Ahh CHOO!

A dashingly attractive couple chats quietly as the car drives down the road. They listen to the radio, and when a good song comes on they turn it up and sing along. Why not, right?

Suddenly, out of nowhere, the guy feels a slight tickle in his nose. Itchy, light scratching that slowly builds. This is it. A sneeze is coming on.

He knows he has two options: a) wind down the window at full speed and sneeze straight out the window, or b) sneeze, quickly wind the window down at ultra speed, and fan the sneeze out the window ensuring every last particle goes out so that his wife cannot smell, see, or imagine that any particles of sneeze remain in the car. He chooses the first option. Good choice.



Ok... so... that is a true story. I admit it! I have issues with sneezes the car. Today, however, I sneezed and forgot to open the window. Me? The sneezophobic crazy lady forgot to put the window down and allow my husband to breathe after my sneeze. It's ok... it only took Josh saying 'Gee, I wish sneeze germs weren't all over me' to realise, and I did what I should have done, and put the window down.

What is it about sneezes, in the car in particular, I find so repulsive? Is it the squillions of germs being catapulted into a small confined space? Yes I think so. Is it the odour of flem that sometimes comes along with a sneeze? Yes I think so. They are just gross!

You know what though? If it wasn't for sneezes, I wouldn't laugh so much. I wouldn't get to enjoy the high pitched, the low pitched, the sneeze raspberry. So I guess, there is good and bad. Just with everything else in life. Lucky I have learned to look for the good.

"You gotta accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative and latch on to the affirmative. Don't mess with mister in between!" Sing with me now.. lalalala....

Endure... no wait...Improve to the end

I have decided that while enduring doesn't always mean 'dealing with tough things', the connotation of the word just doesn't do it for me. I prefer to think of it as 'improving to the end'.

For me, this means not only improving in terms of how I fulfil my calling, service and general spirituality. It also means improving in terms of work, my relationship with friends, family and of course Josh, improving my attitude and my fitness.

So how am I going in these areas?

Well, I am really enjoying my new calling. Serving in Relief Society has helped me to enjoy the ward more. I realise that I stake calling really removes you from being able to build relationships so I'm enjoying that. Feeling more connected somehow helps me to feel the spirit more... so I have been enjoying church alot more. On Sunday at Conference I sang in the choir and had a great experience with that too... so things are certainly on the 'improve' there.

In terms of work. My last blog outlined the horrible jerks that had been in my class (PS. don't call a teenager a jerk. It is not only a rude thing, but also a retarded looking new dancing style that they love to demonstrate. Kill me.) Well, recently things have improved. I'm learning who to ignore, who to kick of the class and then ignore, how to deal with bad behaviour in better ways, and building good relationships even with bad kids.

My favourite part of school this week: On Monday, a Year 9 boy told me that a year 11 kid told him that I have a big bum. I replied 'that's nice. why was he telling you this?' He said "I dunno! He just came up and told me!!' Anyway, I just moved on thinking it was funny. Then today, coming out of a classroom, he was there again with a bunch of his pals. He said 'hey, _______(name I can't remember) said she has a bit butt'... they all laugh... and then I said 'hey, would you like me to tell everyone which of your body parts I think are big or small?' causing his friends to laugh MUCH harder at his expense.

This is kinda the approach I'm enjoying at the moment. You tease me, I stick it in your face. Teacher: 1, Kids: 0.

My relationship with Josh is always good. He's such a champion. Really. I won girls.

Fitness... hmm... my ability to go to the gym was decreased recently due to a horribly sore shoulder. Now that it is slightly better, I should really be going every day again. However, I haven't quite got there yet. Alright... goal for tomorrow... go to gym!

Time to work off that big bum, I guess.

Disappointment

I'm like a 3 year old. I have GREAT difficultly dealing with not getting what I want. I mean, who could say no to this face?

It's crazy, but apparently some people can.

Punks.

Happy Wife, Happy Life!

I'm sure many of you have seen the Bollywood version of Pride and Prejudice... aptly named 'Bride and Prejudice'. Well, there is a special (and yes, I do mean 'short bus' special) song on there about happy wife leading to happy life. I think my darling Joshua has learned recently how true this is!

As much as I like to think I'm pretty level headed and chill, things at work have been slightly irritating leading me to feel more than slightly irritated at home at times. Let's face it, I'm not always level headed and chill. But I can say whatever I want - this is my blog!! :) I had all these great ideas about changing in the world through education. Gee uni fills your mind with a bunch of hooey! I begun passionately and was excited! However, just five weeks into the piece, I have been sworn at, had things thrown at me, had books grabbed from my hands, been called all kinds of names... and occasionally, smiled at (but I like that!).

Days such as these tend to cause a little bit of stress. I just don't understand why kids are so angry at the world. Seriously, parents... BE NICE TO YOUR KIDS! It's mind boggling and so eye opening.

Anyway, so Josh treated me to a study free weekend... meaning, he took the weekend off his police studies to hang out with me! It was great. And it led to a wife feeling much happier come Monday. We didn't do anything particulaly different... went out to dinner, rearranged our bedroom (change is as good as a holiday!) and went to church. The norm! But it was nice to be able to do all that together.

So as I write this, the wonderful man is in our room studying like crazy. But, he is happy. I am happy. And we will continue to be happily in love for many, many more days to come!

Christmas Bells Are Ringing....

I LOVE CHRISTMAS!

Any day that allows me to spend time eating delicious food, having fun with family, and listening to christmas carols is a great time of year! This year we had planned to go to Townsville to spend time with Josh's side of the family, but because we went last minute to America we couldn't really do it. So instead, we spent it with my side of the family instead. My beautiful older sister Lenora opened up her home to us not once, but twice for Christmas festitivities. We had two Christmas dinners because Andrew and Rachel were going to New Zealand for Christmas so we had a pre-Christmas so we could be with them.

Here is the Christmas Card we sent out via email. If you didn't get one, consider this yours :)
Here is beautiful Anna with Andrew and Rachel's new daughter, Cassidy. Aren't they both adorable?

This is the table all set and the fooding begun at Pre-Christmas. Big smiles!

Anna, Natalie, Cassidy, Ryan, Kristen and mum and dad in the background.

I convinced the family to line up like this in age order. It reminds me of the Sound of Music when they line up and do the 'Cuckoo's'.

Present opening at the second Christmas. Kristen, James, Ryan, Nat and Josh.

In the little pool with a little bit of water! Kristen, Ryan and Natalie. Ryan went from pool to trampoline ALL day!

Lenora's skanky little dog had puppies with their friend's dog. These are the puppies. I LOVE THEM!!! Lenora named them all, but I can't remember the names!!

Lenora, Josh, Me, Kristen, Natalie and James.

Christmas was great!! I LOVED EVERY MINUTE!!

Ding, Dong, Ding, Dong... hear the bells? They never end for me!

Hi Ho, Hi Ho, It's off to work we go!

GREAT NEWS!

Josh and I were both offered the jobs we have been waiting for!

After a year of preparation, interviews, testing and what seemed like endless waiting, Josh has been accepted into the Queensland Police Academy and will commence February 1st. That's only 30 days away now! WOO HOO! So we are very excited for what this will bring. He has been training hard since we got home and is really getting that body in shape for the physical requirements. And, we cleared all the CRAP off his desk so that he can study when the time comes also.... because there's lots of learning to be done. MMUUUUCH EXCITEMENT for this one :)

AND! I was offered a full time teaching position. This is a big deal because it is so rare to get a full time job in the city at the end of a teaching degree. But, with my diploma in hand, I am off to save the children of Brisbane! I got a full time teaching position to start on 20 January. It's at a great school where I know a few teachers and am comfortable. It was number 2 on my list of places I wanted to go... so I feel incredibly lucky!

So I guess what I'm trying to say is, Santa brought us great presents this year :)

We Love, Love, LOVE Vacations!!

I've come to realise that Josh and I don't ever do things by small measures. We decided to go on a trip to America in our free month, but did we plan a relaxing vacation? NO! We planned a trip of epic proportions that would mean when we got home we needed another month to recover!

But, now that we have recovered, we are ready to relive it by writing this blog. It was seriously THE MOST amazing experience we have had in a long time and was totally worth the time, money and energy it took to do. We went to 19 states of America and Canada in 28 days.

Here is a little look through the trip...
We flew straight into Los Angeles and then rented a car to drive to Arizona. We saw a whole lot of this on our trip... zillions of windmills! Everywhere! It was relaly quite cool. We left LA at like 3am, so this picture is just as the sun was rising. Priceless..

We arrived in Tucson to see Erin after quite the drive.. who knew it took so long to get to Tucson. Hehe. We discovered one piece of highway marked in kilometres instead of miles, which would have been an exciting part of our trip except that our car was telling us we had 17 miles of gas/petrol left in the tank and Erin's house was like 15 miles away. Cannot compute!

But we met with Erin, spent time with her and her wonderful daughter Lylah and ate Mexican food. MMM.. mexican.... Even though we only spent a few hours with her, it was great. Love you Erin!

We then drove up to Phoenix to stay with Josh's mission president and his wife, President and Sister Jensen. Such wonderful people! Took us to see some great parts of Arizona and treated us like Kings and Queens. We ate so well... mmm.. cinnamon rolls! Apparently the food was quite a highlight. Fat kids!

Well ok the pictures got out of order but I'm not going to worry about it. Here is VEGAS!!

Nauvoo! My wonderful aunt Clair drove all the way from Peoria (3 and a half hours) to spend the day with us in Nauvoo. What a wonderful woman! She was so kind and I loved getting to see a bit of my grandma in my Aunt I never get to see.

This is about two hours from San Fransisco in the mountains near Modesto, California. It was Josh's first time to see snow! Yay! So of course we went sledding down the mountain. I'd just like to say first and foremost, that I was totally better at it than Josh :). It was great fun. We are grateful to the Rawe's for looking after us there. Wonderful people!

This is a place called Point Lobos, also in California somewhere near San Fransisco. The water pushes up on the rocks with massive force to make beautiful big waves. It was stunning. The water looks beautiful, but I'm sure I would have frozen if I tried to get in. It was near a little town called Carmel where we ate lunch. So cute! I like little cute towns... they don't allow franchise stores so it stays really quaint.

This is us in Vegas again... there were about twenty of these in the M&Ms factory so Josh and I spent about half an hour taking photos of each other pulling the same face as the plush toys. Are we five years old? yes I think we are!

New York, New York!! We spent forty dollars getting to the top of the Empire State Building so that we could take pictures and see the view... and it was foggy and FREEEEEEZING! But oh well! We loved it anyway! I don't actually understand the fascination with New York. I saw places I loved much more... but, it really is massive with the tallest buildings and constant activity. But, as they say, there's no place like home.

After New York, we caught a bus to Washington DC. This was one of our favourite stops. We saw so many amazing buildings (and homeless people). We figure it must be a law in DC that you have to have giant white pillars outside your building or it will not be approved for construction... because EVERYWHERE had pillars. They were beautiful... it just seemed crazy!

If I was American, I'd be an awesome president.

We rented a car from DC and drove to upstate New York and visit some of the LDS church sites. At Palmyra, we had an AMAZING time. We loved it. Here we are, in the snow, visiting the sacred sticks....ooops, I mean, sacred grove. It had a different kind of beauty but still a great feeling. We LOVED Palmyra. Such a cute town. And it is where we discovered Cinnamon Toast Crunch... mmm....

We went to Denver and saw my old stomping ground. I love Denver. It is my second home. But Josh had never had the pleasure of visiting. This was another of our favourites.... Josh got to see a deeper insight into my life because Denver is where I did a lot of my 'becoming me' and growing up. We saw the nanny family.. ie, the people I nannied for and spoke with them. It was fun to reminisce and tell stories about how I was the most social nanny ever. Anyone shocked?

Our favourite part of visiting Denver, however, was seeing my wonderful friend Natalie. I LOVE THIS WOMAN! She is so amazing. She is truly one of the best friends I have ever had, and I think we met each other when we really needed each other. I was away from family and needed someone I could love and trust and she needed a friend to help her through tough times. It was a match made in heaven :). It was so great to visit with her and her wonderful husband Joe and two beautiful children, Enoch and Travis. I love that Joe and Josh got along really well too... when husband's love each other you know you're best friends for life! So Natalie, get your butt into gear and come visit us. We love you!

Both of us had been to Salt Lake before, but it was great to visit the temple and to do a live session. I was on the edge of my seat! I love to see the temple la la la la la la... This was a five day stop. Our longest stop. We were lucky to see the Mormon Tabernacle Choir Christmas presentation, see friends and family, and spend time with our wonderful friends the Egberts. I love Utah... it was a good way to end our trip.

After leaving Utah we had two days in LA which we spent with some wonderful friends there who looked after us. Our trip was amazing.... We did so many things... too many to mention! But this is a brief insight.

We are so grateful that we could take this trip at this time before life gets so hectic that we can't. We know we are soooo BLESSED!!!