Well...

I have a lot of catching up to do before this blog is really finished, and I'll get there, once I have a fully functioning computer to work with and better internet...but for now, I just have to say a big farewell to Aotearoa...it is a hard goodbye to say, and I almost can't believe that it has come time for that already, but tomorrow morning, bright and early, I will be leaving this beautiful country. I'll stop off in Aussie for a few days, then I'll be back in the Auckland airport for a few hours before I leave for the States. I was given a card by the classroom next door to mine which said that this goodbye was for an unspecified amount of time or something like that...and that is the kind of goodbye that I am having to say to New Zealand right now...I will return someday, but right now I don't know how soon or how far that trip will be, and that makes me more sad than I realized until it actually kind of hit me tonight that it is for real now. In honor of my last night in Aotearoa, I have decided to make a short list of things that I will miss from this beautiful country...this isn't necessarily in any order, but I'll let everyone order them as they imagine they would be.
6. Sweets...Ice-blocks (popsicles), Crunchies, Tim Tams, Toffee Pops, Hokey Pokey Ice Cream, Moro Bars, etc...so many sweets!!!
5. Beaches...although I haven't been to one in the sunshine for a while, I will just miss driving down the road and looking out to the ocean on one side, or possibly both sides, I'll miss the sunshine that comes with sitting at the beach and the tan that I have gotten while I've been here!
4. BYU girls and the Cutris...I know that most of these girls are coming back to Provo, just like me, but it will not be the same...with three going on missions and around 5 getting married this summer, it just won't be quite the same, but these girls are a part of my whanau now, and I'll love them forever! And the Cutris, especially the kids, are amazing! I will miss seeing Ti and Atti, but at least they aren't too far away from where I'll be living next year! (Sorry to my roommates, but you are being included here so that my list doesn't get too long, but you deserve your own number)
3. James Ahmu...seriously one of the most amazing people on this planet...I will miss being driven around, and led around by this guy...he is pretty cool! Those of you who don't know him, you should meet him! He has given us his e-mail for anyone that may be coming to visit, and he loves helping people have the best experience in his beautiful country!
2. My kids...I had no idea I could love a classroom of kids quite like I loved the kids of Room 4. Saying goodbye to them was so hard. Not only did I love that classroom, but I loved the one next door as well, actually I just loved all of Pomaria! I wish that I could just transport the whole school to the States so that I could teach there forever. I will never forget my experiences at Pomaria Primary School!
1. My baby girls, and the whole Joseph whanau...reading a bed time story tonight to Foo and Sizzle, was so great, but so hard to get through without crying...I love those two little girls, even when they told me every day that they hated me or that I wasn't their friend, I still loved them because they would say that and then later they would love on me and make it all better. The whole family is amazing and I am so lucky that I got to be a part of it.
So thank you Aotearoa, and more importantly thank you to the beautiful Kiwis that I have fallen in love with! I have so much love for these people and for this country!

A lazy day on the beach...

makes for the best day of camping this girl has ever had! We spent our Saturday at the Coromandel out on the beach. The water was beautiful, although it was very cold because of the  cold front that moved into the area while we were there. But we braved the water anyway and it was so worth it! We to the beach around 10 I believe and we spent the whole day in and out of the water, some when kayaking, others tried surfing, others stayed on the whole day reading books and working on their tan. I did a little of everything...except kayaking. The kayaks were occupied most of the day so I just did the other things. I did a lot of laying...a lot of reading...and some time in the water. We have been warned so many times that the sun here is stronger than in the states and that we need to be really careful about applying sunblock when we are out in the sun. After my first big burn at Omaha beach I have been more careful about applying sunscreen...though still not as careful as I probably should be. Anyway I did apply two or three times that day I think and I only had a little bit of pinkness on areas that I did not cover quite as well. Not nearly the burn I had after Omaha! It was a beautiful day at the beach! After our day at the beach we headed back to our campsite and some people showered to get the beach feel off of them...I really roughed it and I didn't shower when I got back...instead my hair just went up in a lovely ponytail or something and I put on some warm clothes! Then we had some more sausages for lunch/dinner/every meal really. We played some Scum in one of the tents, chatted, exchanged back massages, and just had a good time! It was the first time we were really able to go as a group somewhere overnight, so it was just a big bonding experience! Also it was nice to be bonding with the Joseph's a bit during that trip. That night, the Josephs cooked up some Paua, which is like an abalone, for those of you who know that that is...basically I learned a lot more than I really wanted to about that shelled creature. First of all I learned that it has teeth, which you have to pull out when you are getting all of the meat out of the shell, and I learned that it is really nasty work to clean out the Pauas and I avoided it altogether! I did help clean up the dishes afterward however because it had to be done and no one was too quick to volunteer! I didn't try the Pauas...I should have, but after the Kenna that I tried earlier in the day I felt completely justified in saying no to another new and foreign food...plus it looked like green goop and I didn't know if I could handle it...for those of you who have seen Better Off Dead...the stuff that his mom makes that eventually slides off of his plate on its own...that is what the paua mixture reminded me of...not really that appetizing! We turned in kind of early that night because we had gotten a few noise complaints the night before, and we were planning on getting up kind of early the next morning to head home. Plus we were all pretty tired after a long day at the beach! Night two we planned much better and we stayed much warmer than we had the night before! The next morning, one of the first things that I did was run up to the out house to use the toilet...I wouldn't normally share this information, except that something funny happened...well I thought it was funny...I got up there and there were two little girls waiting outside so I joined the line of people waiting. I waited for a while, and a bit later an older lady came up to join the line. We all stood there for a while and waited and waited. She looked at me and asked if I knew if someone was actually in there. I said no, I had just joined the line behind the little girls and assumed that they knew someone was in there. She decided that wasn't good enough and she knocked on the door to find out for herself. When she knocked on the door and asked if someone was in there, a man responded with a yes and I'll be right out...When he did walk out he was carrying a very thick book in his hands and he walked past saying sorry...After he had passed the older lady started laughing and then she looked after him and said something about the "typical male"...then she talked to me about how she couldn't imagine why anyone would want to be reading in the toilet, especially one as smelly as this one...so maybe not so funny, but at the time I thought it was really funny because I couldn't help but think of my dad and all of the books and magazines that he keeps lying around in his bathroom!
So we ate some breakfast, and started breaking camp. With about 30 people, working on tents it didn't take long to get it all cleaned up, and we were on the road before it got too late. We headed for home and all prayed that we would be able to sleep some of the time as we were driving home since we were all headed for a late night of packing and an early morning flight! We drove home, stopped at a gas station to get some gas and use the restroom...got kicked out and told we couldn't use the restroom because we weren't customers so we had to go out and ask the people driving to move the cars to the pumps since they intended to fill the vans up with petrol and then politely go back in and tell the lame man at the desk that we were customers and we needed to use the toilet...he couldn't deny us then thank goodness and we finally got to use the toilet...that is one thing that I've noticed here in New Zealand...it is difficult to find a public restroom that you can just walk into and use...also it is very difficult to find a drinking fountain...they are almost non-existent! I guess it is part of them doing their part to conserve or something but I much prefer the convenience of America when it comes to public toilets and drinking fountains!
Once we got home, we threw clothes into the washer right away and got started packing for our next adventure. After getting our laundry out to dry, we tried to pack everything else that we would need for almost two weeks into a carry on bag...after just a little while I think that all three of us resorted to getting a larger bag and taking the larger bag and a smaller bag in order to fit all of the stuff we needed...I was pretty impressed with myself for getting it all to fit in! We were up most of the night doing this and then when I finally went to bed I set an alarm for 3:45 and 4 AM so that I could wake up and skype with Mom, Dad, Mhari, James, and Andrew...they were all at Mhari and Jame's house in Austin so it was 9 AM there and they were more than willing to get up early to talk to me! Unfortunately I slept through my alarm and it was about 4:30 when I woke up...so I had to hurry but I was worried they may have already given up on me. Unfortunately things were working against me and Micah's computer which was the one I was using to skype on took like 20 minutes to turn on so I finally got connected at like 5 minutes to 5...and my taxi was supposed to be there at 5...I got on anyway because I wanted to talk to them really bad and luckily they hadn't given up on me yet and I had a few minutes that I could talk to them before we had to go jetting off to the airport which would take us to Queenstown...I was so glad that I caught them because I really needed to see some familiar family faces! Well, until the next time...I don't know if I'll ever catch up at this rate but thanks for being patient with me!

Camping will never be the same...

after camping so close to the beach! We drove up to the Coromandel peninsula the day that our classes ended. The Joseph's set up this camping trip ages ago...it was supposed to be for all of the YSA in the stake, but then it got nixed by the stake presidency so it was just 17 of the BYU girls (3 didn't want to go), the Cutri family, all of my Joseph family except Pascal, and Erin's brother Nat who lives in our ward and who we had met a few times before brought 2 of his kids. It was about a 3 or 4 hour trip to get to our camp site, and it was a few hours of heaven! The drive was seriously through some of the most beautiful places that I have ever seen. We drove by a lot of cows as we were going, and my favorite line of the drive was, "these cows are so lucky and they don't even know it. They must be the happiest cows in the world...happy cows don't come from California, they come from New Zealand!" I don't remember who it was that said this, but it was a really funny conversation. The whole time that we were driving we kept saying that we had to take a picture of one area because it was so beautiful, then we would drive just a little further and we would see something even more beautiful and we all wanted a picture of the next scene. It seriously felt like we were driving into heaven because it was so beautiful. I wish that I could spend forever there because a picture will never be enough to show the immense beauty of the place. Our campsite, funny enough, looked a lot like any place that you would go camping in Utah, big trees, mountains and nice little outhouses all around a big open grassy field filled with tents. The only big difference came when you went down the road a bit and over a hill...all the sudden you were standing on a beach on the edge of the most beautiful water that you had ever seen. Anyway, it was an amazing ride, some girls got a little sick because of all of the twisting and curving of the road, but I am a lucky one who is not affected by motion sickness.
We got to the campsite in time for a nice sausage sizzle dinner, and then we played some games while it got darker and darker...that was another big difference between here and camping in Utah...we weren't allowed to have a campfire so we all sat around a propane lantern and wrapped up in blankets (because a cold front was moving through) as it got later. After dinner, we just visited and played some games, and had a ball! We were singing along to Erin's guitar and playing games until like midnight or later. It was so much fun, and the next day we were all very sleepy because of it! After we went in to bed, Brittany Babcock (the other Brittany in our group) read to us from this book called Telesa. It is a book written by a lady in our ward here and it has gone around to a lot of the girls to read, I haven't read it yet but I plan to sometime soon. Anyway, to get us to go to sleep, Brittany did a read aloud from a chapter of Telesa...it was highly entertaining. The next day we got up semi-early, not too early like some of the girls who went diving in the morning. We had a nice New Zealand camp breakfast of cereal followed by some Kenna... For those of you are confused now, wondering what a kenna is, I will post a picture eventually but for now I'll just say it is a sea urchin. You cut it open and eat the orange part inside which is actually its tongue. It is salty and rubbery and probably one of the worst things I have ever eaten, but I did eat it! I think that we got a video of me eating it...another thing that I'll post sometime. I really thought I might throw up after eating that, but I was really proud of myself for giving it a try!

School

I was going to write a post all about the fun things that we did in school for the rest of our class time, but there is so much to say and it is much more exciting when I can post pictures to show and help explain what we did, so I will wait to tell you more about school until I have a chance to tell you all about stuff with pictures and videos to explain all of the fun that we had in our classes! Because they were so condensed, I thought we would have so much work to do each day, but because we had so little time, and I think because we had so much time in class each day our teachers took pity on us, or they were just really awesome teachers and they let us do a lot of really fun things, while still teaching us a lot about the subject that they taught! I think maybe it is a combination of the two things!

Now I never finished introducing the family so I'll finish doing that now...
Rose, is the mum of the Joseph whanau. She chases/chauffeurs the two babies around all day everyday, and she does it so well. She works so hard, and is an amazing mum to all of us. She is always looking out for her kids and praying for the best for them. It has been a lot of fun getting to know her a little better and to learn from her as a mother. She is an amazing lady and I feel like I learn new things about her everyday. I appreciate so  much all that she does for us while we are here and I feel lucky to be a part of her whanau even if it is only for a few months.

The last member of the whanau that you need to meet is Pascal. Pascal is 14, she goes to high school, and is a member of the kapa haka group at her school. She has all the attitude that is required of a 14 year old and she is very strong willed and opinionated. She is fiercely defensive of her family and she is a very powerful and independent daughter of God. She is intense, and doesn't think much of me, but I really admire her and her strength.

Catching up...

This seems to be the title of more blog posts than I care to admit to...but here I am again, so far behind that I don't know if I'll be able to catch up on everything or remember everything quite right, but I'll do my very best! I'm sorry that I have gotten so far behind but I was a little behind to begin with and then around the 25th or 26th of January my computer decided to fight with me and then id decided to break! It wasn't very nice of it! Anyway that happened right before we left on our trip for the south island so I decided to ask another host dad who is really good with computers if he would mind looking at it and trying to fix it. He took it for the time that we were on the south island and said he couldn't find anything wrong with it. He brought it back to me and tried to turn it on at our house and the same problems happened, so he decided to look at it again. After further inspection he decided that it was something wrong with my audio card and he would have to look at it a little longer. He took it to some guys at his work and they decided the best plan would be to turn off the audio drive completely and then it would go a little faster when it was turning on and I should be able to use it pretty normally except that I can no longer listen to music on it or watch videos on it or Skype on it because there is no sound...all of which is a big pain, but I can do my school work which I suppose is most important! Sadly with the turning off of the sound drive my usb drives and my SD reader have also been affected so I can't get pictures off of them...it also means that I can't get all of the pictures from my friends that they have on their cameras. So I'll do what I can, but I don't know how many pictures I'll be able to put up for a while so I'll just work on getting the words all up and then you can read and I'll add pictures as soon as I can! I'm sorry for the slow speed, but with being so far behind + starting practicum, working on my online class, and traveling and having a social life (you know searching for that perfect New Zealander husband) I've got a lot on my plate so I'm not sure when I'll be all caught up...thanks for your patience and continued love and support...I always look forward to messages from home as well...I've noticed I haven't gotten many updates since I left so it's not all my fault...love yous!

Omaha Beach

 Our second Saturday in New Zealand, Erin was kind enough to take us to the beach with him. We first drove up by Orewa Beach where we spent our first Saturday, but then we continued up the road a bit to Omaha Beach, and it was so worth the wait! It was raining in Auckland that day, big surprise since that was like the only weather we seemed to see for the first few weeks, and sometimes still. But at Omaha it was beautiful! (as you can see in the pictures below.) While at the beach Erin agreed to give us our first surfing lesson. Sarah went first while Micah and I watched the girls on the shore. After Sarah gave it a try and did pretty well, it was my turn...or so I thought, I headed out to where Erin was waiting but he wasn't quite ready to share his board yet. Instead of starting soon after I ended up waiting out in the water for about an hour and finally...the waves died down enough that Erin decided I could handle them and he didn't need to keep taking the waves he saw coming! I didn't quite make it to my feet, but I got up to my knees...next time I get a chance to go I will hopefully be able to make it up to my feet, but it is really hard to do! It was so amazing though! After I tried Micah went out and tried with Erin's help for a little bit and then after a while we got our own boards and tried to do it on our own...I only caught one wave successfully on my own and I rode it for a while but I couldn't get up. It was so much fun though and I think if I ever live close to a beach I will become a beach bum and forget about work altogether! Now, this post has a lot of pictures because we decided to take a ton of pictures that day, but there won't be many more with pictures because I can't get access to my pictures from my computer any more :( So don't hate me because this is so long!

I love this picture of Sizzle because I just think she looks so cute! Who knows what she is doing, I just like it!

 Some beautiful pictures of the beach. I think this is what I imagined New Zealand to look like everywhere.

This is one of my attempts at surfing...working my way up!








From the look of this picture I am about to fall over because I am leaning to one side, but still working on it!






After my first try at surfing I got out to let Micah have a turn, and Sarah told me about this figure just up the beach a little and up some stairs so I decided to go and take a picture with it because I thought it was kind of cool...it had a mermaid tail...

And then one with the beach behind me! It was so beautiful! I seriously could live at the beach every day for the rest of my life and not complain...well maybe complain a little bit because of all of the sand, but it would still be amazing!








Before we left the beach we wanted to take some more pictures because we hadn't taken very many the first day at the beach due to the rain. So we started with some jumping pictures obviously because those are the best ones!!
We also decided to do a pyramid picture because it is a classic fun picture...Sizzle was scared to be on top, but she was brave and she did it anyway!
Then we got the babies into some jumping pictures...just ignore the black dot in the middle of the picture...there was something on Micah's camera.

Then we had the piggy back picture because the girls refused to walk back to where Erin was waiting because they wanted a piggy back instead.









And before we left Erin took one jumping picture of all of us together, the babies didn't quite make it up, but they got close and the rest of us were up so we just went with that one!










Then we took one regular one of all 5 of us and it turned out so cute!











And as we were leaving we caught one picture of the three roommates all together with the beautiful beach behind us!










After a lovely day at the beach we were all tired out! Sizzle could barely make it to the car before falling asleep! But no matter how tired we were were were still awake enough to stop and enjoy a treat which included a Luxury Flake bar which was amazing! As well as some chips and Pineapple lumps which have quickly become a staple in my diet it seems! It was a much better day at the beach than our last attempt and we were so happy that Erin was willing to take us along and give us a go on the board, even though it took away from his own chances to catch some waves!

A little sadness...

I wish so much that this blog could be all happiness and good times, but I think I would feel a bit dishonest if I didn't take a little time to post about this past week and the sadness that my family has faced. Since October, my extended family has now faced the loss of 7 members. Most from different sides of the family; 3 of them were quite a bit older and did not come as too much of a shock, but unfortunately too many of them were a shock. I know that this is going to be kind of a heavy and sad post...but I feel the need to send love to my family and just remember for a little bit. Toward the end of October, my family lost a very special man in my Uncle Robert Brinton. He passed away very suddenly, and it came as a very big shock to me. I was in the store when I got the news and I was so shocked that I almost sat down in the aisle because I was so shocked. I have so many wonderful memories of Uncle Robert, and going down for his funeral was probably the best thing for me then. I got to be surrounded by family and celebrate the life of a man that has had a huge impact on my life. Uncle Robert was so amazing and losing him was a really huge blow for me, but I know that he is carrying on a very important work on the other side. And luckily I have such a huge bond with his family and that bond will last forever because of the efforts of Robert and Nanette and my parents...I am so grateful for the closeness that we share. I think it was 2 weeks after Robert's death that my mom's Uncle Leland died. Leland was my Grandpa Roy's brother, he lived across the backyard from my Grandpa and I'm sure that they had a really great reunion up in heaven. Then around Thanksgiving Dad's Uncle Bud passed away after fighting for a while after a stroke I believe. Uncle Bud was my Grandma Betty's brother, and I felt like I knew him the best out of that side of the family because when we lived in Lubbock, when I was growing up, he had a house there and spent a lot of time there. I really have some fond memories of Uncle Bud. Then during finals week, Mom's Uncle Wayne, my Grandma Bertha's brother passed away. I don't think that I have any memories of Wayne Randall, but I made it home just in time to go down to the funeral with my mom, Becky, and Nanette. The funeral was very interesting because I didn't know him and I learned a lot about him during that time, and a lot about his family (my great-grandparents and great-aunts and uncles and my grandma). I sat between my mom and Nanette and I think that more than anything I was glad that I could be there for moral support. The next member of our family to be lost was very sad, my sister Kalli lost the little baby she was carrying. It was a really sad loss, but she is so strong and she amazes me. I love her so much, and I know that she will have another chance to be a mom soon. We escaped the sadness for a while, but this last week, both were very sudden and very sad. My cousin Tisha, lost her husband earlier this week. They have a little boy, and I can't imagine how hard that would be as a mom to try to explain to your child. I didn't know Kimmel very well, I only remember meeting him a few times, but from what I've heard of him, he was a really great guy. I'm sad that I won't get to know him better now. Then the other day I got a message from my dad, I guess my mom didn't want to be the bearer of bad news yet again, so my dad did it. He messaged me to tell me that my cousin Robyn had passed away. I don't know what exactly happened. Robyn is another person in my family that I didn't get to know very well. She had a rough life, a lot of decisions that led to a rough life, but she seemed so happy and like she was doing so well the last time that I saw her. I wish that I would have been able to know her better, I guess that is what the next life will be for...getting to know those that you didn't have a chance to know as well as you wanted to in this life. I don't know the details for a lot of what has happened this week, but I know that much of my family is suffering at this time and I wish there was more that I could do...I guess for now all I can do is pray. So to all my family who is in need of comfort, for all those who are mourning, my thoughts, my prayers, and my love are with you. I am so sorry that so many trials have come your way, and I hope that you all know how much you are loved.

Family Night

Family nights with the Josephs mean kind of a long night, but always exciting! The way that things work around here is that we sing an opening song, accompanied by Erin on the guitar, then we share our schedules for the week, and then every person has to do an individual thing, it can be whatever you want it to be, and then if that doesn't take too long we'll have a quick lesson and a closing song also accompanied by Erin on the guitar and a prayer. Our first Monday, we didn't realize that we would be thrown right into the fire, but we started off with Sarah and then we went around the circle. Sarah of course started out with a really great piano performance that put the rest of us to shame before we even had a chance. Then Cheyenne shared a joke, Pascal read a scripture, and it was already my turn...I didn't really know what to do for my individual activity so I decided to play the one thing that I can always remember on the piano...Mary Had a Little Lamb...it was really spectacular, let me tell ya!! After I did mine, it was Micah's turn, she decided that since she didn't have a good talent to share (not that mine was a good talent) that she would teach the family how to play crazy Uno. Both of us got the family Uno cards when we came because it's always a fun game for a group, so she decided to pull them out and teach them a game. It was a huge success!
While playing we had to take some good pictures to document the Josephs' first Crazy Uno game...which will now probably become a tradition. This is Pascal and I playing...ignore the nasty hair once again...for some reason my hair never seems to look very good down here...must be too humid or something because it always looks and feels kind of like it hasn't been washed in days, even if I just washed it the night before. I think I'm going to try and find some new shampoo to see if that will help it...which stinks because I bought some nice new shampoo right before I left in hopes of it being good shampoo for my hair :(
 The whole family playing some Crazy Uno, after Micah used this as her individual thing, we moved on to Erin, who is very competitive and he decided he also wanted to use Crazy Uno as his individual thing, and then when it was Rose's turn he merely suggested that he thought she might want to do it as her individual thing also...who knew it would be such a sensation?!? It was pretty entertaining! Since then I think we've played this game at least 3 other times! After we finished our last round of Crazy Uno, we sang our closing song, and it was probably the most fun I've ever had singing the closing song for FHE...we sang L-O-V-E...as in "L is for the way you look at me, O is for the only one I see, V is very very extraordinary, E is even more than anyone that you adore". It was a really great way to close the night! I'm looking forward to some really exciting FHEs in this house!!

Saturday Afternoon

After we got home from our day in the water we were all pretty tired, So we came home, showered, and just lounged around. I didn't even put on real clothes...just my sweats and a t-shirt. Sarah practiced the guitar skills Erin has taught her, and Micah pretended to know how to play, then she did actually learn a few things from Erin. We tried our first Hot Milo, which is similar to hot chocolate, but not exactly the same...we had to add lots of sugar for it to compare, but once we added the sugar it was pretty good.

 Sarah playing the guitar...

 Micah...I think pretending at this point, but maybe this was after a bit of instruction.

After playing some instruments, and reading for a bit, we played with the babies a little bit as you can see in the picture below, they like to play a bit rough! Ignore the scary hair in all of these pictures...remember I said that we were really relaxed! Oh and in this picture I am drinking hot Milo. Then I went and helped with the grocery shopping for the week. I mostly wanted to see what the store was like, and just kind of see how much stuff cost. Also I needed some nail polish remover really badly!




While at the grocery store, we bought some Crumpets, which aren't like the things you would expect when you hear about tea and crumpets...I don't think they are the same thing. The Crumpets we had were more like Eggos...only way better. You just toast them and then, according to Erin the trick is to butter them right away so the butter all soaks in, then you put jam on top of it. They are really yum! Erin also bought some TimTams so that we could try our first official TimTam slam! And it was even more yum!!

A TimTam is a very delicious cookie, or biscuit as they call them in New Zealand. It is a chocolate cookie with some chocolatey creamy stuff in the middle and another chocolate cookie on top and all of that is covered in chocolate...it is hard to explain, but it is more delicious than anything I can explain! Anyway, for a Tim Tam Slam,  you bite off one corner, and then you bite off the opposite corner of the cookie then you suck hot Milo through it like a straw. Because the Milo is so hot it melts the chocolate as it goes through the cookie and you end up with this gooey goodness that is wonderful! The trick is to get it into your mouth before that yum gooey mess falls apart. and you have to drink your Milo to get to it. This picture shows all of the girls except Sarah, and Rose. Just loving our Milo and Tim Tams! I think that with the combination of Tim Tams, Ice Blocks (popsicles), and ice cream that they have here I am going to get really fat if I'm not careful!

Now, for my person of the day I am going to introduce you to Cheyenne. This is Cheyenne while she is borrowing Micah's camera to take some pictures of herself. Cheyenne 19 and is the oldest of the Joseph kids that we have met because her older brother Jivarne is on his mission in San Francisco right now. She works a lot, she teaches the beehives in Young Womens, and she is kind enough to drive us to some YSA activities. Because of her busy schedule combined with our busy schedule, I don't know a lot about Cheyenne yet, but hopefully that will change soon!

Orewa Beach and Waiwera Thermal Spa Resort

Well, our first Saturday in New Zealand we had a beach day planned...unfortunately we didn't realize it would be raining quite as much when we got here as it has been. We decided the beach was too much to pass up over a little rain so we went out anyway. Our first beach trip was to Orewa Beach which is like 30-40 minutes from where we are living. We left for the beach a little after 9 AM and when we got there it was still pretty cold...especially since the rain was falling pretty steadily.

 Gathering in the church parking lot for our trip to the beach! I was a bit excited! Can you tell?

 

This is James Amu...he is our master tour guide according to all that I've heard of him. I didn't get a chance to talk to him too much, but keep following and I'm sure I'll be able to tell you much more about him by the time that we leave NZ. He travels with us and drives us around on the South Island in a few weeks, and he will go with us up North in a few months, so I'm sure we'll be good friends before the end of this trip! I've heard he is really amazing!

This is Orewa Beach, even in the rain it is completely beautiful! The funny thing about this excursion was that even though it was raining pretty good, most of our group braved the water, and when we did we discovered that it was actually warmer to get in the water than it was to stay out in the rain.

 This is most of the group that actually braved the water, so as you can see, most of us were so excited to go to the beach that we didn't care if it was a bit chilly! It was really exciting because Stephanie, one of the girls in our group, has never been swimming in the ocean before! It was a big day for her! Sadly because of all the rain, we didn't take a lot of pictures because it was too wet and rainy.

 

 

 

 

 

After we got as cold as we could handle at the beach our wonderful guide suggested a place called Waiwera, which is a thermal pool area basically...this is one of the hottest pools they had there, and it was 40 degrees Celsius I think, so it was very nice and warm. They also had some water slides and a lot of different pools including one movie pool (where they show a movie and you can sit in the pool and watch it) We all got nice and warmed up at this place, and even though we didn't get the day at the beach we had dreamed of, it was still a very fun excursion!

 

At the end of the time at the resort, we all climbed in our vans and started to head home...our van was all full and we assumed everyone else also had a full car...but somehow, no one told the driver of the other van (Ramona's husband) and he didn't check and they were missing thee bodies in their van...luckily we pulled over to have a nice view of Orewa on our way back and someone told us that they were missing people so we headed back and picked up Kirsten, Brooke, and Emily! I'll post more about this day on a separate post, since this one is getting a bit long! Love y'all!

School

My mom has asked for more details So our school here is very different than it would be in the states. We go to school from 8-11:30 and 12:15-3:30, which is forever long, but it is something that we can all survive because we only have to do it for like 3 1/2 weeks, so really we are already almost halfway done!! So exciting! We meet at the chapel for classes which is different than at BYU...at BYU we meet for church in school buildings most of the time, so it is kind of nice to have it reversed here. The chapel is about 30 minutes away from where we live, so we walk to and from school each day and it is usually a pretty nice walk. For that reason alone, I am kind of glad that it has been a wet New Zealand summer, because it is usually a bit cooler than it would be if it were a regular New Zealand summer. For the first week and a half we had two classes, Literacy and Assessment. Our literacy class was taught by Carol Anderton, and I loved her class. She was very sweet, and she had a quiet sense of humor that I found so funny! I was sad when her class ended on Friday, but that means that we are that much closer to being all done with classes! (the picture above is of the three of us roommates and Carol on the last day of class). Our other class was Assessment which Ramona Cutri taught us. Ramona is the faculty adviser that came with us from BYU. She is known as a shorty by Pascal, because she is very small, but she is just a little ball of energy. Ramona teaches at BYU and so does her husband Chris. They have two kids that came with them Tiari (I'm not sure if you spell it this way) and Atticus. They are 10 and 11 or 10 and 12 I think, and I don't know them very well yet, but they seem like pretty cool kids. Anyway, Ramona was a fun teacher, but assessment was not the most exciting material to learn, some parts of it were really interesting though, and I know it is info I will use a lot! Our next subject is Math...so starting tomorrow I will have math all day until Thursday (cause here it is already Sunday evening). So I am not a huge math fan, but I've heard this math methods class is pretty interesting...at least the one here in NZ...I don't know about the one back in the States...it seems like it is a time consuming one there. I'll keep you posted on school stuff for the next few weeks, just for you Mamma!! Love yous! (that is the way they say it here in NZ, yous is plural whether there are really more than one of you or if it is just to one person...it's kinda fun!

Continuing on!

I don't have a good picture of Rose yet, so I will wait to introduce her until I can show you who she is, instead I'll introduce you to the babies today, they love to be in pictures so I have tons of them!

Foo Foo is 6, her real name is Snowden and she is a character. She is really sweet when she wants to be, and really crazy when she wants to be, her mood changes often! She is loud and crazy, and I never realized how much I'd miss that when she wasn't at home, until they went to their Nan's house for the last few days and the house has been so quiet without them. Foo is not shy at all, she tells you what she thinks! Now, in this picture, ignore my scary hair...I pretty much let it do whatever it wants to here...it is easier most days than trying to get it to do anything else...Oh, and in this picture, you can see my first experience with Hot Milo...similar to hot chocolate, but not nearly as sweet...we all added a lot of sugar and it was so much better once we did!

Sizzle (Danzel) is 4, and she is quite a spitfire! She is not afraid to tell you exactly what she thinks and how she feels, and every day you just have to wonder if she will be your friend that day or not! The last day I saw her she told me that she wasn't my friend she was only Micah and Sarah's friend...She is pretty cute! (This is Sarah, one of my roommates, with Sizzle in the pink and Foo in the purple).

These two pictures are from our first day of school, The first is of Me, Sarah and Ati, who was kind enough to walk with us that first day so that we wouldn't get lost! Yes, I am wearing a sweater...it was kind of rainy, but because it is so humid, the sweater didn't last long!

Well, after our first day we dove right into school! We are taking 5 classes while we are here, plus our practicum and an online class. Those 5 classes will be done after the first 3 1/2 weeks we are here so we are almost done with the first two which are Literacy and Assessment, next week we start Math (called Mats here) which we will do all day for four days, and then we will move on to Science and Social Studies on Friday which we will then have for 6 days. Anyway, our first day of classes began with a morning of introduction. We learned some Maori words and we learned about the Maori ceremony we will have at the beginning of our practicum to welcome us into the schools. We learned some Maori songs, including the National Anthem of New Zealand in both Maori and English...I don't really remember it, but I do remember that it was beautiful. We played a few Maori games including the stick game you will see a picture of. It was a very interesting introduction into the Maori culture. Carol Anderton is our teacher here for Literacy, so that first day she taught us about the culture first, and then she taught us our first literacy lesson in the afternoon. It was a really fun first day of classes, and it was even better when we realized that we only had 16 days like that left!

 Us playing the stick game at school

We went to Ramona's house after school that day in order to use her internet for a little bit...since we still didn't have any. I don't think that I can ever take internet for granted again because it was really hard to not have it for a few days...I'm very thankful that we have it figured out now! So by the time we got done at Ramona's it was getting kind of late, so she drove us home to save us from the hour walk...which was so lovely of her! So we got home, Sarah, Rose, and I had a jam session on the Uke, singing Disney songs and other songs that Sarah new how to play. It was a lot of fun just to be singing! Then we had some dinner, and helped do the dishes (those of you who know me well should be proud of me, because you know how I detest dishes, but I've been doing a lot of them since I've been here and I don't mind) Then we had to do the dreaded homework...but luckily it is only homework for two classes so it wasn't too bad to do.

Well, this is all for now, I am still behind, but our internet has been really slow and I've been trying to post this for like three days...maybe two...but it hasn't worked until today with getting the pictures uploaded so I think it is getting better now so maybe I'll get another post up tonight. Love you all!

First Day in NZ

All of the girls at the Airport in New Zealand! This is a picture I should have included in my last post, but I didn't have it until now so here it is!

Before I start this post, I've decided I want to introduce you to the people that we are living with and that I'm sure you will be hearing a lot about in the next few months. So rather than do it all and once and bore you all with a whole list, I thought I'd try to introduce you to one or two each post! First since I already talked about Erin in the last post I'll introduce him. Erin Joseph is the father of our family here, when we talk about him we just call him our dad because it makes it easier when talking to the other girls in our group. Here in NZ most people are very informal, at church you hear very few Brother and Sister titles if any, and if you try and say Brother or Sister they usually correct you with their first name instead, so we all call him Erin. Erin is a builder, he never went to University so he likes to tell us that we must know certain things because we were smart and went to school. He is really a humble man and I think he likes being a father to us all (he already has 4 girls of his own so I guess adding a few to that for a few months isn't to bad) so that is nice to have that father figure even though we are so far away from home. He is the 2nd counselor of the bishopric in our ward I believe so he is over the YSAs of the ward. He has warned us many times to watch out for those NZ boys who only come back to church when the BYU girls come (because a new group comes every year and they've been hosting girls for 6 years, they know) He has also warned us countless times to wear lots and lots of sunblock because the NZ sun is vicious...we have yet to see too much of the sun so we haven't experienced that yet. Anyway, Erin is really funny, he likes to joke with us a lot, he loves music (which seems to be a family trait, which is great because I love it too) He plays the guitar when we sing for family night, and he plays the uke, and he has already showed us many of his favorite videos of songs. Oh and also he is going to teach us how to surf (later this week), and as seen in the picture above, how to play the guitar (which he is already showing Micah). We have a lot to learn while we are hear, and much of what we are learning is already coming though the family we are living with, they are all really great and I'm excited to introduce you to them as I go through the next few posts!
Our first day in NZ started very early because our plane got in at 4 AM. After getting all settled in to our house we took a short nap, and then because we thought we heard people upstairs we got up to try and meet more people. Unfortunately the one person we had been hearing was leaving for work and we missed her so we still didn't meet anyone for a while. We just spent some time upstairs looking at family pictures and trying to match names to faces. Then after a little while we heard one little girl and she went and woke up another little girl and then very timidly came in and talked to us. The timidness did not last long at all, soon they were jumping off the walls and having a ball showing off for us. The two "babies" as they are fondly known are Snowden (6 nicknamed Foo, because of the song Little Bunny Foo Foo), and Denzel (4 I think that is how you spell it but I'm not sure, her nickname is Sizzle...probably because it sounds similar, but also probably because she is a spitfire). I'll tell you more about them in the future. Then we met Ati (Atarangi) who lives with the family. She is a daughter of a good friend of Erin's and she is living with the Joseph's right now while she goes to school here. She has quickly become a good friend to all of us. We waited a bit longer and we met Pascal (14) she is also a bit of a spitfire, but so much fun and at such an interesting age. Then we met Rose, the Mum of our family. She, like all of the family is stunning, and so kind and inviting. Seriously, I don't feel too homesick yet because I feel like our family has been so welcoming and inviting. I can't imagine how hard it would be to have 3 strangers, from a foreign country invade your home for a few months, but they have been so wonderful to us already! After we met all of these people, we got ready for the day and then we went to the store with Ati. It was a bit of a walk, but we made it and at the mall we met Cheyenne (19, Chey).

On our way to the mall, it started raining pretty hard so we stopped off at a little store and we tried a fried moro bar...it was interesting but pretty good, probably not something I'll eat very often because I think I could feel my arteries clogging up just from the few bites I had of the shared one! (basically a fried moro bar is a moro bar which is chocolate with nougat in the middle, which is then put in batter and fried...it kind of reminded me of a chocolate filled doughnut)

On the candy aisle looking for Pineapple lumps

At the mall we had to get a few things and ask around a bit about internet possibilities because we had to try and get something set up for us. The Josephs have internet, but because of some problems with people who used to live here they asked that we find something separate so that there would be no similar situations. This didn't take long so we just wandered for a bit after we got all that we needed, and we got some things we probably didn't need, including some Pineapple lumps, which we all had to try. Basically they remind me of Laffy Taffy (only pineapple flavored) which is then covered in chocolate...it sounds weird, but they are amazing!! We headed home and to our room to at least lay down and rest because at this point we were exhausted! We didn't mean to fall asleep, but we all laid down on the big bed on the bottom, because we were chatting with Pascal and Ati and then we all kind of crashed. We were woken up 3 hours later by a very loud Foo, who was sent to get us for dinner. Dinner was a new meal for me, ramen type noodles, but without the broth, just the noodle part, and hard boiled eggs, with a bit of mayonnaise and lettuce on top. It was so good! Who knew that combination of things could work out so well! After dinner, we helped clean up, and then we had a little family meeting. Basically it was a little meeting to welcome us into their home and into their family. It was really sweet, and they sang this beautiful song to us in Maori. Then we all gave the family the gifts that we brought them from America...Erin was very hopeful that we had included some Jolly Ranchers because apparently he loves those and he can't find them anywhere here, so if anyone is feeling generous feel free to send some Jolly Ranchers...none of our gifts were very big, but they loved them because we brought them! Also Nanette if you read this, I told them how you contributed a few things to my gift and they said to tell you thank you very much! It was a lovely little family meeting, and then because we were so tired, and because we had school bright and early at 8 AM we headed off to bed soon after we finished.

Sorry I'm behind already...I'll get caught up soon, there is just so much I want to tell you guys all about! Also, sorry this is so long, with very few pictures to break it up...I promise I'll work on getting more pictures, it is just so hard when there are so many people with cameras, it seems like every different thing ends up on someone different's camera...we have a photo sharing site, but not too many have been put up there yet, so I might not have a lot of the pictures until later...like a lot later...I'm working on taking more with my camera though! For now, just know that I love you all, and that I am thinking of y'all back home!

Getting here...and settling in!

I left on Monday the 4th of January...my journey began in Phoenix when my parents dropped me off at the airport about 6:30 AM. From there I flew to San Diego, where we had a stop and new people got on and then I flew to San Francisco. I was thinking about going out and seeing part of San Francisco for a few hours because we had so much time in between, but that didn't work out, partly because I didn't plan very well and partly because it cost like $20 to leave your bag somewhere. I found a friend while waiting for my bag (luckily) so I waited for her to get her bag and then we went to find out where we were supposed to go and if we could check in to our flight yet. We (Stacey and I) found out that Air New Zealand didn't open until 3:30 so we couldn't do anything but wait so we went to the international air part of the airport and we settled into a table and waited. She made some phone calls, I watched some Vampire Diaries...it was oh so exciting as we waited for like 4 hours. A few hours after we got there another girl joined us and we just chatted while we waited for the last like half hour. A little before they opened we went and got in line so that we could be some of the first through and it didn't take us too long to get through the line, and then to get through security. Once we made it past security we found a big group of girls on the other side, so we had our own little section of the waiting area, and that is what we did a little more of...wait. We could see the plane we would be taking right on the other side of the glass, and we kept getting more and more excited about how soon we would actually be able to get on it.

My roommates and I getting ready to get on the plane in San Francisco!

Our plane started loading about 6:15 PM so like 12 hours after my journey began I was finally starting the longest part of the journey...my 13 hour plane ride! We left on time (7 PM) and as we got started we were privileged to watch the Air New Zealand safety video...it was great, if you haven't seen it, I would recommend you look it up, it will give you a good laugh. I watched like 4 movies and slept a lot on the way here, ate some pretty yummy food considering it was airplane food, and 12 hours later we were getting ready to land (an hour early!). Once we landed we waited for our bags for a while, so we took advantage of that time and took some pictures with the greeting committee...aka some of the members of the All Blacks rugby team, one of the prides of New Zealand.

With the All Blacks

After getting our luggage and making it into New Zealand officially we waited a little more for our families to get to the airport. Ramona (our professor) met us there as well, but since we got there so early it took a while for everyone to get there. Our "dad" Erin got there to take us home and we were so excited, it was a bit of a drive to get to our home, but it was lovely to see all of the beautiful green scenery! We asked him a little about the family and the living situation...I don't know how much I really remembered from that conversation because I was really tired, after 12 hours on a plane, and considering that it was 5:30 AM (on Wednesday) local time and it had just been a long day! We got to our house and into our room and started unpacking. No one was awake yet so once we finished unpacking we went back to sleep for a bit.

Because no one was very quick to volunteer for the top bunk I took it...it has been loads of fun getting up on that so far! I spend a lot of my time on one of the other girls' beds instead though! Especially if we are all doing homework or working on our computers.

Our closet area all organized and clean...it doesn't look quite as clean now, but it is still pretty nice, there is a lot of shelf space, which is great for 3 girls!

I don't have pictures from the next few days because I stink at taking pictures, and because a lot of the other girls have them on their cameras and I haven't been able to get them from them. Since I would have to download them on my computer I don't know how many other pictures I will get for a while because we don't have a lot of internet to share. I'll leave you for now with this, and I promise I'll get more on here soon! It is hard to focus on this when there are little ones running in and out of your room playing with your stuff and trying their hardest to distract you! But it is a lot of fun and I am really enjoying the experience of being a kind of big sister to so many! (There are 8 of us total and I am the oldest of the whole bunch by like 8 months I think) Mostly I feel like I am an older sister to like 4 of them, but basically there are a lot of girls around here! It is nice though because it feels like home!

I love you all, thanks for the continued support and love! I love hearing from everyone and getting comments! I promise I'll work on more exciting posts and I'll work on getting more pictures soon! Love you loads, or heaps as they say here in NZ!

First post from the land of beauty! (that's what I'm calling it)

This is going to be a short one...I'm working on my blog posts offline mostly (just in a word document) and then pasting them on here in order to save on internet usage (here they charge by the gig and it is ridiculously expensive). So this post is just to say, that more are coming but them might take me a little bit longer to get finished. For now I'll just say we went to the beach today and it was so fun to be there in January! It was rainy the whole time so it was a bit cold, but the water was warmer than the rain falling so it wasn't too bad compared to any other beach I've been to! So it was fun, but I'm excited to be going again next weekend and I"m hoping that the weather will be brighter! I'll put up more probably tomorrow when we are done with church! Love to you all!

Finally!

Well, I have been planning on starting this blog for a really long time...I mean I've known about going to New Zealand for like 8 months or so, but finally it is almost time to go and I feel OK about starting this blog to share my adventures because they are truly about to begin!! I first decided to apply for a study abroad to New Zealand at the beginning of March 2011. I had a class on the 2nd floor of the McKay building and I walked past a giant sign encouraging people to apply at least twice a week if not more. After a few times of walking by I couldn't take it any more...I just had to take the chance and apply for it. By this point it was only a week and a half to two weeks before the deadline for the application, so I hurried and filled out all of the information and I asked a few people to write letters of recommendation for me and I turned it in and waited. I didn't have to wait long when I got an e-mail telling me to sign up for an interview time. I did that and I prepared for my interview. I went on the day of the interview and even though I was nervous I felt good about my interview and I looked forward to getting the results. I kept working toward the end of the semester and tried not to think about the possibilities too much, then one day I got an e-mail saying that I had been accepted into the program...that is where my journey officially began. Since then I've been working to prepare for what is just around the corner now...literally it is only a few days away and I can hardly believe it. It feels like I've been waiting forever, but now it is actually happening! So crazy! So I leave for New Zealand on Monday...I'll be there for a few months, living like a New Zealander, learning from New Zealanders, and teaching New Zealanders and having a blast while doing it!! As I do all of this and experience new and amazing things I will be blogging on here to keep everyone back home informed of what is going on!