Back to the Real World

This post has been way overdue!

Long story short I got a job!! I can say for sure at this stage as I have been working for a week and a half. I am the sales, accounts and administration coordinator for a company called Equip Office Furniture. Basically I do a little bit of everything administrative. The company is a small business which provides a customer everything they need for their small or large office furniture needs.

So what is it like being back in the "real world"? Good and bad. I like my job and the people I work with. I enjoy getting to learn about the aspects of the business and of course I still really like data entry. My first week I even got to go to a celebratory dinner with the company! It was a great opportunity to get to know the others in the company.

Steak/Rib combo at Hurricanes

Coworker John with his 1kg rump steak!

There are six guys and just the financial manager and I are women. No one in the company is LDS and most can't comprehend the decision to not drink coffee or alcohol. In fact a few of them are betting up to $20,000 total that I can't go the rest of my life without coffee or alcohol. They aren't mocking or rude about my beliefs, so I don't mind and just find it funny that they don't trust that I could do it. We did clarify though that they can't try to "trick" me into drinking and of course there's no actual money going around. They are all good guys though, and I was glad I could get to know them better as well as have a great big meal! 

The hardest think about having a full-time job is the schedule! I am at work from 8:30 to 5:30 but it takes me an hour by bus to and from. I constantly feel like I don't have enough time in my free time to get anything done. Additionally my body is really struggling with getting up earlier. I still haven't figured out when to work out because I can't motivate myself to get up early and most nights I am busy and can't do it later. Also, I believe in strong work ethic so I don't answer my phone or texts at work. This is hard to get used to when I for about three months I was at home and could deal with any household stuff whenever.

In the end I am happy to finally have a job, and especially one that I like! Not much else to report at the moment as I am still trying to sort out my schedule!

Holidays and Illness

Warning: Long Blog To Follow!

It was wonderful to spend time with my family in Utah. I had previously set up a Google spreadsheet so my family could schedule specific times to do all the things we wanted. It worked out perfectly!

My second day in Utah was with my mom. We picked up a copy of my marriage certificate and headed on a 30 minute drive to visit my grandparents. While at my grandparents I started to get REALLY sleepy and took a mini-nap on the couch. I learned that I didn't feel the jet lag if I was doing something, but the moment I was just sitting around I felt the tiredness hit me like a sledgehammer. In the end I did get some time talking to my grandpa who has been quickly deteriorating in health. He recently published his autobiography and I felt so bad that I had to tell him I hadn't read it when he asked. He looked so sad! My uncle was also there and I spent a lot of time catching up with him as well.

That night I got to visit my cousin's predator birds! He does falconry and has a license to own predator birds including eagles, hawks, etc. and uses them for presentations, events, and birthday parties (skymasters wildlife foundation).

Juniper - Great Horned Owl

After visiting the birds my brother took me to a Japanese ramen restaurant. It's been ages since I've had a one on one chat with my brother and I was glad we could catch up. Out of everyone in my family I seem to talk to my brother the least, which is funny because it used to be we had the most in common. In the end I think we're happy with whatever time we get whether it is a lot or a little.

The following day I got to sleep in and spend time with my little sister. She's been through a lot in the last six months with coming home from her mission early, cancelling her wedding, and not being able to find a job. That's a lot for anyone to deal with and I'm glad we had time to talk about stuff.

For lunch we met my dad at The Training Table restaurant - the same one I used to work at. The food is still amazing, but I was surprised to discover some have closed and the ones still in existence have a completely new look. Their ranch is still the best and I miss their sandwiches!

I spent time getting some much needed shopping done for the rest of the day and later had dinner at Applebees with my mom, stepdad, and sisters. I was astounded with how good the service was! I had forgotten how much better the service is in US restaurants! My drink was constantly filled, they took our orders and got us our food quickly, and they provided the check before we had to ask for it. To all Australian servers...take notes! I also was so happy to have non-carbonated lemonade again, and especially flavoured lemonades!

Somehow this was the only pic I took of Laura

The next couple of days I spent with my friend Laura who flew out to visit with her two-month old baby. It was awesome to catch up in person. Skype is good, but it's just not the same as in person. We just took things easy and the first day spent a lot of time shopping around at City Creek. While there I had the Apple store look at my phone which seemed to be having constant issues. They replaced the battery for me for free and wiped the phone. Although I had to reinstall apps and lost some app data, all my issues seem to be fixed. The highlight of the day though was going to Tucanos, a brazilian restaurant downtown. My uncle who served his mission in Brazil and my brother went with us. The food was great and we also had a bit of fun judging all the prom dresses we saw that night. The highlight of the following day was having a girl's night watching the BBC Pride and Prejudice. It was great to be with Laura and see her gorgeous little Amelia, who was a perfect angel as we shopped around. Although her baby was awesome, I think the hassle and expense of all the baby stuff made me happy I am not at that stage of life yet. Some day.

Sunday in Utah was crazy! My mom has over 700 people in her ward! There is so much development in the South Jordan area that people are constantly moving in. I'm sure they will split the ward soon. There are so many families that it was quite noisy and for sacrament it looked like it was Stake Conference. After spending over 18 months in a small ward of close to 100 people I was in shock. I guess there are always pros and cons no matter where you live.

That night we had a family dinner and game night. We made chicken cordon bleu and alfredo pasta which nothing turned out as planned, but it all tasted good. After dinner we played Betrayal at House on the Hill. The best part of this game is that it always changes. We had lots of laughs as my mom was the "haunt revealer" and couldn't figure out who was the traitor for the game because it stated "none." She kept looking for the "none" scenario until we finally sorted it out. The second game was also fun because my mom ended up being the traitor. I miss family get togethers!

Monday I went to lunch with my other grandparents to Arctic Circle. I forget how funny my grandparents can be! I also forgot all about Arctic Circle and their complementary ice cream cones.

After hanging out with them my family all headed up to the Woodruff family cabin up Big Cottonwood Canyon. Utah had a very dry winter so there wasn't as much snow as usual, but it was still a beautiful drive and a fun night. We played games and ate s'mores.

 

   

The following day I spent a ton of time sorting through all of my boxes that my mom has stored for me. I catalogued all of the items in a spreadsheet and so for the first time in nearly 10 years I went through all of my fragile item boxes. I had decorative items from when I had my old room growing up including small wooden bunnies, my old school portable CD player, small porcelain animals, etc. It was easy for me to dispose of a lot of it knowing that even when I will have my own house some day, I will never use those items as decorations. At this stage I don't know if Matt and I will ever own our own home. The next time Matt and I go to the US we will likely get rid of boxes of stuff that realistically we will never use.

Later I went with my dad and sisters to one of my favourite US restaurants, The Cheesecake Factory.   The food and cheesecake was great, but the portions were huge! I could barely finish half of my meal.  Each plate was the size of a dinner platter and I suddenly realised why Australians talk about our massive portions at restaurants in the US. After dinner we went to see the new Cinderella, which I loved of course.

That night I slept at my sister's place and got to cuddle with Odin. It's hard to think that I helped nurse that cat to good health and now he's a big, happy, and playful. My sister has been amazing with him as well and has even trained him to sit and wait for his food!

The following morning we got some items out of my boxes in her attic and organised all of her front room. A lot of the furniture needed two people so I was glad I was able to help her out. After all the cleaning and lifting we got to relax with Domino's pizza and watch The Sound of Music with my mom. I miss American pizza!!

April 2nd was a big event because all of my siblings had planned to spend the day celebrating my mom's birthday (April 3rd). We drove an hour to Heber, UT and went horseback riding. It was a gorgeous ride and although we didn't get to do any trotting, the view and our guide were entertaining enough.

Afterwards we got pedicures, including my brother. It was a great idea especially with those special massage chairs that even do your buttocks, which get so sore after riding. To finish off the birthday fun we went to Texas Roadhouse for dinner. Spending quality time with my mom and celebrating with her was long overdo and I'm glad everyone was able to take work off and commit that time with her.

My mom was also excited about going to her book club meeting with me. She had told me in advance about the book A Town Like Alice by Nevil Shute so I was able to finish it the day before the book club. It was fun to sit and discuss with the other women what they thought of the book. I really liked it, but I wish I had tried the audio book that one of the other women had used because that would have been more fun to hear the Queenslander accent they talk about in the book. They definitely didn't use a lot of Aussie words I was familiar with. I learned afterwards that most of the book was loosely based on a couple of unrelated true stories, which kinds of ruins the magic. Nevertheless I highly recommend it.

My final sendoff before I left the US was going to the Oquirrh Mountain Temple with my mom. It was a great peaceful end to my trip. I know that Australia is where Matt and I belong and call home now, but I'm hoping we can afford to visit more often.

The flight home was interesting. The first plane was so full that they checked my carryon for free, which was awesome! This made my 5 hour layover in LAX so much easier since I only had my backpack to carry around. I did have issues when I got to LAX because I couldn't figure out what terminal to go to. My information said terminal 3 so I figured I'd head there, but not the way was the international airport and I figured I'd go into that terminal to get dinner. Well on the board of flights during the security check I noticed my flight and gate. I'm glad it all worked out and I didn't have to wander aimlessly for a while. Additionally, I was happy to find a Panda Express for dinner!


Luckily I had a much better time sleeping on the plane home (likely due to the melatonin and tylenol PM my dad gave me) so transitioning back to Australia time was easy. It was a little disappointing though that when I arrived Matt wasn't immediately there, but he eventually parked and found me and we had plenty of time to get home, change, and go to church. I know many people at church thought I was crazy for going to church, but there was no way I was going to miss it. It was Easter Sunday, I had a great Easter lesson planned for the young women, and it is better to try and stay awake the day you arrive. Unfortunately the rest of the day Matt took a nap while I cleaned, organised, and unpacked.

As for some other news. My second week in Utah I e-mailed Evocca about the status of my references only to find out that they had decided to withdraw the job offer! It was a huge blow! I had my family to support me during that hard time and now I'm back on the market again. It's SO frustrating, but I trust that everything happens for a reason and that everything will work out in the end. I have already had a job interview and hope to have learned from this experience.

The reason I didn't write anything this last week is that I had brought a cold with me from Utah. While there I felt it was trying to surface, but it decided to wait till Australia to explode. Matt has done a wonderful job of taking care of me by getting me vitamins, making me soup, and constantly refilling my water bottle. Today I am finally better! If I had to get sick, at least it was when I didn't have anything else going on. It also made for great cuddling time with my cat who slept with me all day and night. It's so good to be back home! I guess I should also add that despite my sickness I went to my graduation and got my Master of Research degree!

Thanks to Kelly and her family for taking these pics for me!

Dancing Around

Hopefully this post will answer a lot of questions I have been getting recently.

You would think I'd have a lot to report on how I like my new job, but that is not the case. As planned I went to my first day of work to find my supervisor (the woman that hired me) wasn't there after an hour of waiting. After talking to the receptionist I arranged to go to a different Evocca college campus to do some training with another sales woman. I mostly watched and asked questions, but the last few hours I got to call people and set up their appointments. It was fun! I remembered why I liked call centres - you always feel like there is something to do and stuff getting done!

Now to the tricky part, the following day I did not go into work because the HR department had to contact my references and check my visa details first. Naturally, I didn't have too many Australian references so I got a call from HR asking if I had others. I recommended a couple of people I was a research assistant for, but I only had their e-mail addresses. Later they told me they could not get a hold of any of my references (apparently they are unfamiliar with the typical slow response rate for many academics). The next day I went on a hunt to contact these people and any others that would be available immediately. HR also advised maybe I should try some US references and get e-mails so they could send a reference letter form. This went on for a few days till I finally confirmed I only needed one more. I got an e-mail from a reference telling me they completed the form so I waited to get a response from HR but it never came. When I sent an e-mail checking to make sure all my references were sorted I discovered the woman I had been sending communications to was now on leave. When advising this to my supervisor I found out that she was also on leave!

There was not much I could do, but wait and the next week I got a call from someone else at HR asking me questions about my visa (I had already sent all that information via e-mail to the other woman on leave). Later I found out that my supervisor was on leave until March 26th so I will have to wait until April 6th when I return from the US to start training, assuming all of my HR issues are sorted by then.

In the end this has actually been a huge blessing! I used the time to my advantage and investigated a temporary visa that allows me to work. I thought the temporary graduate visa required you to work in the same field you studied, but it turns out I was wrong and basically just had some paperwork to do to get it! This visa allows Matt and I to work in Australia for three years, which gives us plenty of time to wait for our Permanent Residency visa.

Not wasting any time, I got started on all the documents needed for the visa. Conveniently Matt took a day off work to get a vehicle inspection done (for our car registration) so I scheduled us to get our health checks with x-rays completed and our police fingerprinting done. We also got a bit of shopping (and goofing around) done that day.

Since I still didn't work I was able to go to the university and get the transcripts I needed and get all relevant documents certified by a JP. I discovered during this process that I somehow lost my original marriage certificate. Since I am going to the US I have time to get a new marriage certificate. There is a new system called VitalCheck to order these and after multiple failed attempts I found out that the Salt Lake County doesn't have them online yet, which was great because it saves me $55 to pick it up in person! We had to spend a lot of money on the car rego, health checks, and police checks so currently we are just waiting to stock up on money to apply for the visa.

Another major event was a big Relief Society activity that weekend. Each ward was assigned a culture and to prepare a cultural dance. We did Hawaii and because I didn't work I was able to go to many of the Hawaiian dance practices. The activity was fun, but I think the best part was actually just doing the dance with the other women in the ward. To be honest I don't really like stake activities because our stake is mostly polynesian and it is hard for me to adjust to the cultural differences. Nevertheless, I had a good time and it was wonderful to see everyone's hard work come to life.

Also during this time was the Disney-themed Stake Youth Dance last weekend, which the Young Women have been planning for over a month. Because I wasn't working I could spend extra time making masks, printing out Disney pics, going to the store for paints, and other prep work. Unfortunately one of the YW got sick and couldn't finish our painted Rafiki. I ended up spending the entire day of the dance painting a giant Simba for the dance (we needed something to help our sunset backdrop to represent the Lion King). To make it all flow together I also spent days finding high quality pics of iconic Disney movies to do a sort of timeline of Disney Pics around the room. It turned out well and it helped me get rid of my ink so I can get a new printer soon (I hate our printer). I also discovered that since many of the girls were born in the 2000's there are many Disney movies they have never heard of or seen including the Little Mermaid and Snow White! In the end I spent A LOT of time working on that to make the girls ideas come to life, and I think it turned out well in the end. Overall, I think the Lord knew it was better for me not to work during this time.

Frozen Section - Olaf painted by Me & Brittany

Lion King Section: Sunset by Alayna & Brittany, Masks cut out by YW, the rest set up by Matt and I.

Samba took me 6 hrs (including buying paint)

Now for the other major event. I am currently in Utah! I left on Tuesday (and arrived Tuesday) to visit family for about 11 days. Originally I booked the flight so I could be here for my little sister's wedding, but that was cancelled a couple of months ago. She's happy and confident she made the right decision in the end despite the consequences. Sometimes people have to be engaged and start making those future plans to realise its not going to work. Anyway, I couldn't change the flight for Christmas so I decided to not change dates so I can still visit as planned and be in Utah for my mom's birthday. Matt did not come with me because losing two weeks of work wasn't worth it and fitting in an Oregon visit for his family wasn't going to happen.

My flight here was good although I barely got any sleep. Normally I can get a few hours of sleep on planes, but this time I could not find a comfortable position. It didn't help I had a headache that wouldn't dissipate with pain meds and the guy behind me kept pushing ridiculously hard on his screen. I would be trying to rest and feel my sit thump right behind my head. I kept thinking "Why does he have to push so hard?" and "What could he possibly be doing on his screen that would make him push on it so much?"  I think he must have been playing a game or something. I did get a few movies in - some good and some not so good. I watched The Best of Me, The Book of Life (don't watch), and Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. Perhaps it's just me, but when watching The Best of Me and there are kissing scenes I get uncomfortable because I know the person next to me can see it. Although it's PG-13 and nothing shows I still felt weird.

After I arrived I thought I would want to sleep, but was surprisingly quite awake when my dad picked me up. We spent the day together doing a little shopping. I got to see the new City Creek Shopping Mall in downtown SLC for the first time. It's pretty but I don't think I'd ever shop at the expensive stores there. We also got me a SIM card for my phone, which ended up being a big hassle. In Australia it is much easier to get cards and credit. I ended up paying $55 total so I could have talk, text, and data. I spend $45 AUD a month for unlimited talk/text and 5 GB of data in Australia! Oh well, at least I have the peace of mind to use my phone as usual while I am here.

How's driving you ask? It's harder than I thought to adjust. It's been over 1.5 years since I've driven in the states and it's not the right side of the road that's difficult, but driving in the left side of the car. I tend to be too far to the right of the lane, use my windshield wiper for the blinker, look at the door to find the gear shift, and want to walk to the wrong side of the car to drive. The traffic is way easier and the lanes are gigantic here though. I definitely feel that Australia life seems more comfortable to me now. Sydney is definitely more of my home now than Utah.

Although I have done some literal dancing the last couple of weeks, now I am doing some theoretical dancing. I get to be with family and try to spend sufficient time with each person. It's equivalent to trying to remember all the steps in a dance and also not to step on anyone's toes. Not to mention I've learned the Australian "dance" to things and now I have to remember the US "dance." I know the steps, but I am out of practice. Hopefully I'll remember enough to get around Utah ok and be able to have a good time.

Dressmaking, Laser tag, and Youth Activities

So I seem to solidly do one blog per month. Although I prefer doing them weekly, I’m making a goal to stick to doing them once a month. Regular readers (if there are any) will just have to check once in a while to see if I have anything new up or wait till I post it on Facebook.

For two weeks in February I spent my time house/animal/teenager sitting at my Master supervisor’s house in Glenorie, NSW. It’s about a 45-minute drive from my house, but I was able to use her daughter Elizabeth’s car as needed.

It was an interesting two weeks for me.

This story needs a little back story: Elizabeth is 18 (I think) and although she didn’t need a companion, it’s a lot of work to take care of two dogs, two cats, and a horse by yourself and without a full license she needed my help to get around. She is taking a fashion design course which is primarily all design and no sewing. As a side note she also wants to be a famous actress!

Elizabeth and Valentine

Claire & Pixie

Sugar the troublemaker

Sugar and Pixie sleeping with me on the bed

Blind Kelly who loved to cuddle with me at night 

My first night there I learned she had to sew a dress for class following a pattern and it must include a flounce. She had chosen a beautiful silky material that despite our best efforts we couldn’t get her mom’s machine to work with. After seeing the pattern I realized this material was not listed on the pattern  (side note: as my sewing abilities are quite limited and I’ve never made a dress, I felt with sticking with the instructions to be safe).  We had three days to buy a different fabric, sew it together, and have it ready to turn in. To make a long story short, we (and sometimes just me) put a lot of long hours and late nights into the dress and finally got it done! I learned chiffon is by far my favorite fabric to work with, elastic can be a major pain, and sewing round hems like armpits are difficult. Whew! I should also mention that all this was accomplished with my machine as we never solved the tension issue with her mom's machine. 

All seemed good. The day before Valentine's day I had a wonderful dinner with friends from church and a couple of people suggested some job opportunities with companies they worked with. I was hopeful! Matt and I had a nice Valentine's day to my surprise. I met him for dinner and we watched The Theory of Everything at the theatre. I don't know that we've done much in the past for Valentine's day so I was happy he had made an effort to do something. He also called me each night which was sweet. 

I soon found out after the holiday fun that Elizabeth didn't need the completed dress and that her new assignment was to make another dress. This was supposed to be a simple shift dress (with their own flare/design) with the use of a basic pattern the teacher gave them. By pattern I mean a cut out piece of one side of the dress with absolutely no steps included. I felt like this class seemed to expect a lot of their fashion designers when some of them have no sewing experience like Elizabeth. So we bought fabric, she drew her design, and we went to work. She wanted this stair-step element to her design which didn't seem difficult, but turned out to be horrendous to get perfect. We had to get creative to make it work, but unfortunately there was not hope for making it professional looking. Aside from that, we also incorporated an invisible zipper. I melted the top a little because the iron was too hot at first, and then after I had sewed it on with the use of a YouTube video, Elizabeth accidentally pulled the zipper head off. Despite my best efforts we had to just buy a new zipper entirely and sew it in the same place as the previous one. We found out later that the teacher also wanted a liner with it (as we were almost done), but we decided to forgo that as well as the pockets in her original design due to lack of time. As she used my machine the whole time we wanted to complete it together and just hope she didn't get any more sewing projects! I love sewing, but I definitely think you should build up your skills before attacking complex dresses!

Aside from dress dramas, I got to have fun with a rat in the walls, creepy spiders everywhere, giant wasps, and more. There's more to my eventful time in Glenorie, but you'll have to ask me for further details otherwise this blog will take forever!! 

Coming back home meant I had to really push myself to apply for more jobs! I also spent time with the Young Women and got to watch recent convert Dev and her mom do baptisms for the dead in the temple for the first time! It was wonderful and Dev's mom was a trooper and did 35 baptisms! Normally with a small group they might do 10 each, but I think the guy in charging of the names wanted to just go until he didn't have any more! The young man that followed did 55 names. Afterwards a couple of the girls went to wish happy birthday to a youth that couldn't make it and we had a nice dessert night. 

Later that week I finally heard about a job, although it wasn't what I expected. A member from church told her cousin about me for a course advisor position at Evocca college. They are a college that helps people get their "second chance" at an education so they aren't your typical 19 year old students. The job is in the Counselling branch and I will be helping those interested in getting a Diploma of Counselling learn more about what the college has to offer and start enrolment. I loved the people there and the manager that interviewed me at the end is a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. It was AMAZING to finally have someone understand the work and value of what I do for the church and have that actually add to my job application. A few days later I found out I got the job!! I start next week so my next blog will be all about that for sure!

I guess Shade won't need to help me apply for jobs anymore!

A few other things occurred recently worth mentioned. I spent a day with Brock & Kaytlin for Brock's 30th Birthday Party! We went laser tagging at this awesome place that has 4 levels and automatically changing doors (click here for details)! It was a blast, especially with the 10-15 kids that joined us on multiple games. Afterwards we had a picnic in the park. 

Poor Matt had to miss the fun since he had to take the IELTS which is an english test for non-native speakers to prove competency and get their visa to Australia. In our case, Matt needs to score high so we can get points towards our visa. Unfortunately, he said the listening portion was awful and we are not confident he got a high enough score. We'll find out by the 13th this month. So, he missed out on the laser tag and the severe leg soreness that came afterwards. 

Another big event was the Young Women New Beginnings! Jaydene and I had planned our cruise theme for over a month, but as the time came I felt all over the place. I was overly stressed and spent most of that day cooking and getting everything prepped. In the end I think it went well and the stake leaders and girls seemed to enjoy it. We had them all take pictures with our "Port" sign at the end of each section. It was a lot of effort and I'm glad it's over, but now I have to worry about decorating for the Stake Youth Dance coming up March 20th! This calling is certainly keeping me busy!

Also, I just wanted to display a memento of how great my skin is doing! After my most recent skin treatment I had to take a picture when the new skin was revealed. It's amazing I used to struggle to go anywhere because I was so embarrassed about my acne! There is hope all you acne sufferers!

I had just gotten up that morning so that's why I look sleepy, have messy hair, and no mascara.