Summer Time!

So tomorrow will mark four weeks since my last day as an employee!  I'm continuing my search for something new, but so far...nothing.

Yesterday was my daughter's last day of 3rd grade!  I just can't believe that the school year is over and it is summertime.  As I thought about today being my daughter's first day of summer vacation, I realized that this is actually gearing up to be my first summer vacation since I was in high school. Wow!!  It got me to thinking about how I spent my summer's as a child and about how my own daughter has spent her previous summer's.  My brother and I would spend every summer playing with friends, moving (because my dad got transferred) and/or going to visit my grandparents.  Sometimes I really only had my younger brother to play with because we would move and neither of us knew anyone at the new place yet.  As for my daughter, she was in daycare year round until she started school then once she started school she went to a combination of camps or to a relative's house.  Until I lost my job, I was completely stressing about summertime as I had in previous years.  Each Spring, I stress out about how to cover daycare expenses for the summer.  I'm sure that any working parent can relate to this...childcare is expensive! We are fortunate to live near lots of great summer camps, but unfortunately most are so outrageously pricey that they are out of our price range, especially to do it for the entire summer.  The last two years, we have been able to do a mix of camp and having a family member watch her.  This year we had already committed to a couple of weeks of camp and now she'll be home with me for the rest of the summer.  I hope that I can make it special and memorable for her.

Routine

I've sort of settled into a little bit of a daily routine.  I walk my daughter to school then come home, have some coffee and turn on my computer for some job searching.  I've decided that job hunting stinks! It seems like you can divide most of the available jobs out there into 3 categories: IT/computer related fields, healthcare or sales.  I've come across so many jobs opportunities that are labeled as sales and most of those appear to be companies looking for telemarketers...UGH!!  I've submitted my resume to several places but have yet to hear anything. 

I kind of enjoy the peace and quiet of the house during the day, but I'm wondering how other not working people spend their days.  I can only spend so much time looking for a job everyday so I'm left with the rest of the day wondering what to do.  I like to read, but I can't sit and read all the time.  I'm starting to feel a bit restless.  I think it's time to find a hobby!

The 1st Week of the Rest of My Life

My daughter will be finishing 3rd grade in just a couple of weeks and last week I found myself sitting in the car line at her school for the first time ever!  I've heard other mom's complain about having to sit and wait in the car line, but I really didn't think it was so bad.  Her school runs the line rather quickly and efficiently.  All of the "car rider" children are outside patiently waiting in the covered sidewalk area of the car ramp and as each parent drives up, a teacher reads out the child's name from the placard that we have hanging from our rearview mirror. 

I've been walking her to school every morning and either picking her up or walking her home from school everyday.  Twice last week she asked me braid her hair for her.  These may seem like simple little things, but these are things that I have not been able to do for my daughter because I have worked.

On another note, I got my resume in order and sent it to a few places.  It was little discouraging because I discovered that two of the positions I applied for had over 450 other applicants...

Jobless

It's May 4, 2012 and it's my last day of work at a job that I've had for 8 years.  I'm being laid off.  What do I do now?  How will my family and I make ends meet?  Is now the time to change careers?  How difficult will it be to find a new job in this economy?  So many questions... and so many answers.  I'm feeling sort of lost at the moment and I'm not at all sure of what direction I should go.  Besides the year I took off to finish school and the couple of months I was off when my daughter was born, I've worked consistently for just over 20 years. I hadn't been particularly happy in my job for last couple of years so I'm trying to look at the current situation not as a loss of employment, but as a blessing in disguise.