Astounded

This week marked a few cool developments. First: My pride and joy.
Alisabeth was sitting in the back seat in her carseat, I was in the passenger seat and Jason was driving. Robyn was in the back seat too. Suddenly she starts naming the relationships of people. "Robyn in sitting next to me, and Mommy is in front of me and Daddy is in front of Robyn. We're sitting in a square!"
I was shocked. I've seen her name off shapes when she can see them, but for some reason being able to place herself within a large 3-D space and see the spacial relationship seemed a little advanced. I couldn't find anything online for when this normally happens, but I'm dang proud of her either way. When we got home we tested her again and this time she moved into position before telling us that she and we made a triangle. What a girl!!

On a not so happy note, a little over a week ago a woman pulled out and stopped in my lane causing me to T-bone into her. Luckily and thanks be to God, there was no damage or injury for us. The other lady was a little sore because she saw us coming but instead of moving she just braced herself. Her car would be totaled if she tried to turn it in. I hit straight into the side bending the passenger and driver doors to the point where they will not open. Sadly it was a gift from her sister after she lost her house and everything she owned recently so there's not really any option but to crawl in through the passenger side.
She called her insurance and the police before I realized that we had no damage or injury so we had to give lots of statements and denials of claims. It was lots of good fun. I was so mad that it had happened, but grateful that no one was injured, it could have been a lot worse if I hadn't had time to slam on my brakes.

We also got most of the boards up in the house and all of the external wall's outlets finished. Two circuits done, and a third in place when we work on it tomorrow. Hopefully we'll get the bathroom done tomorrow and then we only have to figure out how the heck we're supposed to get to the hallways and the heater and swamp cooler. Those are going to be boogers. We'll probably also get a few more of the patches done. Hopefully we won't have to open any more walls, I'm tired of cleaning up mold.
After that we'll move everything away from the walls invite all of our closest friend in the area over and put up all the drywall and mud and tape them in the same day. We're going to save the painting for after we move out, that way we don't have to worry about messing it up while we're living here :)

Lastly this week marked the start of a prequel to the book I wrote last year. I started it because I realized after finishing the first book and starting the next that it didn't follow well. It lacked an understanding of the planet's history and made it impossible to grasp the significance of what the main character was doing. So I dropped it and stopped writing. Then just the other day I needed something to keep my mind busy so I started thinking about the story again and there it was. I started writing yesterday and I already have 16 pages. I LOVE when inspiration strikes. After this book is done I'll need to go and revise the first book so that the details match more closely and possibly rewrite a bit of it to connect the ideas better and then I'll write the third book. Once they're all done I think I'm going to try to send them to a publisher. I figure they can only say no, but with three books written it's a better bet than a lot of beginning authors. They'll need a lot of editing, but I've heard most books do.

Jason is having a blast with his new position. For those who didn't know he was demoted and his pay was cut by more than $800 a month because of a bad phone call that the general manager happened to overhear and a few not favorable customer satisfaction surveys. His manager was surprised when Jason told him the pay wouldn't be enough, but eventually we had no other choice than to accept it. So we're cutting back significantly and doing what we can to suck it up until January at the earliest. We've also prayed a lot and we're going to fast forward our 5 year plan. We were going to settle for 5 years and then send Jason back to school for Computer Networking, but with all that's happened so far the automotive field just isn't looking great so we're going to head back to school early and complete a bachelors for him.
The part of all of this that I love is the fact that though the demotion upset him, he didn't let it stop him. He's turned it around and basically proven to them that they made a mistake by upselling the heck out of everything and taking every opportunity to improve himself. He is outselling the guy they chose in his place and basically kicking butt. I feel bad for them only because they're going to be hurting when he leaves in January or March.
Of course there is a downside to the new plan too: it entails me going back to work. We prayed about it a lot, and we'll also be moving back to Rexburg, which I am super exited about. Although I hate winters I REALLY miss the atmosphere of a small town. I loved the friends we made there as well, and though most of them have graduated and moved there are a few left, and I have no doubt we'll find more.
We've already contacted my old boss who has assured me that if he doesn't have a position that he knows of several other firms who do that he will refer me to, but he refused to give me any names until they're sure they can't offer me anything. :)
My mom was devastated and Jason's parents (though they didn't tell us directly) didn't like the idea but all three sets of parents are supportive and hoping for the best for us.
If Galusha can offer me a job we'll be moving in late January, if they can't we'll wait until April because Jason won't start school until then at the earliest. It's going to be another interesting roller coaster.
A friend called and we laughed that we were both begging for the day when we'd get a steady paycheck and now that we've got one we realize that all steady paychecks are not the same. Especially with the rental market as it currently stands.

Other than that we're doing well. We made it through another week and our pretty princess is at the top of her game. We got an amazing sale at Toys R Us and walked away with gifts for the next 3 years for an average of $7 a game. I'm most excited about mousetrap and twister, both of which are personal favorites of mine. (of course they're both 6+ but we'll see what we can do to introduce Twister earlier :-)