Better Late than Never!

Preface: I wrote everything below and then never was motivated enough to enter pictures and complete it. Needless to say, it's old but I suppose it makes no difference if you don't hear from me often anyway. 

Three weeks have gone by in the blink of an eye. Now that I work regularly I struggle to separate weeks and I can't remember how long ago things have happened. Luckily I have at least kept a list of interesting things to put in my blog. So here's a list of some interesting things.

First of all, Matt and I have officially applied for permanent residency! Thanks to a loan from my mom we were able to get the funds faster so we could complete the application and start uploading the required documents. This means we now officially have bridging visas and can stay in the country until we get a result from our application. We have uploaded almost all of the documents except for our US police checks, which we just got yesterday and need to be certified first.

Unfortunately we discovered I also need to do a police check for when I was living in Argentina. I was not aware of this and have started the process. I have to fill out a form then meet with a guy in the city to do the fingerprinting and then they send it to Argentina or something to get it processed. The form is all in Spanish and although I am fluent, that doesn't help me know legal terminology and which option I should choose for things. I originally thought I would have to go to Canberra, but the good news is there is a representative in Sydney and it appears the process will only take a month. Hopefully this won't hinder our permanent residency application.

On another note, Matt and I had a fun activity with the youth where we made props for the kids in primary for their music time. Matt was very proud of his sun.

We also had to say goodbye to our friend Whitney who left back to the US. Before she left we had dinner at an indian food restaurant and dessert at Max Brenner's. It was a fun last night to say a 'temporary' goodbye to a good friend. Hopefully she will come visit or we will visit her in the future.

Recently we had a long weekend because the Queen's Birthday is a holiday and took place on a Monday. The Saturday before I had documents to sort and whatnot so I didn't do anything exciting. I did help my friend Cate with her Chemistry homework and later discovered that I forgot to take my keys and couldn't get in my house. Despite my attempts of getting in through the bedroom window on the roof I had to admit defeat and Cate took me back to her place. It was nice though as we got to went to dinner and caught up on life and then I watched a movie at her place while she studied.

That weekend Matt and I got into playing Super Mario Bros again. The back story for this is that we used to play a lot and even unlocked the final special level. It took a while and Matt used to get really frustrated with me because I die a lot and often got in the way. One time he got so mad he punched the wall, which luckily didn't harm it. Since then he refused to play because he didn't want to get upset with me. This time he hasn't gotten mad at all and it has been a fun bonding time for us. It's funny how well we bond over video games! I guess I'm glad we are both nerds.

Last week I went to the doctor for a pap smear because a year ago I got one and they found an abnormality so I had to get another one in a year. It was good timing because I had also run out of birth control - has it been six months already? Additionally, I decided I should talk to the doctor about my depression. In the end I came out with anti-depressants, birth control, and an appointment for the following week. Originally I really didn't want medication for depression because I was afraid of side effects and felt confident I could handle this on my own. The reality is that I'm not handling it on my own and the medication is just a short-term boost to help me find the strength and motivation to get help, exercise more, and do all those things that I know will help. Not many have probably seen the effects of my depression, but my husband certainly has. I am often lethargic, I struggle to keep commitments, I'm more disorganised, I often don't want to be bothered with social things, exercise always seems to hard, really good food is the best mood lifter, and I can get anxiety about almost anything. This isn't my normal behaviour at all and I think sometimes that makes me more frustrated with myself. At this stage I need a third-party to help me be accountable and work on the things that can help me get better. Stay tuned for updates?

To be more proactive about depression I have started reading my depression book again and have been listening to the audio book version of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. I feel a renewed hope in my situation and although I am currently surviving as I am, I think that when I can finally overcome my negative thoughts I will become a better and stronger person overall. I highly recommend these two books to everyone, even if you're not depressed, as the tools mentioned apply to everyone and for every aspect of life.

Another interesting event is that we had a family history activity in the ward last Sunday. I discovered that one line of my family is linked all the way back to Adam and Eve! That's amazing that someone was able to do that! I also went on to my Mom's family history website and found all kinds of neat things and stories. My grandpa helped create the website and as I read his biography on there I felt sad that I haven't tried to get to know him better. He has published his own auto-biography and yet I haven't read it. Well this experience created a new spark within me to try and do more with family history. For years I've just left if to the many other members in my family, but perhaps I have more to contribute than I previously realised. More on this story to come, if all goes as planned.

Some other occurrences were the day I walked to the bus stop and found a house on fire. It had probably been going 10-15 minutes and I was the third person to get there. Two others had already made sure the owner was out and had notified the neighbours. The owner was a 30-something man who was covered in black smoke. Do you remember Mary Poppins when the boy sticks his face in the pipe and his face becomes black? It was almost that bad and you could see he had cried from the tear streaks on his face. While I was there a fireman car came and helped move the guy's car and ask a bunch of questions. Realising there was nothing I could do to help I decided to leave and saw the fire truck right when I got on the bus. The next day there was tape in front of the house and there were still ashes on the ground. For the most part the house looked in tact, but the fire was in the back and I'm betting most of it was charred.
Click here for the article on it.

Last night was a fun work night because we had another celebratory dinner for a good month of sales! We went to the Hunters Hill Hotel where it is pub/bistro. The food was great and the sales guys are always entertaining. This time I wasn't the new one as our new sales rep, Mark, was there too. I'm so glad I love the people I work with and can have a good time with them outside of work too.

This weekend has been difficult because our cat, Shade, has been sick. Thursday he didn't eat his last few meals of the day and seemed very lethargic. He usually greets us at the door when we get hope, but that day he didn't. The next day I tried to get him to eat some wet food and I knew it must be severe when he wouldn't even touch the wet food. Matt took Friday off work to take him to the vet and watch him. Shade's blood work came back normal and the vet gave pills to help him eat. He still wouldn't eat though and when we tried to give him his second pill his mouth filled with saliva and he spit it out. This morning I took him in again and this time they are going to keep him over the weekend with an IV to make sure he get fluids - he hasn't eaten or drank anything in nearly 3 days! They are also going to give him antibiotics and possibly do an x-ray. When a cat doesn't eat it can cause liver damage and ultimately organ failure - more so than dogs and people. There's not much we can do but pray and hope he gets better.
Update: Shade is fine! We had approved surgery for him and the morning of surgery he had pooped and was eating again. We took him home the next day and now seems hungry all the time and is spoiled because we feed him lots of wet food to make sure he gets enough fluids. 

You can see where he was shaved on his chest
for his blood test, and the two shaved sections
on his arms from where he had the IV.

Socialising

Do you have any friends that like spending time with and although you have time to hang out, the planning to hang out rarely happens? Well my relationship with friends Dean and Crystal is like that. Matt and I enjoy hanging out with them, but we struggle to make it happen. Last Sunday we all finally set up a time to have dinner and chat. It was a great dinner, but what makes spending time with them so interesting is that we do nothing but talk and hours go by. We all can talk about a wide variety of topics and rarely get bored, including Matt! It's awesome to have friends like that and Matt and I really need to make more of an effort to spend time with people. 

Mutual with the youth was also quite eventful this week. I was so proud of our young men and one of our young woman who actually took the bus to get there. That's commitment! We played a fun M&M get to know you game where based on the colour of M&Ms you took you had to answer different questions about yourself. Afterwards we played "Never Have I Ever." When I told the girls we would play this game, one said "you mean, the drinking game?" If there was ever evidence that I grew up as a member of the LDS church, that was a definite moment of proof. I had no idea it was a drinking game and had always played it with other members of the church. This was the Mormon Modified Version. One person stands in the middle of the rest who are all sitting on chairs. The person in the middle states "Never have I ever" and then states something they haven't ever had or done. Then all those that have had or done that something have to switch chairs. This gives the middle person an opportunity to steal a seat and the last person standing is the new middle person. We had loads of fun playing this game and learned some interesting things about each other in the process. Success!

Wednesday was also an eventful day. After work Matt picked me up and we went to see Evita the musical with Jaydene and her lab mate. When we got there Matt had seen this Udon place for dinner, which was really good!

The musical however, was not as spectacular as we had hoped. We learned it was an amateur production so there were a couple of mistakes, but the real issues I had with it were the main actress. Having seen Madonna play Evita in the movie, I had certain expectations. To see a woman who I thought was not very attractive play the role of a beautiful actress didn't really fit to me. Her singing was good, but I just did not feel she fit the part. In fact, we all found it interesting that the song from the mistress clearly out-shined the main actress. Later, Jaydene found out that this may just be how the live musical was written and that the movie version was changed. I would suggest then for anyone interested in Evita (Eva Peron) to just watch the movie. Matt didn't like it at all, but mostly because there is a lot going on and he couldn't hear the words to follow what was happening. Oh well. 

Nevertheless we still had a fun night and even got to see a little of Vivid Sydney, which had been extended to Chatswood where we saw the musical. 

The following morning I got to see a cute little bunny on my walk to my bus stop. He didn't run away as I got close to take the picture. I thought about petting him, but then wasn't sure how wild he was and if bunnies carry weird diseases. Still cute though!

To finish off my weekend I ended by horseback riding at Sydney Trail Riding Centre with a couple of the YW, Jaydene, and Whitney. Before leaving it was my day to help clean the chapel so I was happily cleaning toilets when Fekita found me and helped until the others came. When we got there we were late so they rushed us onto horses and go started. It was a fairly relaxing ride since it was just an hour long walk, but everyone had fun. It was Jaydene and Fekita's first time riding so they were a fair bit nervous at first. In the end they loved it and had seemed to bond with their horses, even though Fekita's was a bit lazy and stubborn. 

After riding we got lunch at Little Caesar's on the way, which has American pizza! You have no idea how happy this made me! We got Italian cheese bread as well, which was definitely the best part. I even had the foresight to get some waters from the nearby McDonald's and we ate a nearby park which happened to have picnic tables. 

There was a random little museum next to the park so we decided to check it out. It was really neat surprisingly. The museum had interesting historic items and things relating to Liverpool, including a special ANZAC section. My favourite part was the story of a German escapee that Jaydene found and we subsequently had all the girls read. It was pretty incredible story involving him digging out of his own grave, walking from Liverpool to Sydney, and eventually marring the girl he promised in the end. 

Johann Kuhlmann

It was a great way to end the week! 

The Return of the Bus Guy

Early this week I decided I was going to walk to a bus stop slightly farther away. I was leaving earlier than usual and was glad to get more steps in on the longer walk. As I sat on the bench to wait for the bus this guy noticed me and came and sat on the other end and told me "I know your face from somewhere." I looked at him and immediately recognised the crazy bus guy that I had given my number to weeks before and had blocked from my phone. I just shook my head and said "I don't know" and returned to reading my book. Luckily some old woman sat between us and he chatted with her until he suddenly stood up in front of me and said "Yeah, you are that American girl!" Spitting out a quick "yep" I returned to my book again, hoping he would just leave me alone. Then the bus came and I knew he was going to try and chat with me. Unfortunately the bus was quite empty so it would be too obvious if I sat next to someone when there are so many empty seats. As I made my way to the back I found a single seat by itself where there would be no way for him to sit near me. He decided to sit behind me but stood up and tapped me to say "Hey, I'm really sorry for everything" right as the bus started to move. Naturally I said "no worries" and promptly returned to my book and he returned to his seat.

He didn't do anything but make me extremely uncomfortable. I now know that he must live closer to me than I thought so I am more motivated than ever to avoid that bus station and get a car as quickly as possible. He isn't creepy enough that I think he would stalk me, but the experience I had was uncomfortable and awkward enough that I would prefer to avoid future chance meetings as much as possible. Again, the moral of the story is to never give your number out to random people you have a small conversations with on the bus. I would even say just avoid chatting to people on the bus in general. It's a great time to read books anyway.

As for other less crazy events. Shade got stung by his first bee. Poor thing saw one crawling around and tried to eat it. I knew he got stung as he yelped and ran inside, but we didn't discover until a day or two later that the stinger was stuck in his chin. I had felt something, but just thought it was a sore. Surprisingly he didn't swell up or anything. We also discovered that he can return from our neighbor's back patio. He's decided that our back patio is too boring so has gotten into the bad habit of quickly jumping into our neighbour's area before we can catch him. Matt usually jumps over the fence to get him, but he was on the phone with his Mom. Figuring Shade couldn't go anywhere I just left him there waiting for Matt to get off the phone. As Matt opened the back door to go get him, Shade walked inside. Apparently he figured out how to get back over the fence, but I think he hurt himself in the process. He kept licking his paws. Silly cat. We can't let him wander so we will have to find a way of preventing him from going into other's back patios, but I'm glad he can at least get back on his own as well.

Matt had a weird virus/bacteria/food poisoning issue that we never figured out what was wrong. Saturday he went to an AFL game with Brock and ate a bunch of junk then Sunday his stomach was funny which progressed to a lot of pain and discomfort. It didn't start getting better until yesterday. He missed a couple of days of work from it and he tried loads of things to help including a laxative, an antacid, antiviral/antibacterial and anti fungal stuff, other supplements, and a garlic foot bath. Some things helped calm it temporarily, but the issue did not go away. We hope this was a temporary thing and not early signs of something worse like Crohn's disease. Only time will tell. It sucks that someone who actively works at being healthy can have something like that happen.

Now for the most exciting news: Matt and I were invited to apply for permanent residency in Australia yesterday! Getting invited was the hardest part! Once invited and we start the application there is a very small likelihood we will get denied, and we will receive a bridging visa as well. This means that even if my current visa expires we can stay in the country until we have a response from our PR visa. Once applied though we should know pretty quickly so we should be permanent residents before September! I just learned that they may have changed the pricing though so it may cost $7000 instead of the $5000 that we had thought. This is really going to push our budget limit. It's a blessing that Matt just got another side job and that I have work as well. We wouldn't have been able to do this visa otherwise.

Not much else going on other than Young Women's is still awesome and I have a great counsellor who keeps me functioning. Matt has completely finished painting our townhouse. My job is still good and I'm learning and remembering more, but I still get annoyed with myself for the little things I constantly forget. I have yet to find a psychologist, but I may be able to do Skype sessions with one in Utah. Matt gave me a blessing last Sunday, which helped me find new hope that I can overcome my trials and be stronger for it. For the most part, I think life is good. I just finished all of the Maze Runner series and started the Paper Magician series. The Maze Runner series is the closest I will probably ever get to zombie literature. I really liked the last book and was pleased with the end. It will be interesting to see the movies.

Sorry for the lack of pictures this week, but sometimes you will just have to imagine things for yourself!

Still Learning Lessons

It seems that in a blink of an eye weeks go by. 

Over the last week and a half I have had some interesting occurrences...

The Bus Guy

A couple of weeks ago I was sitting on the bus with my headphone in and reading a book. Despite all the signs of 'don't bother me', a guy came and sat by me and started talking. He asked if I wanted some of his coffee and I of course told him no, I don't drink coffee. I tried to continue reading but then he asked about my book, where I was from, and the questions kept coming. The guy was probably late twenties to early thirties, from Afghanistan but has lived mostly in Australia, is a software programmer and DJ. We talked a little about my religion, but mostly about the US and what the difference between a county and a state was. He asked for my number so we could finish our chat over coffee sometime. After clarifying that I was married and he wasn't asking me out I decided it might be a good missionary opportunity and we exchanged numbers. 

Before you decide to judge me, he wasn't a creepy guy so I didn't think he'd stalk me or anything and I certainly wasn't attracted to him for any reason. I genuinely thought it might be a good opportunity to talk about my beliefs. The next day he texted me about getting coffee (apparently he didn't remember I don't drink coffee) and I had to decline because I always have things going on after work and for the most part I just want to go home. The next week he texted me again and I politely said I didn't know if there was ever going to be a good time. Then it all started getting weird on Saturday he sent me another message saying I'm not forced to meet up and if I think he wants something he has "enough woman in Sydney" to take care of that. I simply explained that my schedule was just too crazy. All seemed well, until he called me and starts saying f-this and f-that and how he can "f" with plenty of girls in Sydney, blah, blah, blah. Wow! I told him he just wasn't a priority to be honest and there wasn't a really good time to meet up. This just caused him to get all upset and basically say I was just making excuses and then he hung up. Needless to say I blocked him. 

I was never positive of this guy's intentions, but I felt like a hot chocolate or something would be harmless. I never expected the kind of crazy result and had the guy acted like that in the beginning I would never even considered talking to him further. Not to mention he never could remember I don't drink coffee and maybe he "forgot" I was married as well. The moral of the story is....DO NOT GIVE YOUR NUMBER TO RANDOM PEOPLE ON THE BUS! In fact, I'll stick to my happy "keep to myself and read" philosophy permanently. I'm just hoping I don't run into this guy again. 

As for a few less psychotic events...

The Dentist

Lately I've had a bunch of issues with my back gum where I had a wisdom tooth removed. It got really swollen for over a week so I made an appointment with a dentist. The swelling went down before the appointment but the dentist said that when my tooth was removed the gum was sewn up too high making it prone to get swollen. I was glad to know that I had no cavities and my teeth are great, but not happy to hear I need to go to a gum specialist. I have an appointment with the specialist  in a week so we'll see what happens. 

Young Women Fun

Tuesday we played Jeopardy with the youth based on General Conference. It was all open "phone" so they could search to find the answers. I wasn't sure how well it would go since I knew there were some tough questions and its hard to remember even little things sometimes. In the end, it was a huge success and everyone had a lot of fun. We also had nachos and Dulce de leche in honour of Cinco de Mayo. I don't think it was the preparation or the food that made it good, but the attitude of the girls that were there. Any activity can be fun when you make it fun and have a good attitude. Thank you Young Women for being amazing!

Thursday was fun as Jaydene and I were going to visit one of the young women and our Laurel president (Fekita) wanted to come as well. Jaydene picked me up from my bus stop near Fekita's and without even knowing for sure she could come we went and visited her. It turns out it was her first time ever being home alone and she only opened the door because she heard Jaydene's voice. Plans with the other girl didn't work out because she was at a parent/teacher interview. In the end we decided to take Fekita out to dinner since none of us had eaten yet. It was a blessing to have a nice chat, eat some good Thai food, and rescue Fekita from being alone. 

Permanent Residency

This last week Matt and I finally got his skills assessment back and found that he was successful! That means we are now ready to complete an expression of interest (EOI) to hopefully be invited to apply for permanent residency. On Saturday I went to get the skills assessment document certified only to find that the GPS had me take the wrong bus! It just so happened Jaydene and I were messaging each other that morning and she could come pick me up and take me to the right place in time. Had I tried the buses it might have been over an hour. She helped me get my errands done and I tagged along for hers as well. Blessings!

That evening I completed our EOI! It took me two hours as I had to keep checking I was ticking the right boxes. It says we have 65 points although we should have 70, but for some reason it wasn't counting Matt's employment in Australia. I fixed that and now it says he hasn't worked for 8 years overseas even though he has. Well it's because they only count the last 10 years and he went to school for 5 months and California for a few months so as for as their calculations go, only 7 of his work years will count. We need 60 points to apply so we are fine, but having 70 points would have really pushed us above other applicants. Oh well. The good news is that it's done and if we were invited to apply tomorrow, we have everything read except for passport photos. 

Mothers Day

Today is Mother's day. I feel it is only fair to complete this blog by mentioning what an amazing mother I have! When I was younger she was the voice of reason that I refused to listen to. I once even argued with her about how to spell my name (I was 6). As I got older I soon learned that my mother is almost always right. Nevertheless, she let me make decisions on my own even when she knew I was going to learn the hard way. Instead of an "I told you so," I always get her open and loving arms (more like words since I'm always far from home). She provides the wise advice that I trust because I know that she is frequently inspired of the Lord. Additionally, she is the one person that I know will drop everything and listen when I am in desperate need. 

My mother and I have a special relationship because we are so similar. She is my mother, my best friend, and sister in a way. Frequently we find we go through similar situations although we are thousands of miles apart. There just isn't another person in this world that understands me the way my mother does! I can only hope that I can be more like her and have the patience, charity, love, and devotion that she has. Love you mom!

 

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.