When J and I first got together, I figured at some point we would have to leave Colorado - he is, after all military. I just didn't think that it would be a year after we bought our house, and I couldn't imagine it being to another country. But it is.
J works extremely hard at his job. He attends all the schools and trainings he can, and when an opportunity presents itself that could better his skillset, and ability to be a soldier, he takes it. Sometime last year we had discussed a possible opportunity that would move us overseas. We talked about it at length (more like I hounded him with questions), and decided that this was something that we wanted not only for us, but for our family.
A few hurdles we had to pass:
-Getting my ex's permission to take my daughter out of the country - not just on vacation, but on a more permanent basis.
(There was some hesitation, but in the end, we agreed that this would be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for her).
-Actually applying for the position. This entailed the LONGEST background check and application I have ever seen. Like we're talking 50+ pages of every detail of our lives on paper. We even had to include a family photo (guess they want to make sure they're not taking on strange looking people?).
-Waiting. Lots of waiting. Mostly just working out the details of the application process, and getting all of the paperwork figured out.
Once our application was submitted, we figured it would be a few months before we heard anything. It was 2 weeks.
The first place they tried to send us was sooo not going to happen. Like ever. Thankfully the person in charge called and asked if we were still interested in the place penciled next to J's name. Yes, yes we were.
So once we found out we got the assignment, I instantly began freaking out. We have to sell our house, re-home some of our pets, what can I bring? what can't I bring? My husband pretty much just tuned me out at this point.
I've been fortunate enough to have all of the questions I could possibly think of answered. Now it's just a waiting game for confirmations, dates, etc. I am most likely going to spend the holidays moving. Yay.
This blog will most likely become our adventures in our new home. Along with advice to anyone who might be thinking of making the same move we did. Stay tuned!
Monday, March 24, 2014
Monday, January 20, 2014
So I totally forgot I had a Blogger...
Goes to show how crazy my life has been the past few years! Can't believe it's been 3 years since I've written here.
Life changes:
-Finished vet tech program, received a degree!
-Realized that said degree does not earn enough money.
-Got married! Unsure if I even wrote about my then boyfriend in my first post, but he is now my husband.
-Had another baby. Apparently I fell victim to the "my baby's growing up" mentality that seems to plague women who have toddlers. Would I change anything about my decision to have another? No. Was it a smart decision? Also a no.
-Started going back to school. Please refer to second line item. Apparently doing what I do to animals earns me significantly more money doing it to people.
Even though all of this has happened over the past 3 years, it feels like it all happened in the last week (aka "hit by truck" feeling). That could also be that I haven't slept more than a 5 hour stretch since I was 7 months pregnant (which was March of 13'), my poor eating habits, and my lack of regular exercise - walking to the mailbox is about as regular as it gets). So, to focus, we'll just start with how my week was...
Monday: my chocolate lab (Annie), who normally breaths in her food, chooses not to eat dinner. I find this odd, give her a Famotidine, and go to bed. Rest of the day uneventful.
Tuesday: Annie still not eating. Being a vet tech, I'm growing more and more concerned. Drop-off at vet for xrays and diagnostics.
*Receive phone call: My dog has eaten something egg-shaped, radiopaque, and the size of a half-dollar, which turned out to be a river rock from my backyard. In the veterinary world, it's referred to as a "foreign body", i.e. the reason why Labradors fund small-animal veterinary practices. Options: surgery ($1500, don't have) or see if she passes it by tomorrow morning. (Given my degree in this field, I laugh at the second option while in my head screaming "Holy S***, how am I going to find the money for surgery?!")
Magically find charity, and start fundraiser and begin to gain hope. Only other option was euthanasia.
Wednesday: Working with said charity lady to get funding approved (you have to be broke with bad credit - check). Phone call. Funding approved! Manage to scrape together difference for emergency surgery. Inclusions in treatment: overnight stay at ER ($$$$$$), and next day monitoring at regular vet ($$).
Thursday: Dog comes home. Doing well.
Friday: Freaking out because I have to be on a plane tomorrow to pick up my daughter from Grandma's in CA, and I have a recovering from intestine-removal-surgery animal. Solution: idiot-proof feeding instructions and medication instructions for husband. Hope dog survives.
Saturday: Plane ride, drinking, and a game called "Cards Against Humanity". If you're vulgar, rude, and like dirty jokes, it's for you. If not, I wouldn't suggest opening the box.
Sunday: Plane ride home with daughter. No sleep, begin to panic - school starts tomorrow.
I started my second semester at my community college today. My college has a rule: miss the first day, dropped from the class. Did I make it to my first class? Of course not. Luckily for me, not only was my instructor understanding of my situation, I just happened to get lucky that there wasn't a wait list for the class. Made it to my other classes. I'm going to LOVE my Econ class. Biology will be tough - trying to stay awake for redundant information from a very dry teacher. English - fabulous. Will let you know how Early Civ is...hoping that my instructor, who has proven to be kind already, finds a way to make an essentially history class more fun.
I feel as though the universe (insert "God" if religious - not for me) is preparing me for something big. Like "I'm going to make as much as possible go wrong, just to see if she can handle it". Elaboration: Nov - car accident. Dec - burst pipe/living room flood. Jan - dog surgery.
Maybe this means I'll win the lottery. Maybe it just means my adrenal glands are going to shrivel up and stop producing Cortisone because of their around the clock work. I'm hoping for the first, preparing for the second.
I have found that writing, whether here or in an actual notebook/journal (has paper with lines, usually professionally bound - interesting concept for today's generation, I know) has become therapeutic. I can only hope that my daily trials and tribulations will make you laugh, and possibly feel better about yours by the fact that your life probably doesn't suck as much as mine does currently. Or that you can find some comfort in the fact that there's someone who can relate to the really crappy few months you've been having.
I will try and blog as much as I can. Since my fabulous English teacher has required blogging as a part of our assignments for her class through Blogger, I am hoping that I will remember to actually sign on, and participate in a little "self help".
Life changes:
-Finished vet tech program, received a degree!
-Realized that said degree does not earn enough money.
-Got married! Unsure if I even wrote about my then boyfriend in my first post, but he is now my husband.
-Had another baby. Apparently I fell victim to the "my baby's growing up" mentality that seems to plague women who have toddlers. Would I change anything about my decision to have another? No. Was it a smart decision? Also a no.
-Started going back to school. Please refer to second line item. Apparently doing what I do to animals earns me significantly more money doing it to people.
Even though all of this has happened over the past 3 years, it feels like it all happened in the last week (aka "hit by truck" feeling). That could also be that I haven't slept more than a 5 hour stretch since I was 7 months pregnant (which was March of 13'), my poor eating habits, and my lack of regular exercise - walking to the mailbox is about as regular as it gets). So, to focus, we'll just start with how my week was...
Monday: my chocolate lab (Annie), who normally breaths in her food, chooses not to eat dinner. I find this odd, give her a Famotidine, and go to bed. Rest of the day uneventful.
Tuesday: Annie still not eating. Being a vet tech, I'm growing more and more concerned. Drop-off at vet for xrays and diagnostics.
*Receive phone call: My dog has eaten something egg-shaped, radiopaque, and the size of a half-dollar, which turned out to be a river rock from my backyard. In the veterinary world, it's referred to as a "foreign body", i.e. the reason why Labradors fund small-animal veterinary practices. Options: surgery ($1500, don't have) or see if she passes it by tomorrow morning. (Given my degree in this field, I laugh at the second option while in my head screaming "Holy S***, how am I going to find the money for surgery?!")
Magically find charity, and start fundraiser and begin to gain hope. Only other option was euthanasia.
Wednesday: Working with said charity lady to get funding approved (you have to be broke with bad credit - check). Phone call. Funding approved! Manage to scrape together difference for emergency surgery. Inclusions in treatment: overnight stay at ER ($$$$$$), and next day monitoring at regular vet ($$).
Thursday: Dog comes home. Doing well.
Friday: Freaking out because I have to be on a plane tomorrow to pick up my daughter from Grandma's in CA, and I have a recovering from intestine-removal-surgery animal. Solution: idiot-proof feeding instructions and medication instructions for husband. Hope dog survives.
Saturday: Plane ride, drinking, and a game called "Cards Against Humanity". If you're vulgar, rude, and like dirty jokes, it's for you. If not, I wouldn't suggest opening the box.
Sunday: Plane ride home with daughter. No sleep, begin to panic - school starts tomorrow.
I started my second semester at my community college today. My college has a rule: miss the first day, dropped from the class. Did I make it to my first class? Of course not. Luckily for me, not only was my instructor understanding of my situation, I just happened to get lucky that there wasn't a wait list for the class. Made it to my other classes. I'm going to LOVE my Econ class. Biology will be tough - trying to stay awake for redundant information from a very dry teacher. English - fabulous. Will let you know how Early Civ is...hoping that my instructor, who has proven to be kind already, finds a way to make an essentially history class more fun.
I feel as though the universe (insert "God" if religious - not for me) is preparing me for something big. Like "I'm going to make as much as possible go wrong, just to see if she can handle it". Elaboration: Nov - car accident. Dec - burst pipe/living room flood. Jan - dog surgery.
Maybe this means I'll win the lottery. Maybe it just means my adrenal glands are going to shrivel up and stop producing Cortisone because of their around the clock work. I'm hoping for the first, preparing for the second.
I have found that writing, whether here or in an actual notebook/journal (has paper with lines, usually professionally bound - interesting concept for today's generation, I know) has become therapeutic. I can only hope that my daily trials and tribulations will make you laugh, and possibly feel better about yours by the fact that your life probably doesn't suck as much as mine does currently. Or that you can find some comfort in the fact that there's someone who can relate to the really crappy few months you've been having.
I will try and blog as much as I can. Since my fabulous English teacher has required blogging as a part of our assignments for her class through Blogger, I am hoping that I will remember to actually sign on, and participate in a little "self help".
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Blogger Noob
Hellllooooo blog world. I have a few friends who have blogs...and they seem to be working out quite well for them, so I figured why the heck not. With my boyfriend overseas, and my inability to muster up the energy to physically write out my thoughts in my journal (it's been quite neglected, and is a bit dusty), I figured I'd "blog". Blog. I like how in our vocabulary it has become more of a verb than a noun. At first, the idea of my innermost thoughts and happenings out there for all the world to see made me a little nervous....not so much that people would be able to read them, but that no one is going to read them. I don't find myself that interesting, so why should all of you? Well, I don't really have an answer to that. I'm just hoping that I can make this as entertaining as possible for all of you to enjoy.
Incase you haven't gotten a chance to read my "All About Us" section, I'll go ahead and enlighten you now...
I grew up in the typical middle-class family in an affluent area of Los Angeles. Did the usual in high school...should have had a 4.0, but partied instead. I continued to party straight out of high school, and did as some do and neglected college. Who needs college when you have a mom and dad, right? WRONG. Through the years I've held quite the number of jobs in a vast range of catergories (Adult DVD Distributor to high school tutor. Told ya.), and never really had any sort of drive to get it together. Then, I met Eric. Handsome, charming, and also living at home. So what did our relationship mainly consist of? Partying, why of course. Partying so much that when I ended up pregnant with our daughter we were at a total loss for words. He wanted one thing, and I knew I wanted the baby (this did not go over well at first). Something deep down inside of me was screaming at me that this was a good idea (yeah, a good idea with no college education, and not much of a job to speak of), and when I saw her heartbeat for the first time, that baby definitely wasn't going anywhere.
9 months later, Hailey was born. All 8lbs, 6oz. and 22 inches of her...oh and did I mention she was EARLY?! Um, that was fun as a first-time mom. If anything was going to scare me from having more children, that should have been it...but for some reason we women forget all of that as soon as we see the most beautiful little face we've ever seen looking back at us. So much promise, and possibility. Then they start to grow into these little people. Little people with opinions, and reasoning, and the mindset of "I do what I want". Promise and possiblity? More like, "No! Don't touch that, take that out of your mouth NOW...what did I just say? God dammit child what am I going to do with you? What on earth is that smell? I know you did not just eat that...I thought I said don't touch! Oh great, you pooped...Honey!" and the list goes on and on.
The first few months Hailey was around, things were good. I was living off of what was supposed to be my college money, and with Eric's parents who pretty much took care of everything. Things looked pretty peachy keen, but when we closed our bedroom door it was another story. Lots of arguing, LOTS of sleep deprivation (which I'm sure sooo did not help), and lots of ridiculous ideas of potential future careers, with no actual motivation to get them done. So the decision was made, and we decided we would come and mooch off of my mom, since living in CA had become somewhat of a dream killer, and we weren't really getting anywhere.
Hailey and I moved first. This in and of itself was probably a blessing in disguise, although at the time didn't seem like it. I had a younger boyfriend who's nagging girlfriend and kid were now a state away. Probably a dream come true for him...long story short, a month later he decided he wasn't coming...I decided I wasn't coming back. I then met Justin. Ahh, Justin. Such a breath of fresh air. I'll post more on him later :) After Justin, came enrolling in school, and the rest is history. I'm now a single mom, in school full-time and trying to balance a relationship with someone who's career could put him anywhere in the world at anytime (seeing as he's overseas now, I've realized he wasn't kidding). Things can be rough (I definitely have a few rough spots...times...days, etc.), but we're making sure to laugh plenty, cry when needed and even have a drink, or two or three (or me two weeks ago, quite a few too many)..once Hailey's asleep of course. :)
Incase you haven't gotten a chance to read my "All About Us" section, I'll go ahead and enlighten you now...
I grew up in the typical middle-class family in an affluent area of Los Angeles. Did the usual in high school...should have had a 4.0, but partied instead. I continued to party straight out of high school, and did as some do and neglected college. Who needs college when you have a mom and dad, right? WRONG. Through the years I've held quite the number of jobs in a vast range of catergories (Adult DVD Distributor to high school tutor. Told ya.), and never really had any sort of drive to get it together. Then, I met Eric. Handsome, charming, and also living at home. So what did our relationship mainly consist of? Partying, why of course. Partying so much that when I ended up pregnant with our daughter we were at a total loss for words. He wanted one thing, and I knew I wanted the baby (this did not go over well at first). Something deep down inside of me was screaming at me that this was a good idea (yeah, a good idea with no college education, and not much of a job to speak of), and when I saw her heartbeat for the first time, that baby definitely wasn't going anywhere.
9 months later, Hailey was born. All 8lbs, 6oz. and 22 inches of her...oh and did I mention she was EARLY?! Um, that was fun as a first-time mom. If anything was going to scare me from having more children, that should have been it...but for some reason we women forget all of that as soon as we see the most beautiful little face we've ever seen looking back at us. So much promise, and possibility. Then they start to grow into these little people. Little people with opinions, and reasoning, and the mindset of "I do what I want". Promise and possiblity? More like, "No! Don't touch that, take that out of your mouth NOW...what did I just say? God dammit child what am I going to do with you? What on earth is that smell? I know you did not just eat that...I thought I said don't touch! Oh great, you pooped...Honey!" and the list goes on and on.
The first few months Hailey was around, things were good. I was living off of what was supposed to be my college money, and with Eric's parents who pretty much took care of everything. Things looked pretty peachy keen, but when we closed our bedroom door it was another story. Lots of arguing, LOTS of sleep deprivation (which I'm sure sooo did not help), and lots of ridiculous ideas of potential future careers, with no actual motivation to get them done. So the decision was made, and we decided we would come and mooch off of my mom, since living in CA had become somewhat of a dream killer, and we weren't really getting anywhere.
Hailey and I moved first. This in and of itself was probably a blessing in disguise, although at the time didn't seem like it. I had a younger boyfriend who's nagging girlfriend and kid were now a state away. Probably a dream come true for him...long story short, a month later he decided he wasn't coming...I decided I wasn't coming back. I then met Justin. Ahh, Justin. Such a breath of fresh air. I'll post more on him later :) After Justin, came enrolling in school, and the rest is history. I'm now a single mom, in school full-time and trying to balance a relationship with someone who's career could put him anywhere in the world at anytime (seeing as he's overseas now, I've realized he wasn't kidding). Things can be rough (I definitely have a few rough spots...times...days, etc.), but we're making sure to laugh plenty, cry when needed and even have a drink, or two or three (or me two weeks ago, quite a few too many)..once Hailey's asleep of course. :)
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