Cleaning Out and little rambling...

Today, my goal was to pack up more of my house. I did not reach my goal. I packed a couple of boxes, but mostly I cleaned.

I started in the kitchen-where any "good" housewife would. I cleaned out the disgusting (molding!) trash can, the fridge, cleaned out cabinets and checked every expiration date on every food item in my cupboard-even the spices. I also did dishes...can I just tell you HOW excited I am to have a dishwasher in my NEW house! I think that is what I am most excited about! It's the little things. After doing dishes by hand for 4 years, and wasting I don't know how many hours, I will finally have a machine to do my work! Ahh...

It is somewhat bittersweet; moving. There are a lot of memories connected with this house, as there were many with our townhouse. I'm sure there will be many more to make in our new house and I look forward to them, as I reminisce about the people, events and life changes that have occurred while we have lived in this house.

I looked through old pictures and old recipes. It amazes me how many connections we have with people over food. I guess that is the American way. Plus, I just LOVE food. And people!

I am fortunate to have an easy-to-please husband who loves just about everything I cook and tells me how good I am at it. I have enjoyed cooking this week-it's like a long, lost friend I haven't seen for a while.

I obviously had no goal for this post, so I can feel confident saying that I must have completed it, because I have nothing left to ramble.....

How long has it been?

I have not been able to blog since January 31 of this year because blogger disabled my account.

Probably because the email I had set up with it (from college) expired. I was mad and didn't know what to do, so I gave up on blogging for the past 6 months.

I finally decided to switch over my old blog posts, sorry your comments are no longer there. I have NO idea how I would even go about getting those moved over here. I am proud of myself for figuring out how to create 2 blogs with one sign in, since I have a (not so public yet) jewelry blog... designedbyg.blogspot.com

But now I am back! Hopefully, a little more consistent, now that I can get into my account!

I did change the url, but I like it better, it feels a little more "grown up." Unless of course you have actually seen the McGee and Me TV show, which is really for kids, so I guess I'm a lost cause.

I also have to figure out what to do about my backgrounds, since The Cutest Blog on the Block is changing all their stuff tomorrow...I think I have impeccable timing!

Ugh, my life is so hard isn't it?!

I am not really sure where this blog will go, but I have been wanting to do more with it and maybe you will get to follow along with our crazy house hunting process, if you so desire...

We shall see...

A-Recycling We Will Go...

Since my husband and I have moved into our new house, we have tried to be a little more "earth-conscious." We started recycling and making a compost for our garden. We have a lot less garbage now, and we feel like we have been doing more of our part.

Before Christmas, we bought this awesome recycling "organizer." It seemed like the perfect answer to our mess that is the entry way in the kitchen. It is nice and big, as you can see...

That is, until we (over)-filled it a bit!

We were very proud of our organizing-we even made labels for each drawer.

See?

Now it's to the recycling center we go, thanks to our new SUV. (I think the SUV and recycling organizer may be canceling each other out in the whole "Green" area, but that is beside the point!

We chose the snowiest day we could-when all the Tennessee snow started to fall, but we were determined to make our house look better and promised each other we would never let our recycling get that bad again.

We are now very proud of our recycling organizer once again, and have found that it makes recycling easier and our kitchen cleaner...

Ahhhhh, that's better. Now my house is in order!

Well, sort of.

Goals for 2010

I am with 3verthing 3mily on the whole goal setting thing, so here they are:

1. Read more (I'm going to set a goal of 5 books, we'll start small)

2. Loose weight (I'm not going to set an amount here for everyone to see)

3. Make more jewelry/crochet/cards/scrapbooks/etc.

4. Organize our spare room into a craft room/office I/husband can actually use

5. Blog regularly (let's go with at least once a week)

6. Learn more about my camera so that I can take better pictures

7. Read my Bible every day

8. Pay off our credit cards

9. Find a "permanent" job

10. Stay organized

P.S. I have added my jewelry blog to my blog list so that those of you that might be interested can look. I don't have much up yet, but hopefully, and if I reach goals #3 and #5, you will see more posts on there soon!

Here's to 2010, or "O"-10 as I like to call it!

Christmas in Colorado

I haven't been home to Colorado for Christmas in 2 years! It was great to be back again with my family and real snow. I also got the best Christmas present of all...I got to meet my niece, Isabella! She is 6 months old, and tons of fun! We enjoyed playing with her on her blanket, and chillin. She is a very happy, beautiful little girl!

We actually remembered to take our camera this time, so allow me to share the pictures of Christmas, 2009:

See how fun she is?!?!?

Snow in the backyard

Mom using the snowblower, or her winter toy!

Dad frying the turkey!!!

We just love her!

Merry Christmas from the family!

And once more, because you can't get enough of this girl!

Opportunity Knocks

This year is not at all what I expected. I have finished student teaching and my Masters Degree, been a bum for a summer, and taught 1st grade for 5 months. I never thought I would finish the Masters program. I cried and cried when I first started, thinking I could not do it. As the year went on, and I fell in love with teaching all over again, I realized (with the help of my husband, family and friends) I can do anything for a year.

This summer stunk. Well, for me it did. For my brother and sister-in-law, it was a miracle-they adopted a baby girl in July, who I got to meet for the first time last week! For my friend, she added a fourth child to her family at the end of July. I had the opportunity to watch her kids the night before and see her newborn and hold him in the hospital. For me, personally, I looked for jobs. I slept in a lot, I cried a lot, and I looked for more jobs. I did toy with the idea of starting a jewelry making business, and started a jewelry blog that [surprise] I have not updated since the summer.

In August, I was offered a first grade interim position (the last blog I wrote explains it more thoroughly). I was ecstatic! I have enjoyed working with the first grade teachers at my school and getting to know my students. I did not expect any of what has happened in the past five months. Sam says I should write a book about it-1st graders come with great stories, and maybe I'll share them on here at a later time.

I've learned that in order to teach, you first have to love. There is no way I can teach these students what a noun or verb is, if I don't first teach them that I love them and that they are safe at school. Without love, nothing else matters. There is no need for anything else, if you don't have love. I also learned (once again, with thanks to my husband) that I am only here to plant seeds. I do not get to see them grow completely. I have heard this before, but the note my husband left me one morning hit HARD. God takes the seeds we plant and continues to take care of them as they grow. I have no idea why the teacher I interimed (yes, I made up that word) for decided not to retire, but I know that I was placed there, for that time and now it is time for me to let go.

Please don't let me fool you, I did not come to this reality easily. And I have a feeling it will be something I have to learn over and over and over and over...

Now, as we begin another year, I have another opportunity. I am the interim teacher for a third grade classroom. I will be there for the remainder of the year (as far as I know). I am looking forward to this opportunity with confidence, and a lot of fear. I know those seem to be conflicting emotions, but that is exactly how I feel. I have new students to meet, new curriculum to teach, and a wonderful group of teachers to work with. I also have the first 6 weeks planned out for me from the previous teacher, and this was the same time I soloed in third grade last year during my student teaching.

I hope to share more and have great stories from third grade to tell. I will be more diligent at keeping you up to date (I know you are sitting on the edge of your seats!)

What tomorrow holds...

The more I think about it, the more I realize how true it is. It seems so simple. We have no idea what tomorrow holds. This has been my motto for the whole summer. Some days it was a comfort, some days it was a concern. But every day it was true.

This has not been the summer I had expected. I had lots of sleepless nights, and if you know me, you know I can sleep. I have never had trouble sleeping, until this summer. I was so full of anxiety, stress and not-knowing. I was looking for a job, and hearing nothing. I was sad, unmotivated and bored. I didn't feel like myself. I was tired of talking about my job search and tired of saying "I don't have a job."

Well, my friends, I got a call yesterday morning, offering me a job-an interim in 1st grade. I am absolutely thrilled! I will get to work with the teachers I worked with last year during my internship and will be at a school I know and am already comfortable with. I was filled with joy yesterday, and felt like me again. I am just so excited to be able to use my degree and teach!

Now I am filled with anxiety, and it was hard to sleep last night, but it's a good thing now. I cannot wait to start setting up my classroom and to meet my students!

Being on the other side of tomorrow gives me a whole new perspective. I am so thankful that God is constant, especially when I am not.

I'm sure there will be more stories to follow-kids are funny that way, and I love to share!