Paper Plates

Life in our house is moving along so fast. When Joel and I were dating and counting down every day until we got to see each other, it went SO slow. Now time is just flying by. These past couple weeks have been especially busy. We had a bunch of friends in town this past week, which is always great. Other than that, we have both been working hard and enjoying spending time with the people around us.
I have really begun to enjoy my job. It was rough at first, since the day can go so slow. However, my manager lets me design anything in the store that I want to and I have a blast with that. It feels really good to have a job that I feel "good at." I have worked at many places that I have been capable of doing the job well, but at this job I feel like I can actually do what I like, and what I am good at. I'm not so big into the sales side of things, but can spend the whole day designing how the front window should look, or the candles. And since we have an endless supply of vases, flowers, tapestry, ANYTHING....its pretty great. I still don't look forward to going to work, but at least I love it when I get there.
Speaking of jobs, Joel quit his job at Conestoga House and Gardens. He had been searching for a new job, but nothing was working out. We both spent time praying about it, and Joel really felt like the Lord wanted him to take a step in faith and quit his job without having another one lined up. He spoke with some influential mentors in his life, and they thought it was a great decision, so he did. He gave them 40 days notice, which is up June 21st. It's a big step in faith, but we both have a lot of peace about it. Joel has begun to line up work in case he still doesn't have a job on the 22nd. The only downside is that we won't have insurance, but we are still working out the details on that. Do we pay a lot of money to be covered, or do we trust that since the Lord has asked us to take this step that he will provide either health or the money to cover expenses? Whatever it is, we know this is the direction we are supposed to be in, and even though it's not an easy decision, we know it is right.
Our cat continues to be disobedient. You wouldn't believe it if you could see him right now. At this moment he is curled up in a big bowl on our coffee table. We always tell him, "You're lucky you're so cute because if you weren't you'd be on the street!" I have never had a cat like this! He has no fear of man whatsoever. Actually, I don't think he has fear in him. When I open the refrigerator, he runs in it and lies down. He jumps up on the table, and I grab him by the scruff of the neck, and say "NO," and as soon as I put him down...he jumps back up! We try throwing things at him, spraying him with water...everything. He is fearless. Unless we grind coffee...he's scared of that.
We came up with a new system for doing dishes. It's called "Paper plates and plastic cups." We don't have a dishwasher, and man those dishes pile up F-A-S-T! Today at church we were talking to a friend, and he said the biggest mistake in their first year of marriage was that they didn't use plastic cups and paper plates. He was glad to hear we were ahead of the game.