Merry Christmas and 2011 Wrap Up!

So....it's been a little while since I posted. Life brought me a little more than I bargained for this last month,so I've been a little busy...and it's been AMAZING! Life can be so fickle. This time it was in really good ways-so don't get me wrong, I'll take it! But, seriously, I was just relating to a friend last night a memory from a year ago now. That's right-it's time for a flashback! A year ago, I was job-hunting, nannying and temping and living off oatmeal and ramen. I took a temp job because it paid really well for just four days of work. The job was a parking survey. So last freezing, snow covered Chicago December, I was walking through the ghetto, checking to see if people pay for parking while wearing a bright neon vest. I wasn't loving it....and then, as I was finishing a particularly sketch block this middle-aged guy came up to me trying to ask me out....and then some older guy in wheelchair (who clearly was not all there) approached me and started yelling-asking me, "Did you put the boot on my chair!?" while trying to attack me. The other guy who had been trying to ask me out wheeled my attacker away, all the while still trying to spit his game amid the obscenities of my false accuser. I just took off running. As I ran, I remember thinking, "What the crap is wrong with my life. I have a master's degree....I have a master's....I have a master's......." It was a good moment. A few days later I was running to catch a bus and ate it really hard on the ice. I mean really hard, like my shoes came flying off...went up in the air and landed on my backside. I wasn't sure if I'd broken my elbow or got a concussion and I couldn't afford to go to the Dr....I wasn't insured...(I did consult with a few of my friends that were in residencies...just for the record...) and I wasn't able to fly home to be with my family for Christmas and I was pretty sad about that. Flashforward, here it is a year later, I finally scored the ideal job, the one I've been holding out for. A full-time public relations position at a firm in downtown Chicago. Legit. Deep sigh....it feels so good. I can't even tell you. As if that wasn't enough goodness for me, I met this great guy! I know right? I found myself wondering, "who's life is this?" and he reminded me that it was mine :). Good things come to those who wait. Life is good right now and I am just so grateful to feel so grateful. I had hoped that by the end of 2011 I would have a full-time job and a good relationship. It took me until the end of November/beginning of December, but it happened. Who knows what life will bring this coming year? I don't pretend to, life can be so fickle, but I will take what I can for now and just enjoy it. Might as well! So my Christmas message to you is a message of hope. Things felt really dark and cold...and it was hard to keep hoping for things I wanted for a while.....so for anyone who may be in those circumstances right now I want to remind you (or share with you)

some words that comforted my longing heart. "Each of us will have our own Fridays—those days when the universe itself seems shattered and the shards of our world lie littered about us in pieces. We all will experience those broken times when it seems we can never be put together again. We will all have our Fridays. But I testify to you in the name of the One who conquered death—Sunday will come. In the darkness of our sorrow, Sunday will come. No matter our desperation, no matter our grief, Sunday will come. In this life or the next, Sunday will come." (Sunday Will Come, Elder Joseph B. Wirthlin) "I testify that bad days come to an end, that faith always triumphs, and that heavenly promises are always kept. I testify that God is our Father, that Jesus is the Christ, that this is the true and living gospel—found in this, the true and living Church. I testify that President Thomas S. Monson is a prophet of God, our prophet for this hour and this day. I love him and sustain him as I know you do. In the words of the Liberty Jail prison-temple experience, my young friends, “Hold on thy way. . . . Fear not . . . , for God shall be with you forever and ever” (Lessons from Liberty Jail, Jeffrey R. Holland) I am so grateful to know that Christmas is the celebration of the birth of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I am so grateful for his atonement and the peace, comfort, healing and hope that that knowledge brings to my life. I am so blessed to know it and I want you to know that I know it. Merry Christmas everyone. I'm wishing you lots of love and a hope for a great New Year! Here's a link for the video Christmas card my friends and I made this year. Enjoy! and seriously....Merry Christmas!