Wow! What a whirlwind of a year it's been. I can't believe I've been away from my little blog for so long. Since 2013! I love my little blog. It's my own little place. To write about my musings and silly things that happen in our life.
I've found that keeping up with 4 kids and homeschooling them and taking them to their activities has me so tapped out I have no "creativity" left at the end of the day! Add to that, my laptop was on the fritz for a year (sticking keys that you have to pound on to get to register what you type) and it locked up every time I worked on anything....it led to not being able to get anything done.
Finally got a new laptop! Yay! (It's a touchscreen HP, pretty basic, that I got on Amazon and I love it so far!)
Another huge happening we've had in life that has really thrown us for a loop is that my husband changed jobs. He'd been at his former job for almost 9 years and an opportunity came up for an excellent job with insurance for the family (finally!) and better pay and opportunities for overtime. No brainer, right? So, after much prayer and making it through the whole process to get hired at this company (seriously, you'd think he was trying to hire in with the CIA!) we felt like it was best to go forward and accept the new position. That was in August of 2014.
Here's the catch, the company was in negotiations with the local Union to get a new contract signed. Only the Union had no desire to sign anything. Unless they were given EVERY thing. But you can't have everything. I pretty much learned that in kindergarten.
And so there was a lock-out. (That's the opposite of a strike in that the company says the union can't come in and work until the issues are resolved). While my hubby is not a union member, he is in the same "bargaining unit" (meaning he benefits from their good negotiations and he takes the fall when negotiations break down). They cannot let the non-union members work if they aren't letting the union members work because it would be "discrimination" against the union members.
So, all this to say, this has been very hard on our family. Why would God give us this excellent job and then allow this to happen?
Why?
Why is rarely a productive question in these kinds of situations. (Only took me over a year to get that!)
Since the beginning of this year (2016) I am working on focusing on the blessings in my life. And there are a lot. God has provided so amazingly during this time. Our income has been less than half of what it "should" be. But we've lacked nothing. I mean, a few luxuries sure, but no needs have gone unmet. And every time I've been tempted to wonder if he should have kept his old job, he hears from a former coworker how slow things are there...he could very well have been downsized or had his hours cut.
So, busyness has reigned. And surviving.
To be continued....
