Who needs work anyway?

Well, in case you haven't heard I was laid off. = ( It's mostly lame because I actually kinda liked my job. Most of the people there were great. I worked at Rocky Mountain Composites for just over 3 years. I started as the secretary, moved into Accounts Payable, and then was promoted last year to a Purchasing Agent. They said the decision was a purely financial one, and hope to hire some of us back on in the future once they get some more money coming in. I think there were about 20 of us. Pretty lame.

I've been looking for a new job for almost 2 weeks now. Not fun. It's a lot of work, and no one's paying me to do it. I just haven't found what I'm looking for. There's a couple I might consider if I just can't find what I want.

What I think I want:
*Full-time (or close) 8-5? *Position: Purchasing Agent, Financial Clerk/Bookkeeper, Office Manager, or Administrative Assistant *Not too far from my house (closer the better) *M-F only *Good pay (the closer to $14-15/hour the better, but it's looking like I might need to take a pay cut) *Flexible atmosphere (I had a job once where I had to ask to go to the bathroom...not cool.) *Not so crappy and/or stressful that I just want to go home and cry everyday (had one of those, too.) *Allowed to wear jeans would be a plus

What are some jobs that you've had that you liked? Let me know if you hear of anything that's even close!

Picture Thief

Here's some pictures that I stole from my sister-in-law's blog from when Jared's family was in town:

Canoeing

08/23/08- I wanted to do something fun with my Dad while he was in town. (He left today = ( .) So on Saturday we went canoeing on the Provo River! It was a lot of fun. We paddled out to Utah Lake and headed back….well some of us paddled back. (I’ll leave out the part about my Dad’s hip bugging him and picking him up with the car.) Anywho, it was great weather for it. It wasn’t too hot on the water with the canopy of trees overhead. It was really pretty. I think we’re going to try and go again before summer’s over, so let me know if you’re interested!

Sis + Dad Night

08/20/08-Once a month we get together for sister’s night. (Minus RaNae, she lives in Indiana.) This month we had a featured guest…Dad! We met at Gardiner’s Village and ate at the restaurant there and then looked around the cute shops. We went back to VeNicia’s house, played some Rummy, and ate the yummy fudge VeNicia bought. It was a lot of fun! The End.

BYU

BYU—Once Jared turned 30 (last December) I became eligible for free tuition at BYU! I didn’t want to cut back my work schedule, but felt like free tuition shouldn't be passed up. So at the end of April (spring term) I took a Career Exploration class, and I just finished my summer class (Excel - Sys100). Even just one class and working full time makes me feel so busy! I’m not sure how long I can keep this up! I don’t know how people do both full-time. They’re crazy! In the Fall I signed up to take Economics, but I heard the teacher wasn’t that great so I think I might take a World Religions class instead. (It will complete my Global and Cultural requirement.)

I think I’d feel different about school if there was something I wanted to do when I grow that requires it, but I like where I work and would be fine staying there until whenever we have kids.

Anywho, if you happen to actually be reading this boring blog, and also went to BYU, let me know if there’s any general requirement classes that you took that you’d recommend.

FaMania

Normally all I have to do is look back through the pictures I've taken to decide what to post about, but I've been slackin in the photo department. But I'll post anyway...

Three of Jared's brothers and their families were in town for a few day to a week and a half (depending on the brother). We had fun eating yummy food, playing games, watching some Olympics (the opening ceremonies were pretty cool, and Michael Phelps is amazing!), and playing with our cute nieces and nephew.

Also while they were in town our friends Jake and Elisa were around for a few days. They were in Alaska for the summer and had a couple days here before they moved to Alabama for school. We had a BBQ with them and the Brandts (or "the Train's" for those of you that still think that's their last name). The food was great (especially Jenn's homemade cream puffs...mmm), we played some games, and had a fun time with them.

It's been a lot of fun; just a little crazy with everything happening at the same time! My Dad came in to town before all of Jared's family left, and he's still here! It's been nice being able to see him so much. We spent some time with him at a few of my sibling's houses and we had a nice dinner at Ottavio's with him, and games at my place.

Just this last weekend (08/16/08) my brother Brett and his family came up from Vegas to visit. He and his daughter, Emily, met us and VeNicia at Raging Waters in SLC. It's a water park similar to Seven Peaks. We had a great time on the slides and in the wave pool. Then Dad met up with us at Iggy's for dinner.

Then Sunday (08/17/08) we had a big dinner with them at my brother Barry's house. The food was amazing as always. We watched all of the humming birds in their back yard and just relaxed, chatted, and then watched "Nim's Island". I thought it was cute. It's always nice to spend time with family!

Oh yeah, somewhere in there I had my final for my Excel class. I got 100%! Yay! You're probably thinking "What Excel class?". I'll tell you about it another time...

The dentist can be good

My dentist office had a customer appreciation day. They rented out the Scera Pool for a couple of hours last Saturday and said we could go for free and invite whoever we wanted to! All of you no-shows totally missed out! The weather was really nice. They had lots of yummy food for free (muffins, fruit, snow cones, cotton candy). All you can eat cotton candy? Sounds like a good way to round up business for a dentist. In more ways than one. Anywho, thanks for coming McGrews. We had a great time! (I actually went some where with out taking pictures so maybe next time.)

On a side note, can I just say that Jared is so cool? Jared used to be on the diving team in high school and they had a diving board at the pool. Jared can do the coolest dives! I should take a video next time. I swear he could be in the Olympics! Everyone around was like "Wow!" Especially me = )

Will Miss the Garcia's!

07/26/08 My old roommate, Erica, and her husband invited a bunch of their friends to Timpanogus Park last Saturday for a going away party. They're moving to New Mexico = ( They have the cutest little girls. They made us yummy Carnitas and we played some Boccie Ball. It was a lot of fun. We'll miss you guys!

4th of July and Beyond (Continued)

Anywho, as I was saying...after the beach we headed back to my Dad's in Vancouver, WA. Jared and I and my niece, Marlana, stayed the rest of the week there. The first couple days there I was still sick and wasn't able to help my dad as much as I wanted to. I wanted to make him meals and do yard work and help clean the house, etc. But the first day there I didn't even get dressed. Jared was so sweet and completely made up for my sick-slackin. He helped prune a bunch of bushes, and mowed the lawn, and made some food for my dad to have after we left. I'm so lucky! Every girl needs a Jared! We did a lot of fun stuff with Dad while we were there too.

I heard the Columbia River Gorge is the most concentrated area of waterfalls in the US. I've always loved hiking up to the top of them, or even just seeing them when we drive by. Dad took us on the drive that my Mom liked to take so often. We drove up highway 14 to Stevenson and stopped for ice cream.

We crossed over the Bridge of the Gods into Oregon. We stopped by a couple different waterfalls. The biggest one was Multnomah Falls. We hiked up to the bridge and took lots of pictures.

Then we drove along the old scenic highway on the way home. We passed more waterfalls, and stopped at the Vista House up at Crown Point. There's a great view of the gorge from there.

I met up with some of my old Jr High/High School friends, Margi, Ashleigh, Alisha, and Brodi. We went to breakfast and then to a park to let their kids play. It was so good to see them! It's been a really long time.

We played a lot of games with my Dad while we were there. We made him some good food. He loves orange glazed salmon so I found a recipe on Allrecipes.com. I love that site. We also made some potato soup (another favorite of his). He loved it! We ate all of our meals outside on the deck. The weather was perfect all day everyday!

On our last day there we went to the Zoo. My brother Brett and his sons came too. The Portland Zoo makes Utah's look like a pet shop. It's so beautiful and has many realistic habitats for the animals.

When we were trying to take this group picture, a humming bird kept getting in the way. So I decided to get a picture of it!

We spent a lot of time looking at the yard, and watching the birds and squirrels. My dad has a couple regulars that will come and eat right out of his hand!

I wish I could see my Dad more often. We had a really nice trip. It was so hard to say goodbye!

4th of July and Beyond!

We had a nice trip a couple weeks ago from 07/02/08-07/12/08. We had a family reunion on the Oregon Coast (Lincoln City area), and then spent some time with my Dad in Vancouver, WA. All of my brothers and sisters and families were invited to the reunion. Not all of them could come but there were still about 35 of us! We rented 3 beach houses, and had a really good time together. It was nice just to relax but we did a lot of fun things too.

We made some cool stuff in the sand:

I got up early one day to check out the cool tide pools. Some of us went for walks on the beach. We went to the outlet mall there and I got a couple cute things. We played some horseshoes on the beach, and flew some kites. One of the coolest parts was watching all of the fireworks. The scenery was beautiful, the fireworks were great, and I got to do it all with the people I love the most!

Me & my sisters

A bunch of us went to the Tilamook Cheese Factory. (Sorry Ryan and Ashley = ) We took the tour but most of the machines were down for the holiday weekend. But we still got squeaky cheese samples (there were other kinds too, but who cares about those when you can have squeaky cheese!) and yummy ice cream. I really like their gift shop there. I'd say that 90% of the bracelets I own have come from that gift shop! I'm serious. They're so cute and so cheap! It was really crowded there, but it was still fun just to spend time with family.

My niece-in-law, Ashley, had all kinds of ideas of things to do. A huge group of us went with them on a hike. We hiked through the forest out to a suspension bridge, and then hiked down to the waterfall. It was beautiful!

(We all looked like that when we were done)

We took turns cooking. Making fajitas for 35 people is quite the task! I think they turned out pretty good though. We played some games while we were there, like Ticket to Ride, Settlers, and Rummy. On check out day I weaseled out of having to clean up by getting really sick. I was pukin out of both ends for like 2 1/2 days! That wasn't more than you wanted to know was it? My stomach hurt so bad! I just felt like yuck. My camera battery died when we took our big group shot of (almost) everyone. = ( I'll have to get one from someone else and add it later. (If you're reading this and have one, please send it to me!) Here's some of the group pix I was able to get before it died:

After we checked out a bunch of us (I keep saying that because if I actually named names this already long post would be about 3 times longer!) went to see the Spruce Goose (Howard Hughes historical wooden plane). It's in an air museum in McMinnville. It's huge! It only flew for a few seconds, but it had a big impact on the aviation industry.

K, this is a lot longer than I thought it'd be. I think I'll stop there and do the rest in another post. Let me first just say that I love my family so much. There's so many of us that we don't get to see everyone as much as we'd like, and sometimes it can be hard to keep in touch. But they all mean the world to me. I'm glad so many were able to make it to the beach. It just wish everyone could have come!