ACTUAL NEWS! aren't you excited?!?!

Ok so we do finally have a place in Upland. And it is actually IN Upland so we wont have much of a commute for school :)

It's a great lil one bedroom on the first floor (yay no more walking up and down the stair to take Gabe out!)

Craziness is that we move this Saturday! so i have less then a week to get everything all boxed up and ready to go. speaking of running i am on a tight schedule so i gotta go. :)

(side note: if anyone is looking for a large comfy couch - we have one we need to get rid of. You can have it for free if you haul it out of here - needs to be gone by the end of the month. )

hasnt been much to report...

so this will be a shorter entry.. i should have actual news soon.

we've had an awful time apartment hunting. most places down there are not pet friendly and i am NOT willing to give up gabe.

we got the job thing worked out at least for the summer. we have enough saved up for the move and to survive until one or both of us gets jobs down there.

we are having an issue with our financial aid. apparently there was some glitch and clint and i were both some how in like the 3% of fafsa applicants to fall thru the cracks or something. so prayers for that is appreciated.

as far as apartments go. our first choice go a hold of us and told us they have an opening on the 15th so we are pursuing that like crazy. it's uber close to campus, within out price range and they not only allow dogs but dont have exorbitant pet fees.

so hopefully by the end of this week we will have good news.

(also if anyone is interested the millersberg garage sale day is MAY 15th. Clint and i will be up there selling some things in his parents driveway. assorted kitchen gadgets, movies, some furniture and some clothing)

an adventure for sure

So i started this blog knowing that this year big things were gonna happen in our lives. Clint and i knew that God was gonna do something to drastically change our lives.

Many of you know that while the past year has been one of the best years of our lives it has also been one of the most difficult.

We went in the direction God was leading us though many of our friends and even our family were at the least very leery of our decisions. God lead us to do the things we did for many reasons. And we dont regret anything that has happened. It has matured us, made us stronger people, and drawn us closer to God and each other.

That being said, more recently we knew that we werent in the right place in God's eyes. But we didnt know where the right place was.

After lots of prayer, fear, and learning yet again how good God's plans really are we have finally figured out where God is leading us.

Back to school. More specifically the very school I swore I would never get my degree from.

Taylor Upland.

This has been difficult for us both. It is the exact opposite of what always wanted. I wanted big town - teeny school. God is giving us small town - big school (big at least compared to what i wanted anyway)

Attending this school means several things for us. Perhaps the biggest one being that it means moving.

We will be moving down there towards the end of April / beginning of May as that is when our lease here in Fort Wayne is up. I have already been to several places down there and i am making progress as to finding a place. (Prayers are appreciated)

We would live on campus but have decided not to for several reasons. The main one being that we have a dog.

Clint and I discussed it though and we do believe that even if we didnt have Gabe we would live off campus because being a bit "older" and such our priorities are a bit different this time around. Neither of us were the best students in our past college career. That is going to change. We are both bound and determined to get the best grades we can get. It is a much higher priority then it was the first time around.

Speaking of academics you might be curious as to our decisions as far as majors and the like. They have changed.

For Clint it was a bit easier. He was a youth ministry major at TUFW but that major is not offered at TU. But because youth ministry is still his passion he figures the most logical thing to do is to still do something ministry related.

So he is majoring in Biblical Literature and minoring in Youth ministry and Philosophy

For me the decision was a bit harder. My major at TUFW was professional writing and i was working on changing it to counseling when the school announced it's closing.

Initially i still felt God was leading me to do something in the counseling and psychology area. but the more i thought and prayed about it i realized that was not God's will. I had to remind myself to look at the big picture to figure out exactly what to major in.

The conclusion i came to was this:

I might not know much about the future but i know one thing. I will always be involved in some sort of ministry.

So as silly as it might sound I too, am majoring in Biblical Literature. But my minors will be in Psychology and Art.

There are a lot of things still up in the air but keeps on doing little things to reassure us that we are on the right track.

will let you all know more about the adventure as we know.

:-)

Most of you all know that i am not a sports fan. I the kinda person who watches the superbowl for the commercials and goofs off on the internet on her laptop when there is actually anything crucial happening. So when my hubby and curtis were making noises (not sure what else to call them they werent words.. maybe groans would be a better word) of first excitement and then dissappointment or just in general yelling "GO GO GO TOUCHDOWN!" i was laughing at a blog or playing one of those ridiculously addicting apps on FB.

But what some of you might not know is that there are some sports that i can get excited about and do follow. Almost anything in the olympics. Summer or winter doesnt matter. Gymnastics,diving, figure and speed skating, and snowboarding are the ones i follow the most. But when it comes to sporting events i look forward to the olympics.

Tonight- the opening ceremonies. Thankfully my amazing husband has been gracious enough to sacrifice the good tv for me even though he hates playing xbox on the old tv. I've got root beer, popcorn, and lots of food that can be made in a jiffy for dinners this week. I will throw popcorn at the screen and i will yell at the judges even though i know they can't here me. Dont judge me. Most of you do it too.

Dont you worry though I do remember that this weekend is valentines day and wont completely abandon clint on sunday. Though i dont have as much of a plan as i usually do. Clint apparently has some crazy plan that he needs to leave the house for 2 hours to prepare for... not a clue what.

random rambles:

i went to that daycare last friday and filled out and app, toured the place and talked to the supervisor for a while. She might have counted that as the interview she might not of. We'll see. She said she would look over my app and call my references and get back to me soon.

Still waiting. I am being patient but really hoping i get something there.

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it's been an interesting week. Some in good ways some in bad. some in funny ways. Like when Gabe puked on my head (though that was not funny at that moment)

How? He is a cat dog and likes to sit/ sleep on the back of the couch and i was sitting in front of him. yeah not gonna lie i shrieked and then took a shower and shampooed my hair 3x. i would have done it a few more but we were running late for remedy.

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the weather has been gross. we got about a foot of snow and 1/2 inch of ice. icky. I want SPRING.

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ya know how i lost my cell phone charger and swore it was at my parents house? yeah it was there.. mom just found it the other day.

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still job hunting and so sick of that too.

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Happiness:

Sunday (yes valentines day) is our 28 month anniversary. might sound odd but we consider Oct 14th (the day we started dating) to be a bigger anniversary then even June 20th (our wedding) might seem a lil backwards but anyone who knows us will not be surprised :) Clint has something up his sleeve.... hmmm

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the olympics start tomorrow! YAY!

this is one sporting event that i go nuts for. I love the olympics. Clint has his superbowl and i have my olympics. :) specifically the iceskating but i will watch as many events as i can. :)

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lil ol' me is back at it...

I started a batch of boiled peanuts on monday but decided to experiment and do them in the crockpot this time so there isnt as much stress and mess. So far so good.

in case any one is wondering they are really easy to make - just soak some raw peanuts (either fresh or dried but dried does take longer to cook) in water over night with a lil bit of salt. the next day put them in a big pot (or crock pot) with a decent amount of salt and literally boil the heck out of them.

I put mine in the crockpot yesterday and started it on high and then switched it to low while i was at the radio station last night and while i was sleeping then turned it back on high when i woke up this morning. I tested them and realized they needed more salt so i fixed that and they are getting there texture wise. They've still got a few hours at least but probably til tomorrow. and i am getting very impatient.

For those of you who are like "what the heck? boiled peanuts? sounds gross!" they really are not. they are an amazing salty little snack that is commonly found in road side stands down south. (though the roadside stands typically cook them in a giant[55 gallons or more) barrel over and open fire or butane)

I cant say whether you'll like them or not but this is what i have heard and so far i have found it to be true:

If you DO like roasted peanuts you wont care for the boiled ones. However the opposite is also true. If you DONT like roasted peanuts you will probably like boiled peanuts. which like i said i have found to be true because i dont like roasted peanuts at all.. i barely like peanut butter either. but i LOVE boiled peanuts.

ANY WAY.....

Today i had a sudden burst of confidence and decided to call 2 places about jobs. One is a daycare. I know a girl who works there so that is helpful. I am gonna try to go in next week and fill out an app. The other place would be nice if i got the position i wanted but they have several that i applied for.

I also sent in 4 more apps for nanny jobs. One of them is only a temp job (6 months) with kinda crazy hours but would probably work out nicely because i am hoping that in 6 months i will have the money to go to trade school and the money i gotta say .. is nice. it's about 40ish hours a week and the pay is negotiable between $300- $400 a week. which i am not gonna lie would be amazing. Gonna keep looking today. cause i need to find something anything by the end of this month.

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.......

so i havent posted in almost a week slacker me. I had a rough week and was in a very whiny mood so knew that if i posted it would simply be a whining complaining post. So i decided to spare you all.

ANY way....

I'll admit that life it rough right now, but i do my best to look on the bright side of things. Like this week, I am excited cause we are gonna go scout out some new apartments. Our lease isnt up until May but we dont want to be rushing at the last minute or end up somewhere we regret. So I've been doing research and am working on a list of places to visit. This might stress some people out but to me it is exciting. I am weird and i love packing and unpacking and get excited at the idea of arranging/organizing in a new place. I am hoping for a washer/dryer in the unit and a fitness center would be amazing. And yeah actually being able to afford the rent would be nice too (ask if you dont know). I am also hoping that this will be our last apartment before getting a house (a girl can dream)

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Things that make me smile:

One thing that makes me smile (and sometimes drool) is reading interesting blogs. One of my current favorites is:

http://notsohumblepie.blogspot.com

It's a cooking blog. Here's the twist though the author is a science geek so sometimes her food has a fun geeky spin like binary code on her homemade hostess cupcakes, atom cookies, or wii controller cookies.

Fair warning though : this blog can make you drool when your not hungry so this is def not one to read while you are hungry..

I cant wait to try her recipes! They all look so yummy. Her dulce de leche, saganiki, and bacon cake (yes you read that right) are just a few on the list of recipes that i want to try.