Jessie going back to school!

Well, I saw on facebook one of the other wives down here at Laughlin posted about a scholarship that's available to military wives whose husbands are considered "of low rank" (such as lieutenants!). It will provide up to $4000 towards an education/license/certification in a portable and high demand career field. Since I already have my bachelors in Geography, if I was accepted, I could go back to school and study another topic that I'm somewhat interested in.

The main issue with living in Del Rio is the location. It's far away from anything, especially any type of quality school. So, with a little research, I found an online school that accepts this scholarship and every program is scholarship qualified. I looked into the different programs, more focused on the medical field. They had things like lab technician, pharmacy tech, billings clerk, admin, etc. I had decided on pharmacy tech because it would be useful knowledge to have even if I never do it for a job.

I started the scholarship application process and got signed up on the website. There, they had a master list of all the career fields that they deem to be needed and mobile, along with all of the programs accepted, and at what schools. I saw on the career list that they had EMT/Paramedic! I have been seriously looking into an EMT program for the past 18 months or so and had even done the prerequisites in Colorado already. I was going to do one program here in Texas, but the distance was going to be the issue, along with the clinical/ambulance rotations, so I never did it.

I looked into the accepted EMT programs and found an online one based out of Texas! I contacted them immediately, completed the scholarship application, and got it all approved in the course of 2 days! So, the academic portion of the course is online, then I have to travel to either El Paso, or Austin for a skills review, and then we'll have to figure out if I can to the ER and ambulance rotations here in Del Rio. The school said they will try to work with me. But they're pretty sure at the very least, they could get something out of San Antonio, which would also be good.

I'm super excited about this opportunity to go back to school and continue learning a new topic that I'm interested in! It's going to be crazy though having to remember how to study and manage time and do tests again! But the timing couldn't be better...by the time I got my textbooks and all registered for my class, Stephen finally started pilot training! Now we're study buddies!

The Twinners

Well, it didn't take long for us to decide it was time to get another pet. Even though we're still mourning the loss of Shadow and Nikki, we decided that we needed to fill that void. We waited at least 2 days before we headed to the pound to adopt the next member of our family. I went there during the day before Stephen was off work, and found 6 that I wanted! I was able to narrow it down to about 4 or 5 before Stephen got there. Unfortunately, he had a hard time picking as well! In the end, we settled on 2 that had caught our eye. They were both female 6 month old puppies, who had been picked up together, and there was no way that we could split them up!

We ended up bringing home Lilo and Stitch! We really don't know their stories, but based on behavior, Stitch seems to be the one who was in charge of their little pack and probably without a home longer, and Lilo seems to have come from an abusive home because she is super skittish and submissive. They are super close and take care of each other.

We got a web cam hooked up so we can watch them playing outside in their pen. It's super cute to see what they're up to! At one point, they were fighting over the dog bed. Lilo was on the bed and Stitch wanted the bed, so Stitch ended up pulling the bed across the pen with Lilo still on it! And let me just say, Lilo weighs over 30 pounds! Once it was where Stitch wanted it, Lilo took a nap, while Stitch stood as guard, and then after a while they switched.

We got some pretty bad news when we took them to the vet. They both had a ton of worms, and all types of worms, Lilo having it much worse. The vet's fear with Lilo was that the worms might have already gotten into her blood stream and to her heart, which is fatal, but only time would tell.  Both puppies also were covered in ticks when we picked them up. Not just little ticks, but adult ticks that were huge and green. So gross! They didn't check for any tick diseases though because they normally wouldn't start showing up on puppies this young. It also appeared that Stitch was hit by a car: her pelvis is broken in 2 spots, she has broken ribs, and some blood in her bladder.  They are going to need a lot of love and care!

Unfortunately, about a week after taking them to the vet, Lilo passed away. We were once again super sad, and sorta freaking out. We took Stitch into the vet to get checked and have them run some additional tests. We convinced them to check for tick diseases, and of the 3 fatal ones, she has 2. She immediately started an intense antibiotic treatment.

A few days later, Stephen had decided to bring Stitch to the park for lunch. We notices that she was super pale. Her mouth was completely white and she couldn't hold herself up. We immediately took her to the vet. Her platelet levels were practically non-existent. They immediately started treating her, gave her a blood transfusion and ended up keeping her for a couple days. They said that if we would've waited even 1 hour more before bringing her in, she would've died. But, she pulled through with a strong will and desire to live! She is back at home with us and has made us feel like a family again!