Normal Life?

As I transition back home from AmeriCorps I have reflected a lot on what I have learned from my experience. It has been very difficult to come back home and start a "normal" life again. Having so much free time to do whatever I want has been a challenge for me. Trying to keep busy is not an easy task when there seems like there is nothing to do. Sure wedding planning has consumed my life some days but is seems like it comes and goes in rushes of excitement and dullness. Don't get me wrong, I have LOVED planning my wedding but it just seems like I'm missing something...someone...my future life partner.

Being away from Lex has been so hard. I don't know how people would be away from their significant other 20 years ago. We have phones that we can be in constant contact with and even Skype where we can see each others face. Talking on the phone every day and Skype just doesn't do it for me. One of my love languages is physical touch and I miss snuggling up to my man every night and being with him constantly. Keeping myself busy has allowed me to get my mind off of the things I miss and look forward to the things to come. I know being away from Lex has its challenges, but in the end the reward will be the greatest. In the mean time, I will just have to rely on my body pillow to snuggle up with at night. At least that gives me something to wrap my arms around! :)

As the Christmas season arises, I look forward to spending time with my family as well as my family and husband to be.

Newspaper

I have been enjoying my time at home by a whirlwind of wedding planning. Being with my family and meeting up with everyone around home has been just the start of fun things to come! It felt good to be back in church and I can't wait to start singing with the Praise team again. 

I was contacted by my local newspaper on the way home from Iowa. Here is the link of an article about my term of service in AmeriCorps.

http://www.mlive.com/hudsonville/index.ssf/2013/11/hudsonville_woman_completes_te.html

Home.

I made it home safe and sound. It's definitely bittersweet. Grandma, grandpa, mom and dad as well as lex's parents all came out to Iowa to watch us graduate. The ten months have been and amazing, challenging, fun, difficult, and life changing experience. Would have never thought that I would have met my future husband. We both returned to our respective homes and are living with our parents until the wedding. The next time we will see each other will be for Christmas. And after that, sometime for wedding planning. 

I'm hoping to get a part time job until May and will be planning away as well. After we get married in June, I'm going to move down to bryson city, nc. 

Throughout my engagement and probably through marriage I will still update my blog so keep reading. :) 

It has already been a crazy ride and I'm sure more adventures are coming our way. 

We're almost done!

We are wrapping up our year in Vinton Iowa doing more trainings and goodbyes. We graduate on Wednesday and then we part ways. I can not believe how fast this year has gone by and everything that we have experienced. It's been a crazy ride but I'm so ready to move back into the real world and start my life with Lex. I can't wait to get home and start wedding planning and get into the holiday spirit! 3 more days and I will be back in Michigan! 

My good friend and michigan buddy Kelli!!

Iowa

So during the shutdown we were on campus doing community service in the local towns. We were sent out on our projects after it ended and have been here since Saturday. We are still Iowa but working at a YMCA camp in Coggon. We are basically doing projects that the Maintence guy has but doesn't have enough time in the world to get them done himself. This camp reminds me so much of the summer camp I worked at. A little bigger but still the same atmosphere. I just love being at camp. Yesterday I drove the tractor all day for work. I was hauling things to the burn pile and pulling roots out of the ground.

It's already snowing here today. First day. :/ gonna be a cold couple weeks working. 

Only a few more weeks and I will be back in Michigan for a while.  

My view of the day. 

One of the roots we pulled out and I put on the burn pile. 

 

At the YMCA camp 

Pouring concrete at a job site in Vinton Iowa. 

Omaha to Vinton

We finished up our time in omaha Nebraska by building more houses and moving more furniture. 

We have been on transition for a week now and were supposed to depart for our next project today, Friday but because of the government partial shutdown, they legally cannot send people out to start their service if they are already on campus. So for the time being, we are working here in Vinton, IA. The campus has a two week contingency plan for us and we will be staying in vinton for that amount of time. 

We were supposed to go to a YMCA camp in Iowa, only about 45 minutes from our base campus. We would be doing maintenance, painting their dining hall, and doing stump grinding. Hopefully we will be able to spend some time there and help the camp out. We will just have to wait and see. 

Oh, I was in the paper again in omaha. Just a little sentence but my pictures in their! :)

http://www.omaha.com/article/20130929/NEWS/130928680

Building houses

We have been working our butts off at habitat for humanity. We have been mainly working on one project site that includes 4 houses in a row and we have been working on all three of them. One is a demo house that is going to be redone and the other 3 are all being built from the ground up. It's so cool to be able to build something so intricate and do it well. 

I have really enjoyed working with our site supervisors. They like working with lex Kelli and I because we naturally get the work we are doing and can do it without supervision. Everyone else is getting the hang of things as we start to complete each house. 

The toughest part about the program now is we are so close to being done with the whole program. 2 more months until we graduate. I am so ready to go home and start planning our wedding as well as start my life with lex and have time to ourselves. 2 more months!!

Oh, I'm also famous...in Vinton. :)

http://www.vintoniowa.org/articles/Et+cetera/article1010428.html

A couple of the houses during the process.