The Road to Paradise: Every Day Life

After a short streak of doing a blog weekly I have failed! Nevertheless that just means I have to start again and keep trying just like every day life.

Here are some highlights over the last couple of weeks:

1. FHE with Brock & Kaytlin

One week we played apples to apples where we decided to play until everyone (specifically me) had at least obtained one card. Who knew that would be such a daunting task? After something like 24 rounds I finally got a card and we could end the game...epic fail for me!

The next week we had another couple (Tom and Jessica Frost) join us and I did a lesson on family history and challenged everyone to explore the family search website (familysearch.org) and obtain their four-generation chart. We are still working on getting Matt's and I definitely recommend all of you out there to do the same!

Four Generation Fan Chart - I'm working on getting the missing data fixed.

2. Young Women Activities

Due to a very small amount of young women for mutual we decided to do a fun movie night at my house. We chose Sherlock (the UK version) in the end and it was just a nice night with popcorn and laughs with our two young women.

The next week we only had one young woman for mutual, but went ahead with our cake/cupcake decorating activity. We had fun using the different tips and tools to create new designs and in the end were glad the young men could help us eat them since we had a lot of cupcakes.

Sarah Scott decorating cupcakes

The few that I made

3. Relief Society Birthday

Not too long ago was the Relief Society birthday weekend filled with multiple stake activities. It all started Saturday morning with a trip to the temple. I went with Cate Lynch and although we got there 30 minutes before the next endowment session the temple worker let us know that there may not be enough seats! We stood in line hoping to make it and in the end we were just two spots away from the cutoff! It was a huge blessing I think because I got to see some new things this time and had a wonderful and spiritual experience.

Later that evening was a pajama (spelled pyjama here) party with all the stake relief society. If I hadn't mentioned it before, my stake is mostly Polynesian which led to quite a wild party. I was looking forward to spending time with some of my ward relief society, but when we got there they split us up into even groups. My group was the purple lilies and although we had some awesome women, not everyone was willing to participate in the activities. Naturally as a younger member of the group I was volunteered for nearly all the activities. I'm glad I went, but it certainly wasn't what I expected and some of the Polynesian woman were absolutely hilarious!

Had to move an oreo from your forehead to your mouth

One woman wearing a balloon tower

To complete the weekend we had a musical fireside the following evening. The talks and musical numbers were amazing! I was also grateful we ended up having a great turnout for our small ward and our song Search, Ponder, and Pray with all sisters sounded great!

4. Searching for....

The rest of the two weeks has been full of searching. Matt is still searching for work, and tomorrow he has been 3 weeks without work! He hasn't been actively searching that much either since it is so easy to just hang around home and watch Netflix shows including Digimon and Pokemon. This week he hopes to really make an effort and visit all the local real estate companies.

I am still searching for other tiger sites for my master's thesis and have not yet had responses to my e-mails. The good news is that I am no longer searching for a desk and can start working in the lab room again. Additionally, today I just confirmed that we can go set up our equipment at Taronga Zoo! I have to leave at 6:30 am to get there by 8:30 am, but at least that leaves me the rest of the day.

Matt and I also had some fun one rainy Sunday morning as we went on an investigator hunt. We had agreed to pick up two investigators for the sister missionaries. The first one we couldn't find the right building but right when we decided to leave and find the next one I decided to try one more building and found the investigator! Unfortunately she was sick and couldn't come, but at least she knows we didn't abandon her. The second investigator we never found as the GPS took us to a bunch of shops and after driving around we had to give up and got to church late.

Small cubby accessorised for cats in the side of an apartment building

Now I am just searching for time to get everything done that I need to such as taxes, prepping the audio equipment, meeting with Young Women, planning a Young Women camp, and more. I've also been really good at working out daily and completed another 7km jog/walk with some strength exercises on Saturday with Cate Lynch! I am still quite sore and apparently need new running shoes.