Monday, August 10, 2009

personality types, ice skating and soccer camp

Hey everybody!

Just a collection of random thoughts I've been having the past week. Friday was my pre-preliminary skating tests. I passed both the moves and freestyle tests for pre-preliminary. It was kind of fun. I haven't taken a figure skating test in over eight years, so this was kind of a thrill. I'm really enjoying the opportunity to teach learn-to-skate classes, and I'm thinking about maybe teaching some private lessons in the future. It also might be cool to do some adult competitions. We'll see! Anyway, I'm having fun, getting lots of ice time through my job, and I'm planning to try and take the preliminary and pre-juvenile moves tests in November.

Jon and I have also been entertaining ourselves by investigating our personality types on the Myers-Briggs system. Jon's company has every employee take the personality test so that they can learn more about each other and their personality types. Jon tested as an INFP (Introvert, iNtuitive, Feeling, Perceiving) but we think we have him pegged as more of an INFJ (Introvert, iNtuitive, Feeling, Judging). I'm almost definitely an ESFJ (Extrovert, Sensing, Feeling, Judging), although I always test as an ENFJ (Extrovert, iNtuitive, Feeling, Judging). We think we have some of our family members and friends pegged, so watch out, we may just know more about your personality than you know about yourself! If you're curious, you can find good descriptions of all the personality types on wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myers-Briggs_Type_Indicator. It's also interesting to find out what celebrities have your personality type. An example of my personality type is Terry Bradshaw. Haha! I'm not sure what that says about me. Anyway . . .

Before I stop, I'd like to ask you guys to pray for the soccer camp that our church is going to be running in two weeks. Pray that we get the word out and get lots of involvement from the community. We hope that this will be a great way for us to make contacts for launching the church in the fall, and we also hope to see lots of people brought to Christ through our witness there.

Have an awesome day!

Rachel Walker

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Back in Norfolk

Well, it's been about a month since we moved back to Norfolk from State College, PA. A ton has happened since we moved, but it still doesn't seem like it's been that long. I decided I should start blogging again so that those of you who have no idea what's going on in my life can sort of catch up with me again. Also, anyone who reads this and has your own blog, send me the URL so I can keep in touch with you too.

Jon and I have kept busy with new jobs and getting ready for school in the fall as well as getting our new drivers' licenses, registering to vote, having our address officially changed, etc. We've also managed to get in a couple trips to the beach in between.

We moved on July 3rd and my parents were able to come down with us to help us move all the stuff off the truck, which was great! I'm not sure how long it would have taken us to unload the truck without the help of my mom, dad and Josiah. We took some time off from moving on the 4th of July to go to Town Point Park downtown and check out Harborfest and the 4th of July fireworks. Although these fireworks are nowhere near as spectacular as the ones in State College, it was still fun to see them set off over the harbor. My parents stayed for a few days and we did some more moving in, checked out a great local restaurant, and visited the Chrysler museum of art.

After we did our initial settling in, I was able to start a part-time position at a local ice skating rink. I'm working part-time doing general tasks around the rink, and I've also been working as a coach for their learn-to-skate summer camps. It's been so much fun teaching kids again. And I'm getting back into skating a little bit for the first time in eight years. The manager of the rink lets me have some freestyle ice time for free, which really helps. I'm taking two skating tests this Friday, and I've joined the local figure skating club (For those of you who skate, I'm taking my pre-preliminary moves and freestyle tests.). I'm hoping within the next year to get the liability insurance I would need to be able to give a few private lessons. I'm also hoping to be able to work with some of the group lessons during the school year.

Jon's job has been going well, although Jon often is disappointed that he doesn't have more opportunities to be creative in his problem solving. Although I don't fully understand all of what he's doing, currently it seems that he is given plans and requirements by the architects at the firm and just places lights and other electrical components in the right place on the drawing and then runs calculations. He had been hoping that he could be more involved in the design and problem-solving process in the buildings. Maybe that will come. His coworkers are all great people, however, which helps. And there are many benefits to working for this company, not the least of which is job security: very important in this economy. He's working on a military project right now, and it looks like most of the work he will be doing will be on military or government projects with the possibility of some university or private buildings on occasion.

We have also committed to attending a local church in the area. We are going to a church plant called "Awaken Church" that currently only has about six attendees and is led by a missionary pastor. Our sending church is a Grace Brethren church in Richmond. Some of the major goals of the church are to reach the younger generation (under 40) that is leaving the church in great numbers here in Norfolk and VA Beach. Part of this is that they are disillusioned by churches that seem to be characterized by large programs, big buildings and asking for money. Pat Robertson is a huge influence in the Christian community here, and many young people see him as someone who uses faith to get people to send him money and promote a political agenda. We hope to reach out to the young people with a church that focuses on teaching, discipleship, Bible study, service and community. The pastor has a unique vision for the church, hoping to include participants and leaders of all races, nationalities, socio-economic levels and ages. He also would like to eventually see a number of churches in many different areas of the city all under the "Awaken Church" ministry, so that the small groups or small churches would be able to minister to their local areas. Jon and I are really excited to get in at the beginning of this and be involved in teaching and service.

Pray for us as the church is going to be doing a soccer camp the week before school starts and we hope to reach out to the community and strengthen some of our contacts. Jon and I will be helping some with the organization of the camp (neither of us can play soccer). The pastor also would like to try to officially launch the curch in September, so we're hoping to have 12 regular attendees by then. Right now that seems like a really big goal!

The only other major thing that's happened was that we made the trip back to State College last weekend for my friend Lisa's wedding. It was great to see some old friends and Lisa looked great! It was also great to spend some time with both sets of parents while we were there. The car ride was not as fun, though. I don't think we'll be doing that regularly, since it took about 8-9 hours both ways if you include lunch/dinner breaks and getting through traffic around Williamsburg and over the bridge getting back into Norfolk.

Well, that's enough about me. I'm going to relax here in Panera a little more before going to get my hair cut, getting lunch and heading to work. Hope all is well with all of you.

Until next time,

Rachel

Monday, July 7, 2008

So busy!!

Wow, for the first time since the wedding, I'M SO BUSY!

Today was my first day babysitting. The youth pastor's wife hired me to watch their baby girl, Abigail, during the day. Abigail is 10 months old and full of energy. She definitely keeps me on my feet when she's awake. Although very interested in exploring everything in my apartment, Abigail soon became bored and was not even interested in her lunch too much. Thankfully, I discovered she loves going on walks in her stroller and that keeps her very calm for a while. She also loves music and apparently dancing to Veggie Tales songs. :-)

One thing I don't think I've figured out, though, is how to effectively change babies' diapers. For some reason, kids always hate it when I try to do this activity. Not that I blame them, I would hate it too, but it has to be done. Making funny faces seems to work a little with Abigail, but she's still very squirmy. If anyone has any good tips on getting kids to sit still for a diaper change, I'm open to ideas. :-) Other than that, we get along fine. She seems to need a lot of sleep and is currently passed out in the other room in her little portable crib. I'm so glad for the company, but it's also nice that I get a little alone time too.

I also need to prepare for my upcoming trip up to State College. Thursday is when I have my two interviews. I'm leaving from the Norfolk bus terminal on Wednesday morning and will be gone until Friday night. Not only do I need to make sure I have everything in order to take with me, but I need to make sure Jon has everything he needs to survive the three days in my absence. I think he'll be fine, but I'm not sure how well he'll get through it emotionally. :-)

In addition to all that, our building is being sprayed tomorrow for roaches. That means that, tomorrow morning, I need to have all the kitchen cabinets completely cleared out. That was ok the last time we did this, but tomorrow, Abigail will be here, and I'm not sure where I'll put everything. It'll be a little bit of a zoo here tomorrow, but I'm sure it will all work out fine. I'm planning to take Abigail to the pool tomorrow too. That should be fun and get us out of the apartment. Well, I feel a little bit more like a responsible adult with all this stuff going on. Hopefully I can get things in order by tomorrow night so that my trip will go smoothly and Jon will be able to survive here on this end too.

~Rachel

Saturday, July 5, 2008

July 4

Hey everyone!

I hope all of you had a great Independence Day holiday. We had a great day here, despite a small disappointment in the evening. Our plan was to spend some time on the beach here in Ocean View and then head downtown to the harbor to watch the fireworks. We had a great beach afternoon, watched a movie and then headed downtown. We got there in plenty of time and settled in on the Cruise ship pier. This pier is fairly isolated and I don't think many people know how to get there, so we had a great spot to sit by ourselves. The fireworks were scheduled to start at 9:30, but, as we sat in eager anticipation, the thunderstorm started rolling in. At about 9:40, we heard an amplified voice from out on the harbor saying that the fireworks were officially canceled. We couldn't believe that someone thought it was acceptable to cancel the 4th of July! But, we started the one-mile trip back to our car with the rest of the crowd, and then the rain started. Well, by the time we got back to our car, we were glad we had left when we did. We just missed a serious drenching. :-) They rescheduled the fireworks for tonight, so we're planning a mall/fireworks trip again today.

As exciting as the trip to downtown Norfolk was, the highlights of our day turned out to come from other places. First, we had an incredible July 4th lunch. We decided to try making mini hamburgers and cooking them in a pan: something we'd never done before. They turned out great, and when they were paired with sauteed mushrooms/onions and garlic toasted French bread, they were truly the ideal sandwich. I added jalapenos to mine, but somehow Jon thought this was overkill.

The second highlight of the day was an unexpected visitor. This summer, we have sometimes felt as if we are running a hotel for bugs. The building has a cockroach problem, and we tend to get a lot of pill bugs (roly polys) from the nearby flower beds. The other day, Jon killed a very large cricket in the bathroom as well. However, we had never had a guest quite like the one we had yesterday. As we were watching a movie, we looked over and were startled to see a seven inch lizard on the floor. Not as startled as it was to see us coming over to see him, though. He ran out in a hurry as soon as we opened the door. We did get some great pictures, though.

Well, I guess I should end here. I hope you all are having wonderful summers. We will continue to run our petting zoo/bug hotel to the best of our ability until we write again.

~Rachel

Thursday, July 3, 2008

Exciting new developments

Hi!

So, a lot's happened since my last post, and the next few weeks are going to be a lot busier. I'm really happy to have more things going on!

We'll start with what I'll be doing down here. I've gotten a regular babysitting job for the month of July. I'll be babysitting four days a week for a family from our church. Their babysitter recently moved and so I'll be watching their 10-month-old for them. I'm so excited! I'll have someone to keep me company here. :-) I'm planning to go to the library this weekend to find some kids stuff for Abigail.

So, I'll start babysitting on Monday of next week, but then I have another new development. I'm on my way up to State College on Wednesday to go to some interviews on Thursday! I'm interviewing at the Grier School for girls in Tyrone and with a program led by my adviser at Penn State. I'm really excited about the possibilities at either of these places. At Grier, I'd be teaching middle school general science. It's a boarding school that is about 50% international students. It would be a really unique experience and I would love working with them. They also have a really big arts program, especially in music. At PSU, I would have a research job working mainly on the same educational project that I did my thesis on. I would be helping to implement an educational outreach program at Harrisburg High School, one of the lowest performing schools in the state. I'm really looking forward to the opportunities at either place.

I got to get out today a little bit too. A friend from church asked me to go to the mall with her and her little boy today. We went to a big mall in Virginia Beach and just sort of did some window-shopping. It's been great getting to know her and some other church people more. It felt so luxurious to go to a high end mall and eating at a food court. :-) Here I mainly just walk to the grocery store or the library.

Well, Jon and I are off to figure out a way to cash some checks so we can have some money. Have a great July 4 vacation!

~Rachel

Friday, June 27, 2008

Thoughts from Panera

Hey everybody!

So, I still haven't found a job. Man, it's a hard life. Right now I'm sitting in Panera sipping my refillable hot tea and blogging. It's rough, but somebody's got to do it. Jon and I have been finding plenty of stuff to do, even though I am jobless. :-) One of my new favorite things to do is to help out with the food closet at the church Jon and I go to. It's about a 15 minute walk from our apartment, and it's great to be able to help. Some people that come there are regulars who often have large families and very little income. It's amazing to hear some of their stories. Other people there make a decent income, but have just hit a hard time because of medical expenses or other things, so their money is really tight that week. We give out a lot of food too. On Wednesday when I went to help, there were four people outside the church waiting when the closet opened. We probably served ten people that day in the two hours we were open. It takes a while to serve someone with all the government paperwork that we have to do for each person, so the people there seem to really appreciate any of the help they can get.

There's not really that much more to add. Jon gets off work at noon on Fridays, so we've planned a trip to Virginia Beach today. Always fun! Hey, if any of you want to call/write/email me, I'm always glad to hear from you. (Since I don't have much else to do.) Hope you're all having a great summer and relaxing, etc.

~Rachel

Thursday, June 19, 2008

Exploring Norfolk






Hey everyone!

In some ways, a lot has happened since the last post, and in some ways, not much has changed. We've been having all kinds of fun exploring the area. We've been to Virginia beach twice, and Jon is thrilled that he gets to go to a beach with waves. :-) The beach near our apartment is on the Chesapeake Bay and only gets "real waves" when it storms. We checked out the Chrysler Museum of Art once. It was really impressive. I've never been in a serious art museum and I was amazed at how many original pieces they have there.

We also visited downtown Norfolk a couple weekends ago to check out "Harborfest." Norfolk is crazy for festivals. There's ALWAYS something going on in the Town Park along the harbor. At Harborfest, we toured the U.S.S. Wisconsin, one of the only battleships left that hasn't been decommissioned. We also got to meet two of the pirates from "Pirates of the Carribbean." So much fun. :-) I've posted a couple of pictures from VA beach and Harborfest.

We're trying to figure out how to take a trip down to Nags Head to check out the Outer Banks, but we want to wait until the wildfire in North Carolina is more contained. Speaking of fire, it seems to be the summer of wildfires here in the Outer Banks/Hampton Roads area. There's a fire in the Great Dismal Swamp just a little to the southwest of us. Between the NC fire and the Swamp fire, we've had some pretty hazy, smelly days. Imagine walking outside and the whole city smells like a campfire. That's something I've definitely never experienced before.

Jon has been going to his internship and likes it ok. I think he feels a little bored, but I think that's the way a lot of internships go. He likes his boss, though, and he seems really interested in some of the projects he's helping with.

As for me, well, I haven't found a job here. No one seems to want to hire for the summer. They all want people who can actually work for them long-term. What's that all about? My land lady is going to give me some cleaning work this summer because her regular cleaning girl for the apartments is moving. So, that will be something. So far, I've been borrowing movies from the library, reading a lot, and working out a lot. Not so bad really. It's definitely relaxing after finishing student teaching and planning a wedding. Hopefully I'll have more luck with my job search for the fall. Right now I have two potential leads. I'm hoping that I'll have more to post about those later . . . I'll just say that I'm excited about either job.

Well, Jon will be getting home soon, so I should get dinner ready. I hope you're all having a great summer! Will be posting again soon.

Rachel :-)