Life!

Wow...can't even begin to tell you how blessed we are feeling lately!

Last Thursday I went home to surprise my dear friend Kim for her 26th birthday. She was definitely surprised!! It was so much fun. I got to hang out with my parents (always a good time!) and then go spend the entire day Friday with Kim, and then we went out for her birthday that night. It was so good to see her again and get updated on her life...she's way too busy to tell me everything on the phone so we had lots to talk about!! Plus she had this great idea to start a journal and send it back and forth to each other in the mail...because it is a lot easier for her to sit and write for a couple minutes in her down time than to call me when her kids are being all needy...geeze, kids. Haha. So that will be fun!

Saturday morning my fabulous mother made me some delicious french toast. How I love her...and how I love french toast!!! Then I had to start my journey home...blah. Luckily, it only rained and it was warm enough that it wasn't freezing, but it was pouring which made it difficult and more time consuming. But I was very thankful to have made it home before all the snow came!! Yikes. I was almost going to extend my stay in Michigan and not come home until Monday...boy am I glad I didn't!

Saturday night was Josh's work party...wow...it was at one of his bosses house and let me tell you, it was amazing! 12,000 sq ft of beauty! Oddly enough though it was not at all decorated for Christmas, which having a Christmas party there, you would have thought they would have done something! It was cool to go in a house like that though. There are so many of them around here, and Josh and I often drive around looking at them just wondering what the heck you do with all that space inside, and now we finally got to see an example! Not a very good one though, because they are just renting it right now, so they haven't done much to make it too personal yet. But it was still amazing. The party was good too! Haha...they had tons of appetizers and we all just hung out and stuff. It was nice to finally meet people and put a face with a name, so when Josh talks about work I know who he's talking about.

Sunday we tried out a new church. I really liked it, Josh isn't sure. It was a bit more contemporary and modern than what he cares for, but he said he would be willing to try it out again. It was a really small church, but most of the congregation is younger, young couples and couples with young children, so it feels like it would be easy to get involved and make ourselves at home there. We'll see - we have quite a few others we want to check out too :) 

Sunday afternoon we went to one of Josh's coworkers house for a housewarming party. That was pretty fun. I realized that my husband is not as much of a nerd as I thought he was, because those guys were definitely hard core nerds and the kind of people you think about when you hear the word nerd! They were nice...it was just comical to me! We played Rockband and a few other Wii games and just had a good time :) 

After that we headed home, and I finally crashed. For the first time in a loooong time, I was asleep by 8:30! And I slept all night too, which usually if I take a late nap like that, that isn't the case. But after 4 days of going non-stop, I guess I was ready for a good night's sleep! :)

Monday turned out to be a really great day...I had an interview at a PNC branch in Downers Grove, and by 3:00 that afternoon I got call saying they wanted to hire me!! I am super excited about it. When I went in for my interview I met almost everyone who works there, and they all seemed really nice and down to earth and I could already tell in the hour that I was there that they all really get along and enjoy working together. Plus, they have women AND men...so hopefully, no girl fights and drama! Yay! 

I have to go to training classes for 2 weeks, and that starts January 3rd (another perfect thing: plenty of time to move, and go home to celebrate Christmas!!) After that I will train in the branch for a week or so and then once I work as a teller for about a month, I will go back to the training classes to learn the banker aspect of it. So it sounds really far away, but I'm sure it will fly by, and by March-April I should be all trained and working on my own.

But the best part is that it is a full time job with benefits and vacation time and sick days (holy cow - I am finally going to have a real job!?!) with paid incentives for doing things that I am already used to doing (like opening accounts and cross-selling and offering other services). Plus it is all of 3 minutes away from where Josh works, so we will be able to ride together and save a ton in gas (and maybe even sell a car?), and it sounded like they would be willing to work with me on my schedule so that it matches up close enough to his that he's not having to sit at work way earlier and later than normal.

At first I was nervous thinking about going back to work. It has been pretty nice being able to do whatever I want and be able to go back to Michigan whenever I wanted to (thank you to my wonderful husband for being understanding about my need to do that from time to time!) and not have to worry about getting time off. But after I went there on Monday, all of that went away and I was really excited about it. I'm excited to meet some people and have people to talk to and I guess feel like I have a purpose again! 

We were kind of starting to get nervous about money, because we got a letter for Josh's student loans the other day and we have to start paying those come January...yikes. It was going to be pretty tight trying to pay that, plus do all the stuff we want to do to the new house, but now we will be able to pay those and pay off all the shiny new appliances we just bought and a few other bills, and SAVE, so we are so thankful and it came at just the right time! Funny how God works, huh? :) 

Also today Josh got a call from the mortgage lender telling him to start the home insurance for the 20th, so we are getting closer and closer to being able to close and move in!!! SO excited. And SO ready! It still seems so far away but it really isn't...I guess I should start really packing and getting stuff ready now!!

Alrighty well time for bed for this girl..hope you have a wonderful day :)