1000

It's been 1000 posts since I first started this blog 4 years ago...A lot has changed since 2005, besides the big obvious one of us having a kid...

Here's the very first blog entry of mine in 2005.

When I look back, I think about politics, where I was living, what I was doing, and what I was wishing for. It really amazes me how in four years the road our lives can take can be so different, personally, professionally, and for us as a collective, both in the community we live in and as a nation.

Technologically, things have changed as well. As you know I don't spend as much time blogging these days. I usually post pictures and continue to blog here just as a more permanent record than the daily repartee of Facebook.

But just in the past couple of years, so much has changed in our lives:

We moved to Oregon to be near family after we learned of Nora's arrival...

We lived with Jeff & Judy for 6 or 7 months until our house in Denver sold...during which time I was hospitalized for 5 weeks (and Nora for nearly 2 weeks since she was 6 weeks early)...

Our move into our house in Salem, as Brian works for a company that keeps him on his toes. As he describes to me what he did today (he's down in Southern Oregon working on Rice Hill and other remote areas), he tells me about this part or that part, and how he fixed or figured something out, and I realize how much HE has learned/changed in the past couple of years since we came out here...

And our daughter has grown and changed, and with each new day, looks at me with increasingly intelligent, knowing eyes. She brings me clothes she wants to wear, can find the letter E and A on the refrigerator magnets, and thinks the dog running by her is a hoot.

I have always loved newspapers...I loved working as a journalist, but I also have to recognize the end of the era, and unfortunately for many of my friends and me, there isn't as much room for writers as there are writers anymore. Sadly, for me, that means moving on. I'm in school at the local college to finish studying the prerequisites of Anatomy, Physicology & other subjects...and I expect to be in nursing school next year. I can't wait to have a new and meaningful career -- one that I hope will not only help support my family, but give me the chance to travel and use my skills to help people.

Since my first post, Brian and I went with our parents and my Aunt to Paris, France...I can't believe it's been 3 1/2 years since that trip...I ache to go back to Europe and MANY other places.

If nothing else, the past four years have taught me that life is short, and the opportunity for travel is even shorter. Oh how I wish I could take Nora everywhere and let her see everything.

It's late, which is pretty much the story of my life these days...I spend lots of time on the computer between online classes and my social life. I love it all.

So here's to #1000 posts to my blog. Thanks to all who have read, who continue to read, and if nothing else, look at pictures of our girl!

---- Jules