New Hopes, Simple Pleasures, and More Coffee Please

Hey there friends!
I hope you all had a wonderful and Merry Christmas and will have a Happy New Year! I am daydreaming about new hopes, simple pleasures and more coffee please! 😉

If you came here today looking for a fun new recipe I am sorry, I don’t have one today. Today I am writing on my blog to say hey, I have missed talking to you guys and here is a little snippet of me as the year rolls by. As the days of hotel life come to an end, I would like to welcome the days of new hopes, simple pleasures, and more coffee please!

With the arrival of 2017, I have new hopes for my career, my parenting, my blog, my family…etc. I have come to terms with sooo many things these past couple months of living in a hotel suite. While it has not always been easy, I have come to realize what things (which are not things by the way) are the most important in my life. Those “things” being my husband and my children. And for that reason, my blog has suffered a bit in the past couple months. However, as we soon move into our new home I am so unbelievably excited for a new year with 3 Scoops of Sugar!

My last day of work at the hospital was Thursday and while I was sad to leave, I am so very excited about my opportunity to stay home with the kids and get back into blogging. I miss cooking, like real cooking with more than a microwave! Supper on a fancy night in the hotel consists of spaghetti and a Caesar salad eaten with a plastic fork. 🙂

I am currently reading Settle for More by Megyn Kelly and it is a fantastic book! I totally recommend it! I have a hard time putting it down. It inspires me to do more with my career. I am a nurse and have enjoyed my career but I feel like I can do more than that. I have worked in a general ICU, transplant ICU, surgery center, clinics, but for the last couple years I have been a pre-admitting nurse and make certain patients come into the hospital ready for surgery. I make calls to patients, obtain their past medical history and prepare their charts to make sure they have sufficient preoperative clearance and all the appropriate records on the chart before they come in to have their surgery. While this has been a challenging career, it has also been very rewarding. Not to mention I work with a great group of ladies! However, I am ready for a change and am hoping to shift gears a bit and focus on my dietetics career now and in the future. And that seems to fit perfectly with starting up a food blog!

Now for the dishy part…we are no longer moving to Kansas. We sold our house, got set up in a hotel for two months, and now will be staying in Nebraska. While the past few months have been one of the wildest rollercoasters of my life, I have to say I have grown more because of it. I have come to enjoy the little moments with Pat and the kids. Some of my favorite moments since being in this hotel have been making homemade hot chocolate for them, the The Polar Express trolley ride with the Pat, the boys, and my mom, and finally seeing their faces after Santa came to the hotel and dropped off all of their gifts! We have certainly made some lasting memories here. It just goes to show you that all of our possessions do not a home make but it is rather about being with the people you love no matter where that may be.

2016 has been a year of challenges and simple pleasures. There were some rocky times but we got through them all and look forward to a hopefully smoother ride in 2017. However, it is those ups and downs that shape us into the people we are and without them I would not be the strong, persevering gal that I have come to be.

My simple pleasures in 2016 have given me the motivation to smile despite the urge to cry, to get out of bed when the desire is to sleep, and take life one day at a time. I now spend a few extra minutes staring at the sunset, hugging my husband, squeezing my kids tight when I drop them off at daycare, talking to my mother on the phone, talking to Pat as we lie in bed before I tune out for the day. What are my simple pleasures?? They are hearing my kids sing the ABCs, my kids asking me to carry them to bed and kiss them goodnight, seeing my family over Christmas, date night with Pat at his work Christmas party, finding the time to laugh with friends at work. My simple pleasures are moments in time with the people I love. These simple pleasures are times I will never forget. To more simple pleasures in 2017! And more coffee please!!

Christmas Eve 2016

Love,

3 Scoops of Sugar