bluebonnet season is my favorite time of the year. bluebonnets make me happy to live in texas. that lasts for about 3 weeks, and then i'm over it. once they die, i want to move to virginia to see the cherries blossom. someday...
it's been 2 weeks today since my store opened and life has been crazy ever since. we're pulling 11 hours days still, 6 days a week, and running on pure adrenaline. the money is coming in slowly, but i think it might take awhile for people to know that we're open.
being in charge of a big store is a weird feeling. i've done challenging things before and had a few cool jobs, but there's nothing like knowing you're completely responsible for a very large store, thousands of dollars, a fulltime staff, keeping the landlord and all the customers happy, and being the face and voice of the business. in the last 2 weeks i've had to become very comfortable with saying "i'm sorry, that's my fault." even when it's not my fault, it is. that's a great feeling, isn't it?
and now that i'm managing, i can't just decide to call in sick when i wake up and don't feel like working. when i was working at ken's store, i called in probably once a week because i thought i really couldn't work. and the days when i didn't call in sick, i would still walk around looking horrible and making little effort to hide the fact that it was a bad day. why ken asked me to run one of his stores, i have no idea. but i've learned very quickly that i can't just not go to work. and i can't mope around and complain all day because i have employees who want to sleep in just as badly, so i have to be cheery and try to make it a fun place to work, even on a rainy day. all that probably sounds stupid, but it's all new to me.
well all of us in this house are kind of "orphaned" this week. dad's in hawaii and mom's in canada so we've got the house to ourselves. we're living on our favorite foods--french toast, cookies, drpepper, pizza, and hot chocolate. you know, a healthy, balanced diet to make the parents proud.
it's 8:30 and we're all going to bed. we're so not cool.
goodnight...
3/30/07
3/18/07
choose life
the weekend...
the krawczynskis (bosses) sent me flowers at my store on friday. i love flowers, but then, who doesn't? i put them right beside my computer so i can see them and smell them all day. almost every customer has commented on how beautiful they are...
emily spent all day at work with us on friday and got way more accomplished than the rest of us combined. plus she kept us company and kept us laughing even when our computers crashed. she was definitely the hero of the day.
after we closed, emily, beth, and i met aubrey and tami to shop for summer dresses and church clothes. it's so much more fun to go shopping with alot of people, especially sisters and best friends. it took a long time for us all to find things we liked, but we eventually found what we needed and we voted on what looked best on which girl. and so we walked out exhausted but happy.
emily spent friday night at our house and went to work with us again on saturday morning. she was even more heroic than the previous day. i never thought those back rooms would shine like they do now. :) we exceeded our goal on saturday by about $300 and ken and i were stunned by how much traffic we got in the first 2 days.
last night after closing, ken and kristen took me out to a very nice dinner to celebrate the new store opening. i've never been anywhere nicer than chilis, so it was very exciting to dress up and eat fancy food. (of course i forgot my camera.) as we sat there talking, i was once again amazed at what God had brought into my life. for my whole life i thought that by this year i would already be a nurse, possibly in med school, and definitely in my own house. i'd be the picture of health and wouldn't have any problems, and i'd spend my time taking care of sick, sad, or needy people. i thought i'd have too many friends to know what to do with, i'd most likely be married, and probably even have a baby or two.
okay, okay, obviously God laughed at my plans. not one of those things that i was planning is true right now, and most of them probably won't ever be. i've spent the last 2 years frustrated, angry, and more than a little confused about why God was allowing these things into our lives. i know i'm not the only one in my family or my church who has spent night after night wide awake, begging and pleading God to have mercy and change our circumstances. it's interesting to look back and see that, most of the time, God didn't remove the trials or pain, but His mercy was shown instead in the strength He gave us to endure, the peace we felt as we waited, and the relief that was experienced through a church that truly "bears one another's burdens."
so...i got completely off topic. anyway. i guess i was trying to say that even though this life of mine wasn't exactly what i wanted when i was 16, i'm trying to remember that "His ways are not our ways." i'm trying to pray for contentment now instead of for a different life. because really, we have great lives.
3/16/07
store
we opened my store today! after 4 months of nonstop gutting, clearing, purging, and scrubbing, we finally unlocked the doors. today was our original open date, but we didn't decide for sure until last night. while i was with my boss at the store yesterday doing last minute tagging and merchandising i evidently had a pretty scary seizure. although i don't remember a single thing about it, from the way ken, my parents, and the doctors describe what i was like, it was definitely my first external seizure. so despite my protesting and yelling at work, mom came over to pick me up and took me straight the er. the good thing about seizures is that you get in right away! :) anyway, the doctors gave me the regular morphine/phenergan cocktail and ran a few tests. i'm supposed to be back in for an mri and some middle-of-the-night eeg's in the next 3 weeks. the worst thing was that i got my driver's license taken away for about 6 months.
my best friend emily came down from moody on spring break and it's so good to see her again. she actually got in wednesday night and then the first time i saw her, she was sitting with me in the emergency room. she stayed all day with me and then came early this morning to drive me to work. she ended up staying at my store and doing 10 hours worth of work that we never have time for. she's amazing!
the kids have all worked hard this week...
this is kevin's favorite part of the store.
this is half of the bow wall that aubrey set up for me. i couldn't fit them all in one picture!
more pics tomorrow. i forgot i had the camera until the afternoon, so i'll take some pics of the actual sales floor tomorrow.
please pray for no more seizures and that my body would tolerate adjusting to the new fulltime workload, and for my boss and coworkers who choose to put up with me while i make this transition.
3/12/07
"purge" is the motto of the day
okay, so my store is opening in 4 days. i'm going back and forth (sometimes in about 10 minutes) between freaking out and being cool about it. we're now spending around 10 hours every day over there and it's finally looking acceptable. i thought that before i post pictures of the store as it is now, i will post some of what it was like 2 months ago when we "moved in". keep in mind that when these pictures were taken, we had already cleared tons of stuff out of there. this place was trashed...wall to wall, floor to ceiling. and this is just the back room. i had no way to take a picture of the main part of the store because...well, it was bad. but we had fun anyway....
beth found her one true love,
and victoria (my boss' daughter) and i found some unfortunate matching shirts. we didn't keep them.so you can see why we've recruited help. alot of people (mostly poor family members who didn't really have a choice) have put alot of time into helping us purge, gut, and redo the place.
we're on our final push to get all the loose ends and last minute maintenance before we let the city in. i'll post prettier pictures soon. :)
3/2/07
work
some of you have been asking about my store so i thought i'd give everyone a little update. i'm over there almost every day cleaning, sorting, organizing, and moving everything. the place was so disgusting when we first got in...i can't even describe it. i've recruited anything that walks and breathes to come help me get the store ready to open, and after 5 weeks of scrubbing and filling the dumpsters about 200 times, it finally looks like we've actually done something. tomorrow we're power washing the floors...yes, "we". my boss says it's because "we" are cheaper than "they". my computers are coming on tuesday, and we should also have phone and internet service by the end of the week and i think by then we should be almost ready to open.
since i'll be managing the store, i decided to try and meet all the store owners in our strip and be really nice to them. i've learned that it's a good idea to make friends with neighboring businesses, because if you run out of pennies or toilet paper, you might have to go beg. most of them are really sweet, middle-aged, self-employed people who probably have no lives outside of their little stores. they all congregate during their "lunch breaks" and talk (read: gossip) outside about the landlord, how "hot" the ups and fedex guys are, their arthritic cats, the mean lady at "curves" who will never come out to play, and debate whether they should ever eat at taco bell again. when they see me scrubbing down shelves or kicking over buckets to make sure there are no mice, they will bang on my door and motion for me to come out and talk. i usually welcome the break and go unlock my door for them. since they are all in their 40s and have all been there for 20 years, i'm kind of like new meat for them. they all want to give me advice and warnings and phone numbers and "secret passwords", but always seem to work the stories of their dying cats and boyfriend problems in there somehow. while i'm standing there listening i can usually hear the voice of my brother in my head saying, "you have no life! haha!"
anyway, enough about midlife crisis drama. my favorite people are the ones who own the bookstore right next to me. they're hilarious and frequently come hang out in my store where it's quieter. (quieter than a bookstore?) one of the ladies there started a ministry where she ships boxes of clothes, books, and toys over to the ukriane to missionary families there. she wanted to know if we'd be willing to help, so i've been giving her all the clothes and toys i can't sell. so far she's picked up three truckloads of stuff, which really helps me out because i don't have to cart it all over to goodwill. in turn, the bookstore gives me all the parenting and children's books that they don't sell, and i put it on my shelves where it will probably sell more quickly. and, they have free coffee. who doesn't love that?
so...that's about it. i'm still trying to get used to the fact that this is my job and this is what i'll be doing for awhile. it's probably one of the last things i would have chosen to do. in fact, i remember telling my parents "that is the last job i will ever take. it's a complete last resort." if i'm still honest, it's not what i really want to be doing with my life right now, but it's what God's given me. so...a lesson in being content? probably. and another lesson in trust, which i think is God's favorite one to give me.
since i'll be managing the store, i decided to try and meet all the store owners in our strip and be really nice to them. i've learned that it's a good idea to make friends with neighboring businesses, because if you run out of pennies or toilet paper, you might have to go beg. most of them are really sweet, middle-aged, self-employed people who probably have no lives outside of their little stores. they all congregate during their "lunch breaks" and talk (read: gossip) outside about the landlord, how "hot" the ups and fedex guys are, their arthritic cats, the mean lady at "curves" who will never come out to play, and debate whether they should ever eat at taco bell again. when they see me scrubbing down shelves or kicking over buckets to make sure there are no mice, they will bang on my door and motion for me to come out and talk. i usually welcome the break and go unlock my door for them. since they are all in their 40s and have all been there for 20 years, i'm kind of like new meat for them. they all want to give me advice and warnings and phone numbers and "secret passwords", but always seem to work the stories of their dying cats and boyfriend problems in there somehow. while i'm standing there listening i can usually hear the voice of my brother in my head saying, "you have no life! haha!"
anyway, enough about midlife crisis drama. my favorite people are the ones who own the bookstore right next to me. they're hilarious and frequently come hang out in my store where it's quieter. (quieter than a bookstore?) one of the ladies there started a ministry where she ships boxes of clothes, books, and toys over to the ukriane to missionary families there. she wanted to know if we'd be willing to help, so i've been giving her all the clothes and toys i can't sell. so far she's picked up three truckloads of stuff, which really helps me out because i don't have to cart it all over to goodwill. in turn, the bookstore gives me all the parenting and children's books that they don't sell, and i put it on my shelves where it will probably sell more quickly. and, they have free coffee. who doesn't love that?
so...that's about it. i'm still trying to get used to the fact that this is my job and this is what i'll be doing for awhile. it's probably one of the last things i would have chosen to do. in fact, i remember telling my parents "that is the last job i will ever take. it's a complete last resort." if i'm still honest, it's not what i really want to be doing with my life right now, but it's what God's given me. so...a lesson in being content? probably. and another lesson in trust, which i think is God's favorite one to give me.
3/1/07
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