Thankful~

I am so thankful today as I look back over the past several days and can see the Lord's hand in it~  I had an interview set for Wednesday for Macy's to work in their office...just something part-time to help out with the bills...well~  got there and the young lady interviewing was young...and unprepared and somewhat unprofessional but!  I was here for a job so I kept it too myself and just was screaming in my head. ha ha  She said I was only her second interview and that she may not get back to me for weeks~  and than she actually for some reason looked at my resume....She saw I had managed a swimwear boutique...oh so long ago~  and asked me to come back in an hour for an interview with the lingerie manager for a full-time position.  I have to been honest...I was not excited about the prospect of bras and panties but!  it's a job and I needed one desperately so I said of course I would come back~  so I went back and waited and waited and waited some more....as I am waiting a women strikes up a conversation with me and asks why am I waiting so long~  who am I waiting for and than she sits down to talk....I told her and she says to me~  you don't really want to work there?  I answer honestly and tell her no but I need a job!  She than explains to me that she is the store manager....The Lord is good!  She tells me that she doesn't want to see me stuck for ninety days and that she knows I will hate it and quit~  so why don't I let her find me a place in the store that is full-time ...where I will be happy and can make money.  My goodness~  she than has me interview with the manager for lingerie anyway so that they can stamp my papers for hire....and the manager tells me that they will be calling me as soon as they find someplace for me....it could be a day or a week.  I leave and get a phone call that night~ so I go back and meet with department head who tells me that the manager wants me in and that they don't normally do this because the position is considered a promotion and they don't hire from the outside...I get to meet the vendor for Ralph Lauren and we hit it off and now I have a job....They hired me as a Ralph Lauren specialist~  So happy!  I have work...and just in time as Tom's unemployment has been suspended until next month sometime.  God intervened .....Monday as I was driving...having a heart to heart with the Lord...I told our needs~  So thank you Lord for listening!

Rambling thoughts~

Mom left bright and early this morning for North Carolina to visit my aunt and uncle.  Tom and I dropped her off at the airport at 5:30!  So it has been quite a long day.  I was so happy that my aunt and uncle sent her a plane ticket.....she can really use time away and time with her sister.  She had not seen her for almost eight years because dad could no longer travel easily.  I am hoping and praying that this will be a good time of fellowship for her and time spent healing.  It has been a very hard several days for me~  Can't explain it but I have been missing dad so much..... I miss him daily but it has been very painful as of late....I miss his presence and his strength.  Even as his health continued to decline; he was the strongest man I have ever known.  I suppose it could be all the changes.....or it is just maybe that I miss him and will continue too~  Tom got a call yesterday and he has an interview tomorrow afternoon at three for a management position with the UPS store.  I continue to pray for full-time employment for him and for our family.  I am faced with do I go back to school or not....I am praying for direction.  The kiddies at church tonight were for the most part calm....I am so thankful for this as I am still under the weather from bronchitis....and exhausted from getting up at four this morning after only sleeping for several hours.  Thank you Lord~  Tomorrow I will be watching the munchkin my niece, Summer Elizabeth Ann.  She is a sweetie and too cute~  My dad would have absolutely been getting a kick out of her antics.  I praise God that he got to spend almost a whole year with her and she got to love on her papa.  I am thankful that my children got to enjoy their childhood with my dad....all the trips and memories we made and I can close my eyes and remember them all~  My children are blessed and so are we...God gave the gift of time and although I wish that He would have given more...I can look back through the years and realize how blessed we were and are.....

Reflections~

Amanda was reflecting tonight about this time last year~ her and I were keeping vigil at dad's bedside at the hospital as he overcame a horrible infection.  It has been a hard eight weeks....yes, that is all....eight weeks that he has been gone.  There are days when it seems that I just saw him and kissed him goodnight and other days when it seems a lifetime since I had seen him last.  So many changes....we were able to move; which I am so thankful for~ across the street from mom...God very much orchestrated this as she needs us so much.  The kids are starting to settle into a routine again~  their very own routine but I have always been a flexible parent~  I don't want to major in the minors.  But!  We all still miss him so~  There are days that really are very hard...today was one of them.  Mom has the business dad left her...but I have a brother who is a non-believer who thinks it is rightly his.....I pray and pray each day that the Lord would just lift him up out of the business and place him elsewhere.....he has made my mother's life very difficult.  I wonder at times where this particular relation came from as he is so different that the rest of us....very discontented....very hard to get along with....never anything nice to say....my dad has been gone such a short time and his presence is missed so dearly and yet my brother finds it so easy to disparage him.....Our family needs prayer dear sisters~  I am heartbroken over this situation.  I will continue to take it before the Lord and I pray for my mothers protection....emotional and financially.....As well as for continued good health.....it was a great deal for mom to care for dad especially these last few years and yet he has no compassion......Dad was a very compassionate person; who taught his children to be the same...so I am at a loss~  I remember him as someone who loved his family first and foremost.  Dad would have done anything for his children, grandchildren....mother...father....sibling~  This Valentines Day is the first for mom without him...she had a dear friend invite her dinner.  I am very grateful for this dear woman who has taken my mom to her heart and has really been there to keep her busy.  Lord I am asking for a resolution to this problem....And I thank you for the wonderful memories you've given me and for the lessons that I learned through dad's life~