A little bit of everything - Part 2

Over the last month there have been some good things and some bad things happening. I'll start with the bad first.

School always has it's disadvantages and after the break when I started my lizard project I thought things were going pretty well. Although I had to change my project to study tigers everything seemed fine until in the last few weeks all of my assignments were due  and the stress was rising with the deadlines. After spending hours on a huge assignment I finished for the day and had just a few more assignments to try and finish the next day (Saturday). The next morning I opened my computer to find that it would not open windows at all! I did everything from dismantling my computer to reading forums on Matt's computer only to decide it had completely crashed. Luckily the assignment I had finished the previous day I had e-mailed to the tutor and was able to retrieve it to turn in and all of my other assignments I hadn't started and just needed my articles which were on an online server. A friend tried to retrieve my files only to discover the hard drive had a damaged partition and he didn't have the time to do it. I'm currently still working on retrieving my years worth of photos, movies, documents, and music from that hard drive. So I used Matt's computer for the rest of my assignments which did not have powerpoint on it. In order to get powerpoint I somehow erased all of his office products and we ended up using a free trial of Office 365 so I could complete my presentation. Whew!!

We did see this once at least!

If that wasn't enough...I went on a mandatory boat trip for one of my classes that ended up making me very sick. I was so excited we were going to see so many cool wildlife, but the weather was so windy that we stayed in the harbour forever spotting birds, then when we got out the waves were so massive that even though we spotted a whale or two you wouldn't see much before another wave hit. To add to this I was VERY tired and FREEZING! My friend next to me was a little sea sick and threw up a few times, and after a while I just wanted to sleep. The teacher came to chat for a minute and all of a sudden I had to vomit bad! I rushed to the edge and blew out everything I had eaten for the day. It was awful and messy unfortunately. After six hours of sitting in the freezing cold I finally sat in the warm cabin, cleaned myself up, and took a nap until the end. Not a pleasant trip and it took days before I felt normal - it wasn't sea sickness, I actually think I got a cold from it all.

In the end I finished all my assignments on time, but not nearly the quality I had hoped to achieve. Also, I was fortunate that the new Macbook Pro's came out at the end of October so I now have a nice new computer for next year. I need a Mac for some of the audio software I'll be using, and the new Mac's have a lot better battery life!

In the midst of all of this homework craze...Matt and I were able to do some fun things. We had an awesome game night with some other couples in the ward where we played a fun charade type of game. That was a memorable night where I learned the names of some famous people I've never heard of. Another member from church invited us to play a new game called Dominion which Matt quickly fell in love with. I'm sure we will make many more visits in the future to play it. We played Phase 10 with Brock and Kaytlin another night and it was incredible how close it was at the end!! Kaytlin won, but just barely. Also, we took Josie and Lachie Mackie to a place called Flip Out that we had a Groupon voucher for. It was an absolute blast! Luckily I still have photos and videos of that! It's been really awesome to get out and do things with more people!

On the other hand, we have also had some pretty good date nights. We used up coupons to Outback Steakhouse. The food is still great, but Australia your restaurant service is terrible. Our second visit they forgot our onion bloom appetiser and didn't bring the bread out till the end. All I have to say is that an onion bloom is only good fresh. We also went to the newly opened TGIF's which I am happy to announce that Matt loved! Good American food, but unfortunately not American prices. Although pricey, I am hoping we will be able to go there more often because they have a menu with so many good things! Our most recent date night was to see Thor: The Dark World at the IMAX Theatre in Sydney. We had great seats right in the middle of the screen and it was a good movie to see IMAX style. I'm just glad we got groupon vouchers for that because it's so expensive I don't know if we'll do an IMAX full price ever. The night life afterwards was fun too as we watched some street shows on our way to the car park. I love Sydney!

Just some other little things that have happened....

I made the most amazing french fries, but I ate them all so fast I took a picture of the empty bowl.

I also made snicker doodles for the first time with a recipe that doesn't make up crispy! They turned out perfect!

And just for cuteness...I found a big family of duckies as I was walking to the bus stop in Uni.

That's it for now! Hopefully I can be a lot better at consistently posting now!

A little bit of everything

So for the last month I have been keeping track of things to include in my next blog. It didn't take long for the list to keep growing so unfortunately I may have to utilise multiple blogs to explain all that's been happening!

Over the last month we have had wonderful missionary experiences! We've continued to teach with the sisters and one sister called me to say they had a miracle! A spanish woman we have been teaching had agreed to read the Book of Mormon - unfortunately she is not continued with this commitment since then. However, another Chinese investigator named Bob (Qai Shun - don't know if that's spelled right) that we had helped give rides and teach made the commitment to be baptised! (see blurry pic to the right with the sisters)

He asked Matt to baptise which just happened this last Saturday! I have a pic of them all dressed up in white somewhere but I seem to have lost it. It was an awesome baptism though! That night we also went to teach another investigator with a baptismal date this month. Melvin is a soccer player from South Africa and has so much faith! The other investigator we have been helping teach is Will who is has his own holistic clinical practice (if that's what you call it). Unfortunately his dad is severely ill in the hospital and this has really hit Will hard with all the anxiety and he is now taking on everyone from his father's business and his own. That's a lot of clients! We're trying to get him to come hang out, and of course Matt has wanted to have a chat about natural remedies since they are both big into that. We have been sad to see some missionaries leave, but now we have lots of elders in the ward as well. Two of them are Spanish speaking and I'm hoping they will assist the Spanish sister I've helped teach. All is good in the ward here and our little group is slowly growing!

We have had some changes to our home over the last month. Matt spent a holiday weekend and painted all of the doors and the stair railing in our house (see pic to the left of the original door colour and the primed stair rail). It looks so much better!! The other awesome addition has been our adorable kitten Shade! We went to go visit Shade before we could pick him up and Matt had fun with all the baby animals the breeder had including puppies, kittens, and baby chicks as well as stick bugs. He loves to cuddle and play which is perfect for our family. As I study he will play by himself or sleep on my lap. Matt's favourite is the flips and jumps he does. As a bengal Shade will be able to jump three times his length and he has easily surpassed our expectations in jumping. He is also VERY fast and sometimes when he catches the toy he tries to tug it from you like a dog. It's amazing the strength his little 4 lb body has! I've also been able to get him to fetch occasionally. I'll throw a ball and he'll grab it, play with it, and then bring it back to me. He's awesome and such a great addition to our family!

A lot has also been going on in Australia over the last month. A while ago there was the International Fleet Review where loads of naval ships and pirate looking ships called tall ships arrived in the Sydney Harbour. Prince Harry came from the UK to look over the ships from all over the world and ships were open to the public to see for about a week. Not too long after that the bush fires started where many people in the Blue Mountains and other areas had to evacuate. Although Matt and I are far from areas that were affected it was so bad that firefighters from around the country came to help. As for holidays not much has happened. Halloween is not very big here, and of course they don't have Thanksgiving or Black Friday. However, the Melbourne Cup (horse race) is quite huge and there are traditional dresses and hat worn for that day. Although the outfit is mostly for those actually going to the race, apparently some in the work place also dress up.

Well that's it for now! I'll post another soon with more details about my cooking creations, school, books, and fun with friends!