I’ve given my 9 weeks’ notice at work!

You don’t think I’m overanxious or anything do you? LOL! I had planned on working right up until the house sold, but ironically we can’t afford that. I know, I shook my head too! But the thing is, we are heading into the summer and Dennis doesn’t get paid for those 2 months and we are not only going to need money for the mortgage and bills but also enough to afford the building supplies to finish the house before we put it on the market.  And I have a retirement fund that will be cashed out when I leave. It’s a pretty good plan if you can stick it out long enough with the store and after 6 years, I have enough built up to cover at least one month of Dennis’ pay. The tax refund, my semi annual bonus and 40 hours of vacation time coming to me will also help.

We are also going to have to really push to get it all done in a short amount of time and if I am working, not only am I too tired to do any work during the week, but Dennis can’t do any work either while I’m sleeping, so once he’s out of school, I am out of work. I was nervous about that but there are alot of shops in the area that I can get work at quickly for a short time if we get desperate, so I am more than willing to leave this job in 9 weeks’ time. It’s been a long time coming too! I got the job thinking I would just have to stay there only a year or two until we got on our feet but with Dennis’ career change and more than 50% pay cut with it, I am still there 6 years later.

We do have a couple of pieces of good news. I did a quick research on the internet and found out that for a house this size in this area (NOT counting the finished 4 room walk out basement) our house is worth $20,000 more than we were hoping to get for it! That means it is entirely feasible that we can still get what we want for the place despite not being able to replace the worn appliances, carpets or windows. The sheer size and location will sell this place if we can just get it in general good repair and cleaned up. We still have two bathrooms to gut and renovate though. Luckily we did the half bath a few years back so that’s just a paint job. Wish us luck…please? LOL!

The other good news is that my ‘curse’ still holds true. That’s what Dennis calls it anyway. A year after we got here, hubby was downsized out of his job and was unemployed for the first time in his life since he started working at 15. It was 8 months of stress and worry and really took it’s toll on him, but I kept telling him that there was a reason we were here in NC and there was a job somewhere out there with his name written on it and to just be patient and he would find it. He did, and he calls it my curse even though it is a good thing! lol. He decided to leave corporate America and follow his long time dream of teaching.  At the time he started looking, he did not know that schools did not want a whole lot to do with lateral entry teachers because so many of them did not last very long, but there was a high school 45 mins away that was desperate for a warm body to replace a teacher leaving without notice between semesters so they hired him thinking he wouldn’t come back but they had him to finish the year. He got in under the radar because of their desperation, but after more than 5 years of wonderful results, they are very unhappy to lose him when we move.

However, hubby sent his resume to the high school in the town we are moving to since they were looking for a math teacher, and a few months later we haven’t heard back from them. Nothing at all, good or bad! He still had his job if he wanted it, but that was going to be an even longer commute than the 45 minutes he has now. I again told him that whatever was supposed to happen would when it was supposed to. So last night he had to drive an hour and a half to get to a 7PM game in the little town next to the town we are moving to. He’s a volunteer assistant coach for the school baseball team and has been for the whole time he has taught there. He got picked up by the coach the first week he was there! Talk about a dream job for my hubby! And he does look soooo cute in those tight pants! LOL!

Anyway, he had been dreading the drive and lost valuable time on his lesson planning and grading but off he went. He stopped in the store on his way home afterward to let me know he got back ok and tells me that my ‘damn curse’ is working again! Hmm? Well it just so happens that a teacher he worked with that left a few years ago is now an assistant principal at this school ‘next door’ to the school he applied to, and they are not only looking for a math teacher with his specific qualifications (able to teach the advanced math courses and also handle the tech math kids that have lots of ADD and behavior problems) BUT they are also looking for a new HEAD coach! Only head coaches get paid extra!  Yippee! This woman was very excited and told him to send his resume right away so things are definitely looking up in that department! Woohoo!

 By the way, the kitchen is finished! Wow, I thought it was gonna do me in, but it is done now. Just a little bit of touchups I need Dennis for but I can start the curtains now! But back to my goal to become a sign language interpreter. That had gotten a little lost in the struggle to get this place fixed up and sold. I had gone through a bit of a funk and the stress is getting to us both. Unexpected bills keep popping up and this job is wearing on me physically.

So things are looking up now thanks to the small things like finding out our house might be worth what we need to sell it for, and my husband’s job lead.  It’s not just because we can’t afford this huge place, but because we’re trying to get ‘home’ and put down our roots in a place we choose. Hubby and I have each owned two houses and neither one of us got to pick any of them. This move is all completely our choice and if we can just get through the stress of getting out of this place, we can finally make our way home, even though we are not even from anywhere around here! lol. ing those early appointments with the doctor, I dutifully ran through all the medical history of my family I knew about. Sometime during another appointment, I don’t remember how or why, but it came up during ‘chit chat’ with the nurse that I had a deaf sibling. She kinda looked at me strangely then checked my chart and asked "You have a deaf sibling?" I answered that actually out of the four of us, I was the only one that wasn’t deaf. Her eyes got kinda big and she said "You have 3 deaf siblings and you didn’t think to mention that in your medical history??!" I just started laughing because I could see how outlandish she thought that was, but I said "Hey, you gotta understand…in MY family, being deaf isn’t a medical condition, it’s like having brown eyes instead of blue or something! Certainly not anything to worry about!" LOL! She never did understand but I didn’t care.

My spirit is picking up now thanks to the small things like finding out our house might be worth what we need to sell it for, and my husband’s job lead, and the rush I got from the show reminding me why we’re working so hard to relocate. It’s not just because we can’t afford this huge place, but because we’re trying to get ‘home’ and put down our roots in a place we choose. Hubby and I have each owned two houses and neither one of us got to pick any of them. This move is all completely our choice and if we can just get through the stress of getting out of this place, we can finally make our way home, even though we are not even from anywhere around here! lol.