Should old acquaintance be forgot...

That's an awesome quote Meredith. Day to day nothing changes, but pretty soon everything is different. I like that. Well my family has a lot of traditions. My cousins come over every Christams Eve and we have a gingerbread house decorating contest, to which I am and always will be the champion. Its an art form really. Then for Christmas Eve dinner, we have wings. To tell you the truth I cant remember when or why it started but thats just what we do. After dinner we build a fire and watch A Christmas Story on TBS. I cant begin to explain how amazing the movie is and I will challlenge anyone who thinks they know more about that movie then me. Then we leave cookies out for Santa and open gifts the next morning then go to my Grandma's for dinner. Christmas this year was awesome. Got to see all my family and got a few cool gifts. As far as New Years resolutions go, Ive never been one to make a definite goal and stick to it but usually there broad. This year though its gonna be to continue to get to the gym or work out in my apartment everyday. I have way to much time on my hands at home to not work out everyday. It sucks cause the DAC has been closed this whole week so i havent played any basketball, which I dont like. Ive been pretty good though as far as exercise goes these past couple weeks. So I hope everyone had a wonderful 2009 and I wish you more and better in 2010. Have a safe and happy New Years Eve and ill see you next year. Oh and im spending the first week of Jan. in Canada with high school friends which Im really excited for. Peace

resolutions?

I'm not big on NY resolutions. Professionally... my resolution is to teach myself web design in the next year. Personally... since I know I will never last a year following a resolution I'll just say to complete the painting I am working on. That gives me more than enough time to finish!

Hope everyone has a happy new year and that the Flyers win the Winter Classic!

Christmas/New year Resolution

What did I do for Christmas

I went to New York city. Stayed at this hotel which was right by Time square. I went with my best friend and we walked around, saw the tree and went to upper east new york and went to the Bodies exhibition which was awesome! It was raining and kinda freezing but it was an amazing weekend.

What is my new year's resolution?
I am not too big on new years resolutions. But I try and make at least one every year. So for this year, my resolution is to stay self-driven and motivated. Also, this might sound weird but I am going to make sureI pray every night and thank god because I think its extremely important to appreciate what you have. And I'm gonna make sur eI pray every night before I go to bed.

A Brand New Decade

1.) What did I do for Christmas?
This year was pretty monumental…it was my first Christmas ever! I went home with the bf to his Grandparents house in upstate NY. I even got a stocking and a bunch of presents! Along with the Christmas celebrations, I went snowboarding for the first time…epic fail. I probably won’t be getting back on a board any time in the near future. But, it was fun none the less! We also played Catch Phrase which is now my new favorite game. I recommend it to everyone. So overall, I’d say this was a very successful first Christmas!



2.) What are my resolutions, personally as well as professionally?
Along with Meredith, I also have been thinking of the past decade and what I was doing 10 years ago. Well, I was probably listening to the Backstreet Boys Millennium album and wishing Nick Carter was my boyfriend. Oh how times have changed.

I was never one to make serious resolutions and actually stick to them after January. But, this year it’s different. One of my biggest New Years’ resolutions is to train for the USA Triathlon Collegiate National Championship in April. We have a strict training schedule starting on January 4th and it doesn’t end until April 17th (race day). So, I basically have to stick to this resolution/training regimen to do well in the race. Other than that resolution, I just want to basically concentrate on living life to the fullest and gaining as many life experiences as possible. I watched the movie 21 last night…so my mind is full of awesome life experiences. I’m thinking about starting a life counting cards in Vegas and winning hundreds of thousands of dollars. I guess that can be considered a professional resolution?

I hope everyone has a fantastic New Years and 2010!

Happy 2010

Wow, I just realized that it has been an entire decade since the rumors, fear and hoping that the year 2000 would even occur. I was 12 years old at the time, in 6th grade with a weird obsession for Tommy Hilfiger. (I'm not going to lie, I had sneakers, a backpack, the clothes, perfume, even screen name...) I was living in Florida and wore my hair in a pony tail slicked back with gel every day. I was the "new girl" that every 12 year old boy wanted to get to know better.

Now, here I am, countless houses later, 22 years old, finishing up my 4th year of college, ready to move on with my life. It's weird; day by day, nothing changes but pretty soon, everything is different.

So, 2010, the big, scary, new year. What are your resolutions, personally as well as professionally? (And if you don't believe in making new years' resolutions, might as well start now).

Family Traditions ...

Every year my family gets together on Christmas Eve for some good ole Polish food (pirogues, etc), presents and funny stories. One of the best present’s I received was my Aunt and Uncle flying in from Louisiana to celebrate Christmas with us this year. I am so glad my Aunt got to see some snow on the ground. On Christmas day I exchanged gifts with Aaron and then we went over his sister’s house for dinner, presents and fun! Needless to say, I love family time around the holidays!

Another very special moment for me this holiday weekend was having my first family party at our new house. We had hors d'oeuvres, drinks and played Wii! All in all I had a great holiday weekend full of family time and fun, minus the days I worked at BBW … lol. Hope everyone had a Happy Christmahaunakwanza!

Happy Holidays everyone!

I'm currently waiting for my sister to come pick me up (I can't walk in the snow/ice with the boots I'm wearing...almost slipped everytime I was on the ice this morning) then we will be heading home to my parents house for dinner tonight. Tomorrow we're going to my aunt&uncle's for Christmas day... tonight and tomorrow are both with my mom's side of the family... Sunday is the annual Findley Christmas get together... where everyone will be eating/drinking/watching football. That's about it for my Christmas plans. Hope everyone has a great holiday/weekend! And I hope my sister gets here SOON.

Let it snow

Well while I was off in the Poconos for a long weekend, Philly got drenched in 23 inches of snow. Sucks for you guys. I slipped and fell on ice on the way to work this morning, so I guess it sucks for me too.

Anyway, this week is a short week and a lot of us won't be here. So what are everyone's holiday plans?!

I'll be spending Christmas Eve and Christmas morning with my family and then I'll be spending Christmas afternoon with Chris's family for the first time in 4 years. It's about time, huh?

Enjoy your holidays :)

What if SHM was located in New York?

I couldn't be more creative. If SHM was in a different city, we def. wouldn't have eagles and phillies fans. And it wouldn't be as cool since it would have interns from probably NYU and not Drexel. There will be more Yankees which will be not acceptable! haha

On a serious note, SHM would still be the same company because we have internationally located members as well as Board members running this society are from all over America. The staff would definitely not be the same but SHM mantra would still prevail. SHM would still be making a difference in health care system and improving health quality.

What if...

As my contribution this week, I've left comments for everyone who posted on the Southwest topic...take a look and let me know what you think?

What if..

What if SHM was still located in the old office? I don't know if we'd all even fit in there anymore.. it's amazing to see the growth that has happened in the past 2 years alone (the time I've been here to witness it). I was thinking about this the other day when I passed the old building and when I heard last week was a year since the relocation!

go big or go home.

Well this can be answered in many ways, so I decided to be optimistic and answer big.

What if...someone donated $100,000 to SHM?

First off, great job Ken! This would be a HUGE donation and everyone would be super excited. I think this money would help us reach our goals more easily and effectively. It would help out all departments, and provide so many resources in the M&M department alone. We could splurge on bigger ad campaigns and more towards the rebranding project. This would be really awesome if it actually happened, so let’s stay positive…it could happen!

First let me apologize for being tardy to the party.
Sorry Meredith :) But here I am!

And because Meredith loves me I'm going to answer last weeks questions about goals. I'm with you Meredith when it comes to making goals. I don't plan too far ahead because I'm not the type. My friends plan everything from what they are wearing this weekend to what retirement home they will be living in. Not me! I'm going to roll with the punches. Life is a funny thing and I always think that if you plan every step of your life you limit your possibilities.

As for me my goals are:

Work for a non-profit that helps children and women (in this country and others)
Travel
Get married and have kids
Not live in NJ (property taxes are killing me)

That's about it.

Later Gators,
Celisse

Expect the Unexpected

This is straight from the book Kari is reading, Nuts!

"Instead of counting on the Luck of the Irish or doing conventional strategic planning, Southwest prepares for the future by practicing the art of "What if...?" Future scenario generation is the technical name of the process Southwest Airlines is using to prepare itself for the twenty-first century. The company's executive planning committee meets periodically to create future scenarios in which the airline could find itself. These sessions include a lot of "What if...?" questions designed to get the group thinking about all the possible situations Southwest could face."


So, fill in the blank everyone.

"What if SHM...?"

What to do...What to do...

Katie - Your post completely resonates with me. Its funny to look back at 5 year increments and see how DRASTICALLY life goals change. With my birthday coming up on Friday, a reoccurring conversation these past few weeks has been "Wow....If you asked me what I thought I'd be doing at age 28 about 10 years ago I would have said married with 2 kids...a boy and a girl named Julie and Alexander (because I know you were dying to know!). Looking at where my life is NOW I still don't think I'm ready for that...but maybe by the time I'm 30 ;-) Here's some stuff that I've got on my "before I hit 30" list:

• Live somewhere else! Colorado? Boston? Not sure...but now is the time to do it!
  
• Teach Yoga (somewhere other than SHM although I love that I'm able to!)
• Complete my Vinyasa teaching certification
• Go to Peru and Egypt (Yay! I can check one of these off in April!)
• Return to the tourism industry in Philadelphia or whatever other magical city I end up living in.
  
• Watch all of the Star Wars and Rocky Movies. I know. I know. I should be ashamed of myself.
• Have a freelance writing piece published! (next step: what the heck do i want to write about?)

Since you know how much I LOVE the show, I recommend you all go to www.hulu.com and watch last week's episode of How I Met Your Mother...Marshall reads a letter from his 16 year old self to his 30 year old self. Its silly. You'll love it!

Life Goals

I don't have anything interesting or witty to say here. My biggest goal in life is to be a mom that also gets to work from home. I guess a goal to go along with that is to get as much experience as I can before I become a mom so when I'm ready to work again I have something to show for myself.

I guess the interesting thing about that is, 5 years ago I didn't want to be a mom at all and if I did somehow get stuck with kids they were going to daycare. Funny how things change :)

Even if my career aspirations or interests change between now and 10 years from now, I'll still want to have some kind of stay at home/part time job so my #1 focus can be my kids but I still feel a level of independence - and have something to keep me from going crazy. Fife would like me to get a job at a University so our kids can go to college for free...SHOCKING. We'll see how that all turns out.

Have a great weekend everyone, see you Monday!

Loving the cookies!

I think my biggest long term goals are (well they are all inter related) - Become a Dentist and have a happy family including 2 or more dogs.
I don't really have big long term goals. I believe in going with the flow. But I do have short term goals which I know would lead me to a good future. Like right now, my short term goal would be to do awesome on my Dental Admission Tests so I can get into a dental school. These are the 2 things I know, that would make me feel sccomplished in life. I've always wanted to do be a Health Professional, also I believe that its always important to have a happy home. So along with fulfilling my ambitious dream, I would want a happy family with 2 or more dogs(cuz I love dogs and 1 wouldn't be enough). I really wouldn't care where I live as far as I have these two things in my life.

I hope everyone had a great time at the SHM holiday party. I wish we could have one more, it was so much fun. Meredith- I can't believe you posted those pictures on facebook. My mom's on facebook and she was like is this what you do at work?- Drink and gamble haha she was kidding.

I am sorry Carly and Mer, if you had cover phones for me yesterday. I was out cuz I had to take a final and I completely forgot to let Elaine know that. :-(

Have an amazing weekend !

My SHM Snuggie made my day.

When I was reading Meredith’s blog post I noticed that I feel exactly the same way (obviously because we are the same type). I find that I can’t pin point a long term goal for myself because I want to experience so many things. Here are a few things that I’ve thought of that I know I want to do before I die:

-be a counselor at the overnight camp that I went to when I was growing up
-visit my brother while he’s in the Peace Corps
-raise my family in Colorado
-run a marathon
-make a significant difference in someone’s life

I don’t know what I want to do for a career but I know I want to travel. I enjoy taking life as it happens and I love being spontaneous. So, maybe my biggest long term goal is to stay spontaneous throughout my life and enjoy it to the fullest.

GOALS

My biggest long term goal is to marry a Flyer, and hopefully by then he'll have a Stanley Cup under his belt rather than a terrible losing streak. Actually, any player in the NHL in general would do, Joffrey Lupul perhaps? Ok but seriously, my biggest long term goal.. would probably be to make a name for myself as a Freelance Designer.... or I guess just as a Graphic Designer period.. but I would really like to have my own solid client base together and a really strong portfolio with tons of different projects. I think the most appealing thing about freelancing is you can work on such a variety of things! And you can make your own schedule, take projects you like, reject projects you don't want.... but I don't think I'd want to freelance full time, more as a side gig. It would be a good job to have if I was trying to raise a family though.... with lupul. Ok, ok.. I'm done.

Goals

This weeks' guest blogger? KATIE.
(Kari and Celisse, you still have to post, so you can choose to answer either last weeks' or this weeks' question....I'm being nice).

Todd, Ashley and Kari know this about me:

I hate making goals for myself.

I don't know why, but I think it's because I don't like planning things out in my life. I like having a general idea (ideally married by 25, ideally living in LA, etc.) but I don't like having every step planned out for me, because what if I don't like to follow those steps? I like knowing that just because things didn't go according to plan (which they NEVER do), doesn't mean I failed, or that I was unsuccessful.

I may have a general idea of what I want to do when I get out to Los Angeles, but I'd rather just go with the flow (settle into my dream home with the rock star hubby, travel with him, etc.) then find the right company for me or know exactly what I want to do for the rest of my life.

Anyway, all of this is being discussed because today I made my Professional Development Plan with the help of Kari. So I want to ask all of you, what is your biggest long term goal?

Mine is to move to Los Angeles by the time I am between the ages of 24 and 25.

Major changes in QI!

There were major changes in QI department this week. I know it does not affect my role directly but it affects who I would be interacting with. There are new people coming in and I am really excited to work with them. It will be amazing to see how Joe will be taking over QI and having 1:1 with Joe should be interesting since I have to report to a Senior staff from our department once every 3 weeks. Also, there’s a new consultant who is going to be working with us and she used to work in CHOP so it would be interesting to get some input from her and learn something new from her. I would never expect to experience these changes but I guess I see how a company has to make changes for improvement. And I wasn’t here for the all staff meeting that day but I heard the example Larry gave about the basketball team and a new player on the team which I thought was really good! I guess I can put my learning from the book- Who moved my cheese-actually into action.

changes..

The changes that are happening are going to affect everyone in different ways ..
A couple ways it's going to affect me when Katie leaves the department is that she will no longer be my CVB! :(
The Monday art meeting will be changing.. Todd passed the ownership along to Ashley.. and she's already got some new ideas as well as a new time (10 AM .. thumbs up!)
Todd gave me some small projects to update his binder for the changes as well! I'm sure we're all going to see changes everywhere, whether they're big or not!

As an MA, I find it very interesting that I am experiencing these changes. Nothing like this has ever happened in my past and I always wondered what it would be like. It’s hard for me to see how my job will change because my role has not been directly affected, but, I am excited to have the chance to take on more tasks and really expand my job. I would love to work with multiple people in the department and the office and I feel that these changes will help push that along. This will give me more of an opportunity to get the most that I possibly can out of this co-op.

Happy holidays everyone! What’s on everyone’s wish list??

A Change Gon' Come

We had two meetings today discussing some internal changes here at SHM. There have been some changes between departments with some people taking on a much larger role and some people switching roles completely. Personally the changes do affect me. Katie will be leaving the M&M department to take on a role in the Advocacy and Practice Management department. Since I have been Katie's MA since starting here, Im sure my role within the department will change. I'm sure I will continue to work with Katie on the PR task force and look forward to continuing to do that. But with Katie's departure I will most likely become someone elses MA. I have not heard anything about whos or when this transition will take place but I look forward to continuing and possibly expanding my role here at SHM. I want to help everyone in this process so this transition is as seamless as possible. Id also like to thank Katie for all the help and guidance that shes given me while working with her. She has really been a big help here. So in conclusion these changes will affect my position and possibly my role here at SHm. I look forward to continuing to help out whoever it is I am working with.
On a personal note I had a great break this weekend. I got to see all my family over Thanksgiving and had two reunions with all my highschool friends. Also I got to go to the Eagles game Sunday which was very cool. I got to see a win which really capped off the weekend the right way. So overall a very good break and looking forward to seeing all my friends again over Christmas

Cant believe its December already

1. Given that we have a 3 day work week, how are you managing your work load in three days as opposed to five?
Just trying to get all of my usual work done in a timely fashion so i can get done any extra work that I would need those last two days to complete. Im a little late on this post so I can tell you the workload last week wasnt terrible and I got my work done. The dashboards got pushed back to yesterday which was a huge help for me.

2. What are your plans for the upcoming holiday weekend/Black Friday? Does your family have a Thanksgiving tradition?
I had Thanksgiving Thursday with my dads family up in PA and Friday went down the shor for part 2 with my grandmom. I guess the only real tradition is opening my birthday gifts from the family before dinner. My birthday always falls the week of Thanksgiving so I get my gifts when the families get together.

3. What is your favorite Turkey Day dish & why?
Either my grandmoms baked mac and cheese or my uncles smoked turkey. He does one regular turkey and then smokes one. Both dishes are fantastic.

All Things Go

Welcome back from a lovely 5 day vacation. I hope everyone enjoyed their time off, I know I did.

This morning, we all heard about some pretty serious changes about to take place.

How do you think these changes are going to personally affect you?

I leave you with a quote John said this morning:
"Experience is not what happens to a person, it is what a person does with what happens to them."