The last six to seven months have been a little hectic in our household. My husband and I have planned a secret trip/honeymoon, moved across the country, and even added to our family. In addition to choosing these big changes, we have had many things added into our equation that we didn't necessarily expect, the three biggest being COVID-19, stress and anxiety. It has been a whirlwind of craziness and we are finally settling in to where we are at during this stage of our lives. Things are finally calming down in some sense and I want to let you in on what's been happening and what our plans are moving forward.

I had initially put my blog posts on hold without warning due to planning our honeymoon. The schedule that I had initially set up for myself was crazy with our two week trip that we had planned. We had to plan accordingly with Christmas and New Year, being in a whole other country/time zone, and not letting something slip out about our secret. We didn't want my M-I-L finding out that we were going to be surprising her in Denmark and getting to spend Christmas with her and the family there. We were there for three or four days before the rest of the family flew in and we were able to surprise her. Let me tell you, her reaction was well worth it and we had the best time while we were there. I learned so much about the Danish culture, Christmas Markets, the European architecture, and all the ways to ride a bike with your family. While we were out of town, I didn't want to be stressed about making the deadlines that I had set in stone for myself. I wanted to spend the quality time with my husband and with our family; so I did.

After getting home, Justin and I kicked it into high gear with our plans to move away from Kansas City. With constantly looking for houses and jobs, I didn't have time to sit down and work on my blog. Honestly, I didn't take much time for myself at all. We were at an all time high for stress. Moving 20 hours away is not an easy task, but if you're looking for an adventure, I would recommend it. It's hard to leave all you know behind and basically start over but at the same time, it is so refreshing. I feel as though Justin and I have grown in many aspects of our marriage. We were able to learn more about what areas of life really stress one another out, how to work through our budget more efficiently, and how to communicate and trust each other better.

In the midst of us sorting out our move, COVID-19 kind of benefitted us. Isn't that weird to hear?? Let me explain. On one side of things, my current line of work had put a halt on hiring new people. It's dangerous to bring new people into such an important area of work, PLUS the market has been low. It makes sense to be hiring less, with the time being. The company that Justin worked for did not have a location for him to transfer to, so we were both in the boat looking for new jobs. BUT there have been so many companies hiring customer service positions and most, if not all, have been work from home positions! Hiring processes has been moved to virtual meetings, which makes coordinating and scheduling from afar much less stressful. Not only jobs, but the process of renting a house has been made a little easier as well. There are options for virtual tours, you can walk through houses by yourself to keep others and yourself safe, and a lot more communication is done over the phone/email/text. So we have been able to transition a little smoother. It is obviously a bit different than we both imagined but we are grateful that everything always works out the way it is supposed to!

COVID-19 has also been beneficial to our family in another aspect. With the social distancing and stay at home orders that began in March, a lot of pet rescues were trying to find foster or permanent homes for dogs. With less people visiting these facilities, not only do animals tend to stay for longer periods of time, but they also get less human contact. I don't know about you, but if I was left in a rescue facility like them, I'd be super depressed and rambunctious. Plus, less revenue coming in from adoptions - so funds to provide for these animals would deplete rather quickly. We felt the burden for these animals during this pandemic, and rescued Lolah. She has been a fun addition to our family. She thinks she is a 55lb lapdog and loves any and everyone she comes into contact with. With all of that being said, she is a German Shepard/Akita mix, and little did we know, that would cause such a big hiccup with renting a house. Did you know that those two breeds are on the Top 10 Aggressive Dogs List? The ONLY thing aggressive about Lolah is the fact that she can drag you across the ground with how strong she is, and when she jumps up because she's excited, she'll knock you over if your feet aren't planted firmly on the ground in anticipation. We had a lot of renters turn us away due to having her alone, it didn't matter what our employment history, credit history, or down-payment ways. Through all of the headache of searching and asking, we finally found the perfect house for us and BOTH of our dogs, so we jumped on that one and got it! Now we have the luxury of a backyard and no shared walls with strangers. It has been glorious!

We have been in our new home for a little over a month now. Justin and I have both been crazy busy since the move. We have both been working our behinds off with two jobs while we figure out our new budget system. We will be transitioning a bit more within the next few weeks with our time-management and making sure to set our relationship as our top priority! Thankfully our part-time job we work together, so we aren't away from each other for as long as it sounds (yay for CFA). Justin was able to score a solid full-time position with a good company, and I will be transitioning back to pharmacy next week! Yay for not needing our "in-between" jobs anymore! We are beyond grateful for everyone that has either helped us with our move or prayed for us during this crazy period of change for us.

Justin and I have FAR LESS to be stressed and worried about now that the HUGE changes have already happened. But now we are learning to embrace where we are and taking everything new as one step at a time. After New Years, I had a whole blog post typed up, ready to go about our adventure to Denmark, my resolutions for the new year, and the new changes that I wanted to make in regards to my schedule with my blog. In this, I had explained how I was feeling about posting SO often about my experiences with foster care. I found myself getting overwhelmed easily. It isn't easy typing out my life and sharing it with you. It was an added stressor to all that was already going on, so I pressed pause. There is a purpose for me going through everything I did, and for that reason alone, I will continue to share my story, but in pieces. So I will probably not stick to a schedule as I initially planned because I will be taking this one step at a time - while healing during the process.

I hope you have enjoyed getting to know a little more about why I went AWOL. Rest assured, you will hear more from me, whether it be about my foster care journey, my adoption, my marriage, my new business I will be starting on the side, or life in general. It just may be spaced out a bit more.

I appreciate you for supporting, loving, and encouraging me.

Much love,

Kayla Olsen