Workin' hard

I got a sweet job! I now work at the Kindergarten and Preschool on BYU campus providing speech services. It's been a little scary not having a supervisor, but definitely lots of fun and a blessing to us financially.

Toughest (maybe these sound lame, but I'm sure my fellow SLPs understand)
1. Felt the pressure of deciding which kids qualified for speech services with very limited information.
2. Read a really long language assessment chapter not because it was assigned but because I ACTUALLY need to know and use the information... like tomorrow.
3. Listened to a stuttering 4 year old and tried to remember my stuttering class.
4. Being let loose, no one telling me what to do or supervising me.

Best
1. The boy who said "Yes! I've been wondering when it would be my turn to go to that room [speech room]!"... I hadn't taken anyone out of his class for speech yet, but wow, I'm glad we have such a good reputation.
2. Being asked to come over to play after school yesterday after only 10 minutes of interaction and hearing "Heaver!" yelled excitedly everytime I saw the child today.
3. The fact that 4 and 5 year olds are so motivated by stickers.
4. Getting paid more than twice as much as my last summer job and doing something I actually like!
5. Being let loose, no one telling me what to do or supervising me.

Audio Books

I have made a remarkable discovery: Audio Books.

As many of you know, I work at Kohl's in Draper, but I live in Provo (35 minute drive one way). Before my discovery, this drive was quite inconvenient.

However, Heather suggested that I take a look at the Books on CD at the Provo City library. It was then that I found my first Audio Book: Ender's Shadow.


First of all, I just have to say that Ender's Shadow is a fantastic book. If you liked Ender's Game, you'll also enjoy Shadow. It's the story of Bean (essentially the #2 commander in Battle School, right behind Ender), and it takes place during the same time as Ender's Game. Card has created a really interesting character in Bean, and Ender's Shadow is just an exceptional story. I was sad when it ended.

Anyways...because of great Audio Books, I actually look forward to my time in the car. Listening to books makes my time in the car effective--it's nice knowing that an hour that would otherwise be wasted can now be used for reading. Plus, it's fun. There's quite a few great books out there--you just gotta find them on your library's website and place a hold, because they're pretty popular, and so you can't really count on just dropping into the library and having a great selection.

So what are you waiting for? Go to your nearest library today! If you don't have lots of driving time like me, then go to your library and get a real book (you know, the ones with paper)! Reading is a really great way to entertain yourself (if you get a good book, that is), as well as engage your mind and get exposed to new ideas and people.

Dada

Last night we babysat Steve's cousin's kids, Abbey (4) and Mariah (2) (Riah). They are the cutest kids ever, but I'll tell you what's even cuter... my husband playing with and taking care of them. They love him! Riah calls him Dada (she calls all boys dada, but it's still cute to hear it) and is constantly tugging on his shirt to show him something.

The best parts of the night happened when we were putting them to bed. When Abbey found out that Steve didn't know the song Jesus Said Love Everyone she insisted on teaching it to him and made him sing along. I wish I had a video because it was hilarious. She would definitely be the sunbeam at the primary program that you can hear belting the tune above everyone else, in a very cute way, of course.

When Steve had to go downstairs to get Riah's boppy (pacifier) I said "Let's surprise Steve and sing a song for him when he gets back". Abbey with an excited look on her face: "Does he know Jingle Bells?" Me: "Yeah... I think so" Abbey: "Does he know ABCs?" Me: "Yes" Abbey: "What about You Better Watch Out?" Me: "He might not know that one" Abbey: "Okay!!" So we proceeded to sing more verses to Santa Claus is Coming to Town than I thought it was possible for a 4 year old to know when Steve walked in the room. She loved it and I think he did too.

Then for one of our last songs we sang the ABC song. About halfway through Abbey started writing the letters in the air. It was hilarious and cute to see her scrambling her little arms in the air, trying to write the letters fast enough to keep up.

P.S. Does anyone know how to deal with line spacing? It seems like mine always end up looking dumb with some double spaced and some single but I don't know how to change it.

Harry Potter world

I can't wait to be done with finals so I can slip into Harry Potter world for a few days. I never read the final book because it came out the day after we got married and I didn't really want to spend our honeymoon with wizards. Then when we moved back to Minnesota I had to wait for everyone else in Steve's family to read it. Things got crazy, school started, and now it's finally ending!! I read the summaries of books 5 & 6 on wikipedia so I'm all reviewed and ready. Guess I'd better get studying!

Phones, jobs, and cooking adventures

We've definitely been slacking in the blogging area so here's an update.

Phones

Thanks to some really awesome parents, we know have 2 cell phones! We're on my parents' family plan anyway, so they just added another line and told us not to use more minutes than we did when we shared a phone. I can't tell you how wonderful it will be to be able to call each other instead of trying to use e-mail all the time!! Coincidentally, we've both regressed to the phones we had before we were married. Our phone was having problems so I'm using my sister's old phone which is exactly like my old phone and Steve's friend, Chad let us have his old phone which is exactly like the one Steve used to have. Weird.

Jobs

Steve is liking Kohl's. He's just working hard, moving through the binder of to do lists they gave him for his internship, helping out in different parts of the store when they're really busy, and figuring out what area of the store he wants to pick for his "project". Last weekend there was an extra associate's discount in addition to the 15% off he already gets, plus there were lots of Father's day sales so we got GREAT deals on some stuff.

I just started working mornings at Provo Early Education Program (PEEP) as a teacher's aide. I worked there about a year ago and really liked interacting with the kids. I'm still looking fior another part time job for the afternoons since school is done on Thursday, so if you know of anything from about 1-5 let me know!! In addition I'm a research assistant for a professor and doing some tutoring on Saturdays. If you can't tell, I'm anxious to earn some money before I start about 300 hours of unpaid internships next year.

Cooking adventures

We made some cookies a few weeks ago that just turned out really flat and we're not sure why. When we stored them in a tupperware container they all stuck together and ended up as one humongous cookie!

For Father's Day we went to my parents' house. We brought an orange dream cake for dessert and even though I stink at getting cake out of round pans I was able to cover up my mistakes with the frosting and I think it tasted pretty good. Steve had it at his job at the BYU religion department and got the recipe from his coworker who made it. It reminds me a lot of an orange creamsicle and one of Steve's other coworkers claims the frosting is actually made of dreams. Definitely a delicious summer treat when you chill it (besides the fact that you have to turn on the oven to bake the cake).

Orange Dream Cake

White cake mix

3 oz. Orange Jell-O

16 oz. sour cream
12 oz cool whip

1 cup powdered sugar
zest of 1 orange

Make cake mix according to package directions adding half o the Jell-O mix. Bake in round cake pans and cool. Cut the rounds in half horizontally.

Frosting

Mix sour cream and powdered sugar. Fold in cool whip. Divide mixture in half. Frost inner layers of cake with white half of mixture. With second half of frosting, stir in remaining Jell-O mix and zest of orange. Cover the cake with the remaining frosting. Top with remaining zest if desired.

*My note: store this in the refrigerator after making it. If you want to eat it really soon after making it, put it in the freezer. It tastes AMAZING when it's cold.

Rolls

I had a lot of fun making rolls today. Ever since I learned how to not kill yeast, I've been trying to make them every so often because you can pretty much eat them with any meal and they make yummier sandwiches (even if you have to take a few) than cheap store bread.

Usually I half the recipe my mom gave me, but this time I forgot! Our next biggest bowl was dirty so the dough overflowed while rising!

Here are all the rolls! I think we'll be freezing some unless we get mega roll crazy (actually it may be too late for that).

Favorite: Butterhorn (crossiant-looking). Needs improvement: Parker House (normal and mini) Best treat: cinnamon (Disclaimer: I do not actually know the names of rolls, but my cookbook does).

Great Aunt Afton’s Rolls
2 Tablespoons yeast
½ cup warm water
2 cups milk warmed in microwave
6 Tablespoons shortening
1 Tablespoon salt
3 eggs, beaten
6 Tablespoons sugar
Four to make soft dough*, (about 7 cups)

Dissolve yeast in warm water and set aside. Heat milk and dissolve shortening in it. Add salt. Cool slightly. Mix sugar with egg and add to mixture. (At this point you should have combined the yeast, milk mixture and egg mixture.) Add flour to make soft dough. Let set 10 minutes. Knead about 10 minutes or until small bubbles appear in dough. Put in greased bowl, turn dough over to cover top with slight layer of grease. Cover and let rise until double. Roll dough out thick. Cut with round cookie cutter or drinking glass. Stretch the circle a little to make oblong then fold over. Let rise until double in pan. Bake in hot oven* (425 degrees) about 6 minutes.

* I love that my mom had to add in the info in ( )s.

Talent

Okay, the video in this post is of the children an old family friend (we used to go to church with them in Lakeville Minnesota; the father drove me to my friend's house after I totaled my car by hitting a deer).

Anyways, this video, I think, is inspiring. The kids in the video are good kids; you wouldn't know the difference between them any other kid you see at school. But they put in a lot of diligent effort and work into what they do; they love it, and they are extremely talented at it.

We hear a lot about the negative side of human nature, and this clip kind of reminds me that there's a positive side too.

First day at Kohl's

Today marked the first day of my Store Management Internship at Kohl's Department stores. For those who don't know, I am doing my internship at the Draper location. It is a 10-week program, and it's meant to give interns a look into retail management. I've never worked retail, and I've never worked management, so it'll be a great opportunity for me to learn some things.

Summary: I had to go to the West Jordan store today, which was a bit of a drive, but that's okay. We started with the standard first-day-on-the-job lineup: watching some videos, talking about company policy, etc. Then I got to meet many of the other managers, attend a manager's meeting, and then look through the training booklet for the internship and plan out the things I'll need to do during the next week (I am going to be very busy). After orientation, training, getting to know the store and the people (all during the first half of the program), I will eventually be doing the following for the second half of the program:

1. Being part of a rotating crew of on-duty sales floor managers for some of my shifts.
2. Picking an Impact Project--that is, I will select a specific area of the store that I would like to focus my efforts on (e.g., shoes, accessories, etc.) , and then do everything I can during 1 month to make improvements in that area.
3. Presenting my experience to the store and district leadership at the end of the program.
   

Impressions: I think it's going to be a lot of fun, and I think I'm going to learn a lot. The people that I've met so far are great, and the program is really structured and provides a great opportunity for getting some great experience and education. I'm really looking forward to it, and I think it'll be fun to be involved in some decision-making and analysis (instead of just grunt-work).

Downside: The only thing that stinks is how much I'll have to be away from my cute and wonderful wife (with travel time, about 10 hours/day, 5 days a week).

Request: If any of you out there have retail experience, be sure to give me your best advice by commenting on this post. Please don't share negative experiences or complain about how much you hated your high school retail job--that won't help me :) But if you have advice that could help me, I'd love it.