Life and kitchen in progress

We've had a full couple of weeks. I'm almost done with my first clinical rotation. I've been doing Cardiology, which has been interesting, humbling, and overall a good experience. I appreciate that the teaching faculty involved in my residency program value patient care, teaching, and teamwork. My schedule has taken some getting used to, being on call at the hospital overnight every fourth night, but a post-call nap goes a long way and we're doing well. I'm starting to think about research and exploring mentors within the areas of Geriatrics, Health Disparities, and/or Palliative Care.

We're continuing to settle into life in Pittsburgh. Ryan has now removed a lot of the carpet upstairs, including in the guest room, hallway and stairs. We still can't understand why it was the fashion to cover beautiful hardwood with carpet. We're also beginning our kitchen remodeling project. Here are pictures from when we bought the house:


We have about half of the IKEA cabinets assembled and installed and are beginning to remove the old cabinets. By Tuesday, we'll pull out the rest of the cabinets and have 3 weeks without a kitchen faucet while we wait for the countertop to be fabricated. It'll be great to have the kitchen finished by the end of August. We're excited about how it'll look and function.

While I work, Ryan's been training, walking and playing with Sadie (we have a favorite dog park that she loves to run at), making art and volunteering at a print-making organization, and playing music with the small emergent Episcopal church that we've been going to called Three Nails (http://www.threenails.org/). We enjoy that it's focused on community, liturgy, and is only two weeks from our house. Hopefully, we'll be able to join a cell group on a semi-regular basis in the next few weeks.

Burr and Natalie, good friends from Madison, are in town visiting for a few days this week. It's been a great visit and excuse to see more things here in Pittsburgh. They went to the Carnegie Museum of Art, and then we went to the Zoo (and saw the baby tiger) and to the Mattress Factory, an art museum with large installation pieces.