Updates!

So Jp and I are getting married in less than 3 months! It's coming up so fast! :) We are so excited and cannot wait! We also were blessed with a place to live, which is my great aunt's condo that she is not living anymore since she is in a nursing home. We are lucky because we only have to pay the association fees, which are cheaper than any place we were looking at! It is a 2 bedroom, 2 bath, with a porch in the back and it's lovely. We replaced the flooring with beautiful tile, and will be replacing the carpet as well. It looks great so far. We just picked out paint colors yesterday to add some color and we are so excited! We are so happy that God provided us a place to live that was affordable and temporary since we do not know where He will have us live yet once we both get out of school. God is truly faithful!!

God has blessed us very much, and we continue to ask for His blessing in the area of finances for us and direction. School is expensive, and we have decided to not take out student loans, but instead to rely on God to provide for us the money to complete our degrees (with grants, etc). The wedding stuff is pretty much in order as well. We will be mailing invitations soon, and having bridal showers, etc. I can't wait! It's all happening so soon but I want it to come sooner! Jp and I are ready to start our life together and go on our cruise! ;) haha We're ready to not have to say goodbye to each other every night, but instead look forward to falling asleep & waking up together each night and morning! Married life will be a great new adventure, and I'm glad I get to share it with him :) I love Jp so much and am so thankful that God brought him into my life. I honestly do not know what I would do without him. He has truly made me a better person and I probably don't deserve someone as wonderful as him, but I am very thankful. I can't wait to be his wife! July 31 come quickly! :)

I dont even know who reads this anymore, but anywho, those are some updates :)

Last day of dental shadowing...but awesome surprise!!

So today was my last day of dental shadowing...I am very sad. But God totally gave me the best last day EVER!! Brenda usually always tells me information about who the first patient is and she told me that “our first patient has a daughter who plays on a TV show called Lie to Me”. I was like “NO WAY! I LOVE THAT SHOW!!” So I was super excited to meet her mom!! The mom/our patient’s name is Sonia Raymund, whose daughter, Monica Raymund plays Ria Torres on the “Lie to Me”. Jp and I watched the whole season (13 episodes) in basically 2 nights. We are addicted!!
Ria is one of the four “detectives” on the show who solve the cases and she is the “natural”. She is the young latino girl in the picture above. It was awesome to talk to her mom because she gave me some inside scoop! They are shooting at the end of this month for the next season! She also told me that her daughter’s character is going to change a little. They want to make her look younger (she is 26 but playing a 24 year old) and they don’t want her character to come off so “tough”. So that just totally made my morning even better!!! It was awesome. Also Brenda’s oldest daughter came in and told Brenda that she is having a baby boy! She has just found out the gender that morning. What a miracle a child is! The next patient brought things back to reality because she had just lost her husband last Tuseday. He passed away in his sleep about the same time last Tuesday as the time she was coming in for her appointment. So you can imagine the emotions she was feeling. She is an older lady, and if you would like to pray for her, her name is Carmela. She’s just having a hard time in dealing with her husbands death and the whole process that goes with it. (Isn’t it crazy they make people deal with all the legal stuff during their time of mourning...it stinks). The third patient was hilarious. She was like a 30 year old with a 5 year old personality. She could not sit still for anything and she just kept talking. She was so funny! She told me she hates the dentist and that they need a seatbelt just to keep her in the chair! She has veneers, a tooth implant, fillings, a bridge and almost anything you can think of in her mouth. Our last patient had anesthesia before we worked on her teeth but she had good teeth naturally. We put varnish on her teeth, which is a protective covering of the margins of your teeth. Brenda basically painted it on with a teeny tiny paint brush. It was cool. So I had a very fun and interesting last day. It was sad to leave, but they did say “We might see you soon!” You never know what God has in store ;)

Compassion

I was listening to the song "Give Me Your Eyes" by Brandon Heath and it started me thinking about a lot of things...

God cares about each and every one of us. He knows EVERYTHING that is going on in each of our lives...even down to the tiniest details. As I'm sure we all have heard and know, that God has every hair on our head counted (Matthew 10:30). How cool is that? Watching the music video to this song just made me realize how many people pass by me or I pass by them, and we don't even share eye contact. How many of us would go up to a complete stranger that is crying and just show them compassion? Or what if it IS someone we know, but either isn't our friend or could be our enemy? Triple J's message on Tuesday night discussed loving your enemies. The Bible says that of course it is easy to love your friends; even sinners do that. But loving your enemies is what sets us apart from the rest of the world. It might be an easy concept to grasp, but a hard one to put in place in our lives. Love your enemies? Well why would you want to love people who hurt you?

Because God loves us each and every day, even though we hurt Him over and over again with our sin. God showed mercy on us, that "while we were still sinners, Christ died for us". (Romans 5:8) Wow. That is amazing. And we are blessed that God's mercies are new every morning (Lamentations 3:22-23). The lyrics to the chorus and one verse of the song are here below in case you don't know the song or just want to read it. It just makes us more aware that we need to have compassion on others just as God has compassion on us. We need to care more, love more, trust more.


Give me your eyes for just one second
Give me your eyes so I can see
Everything that I keep missing
Give me your love for humanity
Give me your arms for the broken hearted
The ones that are far beyond my reach
Give me you heart for the ones forgotten
Give me your eyes so I can see

I’ve been here a million times
A couple of million eyes
Just move and pass me by
I swear I never thought that I was wrong
I need a second glance
Give me a second chance
To see the way you’ve seen the people all along

Third Time's a Charm...

Today was my third Tuesday dental shadowing. I had a surprise!! When I first got there, I looked at the schedule of names of the people we were seeing today. The third one down was....Ethan Wright! I was like...”I wonder if it is THE Ethan Wright?!”. So the first patient we had was a heavy smoker of cigars and his teeth were stained...BAD. I honestly didn’t think that it was going to come off, but magically...it did! They looked so much better than when he first came in!! Then the second lady we had, had beautiful teeth, and it was an easy clean. Then our third patient was...Ethan! How funny is that?! So it was cool to talk to him and awesome that I found out he is coming to ALIVE tonight! Then I got to watch Brenda clean his teeth. Probably weird for him. Then our last patient needed full mouth x-rays, which I got to help with. Then Brenda cleaned her teeth and we were done for the day. Only 1 more Tuesday left...I’m so sad
:(

Recap of the last week: This post is full of surprises! Jp surprised me last Tuesday with a bigger diamond on my engagement ring! We had turned in my ring to get a scratch off of it, and since Jp took it in while I was at work, he worked his magic and got me a 1 carat diamond for the center! I was shaking when he gave it to me! Proposal all over again! He is the best :)

Then, Jp's bank account got hacked into an he went in the negative 68 dollars. Not good. Hopefully that will get worked out.

Also, we had Jp's little cousin's Sweet 16 birthday party on Saturday at Jp's house, and Amber (the birthday girl) got her face smashed into the cake...not cake smashed into her face...vise versa! Jp and Kevin pushed her face in the cake as she went to blow out her candles!!!This is her and her mom! When she was running, chasing her offenders, she gave her mom some cake...in the face! This is the crazy family I'm going to be apart of...and i LOVE it! <3

She was such a good sport! We had a lot of fun with the pinata too. Even though Jp and Jason got a little carried away. All in all, it was a great party, and she loved it!

:)

Second Day Dental Shadowing!

So I had my second day of dental shadowing today. It was awesome. The first patient we had was a man who we got to give antibiotic shots to in his mouth. I had my gloves, goggles, and mask on and got right in the action :) Then the second patient was a lady whom the doctor had to numb her with a needle cause we were doing a deep root cleaning. Then he offered her use of the office iPod for her to listen to. How awesome is that! Also they gave her a neck pillow for her to relax. Crazy! She had major tartar behind her bottom front teeth and I didn’t think it would be able to come off. But it did! I was super shocked! Her teeth looked great after that!

So that took about 3 and a half hours, then Brenda and I just talked about dentistry and she showed me some before & after pictures of people who had major work done. This one guy had tiny baby teeth cause his real teeth were grinded down so much, they were almost half the size! But then he got porcelain veneers and he looked amazing! It’s so crazy to think how your smile can totally change how you look!! It was a professional looking smile :) So I asked Brenda how much veneers are typically, and they are about $1200 a TOOTH!!! Oh my goodness!!! But they really are worth it because they make your smile beautiful :) Anywho, I can’t wait til next Tuesday. Each time becomes more fun than the last :)

Here. Today. Now.

So I was reading Beth's blog about the daily verse, and I signed up for it. Today's really spoke to me...

Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble. Matthew 6:34

If you're thinking about the future more than you're living in the moment, reconsider. Yes, planning and strategy has its place, but so does being aware of what God has for you right now. Work toward balance in this area and embrace what He's placed before you for today.

Obviously Jp and I have a wedding ahead of us, and I haven't been overwhelmed or planning like crazy yet, but I'm taking this as a "caution sign" to not get so caught up in all the planning for the future, that I miss the here and now. So I will keep my balance, and see the beauty of what God has for me today.

:)

First day as a dental hygienist......'s shadow :)

So today was my first day shadowing Brenda, a Registered Dental Hygienist at Today’s Dental. It was an awesome experience! I need 16 hours of “observation” before I can even apply to the Dental Program, which is why I am shadowing. Plus I’m getting an actual feel on what it will be like as a RDH. I learned some very interesting things today. Let me share them with you now...

Did you know that you are supposed to brush your teeth AS SOON AS you wake up...before eating breakfast or drinking anything? I had known people who had brushed their teeth before breakfast, but do you know WHY it is important? Here’s why: bacteria and plaque form on your teeth overnight and then you eat your breakfast and drink your coffee which bakes it on even more. Then when you go to brush your teeth after, it has created a shield, blocking you from removing the bacteria in your mouth. Brenda gave the following analogy: “You don’t want to eat your breakfast on dirty dishes, do you? Your teeth are the dishes, and you want them clean before you eat or drink anything.” Good illustration, I thought.

Also... Did you know that people normally chew on only ONE side of their mouth? For you weird ones out there, you may chew on both. Anywho...guess which side of your mouth is cleaner?...the one you chew on!!! Most people may think it should be the opposite but actually since food is being chewed on that side, it is pushing around the tarter and plaque which is keeping the bacteria from forming in one spot. There ya go.

Overall, I had a really great time. The people there are extremely nice, and encouraging me to do what I love. I got really excited being there today, and I felt really comfortable. I also got to do the x-rays on the patients! How awesome! I can’t wait to go back next Tuesday! :)