friends in Baraboo - no more laundromat!)

Cool screen door on the side porch.

Part of the front yard from the side porch.

Part of the back yard from the side porch.

Views from the bottom and top of the stairs. STEEP! This is after the previous owner paid to have them made better...somehow. The stairs were the big sale-killer for this house. It will be a big project for us - maybe this coming summer?

At the top of the stairs in our little "hallway" looking into the two bedrooms upstairs.

Small bedroom as viewed from the hallway door. It is connected to the master bedroom. the actual door is gone, but we'll replace it soon.

Now pay attention! These are the "before" photos of the master bedroom! The room had one, maybe two outlets, conduit on the walls for "updated" wiring, carpet glued on top of some really funky rainbow-speckled linoleum, entirely uninsulated walls, cracked plaster with holes, a VERY creaky, springy, unstable floor, a tiny "closet," etc...

Read on in our next post to see the transformation of this bedroom!

Love,

Steph and Jim