The Holiday Season

The last couple of weeks have been eventful and filled with way too many sweets. What else could you expect from the holidays?

Lego Christmas Tree in Sydney

Leading up to Christmas I got to spend some fun times with the young women in the ward. The two oldest girls and I went miniature golfing  and although we gave our best, too often were we beyond the maximum number of putts.

Fekita and I Christmas Sunday

Later for the mutual before Christmas one young woman, Sarah, and I delivered Christmas hampers (from the ward) to people that would be alone for the holidays. This turned out to be an eventful night. One of the receivers of the hamper was not very receptive and practically refused to take it. It was an awkward experience for both of us. As we finished early I thought I would take her to Max Brenner for dessert, but that proved to be a terrible idea! It was nearly impossible just to get into the car park because it was the big night where the shopping centre would be open 24 hours. Although I was able to get into the car park, we gave up and left wasting nearly an hour in the process. After McDonald's we went to drop off some chocolates to another family in the ward. I visit teach the mom, Rashika, and her daughter, Dev, is in Young Women's. We got partially lost getting there, and then took the wrong elevator. For a moment I thought we would be stuck in the elevator because we couldn't figure out where the ground floor was since 0 and 1 turned out to be more apartments. Luckily, Sarah tried the minus sign and 1 (-1) which worked and then we had to wait for Dev. Unfortunately the elevator to Dev's apartment allowed her to come down, but the button didn't work to open the elevator to go back up. We waited for her dad to come down and keep the door open so we could all go back up to the apartment. Their apartment was VERY festive and I felt bad giving them chocolates when they already had plenty. Finally, I dropped off Sarah at home just after 10 pm. What a crazy night!

Our pic to commemorate the night

The other days leading to Christmas were less crazy. I finished sewing the pillow for Shade's window bed.

Matt and I made an orange bundt cake and chocolate covered peanut butter pretzels (Costco pretzels). 

I should add that the three days before Christmas Matt had decided to do a cleanse and was only eating salad and other greens. This made him really moody the morning of Christmas Eve. He needed to finish his cleanse by taking Epsom Salts (a saline laxative), which hadn't yet arrived. We found out that they had come by when we were home, but we never heard them. Later in the day we drove the 35 minutes to some random airport to get the package and discovered one of the containers had broken open in the box. Naturally, Matt's mood wasn't improved. Nevertheless we had a good night watching How the Grinch Stole Christmas and The Muppet Christmas Carol.

Playing with the cat Christmas Eve

A side back story is that my wrists are still sore and I get shooting pains occasionally. Doing the dishes hurts the worst so Matt has been in charge of that chore for a couple of weeks. This means he waits for about a week to do them. Well after all the cooking, our dish pile on Christmas Eve was horrendous! Knowing he wasn't feeling good due to the cleanse I stayed up late and cleaned the whole kitchen - there was no way I was going to wake up Christmas morning to a messy kitchen. I think the Lord must have helped my wrists since they didn't even hurt.

The next morning we were going to make ebelskivers (mini-dutch pancakes) and bacon. Matt wasn't feeling too good so he went back to sleep and I cooked and ate by myself. Needless to say, I was frustrated that my favourite holiday wasn't going so well. I spent the rest of the morning finishing the Book of Mormon that I had been reading since mid-November. In a way, I was glad I had that time to myself and finally completed my goal of finishing the Book of Mormon by Christmas. Eventually, Matt got up and we opened presents, which significantly improved my mood. I've decided I love Christmas because I am terrible at showing affection or appreciation and somehow by giving people meaningful gifts I feel I achieve that. Some of the most meaningful Christmas's for me have been the times I would have been happy with nothing, knowing my family didn't have much, but somehow they sacrificed anyway to give me what I needed or wanted.

This was a cheap pool I got Matt so we can sit outside in the summer and not die of heat!

Matt got me an ergonomic keyboard to help my wrists. It works great, but it's huge! 

For Christmas day we went to the Scott's house for a big linner (lunch/dinner). They are an awesome family and because they have a large house perfect for entertaining we have had many church activities there. Their two oldest girls I know well from young women's so it was easy to feel at home. They also had Bro. Scott's parents and a neighbour over. It was the most traditional Aussie Christmas I have had. Each plate had a Christmas cracker that opens with a pop and has a paper crown, a joke, and a surprise inside. Mine had a lock and key which I traded for small playing cards with their young daughter. We had ham, turducken (chicken within a duck within a turkey), some special meatballs, vegetable salads, and more. Matt and I decided to pass on the traditional desserts of fruit cake, Christmas pudding (looks like soggy fruit cake), and pavlova. We ate plenty of other sweets and Sis. Scott's homemade almond roca though.

He's a teenage mutant ninja turtle!

Our original plan was to go to another dinner and games with Racheal and David Laugery in the ward. Unfortunately, my stomach was really upset! I didn't want to go to their house and feel uncomfortable the whole time with my stomach doing somersaults so we ended up staying at home and watching Christmas movies. In the end I think we had a good Christmas, but it will never feel like Christmas here with the heat and lack of family. Hopefully next year we will be able to afford to go to Utah for Christmas.

With Christmas over I got some good news! My supervisor reviewed my thesis corrections and now I am just getting the final signatures to get it turned in! This leaves me time to work on finding a job and finishing our permanent residency paperwork. I recently learned that the visa we are applying for may have a 1-2 year waiting period. This could be bad for us if we cannot get a bridging visa (temporary visa while waiting on another visa application) or another type of work visa. Permanent residency is definitely a nightmare, but I just hope all will work out in the end.

Monday we went to have a family home evening with Brock & Kaytlin in Penrith. It is so sad they live far away now, but at least we can still hang out once in a while. After dinner and the lesson we played a game that I think is called  Logos. Most of the brands were Aussie so Matt and I didn't have a clue for a lot of questions, but it was still fun.

The following day we went to see the last Hobbit film in the gold class theatre with Brock & Kaytlin. Gold Class is a smaller theater where every seat is a recliner and they have a full restaurant where you can order food beforehand and get it delivered to you during the movie. The food is ridiculously expensive so we brought our own snacks. The movie was awesome, but the theatre was too cold! I was actually happy to go back to the heat afterwards.

That night Matt and I played one of the games that my family had sent us for Christmas (the package arrived the previous day). I was skeptical when I saw how many pieces it had, but it was a lot of fun! Basically you have a certain amount of time to build a ship and then you take that ship through various obstacles hoping to get as much cargo or "cosmic credits" as possible. The fun part is that your ship will change every time and so will the cards so you never know what to expect. Thank you Destin!! Tonight we are going to try the two-player game my sister got us, and perhaps do some New Year's celebrations as well.

Well that's it for the holidays and 2014! This year has been one of the hardest years of my life with the depression, jaw issues, wrist issues, and overall stress! Nevertheless, I have learned a lot about myself and I hope to only improve in the next year. "Tomorrow is a new day, with no mistakes in it." - Anne of Green Gables

Too Much Time

“Time is a drug. Too much of it kills you.” -- Terry Pratchett

Typically I'm really good at filling up time. I make a daily to do list and dedicate myself to getting everything done, but over the last few weeks it has definitely not been that way. When you wake up in the morning and you realise you don't have to get up for anything it is easy to just decide you won't do anything. Although this blog will cover events and things that I have been up to, I will admit that about 80% of my time has been filled up with Netflix, Hulu, and the news. 

If you are wondering about the status of my thesis, the most I can say is that so am I! It's been over a month since I expected to hear back and be making edits. My limbo period continues...

Event #1:

I took a two-day real estate course and got my certificate of completion! This allows me to work in the real estate industry. Unfortunately, I'm not so sure I want to do that. I like my weekends and a lot of property management and sales is done on Saturday. Not to mention when the training woman said that door knocking and cold-calling were part of the daily activities I was not so sure I want to pursue that kind of job. 

I have no idea what I want for a career anymore, but at this stage I just want a job that pays well and makes me feel useful. I'm really good at any kind of administrative and customer service occupation so that's what I have been applying for. If I don't get any of the local administration jobs I've applied for in January I will just apply for ANY job. In the end it doesn't really matter what job I have because as long as I feel I'm useful and making a difference and earning decent money I'll be happy. Until Matt and I get permanent residency, employers can only hire me to the end of my current visa (September) anyway. 

Event #2:

On my run one morning after a major thunder and lightning storm I found a friend. This little dog just decided to jog along with me for a while. He got distracted and so I just kept running figuring he would find his way home. On my last lap he was still where I left him so I walked him back to the construction site that I found him. It turns out nobody at the construction site or the nearby neighbours knew where he came from. I should add it is REALLY uncommon to find strays and considering how good of a healer he was I was positive he had an owner. 

I carried him all the way home so he wouldn't run away and grabbed the cat leash. Surprisingly the dog was perfectly fine with Shade, although Shade wasn't too sure. I let the dog inside while I gathered stuff to walk him to the nearby vet, and there was an awkward moment where the cat and dog were right next to each other and although Shade's tail was huge, the dog just ignored him and nothing happened. When I took the dog to the vet they found that he was on their records and were able to get a hold of Elvis's owner to come pick him up. Happy days!

Event #3

Speaking of animals, I had a fun event with Shade recently. I went outside to bring our bikes inside. When I opened the back door to bring Shade back in he walked in with a lizard in his mouth. I rushed to grab a camera and recorded him for nearly 20 minutes! He didn't want to kill it, just play with it. I couldn't believe how the lizard was surviving being beaten up by the cat the whole time. After Shade punctured the lizard and I saw blood I felt it was time to extract the poor thing and I let him outside assuming he would die, but he disappeared. Normally I would save the lizard, but I figured since it was in Shade's mouth it was already almost dead. We found the missing lizard tail later. Here's a short clip and I'm sorry for the loud TV in the background of the video...

Event #4

On a different note, Matt has been working on another side job. I helped him all day Saturday and Monday night. The back story of this apartment is interesting. The tenants had serious domestic fights and someone called the cops who ended up breaking down the door. Supposedly later they had a break in and a bedroom door and the mirror in the bathroom was stolen (Seriously??). To add to that they had some Coke bottle explode in the bedroom so there were coke stains all over. Unfortunately, tenants like this are quite common and while we were there painting we heard at least 3 apartments have some serious fights! 

Black smudges from the finger printing done. 

These are knife marks and profanity left on a door from the tenants.

The Coke stain?? 

This has ended up to be a big job and I'm glad I have had the energy to help Matt out. I've also finally learned how to paint semi-even coats, paint trim, and now I understand that getting paint to match is not an easy task. For everyone that thinks anyone can just paint their own place, all I can say is you're probably wrong and if you want a really clean look you should hire a professional. Additionally my back and arms ache from all the work of a day and a half whereas Matt's muscles are used to it. 

Event #5

You have likely heard of the recent tragic event in Sydney, Australia. At the Lindt Cafe in the CBD in Sydney a 50-yr-old man held 17 people hostage. The siege lasted something like 17 hours. In the afternoon 3-5 people escaped and around 2 AM several more escaped while the captor fell asleep. Apparently, the cafe manager tried to take the gun from the captor at this time and in the process was shot dead and others were wounded. The police immediately took action and the man was killed at the scene. Another woman died from a heart attack after being taken to the hospital. That is my short summary with the basics, but there is a lot of detail elsewhere (click here). 

This was a major event and you rarely hear about things like this happening so close to home. Nevertheless, there isn't much you can do to prevent acts of terrorism or other bad things from happening. I'm not really shaken by it, afraid, or even concerned in the slightest. I feel for all those that were involved and the families of those that lost someone, but at the same time I'm over hearing about it. I watched the news for about two hours and nothing new was happening so I got bored - why dwell on it if there's nothing I can do about it? This may seem really insensitive, but I liked to speculate what they were doing, were they eating chocolate? - they'd have to be starving in there, were they able to do stuff on their phones?, and what would I do in that situation? Anyway, stuff happens and we just learn from it, support each other, and move on. It doesn't matter where you live, what nationality you are, or where you like to have your morning coffee - anyone can make bad decisions and even life-threatening ones. This is all part of life and I intend to live it. (End soap box rant)

Event #6

Last night I went with the Young Women of my ward to see the temple lights for mutual. It was a fun activity with a lot less looking at lights than I expected! We spend a lot of our time rolling around on the grass. I'm thankful the temple is so well groomed for us to be able to do that! I love working with the young women and I'm excited to see all the amazing things they will do as they continue to learn and grow. Life is awesome!!

I'm still working on my sewing projects, and just completed some holiday treats (oreo truffles)! I'm excited for Christmas and have already started watching cheesy holiday movies! Matt and I aren't going to have missionaries over this year, but we are going to visit a family that invited us over so at least we won't be alone doing the same things we always do. We aren't doing Christmas cards, no particular reason, but we don't usually get many anyway. This blog will have to do. I hope everyone has a WONDERFUL HOLIDAY SEASON!! Enjoy your cold and snowy Christmases because I will be thinking of you as I melt in the summer heat in Australia! 

I Remember When

Sometimes there are periods of time in which a person becomes reclusive. I have definitely been more reclusive than usual for the last year.  Due to this, I have been out of contact with a lot of good friends. So I felt it would be nice to have a blog with memorable moments I have had with people over the years. 

I remember when my best high school friend and I went dancing and hung out at the Hogle Zoo in Utah.

I remember when my roommate and I drove over an hour to find the nearest location selling Girl Scout cookies in Florida. Yumm!

I remember when my cousin got married to my good friend in Florida.

I remember when my missionary companion and I would huddle under one umbrella and sing Mary Poppins songs while tracting in the rain in Argentina.

I remember when I toured Punta Tombo with some awesome missionaries and adorable penguins.

I remember when I played football, dodgeball, and other games with other missionaries on our p-days.

I remember when some roommates and I took a midnight run to climb on top of one of the buildings at OSU at the end of the school year. 

I remember when I hiked the blue mountains in Australia for the first time with a group of friends.

I remember when my friend and I would sing along to Tik Tok by Keisha over and over again while I visited her in Brisbane.

I remember when a large group of friends made a long massage chain at a friend's house in Australia.

I remember when I toured Sydney and a friend and I happened to be in the right place at the right time to make our own canvas painting.

I remember when some friends and I went to a bring your own pool party for the Hamish & Andy radio show in Sydney.

I remember when I went surfing for the first time in the freezing cold ocean at Oregon. Little did I know I would fall in love with it!

I remember when a roommate and I climbed on top of another building at OSU and played tennis in mid-day.

 I remember when I climbed into a small crevasse while on a church activity with two of my best friends.

 I remember when my best friends and I would stay up till 3 am playing Guitar Hero for multiple nights in a row.

I remember when I went outdoor rock climbing for the first time at Smith Rock in Oregon.

I remember when I toured Namibia with my friend/roommate and hiked to the top of the dunes in Sossusvlei.

  I remember when I did yoga on the beach with a group of friends in Oregon.

I remember when my roommate and I tried to hold back four big dogs from escaping and practically got dragged out of the house.

I remember when two of my best friends drove 14 hours so they could be at my wedding in Utah.

I remember when I made gingerbread houses with friends in Eugene, OR.

I remember when I moved to Australia and had a good friend invite me to hike the blue mountains where we swam in a rock pool. 

I remember when I had a fun pizza and movie night with my roommate in Australia.

I remember when I first got stung by a jellyfish when I went to the beach with some friends.

I remember when I had a bunch of people over for dinner and we played a game that made us all laugh hysterically.

These are just some of the many memorable moments I have had with good friends, and there are many more friends I have not included. I have not forgotten anyone that I have spent time with throughout my life. Our lives have changed and moved on from some of the fun moments we have shared, but that does not change a friendship. I know that I have not been great at keeping in touch, but if any of my friends are in need I will always be there!