a bittersweet day.

I think I realized today that I am growing up a lot faster than I recognize. I get excited and forget about right now and think about a few weeks when I leave my home and living in an apartment 800 miles away and really making my own decisions.

Today was my last day of work, and all day I was trying to figure out my feelings about all of this. First off, working at a Ben Franklin Crafts and Frames is probably the best thing that's happened in my life so far. I truly believe that this job has made me more outgoing from helping customers. I think I've matured. I can handle talking to and helping people that are twice my age and it doesn't make me nervous anymore. I also know that working in an environment with creative people has brought out my craftiness and I'm not afraid to hide it. I'm still trying to figure out "what I want to do with my life", but the employees of Ben Franklin seriously boosted my confidence about my talents to create, so it'd be really cool to design for a scrapbooking company. But basically, this was a bittersweet day.

Completing almost two years of working at Ben Franklin, in my opinion, is a pretty big stepping stone for my life. I have been so used to working the same shifts every week since I was 16, and it's going to be weird to create a new "routine". I left work now to get ready for school, and now that today was my last day, I can't believe it's almost time to start another change or "stepping stone" for my life.

I snapped a photo of the store before my shift started this morning. I love the vintage feel of the sign, maybe because it's probably actually vintage. haha.

When I came to work all the employees gave me a really nice card that they had all signed. I felt really loved! And then when I walked to my department, cupcakes were there because we've all been working really really hard for the past couple of weeks with some big changes going on in the department.

Drew, from the frame shop, gave me a tie-dye pocket knife for school when I do this camping program for a couple of months and Patty, from my department gave me a pillowcase (that of course she made). Jan, fabrics, gave me a really nice hand made quilt that is so so me. Definitely coming with me while I'm out in the wilderness for two months. It's just awesome to know that these people here are going to miss me just as much as I'll miss them.

Note to self: this was the BEST first job EVER.