Tuesday, September 16

Changes -

Change. No this is not a plug for Barack Obama, I wouldn't be caught dead. Anyway, political feelings aside, change has been the theme of the month. My last update was about a month ago, I am sad to say. This summer has been very busy and change has touched almost every aspect of our lives lately. God is up to something, but I have yet to figure it all out yet.

One thing that has changed is our girls are getting so big! Kati started preschool on Aug 11, and even though this deserved a post all of its own, I didn't get there. (Much like the pictures that I have not gotten done of the girls.)

Kati loves preschool! That is an understatement because she LOVES preschool. She is learning to read and doing very well. Recently, we read a book and she read 9 out of 11 words that were on the page. I am proud of her. She loves to learn. I hope that is a quality she will always posess.


Ava is 9 months old now and growing very very quickly. She is wearing 18 month clothing. It's a little much for me. It seems like she was just my little baby who cuddled, but now she wants to be on the floor and crawling around into everything. We vacuum a lot more now! She is eating some jarred foods, but I am giving her more grown up foods. She loved the fruit and veggie puffs too. I think she will be walking soon.


What else has changed, you ask?

I received a job promotion at the hospital I work at. I was the executive secretary to the vice-president/chief operating officer. While this was a fulfilling job, I was starting to get bored. I had always said I didn't want to be a secretary the rest of my life. (I did enjoy the status it brough though.) Well, God must have heard me because the doors started opening. Back in June, my friend announced she was moving back home, and her position would be open. My boss asked me if I would be interested in her position. I thought about it for awhile. I went had a lunch interview with my potential new boss and talked about the position. I knew that taking the job would be that another woman in my office would not get it, and although she had her heart set on it, they weren't going to offer it to her. This was a very troubling time for me. I sought a lot of counsel from people and prayed about it a lot. At times, when it was so stressful, I prayed that God would shut the door but he never did. Even when it appeared that this wasn't meant to be, things changed and the opening just got wider. They were originally going to list the position as a lesser position, with the opportunity for me to move up within a year when I proved myself. I was okay with that at first, until I found out that meant no pay raise at all. So I thought the door was closing. We on vacation at this time and I was glad to get away from all the office drama. When I got back, I found out that they were going to repost the position as the lead position so that I would take it. I wanted a 10% raise. Not to be greedy, but I was advised by my current boss that you should always aim for at least that. So long story short, I have been there two full weeks. I got the raise and looking back I can see that God opened the doors all the way. Even when I wasn't sure it was the right way, He was guiding the whole situation. The great thing is that I am home earlier in the evening and get to spend more time with my family.

Sometimes when God moves he opens one door and closes another. Well that is exactly what happened last Monday. Michael went to work and came home unemployed. In some ways this is a huge relief as he was miserable and in a job that he had really disconnected with long ago. The company was doing things that he felt were unethical and he didn't feel comfortable making the transactions. His boss had never liked him and overall it just wasn't a good fit. So for now, he is being Mr. Mom until he finds something else. He is doing pretty good, although I know it is hard on him to go from employee to full time dad. He loves his girls and is a good daddy but doing it for hours on end it definitely hard on him.

So anyway, that is all about the change going on right now. We are trusting God for the next thing. We have seen his faithfulness many times not to trust that he will provide.

On another note, it always seems that God knows exactly what we need. There have been instances of this lately.
Instance #1. Last Friday night as I drove home from work, I was thinking and telling God that I am really lonely for friends. No one really knows me anymore. Later that night I was on facebook and an IM popped up from one of my oldest, dearest friends, Jenni. Jenni and I grew up together and nearly every childhood memory includes her in one way or another. Jenni is a very busy mom with 3 girls under 2 years old! Being busy moms, we don;'t really have the time to talk but we did that night by IM for almost an hour. It was so good and so cathartic for me to talk to someone who knows me and I could be myself. At the end, I closed Facebook and just cried. I feel like God directed her to me for that exact night when I really needed friendship most.
Instance #2. When I orignally applied for my new job, I said I was X amount of dollars. It was above the 10% increase but I figured why not go higher. So I got a 44 cents less than I orignally asked for and I was still happy with it. THen yesterday, by former boss, who is still in the same office, came into my office and said that I would be getting my performance raise based upon last years review. With that raise, I now make 20 cents more than I originally asked for when I applied for this position. Follow all that? Anyway, it is just cool to me. It came when we needed it most.

So that is the update on all the changes going on with the Ingraldi Family. I will update more often and let readers know how it all turns out.