EDITOR’S NOTE: This is another in a series of articles on the Peninsula Home Fund. The next article will appear Sunday with an updated list of donors to the fund. Please click on the button at right and print out a coupon to include with your donation in any amount.
SEQUIM – “I just feel so blessed now,” says Christi Tangedahl-Knapp, explaining that her life has taken a turn for the better since the Peninsula Daily News’ Peninsula Home Fund helped her to secure a career with better pay.
Christi, 27, had been living paycheck to paycheck at minimum-wage jobs.
A self-described “social butterfly” and “people person,” she decided that her road to self-reliance was at her fingertips – or rather at her future clients’ fingertips.
She set her sights on attending The Hair School in Port Angeles to become a licensed nail technician.
But she didn’t have the money to purchase the required $750 nail kit and other items necessary to start her own business upon graduating.
That’s when the Peninsula Home Fund came to her aid, following an interview and after her job plans had been carefully reviewed by Home Fund case managers.
The Home Fund paid $200 toward the purchase of the nail kit, joining with other local agencies which paid the remainder of the costs.
“The Home Fund really helped me at a time I needed it,” says Christi, adding it was important to her that she not become a woman dependent on the welfare system.
“Because of people helping me, I was able to go school full-time, work part-time and graduate with a career.”
Then tragedy struck.
“I had a miscarriage,” says Christi. She had been pregnant for several months.
She lost the baby.
Then, adding to the shock, the father of their child decided to end the couple’s two-year relationship.
Devastated, she took month off school to recover.
Not long after that, she met her future husband, Richard Knapp.
“When we first saw each other and made eye contact, we both just kinda knew we’d be together,” says Christi.
The two recently married and moved into a rented home in Sequim, within walking distance to Carrie Blake Park.
She is ecstatic that she and her husband are expecting a baby,
Christi also has her business license and has set up a work station at home.
“I’m used to being independent, so now my plan is build up my business and clientele so that if anything happens to my husband I will be OK by myself.”
As Christmas approaches – with a new husband with a well-paying job, a baby on the way and, thanks to the Peninsula Home Fund, a new career for herself – Christi says her life is truly blessed.
