Fall and new beginnings...

Fall is my favorite time of year!  The orange pumpkins, hot cider, apple pies, hot ham & rolls!  I haven't posted in a while.  Maybe it's a little annoying to some but I've been doing so much lately!  Since being laid off from MGIC 2 1/2 months ago, I haven't had time for my blog.  I usually did it at work!  I'll try to quick update you all on the last few months.  I job hunted like crazy most of the month of August.  It was stressful and depressing.  There were some days, especially right after being laid off where it took me a couple hours to get out of bed.  But I did and I applied like crazy, refined and tuned my resume several dozen times, talked to recruiters, had many phone interviews and a few in person.  Right before I went to the Bahamas with my wonderful Aunt, I had two potential opportunities I was excited about.  It was between BMO downtown Milwaukee or The Gehl Co. in West Bend.  After returning from an awesome trip I met with both companies and got an offer from BMO before I even got home from the 2nd interview!  So I began my job at BMO two weeks ago.  I'm a Project Leader for the AML (Anti-Money Laundering) Technology & Analytics Group.  I have a really positive boss who the whole team loves working for and my team is full of nice, normal, hard-working people.  My salary is better, I get a pension!, and the vacation and sick time is so generous.  I feel so blessed.  For a moment I wasn't sure I was going to be able to use my education, experience, etc.  I didn't give up hope though.  I guess my persistance paid off but it really couldn't have been done without the support from my incredible husband and family.  Nick always believes in me.  My sister Heidi never lets me forget my confidence.  She manages to have a baby, work full-time, run Ellie and Jack around and do all this other craziness AND still make sure I'm ok.  She's the one that 'pumps' me up.  My parents are always in my corner too.  I had the chance to help my Dad with the siding on their house.  It was so great to be off for two months!  Anyway, to be surrounded by so much love and support really made things easier in the aspect of job hunting. 

So now that I have a job, Nick and I are excited to start thinking about purchasing a house.  We love the condo, the location, and the extra time we have because there is very little maintenance, but we so badly want a house to grow our family and so Silas can play in the yard!  We need a basement for all the baby stuff and extra crap that just seems to never go away.  We need a bigger kitchen for Nick to cook meals and me to wash the dishes :)  We hope to move by spring time of next year but who knows, if we find the right house now then maybe we could move before the holidays!  We'd like to stay near the Lake Country area, preferably Hartland or Merton, maybe even Sussex or Northlake.  We'll see! 

I'm excited to be off tomorrow for Columbus Day.  Yup, banking hours!  Love it!  So I get to spend the day with my sweet Silas.  Like old times.  The months I had off were unbelievable.  Silas and I had the best time.  Here are some pics...