Birthdays, Babies, and Haircuts

Last week was John’s Birthday and with the help of his family we gave him a little surprise party the night before the big day.  Everyone got together at the Southwick’s house and John had no idea.  I felt like I almost ruined the surprise because I was the first to open the door and I didn’t realize he had turned to throw something away, but luckily he said it was fine and the nieces and nephews were smart enough to wait a minute before shouting surprise.  I wish I had taken pictures at the party, I didn’t even think about it.  We ate pizza, did presents, and I made better than sex cake.  It my first attempt at the dessert, but with my mom’s help it turned out really well!  On John’s birthday he was able to get work off and doesn’t have school on Tuesdays, so he was so excited to be able to sleep in.  After we finally got up, we went shopping for some new shirts for John.  He really wanted a red, plaid, short sleeve, button up shirt (it was very specific) and after going to the mall and different stores in Jordan Landing we finally found the perfect shirt at Old Navy.  Along with the perfect shirt he also got a blue t-shirt to wear with his summer shorts for only 5 bucks!  We’re big spenders :)

For the past couple years (well the years we’ve been together on our birthdays) we have made it a tradition to go to Wingers to celebrate.  Reason 1: because it’s delicious.  Reason 2: because they give their birthday guests free ice cream pie.  Reason 3: because usually they give each of us a piece of free pie because we’re both celebrating our birthdays.  So we went to Wingers for dinner and got our free desserts and basically I was so stuffed by the end I wanted to go pass out.  Anyway after dinner we went with John’s dad to buy him some new black Sunday Shoes (his old pair had a hole in the bottom).  He got a pair of Ecco’s on clearance, which he said were super comfortable and was excited about.  His dad thought they were a little too casual for church, but John promised that if he ever got called as Bishop he would buy a more formal pair.   

The last presents John got on his birthday were 3 awesome laundry baskets….  Yeah remember how I said we’re big spenders? Haha, really the reason I got them is because John LOVES the square laundry baskets at his Dad’s house, and lets face it with me doing my 40-hour a week internship he was doing the laundry for our family.  So I thought it would be a funny/useful gift.  John said he liked them… but I think he was probably hoping for something a little more exciting than laundry baskets from me.  Maybe next year...     

My older sister Jeannie just had her 4^th child.  His name is Eli and he was born on April 4^th.  Haha, 4^th on the 4^th… I just realized that.  Anyway the reason I’m telling you about it is because since she had the baby I’ve taken on some of her roles.  Basically I’m teaching her primary class every other Sunday and I’m being a substitute piano teacher for some of her students.  Things have gone pretty good.  I think I was most nervous about the piano part, but after the first week the nerves have settled down a lot.  I think the hardest part about being a substitute piano teacher is probably not knowing what boundaries to set with the students… mostly because I don’t want to conflict with what Jeannie has been focusing on.  Plus with the location change and different piano and all that, I feel like sometimes I go really easy on the students…. oh well, hopefully their still progressing somewhat!

Last but not least, I cut off 10 INCHES of my hair!  Most people I talk to really like it.  I waited to put the news on facebook and the blog for a while because I really like seeing people’s reactions.  So if you want I guess you can still tell me your reactions, unless you’re going to tell me I look like a 10-year-old like my sister Angi did. 

Right Before

One Week After

I wish I would have gotten better before shots, but I figure I already have plenty.  

Like this one!

Random Engagement Shot :)

Straight Hair!

My hair hasn’t been this short since probably… 2004-ish?  But I was ready for a change :)  The things I'm most excited about include:

1. All the dead, dry, ends are gone.
2. Taking the time to do my hair has decreased dramatically.
3. It's fresh and gives me a new start.
4. It still fits in a pony-tail.
5. It'll be really nice for the summer :)

Internship Excitement!

So these past couple weeks life have been INSANELY BUSY!  So lets recap some exciting things that have happened…. First things first:

I’M DONE WITH MY INTERNSHIP!!!!

(which might be obvious looking at this giant post)

Yes there were days when I thought it would never happen, and now that it has I can’t believe it!  The last couple days at school I ran all of the sessions (usually Alison, Meg, and I take turns)…. Which was a just a little bit tiresome, but definitely necessary for the situation.   My last session was a “goodbye session” in order to explain to everyone what was going on and why they wouldn’t be seeing me anymore.  Basically what I did was talked about the different emotions I was feeling (happy, sad, excited, proud, disbelieving, and curious) and we sang a song correlating with each one.   I also made paper faces to display what these emotions tend to look like when people are feeling them and talked about when the students might feel them in their normal school day. 

Finishing didn’t really feel like finishing… I think the reason behind that was because I was the only who was leaving.  Everyone else at school was just in their normal routine and all have to go back to school on Monday (tee, hee, hee).  One exciting thing that happened on my last day was one of the classes made me a big sign saying good luck and surprised me with cup cakes!  The ladies who help run that class are fantastic and really gave me my second wind for these last months.  They basically love me and are trying to get the principal to hire on a 2^nd Music Therapist in order to keep me on the staff…  and although that would be awesome, I highly doubt they have the funds for that position… but who knows, maybe I’ll get a call from them in the next couple weeks! 

On the last day of the internship I had to do a short presentation about the case study I’ve been working on for about 3 months (basically half my internship).  I was nervous to do the presentation because my client for the case study’s parents were coming to watch and I hadn’t practiced presenting very much because of everything else I had to do.  Before the presentation, the other therapists at the school were doing a pot-luck lunch, so I brought some lettuce for the sandwiches. Since the lunch was literally right before the presentation, I took my food to go, and headed back to the music therapy room where I could eat and practice the presentation alone. Anyway the presentation came and went with minimal flaws and I was pretty happy with how I did….  However after the day was over and I got in the car to drive home, I made an excited face in my rearview mirror to express the feeling of driving home from Hartvigsen one last time.  As soon as I did that however, I noticed that I had an ugly piece of romaine lettuce stuck in-between my top two front teeth!!  WHAT?  My co-workers let me do my presentation with that in there???  How Embarrassing….  Lesson learned, never let yourself be too nervous to do a presentation that you don’t first smile in a mirror.  Ugh, oh well… right?

So now what?  Well that’s the top asked question for one Sarah Southwick.  Things get uncertain from this point on.  The first official step is to apply to take the Certification Board for Music Therapists National Exam.  The second official step includes actually passing.  In the mean time my Internship Director, Alison Wendel, is going to be contacting the Utah State Developmental Center-USDC (her previous employment facility) in hopes of getting music therapy instigated down there again.  She had an amazing program set up down there when she left. That’s actually where I was going to do my internship in the first place, but when she got offered the job at Hartvigsen during massive budget cuts at USDC, she decided to make the change and asked me if I would be willing to follow her.  I obviously did and here we are.  I’m not sure what the chances are of me getting a job down there, but at least there’s a hope.   One thing that is on my side is apparently one of the big supervisors at USDC who didn’t support Music Therapy recently got fired… so Alison is really hopeful.  On the USDC website they also list that they offer Music Therapy services, which hasn’t been true since the end of August…. So hopefully I can help make that true again. 

Getting a job down there also has its pros and cons:

Pro: It would be a Job 

Con: It’s located in American Fork

Pro: I would be getting more Music Therapy experience under my belt

Con: It would probably be a contract position, not a full time gig…. Which I’m not what that all entails….

Anyway the list goes on, and maybe I’ll post more depending on how the next couple weeks pan out.  *Cross your fingers everyone*       

My birthday was also on Conference Sunday, so that was exciting.  The weekend was a little busy with conference, working on last minute internship stuff, and John working, but we did get some time to celebrate.  On Saturday night before the priesthood session we went out to eat at Café Rio.  It was delicious.  We weren’t the only ones who had the idea to eat out, as there were lots of guys in their shirts and ties eating there before priesthood session too!  Luckily we beat the rush, so that was nice.

On the morning of my birthday, John had to get up early to work and I was able to sleep in.  However at 8:00 I instantly woke up and realized we had left our laundry in the washing machine.  So I got up to switch it and I saw that John had left some flowers and chocolate on the table next to our bedroom door.

  

It made me happy and excited for him to get home.  We spent the morning watching conference with my family.  After, we had a waffle brunch and John and I tried out our new waffle iron.  Some of the family came over for waffles, so that was fun.  For the afternoon session we headed over to spend some time with the Southwick’s.  John had a hard time staying awake during the session, but he did wake up at 5:30 in the morning…  For my birthday dinner we had Navajo Taco’s and the Wades joined us.  Dinner was complete with Lemon Birthday Cake with glaze icing and chocolate Ice cream, Yum!  For my birthday John also got me some awesome Sandals!  I can’t wait for the sun to come out so I can wear them.      

Yesterday we went to Target and decided to look at the wallets.  I was long overdue for a new wallet.  A couple years ago around Christmas my sister Angi saw my current wallet and told me she would be embarrassed to see me use it in public…. And that was two years ago, haha.  So this is what the wallet looks like now… I think I got it back in 2005, but this picture was taken Sunday.

I’m really picky about wallets, which is part of the reason I haven’t gotten a new one in so long.  But we found this one and although I don’t absolutely love it, it’s 100 times better than the old one.

Yeah the comparison between the two is pretty bad :)