Letting the Love Live On

When I was in Romania I loved writing my blog posts. I looked forward to them every week. Not only was I eager to share all of my crazy adventures and brag about my wonderful babies and experiences, but I loved the simple act of writing. It was a passion I discovered in Europe, but did not bring home with me when I returned to America. Since then I often think about writing blogs and get excited when I actually sit down and pull up a blank page. However, I soon get overwhelmed, or underwhelmed, about what to write about, and instead of releasing my many thoughts and ideas, I give up and close the computer. In Romania, I had an easy focus and often found myself refraining from pouring out pages upon pages of writing. Now, I feel as though my life is extremely ordinary and my writing would just be a summary of my boring life events. I still think that every day brings an adventure, but they are adventures that only myself and Tyler embark on and I’m afraid that no one else would find them interesting. So, I decided to return to my old focus and incorporate the lessons I learned in Romania to my life now. Each week or two I will try to think of a new lesson that I learned in Romania and share it with you all about how it is now influencing my life. I always said that I wanted the influence that my kids had on me to have an influence on the whole world, and this is one way that I can help make that happen. And, since a few weeks ago marked my two year reunion of meeting the kids I worked with-I figured the timing was perfect.

The first lesson:  Be thankful for literally everything you have.

For those of you who did not get to read my posts about the kids in the orphanage I worked in, I will give a short summary. Almost all of the kids have disabilities. Many have multiple disabilities and some do not even have their sight or hearing. I still remember the feeling I would get when I would simply place my hand on their tummies and see the brightest and most joyful smile appear on their face. Or when one of the girls was learning how to walk on her own and after taking each step would look up into my face and show me how proud she was and seek praise with her eyes because it was her only form of communication. Not only did I have a language barrier with the kids, but a communication barrier of every other kind except for smiles and giggles that they would reward me with. Other than a lack of communication, these kids also had a lack of clothing, toys, families, and most importantly: love. Spending my time with them made me realize how thankful I should be for literally everything I have in my life. When I returned home I thought about how grateful I was to be living in the United States and made a point to appreciate everything I have been blessed with.

Each day I find myself thinking about my kids and how much I miss them. These thoughts remind me to be thankful for what I have and to appreciate them more openly. So in honor of them, here are some things that I am thankful for this week:

1. I am thankful for a home that I get to share with my wonderful husband. We just recently moved to Provo and although it is not as nice as where we were previously living, I couldn't help but constantly think about how I am thankful that it has a working washer, does not have a crazy bird living in my pantry, and does not have exploding pipes in the kitchen (read some of my first few posts of living in Romania for those stories). And I will FOREVER be thankful that it has a working toilet. I will always be thankful for a working toilet.

2. I am thankful that I was able to get an education and have an amazing job. I complained about school a lot. I wanted to be done and move on to the more exciting parts of my life. But now that I am done with school, a part of me misses it. I think about all of the things I learned and experiences I was able to have and the people I was able to meet. In fact, if it wasn't for school, I would not have gone to Romania. So really, I will forever be thankful for school. My schooling also allowed me to find my job. I love working with the students that I work with now. In a way I feel as though I am honoring my kids in Romania. I am drawn to children who struggle with communicating and learning and I want so badly to help them. I saw it in Romania, and now I get to see it every single day and hopefully make a difference in their lives. My kids in Romania will never have the opportunity to attend school, meet new people, and have those life experiences that come with it. Thinking about this makes my heart break and I want to live life to the fullest simply because I have the ability to do that when I know so many others don't.

3. I am thankful for food. This one you may think is silly because I've always said I was thankful for food in the past, but I am REALLY thankful for food after Romania. I am thankful that I can cook whatever I want to in a fully equipped kitchen whenever I want. I am thankful that we have so many choices of fast food that I can drive to within 10 minutes. But first and foremost, I am thankful that cabbage is a rarely used and easily avoidable in the American diet.

4. Most importantly, I am thankful for family. Seeing my kids find joy in life through the simple things would always make me smile. However, my heart always ached for them knowing that they would never know the true joy of having a family and feeling their love. My family has always supported me and loved me unconditionally. My husband does so much for me and makes me feel confident and loved. My new family in law has accepted me and loved me as their own. And my many friends have shown their support and appreciation for me as well. I cannot think of words to express how thankful I am for all of them, but I only hope that I can show my love and appreciation for my family and friends in my life. So from my very full heart: to all of my friends and family reading this- THANK YOU! Thank you for reading my posts when I was in Romania and thank you for humoring me long enough to read the one's since and letting my beautiful kids in Romania continue to influence you for the better.

So this week try and think about something you are thankful for. One of my favorite quotes is, "Look for something positive in each day, even if some days you have to look a little harder". I know it can be difficult on those harder days to find something to be thankful for. Even if the positive event is simply making someone else smile, or being able to eat your favorite candy bar, it is worth being thankful for.

The Simple Adventures of Life

Hello friends, family, and strangers who are reading this. I have not written a post in a while so I thought I'd throw one together to update you on my incredibly interesting and adventurous life. Just kidding, its pretty ordinary at the moment but honestly-I wouldn't have it any other way. At the moment there are four different categories that make up the life of Carrie Schow. Those categories are (in no particular order) 1. School 2. Work 3. Tyler 4. Personal Free Time. As you can tell I live a very original and exciting life (sarcasm again). So if you don't mind me rambling on about what I am spending my time doing these days, please continue to read on. If not, well at least you got the summary.

1. School
77 DAYS UNTIL I GRADUATE AND CAN END THE ERA OF POINTLESS LEARNING IN MY LIFE. I'm totally kidding about the pointless learning. I think a education is very valuable and I enjoy learning about how tiny humans develop. My graduating degree will be a Bachelor in Family Life with an Emphasis in Human Development. This semester I only have 1 class that I have to attend and the rest are online. Luckily, all of my classes are interesting so I am fortunate to actually enjoy the final semester of school. Overall, choosing to study human development my freshman year has been one of the greatest blessings of my life. I love learning about children and why they are the way that they are and how to best help them develop healthy relationships, personality traits, and habits. More importantly, it has totally prepared me to be mom of the year someday. Or at least not totally screw up my future children. Also more importantly, choosing this major has led me to my current job which I absolutely love.

Typical selfie

2. Work
When I would tell people that I am studying "Human Development" they usually would look at me rather blankly and say "oh that's cool. . ." take a long pause. . . and then say, "So like...what do you wanna do with that?" (Or in other words-what the heck CAN you do with that???). In my mind I'd be saying something like "Be a mom, duh" or "I have absolutely no clue to be completely honest". But I would usually tell them, "I'm not sure yet but something that involves working with kids". Well everyone-I have found that something! I currently work at a public charter school with elementary school children in the Special Education Department. When I chose to take this job many people warned me that I would get burnt out and that it would be exhausting. Well guess what? I'm just about burnt out and I'm exhausted at the end of every day. But the kids that I get to work with are some of the funniest, sweetest, sassiest kids who I absolutely love. They make me laugh every single day. At the same time, they make me chase them down the halls or hand me snot filled Kleenexes every day as well. But I always come home with a new story and reason as to why I love my job. It is very rewarding and I love watching them learn and grow.

Us just livin' life

3. Tyler
Well, we're just about at our 7 month mark of marriage! So far, it has been totally awesome. This semester Tyler is also taking mostly online classes which makes his work schedule much more flexible. He has been jumping around new accounts at work which has influenced his hours a little bit but we are on a mostly regular 8-5 schedule together. He decided to run a marathon in June which he is training for. I decided to do something totally absurd and signed up for the 10k (in the same race). I have never run that much in my life so we'll see how it goes. We are currently teaching the 5-6 year olds in Primary which is fun for us most weeks. Just kidding, we love our kids. All I really have to say about Tyler is that he's the best. I leave our house every day already missing him and come home as excited to see him as I was when we first started dating. He really is my best friend and I can't imagine going through life without him.

On our way to teach our Primary class... apparently we enjoy taking duck face car selfies...

4. Personal Free Time
To be completely honest most of my free time involves catching up on the latest episodes of This is Us, Greys Anatomy, The Good Doctor, and The Bachelor. However, I do keep up with cooking, cleaning, laundry, and taking care of our five chicken children (Matilda, Delores, Francine, Georgia, and Nugget). I think the chickens and I are finally bonding. Oh yes-I also spend a few hours every few days trying to motivate myself to spend 30 minutes on the treadmill. . . ya know, 10k coming up and such?

Well that pretty much sums up my life. I am not exploring the islands of Greece or enjoying the beautiful streets of Italy like I was a little over a year ago. But you know what? I am exploring what it is like to be a wife and enjoying the new experiences I have each and every day. And that is why life is so, so good.