If I could only

write as half as good as I photograph, this might be a bit more interesting.

My husband, Eric, has been searching for a job/career since the early part of May.. and it has been a pretty terrible experience. We live in a town with four universities, people come here, stay for four-five years and move away to Dallas to start their career. The people that do live here, have been here for years and years and are here because of their career in education, city council or health care. So there's a pretty terrible job market. For example, he did a job search on Career Builder for full-time jobs and discovered 2,500 possible jobs in Austin, over 1,000 jobs in Lubbock and a whopping 60 in Abilene, most of which are in education, health care, restaurants and truck driving. All of these are important careers, but Eric has no background or schooling in any of these areas. Everything else the pay is not worth his time, or it's in sales. I know, I know... not all of those jobs in Austin and Lubbock are relevant, but it's just an example to show you the market.

So now you're saying.. well why don't you move? Trust me, I would love to get out of this place... but right now some of our closest friends and family live here and it's important to us to cherish those relationships as long as we have them. However, the main reason is money, we don't have the resources to just pick a town, move there, find a place to live, start over and look for jobs. Another huge reason is that I have lots of connections here for my photography business, which is still in the early beginnings, and it was important to both of us that I try my best to get it on it's feet before moving somewhere with no connections.

All of that say.. he finally has his feet in the door with a stable company with a market in Abilene for something he has lots of experience doing, and a nice salary package. He has tried so hard to get to this point. He's sent emails and resumes, and made tons of phone calls and had to take two tests last Friday in Lubbock, and we got a call this morning with the good news that he passed both tests and that someone is supposed to call next week with information about an interview, which will hopefully be one of the final steps. Right now he works as a waiter.. which if you've ever worked in serving, or retail, or customer service, you know it's a nightmare.. and he's soooo ready to get out of it, and people in Abilene tip like crap.

I have been blessed with several photo opportunities over the last few months, of which I am very thankful.. but even still we're barely making it as it is, and our student loans (for those incredibly functional and important college degrees) are about to come with fire breathing dragons and sit on our front porch bellowing out to our checkbooks.

So I'd really appreciate prayers on his behalf. Four months of searching for a job and coming up empty wears on a man and he's just about at his wits end. We REALLY need this job!


On another note my new puppy is finally getting the idea of being house trained, she's been doing soo good the past few days!! Today marks three weeks that Luna has been a part of our home! She is such a joy in my life.

AND.. Sunday is my birthday! The big 23!