For Real

The reality of our move is starting to hit me hard. It feels especially real now that we've been to Fresno and have a taste for our future surroundings. The trip was a success in some aspects and a disappointment in others. We did find an apartment that we both feel very comfortable with. It's funny because there was another complex that was bigger with more amenities for the same cost as our apartment now but we both agreed that we just didn't feel good when we drove around the grounds. It's not like it was ghetto or ugly or anything, it just didn't feel comfortable. I'm really excited because our new place is a two bedroom which is quite the upgrade from our 1 bedroom now, and we are only going to be paying $5 more a month! It may not have the upgrades, or a microwave, or a pantry, but these are all things we can work around. The grounds are really pretty and it is a smaller complex. Here is a picture of our new place.

We ended up looking at about 11 other apartments. The science of picking the right one is very complicated. For example, JR is very particular about the space around the toilet. If it's not spacious that's a major drawback in his book.
This does not pass the test:

This one does pass the test:

Silly boys! Anways, I think we are going to really like it in Fresno. It is actually a very pretty town...if you stay in the Northern part anyways. Southern Fresno is pretty ghetto but everything we need is North anyways. Plus, what place doesn't have ghetto parts? We found that Fresno has a lot of trees, flowers, and unlike Phoenix, it actually cools down at night. I feel much better about the move now.
I had my interview with University of Phoenix Fresno campus and that was the disappointing part. Not that they've turned me down yet, it's still an option but I've been with UOP for almost 5 years and I drove 600 miles and the best they gave me was a group interview with 30 other people who are brand new to enrollment. Yeah, lame. Didn't even make an exception and at push me through to 2nd round interviews so I could at least get some one on one time with a manager. If they even call me back for a 2nd interview I'm not sure how that's going to work since I'm back in AZ. I'm still hoping it'll happen but at this point am a little discouraged. On a brighter note, JR shouldn't have any problems transferring his job!
We did just about everything we set out to do by Friday so had some time to just chill in Fresno and get to know the area a bit. It was a really nice trip all in all. We drove up Wednesday and made a detour to Santa Monica Beach. What's a trip to Cali without the beach?



We also stopped to see both the Redland's temple and the LA temple. We are slowly starting to see the temples of the world! We'll get there some day.
Redland's Temple:

One of the windows that we thought was pretty cool looking:


L.A. Temple:




We had some fun times in the car as well. Can't beat a good road trip right? Here we are stuck in LA traffic playing a short game of Pass the Pigs on the arm rest. It didn't work well but it worked:

We also get to do a Session in the Fresno Temple. Our new ward will be meeting in the church that shares a parking lot with the temple. Kinda cool.
Fresno Temple:




All Templed out yet? Well that's just fine cause Fresno was the last temple we saw...on this trip.
We checked out Fresno State's Campus and where JR was going to be taking his classes. Seems like a pretty nice campus. Smaller that ASU which I personally think is a good thing. I think JR is getting excited to start his program, nervous, but he loves school so he's going to do great!

Our new landlord also gave us tickets to a local triple A baseball game (the Grizzlies) in down town Fresno so we got to see the downtown area and have some good old fashion baseball fun on Saturday night.


So, to sum up, Fresno is awesome and because of this you all should come visit us. Official move date August 1st. If anyone wants to help us load up the truck on the 31st just say the word and I'll make your dreams come true!

The darndest things

Last Sunday in Primary another class gave the sharing time presentation. Part of the lesson involved handing out candy when a child could answer a question. A few minutes in to the lesson one of my little CTR 5 girls comes up to me looking very concerned and shows me this:
Wondering why the concern she then asked me, "If I eat this will my head do that?" She was referring to the smiley balloon on the package of course. I assured her that her head would not blow up if she ate it. I don't think she believed me though because she ended up trading it for a lollipop. Ha ha! Funny kids!

Partay!

JR's birthday has come and gone. As you know from previous posts it was actually last Wednesday. After we both got off work we headed out to go hiking. JR has really been in to hiking lately and I have never gone with him so thought that might be a nice birthday activity. All was going well until about 3/4 way up the trail we were cut off by a rattle snake! I was a huge wimp and wouldn't sneak past him to go the rest of the way so we didn't quite make it to our destination but I'm sure we will make it to the top one of these days when there are no snakes threatening our lives!

Happy 26th!!!

Today is JR's 26th Birthday! Unfortunately we both have to work and chances are he will not read this post for another 3 weeks or so but just wanted to acknowledge that my man is catching up to me in age. HAHAHA!!! At least it will appear we are only a year apart for a couple months. I tried my best to do something special for him before I left for work so I made him breakfast in bed and then had to leave him with a big mess in the kitchen. Sorry about that birthday boy. Hope you have an AMAZING day! I love you!

Latest with the move

Just as an update I thought I would let you all know that the plan right now with our move to Fresno is to pack up and head out the last weekend in July. We are going to go check out some apartments in Fresno the end of this month and while we're there I have an interview for my same position at work at a University of Phoenix campus in Fresno. I'm pretty nervous, especially considering I haven't interviewed in almost 5 years. I just feel there is so much riding on getting this job that it's pretty stressful. I feel I could relax so much more if I knew I was going to have a job when we move. Just a little statistic for you, Fresno is on the nation's top 13 list of unemployment cities. Nice huh? Unemployment there is at about 15.6%. So as you can see, getting this job is pretty critical. If you could all please keep me in your prayers I would really appreciate it. If we can land this job and find a place to live on this trip we'll be all set...for the most part.

Party In n' Out Style

Monday was great! I took work off so that I could go with JR to his work party. JR is working for In n'Out and turns out that they are a pretty phenomenal company. They really threw a good party. They rented out Big Surf for the day so that every employee and one guest got in free and we were the only ones there. Not only that but they had an In n'Out trailer set up inside the water park where they were cooking burgers and everyone got all they can eat of In n'out burgers, corn, fruit, an assortment of salads, drink, and ice cream! Seriously, all you can eat. Then on top of that they had a big raffle where they raffled off all these cool things like a bike, Wii, I-pods, gift cards, you get the idea. We didn't win anything but a guy from up on stage did throw us a frisbee so we didn't walk away empty handed! There really weren't long lines to any of the slides so it was awesome! The first slide I went on really caught me off guard. I hadn't been to a water park in like 10 years so I wasn't expecting it to be so fast. I couldn't breath the whole way down because the sharp twists and drops kept taking my breath away and water was shooting up in my face and it was dark so I couldn't even see. I really started to panic and just when I thought I was going to die I hit the water. Pretty sure I'll never do that slide again. The more meandering slides that you go down with tubes were much more my style. I like those ones a lot although JR thinks they are pretty boring. We had a lot of fun though and I hope In n'Out decides to do a lot more parties in the future!

Why can't they just stay mini?

Last weekend we went to JR's dad's house to pay a visit. His dad breeds miniature schnauzers so there are always little schnauzers in abundance running around. The schnauzers are a pretty cute dog but when we arrived this time we were greeted by this little treasure:

Apparently they came across Tinkerbell the terrier and couldn't resist and are going to start breeding her as well. I love this dog so much. It was honestly the cutest little small as a gerbil dog I'd probably ever seen. If this dog stayed like this forever I would probably pay any price for her because it would make me smile every time I saw her tiny legs running across the floor. Apparently full grown she'll still only be 4 pounds.
If anyone ever wants to get me a dog some day please get me one like this one.

The box in this next picture is a little bigger than the size of a lipstick carrier.