Lost a contact, found a job!

So this has been a crazy week! It's getting closer and closer to the time when I graduate, our housing contract ends, and I have to leave my university jobs--all without knowing what comes next. Well, a few things fell into place this week.

Friday morning we had the opportunity to attend the Provo Temple with a group of seminary and institute teachers. We met before in one of the meeting rooms and the Provo Temple President, Pres. Merrill J. Bateman came and spoke to us for about 45 minutes. It was really interesting and I learned new things about the temple that I didn't know. He even opened it up at the end for a short question and answer session which was also very interesting and a great opportunity. I'll have to tell you about it in the temple sometime. :)


That morning as I was getting ready to go to the temple, I opened my contact lens case to put in my contacts for the day and when I opened up the left side, there was nothing in it. In my 13 years of wearing contacts, that has never happened to me. I remember putting it in the night before, but in the morning, it was gone. It's hard to know where to look for it when that's the case. Unfortunately, since I wear gas permeable contacts and not soft lenses, I couldn't just open up a new package of lenses. I've actually had those lens for about four years, so I'll have to go in for an eye exam and order new ones. That's another thing I'm trying to take care of before we move. :) Of course trials also accompany the blessings, and although I don't consider this a huge trial, it has been somewhat inconvenient.  

A huge blessing came earlier in the week however. Monday night I got a call from Allen Communication Learning Services in Salt Lake to come in for a second interview on Tuesday. I went in and met with the Director of Instructional Design and the Chief Learning Officer. The interview went well and they were very interested with the work I've done with my master's project simulation. At the end of interview they said they would let me know in the next day or two and might invite me to come in for a panel discussion interview. Unexpectedly I got a call that night from them offering me a job. They sent an email that night with the details and I accepted the offer the next day.

 
 It really is a blessing to be offered such a good job. I have interviewed four times with principals for teaching positions and had several other offers for teaching interviews, but things just kept not quite working out. I've had enough experience as an instructional designer to think that it's something that I excel at and am interested in, but not enough that I feel really comfortable or confident doing it, especially in a business setting. So, I am somewhat nervous but grateful for the opportunity. The pay is more generous than I expected and because they offered me a full-time position I'll be able to get benefits for both Jason and I while he completes his student teaching. Additionally, it could turn into a convenient part-time job to have once we have children if it's needed. The shock is finally starting to wear off and Jason and I are busy finishing up what we need to here at BYU before we move and I start work on Aug. 18th.

Friday night I also convinced Jason that we should hike the Y before we leave. We didn't leave our apartment until after 8:30pm so we hiked up the trail during sunset and reached the Y about dusk. I'm always surprised at how STEEP that trail is! They might as well put a staircase right up the mountain side. It was kind of windy that night so a lot of the pictures didn't turn out, but you can see in these that I'm wearing my glasses since I lost my contact.

You can see the Provo Temple on the far right side which can kind of orient you.

The last time we hiked the Y was right before we got engaged.

Anniversary Celebration

Friday was a great day! One of those happy fun days that you don't mind re-living or at least remembering. To celebrate our anniversary, we decided to go to Seven Peaks Water Park. The weather was perfect! We live so close that we even decided to ride our bikes. :) Our favorite ride was Shotgun Falls, a two-person tube ride that is fast and fun. The worst part was the super hot sidewalks that kept us running up some of the ramps because we literally couldn't stand in one place for more than a second. Later in the afternoon my cousin Bill joined us for an hour. He actually works for Seven Peaks and gave us some free tickets. Thanks Bill! We had a really fun afternoon.

Afterwards we showered and went out to dinner at Los Hermanos, one of my favorite restaurants, and then walked around downtown Provo for a little while. It was a great day with my best friend!

World Folk Fest

Tonight my sister Katrina and her husband Neal came to visit us. They are here visiting with their two children from New York. It is Katrina's birthday (which means it's my half-birthday :) ) so my mom and sister Kristilyn took a couple shifts watching their kids so they could get away for a date night.

We ate delicious Navajo Tacos for dinner and chatted a bit and then headed to Springville to see the World Folk Fest. They had several groups from around the world come and perform on an outdoor stage at the Arts Park. Some of the visiting dancers represented were France, Spain, Paraguay, Nepal, China, South Korea, Polynesia, and the Czech Republic. Although it wasn't as high quality dancing as the BYU folk dance team, it was really fun to see the dancers perform their own native dances.

My favorite was the Czech Republic. They were the most precise, professional, and lively with their dancing, and I also got to meet them on Wednesday when they came to my beginning Folk Dance class. They taught us some of their steps through a translator, and I even got to dance with a couple of young men from the Czech Republic group. While they visited our class, they showed us the hat dance and let us do it with them in class while their live orchestra group accompanied them. It was a cool cultural experience!

The Hat Dance

Pioneer Day at Bear Lake

All my immediate family came into town for a reunion last weekend. They came from New York, Missouri, and Colorado. We rented a vacation home near Bear Lake and had a wonderful time playing, talking, eating, and playing some more. We played along the shore, toured Minnetonka Cave, and played around the house. We also took advantage of the delicious fresh raspberry shakes! It was so great to be together with all of my family!

Our view from the balcony

Jason carried Daniel from most of the 90 minutes tour since he was scared of bears in the cave.

 

A Few Fun Activities

So, I don't have a lot of time and I promised Jason I would go to bed in ten minutes, so here is your 10 minute post of activities.

Last Monday Jason and I went to see the Alpine Community Theater production of "The Wizard of Oz." It was really well done, especially for a community theater. We went with Jason's dad, brother Jeff and family, Tim's family minus Tim, and Grandpa and Grandma Colleen Richards. We mainly went to see the star of the show . . . Jason's mom. She did some of the choreography of the Winkies, got thrown across the stage by the "wind" during the tornado storm part at the beginning, and then did some dancing herself with the Ozians. The acting really was great, especially the Scarecrow, the Tin Man, and the Lion. He was exactly the same as on the movie, it was amazing! It was a really fun night!
Friday we had a little cousin get together at Jason's parents' house with Andrea and Nate and Whitney and Cody. We played some volleyball in the backyard, played a version of nerts called "Wacky Six" and then roasted marshmallows over a fire and ate smores. It was so beautiful outside and we had a fun time before Nate and Andrea move to Texas in a couple of weeks.

Saturday Jason and I went to the Manti Temple as part of a ward temple trip. It was so fun to go there again since it's been several years. The murals are beautiful and I enjoy hearing the endowment in the voices of the temple workers since it helps me focus on different aspects of the endowment.

After the temple session, we stopped by the Manti Cemetery to find some family grave sites, but they were hiding from us that day and we never found them. Fortunately we did find our ward at a yummy pizza place in Ephraim for dinner and that was really nice and really yummy. We got a chance to chat with Bishop and Sister Meredith who we will both miss when we move.

I think the sky in this picture looks really fake, but that it really how it looked that day.

Happy Anniversary!

Happy Anniversary to the man I love and waited for!

Reunions

I went to two very different types of reunions yesterday. The first was what I call an extended, extended family reunion. It was the Whitlock Reunion that's done every other year at Mutual Dell. Whitlock is my maternal grandma's maiden name. So the reunion included all of my grandma's descendants as well as the descendants of all my grandma's siblings. Fortunately, I recognized some people there, but there were a lot there that I'd never seen before. Anyway, it was a fun day with good food, fun games, and good company. I feel very happy to be a part of the heritage I have. Even though I didn't know everyone there, I could tell they were good people living good lives. One fun part of the reunion was the zipline they had there. It's been a while since I'd been on a zipline and it was pretty fun, although waiting an hour in the hot sun was not quite as fun. :)
That night I also went to a high school reunion. I wasn't sure I really wanted to go, but I felt bad for the people sponsoring it because if they didn't sell enough tickets within a couple of days, they were going to lose very large deposits and would be forced to cancel the reunion. Anyway, I went and took Jason with me. It was at Gardner's Village. The food was pretty good and I did talk to a few people that I hadn't seen in a long time, but overall it just reminded me that I've grown and changed a lot since high school. I don't feel that I am the same person that walked the halls of that high school. It would have been much more fun if more of my good friends from high school had gone, but fortunately I'm still in contact with those that didn't come and can get together with them another day.