take a deep breath and grab a drink...this is a long one!

Man - where has the time gone? Sorry for not blogging - so much has been happening. As most of you know, my company was restructured 12 days ago, leaving me not completely out of a job, but certainly with way fewer hours. Not enough to keep my life the way I want it. So, I had to find another job. One that would make it possible to continue working for my company (which I love) but bring in a steady income. Craig and I worked on getting a resume built for me - something I hadn't needed in almost 10 years - and I diligently scoured the help wanted ads in the newspapers and online.

Last Tuesday night at supper, Craig mentioned that a woman who used to work for him had gone on to be a Director in the Scotiabank Call Centre, and he wondered if I would be OK with him checking into some possible job opportunities there. Even after a few days of looking, I was discouraged, so I told him to go for it. And he did. The next few days were a whirlwind. His contact walked my resume down to Human Resources (thanks Viv!) (thanks Craig!) and within an hour I received a call requesting a phone interview. That was scheduled for Thursday morning.

At the end of that interview, I was happily informed that I was successful in making it to the 2nd round of interviewing. Great! I thought - what's next? Turns out it was 2 hours in front of computer doing a myriad of tests that totally freaked me out. Everything happened so quickly! Friday morning 8am, found me in Scarborough, taking all these crazy tests. When I finally finished, my confidence was so wobbly, I just didn't think I would make it. To top it all off, when I finished the test, the coordinator told me that she couldn't give me the results right away, and that she would have to call me and let me know if I was to proceed to the NEXT round of interviewing. I returned home and spent the next two hours watching a movie with the boys and making Christmas ornaments (PA Day). When the call came in, the three of us held our breath waiting for the verdict. Yes! I had passed all the testing and "could you please come to the office for 9am on Monday for a face to face interview?" "Well certainly", I said - and I found myself back in Scarborough for another round this morning. Today was a "behavioural interview". Things like, "tell me a time when you really had to work to understand a problem that someone was having and how did you solve it...blah blah blah". Tough. There were two interviewers and I had to take a bilingual test as I had listed on my resume that I was french speaking. The interview took about an hour and at the end I asked when I would hear if I was a successful candidate. The interviewer told me that I would hear from HR later in the week.

I got home at 11am, and at 12:21pm, I got a call from the Manager of Human Resources??? (is that right, Craig?), informing me that they would like to offer me a position at the Call Centre. I was thrilled. The hours were perfect and allowed me to continue with my current job, without any problems. One hitch - "Training starts tomorrow". I almost had a heart attack. How do you organize your family etc in such a short period of time? I explained that I had been under the impression that there was a training date set for January and that I was better suited for that start date. I was informed that she was not aware of a January start and that this was the job that was available. What to do. What to do. So, I took a deep breath and asked for the training hours. To my surprise, they were from 4-11pm five days a week until February 6 and then my regular part time hours after that. Well, that was perfect! No having to worry about the kids in the morning and only a little work having to be done to get the afternoons organized. Thankfully a good friend offered to take and pick up the boys if I needed it. I was so happy to be able to ask only for the afternoon drop offs.

SO...

I start tomorrow! Eeek! I can't believe it! It has gone so fast. I spent the afternoon and evening getting organized, getting the busing schedule (actually, Craig did that), organizing with Deniese for the drop offs on Spanish nights, getting minutes into their cell phones, explaining to the bus driver that he would have two more come Wednesday, making an 'after school checklist', and talking to them about all the major changes that were going to happen. Starting tomorrow. Nothing like dropping a bomb on them. They were great, as they have been through this whole thing and now I think we're ready.

Craig is the one that this is really going to get hit hard. He is just the best. I am blessed. He will be coming home, doing suppers (which I am going to try and have prepped each day), homework, bedtime, etc. After this I will willingly push him out the door so he can play football all day Saturday and Sunday. He will deserve it! I know that this is just what families do, but there aren't too many women that can count on their husband the way I can.

OK - enough about all of that. What else have we been up to? No bowling last weekend, but Kaedo played soccer at 6pm on Saturday. It was painful. The kids were tired and it was a lloooonnnngggg hour. We had a movie night (Hancock - OK but not great) and slept in on Sunday. Got a chance to spend the afternoon with Deniese and that was about it.

This week we have no bowling again, but Kaedo plays soccer and Craig is helping a friend move. Sunday I think we will decorate our tree. We have brought everything up but the furniture needs to be moved and Craig has to set up and 'fluff' the tree.

Today was the first snow pants night for the kids. Pitch dark out and they are with the neighbors jumping in the snow and having a hoot. Here is a picture I snapped of them just as they were coming in. They were just having a great time. Love it!

Well, keep your fingers crossed for me - here's hoping all goes well. It is a new chapter for me. For us. I will be actually working with other people, not just talking to myself in my office. Changes, they are a comin'.

To my niece and nephews - your Christmas presents are in the mail. I sent them today - make your mom and dad let you open them early. Does that make sense???

Hope everyone is well.

later,

s

Had to throw in this picture of the dog - hilarious. Poor bugger!