On Being Completely Excited!

I am in such a good mood I just have to tell everyone!

As you probably read before, I am moving to VA at the end of the year.  I am completely excited about this!! There are a multitude of reasons but OMG!!!  I am exceedingly excited about this bakery and all the possibilities.

So the surprising news, I told my mom about moving and the bakery and not only did she think it was a great idea, she has offered to help put me through culinary school!  (I think aliens might have abducted my mother and left a replacement).

The school I am looking at has a 24 week program 5 days a week, 6 hours a day for the first 16 weeks and then an externship for the last 8.  It is an intensive program but I am totally into it.  The cost of tuition is high but includes all the supplies, uniforms, books, equipment and everything else.  I've already filled out the FAFSA and it will cover a small portion of the tuition but I will have to come up with the other $10,000.  I don't know yet how much my mom is going to be able to help but I am also looking for grants and scholarships if any of my faithful readers (HA!) know of anything.  The rest will be in loan form I am assuming.  I tour the school on Tuesday (or maybe today if I can get an appointment. I am too excited to wait!) and assuming I get in and have the money and all, I will start in April.  That means I'll finish in October which is PERFECT timing!

I got home this morning, changed clothes, turned my MP3 player on, put in my headphones and walked to the library and back, stopping for an almond croissant and vanilla steamer on the way.  It has been an awesome morning and I am totally in love with everything coming right now.

Well, that's all for now, I just had to share my excitement.  I am off to see a man about a horse.....or a bank about a loan (either way, right?).


“Dreams get you into the future and add excitement to the present.” --Robert Conklin

On Big Announcements

This is something I have been contemplating for a while now and I think it's time everyone knows.  Let me start by saying this though: for those of you that speak to my mother, I have not told her, please do not mention it!! I will tell her myself when the time is right.

SO, the big news.... While I love Portland dearly and it will always be a place of wonderful memories, I will be moving back to Virginia at the end of my lease in October.  (DUN DUN DUUUUUUUN)

Right, anyway, there are a number of reasons for this move, first and foremost being that I want to be closer to my family.  My dad, my grandparents and all my aunts and uncles and cousins are on the east coast, from North Carolina to West Virginia.  The closer I get to starting a family myself, the more I want to have them nearby.

The second big reason is that a friend of mine and I are looking at starting a bakery to go along with his graphic design studio (www.rappsodystudios.co.cc).  I know that, outwardly, this doesn't make a whole lot of sense but I promise it does.  We will have a store front and cafe but then we will also have an "edible marketing" division.  Customers and companies will be able to get cookies, candies and chocolates custom designed by our graphics team! It's going to be awesome!!!!

I will be moving to an area a little West of D.C. and a bit North of Richmond, though the exact location is TBD.

For those of you that know me and know my aversion to VA, rest assured, I am not making this decision lightly.  I will not be anywhere near the area I grew up in and I think I will actually like it.  I feel amazingly good about the whole thing.  I feel more at peace with this turn of events and the timing and the future than I have in a long time.  I know it's the right thing and I am completely excited!!

I am going to enjoy Portland to the fullest while I am here, going out with friends, exploring Oregon.  I have a new roommate that I am counting on to show me a good time.  ;-)  I love Portland, I love Oregon and I am sure I will come back here many, many times and maybe even move back someday.  For now, though, I feel in my soul, in my gut, in my heart, what ever you want to call it, that it's time to go home.

On 2010

Well, it is officially a new decade.  Thank god.  That last one was getting highly tedious. 

I was talking to a friend, we'll call him William, recently about our past relationship (we dated in high school) and I asked him what had attracted him to me (other than my stunning good looks, of course).  He said that initially it was my confidence as he watched me audition for a play and then he fell in love with me because of my strength and courage and determination.  I wasn't going to let anyone stop me from doing what I wanted with my life. 

I thought about this a lot and I realized that all the reasons William had for admiring me and loving me all those years ago are gone.  It was right after I left him that I started my 10-year relationship run and I have lost most of who I was.  I miss that person.  At the time, I was using Rose Myra Avery as my name, trying to change it.  It was my stage name and I was determined to become famous.  I was a different person back then, especially when I was Rose Avery. 

I have decided to use this year to work on becoming the person I was on my way to then.  It is a whole new decade, it's time for a whole new me.  If I am going to find the man of my dreams, I've got to be the person I want to be.

So here's to you, 2010!  May you lead us into a better time and a better life. Let the lessons we learned in the last decade make us wiser for the next.