Masquerade Balls, the Orchestra and live performances--we must be in Seattle

February has been a busy month. First there were midterms (which are still kind of on-going for Tom, and I’ve had a weird schedule of back-to-back exams). But, we were able to get away from it all for a weekend to the cabin. As usual, these photos have pretty much all been seen on Facebook, but in case you’ve been spending time away from the social media world, here is another glimpse of them.

We joined my fellow classmates at the Spokane site for a masquerade ball. We readied our masks and had a little fun playing dress up

I think Tom looked better in it than I did

We tried to look serious but all my serious faces just looked creepy, so we have a lot of smiling pictures. 

 

See? ... Creepy

There was a student there taking photos, so I’m trying to get his shots from our “photo shoot” session like you would see at a prom—and if I ever get those from him, I’ll post them too.  

The following morning we were met with glorious sunshine and we went on a lovely walk in the fresh snow through Enlish Point Trails. 

We were sad to go, and even more sad to see the sun go (at least I was). Apparently it’s been too long since I’ve seen the sun because my eyes weren’t able to handle the bright light—I looked like I had bell’s palsy in all the photos we took, this one was the best (that tells you how bad they were!):

Then I tried to really hold my eyes open and we both looked like fools:

 

And, a trip to the cabin wouldn't be complete without a trip to Hudson's Hamburgers. Yum!

After the ball, we had a long week of school that was full of good moments. I have a small group of 8 students that meets once a week and we’ve gotten pretty close. So, we joined Lauren, our small group leader (who is a resident in family medicine) at her home for a home-cooked meal. We also happened to be celebrating a milestone for my classmate Maria, who was originally born in bangledesh and just gained American Citizenship. We celebrated by singing the national anthem over red-white-and-blue themed cake. It was priceless.

Then, later on during the week, Anna (another classmate who is originally from Bozeman) got engaged. We surprised her in class – this is her candid surprised face:

 

And what surprise celebration of an engagement would be complete without champagne and strawberries? We didn’t have time to make chocolate covered strawberries (what med student would?), so we just ended up mixing chocolate and strawberries in a bowl—not the best presentation but still delicious!

 

The excitement of the week continued as we drew on each other during lab to mark the various zones of the peripheral nerves in the leg.I got to be the leg model this week.

 Then, we topped off the week with a med student talent show and bake-off. A few of us submitted baked goods--I got haggled into making Challah bread and ended up winning 4th place and got a new coffee tumbler (so I guess it was worth it). Here you can see the spread of deliciousness and the tough judging going on.

 Then the talent show portion of the event ensued and I was yet again amazed by the skills of my classmates! they are an incredible bunch. Here is picture of a band of first year med students (four of which are in my small group, so I was particularly proud) in their finest medical-related garb:

We even had tap dancers!

 To top off this amazing week, we were invited to go to the Orchestra at the Town Hall in downtown Seattle last night. Shane, one of Tom's classmates from UPS who presented in Cambridge with him in 2009 is a trumpet player and is involved with the Lake Union Civic Orchestra. It was a BEAUTIFUL performance and it was so wonderful to be a part of the crowd!

 And what Friday night would be complete without a little Fro-Yo? Thanks mom and dad for the gift card to Menchies--we had to spend it all in one visit, so you should see the size of frozen yogurt container we got to bring home to snack on later!

 

Tom and I both have tests this upcoming week, but then we are less than one week away from finals week for the quarter--we can't believe how fast it has gone! Here's to another week of studying human anatomy with a ton of wonderful people!