An adventure down South???

Well, it's day 21 of being in Utah and it has definitely been an adventure so far. A job hunting adventure that is. I guess I was expecting to gain employment quite easily- I was wrong! But I have had a couple successful interviews lately, so I guess we'll see. So far the main events down in Utah have been meeting a lot of Chris' family, exploring the nearby sights, going to an AMAZING driver dinner/reunion with a bunch of Skagway peeps, a corn maze and then the main event- my baptism!
That's right. I actually made the decision to be baptized last Saturday into the LDS church. I'm sorry if I didn't get the word out to you personally sooner- it was a bit of a whirlwind but an absolutely fantastic experience.

I was not expecting 50 people to show up. Friends from Skagway came, Chris' parents and paternal grandparents were there, and all of his siblings (minus one) and their families attended as well. I was absolutely flattered and grateful for all the love and support I felt that day. I was also not expecting many great gifts and congratulations. The entire service was all about me, which was a bit nerve-wracking but very special at the same time. My friend's Brayden and Jesse gave talks on baptism and the gifts of the Holy Spirit, Chad's mother gave the opening prayer and my good friend from Skagway, Allyson gave the closing prayer. It was a very spiritual experience that I'll remember forever.

The next day Chad's father performed the confirmation and Chris, Jesse, Brayden and Chris' father were in the circle as well. The confirmation was really cool because I recieved the gift of the Holy Spirit and all of these worthy men had hands on my head in order for me to receive this blessing.

For now, I'm still living with Chad's family and job searching. My hope is to get a job SOON! I'm really sick of just sitting around during the day with not much to do. I DID get a small job though that will be both a blessing and a challenge. There's a private girls' school in Layton, about a half hour drive away that has hired me to come in once a week, for only an hour to tutor a girl who is basically failing every class. It is great money, but limited hours and will be a great learning experience for myself in my future teaching career. And of course, I really want to help this girl. The school is for troubled teens and from what I can tell (I've met her once and been told a lot from her teachers), she is a very smart girl, but she just doesn't apply herself. So therefore, the work doesn't get done and she fails. But its not for a lack of intelligence at all, its laziness. So hopefully I can motivate her to succeed and be able to function in the real world soon.

That's all for now!

And the next adventure is...... UTAH

So..... apologies to everyone (ahemmmmm, SHALEE) for not updating this blog sooner. In a nutshell I have left Alaska *tear* and am down in the lower 48 states again. My good buddies, the guys I hiked the Chilkoot trail with, left in mid August to head back to school, so for the remainder of the summer I continued working and keeping very busy. But I definitely got burnt out from tours, which I wasn't expecting. Everyone had mentioned that come August/September, drivers tend to get burnt out giving the same tours they given over and over and over again since May. But I didn't get that feeling last year in Ketchikan, so when it hit me this year I was semi- shocked. But I got through it, knowing that although the tours are very common for me, this is the first time for many of the passengers and they have paid a great deal of money to go on my tours, so I gave it my all.

And then on September 17th at 11am I sadly took my last look at Skagway for the season and flew back to Seattle, via Juneau. I was home for a period of 2 weeks, which were filled with visiting everyone I could possibly think of in the greater Seattle area, as well as a much needed trip over to my old college town of Ellensburg (Yay for Jonny and Ian's housewarming party!!!) and now I'm in....UTAH.

Yes, you heard correctly folks. I somehow found myself in Utah for an undetermined amount of time. See, I met this boy up in Skagway. Again, shocker I know. And we're pretty serious and seeing as the fact that he's still in school and I'm not currently and looking for my latest and greatest adventure.... I ended up in the Ogden, Utah area until about April or May when I head back to Skagway again for the next season. In all honesty, I don't know what's going on down here. So far I am LOVING IT. I am exploring. I am having lots of fun and meeting up with a bunch of old Alaskan friends along the way and just seeing how things go. So far I have been recieved with open arms from everybody I have met and felt very much at home. The mormon hospitality is outstanding and I am so very grateful for it. I went on my first job interview today at this department store called Dillard's, which in all honesty I don't particularly want... but we'll see what happens in the next couple weeks or so.

So far I have attended General Conference at the conference center in Salt Lake City where I had the privilege of hearing many of the leaders of the mormon church speak, including the head of the church, Thomas S. Monson. It was an amazing experience. I was in a building surrounded by 20,000 very reverent, very respectful dressed up people. It was so cool. And then after the 2 hour session, we left, had a picnic lunch in a park in Salt Lake City and then walked around the grounds surrounding the Salt Lake Temple. It was breathtakingly beautiful and we were able to go in both visitor centers and thoroughly enjoy our time on Sunday afternoon.

More details to come!!!!