Back to Busy

♪Working nine to five, working nine to five♪
This song runs through my head on a pretty much daily basis as I make my way to work where I work 9-5 lol. It has been such a blessing to be able to sleep a little longer than I was able to with my last job. But when you get home at around 6, you have little time to do much else for the day. Finding a routine has been a little tough, just with taking care of things around the house, appointments and such. Plus money has been a huge stressor for us lately. Being on unemployment really set us back financially, we are pretty much scraping bottom at this point until my paychecks start coming. Once we get back on track, it will be time to buy another car and set ourselves back again lol. If it isn't one thing it is another, I guess.

Matt and I are going to start trying for a baby this late summer/ early fall :-D. I am so excited to start a family. Though I just went and picked up my prescription for prenatals and they were rejected by insurance so I need to double check that prenatal care is (eek!) covered. I don't know why it wouldn't be. I don't want something else holding us back but I also have to think about the decisions we make and what it means for us and our future child/children. (Side note been writing this for like a week now lol)

I have also been bit by the forum bug, I joined a ttc(trying to conceive) community and have started talking to a few women who are planning on starting to try around the same time as Matt and I. I am still up in the air about when exactly to stop taking my birth control. Because I would like to start tracking my cycle and on birth control I rarely ever get my period so that may make it difficult. But we shall see, been discussing it with the hubby but he is not too keen on wearing raincoats again (lol I know tmi). I guess we could just leave it up to God for a month or so, really leaning towards stopping birth control at the end of June, so my cycle can regulate.

In other news, well there isn't much to say as that is mostly what me and the hubby have been talking about :-)

Making Progress

Unemployment has been both good and bad. I have loved having free time, making my own schedule. But I have hated feeling useless and ineffective. I was offered a job last week. No more contracts or lack of benefits. A full time position with benefits!!! I am beyond elated and feel so utterly blessed. I have worked for this for 7 years. Through college and job hunting and interview after interview and my contract work, this is what I have waited and worked for and it has paid off. It is such a feeling of accomplishment to receive this job offer. I am set to start on Monday, working 9-5. Looking forward to following a schedule again but definitely going to miss my free time. I am trying to get some stuff I have been meaning to do around the house done this week.

Getting to the title of the post. Today I looked around and realized, what I am doing with all this stuff that just sits collecting dust, for when I someday need it? I do not want or need this clutter. So I am making a conscience effort to reduce it. I have been holding on to some reference books from college/high school and most of that information is available on the internet, so why keep them? It isn't like I write research papers on a regular basis anymore. They have served their purpose for me, time to move on. Also I have a decent supply of scrapbook supplies, namely paper, stickers and other various items but I have not dedicated quality time to scrapbooking for quite a while. I want to find people who can use what I don't have time for right now. I am going to keep some things, like my Cricut and a few other supplies for small projects but I don't want them sitting around my house making me feel bad for not dedicating more time to something that isn't a priority in my life right now and doesn't need to be. So I am currently exploring options for new homes for some of those things. I also need to go through my clothes and our spare room/storage area to see what we don't need.

I think another place this comes into play, meaning the whole idea of clearing up space and moving forward is when it comes to starting our family. I want to bring a child into a happy, healthy, uncluttered home with room for him/her to grow. I want to stop filling my life with stuff, I don't need it. I have been trying to get back to devotions and reading scripture and filling my life with more of that. Church has not been a huge priority for Matt and I either, but our faith never waivers. We need to be more proactive though, I want my children to grow up knowing Jesus, really knowing him so they can spread the gospel instead of wandering as I did. Though I know that was part of my journey and wouldn't be who I am today without things happening in my life as they did. Because my job offers benefits and more stability than we have felt for most of our relationship, talk has turned to babies again. I am going in for my annual physical in May and will be talking to the doctor about my health and if there is anything to be concerned about if we want to start trying. I do want to lose some weight because I know that will be a concern and want what is best for a baby but in order to do that I need to do better for myself.

Writing and Reading

"It was a long time before I realized that you don't have to start right, you just have to start. Put pen to paper, allow yourself the freedom to write badly, to get it wrong, stop looking over your own shoulder." -Abigail Thomas, A Three Dog Life

I just finished reading this book and though I didn't really enjoy it all that much, this quote struck me for some reason. Maybe because lately I have been really missing writing and journaling. In high school I remember writing constantly as a way to just say the things I didn't feel comfortable talking about with other people mostly. And it really helped me get through some tough times in my life (well actually what I viewed as tough times but what amounted to overblown teenage drama and hormones lol). I have a whole trapper keeper full of poetry and things I wrote and a couple more journals on top of that. It isn't a definitive chronicle but it paints a pretty clear picture of who I was at that time. These days what I write doesn't paint that clear of a picture. Between this blog and a couple snippets of writings I mostly seem like a woman too wrapped up in herself to really see the big picture. To see that I have not made enough time for people in my life. Not even enough time for my husband. We try to spend time together but normally we wind up wrapped in our own little world. One of us watching TV and the other on the computer or tablet or wrapped up in some other task (coupons, video game etc). That isn't quality time, it is just time passing. I find myself spending most of my day staring at a computer screen either looking for a job, figuring out the financial situation or doing other mindless tasks and I turn around and Matt is home and I don't know what happened to the day. Sad.

I have a job interview tomorrow and I am really hoping it goes well so my days can go back to having a rhythm and what felt like a purpose though I will miss the option of planning my own day, my way. I can not depend on something to change if I stay the same. Even if I don't get this job, or I do or whatever happens, my attitude needs to change. I guess I really just don't know where to start. I have been reading and reading and reading lately. At least for me it would be considered that. I have read 5 books this year which may not seem like a lot but seeing in 2012 I read about 4 total by December (and had only read 1 by October!) that is pretty awesome. I finished A Three Dog Life and started Waiter Rant by Steve Dublanica which so far has made me feel not so alone. The man who wrote it had 3 jobs before he was 30 and then ended up being a waiter with a college education and felt completely disheartened by the entire corporate system. You can read a full review from Goodreads (which is AWESOME if you love to read) if you follow the link, the same for Three Dog Life. But there are just times when having a college education seems useless or pointless because of all the political corporate crap and that is kind of how this guy felt, not exactly but sort of. I guess what I really want is connection. Connection to something outside of myself that gives me hope and I am trying to find that in a book. 

Also writing makes me feel like my thoughts make sense even though I feel that this post is losing its point lol. 

Feelings

I really miss writing, expressing my feelings in a constructive way that helps me really sort out my feelings. Not just updating the cyberspace world about the stupid goings on in my life but really expressing my feelings through poetry and journaling. Working through my emotions and feeling a catharsis when I step away from the paper or computer. I am currently finishing out my work assignment through a temp agency. After Friday I will be unemployed and I thought I had faced it and understood what that meant. But today it has hit me, I will have no job as of Monday. I will not have to wake up early and be somewhere. It scares me. I feel the sadness creeping in. I feel lonely already. That loneliness is what led me to terrible places in my life before. Matt and I have been struggling to deal with the changes going on around us lately. We are moving and all that entails, we will have less income, and to top it off, Matt's best friend's dad passed away this last week and Matt is taking it pretty hard mostly because he (actually both of us) are really worried about our friend, he doesn't have many close friends and lives alone except for having his kids occasionally. The shortness of life, wanting to live here and now, spend my life doing something meaningful. The lack of a plan doesn't help. I had a plan until I graduated college than the plan goes out the window in an economy that was struggling and is now making a painfully slow recovery. With disappointment after disappointment it is hard to keep the faith. I had an interview a couple weeks ago and I was so excited and hopeful until I got there and they tore me to shreds and made me feel worthless yet again. I am worthless with a college degree and 18 months as a lab technician gaining experience. I have held a job pretty consistently since I was 15 and yet no one wants to hire me. I don't want to go back to school but I am starting to feel it is my only choice so that I can feel worth something. Matt and my family and friends try to help and give me hope and it helps temporarily but then I am alone and the thoughts creep back in. The fear. The hopelessness. The loneliness. The need to curl up in bed and sleep it away. No matter how much you sleep, you have to wake up and you have to face life. You have to face the need for income. You have to face the bills. You have to face the ache in your heart to start a family and the million reasons you shouldn't but the one that means more than the rest. Expanding the love in my heart. I love Matt so much, I want to expand and compound that love by making a baby with him.  I am so blessed. I have a place to live, food, money to pay bills, family, friends, a husband who loves me and would do anything for me and blessings beyond anything I deserve. And yet....I sit here and act like everything is soooo terrible but in reality it isn't. In reality, my life is good. God loves me and pulls me through. I want these feelings to float away and never return. My heart and my head have different ideas. This world and my faith have different ideas. Everything conflicts. 

Bottom line: I am scared and lonely and feel no way to really express it that is constructive. Besides a need to keep going and make the best of what is in front of me.  

The usual

I can't believe January is almost over. I say this every year yet time keeps marching on. In June, Matt and I will have been married for one year. In July I will turn 25. In September, Matt and I will have shared our lives for 4 years. In November, my best friend's little boy that she waited so long for will turn 1. And in December I will once again wonder where the time has gone. Matt and I continue to work and try to make decisions about our uncertain future. Our lease is up in March and so is my contract with the company I currently work for. Do we stay or do we go? Is it time to move out of this apartment that so often drives me nuts? (Needless to say after growing up on a dirt road where the closest neighbor is 1/4 mile away and surrounded by corn fields, I am not cut out to have neighbors within a few feet) Or do we stay and enjoy our love nest another year? The problem is at this point we can afford the rent we  pay but will we be able to next month? The questions that life always seems to be full of. I have started applying for a new job and getting the feelers out but have yet to have any feedback. I dread ending up that person I was toward the end of my job search last time. I was full of anxiety and stressed out beyond belief. Matt continues to work as a temp and go to school part time. He is burnt out. 

On top of job and life craziness, we continue to feel our conversation steer toward babies and family. We are both in a place where we feel this is the next step but a more permanent job for one of us would really help me feel more comfortable making the decision to bring a life into this world. We haven't started trying officially but my birth control is 80% effective and we hardly ever use a condom, a few years ago that would have never been an option, I would have been anal about it. I know that things will work out no matter what happens. I don't live in a world of sunshine and rainbows but I live knowing there is a God who will always provide for us. The other thing holding me back is my weight and being out of shape. I want my children to have a good role model, which I believe I can be no matter how much I weigh but I would love to have more energy to chase the little ones around. I always say I need my baby fix, but lately just holding babies isn't enough, I want more. I want to hold a baby I carried inside of me for 9 months, to wake up at all hours of the night to feed him/her, to rock him/her to sleep, to see Matt hold our precious child in his arms. That is what I want most to give my husband something he has longed for and had taken away from him so many times. That pure joy that I saw on my best friend's and her husband's faces the day after they had their son.

Three nights I week I spend 3-4 hours alone, contemplating life and trying to figure out ways to not think about the future because once again I am scared. I try so hard not be, to believe in myself and the future but I always slip on those three nights. When Matt isn't here to tell me it will be ok.  

I know in my heart that everything will work itself out. That God has every part of my life planned and knows where I need to be even if sometimes I don't.

“The will of God concerns the present moment more than the future; it deals with our motives as well as our actions; it focuses on the little decisions we make every day even more than the big decisions we make about the future. The only time we really have both to know and to do God’s will is the present moment. We are to love God with heart, soul, mind and strength, and we are to love our neighbors as ourselves.” Jerry Sittser

Time

Since the last time I posted so much has happened, it is really hard to know where to begin. I feel like I wrote that last blog post and turned around and it is 6 months later. Where did the time go? Well I now have a new last name and my husband (still really weird to say, ask my coworkers lol) has started a new job (still as a temp but more money and hours). Temp work is a frustrating thing but because he is in school, it is really one of the only options if he still wants to work full time. I continue to hold down two jobs only by the grace of God. My husband and I work about the same amount of hours (50) each week and he has school on top of that. Just one of the reasons he is my superman.

  This is one of my favorite pictures of us ever. I had found a picture on pinterest where the groom and all the groomsmen did this and thought the concept fitted us perfectly. Since Matt being my superman was one of our little things. I had bought him Superman shirts, undies etc for birthdays and anniversaries. And I thought he had forgotten about this idea but he showed up wearing the shirt under his tux and I was sooo excited :D. 

Other than that, we try to make the most time we can to be together, to see our families and friends and to just breathe. Some weeks it is super difficult but we do what we can. Somehow our conversation always seems to turn to starting a family. Matt is so ready to be a daddy and has been pretty much since I have known him. His past is a big part of that. So many times he has been a dad and it has just been taken away from him. Right out of high school he had a little boy with his girlfriend and tragically they were killed by a drunk driver before the little boy was even one. Just thinking about this makes me tear up. I can't begin to imagine that pain. And even after that, he was engaged to another woman with two kids and Matt pretty much became the father in their life but things with her didn't work out and leaving those kids was one of the most difficult things he ever did. I know that Matt will be an amazing dad. Our plan at this point is to possibly start trying next year, pending job situations and such. But I know in the back of my mind that it is not up to us but to the One who created us. When and if God wants us to bring a child into this world, it will happen whether I feel ready or not. 

I am hoping to have more time to blog now but it never seems to work out that way. I thought when the wedding was over there would be more time for lots of things but turns out having two jobs is kind of what was keeping me so busy because I feel almost as busy now lol. 

And so the countdown begins....

Exactly 4 months and 2 days until what I believe will be the happiest day of my short life thus far. The day I become a Mrs. Until Matt and I tie the knot and take that big leap together into the great unknown of marriage. To spend my life with Matt by my side will be the best thing I could ever ask for. Someone to stand by me when I am ugly and crabby and crazy and be there to laugh with me through everything life throws at us. I can't imagine my life without him and to be honest I wouldn't want to go back to life without him. He was the missing piece, he helped me to realize who I am and be thankful for it, not ashamed of it. The countdown has been going on since we got engaged a little over a year ago but now we are in crunch time, making sure all those details work together to make June 23 a magical day, not to be forgotten. From putting together invitations with my best friends to picking a florist to choosing tuxes to ordering the shoes to finding my something old, I am consumed with wedding. There are days I would rather be sleeping or relaxing but all of this planning will be worth it because in the end Matt and I will be husband and wife and that is what matters. What is at the heart of this thing we call a wedding. Don't get me wrong I can't wait for this party but the planning part is a lot more work than I had imagined especially working 50-60 hours a week and looking for an apartment and finding time to have a life. We have a lot on our plate but that is all part of this fun stuff I call being an adult. My day dreams now consist of having a place all our own to relax in and keep the way I would like it kept. A space to do bills that isn't a nightstand, a file cabinet to keep important papers not a plastic box. A bathroom to organize the way I like it and only have my stuff. And the list goes on but God has given me a place to live, food in my belly, a man who loves me, friends and family who are willing to help and love me through anything. Also jobs for both me and Matt to help us to start our lives together in this crazy mixed up world.

Shower is calling and then bed for this girl, tired beyond belief