And another thing....

http://jezebel.com/5688773/kanye-wests-most-ridiculous-on+air-moments?skyline=true&s=i

Kanye West is a delusional idiot. And I can say that because I am a one-third owner of this blog. He has never proven himself to me, so I'll never understand why he's always saying how wonderful he is. Kanye West uses other (greater) artist's samples to talk over. He cons listeners into thinking he's rapping when he's actually just rhyming the same word with itself, putting an emphasis on the other syllable. I've had enough of his spoiled, childish rants. Can we say undeserving diva? The best thing Kanye ever did was put Dion from Clueless into his music video for "All Falls Down," but then again he probably didn't think of that himself anyway.

I've been listening to hip hop for a really long time and there are much better performers who let their music speak for them. I actually saw Kanye perform in Barcelona in 2006 and for an artist who claims to be changing the world with his words, there were probably about 5 Spaniards who even knew who he was. The highlight of that concert was the surprise Common cameo, as Kanye himself was completely uninspired and unengaged with the crowd, like a robot on repeat.

There's a lot of buzz about Kanye's new album, but I'll probably pass on Paranoid with a Peter Pan complex.

A little stress release....

So school, and my current life happenings, but mainly school, is stressing me out beyond belief. I wish not to include any of this negativity, or any school related events, here on our safe-haven blog. Just know this: your dentist has feelings too. And your dental student's feelings mostly consist of despair and anxiety with a glimmer of hope. And as a patient at the dental school, my life is entirely in your hands and you shouldn't have the authority to hold that kind of power.

As a way of coping, I tried a little exercise tonight to positively de-stress that did not involve crying or calling Mommy (she and dad called me so that doesn't quite count thankyouverymuch). ((I also ate some bread pudding, sue me)).

With help and advice from my classmate Mason, the ultimate camera/gadget photography guru, I made a decision to invest in a new heavy duty camera. I've always loved taking pictures, but have never had any formal training. To distract myself from my sorrows I put on some relaxing music and went around my apartment taking close up photographs of different colors and textures that helped me feel calm.













I think the sink water just may be my favorite. What do you do to de-stress? Here at PLSB we can use all the tips we can get. By the way, I know we've been MIA for about 5-6 months but hopefully we can take the time to get things on our website up and running again.

Election Night!

Anyone else watching the election coverage? Big stuff happening right now, and I have to admit that this is really only the second time I've been truly drawn to watching as the counts come in and analyzing how all the numbers will play out.
Why now?
In the last election I was really drawn to the history that was being made and how the nation pulled together to achieve something once thought impossible.
Now, it might be more selfish in the reason why I'm so interested. That, and I'm a lot more educated now, finally.

But first, as a quick aside. Did you just see this (whack) from Kentucky accept his new Senate seat?


From wikipedia.org
B and I are texting back and forth as we watch the election results coming in. One of the texts was that someone told him today that he looks like Rand Paul. Now, B has been told several times that he looks like Justin Timberlake; but I think its time this maybe budding politician moves up to being compared to one in the political world. Let's just hope he never says something like 'there are no rich, no middle class, and no poor in America'.

So, this election marks the beginning of what I'm calling in my head the start of "Real Life" planning. I will officially say that one of the few places we are considering after we both graduate in May is Washington DC (!), and the results of the election will affect B's job search. Not that the results are going to change my job search approach, but in my head I have been avoiding sending out CVs and cover letters with the excuse of 'I'll just wait until after the election'. Tomorrow "Real Life" will hit me and I will have no more excuses to not being able to answer the ever present (and starting to feel nagging) question "what are you doing next year?". Its pretty crazy how fast this last school year has already flown by and I know we will be all taking our licensure exam in May in just a few blinks.
Also, along these same lines - everyone send happy thoughts to Yasi tonight and tomorrow! She is among the early brave and is taking her Part II Board exams tomorrow and Thursday! Jamie and I, on the other hand, are waiting until December to tackle this huge exam. You will rock it Yasi!!

Happy election watching to everyone! And, bring on the "Real Life" challenges, because lets be honest - I can't wait!

Fashion...

I'm not one to usually talk fashion. Especially not on a blog. But, this is speaking to me:

(jcrew.com)
So many things I love and wish I could pull off!

Dumpster diving

B found this chair in the dumpster at his apartment last spring.

When he brought it up, I told him he couldn't sit on the original cushion. Nasty! Who knows where that has been or who has sat on it. Plus, the cushioning had torn and there was no support for the seat.

Well, he quickly found a solution to keeping the cushion supported.
And soon enough he spent every extra minute out on his porch sitting, watching the boats go by. Sitting on this chair. With a gross cushion. From the dumpster.

But then I got my hands on it this summer. And tore it apart.

Sanded.

Refinished. Stained.
With an idea.
Jute.
(Has anyone else used jute before? I have a whole roll left over looking for a project)

Turns out jute is a pretty strong and great for upholstery. So I wove it into the frame.

Like elementary school weaving, but harder since I had to sew each end in.

Did I mention how long this sewing took?

Especially when the dogs got in the way.
** Yes, plural...dogs. More on this pandemonium later.


Speaking of dogs, Ti really enjoys the new dog bed (old cushion). Except its stint inside was less than a minute, it is now his patio lounger.

The best part - the final project is a success!!

A little stiff now at the beginning, but I know it will loosen up.

And to spiffy it up, an Ikea cushion that fits perfectly!

I just can't decide if I like it better with, or without the cushion.

A little Rusty....

Can you believe we made it to 4th year??

Hello blogworld! PLSB took a very long summer hiatus considering that we've been back in clinic since July 5th. So much has happened since we last posted! I took a vacation to NYC, spent time with family, tried a new restaurant in San Antonio that I would not recommend, started 4th year of dental school, took a trip with Brigid & Yasi to Houston, got an iPhone (what?!?!), hosted/partied with Japanese dental exchange students and welcomed my friend Lauren back to the states for a short escape from Peace Corps.

A photo summary:

Eating at the delectable Breadwinners with Ben's Mom, Sister and Nephew. We also enjoy Bonnie Ruth's brunch when out in the Dallas 'burbs. (For a taste of French goodness in San Antonio or Houston check out more places I like.)

Hanging out at the pool in Rockwall, TX near Lake Ray Hubbard for the Flippo wedding festivities.

Ben and his best buddies at the rehearsal dinner at Primo's.


We spent time with my family and friends in Baytown, hit up the usual spots, but also took the time to visit the San Jacinto monument. That's my sister Alyssa who was home from college and agreed to accompany us on the ferry ride over to the monument.


I've got a million pics from NYC and this could be a separate post, but here are two of the faves. It was Ben's first New York experience and he couldn't get enough of Times Square.

And OH the food!!!
-Otto
-DBGB
-Rice to Riches
-Philipe
-The Standard Grill
-Vespa
-Good
-Sushi Lounge


The "strike pose" created at Bowling Night.



The above pictures highlight the fun times we had hosting Haruna and the other Japanese dental exchange students. An exhausting ten days, but very rewarding.

We had to go to Sea World early on a Saturday morning with the Japanese students. Sea World is my own personal hell. Especially on a Saturday in August in San Antonio, but that's another post in itself. Can you believe I took this Flamingo photo with my iPhone??

I've recently been on a quest to avoid buying store-bought sauces, etc if I can. I took a chance on making homemade Spaghetti sauce and I absolutely love it. Knowing that you made the sauce and you know what's in it is so exciting and rewarding. Plus, the homegrown peppers from my patio really made the difference!

Having the iPhone makes it possible to have impromptu photo shoots of things like wacky hat night.
And finally, I spent the last weekend on the river in New Braunfels with Lauren and "the boys," and got to see Stephanie and Jena in Austin. It was great to be together and I enjoyed staying in Jena and her finance's new home. (Good food here and here.)

Maybe I could like a city life

You would think with time off of school and no real responsibilities, there would be abundant time for blogging, right?
WRONG!

With plans for real blog topics but no time right now to put them on paper, I bring you the excitement in my life right now.
Washington DC!
I'm here, finally! B is up here until August doing a internship "on the hill". He is renting a room in a cute little house with other summer interns pretty close to capitol hill --> great part of the city, I've decided.
After a little walk around part of the city yesterday afternoon and a wonderful dinner and celebratory beers, I'm ready to tackle the city. There are so many things on my list and part of me wants to run ahead and cross half of them off today. No worries, I'm taking it slow. I'm currently enjoying his patio, a cup of coffee, city sounds and contemplating which shoes would be best for all walking ahead of me.

Suggestions for my time in the Capital???

Toothy Tuesdays: Baby teeth.

We were running out of Toothy Tuesday material, but this past week and a half of pediatric dentistry has given PLSB plenty of material to share. I'll just cut to the chase:

-Baby teeth are important! They are necessary for chewing, looking good and guiding the permanent teeth into place. As soon as a kid gets any teeth in their mouth they must be brushed or wiped.

-Don't put your baby to bed with a bottle. Sugar and milk marinating on the baby's teeth all night equals mucho, mucho cavities.

-Start transitioning away from a bottle, pacifier or thumb when the kid is a year old so that all the suckling motions won't interfere with expected development of the roof of the mouth and positioning of the teeth.

-Only drink juice, soda, gatorade, etc at meal times. Eating and chewing stimulates saliva release, naturally cleansing the mouth. In between meals, when saliva isn't flowing as much, acidic drinks keep the mouth at a bacteria friendly pH, never letting the mouth get back to neutral. Water is the best thing, especially water straight from the tap that contains fluoride. (This bullet is for adults too).

-Kids only need a dot of toothpaste--the size of a grain of rice. Kids also need help and supervision brushing.

-And as my classmate said, "if you love your child, you won't let their teeth rot." Seriously, you may have to hold a kid down, but you are doing more harm by not brushing and soaking their sweet little teeth in sugary acid. We've seen countless three year olds come in with a) rotted out numbs of teeth or b) a mouth full of silver crowns, even on the front teeth. Not to mention the poor little babes with swollen faces due to abscesses around their teeth (this can actually be quite the emergency situation).

-Extensive dental work is not done on a kid as it might be on an adult. Even the best behaved children might be simply too young to handle long and noisy dental appointments. Thus, to avoid further infection they might need to be sedated or actually sent to the operating room. You can imagine that sedation and general anesthesia would be stressful for all parties involved and should be avoided.

After the first day of my summer pediatric rotation I decided specializing in pediatrics is probably not for me. I definitely want to treat kids in my general practice, but only the GOOD kids. I was really touched this morning when the father of a patient handed me the drawing I posted above. It's easy to get discouraged when working with patients or parents of patients who don't know how to care and/or aren't willing to do their part, but this guy made my week! He was a magnificent father and an obviously talented artist. I've never gotten anything half as nice from a patient.

New life everywhere ya look.

The past couple of weeks have been filled with new life and new beginnings. First we visited Ben's precious and perfect nephew.....

I cannot comprehend how small this creature is! His sweet little face is the size of my palm. When I pointed this out, Ben said, "duh. As we learned, the neurocranium is larger than the viscerocranium for the first two years of life."

Although I didn't get to share mothers' day with my mom and grandma, I was really honored to spend the weekend with Ben's family, welcoming the newest member into the mom's club. For some reason I've never been the kind of girl to plan a dream wedding or fantasy home, but I've always known my biggest accomplishment will be motherhood. That being said, visiting the nephew didn't bring about new ideas or epiphanies about babies per say, but did make me see their effect on the greater community--the family. AND made me decide I should get lasik before giving birth so I can fall asleep at any given moment.

I failed to take pictures of the six closet dividers I made for the new baby before they were sent to his mom, so I snuck up to the nursery and got some pictures of these crafts in action.


The dividers are designed to fit around the closet rod, but this particular rod doesn't dismount so Ben's sister had to improvise with the green ribbon. This craft is so easy to make and organizes the baby's clothes by month. I chose more mature designs (if scrapbook paper can be "mature") as the clothes got bigger, but only took these two photographs. The closet divider idea came from this blog.

After our stint in Dallas to meet Ben's nephew we went to Houston to meet my new niece.....

PRINCESS LOLA MUFFIN!!! She goes by Lola and she's cuter than you thought possible.

She only weighs 1 pound, 8 ounces. I guess human babies aren't the only babies that bring families together.

As if all this baby fever wasn't enough...Brigid and I saw BABIES last night. It was definitely enjoyable watching the four babies from different cultures, observing the similarities and differences in their rearing, but we're still left wondering what we were supposed to take from the documentary! Hmmm.

One last note on children--some of them behave so badly!! We visited my sister Leah's fourth grade classroom on Friday and I have no idea how she has survived being a teacher this long with that group. I would most definitely have cried at my desk long ago. Before you get all goo goo ga ga over these cute photos I've shared and decide to start popping out the little ones--please get an education, a partner, and a positive attitude.