Moving SUCKS butt!

The last few days have been full of packing up all of our stuff. It has seemed like the packing will never end. I can't believe how many boxes we packed. We went through several rolls of tape. We are both feeling very burned out.

On top of it all I have been working this whole week. I had to in order to get my seasonal bonus. I'm sure it will be worth it when I get the check but it really sucked not having more time to help Soren pack all of our things. I was even at work when people came over to help load the truck. It sounds like there were plenty of people so I guess I wasn't missed that much. I am so grateful for the people that came over to help us. When we moved in we had no help from the ward and it was horrible. I tried getting a hold of someone in the ward to help us, but no one ever responded. This time it was much better. Thank goodness for church members that will help you move.

So, now we just have to clean the apartment and leave. Hopefully the trip home will be quick and uneventful.

We're Done!

Soren and I had our very last Final today. Yay! We are officially done with our college careers. Soren's parents are flying into town tomorrow for our graduation. I'm excited for them to come into town. We are going down to Fargo to pick them up. Soren has been having fun telling them how freezing cold it has been. They are in for quite the treat. We'll see if they will turn around and go right back into the airport. It was -5 degrees at one point today.

Now that classes are out of the way we are going to have to do some serious packing. I listed several things for sale, including our SUV. Hopefully we won't have any problem selling our car. We really don't want to have to take it with us.

Anyway, I'm so excited that we are going to be able to move on with our life. I will miss all of the people in Grand Forks. However, I'm all super excited to see all the people I love in Sacramento.

The Disapointment Continues

Most people who know us know that we have been trying to get pregnant for almost two years now. The last few days I was getting my hopes up a little because I was having some pregnancy symptoms. Rationally I told myself I knew I wasn't pregnant because why would I get pregnant now after all this time of being unsuccessful. I had pretty much given up worrying about it and over the last few months had been doing a really good job of not thinking about it.

I don't know why I let myself get hopeful. I know we aren't going to be able to have children on our own. We will probably have to adopt or something. We will cross that bridge when we get to it though. I cried today when I found out I was not in fact pregnant. It's really horrible having such a strong desire to have children and it not being possible.

I wouldn't wish this on my worst enemy (if I had one). For all of you that are able to have children you should count yourself lucky. Also, if you are ever feeling like you don't want to put up with your kids know I would take them in a heartbeat if I could. Be thankful for what you have been blessed with. I'm trying to be thankful for the blessings I currently have in my life.

Stressed out

Okay, just a really quick post to let you know I am insanely stressed out. I actually started hyperventilating on my way to work this morning. I had to consciously force myself to breath slower and to get myself under control. My stress centers around the fact that next week is finals week and there is a lot of pressure to do well so I can actually graduate. I'm doing well in all my classes so I'm not really sure why I am so worried. I just need to keep telling myself to calm down.

Now I am off to work more on a paper I need to get finished. I will just keep repeating to myself that it will be okay.

On a happy note: less than 3 weeks until we move!

Thanksgiving Day

Elizabeth got a hold of the pot holders and I thought it was so cute watching her walk around with them that I just had to get a picture.

Anna and Dusty Butler

Yummy food!

The main event: The Turkey!

I thought it was time that I actually put some pictures up from Thanksgiving. We got together with some friends and had a small event. We all divided up who would do what and then we all ate at Dallin and Mckensie Pierson's apartment.

We started off the day by going shooting. I guess it is somewhat of a tradition for Dusty Butler. It would have been a lot fun usually, but it was just so cold that morning. I think Anna and I spent half the time in her SUV trying to warm up.

I was in charge of cooking the turkey since we have a roasting pan. My original plan was to put it in the oven before we went shooting at 8am, but I didn't because then it would have been done almost two hours early. I thought we would only be out shooting for an hour and that there would be plenty of time to cook it once we got back. Unfortunately I wasn't really keeping track of the time. I didn't notice the time until about 9:45. As soon as I realized the time I told Soren that we needed to leave. He said: "Okay, it 10-15 minutes." I had to tell him "No, we need to leave NOW!" We ended up eating later than we originally planned because the turkey wasn't ready. We ate at about 2:30. Hopefully people weren't too mad at me for pushing back eating from 1:00.

I also made the best rolls ever. Natalie Clark was nice enough to give me the recipe and they turned out so good. Every one loved them. All of the food was good enough to stuff yourself. However, oddly enough none of us seemed to able to eat that much. It made for a lot of delicious left overs though.

Last of all I would like to express the things I am grateful for. There are so many things I could list. Here are a few:

• My wonderful husband who puts up with so much from me.
• The fact that this is our last semester of school.
• To be escaping North Dakota's horribly cold winters.
• The fact that soon I will be back with family and friends I have missed so much.
• All the people that have made our time in North Dakota a little better. Thanks for your friendship!
• My cozy little apartment. I will miss it.
• To be alive and well.

In a better mood

Okay, I think I'm getting over my grumpiness. I can't think of one time today that I got really frustrated or upset with anyone. Yay! I'm going back to being my normal self.

We are starting to really get somethings in our apartment ready to be moved. Tonight someone came over and bought the futon that was in our office. (I had listed it on our school's version of Craig's list---the Underground). Now that it's out of the way we can start stacking up even more boxes in the office. Our plan is to stick everything in the office as we get it packed up. I'm hoping that by the time graduation comes we will have all of our non essentials packed and ready to go. Graduation is in exactly one month from tomorrow. I can't wait to get the heck out of Grand Forks.

Anyway, I better keep this short. There are plenty of other things that I need to be doing.

Some people's children!

Disclaimer: In the following post I am going to vent about all the rude people that have been around me lately.

Either I have been running into a lot more rude people lately or I am just really grumpy. It is probably the latter. Soren has definitely been having to tell me to calm down quite a bit the last few days.

Today we went grocery shopping and I was standing at the deli waiting for help. Another women came over to wait at the deli a few minutes after I did. When an employee finally came over she asked the other woman what she needed help with. The other woman didn't bother to do the polite thing and let the person know I was there first. NOOOO, instead she went ahead and told the employee that she needed to place an order. OH MY GOSH, how rude can you be! I guess her time is just SO much more important than mine. Whatever, I thought at least the deli person would hand her the order form and help me while she filled it out. Boy was I wrong, the employee just stood there waiting for her to finish. After a few minutes of this I asked if there was anyone else that could help me. She said someone else should be over in just a minute. No one else came over so I had to wait until the woman was done placing her order. In the meantime another woman came over to wait at the deli. When the employee was done watching the women fill out a form she then asked who was there first. Um, maybe the woman that had asked five minutes ago if anyone was going to help her and not the woman that just walked up! I was so ready to just walk away and say screw it, but I really needed the stupid meat and I would have just had to come back later.

Another recent incident happened at the drive thru for Taco Bell. I had to wait behind a man for fifteen minutes while he decided what to order and just generally played with things in his car. I can't count the amount of times that he put on and removed his seat belt or leaned over to get something off the floor. What the heck was he doing! I would have left, but there was a car behind me so I couldn't back out. Don't people realize that if you don't have any frickin idea what you are going to order that you shouldn't choose the drive thru. GO INSIDE where people won't care if you stand around and decide what you want. The drive thru is for those of us that know what we want. Plus, I only go through the drive thru when I am in a hurry so I don't appreciate having to waste my time.

There are many more instances I could share, but I will stop there. Thanks for letting me vent and sorry if you have felt my wrath lately. I promise I am trying to get over my grumpiness and go back to being my usual laid back self.

Our future kids

So I was inspired by a friend to go to this site and see what my future children might look like. Here are our computer generated boy and girl based on pictures of Soren and I. I know they're not real, but I think they turned out pretty cute. Now if we can only get some real kids!

I'm in love with Jane Austen

Lately I've been reading a lot of Jane Austen books. Currently I'm reading Emma. I wouldn't have expected that I would enjoy her work so much. After all her books were written over a 100 years ago. Despite this fact her books are surprisingly easy to read. I'm seriously tempted to start a Jane Austen book club so I can talk about her books with other people. Maybe I will do this at the beginning of the year. Right now there are too many things to do for school. However, don't be surprised if I drag you all into a book club in January.

It all hits you at once

Life sure has been crazy lately. It seems like things hit you all at once. I have assignments and tests in several of my classes this week. It has been pretty stressful. I think I am starting to get a handle on all of it. Times like this definately make me look forward to being done with college. To top everything off I am sick right now. I guess all of the stress lowered the defenses of my immune system.

I just have to keep telling my self that I have less than two months left and so I just have to keep it all together for a little longer. I can do it!

I'll write more when things have calmed down a little.

Maybe someday there will be more time

There are so many things that I would like to have time for. I would love to start a book club, do some traveling, get back in contact with all the people that I love but don't talk to nearly enough, etc. I'm sure everyone would agree that there never seems to be enough time for all the worthwhile things we could be doing. I realize that I have to use what time I have now and that I can't keep putting things off.

My life for the last few years has been a crazy mix of school, work, family, friends, church, etc. During this time I told myself repeatedly that it will be nice once I am done with school because then I will have so much more time on my hands. While, that is somewhat true I'm sure that new things will enter my life that will take all my time.

I have decided to renew my efforts to get my life organized. I nned to schedule time for exercise first and foremost. I also would like to find more time for the massive number of books that are on my list to read. Another thing I need to do is get on top on all things that need to be done around the house (especially since we are moving in about two months). Does anyone have any suggestions for what works for them? Or you could just share what your goals are to get organized.

Putting my foot down!

I have always been a person that likes other people to like me. I generally go with the flow and will let other people have their way if I don't feel strongly about something. I also try to do whatever I can to help out. In many ways I think this is a great part of my personality. However, I also realize that some people will take advantage of you when you are a giving person.

I learned this quite well with my last job at TJ Maxx. I was extremely dependable and would almost always step forward if there was an emergency where they needed me to come in. (The one major exception was when they called me on my wedding anniversary and asked me to come in.) In many ways I didn't say no when I should have. Anyway, as I posted here already I have been hired at Amazon. When I informed TJ Maxx that I found another job I told them I would still come in 1 or 2 days a week for the 3 weeks I was doing training at Amazon. I also told the store manager that I wasn't going to be available on Saturdays.

Well, my generosity was horribly abused. The first week after I told the manager this she scheduled me for shifts that conflicted with my training at Amazon and also scheduled me for Saturday. I went in and confronted her about this and she changed the shifts around a little. I ended up working there 4 days that week which I wasn't very happy about considering I had told them 1 or 2 days, but I worked them anyway.

The next week I expected that they would obey what I had told them. I guess that was too much to expect. They scheduled me for another 4 days including Saturday. This time I really wasn't having it. I went in and told the store manager that there was no way I could work that much. (It would have been 50 hours between Amazon and TJ Maxx, plus my college classes.) I literally would have only been home to sleep. She said she would have to take a look at the schedule and she would get back to me and let me know if she could reduce my hours. (How generous of her.) She got back to me and said that she could shorten my hours by 9 hours. I told her it was better, but I still couldn't work on Saturday because I had already made plans. She still didn't remove my from Saturdays schedule. (I guess she didn't realize that I was telling her that I wouldn't work Saturday rather than asking for it off.)

After that I just let her a message that said something to this affect: "I can only work one day next week. If you schedule me for any more than this I will not show up. Also, I cannot work this Saturday. I have already made plans and I can't cancel them. This should give you plenty of time to find someone to work in my place. I told you two weeks ago that I was only able to help 1 - 2 days a week and that I wasn't available Saturdays. I have been very accommodating. Please don't continue to abuse by kindness."

Well, I went in to work on Friday and I wasn't scheduled at all for the next week. It was a big relief not to have to deal with their crap and more. I cleaned out my locker and picked up all my pay stubs. It feels great to say that I am finally free of TJ Maxx.

You may ask yourself what the moral is of this rather long story. Here it is: Realize that you deserve to be treated well, and if you aren't being treated as well as you deserve don't put up with it. I finally put my foot down and it was very empowering. I suggest you all do the same.

Personal realizations

We all have times that we finally come to realize things that have been bouncing around in our head. Tonight I had a girls night with some ladies I know. We went out for dinner and a movie. It was fun chatting and having a break from responsibility. We saw the movie "The Women." It was a cute movie and we were all laughing at several parts. However, at the end I had a somewhat unexpected realization come to me. One of the characters gives birth and at that moment I realized that as much as want children it may never happen and that I need to learn to be okay with that. It was like at that moment I was being told "Julie, I know you won't like this but you need to be strong and learn to be happy without children."

I have actually been thinking a lot lately about the fact that we all need to count the blessings that we already have in our life and not be constantly yearning for something we don't have. Someone I know through the message boards on webmd has been through a lot in the last couple months. She went from trying to have a baby for a long time, to finding out some wonderful news that she was finally pregnant. Then right after this exciting news her husband suddenly died. He was only 30. She tried to take comfort in the fact that at least she would have their child. Now she just found out that she is having a miscarriage. My heart goes out to her. I cannot even fathom the pain and heartache she is feeling right now.

All of this has helped to remind me that I need to be thankful for each and everyday. I have so much to be thankful for. I am lucky to have a wonderful husband who loves me. I also have some wonderful friends that have shown me in many circumstances that they will always be there for me. Most of all: I know that there is a reason for this life. This comforts me during the times when things are hard. There is always a light at the end of the tunnel. Sometimes we just have to have faith that it is there and keep walking forward.

To quote one of my favorite hymns:
"When upon lifes billows you are tempest tossed,

when you are discouraged, thinking all is lost,

Count your many blessings; name them one my one,

And it will suprise you what the Lord has done"

(Count Your Blessings)

Love the new job

So far working for Amazon has been great. I commented to Soren that I wish I had started working there two years ago. I guess TJ Maxx hasn't been all bad, but it sucks compared Amazon. I may be complaining in a few months when things get really busy as we get closer to Christmas. For now I very happy with the change. Plus, I would still be dealing with the holiday rush if I was at TJ Maxx.

Hopefully this job will help us save up some money for when we move back to California. We will definately need some extra money during the time when we are having to look for jobs. Hopefully we won't be out of work for too long. I guess I'll worry about that when it comes though.

Back to School, UGH!

Today was my first day of classes. I really don't want to do another semester, but then again it is my last one. There is just a pessimistic part of me that wonders what lame reason UND is going to come up with to not let me graduate. I need to go talk to my advisor and get a signed statement or something that says that I have enough to graduate. I was so mad last semester when they suddenly decided some of my transfer classes weren't good enough for them.

Anyway, this is my last semester I guess. I just need to focus on that fact and do my best in my classes.

Success

After a month of looking for a new job I finally got one. I was really beginning to think that I was going to be stuck at TJ Maxx until we moved back to California. This morning I got a call from Amazon. I went on an interview there yesterday afternoon. It pays $1.50 more per hour than I am currently being paid. I will be working Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday which works perfect with my school schedule of having classes Tuesday and Thursday. Orientation is this next Wednesday and then I start training on September 2nd.
I'm really excited about having a new experience. I really hope that it will be a good one.
One of the best things about this job is that it is only seasonal, so I won't have to feel bad about working there for four months and then quiting. This job will be ending about the same time that we will be leaving for California.
Yay for me! I will now be raking in the big bucks.

Husbands...Can't live with them, can't live without them

Okay, I suppose I shouldn't have two posts in one day, but I just had to share this. Soren and I have different jobs when it comes to taking care of things around the house. Dishes are usually his job. Laundry is always my domain. We help each other out when needed.
Well, today I didn't get the chance to finish the laundry because I had to go to work. Soren being the wonderful man he is offered to do it for me. I didn't really think about until I was going in to bed. I was in the process of unbuttoning my jeans to get changed into my jammies and I casually asked him if he had finished the laundry. He looks up at me and says "don't take off your pants!"
He had left our whites down in the laundry room of our apartment building. So, I go down the stairs hoping that no one has removed our undies from the dryer because they needed to use it. (The laundry room of our apartment building only has two washers and one dryer.) Luckily the clothes were still safe in the dryer.
I just find it funny because this is a common occurrence when Soren finishes up the laundry for me. I will be leaving for work and I tell him the clothes in the dryer will be done in 15 minutes (or however long it is) and ask him to bring them up. I get home 5 or 6 hours later and where are the clothes? Are they in our apartment where they should be? No, they are in the laundry room still.
I can't tell you how many times I have gone down there after work to find our clothes sitting in our laundry basket or on top of the washer. Thank goodness that I always do the whites first so that it is at least only our shirts and pants that people are touching. It will be so nice to eventually have our own washer and dryer so that we don't have to worry about remembering to pull our clothes out of the dryer before someone else does.

And It Poured!

If there is anything I will miss here in North Dakota it would be the awesome thunderstorms. It is one of the coolest things you can experience. The amount of rain that can come rushing out of the sky is unbelievable. It was raining a lot this afternoon. I think I was in the rain for about two seconds and I got drenched.
There were huge puddles in the road. It reminds me of two years ago. It was just after Soren and I had moved here. We had a classic down pour and one of the major roads near our apartment was flooded with a few feet of water. We own an SUV and we were having fun driving through it and spraying all kinds of water everywhere. Well, one of the times I was driving through I didn't realize that the car driving the opposite direction we were had their windows down. By the time I realized it was too late. The image of that guy holding his hands up to the window to hold back the water will always be etched in my memory and it still makes me laugh uncontrollably. Did he really think that he would be able to hold the water back with his hands?
I absolutely love the rain. I never use an umbrella. The feeling of raining hitting my skin makes me happy in a way that I can't explain. About a week ago we had an amazing thunderstorm. It was the kind that you could feel even inside of a building. The rain was coming down so hard it looked like a waterfall coming out of the sky. I had the irresistible urge to play in the rain. I tried to convince Soren to play in the rain with me, but he said no. So, I went without him. I kicked the water in massive puddles and danced in the rain. It was so much fun! We need more thunderstorms like that for me to play in.

My prospects are looking up

So, for those of you who don't know: I decided to quit my job a few weeks ago. I haven't been happy there for the last few months. The hours suck and the pay is horrible. Well, something happened a couple of weeks ago that was the last straw. I put in my two weeks notice and started looking for something new.
I have put in what seems like a ton of applications, but I haven't heard back from that many places. I was begining to think that I was going to be stuck at TJ Maxx. Well, yesterday I got a message from a place that I had applied to a few weeks ago. They said they have some openings and are looking to hire some people really soon. I had a phone interview today and at the end the woman told me she would pass on my info and someone would contact me in the next week. Well, two hours later I got a call back to set up a face to face interview.
How awesome am I that it only took two hours for them to call me back for another interview. The pay would be pretty good. (For North Dakota anyway.) I really hope I get the job. I am so ready to be done with retail and dealing with Canadians. (If you haven't already heard me rant about how horrible Canadians are as customers I'll have to share that with you some day.)
Anyway, I'm excited about the possibility of getting a new and better job. Wish me luck.

Scooter issues

So, Soren and i decided to buy a scooter. We bought it online because it was a whole lot cheaper that way. It took about a week to arrive and we were anxiously waiting that whole time. When it did arrive we thought that it would be ready to go. Not so fast!
The battery they sent us was bad. So after calling every place in town to look for a new battery we found one place that had it in stock, but they want $100 for it. We called the company that we bought the scooter from and asked if they could send us another battery. They didn't have any in stock, but they said they would reimburse us if we bought one locally. So, we got our battery finally, got it all charged and then hooked it up thinking that would fix everything. The scooter wouldn't start. Then we discovered something must be loose in the wiring. The scooter would start sometimes, but then it would die.
After calling the company again we found out that sometimes wiring came loose during shipping. They told us that we could have it looked at and that they would pay the costs after we paid $100. We decided it was ridiculous to have to pay more money for a brand new scooter and that maybe we could find the problem. We bought a tester at Walmart and started testing the connections on the bike. It ended up that the fuse was broken. You couldn't tell by looking at it because it was broken right under the metal end cap.
So after a few issues the scooter was working great. I rode around on it like crazy that night and had a ton of fun. Little did I know that would not be the end of our scooter issues.
The next day when I was at work I got a call from Soren saying he needed me to pick him up. I said "Okay, as soon as I get off work." He said "No, I need you to come get me now." He told me he had crashed the scooter and it wasn't drivable. So I told them at work that my husband have been in an accident and I needed to leave right then.
Here it is a week later and the scooter is being looked at to see how much it will cost to fix it. I hope that the damages aren't enough for it to be totaled. At least we have insurance so we will only have to pay $50 of the costs.
Good grief! Hopefully after this we won't have any more issues with the scooter.

Joined the bandwagon

So, I decided that it was time to join the countless others who have set up blogs. I probably won't have much to write, but it will be nice to have another way to keep in touch with people