Cleaning OUT

I have been trying to get around to cleaning out my pantry for a good while now. It was a much bigger task than I really anticipated, but I finally got it clean and organized again.

Our pantry is a space that the previous owner built in from an outdoor porch. Now, if it were me doing the space, I can promise that I would do it completely differently, but I have to work with what I've got, I guess.

Pantry before: I had already started moving some stuff out when I took this picture.

Pantry empty and clean. Where did I put all the stuff?

All over my kitchen - YIKES!

This one is a little embarrassing. Ha!

Sorted through everything and put what I needed, back into the space. Still not perfect, but looks much better!

Used an old green tea box to organize all my spices. Organization = happy!

Little office space - always been there, slightly more organized. (The jug is our spare change)

5 bags of trash to take out! GOODBYE!

Order has finally been restored!

You can see my counters again!

My pantry is organized and I have one less thing bugging me! What else can I clean out on my day off? :)

Confessions

As I told you before, we opened up our new church last Sunday. We were so excited and the new building is absolutely stunning. It was so much more than we ever expected, and I am so proud to say that it is my church! I hope that last statement doesn't sound vain or materialistic because it isn't meant that way. If you know our church, you know we started in a small suite next to a popular drugstore in town. Once we outgrew that building, which didn't take long, we moved to a building that before renovations, was an athletic club. We come from humble beginnings, so to have such a beautiful new building is just wonderful, and a blessing from God.

I have really been feeling the conviction of the Lord lately. Since I graduated, Hal and I haven't been the best about going to church like we should. Although I often have to work on Saturday or Sunday nights, I still don't feel like that is a valid excuse for not going to church. We are lucky because our church offers an early service that we go to usually. Here recently we would just sleep in instead of going to church, or get up too late to make it to the early service. Our second service, in the old building, was always so crowded, so we would use that as our excuse not to go at all. Now that we have a new, much larger building, we really have no excuses anymore.

Last Sunday during the invitation at church, our pastor asked if any of us just felt like we were straying away from God and felt uncomfortable by this. Everyone's eyes were closed so I don't know if anyone else answered, but I raised my hand to answer yes, I felt as though I had let myself stray away from the Lord.

Jesus has always remained first in my life. I just know that recently I haven't been the Christian that I should be. I went through a period where I stopped growing in Christ. I didn't pray as much as I should have, and I feel like I took things for granted. When I think about how much God has done for me, I am ashamed to think that I haven't been trying hard enough for him.

We talked about John 3:16 in church last Sunday, and how God is such a giving God. Just hearing the sermon on this verse that we all know so well, reminded me of how I need to receive the blessings from God and return those blessings back to Him. I need to do a better job of not only giving my tithes and offerings, but also giving my whole self. I want to use my talents as He has instructed to glorify Him, and I want to use my opportunity as a nurse to share Christ with others. I need improvement in all of these areas. I know that I will never be perfect and that I will always fall short. As humans, this is something we will all struggle with, but I am committed to living my life for Jesus and for following his will for my life.

Hal and I are so blessed, more so than we will ever deserve. If it weren't for our faith in Jesus, we wouldn't have made it through the sacrifice of getting through nursing school. I am ashamed that I allowed myself to stop growing, especially after the blessings that God has bestowed on us since we have been married.

Thankfully, the Lord has already forgiven me. It is my hearts desire to serve the Lord to my fullest potential, and to never stop growing in him. It is also my desire that people see the Lord in me, in my attitude, in the way I treat my patients, and in the way I lead my life in general.

I hope that through this blog, I can document my growth and look back one day at how far I have come.

Favorite Pins

I told you before that I recently joined Pinterest. I love the whole idea and I have quickly become obsessed. Here are a few of my current favorite pins.

I love this one. I so need to hear this on a daily basis!

kitchen inspiration

haha!

Wish I had $3000 to spare on this coat!

So true.

Green is my favorite color, I LOVE these!

Such a cute idea! I would love to turn my rockers into swings!

Stay Tuned!

So as not to go 20 days without blogging again, I have written 4 blogs and stored them! I promise more blogs to come really soon!

See below for yesterday's most recent post/update. :)

Quick Update

It has been almost 20 days since I last blogged, so I am not doing as well as I had originally hoped at getting back into this blogging thing. Every time I sit down to write nothing really seems important enough to share. We are just so normal now. Ha! We have been kind of busy, but I guess that is no excuse for not blogging. Sometimes it feels as though all I do is sleep and work, so on my days off I have so much other stuff to catch up on.

I recently joined Twitter for the first time and I quickly fell in love. I never really got the whole idea of Twitter until I finally gave in and joined. Twitter is perfect for someone like me. I don't like reading lots and lots of details; just a few words that get straight to the point is exactly what I need/love. I am currently following about 30 people, most of them athletes from my favorite teams, sports websites, and then a few friends. You can follow me too - @H2Chafey. (I haven't tweeted just yet, though.)

I also just joined Pinterest this week. OBSESSED! I cannot. get. enough. Check it out if you haven't already.

A couple of weeks ago Hal and I learned our friend and Hal's classmate, David Hortman, died in a helicopter crash at Ft. Benning, GA. It was such a tragedy to hear of his death and Hal and I were both devastated. We attended the funeral this past weekend and I am so glad we did. I was pretty emotional and knew that the funeral would be so sad. The last military funeral I went to, I sobbed through the entire funeral, and I didn't even know the guy (graduated with Hal from the Citadel). David's funeral was so sweet. Everyone spoke so highly of him, just as we expected. What I didn't expect was that there would be more laughter than tears, but it was true. All of the speakers shared wonderful, funny memories of David and there were many moments of laughter during the service. It was exactly what David wanted, though - a celebration of his life. Hal and I were very lucky to call him a friend, and will continue to honor his memory.

We ran our second 5K this weekend. We did the annual Edouard Michelin 5K in Greenville, two years in a row. I was not nearly as prepared for this one as I was the last, and I added 2 minutes to my time from last year. I haven't been nearly as dedicated to running because I am simply too tired from working night shift. It was a fun race, Hal did really well, and even though I didn't do quite as well as last year, I still ran the whole race. It really does feel like such an accomplishment when you cross that finish line!

Hal and I before the race. This pic was taken about 7 am, so neither one of us look stunning.

Right now we are in the process of planning our 5 year anniversary adventure! I cannot believe that in 7 months we will be married 5 years! We have been doing a lot of research and we have made a decision as to where to go, but all the details aren't quite nailed down. I can't wait to share our adventure with you once we have everything set.

One last thing that we are super excited about right now is that our church opened up a new building this past Sunday, August, 21st. It is such a beautiful building and we are so excited about the opportunities for growth!

I know this post was all over the place, but I am trying to keep you caught up on what has been going on in our lives over the last couple of weeks. I am going to try to get better about my blogging. See you soon! :)

So what's really going on around here?

Since I last blogged in October of 2008, our lives have dramatically changed. Yes, there is the obvious thing that I am no longer a full time student, but its so much more than that. If you want to know how our lives have changed, keep reading. :)

Hal is no longer swinging shifts like he used to! Before he was working a night and day shift rotation. If you kept up with my blog before, you know how hard that was on me. I never got used to it, and it seemed to only become harder with time. Well, there are two parts of good news to this story. First, Hal moved to Michelin's North American headquarters in Greenville (so he's no longer working in a plant) AND he is now working 8-5! This was such a welcome and wonderful change for him, and he's been at Michelin HNA for about 18 months. His job now is as an Account Coordinator for Sam's, Costco, and BJs. He loves it. There are a lot of opportunities for him to move up in this position so we are very happy the Lord blessed him with this new job! There is the chance that we may have to move out of state in the future, but I am totally supportive of wherever this job takes us.

The timing of the new job came perfectly, just after I started nursing school. He was home more and we were able to spend a lot more time together.

As for me, school was finished at the end of November 2010. I officially became a registered nurse at the end of January this year, and was offered a job the same day I found out I passed my boards. What a blessing! I had been working at the hospital for about 8 months as a PCT (patient care technician aka nurses aid) so the transition into RN wasn't all that difficult. I was so lucky and blessed to be offered a job in the unit that I had been hoping and praying for, CVRU. CVRU is the Cardiovascular Recovery Unit, where patients come directly after open heart surgery. I started my training there in February, then switched to night shift back in May. Night shift has been a challenge for many reasons, but ultimately I love it.

The one thing that I have really regretted is the fact that Hal and I are back on opposite shifts again. Thankfully, I only work 3 nights a week, so its really not that bad. The very first night that I left for night shift, I cried the whole way to work because I just felt so bad for leaving him! I have gotten more used to it now, and it works out okay. Although my seniority will likely allow me to obtain a day shift position in about a year, I may continue to work nights.

I do have aspirations of going back to school, but that is something that I am praying about right now. I want to make the right choice for my career and for Hal and myself. My current plans tentatively are to be putting my application in for graduate school by the time I turn 30, which will be in 3 years.

We are still living in the same house, and probably will be for a long time. We have talked about, prayed about, and decided not to have children, so our house seems perfect for the two of us right now.

Layla is still as sweet as ever, and more than spoiled rotten. She usually sleeps all night with Hal and all day with me. We call her our "lousy" dog because all she seems to do is sleep!

I hope that I can get back into blogging on more of a regular schedule. I want to be able to look back in the coming years and read what is going on in our lives now. I can't wait to see what our future holds!