There has been some really good things happening here. It feels weird to say that good things are happening and that life is starting to have a semblance of goodness to it that we haven't had in a few months.
At the start of this month I interviewed for and accepted a new position at my bank and that means two things. One, I'm full time now (woot) and two, I had to move branches from a small one to a big one. The change has been an interesting one, and I am still learning and adjusting to things and how they all work at the new branch. It has been a very incredible blessing to us. We have been working towards this for over a year.
Shortly after I changed branches, word got out that my old branch needed a new part timer to work the closing shift. Tim applied for, and was offered the position. This is another huge blessing because that means once his contract with the Red Envelope people is up, he can focus on being there more fully. He's been there about a week now, and so far it's going well.
We are thankful too that my dad was able to come out and visit us for a weekend this month and spend some time with us. It was bittersweet but also quite wonderful to spend a little time just relaxing and eating.
The winter has truly come down on us now, and it's been in the low teens to mid 30s in temperature. So we've had a little snow and we're dealing with that. It's quite pretty when we look out on the balcony from our apartment because we can see out along this little valley-thing.
We are very thankful for a lot of the things that have come our way recently. This was the thing we needed so desperately to try and counteract the terrible events of this late summer/early fall. So while the balance isn't quite met yet we are feeling quite optimistic about the next few months, into the new year.
And this is where I'll leave you for now. We are thankful for new jobs, family and friends, opportunities and the good times we've been able to have in the last year or two, and in the years before Tim and I got married. There's a long and bumpy road ahead but we're feeling able to take it on now.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes
Fall has come and come upon us relatively quickly, all things considered. We had a few weeks of Indian Summer and then suddenly it got cold. This is not a bad thing. The trees were gorgeous for about three weeks, and now it's gotten windy and billowy so I'm ok with that.
I've been working very hard to recover from the events of July/August/September and I think I've done well enough, all things considered. Tim has also made some wonderful strides in his own place, the most fun and best thing: he got his Driver's License! So now he's driving around on the automatic car and I've been driving the standard/manual truck, who my dad named Willy. So I'm driving Willy around and having a blast. It certainly makes things interesting.
Life has thrown a few curveballs at me on a professional level and I'm working to come out in the way I need to. I have a few good feelings so we'll see where that leaves us. I'm getting ready for our annual Wine and Cheese night. It's just a quick way for us to say Thank You to our customers and get to know them on a more personal, non-banking type level. It's a lot of fun.
Tim got a second job working at a Red Envelope Co. and he's enjoying it pretty well. The drive is about 50 miles round trip, but thankfully his hours means he misses a lot of the morning commutes, so that gives him plenty of time and space to learn the highways and byways to get there and back.
So that's been our October so far. We had a friend from Alaska come visit us last week on her way through to Texas and that was fun. It's been a strange few months. There is still a lot of good happening in our lives, even if there is overwhelming sadness as well.
I've been working very hard to recover from the events of July/August/September and I think I've done well enough, all things considered. Tim has also made some wonderful strides in his own place, the most fun and best thing: he got his Driver's License! So now he's driving around on the automatic car and I've been driving the standard/manual truck, who my dad named Willy. So I'm driving Willy around and having a blast. It certainly makes things interesting.
Life has thrown a few curveballs at me on a professional level and I'm working to come out in the way I need to. I have a few good feelings so we'll see where that leaves us. I'm getting ready for our annual Wine and Cheese night. It's just a quick way for us to say Thank You to our customers and get to know them on a more personal, non-banking type level. It's a lot of fun.
Tim got a second job working at a Red Envelope Co. and he's enjoying it pretty well. The drive is about 50 miles round trip, but thankfully his hours means he misses a lot of the morning commutes, so that gives him plenty of time and space to learn the highways and byways to get there and back.
So that's been our October so far. We had a friend from Alaska come visit us last week on her way through to Texas and that was fun. It's been a strange few months. There is still a lot of good happening in our lives, even if there is overwhelming sadness as well.
Thursday, September 9, 2010
Starts and Ends
It has been a crazy few weeks. Since the last update we have started to see the reality of the year for us.
It is not the year we were hoping so desperately for. I'm going to be brief for this post and perhaps follow it up in a week or two once I get more settled. But for now, here's what has gone down.
In July my car died. My parents came out to visit and sell us their old cars, and a week or two after that, my mom was diagnosed with cancer.
Cut to the end of August, she was in the hospital and coming to the end of a surprisingly quick battle with Cancer. She passed away August 30th, and I was VERY thankful that I was able to get out there and spend time with her in the last 36 hours she was alive.
I was very thankful, too, that I could be with her when she died, as much as it hurt and as sad and devastating it was to experience. My dad and I then drove to Michigan and made arrangements for her funeral and burial. We were thankful that we could remember her in a way that was both glorifying to God and to memorialize her life. She is now at peace and with no more pain, which is a blessing I cannot even begin to speak on, since there are no words to do so adequately.
We buried her with my grandpa in Georgetown Cemetery, and even got to visit with my dear Grandpa. I left a pretty pink rose on his tombstone, and cried a few tears for him too.
Life has been seemingly on hold for the last few weeks. It's still on hold for a while, and I hope that something good will happen to us soon. Tim and I are too much sad that our lives with my mom were cut so short. I know that's life, and I'm trying to deal with it.
It has just been a really sad week or three. I hope and pray it gets better. There are no other words to say.
It is not the year we were hoping so desperately for. I'm going to be brief for this post and perhaps follow it up in a week or two once I get more settled. But for now, here's what has gone down.
In July my car died. My parents came out to visit and sell us their old cars, and a week or two after that, my mom was diagnosed with cancer.
Cut to the end of August, she was in the hospital and coming to the end of a surprisingly quick battle with Cancer. She passed away August 30th, and I was VERY thankful that I was able to get out there and spend time with her in the last 36 hours she was alive.
I was very thankful, too, that I could be with her when she died, as much as it hurt and as sad and devastating it was to experience. My dad and I then drove to Michigan and made arrangements for her funeral and burial. We were thankful that we could remember her in a way that was both glorifying to God and to memorialize her life. She is now at peace and with no more pain, which is a blessing I cannot even begin to speak on, since there are no words to do so adequately.
We buried her with my grandpa in Georgetown Cemetery, and even got to visit with my dear Grandpa. I left a pretty pink rose on his tombstone, and cried a few tears for him too.
Life has been seemingly on hold for the last few weeks. It's still on hold for a while, and I hope that something good will happen to us soon. Tim and I are too much sad that our lives with my mom were cut so short. I know that's life, and I'm trying to deal with it.
It has just been a really sad week or three. I hope and pray it gets better. There are no other words to say.
Friday, June 18, 2010
Summer goodness
There has been so much GOOD going on here on the Prairie. So, so much good. This week (and the next week or so) will more than likely set the tone for the rest of the year, if not our lives. [Note: I'm probably making this much more dramatic than it really is. Truly this is something that will be very awesome if it all works out. It's not some insanely wonderful change or plan of events, but rather just a few little nods we've really been needing.]
I can't say more than that at this point, at least not directly, but we have some very interesting opportunities that seem to keep falling into our laps. Our Taurus has started becoming more and more, well...unreliable, so we're working to getting another car. She died for a few days this week until we could get the parts for her to get up and running again. Her "death" was actually quite wonderfully spectacular, and made for a good story at work with customers, though anxiety was high.
Tim is at our friend Dan's wedding in Ohio this week, and while I'd love to be there I couldn't get the time off work I needed, and besides, one of us should be here to maintain the house.
So that's what's up in the Prairie. Summer has really hit and we're surrounded by trees and leaves and grass and lakes...not to mention lots of little babies for wildlife. It's wonderful. And gorgeous.
I can't say more than that at this point, at least not directly, but we have some very interesting opportunities that seem to keep falling into our laps. Our Taurus has started becoming more and more, well...unreliable, so we're working to getting another car. She died for a few days this week until we could get the parts for her to get up and running again. Her "death" was actually quite wonderfully spectacular, and made for a good story at work with customers, though anxiety was high.
Tim is at our friend Dan's wedding in Ohio this week, and while I'd love to be there I couldn't get the time off work I needed, and besides, one of us should be here to maintain the house.
So that's what's up in the Prairie. Summer has really hit and we're surrounded by trees and leaves and grass and lakes...not to mention lots of little babies for wildlife. It's wonderful. And gorgeous.
Monday, April 19, 2010
Spring has Sprung
Spring has finally come to our little place here, and while we like that the trees and grass are starting to turn green, we're not really enjoying the insane amounts of pollen in the air. It's making us both feel bad.
We have been living very quiet lives in the last few months, always managing to make ends meet, and living as best as we can. We are pretty happy with the way things are, though I always like to dream about what COULD be. We've been talking a lot about the state of things and we've realized a few very important ideas that we are doing, without even realizing it.
A few weeks back we were surfing Hulu and came across Dave Ramsey's show. We hadn't listened to him before, just because we didn't know/didn't watch his channel back in Chicago when we had TV...and we realized we had one of his books (wedding present from a friend's parents). We realized after reading parts of his book (and watching two episodes of his show) that we're already doing the things that he wants suggests. Honestly this is like the best sort of affirmation we can have here.
Tim has been driving more, which is a good thing, and hopefully he'll be able to get a driver's test date sometime this summer. He's doing really well, which is a wonderful thing and I'm hopeful that he'll be driving on his own within the year. :)
We are doing well, despite our silence the last few months. All is good, Spring has Sprung, and I'm glad that we're in the Prairie. It feels really, really good.
We have been living very quiet lives in the last few months, always managing to make ends meet, and living as best as we can. We are pretty happy with the way things are, though I always like to dream about what COULD be. We've been talking a lot about the state of things and we've realized a few very important ideas that we are doing, without even realizing it.
A few weeks back we were surfing Hulu and came across Dave Ramsey's show. We hadn't listened to him before, just because we didn't know/didn't watch his channel back in Chicago when we had TV...and we realized we had one of his books (wedding present from a friend's parents). We realized after reading parts of his book (and watching two episodes of his show) that we're already doing the things that he wants suggests. Honestly this is like the best sort of affirmation we can have here.
Tim has been driving more, which is a good thing, and hopefully he'll be able to get a driver's test date sometime this summer. He's doing really well, which is a wonderful thing and I'm hopeful that he'll be driving on his own within the year. :)
We are doing well, despite our silence the last few months. All is good, Spring has Sprung, and I'm glad that we're in the Prairie. It feels really, really good.
Friday, January 1, 2010
Very Merry
Ah, 2010. How quickly it seemed to creep up on us, especially since the last few months have been, at best, a blur of epic proportions. The "holidays" are done for the most part and we can pretty much just continue on and not worry about it. We actually had a really GOOD Christmas and New Year's Eve, and that's something that we are grateful for.
We hadn't planned on doing much of anything on Christmas at all, especially when the weather reports were saying things like 20+ inches of snow in 72 hours...but on Christmas eve, our friend Chris came in his SUV and told us to get ready and come over to his house since his mom had pretty much demanded we show up. So we went over on Christmas eve to our friend's house and ate some finger foods, had a few glasses of wine and had a few cookies. Later towards the end of the evening, we hooked up their St. Bernard up to a sled and ran up and down the road with him pulling people in it. The weather was perfect and it was probably the best night we'd had in a few weeks. Tim, Chris and I then drove around Lake Minnetonka (like we did on July 4th) and looked at all the prettily decorated houses. It was a wonderfully great evening. Tim and I got home, and slept.
About four in the morning we woke up and were unable to go back to sleep, so we got up and opened some presents. At around 7 or 8, we got tired again and slept for a few more hours. Who are we to make our internal clocks make sense? We woke up, showered and enjoyed our gifts, and then left for Chris' house again, since we had been invited over for dinner. We hung out with the sisters and Chris, and ate more cookies and delicious food. The temperature got to 34 degrees, and things started melting, which has resulted in a lot of ice on the back roads. It has cleared up a bit.
New Year's Eve was a pretty good party too. We went to Brady and Jason's house around 8ish, and there were already some people playing music and talking. I was DDing for the night, and was ready for anything. We played pingpong and talked and danced to some funky tunes in the back room and I drank soda all night, which was fine. We all watched the ball drop and kissed at midnight, which was fun and sweet. We finally went home around 1:30ish after dropping someone off home, and we both fell asleep.
We had a very merry season, and we are most definitely looking forward to a year of stability and promise. I know we have a list of goals and things we want to accomplish, and I think we'll make it just fine. Personally, I'm feeling really good about it.
We hadn't planned on doing much of anything on Christmas at all, especially when the weather reports were saying things like 20+ inches of snow in 72 hours...but on Christmas eve, our friend Chris came in his SUV and told us to get ready and come over to his house since his mom had pretty much demanded we show up. So we went over on Christmas eve to our friend's house and ate some finger foods, had a few glasses of wine and had a few cookies. Later towards the end of the evening, we hooked up their St. Bernard up to a sled and ran up and down the road with him pulling people in it. The weather was perfect and it was probably the best night we'd had in a few weeks. Tim, Chris and I then drove around Lake Minnetonka (like we did on July 4th) and looked at all the prettily decorated houses. It was a wonderfully great evening. Tim and I got home, and slept.
About four in the morning we woke up and were unable to go back to sleep, so we got up and opened some presents. At around 7 or 8, we got tired again and slept for a few more hours. Who are we to make our internal clocks make sense? We woke up, showered and enjoyed our gifts, and then left for Chris' house again, since we had been invited over for dinner. We hung out with the sisters and Chris, and ate more cookies and delicious food. The temperature got to 34 degrees, and things started melting, which has resulted in a lot of ice on the back roads. It has cleared up a bit.
New Year's Eve was a pretty good party too. We went to Brady and Jason's house around 8ish, and there were already some people playing music and talking. I was DDing for the night, and was ready for anything. We played pingpong and talked and danced to some funky tunes in the back room and I drank soda all night, which was fine. We all watched the ball drop and kissed at midnight, which was fun and sweet. We finally went home around 1:30ish after dropping someone off home, and we both fell asleep.
We had a very merry season, and we are most definitely looking forward to a year of stability and promise. I know we have a list of goals and things we want to accomplish, and I think we'll make it just fine. Personally, I'm feeling really good about it.
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