School's Out For the Summer

I really want to get better at updating this more frequently. I was surfing around on my ancient old MySpace page and read through some stuff I posted. It's fun reading about what was happening at various points in time.

So, I'm going to try and update this more. I know I've said that too many times to count since I've had an online journal. but, now that I've finished my class, I have more time.

Which makes me realize several things have happened since I last posted. Here's a break-down...

1) A took an undergrad Creative Writing class - It was fun, but very time consuming. The class was small and somewhat disorganized at times, but the textbook was very informative. I'm glad to have a break though. No plans yet when/if I will take more classes in the fall.

2) Started job-hunting again. Both Alan and I. We've had our share of applications, interviews, thanks but no thankses, and job offers that we ultimately ended up turning down. Currently, I'm waiting to hear back from a job I REALLY want. All things point to it being more promising than previous jobs, but I'm just stuck on feeling like I won't get it. I think I'm trying to avoid being let down again.

3) We flew down for one of my best friend's wedding in March. It was so nice to see my old friends, though it in turn reminded me of how much our friendships have evolved since high school. Makes me sad that there are portions of their lives I didn't know about. I miss the old days.

The Bride and Me!

4) Alan and I are going to re-sign another year at the place we're renting right now. The landlords agreed to lower the rent significantly for us, so we decided to stay. We still want to downgrade the amount of STUFF we have though. Despite rearranging and giving some things away through Freecycle, we still have plenty of bins stacked in the corners of rooms. I really want to minimize what we have since most of it we don't even use!

5) It's warming up and the Farmer's Market has begun! Not much produce is being offered yet, but I'm looking forward to doing more outdoor things and finding less excuse to go to the gym, which we signed up for in February. Maybe I'll even learn to ride a bike this summer! ;-) BTW...the "huge storm" I mentioned in a previous post ended up being Snowpocalypse/Snowmageddon 2011. Seriously...Chicago hadn't had a blizzard like that since the 60s or something. It was awesome! School and work was cancelled for 3 days!

Digging our way out of the garage

6) We want to do a garage sale this summer. Hopefully it'll help us minimize and maybe make some money while we're at it. I've already given a ton of stuff away through Freecycle too. Love Freecycle! We just picked up our first item from a fellow Freecycler this weekend too. Can't wait to use it.

Picnic basket!

7) In the theme of minimizing and saving/making money, we've decided to try out a Costco membership. We had our first shopping experience yesterday and it was really fun! We got a lot of stuff for not a terrible amount of money and we probably won't have to buy most of those items for at least a month now. Nice!

8) Since we've decided to rent for another year, we really want to decorate the house better (IE hang picture frames and put pictures in them, paint the guest bedroom, and refurbish existing pieces into more modern looking pieces). Snapfish was offering 100 4x6 prints for only $10 during Mother's Day, so I uploaded a bunch of our wedding and engagement pictures as well as some family and friend photos to hang up. They should be arriving shortly. Though now I'll need to find more frames to put them all in! We're thinking of doing a gallery wall, so that would work! We got our first garage sale item 2 weekends ago. We picked up a small side table we're planning on painting and putting in the master bedroom. We have no color in there, so maybe light blue will freshen things up! Alan also got an old wooden window from a co-worker that he wants to possibly make into a picture frame. Hopefully it works, if not, I think it'd be cute hanging above the mantle by itself!

Well, I think that's just about it for now. Hopefully, within the next few weeks I'll have more to post about. I just ordered a free quart of Glidden paint in Country House Blue, but it won't arrive for another 8-10 weeks. So, it may be a while until we see that little side table again. Anyway, that's life in a nutshell for now!