Friday, October 25, 2019

Day In The Life: October 24, 2019

I woke up yesterday morning and after reading one of my daily blogs, decided to do a "Day In The Life." Before I start, I should mention one thing I've been quiet about on the blog.

I lost my job at the end of August.

I had some warning but this was not my choice. I have been looking for work and one of the things Dave and I talked about early on is that I wanted to look at finding something with a bigger organization. My job is usually administrative assistant and/or bookkeeping based and I've mainly worked for small offices. When I get bored, or the workplace takes a different direction (as happened this last time), I'm out of work because there is nowhere else for me to go.

Given all that, I just found out on Wednesday, that I have moved to the next stage in a job interview process I am quite excited about. But bigger organizations move slower. Thus, I am in a waiting stage, and trying not to stress too much about it. I likely won't hear anything further until mid-November so prayers for patience and perseverance would be greatly appreciated.

And now on with an "I'm unemployed" Day In The Life :)

7:10am -- I came downstairs, and both kids were already awake. They were playing iPad and Sam had had breakfast already. I really do love this new, more independent stage.

7:30am -- Rachel was eating breakfast and practicing her French spelling words. Sam barely has to study for things but Rachel needs to put in a bit more effort. However, she is very self-motivated so it's more that Dave and I need to keep up with her! And sometimes that means practicing spelling words at breakfast. Ha!
  

7:45am -- Rachel and Sam were packing their lunches and Dave and I were having (mostly uninterrupted) adult conversation (YAY!). When I think back to just last year when mornings were chaotic, this feels like such a switch. The kids still need a little bit of help, but really, they are in charge of most of their own lunch.

8:15am -- I was doing Rachel's hair and trying to dry her sleeve so she could put her shirt back on. She spilled water on it and I was holding it over the still warm burner to try and use the heat. It sort of worked :)
 

8:30am -- I ALWAYS have to make my bed in the morning, so after we sent the kids off to school (they walk on their own most mornings), I got dressed and made my bed.

8:45am -- I hung out a load of laundry before I headed out for the morning. 

9:00am -- I headed off to volunteer. This is my second session of volunteering with either Kindergarten or Grade 1 students to help them work on letters and sounds. This session I am doing sounds. I arrived to find out my kids are on a field trip (this was not my normal volunteering day so I forgot to check the kids' schedule). I ended up having a great conversation with the librarian so it was all good. Oh, and I ate a banana muffin for breakfast on the drive to school. (I don't volunteer at the school where Sam and Rachel go -- I volunteer at a school where a friend is a teacher and needed people.)

9:45am -- I walked to the grocery store from the school. The fall colours in our area an INCREDIBLE right now. I LOVE them.

10:00am -- I walked back to my car with flowers and chip dip for the readathon tomorrow.
 

10:15am -- I got home to lots of good news -- HAMILTON tickets will be available soon!!! Figuring out how to fit ticket buying in meant rearranging my Saturday schedule. I also got some positive job news. I have a GREAT community of friends, and people who already work within the organization I'm hoping to work for, who are really supporting me through this job search so I had to send off some e-mails and texts updating them.

10:30am -- I got another load of laundry started, talked to Dave, replaced some really dead flowers with the fresh ones, and did some house tidying. Exciting times.
 
 

11:15am -- I started to write down the bones of this blog post and re-size pictures while drinking a third cup of coffee-hot chocolate.

12:00pm -- I hung out another load of laundry.

12:30pm -- I ate a partial lunch of Moroccan stew leftovers and read.

1:15pm -- I had the rest of my lunch -- leftover top a potato. This is one of Sam and Rachel's favourite suppers.

1:35pm -- Dave always needs to bring Hallowe'en candy to work for his in-office trick or treating and he really shouldn't have left the box at home. HA! I read some blogs, caught up on Facebook and Instagram, and did some other computer stuff.


And here is where I interrupt this blog post with a prayer request. This past weekend a man in our church was killed in an accident. Although he was just a year younger than me, I didn't know him very well. During this time I also read his obituary and watched a tribute video. Today I will be attending his funeral and helping serve/clean up his funeral luncheon. Please pray for his family, friends, and community.

2:55pm -- I did some dishes before going to pick the kids up from school.

 
3:10pm -- I picked the kids up from school. Rachel was excited about Fall; Sam was excited about running away from me as I took pictures. Ha!

3:50pm -- Really, this time period can best be described as "post-school madness." The kids unpacked their lunches and cleaned up their backpacks. Sam did garbage and recycling and we spent way too much time looking up stuffed animals on the internet to see if Sam's Squishy Turtle is a beanie boo -- it's not.

4:20pm -- I cooked supper. There are no pictures because I was too busy cooking. Rachel grated cheese for me.

5:00pm -- We ate supper (sort of). Thursdays are an early supper night because of Rachel's dance. I also did Rachel's bun for dance and brought in laundry. We eat supper together every night except for Thursdays. Dave ate his supper quickly between 5:15 and 5:30.

5:40pm -- We dropped Sam off at a neighbour's and then walked to the ION for parent viewing at dance. Normally I just take Rachel to dance but Dave came this time too.
 

6:20pm -- Rachel had a few minutes to practice cartwheels in the hallway before dance. I'm so impressed with her determination when she wants to learn something. She's been working on cartwheels for months.

6:30pm -- Rachel's dance class on Thursdays is an exam preparation class so she really has to concentrate. And work hard.

8:00pm -- I left dance a little early to grab the ION so I could pick Sam up from his sports program at the school. He does this on Thursday nights for an hour and a half.
 

8:15pm -- We were all home and the kids were having "second supper." They really wanted applesauce and marshmallows and  I really wanted them to eat more of their supper. We compromised somewhat.
 

8:50pm -- Because I am gone most of the day at the funeral, I made challah for today ahead of time. This is the first time I've left it to rise in the refrigerator overnight so we'll see how that goes.
 

9:20pm -- I spent some time resizing pictures for this post and eating grapes.

10:00pm -- There are no pictures but I basically went to bed. I was too tired to even read.

So there is a day in the life of unemployed me! Hopefully next time I do this, I will have a job but until then I will try to see this extra time as a gift.

5 comments:

  1. Oh, I'm sorry to hear about your job struggles. :( I hope that something good comes from this new organization!! It's amazing how your kids can get themselves ready so independently!!! How far of a walk is it to the ION for yall? Also, if you were thinking about writing up a primer on how Canadian elections/politics work, I wouldn't be mad. Hahahahah. With yall's elections this week, I realized how much I DON'T know about your government!! I for sure thought it was much more like ours in terms of electing a prime minister/president...but a few Wikipedia articles later, I see that it is not similar at all, and now I'm just more confused!! Several times this week I thought "man, if Natasha would just explain this to me..." so...just in case you're bored and want to explain, here I am!! :)

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  2. I love these sorts of posts.
    I'm so sorry to hear about that man's passing. You never know when its your time to go.

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  3. Good luck with the job hunt!! But you're filling your days with lots of productivity, particularly the volunteering, well done! I still want to get a clothesline for our yard, love yours!

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  4. Yikes I'm so sorry to hear about the job struggles. It is so frustrating and then the waiting is the WORST. I'm happy to see you were able to have a productive day and I encourage you to keep writing stuff down because it's a great mental boost!

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  5. I love these Day in the Life posts!!!! And of course by now you are employed again so yay to that! I've been unemployed so many times and it is the worst. The whole job hunting thing. Interviews. Second interviews. Third interviews. I don't even want to think about it.

    So what is your parenting secret for getting kids to make their own lunches and clean their lunch bags / backpacks etc? I read SO MANY BLOGS where this is a major issue. You're the first blogger I've come across who has kids that do as they're told when it comes to this particular task.

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Thank you for being interested in my life as I blog it and for leaving a comment. Comments make me happier than reading a good book and drinking a cold Coke. Almost :)