Wild Weather in Orange County!

Today we had some really wild weather. The forecast was for winds, but nobody ever said it was going to resemble some crazy tornado! Well, not literally but pretty close. I was driving on the freeway and the sky was brown from all the dirt. Trash was flying through the air all over the place. And as you can see, tree branches were no match for the strong, although brief, wind!
I even saw on the news a roof that was torn off a building where helicopters land, hmm that won't be good. The winds only lasted for about 10 minutes, not to mention it was raining. This poor tree belongs to my next door neighbor. But it isn't as bad as some of the trees they showed on the news... they were literally uprooted completely and had fallen away from their original place. One part of a tree fell on a Jaguar, oh so sad. What a day!

My "new" car

Ever since I started driving I have always driven old used cars that my dad bought for a few hundred bucks, what else could we do when we had as many as 6 drivers at a time, all with different destinations! So... may I present my newest car I have ever driven.... our "new" Plymouth voyager! Matt's dad bought a new car and since he was going to sell his old minivan, we decided to buy it from him! So here it is, my new sweet ride!

The best part is... now I am ready to load up my car with kids, once we have them! Till then, I just have more room to put my fast food trash and old water bottles.

A link to "The Chase" by Matt Worley

Here is a link to Matt's video for you to watch. He thought of this idea about a year ago, and here it finally is: The Chase
Enjoy!

The Chase

Yesterday Matt's short film "The Chase" was seen at the Home Grown Film Festival. I didn't realize it before, but the entire festival was put on by two girl scouts! It was a big project and I think they did a great job. This was the first year that it was held, but over all I would say that it ran smoothly.

It was sooooo exciting to see Matt's work up on the BIG screen! I was internally-giggling the whole time and like a little girl I was just so excited through the whole thing, luckily it is only 2 minutes long! Then at the end of the film, the audience laughed... that was exciting to hear! You never really care about the audience reaction until the work being seen belongs to someone you love and you have seen the work put into it.

Good job Matt, I am so proud of you!

The Gun Show and Film Festivals

This has been a very exciting month. As you may know Matt does professional video production. Recently he and his brother worked on some short independent films of their own to submit to various places. Both Matt and his brother were recently selected as finalists at the Home Grown Film Festival next week in Los Angeles. Matt's movie is titled "The Chase." That was pretty exciting to hear the news that he was a finalist. Hopefully he will be recognized for his work!

So, that was pretty exciting... but then today happened. Matt has been involved with a few friends and they created their own production company The Juniper Sequence. They have been working on a movie idea for a very long time. They finally got their lucky break several months ago when they pitched the idea to a production company called Dark Horse Entertainment. They have received great feedback with some hope of funding for their film.

After a couple months worth of work and meetings, and artwork, and animation, and editing, and... well you get the idea, the guys went for another meeting today. I can't build up the excitement with text the way I would like to so... here it is: Dark Horse wants to pitch the idea to Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith's production company, and are willing to fund the "The Gun Show"! AAAAHHHH!!! Can you just imagine the thrill!! We all went out to celebrate tonight. This is hopefully the beginning of a wonderful production company and their first of many movies together. I am sure I will write more about it later, but that is the BIG news!

First Dental Cleaning, and Recommendations

Today I had the privelage of cleaning my nephew, Tanner's teeth. It was his first professional cleaning. He has been seen by the dentist before, but never cleaned. It was exciting to be the one to set the tone for his future dental visits. He was a wonderful patient, but as most kids do, he got kind of bored so there were a few times I had to stop and squirt water in his mouth to entertain him.

At one point I poked him... and he told me all about it! He was upset with me, and told me not to use the tool I was using. So briefly I switched to a different tool, and when he wasn't paying attention I switched back. AFTER I switched back he told me that he never wanted me to use that tool again, so I said "ok" and carried on. Ha ha ha, sometimes you do have to tell little lies. That is ok, his mom was sitting right there when it happened so I didn't feel so bad.

Tanner was a great patient, and I am so thankful he trusted me enough to be my patient. I recommend that exposing children to the dental office as early as possible is the best thing. As soon as they have teeth, if you can.
1.Take your kids to your appointments and let the dentist just look in their mouths without touching
2. Gradually move into having them sit in the chair and let the child touch everything, and become familiar with their surroundings.
3. Never tell a child bad stories about dentists. We are finally getting the stigma of "bad" dentists to go away now that the baby boomers are starting to retire...they are usually the ones with the fear. Things have changed significantly!!!
4. Be regular, make them see it is important!

Ok, that is just some advice I have... oh and one more... Parents, try not to be in the room with the child when they are having dental work done. If a child is a little nervous and sees you there, then they will take that opportunity to "get away". They will scream, cry, and fuss because they know you will "rescue" them. I once saw a little boy getting a filling done. He was a little uncomfortable (who isn't?) but as soon as his mother walked in the room he literally screamed bloody murder! And what do you think his mom did? That's right! She "saved" him, and we couldn't finish working. Make things simple... trust your dentist, stay out of the room while the work is being done. Just reassure the child that you are in the next room and you won't leave until they are done.

Ok NOW I am done. Keep 'em clean!

Future RDH's

I thought I could start sharing some moments of Dental Hygiene school with you. My class (class of 2008) began with 20 students. Throughout the first semester we "lost" 4 students and so now we are down to 16 (Myself, Ginny, Mon, Nini, Kari, Karli, Uyen, Candice, Kindall, Jennifer, Arlene, Linda, Emi, Ngoc, Lyn, and Bruce). We all get along really well. There are a few of us that gravitate toward eachother naturally though. This is a typical picture of us during lunch. Ususally a group of us has gone to McDonald's, Del Taco, or some other fast food establishment to get food, and we study! I love our time together, we have a lot of fun!

Bad day...grrr

I had a rough day at school on Friday. I had a quiz, got a previous midterm returned, had a patient cancel for next week, and it all came crashing down. My midterm that was returned to me was the start of my bad day. I studied really hard for my oral pathology class, but I just couldn't fit it all in my brain. I ended up with a C on the exam. That may not have been such a big deal, except the last two exams in that class I also did poorly on. It is a tough class. Then there is the added pressure that if I don't pass that one class (or any class for that matter) by the end of the semester I am out of the dental hygiene program completely. Talk about scary!

Well, I was very upset and so during class I started to cry. I didn't really care who saw me, we have all had our fair share of tears throughout the program. I just sat in the back, cried, and took notes while my professor carried on with her lecture.

That night I received a wonderful phone call from a girl in my class. We get along, but I don't necessarily hang out with her. She called to check on me, a few girls had noticed how upset I was and they just wanted to cheer me up. I am really happy that I have such a great support of other students. We are all going through the same thing, and it is nice to have someone to talk to who really understands. It was a precious moment in the midst of a bad day.

Romantic Acts

There are so many times we women expect our men to do romantic things for us... buy us flowers, surprise us with gifts, etc. But I have to tell you about one of THE most romantic acts that Matt has ever done for me.

While we were dating, Matt and I lived 85 miles apart. I was working at Blockbuster at the time and I took my "lunch/dinner" break. I went home because there was something I needed to do on the computer, and so I called Matt just to chat while I was on my break. Long story short, my computer wasn't working and I had to go back to work. I was so angry because I couldn't do what I wanted to do, and I didn't have time to eat anything. Poor Matt had me complaining in his ear the entire time. As I sometimes do, I over-reacted and got upset at Matt because of nothing he had control over.

I went back to work, grumpy. About an hour later a man from Pizza Hut came in with a delivery for me. Matt had called and ordered a pizza for me to eat, and told the girl on the phone what had happened. So she wrote a love note on the top of the box of the pizza from Matt. I could not keep from crying. Matt was so wonderful that not only did he not get upset that I was mad at him for no reason, but he went out of his way to buy me dinner, because he knew I was hungry. Now that is love!

I love to tell that story because it isn't the big Hollywood romantic event, but to me, he made my heart melt. He is so wonderful, and I still notice those little romantic acts he does for me.

Death By Chocolate

Last week I went to a fun party called "Death By Chocolate!" Everything served had chocolate in it. We had fondue, chocolate wantons, lava cake, brownies, chocolate-banana cake (my contribution), chocolate peanut butter cookies, oh and lots of milk. It was so much fun, and as a chocolate lover it was a wonderful dinner too!