samuel baby

I used to roll my eyes at friends who showed off their nieces and nephews, and now I'm one of them. As of 10:30 yesterday morning, Stephen and Ashton are now the proud and totally stylish parents of Samuel Martin Jenkins.
And Abby is one very excited cousin. I'm sad I missed the special day, but I'm excited to hit H&M for baby Samuel.

Oh My Abby

I just found this picture on Lauren's blog. I miss this little girl, but how cute is she?

And Maryn took and photoshopped this pic. She (Maryn) is on her way to being a genius photog. Having such a perfect model can't hurt.

showing off

I posted a few months ago about the chapbook project I was working on for my poetry workshop. This is a small collection of poems, most of them written in Chicago. I asked a friend to paint a watercolor of an orange tree--she brilliantly sent me three different options, and this one was exactly what I was hoping for. I printed the first cover page on vellum (classic copy guy question: "You know that you'll be able to see your title page through the vellum, right?" My cranky answer: That's the point), with the second cover page on a linen-textured paper. I spent way too much time cutting the paper down to the write size (yay, Xacto knife!), then folding and sewing the books together (look, Mom, I'm sewing!).

The moral of this story is that I have a few extra chapbooks. So, if you're interested, I'll mail them this week to the first four people who ask for them.

I might be getting ahead of myself

but I have a job interview in 30 minutes. When I left the apartment this morning, I didn't have a job interview today. So I left the house in an old Tshirt (not gross old, but clearly not new) and a skirt. And flip-flops.

Here's hoping the interviewer has a good sense of humor.*




*It ruins the shock value, but for the record, I told her I wasn't dressed for an interview and she said that was fine, as it was so last minute. But I'm still wearing flip-flops. At least I shaved my legs last night.

all is not lost (yet)

Two of my poems are going to be published.*



*"and now they came like rain and were real" and "There are no wings in Ecclesiastes." I guess they like long titles. And I'll post the link (it's an online journal) as soon as they're up.

dis-couraged

I don't know what to do.

I just spent an hour tailoring my resume and writing a new cover letter for a position that was pretty much my dream job. I felt good about my application, I was excited that maybe something good was going to come from all these weeks of waiting. I sent the email and got started on the homework I was supposed to be working on.

On a whim, I checked the website again, just minutes after sending my application. The job is no longer posted.

I know that the employment situation is awful for everyone right now. I know talented, awesome people who can't find a job. I happen to be one of them. But I am so frustrated. How many times am I going to go through the nervousness, the anticipation, the interviews, the waiting, only to find out that I'm still unemployed?

I had this moment last night where I felt like life was looking up. I'm trying so hard to hang on to that feeling and the belief that something will work out. I just don't know how long I can stay this course.

crash course

I need to write a long question-answering post. The problem is I don't have any answers just yet. So here's a pic from my Utah visit--my very fun Utah visit. We danced in the rain, went shopping (a few times), hit Yogurt Stop (a few times), made Chuck Bartowskis (sandwiches), went to the Oquirrh Mountain Temple open house. . . played with sparklers. . . it was a long, awesome weekend.