Babysitting

It's been my first chance to blog since last week. I would say it's been a chaotic week, but I think that's what I say every time.

Wednesday night, we helped out with youth group. It was very challenging for me. I'm pretty introverted, and it was harder when it was with kids that I have a slight relationship with, but am completely removed from their world. And then there were the ones that I hardly know their name. Our leaders did good leading them, considering they have no experience doing it whatsoever. It was a hard night for me, just realizing that I have been removed long enough from this setting to be hard to get back into it, and also that I am one of the adults there now. Kind of scary.
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Thursday I did errands, and then ended up hanging out with a friend of mine for several hours. We went to lunch and then spend a couple hours at the beach. I had not hung out with her in several weeks, so it was a lot of fun.
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Saturday night, we started "babysitting." Caleb's parents are out of town for 5 days, so we moved into their house for that time. We dragged all of our computer stuff over, which has been a hassle, but worth it to me so that I can do school. But I did not think about how noisy it always is at this house!
It is kind of hard to explain, but this is a very open house. The friends of the kids are always over, to do homework or hang out. When we got here Saturday night, there were at least 6 extra people here. It turned out to be awful for my homework situation.

[As a side note, living here cuts down on our living expenses a tiny bit. We aren't paying for food, nor driving so much. Caleb is walking to work like he used to. It's also weird spending so much time here again since I've been away from being here everyday since our wedding.]

Yesterday, I went to lunch with my parents. It was the first time since May when I started working on Sundays. It was nice to get to do that with them again.

After lunch, I came to the in-laws' house to do homework. I had a whole load due at midnight and could not find the quietness to concentrate on it. A group of girls were giving dreadlocks to one of the boys. I was here for the whole process. They started at 3 o'clock and finally, finally finished right at midnight. The boy was in pain from all of the tugging and pulling and the main girl doing it was exhausted as well. They all had homework to finish and had not counted on the process taking 9 hours. It was great entertainment though! I was planning on posting pictures, but they did not turn out as nice as I was hoping.

Today I am to be doing homework all day, yet again. Then we have small group tonight.
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It is definitely fall here. The leaves are officially changing and falling and it has gotten colder. It is sad, because everyone is rooting for sunshine after not having much this summer. I'm looking forward to all of the leaves changing though, so I can take some great photos! I discovered a few days ago that looking up from our apartment, we see the hillside to the north, and it is covered in birch trees and others that turn gorgeous. It will be an amazing sight every day!
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We got our free money on Friday (and got paid!) so that was a blessing. All of it is divided into the separate savings accounts and is set to start earning interest tomorrow!
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At work on Saturday, I got my first Alaska state quarter. Not to sound corny or weird, but it's so strange knowing that I've been waiting for this since 1999, never thinking we'd make it to 2008 to actually get to the second to last quarter. Time does fly by!