Remember that time I used to blog a lot?

I'm not sure what happened.  I guess I got busy NOT BEING AN INTERN ANYMORE.  Wooo!!!  I'm officially now an "upper level", meaning I get much more responsibility on the hospital wards.  Pretty terrifying and exciting at the same time.  But for now, how about a few pictures from celebrating the end of intern year?

"single digits dinner" - meaning single digits left until the end of intern year.  This dinner is sponsored by the department and all the upper level residents covered our shifts so we could spend the evening together.

Yaquing and Laura

The primary care track 'terns

Announcing intern superlatives.  Mine was "most likely to plan a meeting to plan a meeting"

Hayes, Anem, me and Sherry

Arpan left us to go be in Michigan with his fiance.  I'm still not ok with it!

And of course, Hartke.

Anem, me and Hayes on the last day of intern year

Now we'll move on to Beach Week.  Our residency starts a week early so that the last week of the year (last week of June) we all can celebrate with a week of vacay together.  We planned a trip to Isle of Palms, Charleston SC and rented a sweet beach house with a pool.  We had a lot of fun, played a lot of volleyball, and didn't get into too much trouble ...

The living area of the 4-story beach house

Turns out it was half-Christmas!  Santa didn't come, though

Intern besties!

And Hubs even got to come for the week!!!

He played grill master for a couple of afternoons

Of course some catch phrase/taboo got brought out.  "This president was in a big scandal!!!  Oh wait, there wasn't a scandal.  Ronald Regan."

lots of laughing and yelling ensued ...

And of course there had to be a champagne toast ... on our rooftop deck!

There was an elevator, and the boys literally took it ... every time

Will's mom and dad cooked us up a low-country boil at their beach house.  Not too shabby!

We ate ... a lot

Sparklers by the pool

and Rich serenaded me and Stu in the mornings when we cooked breakfast for the whole house

What would a trip to Charleston be without a meal at Husk, reportedly one of the best restaurants in the country?!

A group of 11 of us went.  Everyone's favorite?  Pig ears and hummus.

And look who we brought to dinner with us!!!  Smitty and Becky, our pals from Mobile!  They live in C-town and joined us at Husk.

Camera lens fogged up from the humidity...

Vacay = week with the fams!

You know you're getting old when a week of vacation means going home to see your family.  But, that's the way it is when you hardly get to see them during normal times of the year! Both Stuart and I were able to take vacation at the same time last week, and we hopped a plane straight to Memphis, hung out with his family a few days, then drove to Gadsden and hung out with mine.

Of course there's nothing like a Deep South welcome home, with a handgun and some hydrangeas on the kitchen table!

Saturday we got up fairly early and headed out to the Owl's Hollow shooting range (I used to think this was called Al's Holler until fairly recently).  My dad collects guns and is into target practicing, and I've just gotten to go with him once.  We thought this would be a good time for us to be a good Southern family and go a'shootin!  Good thing we're already married or Stuart might be a bit intimidated by my dad's shooting skills.

.22 rifle (I think)

Mom even shot a little bit!  She was nervous at first but got really excited when she hit the target.

Lesson of the day:  I have no upper body strength and it's hard to aim and breathe at the same time!

Guess who shot this golf ball at 25 yards in fewer tries than their husband?  Ahem.

It got pretty loud with the Winchester 300

Can you see the exploding water bottle!?  Thanks, shutter speed.

Mom at it again.

Handgun.  Turns out I may not kill a "home intruder", but at least I'd scare them!

Me and Mom

Mine

Stus

Of course a visit to Gadsden wouldnt be complete without a family gathering and seeing my BFF!  Mom's side of the family came over for a cook-out, complete with lots of talking and kiddos running around.  That last part was extra special because Trenton (tuxedo shirt below) just got a liver transplant about a month before.  It was wonderful to see him doing so well and running around and playing.

Then look who I found!  Sawyer came over, along with his parents Megan and Daryl

Besties

Next up it was back to Memphis/Hernando to hang out with Stuart's family for a few days.  Friday night the "Grenada Fam" came over and we visited with the Carson and Daly families.  I hadn't seen them in over a year, so it was really nice to catch up.  Saturday the guys went to the St Jude golf tournament and the gals headed out for a spa day!  I got my hair cut for the first time in 7 months.  Yeah, kind of embarrassing I hadn't found the time to do that in so long.  But boy did I feel better afterward!  Since the Saulters didn't know when they'd see us next, we went ahead and had a birthday cake for August!  And a couple of Stuart's good college friends came over for dinner Saturday night.

Poppa John and Reid playing ping pong

Stu reliving his childhood with Reid and Vera Kate.  That boy loves leggos!

Techies, Brian and Sharon

And obviously there was the white shirt family photo session =)  We actually had a good time doing this and got a lot of laughs out of it.

What's a family photo without a jump session?