It's been a long time since I blogged, and since this blog is kind of doubling as my journal this year, I feel unsettled with how much has happened and how little I've written.
So here goes. *Deep breath*
NaNoWriMo
National Novel Writing Month (November) is in a week, and I feel overwhelmed at the thought of trying to write a novel again. It's been a year since my last whole-hearted attempt. I'm doing tons of research and planning so that Snow Glider will not only be written in November, it will be written well.
A lot of my "research" involves watching Bear Grylls tips for surviving in the arctic. Holy crow it's intense. I'm so glad I chose an arctic setting now, and my MC is definitely gonna have to display survival skills in the book. After all I'm learning, I have to include it in the book!
I'm also learning a lot about cultures that really do live in the arctic, and I'm sad that more people don't know more about the Sami, Greenlanders, and Inuit. I hope I can raise at least a little bit of awareness if Snow Glider is ever published.
Making more of an attempt to make friends
When I came home from Europe, I had two good acquaintances--two--come up to me and say, "Hi, I'm ---. What's your name?" Both times I just gaped at them and went, "Guys! It's me!" Needless to say, I feel like I haven't made a good enough effort to leave a lasting impression on my ward friends.
So, since I've been home I've done a lot to bond with people. My first week back, especially since I was jobless, I had lots of opportunities to socialize. That first Saturday, I went with Liz to clean the church and met a few new people there.
Later that afternoon, I went hiking with my friends to Donut Falls. It was a fun, leisurely hike on a beautiful autumn day. There were fat little chipmunks everywhere scrounging for last-minute winter rations. April had a bag of trail mix, so I fed peanuts to the chipmunks by hand. They were bold little critters, and I was glad that none of them bit me. My dad would never let me hear the end of it if I had to get rabies shots from a Donut Falls chipmunk.
Much later that evening, I helped Liz make a pizza casserole--the first time I've cooked with any of my roommates. It turned out to be delicious.
That first Monday back, our ward FHE was a service activity for the man who takes care of our church grounds. We went to his house and weeded his yard and took out bushes. It was good to give back to someone who's made our church such a pretty place.
Then on Tuesday, we had another ward activity--this one a Relief Society activity. We made holiday crafts. They had tile picture frames, little baby Jesus ornaments, and wood blocks. I made a stack of three wood blocks. On one side of the blocks are Halloween designs, and on the other are Christmas designs, so they work for both holidays! The RS committee provided cuts of scrapbook paper for us to use, and it was interesting to see how even though all the blocks are the same size and the papers are pretty similar, we all put our own unique style and personality into the blocks.
Here are mine. :)
On the following Sunday, we had a Relief Society breakfast/training meeting, where half the Relief Society got together to eat breakfast casserole and fruit salad while learning more about the importance of our callings. I got to know a lot more girls in my ward at that activity.
For FHE this past Monday, we had the coolest Halloween activity ever! We went up to the Salt Lake cemetery, where we were divided into four groups and given maps of the cemetery. Four of the graves were circled, and each group stumbled around in the dark to find them. Each grave belonged to a famous person in Church history. I can't for the life of me remember who the first woman was, but the other three were Truman Angell, Mary Fielding Smith, and Porter Rockwell. At each grave was a ward member dressed up as the person. They'd each memorized a script telling about the life of the person. It was both very creepy and very cool. Even though I knew it was a ward member's face hidden in the shadows, you could almost imagine that it really was each person's spirit standing by their own gravestone, eager to tell their story and be remembered. I loved it.
Family Get-togethers
I'm also spending much more time bonding with my family. My first Monday back, I was invited to have FHE with the Jenkins and my grandparents (I went after our ward FHE where we cleaned up that yard). We had a delicious dinner, then watched this commencement speech from the University of Texas:
Please please watch it. It's one of the most inspirational things I've ever listened to. It made a great FHE subject.
And then FHE kind of derailed into a YouTube party, where we watched a bunch of trailers for upcoming movies, and then watched the newest episode of Studio C, which grandma and grandpa found very...interesting. :) When it was over, we played Quick Rook while eating ice cream on pizzookies.
I've had dinner at grandma and grandpa's a few Sundays already, usually followed by Rumikub, and most recently with an episode of The Paradise.
Since Ashley has come back from Norway, she and I have gotten into all sorts of shenanigans. We've been working on our fitness most mornings. We've gone to BodyPump, hiked in the mountains, jogged around the park track, and just this morning went to yoga at Dash. It nearly killed us, but we feel very good about ourselves.
We've also been doing a bunch of crafty things together. We've been to Walmart several times for supplies. Last week we painted canvasses. My room desperately needs more decor, so I painted this to fill the space where a headboard should be.
I got the idea from Pinterest. The original piece was black and white, but I have enough black in my room, so I changed it to red.
Then yesterday we invited A-Hui over and made pumpkin chocolate chip cookies, then painted pumpkins to decorate grandma's porch with.
Don't you just love October??
Finally, in family news, I have a new cousin! Aunt Lucie had a baby boy on the 20th--his name is Tennessee James "T.J." Chamberlain. I can't wait to meet him!
Job hunting
The most stressful thing about coming home from Europe has been the job hunt, but thankfully that has mostly been resolved. It was really frustrating those first two weeks. I kept getting my hopes up about some jobs, then not hear anything back for forever.
But then I went to a group interview at the JSMB for a banquet server position. It went extremely well and I felt confident that they were going to hire me. Two days later, they called me and wanted me to work for them.
Unfortunately, they called me while I was on my way to another interview with the Deseret Book downtown store. I too the JSMB that I would call them back, then went in and talked with the DB manager. After a fantastic interview, he hired me on the spot.
So I was sad to have to tell the kind people at the JSMB "thanks but no thanks," but I have a job now! Yay!! I hope this one won't be temporary, but it very well might be. I also got an interview to be the receptionist at the DB corporate office--a position a little higher up the ladder and a little more applicable to my career path than the store associate position. That interview also went very well (I feel like a professional interviewee at this point), but I'm still waiting to hear back from them.
So far working at the downtown store has been amazing. It's been a learning process, sure, but I'm catching on quickly and I just love the whole atmosphere. Everyone who comes in is so nice and my coworkers are wonderful and helpful.
I also get to use my Spanish a lot. Yesterday there was this adorable family of four little girls with their mom, and they only spoke Spanish. The girls loved that I spoke their language (though they were skeptical at first. "Are you sure you speak Spanish?" one asked me.)
The distribution center especially likes having me around, because it's really hard to find the right temple clothes sizes and specifications when there's a language barrier. Not that I'm all that useful when it comes to clothing words. I'm picking them up now, but that first day I did my best but realized most of my vocabulary is very gospel- or Paraguay-specific.
Also, being on my feet all day is reminding me of Paraguay a lot. I haven't been this foot-sore and physically exhausted in a long while. I don't even remember Grounds being this exhausting. I'm sure I'll get used to it soon, though.
Speaking of jobs, it's finally safe for me to say that my parents are officially moving back to Utah!!! My dad found a great job in Salt Lake, and our dreams of all living in Utah again are finally coming true! Of course, Amanda, Chase, and Jackson are still in Idaho, but at least now Mom and Dad can visit them much more frequently! I'm so excited.
Phew! FINALLY all caught up. I feel great relief now. On to writing a novel in 30 days!
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