I had a dream....

This was not your inspirational, strive for a better society Martin Luther King, Jr. type dream.
It was a bit of a nightmare...

I dreamt last night that we were already back in Milwaukee, living at my grandparents house and I got a call for an on campus interview (YEAH!). As I was preparing for this interview, I was looking for my suit and realized that I had left my suit in Lincoln. I then realized that I had left everything from that side of the closet in Lincoln including all of my dresses and sweatshirts. This is bad enough but then I approached Kevan with this information and he said that he was planning to go back anyway because he had left a few items too! When I looked in the moving truck, I discovered that he had only put 8 or 10 of our rubbermaid containers and had left everything else in Lincoln....

...then the alarm clock went off and all was well. I have full faith that Kevan will remember all of the boxes and that I won't forget my suit!

12 days left in Lincoln!

Life happens while you are busy making other plans.

I have grown to understand something these last few years, especially the last few weeks - Life happens when you are busy making other plans. I think John Lennon said that.

Both Kevan and I are planful people. Kevan more so than me, he doesn't go across town without a plan. Both Kevan and I are practical people. I don't buy anything unless I know exactly how it is going to be used and then I only buy it if I will want to move it later or it comes in a recyclable container.

Life happens when you are busy making other plans.

When I was 19 or 20 I made a catastrophic decision. The world still turns, I am alive and no one got hurt directly, but I decided that I was not going to push myself in the teacher education program and I changed my major. WHAT!!! I think this is why I work with college students - if I can stop them from making the same mistake I did maybe I can correct mine in some way. I don't know if I will ever become a teacher, but the dreamer and believer inside me says - do it, make it happen! The planner says "there is no time/it no longer fits", the practical thinker says "you have a masters degree already and now you want to go back to school again" - Nice! Well I was "planning"on becoming a teacher and life happened - it caught up to me not acting on my plan. I got to get over it or get on it!

Kevan is on his way back from a job interview tonight. I have not talked to him yet so I don't know how he feels he did. I think that the University that he applied to would be a great fit for him and I am hopeful that this will work in his and our way. Our plan was to move back to Wisconsin and still have a live in job to help ease the transition. The planner says "this is the plan", the practical thinker says "duh free room and board no brainer!" Life says "hold the train we are taking a detour and you're staying at your grandma's house for awhile."

Life happens while you are busy making other plans.

I have put a lot of faith in the fates, destiny and the universe in the past. I believe that what you put out you get in return and that the universe takes care of you. Well universe I am waiting - trying to be patient - what is next?

Brave Not Smart

I woke up Saturday morning at 6:45 am with the feeling of sheer panic taking over my entire body. This was for two reasons: first, I had to clean the bathroom this weekend and had been putting it off for a week; second, when Kevan and I move back to Wisconsin as of Saturday and yeah still as of today neither of us have jobs yet!

Our plan had been to stay in Housing/Residence Life to help ease the transition and save a few more dollars. As of yet the limited job search that we did has hit a wall, but is still in progress. There are just so many candidates and not enough Residence Director positions for every one. Most of the time it does not matter if you are qualified because we are qualified, it is a matter of are you a good fit for the department.

So why move home without a job and with limited prospects?

Both Kevan and I are generally happy, hopeful and positive people. However, Nebraska and our experience here has turned us grumpy, uninspired, negative, and judgy - GROSS! Some of this is of course on us. As a person you are responsible for making your experience what it is going to be and taking responsibility for your actions and behavior. Our experience however has had a lot to do with our decision to leave.

Bottom line we are not happy here. We have the financial resources and family support to take on an adventure such as this right now and if we don't, if we stayed in Nebraska, I am not sure either of our mental states would make it.

To stay would be safe - we would have a general picture of what would happen and it could be a self-fulfilling prophecy of discomfort and unhappiness.

To go is brave - we have no idea what to expect and from where we are starting it can only go up.

What I have been telling people is that it is Brave not Smart, but I am hopeful that this move and our lives in Wisconsin will put us in a more positive environment. As of right now, we are frantically applying for jobs that come our way and getting excited about move.

"Rounding--Third" and Coming Into Home

I have thought about having a blog for awhile now, but never really had the content. My friends have blogs and have been really successful with articulating their observations or reporting about family happenings, but I knew that wasn't going to work for me personally. While I enjoy reading theirs and knowing what is going on in their lives, I knew I would get board and busy and loose fast interest in my own.

Kevan and I recently watched Julie and Julia, which to my surprise was a snooze fest. However, in watching the movie I decided that I too could write a blog for one year about our up coming move back to Wisconsin like Julie wrote about her cooking adventures with Julia Child's cook book. After one year I could stop or continue - no commitment!

As stated Kevan and I have decided to move back to Wisconsin in July just before Kevan's yearly family picnic. This decision did not come lightly for reasons I will get to in the following weeks and we had been contemplating it for awhile now. We were told that it is not going to be the same and that Wisconsin really is not going to be what we expect it to be. Kevan has not lived in Wisconsin for 17 years and I have not lived there for 5 years. I agree that it will definitely not be the same, I mean come on the Brewers traded JJ Hardy - something I took a little hard! But honestly, it won't be the same. I feel that this blog will be a place where I can share our experience of reentering our home, the place where we grew up, and are now returning as an "adult." I believe that Kevan and I will have an interesting perspective about how we view our families, friends and Wisconsin. No one else might think so, but we will see - your reading stick with us let us know! :)

I thought hard, maybe not long. about what I wanted to title this blog. I knew I wanted it to have home as a theme and I tried several names involving home and family and the like but all had been taken. [Side bar: Annoyed I started checking these names to see what sort of person had "stolen" my oh so awesome name and guess what --- Many of the blogs had not even been updated or used in years! BLAST!] So needing to get more clever I turned to America's favorite past: Baseball. This of course is great because Kevan and I love baseball and could pretty much attend any game and be content and we love the Brew Crew! So we are Hayden's Homestand and Rounding--Third and coming into Home. [The dashes are necessary because someone already has the name, but I said screw it and improvised!]