It has started!!!! (more gratitude)

My new life is finally taking a tangible step forward!! It has started!!! I accepted a full-time job offer today with Cornerstone Home Lending and I'm so thankful to be ending this year employed once again. (It really is time to address my sleep schedule now.) Throughout the past five months of searching for jobs, and searching for myself a bit too, I have always held to the belief that the right job would work out in the right place and the right time. Assistant loan processor is probably not the job I was chasing after in my dream-life scenario, but things work out for reasons. And it feels like the right move. Speaking of moves, I'm also planning to take my country, wide-open-spaces self into the heart of Salt Lake City and try out the downtown scene! I've never considered myself a city girl, but thankfully SLC is one of the smallest big cities you could run across, and it has grown on me a lot in the past few months. 

It's been quite the journey this second half of the year. Quite the journey. I'm so thankful for family that took me in and kept me housed and fed and feeling loved, no matter what. I'm thankful for friends who poured out their support in June, and who have continued to support me through my arduous job search. I really do have a TON of friends!!! I'm thankful for Amber, who helped me in the most difficult moments and is now a great friend for doing crazy/fun stuff! I'm thankful for Jenelle, who was basically a therapist to me through a lot of everything. I'm glad she got married so I could meet Dan, a great friend who helped me come to love SLC and believe in myself again. I'm thankful for my adopted ward in Farmington, who took me in even though I'm an outsider. I have made some great friends in that ward, including Annika, who referred me to this job! I haven't feel so accepted and loved in a ward in a quite a while. I'm thankful for dance - the opportunity to maintain at least one part of myself through thick and thin, stay connected with my friends, and perform. I'm thankful for oodles of down time that allowed me to doodle around and start developing a talent that I hope to one day market. Not to mention all the time I had to work on my cross-stitch project. I'm also extremely thankful for the time I've had to go to the temple regularly and feel peace. To build deeper relationships with family members. To better understand how family always loves you and wants to help you... that was a lesson I learned from so many of my aunts, uncles, and cousins. 

And finally, I am thankful that I can go home for Christmas this year. It just wouldn't be Christmas without my mom and dad and a handful of brothers, all of us doing our holiday traditions in Missouri.