Blogs I love

I read four or five blogs pretty consistently and of the famous people who blog, I love gwyneth paltrow's the most. Here is a post I particularly love because she sites yet another one of my favorite blogs in it: http://goop.com/newsletter/104/en/

And of the not as famous people that I love to read, I recommend you check out Laura Nelson's blog and Suzy Williams's. I am addicted to both.

March, Married, and Madly in Love

Happy March everyone! I love March the most and I have a feeling I will really love this March the most because WE ARE MARRIED!
I have some married lady goals that are beyond reading all of the Harry Potter books (although I am in the middle of book three and I have to say I lah-ove it!).
I want to learn to grocery shop so that I can cook and bake, and I want to be the most supportive wife anyone has ever met!
Tonight I cleaned up a little and warmed up our leftover pizza (yes I know this isn't cooking) while I waited for David..My Husband!...to get home from an initial interview/meeting at Moila so we can join the golf course and country club. And I loved it. I was just thinking about how wonderful it is to be a wife and to try to make My Husband happy. I just can't wait to wake up each day and know that David is My Husband and I get to spend each minute with him.
Okay, I know this is turning into a diary entry and you are probably annoyed and rolling your eyes - but I just had to get it out there. I am so in love with My Husband and so excited that it's March and I'm a wife.

Use it well

David and I, surrounded by our most wonderful families and beautiful, loving friends, got married three days ago. I promise to keep this short because at the moment I am sitting in sunny Las Vegas, drinking my coffee on the balcony, and reading, actually finishing is more accurate, the first Harry Potter book. Harry receives his invisibility cloak with the gentle advice to "use it well" and I keep thinking of the bible verse that goes something like those who have been given much must give much in return. I have been given everything. I honestly have the best parents and sisters in the world and just married the only man who could have argued that no, his siblings and parents are the best. And I would have agreed. Our families made our wedding a fairy tale. Every single detail was absolutely perfect. I cant explain how the toasts from our siblings made me feel. I have four sisters that love me dearly and will always stick up for me and David? I have two brothers that have loved and accepted me from the minute I walked into their parents house? I have a father in law who thinks I walk on water and a mother in law who can't stop thanking God for me for her son? I have a mother that has been my best friend since the day I was born and never let me even talk about money or the time she gave for this wedding? I have a dad who wouldn't always admit it,except for during a father daughter dance, that thinks he can see where my wings were supposed to go? How did tge smartest, most caring and gentle man in the world pick me to marry just three days ago? How on earth am I this blessed and how on earth will I side it well to give so much in return for what I have been given?

Read it and Weep (with Joy)

9 Days!

Is Cheese a Vegetable?

Abby and I are doing a detox/diet/punishment.
Abby calls it a detox. But Abby also could kick your butt in kick boxing, eats healthier than anyone in the world, and just rocks overall.
To me, it’s a diet because I can’t do it to the extreme amount of calling it a detox. If I was strong enough it would be a detox. But I’m not.
So here’s how it goes (in theory).
From the minute you wake up until noon you eat all the fruit you want. You can’t add sugar and you can’t mix it with other things like yogurt. Just straight up fruit.
Then from noon until eight pm you eat all the veggies you want. This is my favorite (and only doable) part. You can eat all the sweet potatoes, avocadoes, tomatoes, and lovely green veggies you want. You just can’t dip them in ranch (sigh), add sour cream to them (bigger sigh), or dip them in peanut butter (biggest sigh).
And you can’t eat cheese.
You see, this is where you lose me. I don’t know if I can go ten days without cheese.
I know you think I am exaggeharting (unless you know me really well…or at all..okay nevermind, you don’t think I’m exaggerating), but no cheese and no peanut butter…I might not make it to my big day (which is in 12 days if you are counting J ).
Okay, so you get what this is supposed to look like, and you get how weak I am. So now I can confess that Abby is doing it. She is going to try it and I already made her sign a release that I can post about this. But I can’t do it completely. I am starting with waking up and having a bowl of cereal or oatmeal. Then following the rules until noon. And then I will have a half of a peanut butter sandwich and follow the rest of the rules. Fruits all morning, veggies all afternoon and night. I am giving myself two cheats so I don’t pass out, and so that I don’t make the last 12 days of our engagement hell on my adorable fiancé. I’m a little cranky when I’m hungry.
So here it goes. Wish me luck. And bring my cheese as a wedding gift!

It's February!

Happy Richmond Wedding Month everyone!

I was supposed to be in Kansas City at a training from 8 - 5 each day this week, but the blizzard outside has put a hold on that. And it has even put a hold on reporting to the office. I have called in to my trainings each day and worked remotely from my snuggly house, with my snuggly dog. This weather actually only enhances the idea that drives our company any way. Information at the right place at the right time should be accessible from anywhere. And so it is.

What this also means is that I get to read more. Instead of getting home at six or six thirty, I am sitting here against my beautiful front window watching the snow cover the walk and driveway that I just shoveled for the second time already, and thinking that instead of driving home for the day at five, I will already be here and ready to read.
What am I reading this snow week (it left Snow Day sometime yesterday) you may ask.
Well, I will let my trusty assistant show you:

Bo loves Tom, Huck, and Harry almost as much as I do.

To read list

Today I typed 19 pages of notes on Specialty Practice Management (single spaced). And I should be reading those. However, today my mom also brought home the Harry Potter series, books 1-7! how am I supposed to read about billing, registration, and scheduling when I have half of Tom Sawyer, Huck, and Harry all sitting on my nightstand?? What's a girl to do?

Snow day snow day

List of things to do on a very snowy Wednesday evening...exactly one month away from the wedding, a list that doesn't include anything weddingish or purple:

- watch your big brown dog run and run in the snow
- light your fire and make grilled cheese for dinner
- shovel once or twice for your workout, even though the snow is still falling at unreal amounts
- chase your big brown dog around some more and laugh when, like a kid, he refuses to come inside to warm up
- watch The Middle, Better With You, Modern Family, Cougartown, and Off the Map... And don't feel guilty about watching three hours of tv
- pop your own popcorn on a commercial break
- smile at your big brown dog, all curled up on his bed, exhausted from his snow day


I will now be hibernating for the rest of the day (and praying that this snow is no indication of the weather one month from now)

I'm getting married in ONE MONTH from tomorrow!

I think that I drive some people crazy. Probably most people aren’t like my mom and me and change subject mid-sentence, or can carry on a conversation that few would understand because it is actually ten conversations in one. But I guess I do this, and I guess it drives people crazy, and I guess if you have stuck with me this long, you would say I do the same thing with whatever I’m reading and supposed to be blogging about. In the past four days I have sat down to write about 400 times, and not only can I not sit still long enough to write an okay blog post, I can’t complete a thought on what I want to blog about before deciding that something else I’m reading incorporates so well that I can’t summarize one reading without going into the next, which makes it very hard for a person like me to blog about. But here it goes, and I’m sorry in advance.

Right now I am reading wedding magazine after wedding magazine until I can’t see or make sense of the difference in words like plum, amethyst, fuchsia, eggplant, lilac, or, plain old purple (and I know you do not want me to blog about this type of reading, it’s bad enough that you have to try to have a conversation with me at this point that doesn’t revolve around the shades of purple).

Would you rather here about the two day reading I did on the differences between EMRs/EHRs/PHRs? No? Too late, here’s an overview because I think you should know:

An EMR is health-related information created, gathered, managed, and consulted by licensed clinicians and staff from a single organization who are involved in the individual’s health and care. Whereas an EHR is the aggregate electronic record of health related information on an individual that is created and gathered cumulatively across more than one health care organization and managed and consulted by licensed clinicians and staff. An EHR is an EMR with interoperability. A PHR is a health-related cumulative record on an individual, drawn from multiple sources. It is created, gathered, and managed by the individual. Want to know what I do? No? Again, too late. I implement and facilitate adoption of PowerWorks, which is an EMR, but LACIE, the information exchange that owns me (and yes, lately especially, they own me) helps to make this EMR an EHR for a number of reasons I will not go into here.

Because I have a feeling I’ve already said too much, but just in case anyone is still reading, I will tell you the three other things I am actively reading. And although it’s hard to see it right now, these three really tie in together. I am still reading and still inspired by Tender, Loving Care and the book by my friend, Donna, Prevent Cancer God’s Way. And as I drift off to sleep thinking all of my thoughts about the wedding, my career, being healthy, and having a servant’s heart, I read The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.

And somewhere between exhausted awake-ness and peaceful sleep last night, Tom Sawyer told me that “work consists of whatever a body is obliged to do, and. play consists of whatever a body is not obliged to do." With peacefulness that I can’t put words to, I admitted to myself that somewhere in all this reading, the lines between work and play blurred for me. No one told me to read these things outside of work, but I do because I love it. Because I want to know how to get some clinic in rural Missouri the most meaningful use money they can get, because I know that if I serve those who serve the sick, there will be less sick people, and because those that are sick are people, Tom Sawyer like little boys that remind me of Seth and Eli, and I want them to be well.

So I want to prevent as much illness as I can and pass this information on to others (Prevent Cancer God’s Way), I want to compassionately teach healthcare providers how this EMR and EHR can help them do their job better (EMR/EHR/PHR research and Tender, Loving Care), and I want to never forget that those tiny patients are someone’s little boys that should be out running around doing silly little boy things (The Adventures of Tom Sawyer). The purple wedding details are just for fun.

RIP Christmas Tree

This weekend I did two things. Wedding Planned and De-Christmasized the North 32nd Street house.
Saturday I did wedding things with my mom all day and made a lot of progress. I worked hard to be a good bride and make decisions. Sunday I worked out harder than I've worked out in a long time by taking down Christmas decorations and cleaning the house. I put everything red and gold (this year's theme) where it should go in the garage, moved all furniture to dust, sweep, and mop, and arranged everything in a new, non-Christmaslike way. The only thing I could not do on my own was dispose of the tree. I did manage to remove all the ornaments and get it out the front door. However, that's the best I could do. And then it started snowing and hasn't stopped. So, instead of worrying about this, I am going to cuddle in my clean house and read a good book. And you are welcome to drive by and laugh at our new lawn decoration.

Three Little Words

One of my best friends and book guru, Jenna, recommended (a year ago – a detail I’m not proud of) I read an autobiographical novel by a young woman named Ashley. I finally, as one of my New Year’s resolutions, picked it up on January 4^th. Today is the 7^th and I finished it last night. Needless to say, it was good. And I promise not to spoil it by telling you the three little words that make up this book. I decided instead to come up with my own list.

I was sitting at Firestone getting the oil changed in my car when I decided to think about my list. (This is also after our first premarital counseling session where the pastor looked at me and said, “You like to make lists don’t you?”) As I was brainstorming I flipped through the December 2010 issue of Harper’s Bazaar. I read two very interesting articles.

The first was by Ashton Kutcher (there is no reason to start a list here of all the reasons he is my celebrity crush, but let’s just say the fact that he is an extraordinary writer tops the list). This was all about how we all text and email and write on Facebook walls to flirt with and swoon our significant others. It made my stomach do flips just reading about how much more exciting it is to receive that first phone call from someone you are interested in. Scary and exhilarating. I remember the first time David called, I couldn’t answer. I had to call him back after twenty minutes when I calmed down. And even then I had to have an excuse ready to let him go because I knew I would say something stupid. To which Ashton (yes, first name basis), says that “vulnerability is the essence of romance.” How true that is. I have never said more stupid things in front of a person than I have in front of David. And he loves me anyway, and maybe, even more. And so I came to my first three little words: Still Get Butterflies

The second article was about the part of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis’s life when she was an editor. This article deserves its own List of things I love. Not only was it about Jackie, editing and publishing, and filled with great pictures and quotes, but it mentioned one of her final editing endeavors: a book about weddings. A job she accepted saying, “let’s do a book to let all those nice American girls off the hook and show them that they can do it their way.” Hello! I love her. Here’s a link so you can read it yourself, although I’m more tempted to tell you to go buy the issue so you can hold it and see the glossy pictures.

http://www.harpersbazaar.com/magazine/feature-articles/jackie-kennedy-onassis-story-0111

And so, my second set of three little words is: Give Yourself Permission. This takes a little more follow up and I have to give credit to my mom. My beautiful mother, after listening to me ramble on about something I am anxious about, often sighs and tells me, “Katy, I give you permission to be happy.” Why does either my mom or Jackie Kennedy have to remind me that I have permission to do what I want to do? Anyway, in case you are like me and need someone to say it, I give you permission to do what makes you happy. Right now. So go try it.

So to say goodbye to the first book of 2011, I have a few things to say:

Too many orphans

Try overcoming adversity

Anything is possible

Someone needs you

Do what’s right

Let’s do something

Truly be yourself

and

Thank you, Jenna

And now, tonight I start a book written by my friend, Donna Long called Prevent Cancer, God’s Way. Three little words I use to describe Donna are strong, faithful, and beautiful. I will let you know where to buy the book. Because, for 2011, shouldn’t three words for all of us be Fully Love Life.

A Resolution Worth Trying to Keep

This book was written by a CEO of a hospital. Although he is also, of course, so much more than that title, that is his qualification for writing this book. I fully understood the importance of this book by the time I finished the first page. He remarks, “CEOs don’t take care of patients. So, what do they do? The single most important thing a hospital CEO does is to take care of the people who take care of people – to serve the servers.” Now I am obviously not a CEO of a hospital, and I am fully aware that I will probably never be the CEO of the hospital. But this one statement, to take care of the people who take care of people, has just become my 2011 professional, New Year’s Resolution (also, ick, I hate resolutions and think it’s annoying that I hate them, but then talk about them and make and break them each year…but this seems like a worthy one…not that “throwing away all granny panties and stained t shirts from middle school” weren’t worthy at the time).

So, my book pick of the week, this last week of the best and busiest year of my life, is “Radical Loving Care” by Erie Chapman. He defines Radical Loving Care as "creating a continuous chain of caring light around each and every patient." Who doesn't want to strive to create more of a chain of caring light around each person we come in contact with in our personal and professional lives? As long as this is the beginning of my long list of resolutions, I don't mind jumping in to the 2011 resolution making trend...maybe I will be able to keep this one. Wanna join?

"Make up the fires, and buy another coal-scuttle before you dot another i"

“The chuckle with which he said this, and the chuckle with which he paid for the turkey, and the chuckle with which he paid for the cab, and the chuckle with which he recompensed the boy were only to be exceeded by the chuckle with which he sat down breathless in his chair again, and chuckled till he cried.”

The women in my family have a problem. We sisters were cursed with it from our mom, who received it from her mom, who we are told also received it from her mom. So it must be a Felker/Sowell/Blake woman trait. We, like others who have this epidemic, often get together and laugh until we cry. Now this sounds beautiful. But let me assure you it’s not. It’s not that cute joyful noise of laughter that is accompanied by a simple tear or a delicate “wipe away your mascara with a white tissue’ cry. We seriously cannot breathe. We laugh so hard that we cry and forget what we were laughing about because we start crying and cannot talk or make a noise. You can’t even hear any laughter. You can’t remember why we started laughing or if it was even funny, because we cannot talk to explain what just happened. Usually this hits one of us and it makes the others start, and then just hold on because it won’t be over soon. And then, only making it worse, when it finally passes no one else thinks whatever it was that got us started was funny. Except, the funny part, is the way we look when it’s all done. We are not pretty laughers and we are not pretty criers, so the combination is the worst.

This is all only to make a few comments about A Christmas Carol that I just finished: One, I loved this book as much as I hoped and thought I would. Two, the Felker/Sowell/Blake girls have been called pretty and been called “Crazy Indians” and these two often go hand in hand..however, when we laugh we only fulfill the latter. Three, I understand dear Scrooge. I understand, thank God, how it feels to be so overcome with joy that you have to chuckle until you cannot breathe because there’s nothing else to do.

We are less than one week from Christmas and I am so overcome with joy and love that I feel like we will all just have to sit in a room and laugh until we cry in order to get this joy out of us. My mom and I drove to Kansas City to finish shopping yesterday. She told me that she can seriously feel my grandparents with her and that it’s such a complete feeling of joy – that it’s an actual physical joy. I agree so many times a day. I feel that it truly is a wonderful disease or epidemic. And that it’s contagious. You only have to be in my mom’s presence, or Seth’s, or Judy’s, or David’s before you catch it. That feeling of being so overcome with joy that you have to let it out somehow. And sometimes all you can do is chuckle till you cry.

Thank God for this contagious joy. And in the next week I pray that we let it happen and don’t worry about not being pretty. One of my favorite Christmas songs says “guide us thy perfect light.” I think of this sort of joy as a perfect light.

Let Your Heart Be Light

I know that this is a blog about books, and I know that I have not read many books this year. However, 'tis the season to get busy with the things that make this season so wonderful.

Baking cookies with friends

Christmas partying with my David

Not missing the big things...like "gender revealing party" for my best friends' baby..It's a Girl!



You get the picture. So, no, I haven't quite finished a Christmas Carol or re-read Little Women for this season. No, I have not wrapped all of my Christmas presents, and no, I'm not done shopping even nine days out. No, I have not bought the last twelve rolls of ribbon for the wedding or finished the guest list. But, Yes, I have made it to each Christmas party (and won the dessert contest at one), handed out Cherry Mashes at the end of Holiday Park, turned on my tree the minute I wake up each morning (even if it is way too early because I had to drive to Bethany Missouri and leave town at 6:45 every morning), and have refused to move my radio from 102.1 for 24 hours a day. I have had my nephew for a Birthday slumber party and eaten popcorn out of the Christmas tub until the four year old admitted "Kiki, my tummy hurts." And I have been excited for my fiance when he brought home a pheasant, a duck, or a crane (yes, he crane hunts...) And I told a dear friend goodbye in the midst of editing and finishing a state proposal. I may not have finished my book, I may not have texted you back in a timely manner, and I may not have made it to every single Girl's Night Out. But I have worked hard this season to try to be the best Christian, the best sister, the best aunt, the best daughter, the best fiance, and the best friend. And, if I have time, the best PowerWorks specialist, the best dessert maker, and the best lemon cookie baker. And, if you have time, tis the season to read some great books.

There'll be scary ghost stories...

Now here is something scary... Today while reading one of my favorite blogs I heard that the setting of one of my favorite family traditions will no longer be open for business. Brace yourselves for this one, call me dramatic, avert you eyes before I crush all your dreams for your future families, or keep reading on completely bored. Whcichever action is your own, know that I apologize. I apologize that your life will never be the same because Pik a Pine is closing. I kid you not. This is the last year of Pik a Pine.

My family has been going to this Christmas tree farm since before I was born. Seriously, I went while in the womb. While everyone else is running around St Joe like mad the day after Thanksgiving for the sales, we are bundled up chanting "pik a pine, pik a pine, pik a pik a pine." We all complain. We all make fun of the silly tradition, and we all never miss it (or the hot chocolate and popcorn). In fact, even our dogs go.

2010 has been a year of changes for me. You might say that I made it my "D.B." In the past 11 months I have gotten engaged to the love of my life, moved out of my Plaza apartment (with this change came moving away from Abby who I had spent the previous ten months living just three floors above) into my first home, moved David from St. Louis to start a completely new career, lost our three grandparents that were still living, accepted a new position and left my first career, and, oh, planned a wedding. There was a cold January night before one of my best friends, Jenna, moved to Nevada that Abby, Jenna, and I sat outside on our bench on Ward Parkway and promised we would all make 2010 our dirty bitch. Yep.  That's the phrase we chose. So we proclaimed that 2010 would be our "D.B." And I would say that all of these changes proved that I did do just that.

I don't know exactly why all of this hit me with the announcement of Pik a Pine closing, but it all seems related to me. I was hesitant to switch family traditions around this year when Erika suggested that we all go to Schweizer's instead of Pik a Pine. So, just as any normal family would do, we put our heads down and took a vote. (What, that's not how your family does it?) And when push came to shove, we all agreed that it would be fun for Seth and Eli to take a tractor ride at Schweizer's. And it was fun. We started a new tradition this year. We decided 2010 was the year to start new Christmas traditions, and I guess that Pik a Pine agreed too. We didn't know this would be the last year of Pik a Pine before we went to Schweizer's, but this all seems to have fallen in place just perfectly.

As I say good bye to Pik a Pine and wonderful memories, I have to close this year saying goodbye to my grandparents. So I will go to Pik a Pine one last time. Not for a Christmas tree this year, but for beautiful grave mounds for George, Ray, and Shirley.

And I thought the scariest thing was that "Marley was dead." ...I've only read to Chapter 1, but more on this later.