I Move Fast

Thanksgiving has come and gone and I did get the position I was hoping for in Virginia. HORRAY! They called and offered it to me the 13th of November and I started the 16th. What a relief to watch things fall into place and know I will not have to use my car as a closet anymore! Me and a good friend of mine are still getting situated into a house we moved into last weekend. I LOVE IT. Great neighborhood, decent rooms, basement...really what more could we want?

More importantly.....I HAVE A JOB!...AGAIN...lol. I began work at Family Preservation Services in Roanoke as a Intensive In Home Counselor and have been doing training there these past couple weeks. It will be challenging, but I think I will get a ton of experience, and learn a lot. I am so grateful to have a job and place to finally settle. While it is far from many of my friends and family, I think it will be a great opportunity.

Here's hoping after my stuff gets to the house next week (from both Lexington, KY and Knoxville, TN) I will have the time to post some new creative thoughts and ideas about projects I'm working on!

Light at the End of the Tunnel

As I have posted earlier...these past 7 months now have been some of the most confusing/ frustrating times. Celebrating graduation and making the transition to adult world has not gone very smoothly. Smoothly is definitely not my style. Lets rewind a bit.

May - Graduation. What a glorious day. All my 7 years of hard work rolled up into one piece of paper. Beautiful. As I began to search out what path to take my wonderful credit union was gracious enough to give me some pretty good hours to hold me over for about a month...or 6 months....haha

The months following I will summarize briefly. I spent a lot of money, gas, and time trying to find a job. Obviously the economy sucks right now so I was told endlessly I was overqualified. Last count I had bugged, emailed, called, and applied to roughly 183 places. That my friend is when discouragement overcame me. Lexington, St. Louis, Knoxville...nothing was seeming to work out.

October 5th, 2009. IT's OVER. I got a call from Child and Family TN offering me a position as LEAP Coordinator. I was ecstatic. All my hard work searching had paid off! I was slightly off guard because the position I accepted was not what I had interviewed for, but nevertheless IT WAS A JOB....WITH HEALTH INSURANCE. I began training the 21st of October, and after 3 days of training was thrown into the position both at a local school and group home. I was exciting about this new adventure although confused about my position still.

To make a long story short the position was not what I had thought it would be. I had come to understand it would not include therapy hours (which would be necessary for me to become licensed), and many other confusing and uneasy additions. Basically, I quit after 5 days. I knew from the beginning it wasn't gonna work out even though everyone I had met had been very helpful and nice. This is not in my nature and was a weird circumstance, but I feel very good about my decision.

Since then I have had a promising interview in a new state: Virginia. I have a second one tomorrow, and hope that it will prove to be the real end to my job hunt. It would be a great opportunity to start out in, and it would be close to my good friend! I have appreciated all the support of my friends and family in this time, and feel very blessed to have so many people who are willing to lift me up in prayer!

The Storm

At some point I would really like to use this space to post fun things I've made and what type of ideas are flowing through my brain. However right now creativity is far from my grasp it seems...

I graduated in May with a Masters Degree in Marriage and Family Therapy/ Professional Counseling. I couldn't believe I was finally done with 7 years of college and ready to leave the papers, late nights, frustrations, firsts and acomplishments all behind. It was a bit of a surreal feeling...Definately exciting, but a little scary as well. But alas, HOPEFUL was the overall theme I carried.

That was about 4 months ago...

Now I so desperatly find myself trying to swim to the surface and find the HOPE life perserver searching for me. Somedays I find it easily and float securely on it..Other days I'm enguled by my Tidal waves of emotion...and struggle to see anything else. Often, I think I can see land ahead, but only get pushed away further by the tide. This has been the ongoing battle in my life lately: ME versus JOB MARKET. I'm sure it is the same story many are facing right now. I was not prepared.

I hope that this month of September brings me some calm in the storm. It would mean so much to me for my heart to be stilled in this storm. I do not wish to drag others through it, yet it seems like that is what is happening.

This verse has been a comfort to me and gives me hope that I will have that peace someday.

Phil 4:6-7 Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Cupcakes Galore

This past week has been a whirlwind.  I had the honor of making my friends wedding cake for her reception! This is the first BIG event I have done with my new found hobby, and hope there are many more in the future!  We actually decided to do a tower of cupcakes instead of the traditional wedding cakes.  It was such a fun project and feel like the end product was great! Everyone seemed to be real complimentary of the cupcakes, so needless to say I was a happy camper.  :) Chanti and Derek are one of my favorite couples, so I was glad to help with their wedding.

The Grooms Cake was fun also, it was the Triforce from Legend of Zelda.  Not having a very extensive knowledge of video games, I had to do a bit of research to figure out what it was.  Derek seemed very happy with it, so I'm hoping I nailed it. 

This was a great experience, and I loved getting to be a part of such an important day for my friends! While fun, it was also exhausting and I'm looking forward to relaxing this upcoming week.  Cupcake mania is over! 

#6

SMOKIN'- Last night when doing the final clean of the trailer I reflected back on the humerous things that had happened while living there. Much of the night ended up being spent on debating what to do with the vacuum cleaner. This is a necessary component when cleaning, and at a purchase price of $5 at a garage sale 3 years ago, it was certain to quit the night we needed it most. So, there is was smoking and burning up in my closet of a room. The stench it left smelled rancid of what I'm certain a burnt rat smells like...maybe Pablo was living inside. Needless to say we threw out the vacuum cleaner with the garbage. I tried to sleep with the stench, but the headache I had from the smell was not going away ...luckily my roomie is always prepared with good smelling scents from Bath & Body Works. One wallflower later and I was in slumberland.

So long trailer sweet trailer...

Well tomorrow will mark the end of a 3 year stint in good ole JBC's "married student housing". I begin my blogging journey with this post since it has been location of so many memories, events, and emotions over the last few years. I'm very glad to be leaving since I feel it marks the end of a very important moutaintop for me. I'm definately ready for any terrain that lies ahead.


TOP 5 MEMORIES

5. KATRINA- You may think it sounds quaint to fall asleep to the sound of rain on a tin roof. It's not. The mere echo from a small drizzle outside could keep me up all night. Not because it sounds like one of those noise machines you would buy at the mall, but becuase it sounds like a hurricane in my house. A slight breeze rustles the trailers skirt so much you would think evacuation is necessary.

4. WHAT?!?! - I would be shocked if my hearing is still in tact after the last few years. If there is laundry going the house actually shakes and makes it extremely difficult to hear the TV.. even with the volume on 100. U can imagine what it is like trying to talk to someone with all this racket going on..Many humerous miscommunications occured becuase of this situation.

3. MOWING- Who doesn't enjoy cutting grass? Ok many people don't, I for one always loved it until these last two years. Looking at the two tiny strips of grass that needs to be cut weekly, one would think this would only take about 10 mins or so...not the case I found out. Each strip has a small swamp area that if it has rained in the last 2 weeks takes at least 2 more to dry out. This would mean the grass would get cut once a month...making the Trailer trash motiff complete. Now if you do dare to cut it after the hurricane, the mower has a few tricks to learn. After trying to start it multiple times and throwing the throttle up quickly, you must then aproach the yard cautiously. Going too fast or slow through the tall grass (or short grass for that matter) will cause the mower to die. This is one reason i developed the tip and push method. This consists of trying to cut both strips of grass while bending my 6 foot tall frame in half and tiping the mower about a half a foot off the ground. Fun times.

2. HOT or COLD?- One disadvantage to living in a plastic house is that the tempature is remarkably same to that of the outside world. It must be countered constantly. If it is night the heat must be on, or you will be frozen to your bed. During the day you will roast if the air is not on. Good thing utilities were included :)

1. PABLO- Ok I don't know if I ever gave our pet rat a name, but he should have had one seeing as all time he spent with us. Last year I decided he was a wombat. No small mouse or rat could reek havok on our house like this creature has. But after being spotted we indeed find he is a rat. A pack rat. yes that is right, we had quite a few possessions disappear, the most impressive being our rug that was on the floor in front of the sink.

These top five may sound like complaints, and believe me they were at the time, but looking at my experience here and seeing how comical it was I have nothing to complain about. What a blessing it is to live in a place where my biggest complaint is that I can't hear the TV, or that I have to remember to turn on the air. I hope I will never take for granted the luxaries that we have here, no matter how "inconvienient" it seemed sometimes!