10 Year Plan

I wish I had the patience to make a 10 Year Plan and then relax knowing I would get everything I want to do accomplished in due time. For me, that doesn't work. I want to do everything and I want to do it all right now.

~ I want to do the Hospital Unit Clerk program and spend a few years working in that field.
~ I want to volunteer for a local health-related non-profit for a few years before doing my Master's.
~ I want to do my Master's of Public Health.
~ I want to do more international volunteer work in a health related setting.
~ I want to accomplish all of this simultaneously and in the next few years. I'm a dreamer.

To some extent, this could work. For example, I have already started the volunteer work and could continue it while finishing my Medical Terminology course. I could then get employment (fingers crossed) in the medical sector while taking my Hospital Unit Clerk program. Once I complete that program, I could potentially move into that career field and then do my Master's via distance education. The tricky thing is, I also want to do the international volunteer work before my Master's.

And where does my husband and family fit in? What if Adam has a career change in this time as well and what if it involves relocating again? What if Adam wants to go back to school? How does 'life' fit into my plans??

I need to learn patience. I want to jump in and do everything all at once, but life doesn't work that way. There's applications to do months in advance, time spent waiting on test results, holidays, and of course, each thing I want to do takes time as well.

And don't get me started on finances...

Honeymoon Prep

As I begin to prep for our honeymoon, I wonder how traditional brides managed trip planning at the same time as wedding planning! I'm thankful for the break in between the two, because preparing for our honeymoon has it's own long to-do list.

We'll be going away for about two and a half weeks in total, so there are some things that need to be taken care of. Here's our list:

-book the dog into the kennel
-arrange for someone to take or babysit our cat (her flea allergy means a kennel would be a disaster)
-pay October's rent in advance
-pay September's phone bill in advance
-get travel insurance (oops! I usually do that when I book the vacation... not sure why I didn't this time)
-get traveller's cheques
-plan a food & souvenir budget
-buy Adam some new sandals
-find a bikini top to go with my bottoms
-pack
-get a hair cut (we both need one, although I could pass on this if time/budget don't allow for it)
-book our bus tickets (part of our honeymoon is spent in a city and the rest in a small village that we need the bus to get to)
-pay October's student loan in advance
-get rid of our van & cancel the insurance
-unplug appliances & give away any food that would otherwise spoil
-get a spare tire, jack and tire iron for the car
-leave a copy of our itinerary and passports with one of our parents

As you can maybe tell, our honeymoon plans changed a bit! We discovered that a road trip across this huge country would take a lot more time than we have for this trip. Although we could just do a partial road trip, it seems a shame to get as far as Ontario or Quebec and have to turn around and miss the Maritimes altogether. We still plan to do that trip someday, but not this year. This trip will be a nice, relaxing couple of weeks lounging on the beach or in our pool in Mexico. Much more affordable!

Excitement!

I just had a great meeting with a local non-profit that provides education, counselling and support to people living with HIV and Hep C. I'm going to be volunteering with them and my first gig is next week! I'll be happily handing out free condoms to students at the college's orientation day. Want free condoms? Come visit me!

Picture Perfect Project

We knew we wanted to do something unique with our wedding photos. We had originally planned on having our favourite photo put on to a large stretched canvas but our budget prevented that from happening.* Somehow we had never really considered the mismatched picture frame idea, even though I love it! Today we decided to head out to our local second-hand stores and see what kind of mismatched frames we could find. We were pretty darn successful, and thus, the mismatched picture wall idea prevailed.

Here's what we did:

Step 1: Scour second-hand stores for cheap frames.

Step 2: Purchase a can of spray paint and some picture hanging hardware (a couple must-have frames didn't have this feature built in).

Step 3: Lay down some newspaper, cardboard or other protective surface wherever you plan to paint.

Step 4: Sand and dust off your frames (it helps the paint adhere better).
 

Step 5: Paint, dry, repeat until each frame is evenly covered. (At this point I also painted the matting that came with 2 of the frames, because dusty rose and maroon just didn't 'go' with our bedroom colours).

Step 6: Attach hardware, put your pictures in your frames and hang them however you like!

We're still working on steps 5 and 6. We're no experts on spray painting techniques, so we ran out of paint with only a tiny bit more painting to do (oops). Then, we also need to have a few more pictures printed to fit the unusual frame sizes we bought. Lastly, we will hang them and enjoy our mismatched picture frame wall!

More pictures to come once the project is completed!

* Note that you can often do this fairly cheaply with web sites such as Shutterfly. They almost always have specials or discounts, especially when you first open a (free) account.