weekend wonders

Mid-Autumn Festival is coming up! :D We enjoyed some mooncake while we stopped at my parents’ over the long weekend.

 

The next stop was Mike’s parents’. Ballerina flowers on the front porch. (Can anyone help me with the plant’s real name?)

 

Then, a game of Mastermind. Apparently awarded “British Game of the Year” in 1973. It was indeed quite fun.

 

The pre-celebration banana foster :D 

 

The pre-celebration animal-farm visit. The animals politely decline our offers of food.

 

A goat peering at me through the fence :S

 

Didn’t have a lot of time before it started to rain and we must head over to the celebration, but I mustn’t leave the farm before visiting my favourite farm animals :D

 

 The celebration! My niece’s plush puppy and I enjoyed a piece of wedding cake after the meal and speeches.

 

The bride made ceramic mugs for everyone! It was an incredible amount of work to make so many mugs. And they were so beautiful. Nothing expresses love better than handmade.

 

Post-celebration, I headed home with thoughts heavy as the clouds hanging over us. Well, there’s my returning to school. And then there was an upsetting news — I found out over the weekend that I wasn’t scheduled to work in the coming school year (I am to be “on call”, whatever that means).

I was only able to work 5 hours a week anyway, so even though extra income certainly helps, losing the job isn’t devastating financially. Actually, the first thoughts that came into my mind when I received the news was: oooh, then I get a day off to craft! And maybe I get to keep Favourite Things Fridays. And the still, small voice in my head tells me that it’s probably a blessing after all:

More time to do school work + more time to attend to my emotional well-being (i.e. crafting) = better results in school work = better chance of getting into graduate programs (if I choose to apply) = more options.

5 hours of work a week at minimum wage OR more options? 

Duh,” says the still, small voice in my head. 

 

So I wasn’t too upset about basically losing that specific job (“on-call” my foot). I think I’m upset because I place a lot of value on having a job, however small that job isAs if others would think of me more respectfully if I can say that I go to work on a regular basis and I have an income. Being jobless is terrifying (even though 5 hours a week at minimum wage with no contract is as close to jobless as one can get without being actually jobless).

That, and I felt totally disrespected, that I was being treated like I was totally disposable and unimportant in the way I found out about my job situation.

Feeling disrespected, for me, is far more difficult to get over than losing a job.

When we got home it was early evening. And as I looked out the window I saw that the sunset sky was purple.

 

… which reminds me of my sister. Her favourite colour is purple and one of her favourite things to do is cloud-watching. Then I remember her attitude of forgiving easily, and always giving people the benefits of the doubts, and always giving her best without thinking about rewards, whether it has to do with financial compensation in a job situation, or people’s recognition in a volunteer situation. 

Then I thought if it would be possible for her, then it would be possible for me, too, to let this all go. And move forward. Start afresh. Who knows what open doors tomorrow may bring.

Indeed, school starts tomorrow :D

Thank you so, so much for your encouragement after my “back to school” post! I will carry your wise words with me as I step foot in the classroom tomorrow.

All my best wishes for the new adventures in your life this fall!

 

 

 

6 thoughts on “weekend wonders

  1. Hi! Just bopped over here after seeing your monster phone cases on Tangled Happy. The flower is a Fuschia

  2. first of all, don’t you just LOVE love instagram for those easy, pretty shots? I love your pretty shots. And the clouds WERE amazing. It lit up Hamilton’s sky like a pretty painting last night. I think no job is alright perhaps for a while, you’ll have so much to deal with in this first year I think you just need that time to focus on that, and with that extra day to rewind and relax. =)

  3. The first time I went to San Francisco was in 1976, and I bought some lotus cakes in Chinatown (very similar to those moon cakes you mentioned but with a flaky crust). When I bit into the first one, I thought I’d died and gone to heaven. Unfortunately, we were already on the freeway coming home. I wanted to go right back and buy more! I have had a few more over the years, but darn it, they’ve never tasted as good as those first ones. Thanks for bringing back that memory :-).

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