CA DMV

We went to the DMV a couple of weeks ago. Yay for us, right? I was expecting a 2 hour wait (sad, right?) based on the fact that the last time I was at the SS office it was that long. Well....We got there around 10 am. and there were at least 100 people there. doh! so after waiting in a line to state what we wanted to accomplish. They gave us paper work and told us to get back in line. After that we were sent to the longest line, where we waited two hours. Good thing we had plenty of time to study the CA Drivers test booklet....and play risk, temple rush, read a book. After that line we were sent to another line to have our picture taken (wait what? we are getting our pictures before we pass the test, weird they must have a lot of faith in us). I was then promptly sent to another line to get the test. I stood and took my test that I had been nervous for all morning...."this sign means what? When can you turn? (which is actually a trick question since CA has so many wacko signs)" and so on and so forth. I complete the test and wait in line to have it graded. Did I mention that there was only one person working the test desk...so all 100 + people had to go through just her to get their test and then to have it corrected right there. 

The test lady calls me forward and starts going through my test and with her red pen she started making marks on my paper. I did not know how many I could miss without failing. but I knew my fate when at the very bottom of the test she marked how many wrong and wrote an F and paused. ...."F, F? I could not have just failed, those were ridiculous questions? anyone that can read english should have passed that test!!" well all of these thoughts were raging through my head when I finally gasped out, "F? I failed?"  the test lady briefly looked at me and said, "mam what're you talkin' about? You miss six and you fail, you only missed two." Well I passed with flying colors, even though she wrote a big F on my paper.....must mean something else, like Fantastically well done? 

 The test lady handed me my test and in my exhausted and overwhelmed state I found a seat to wait for seth to get done with his test even though I felt like yelling "if I have to stay one more minute in this place I'm going to go bonkers!" Now interesting situation. I noticed that at the DMV, seth and I were two of the 20 Caucasians there, everyone else seemed to speak another language. One of the individuals who was from  Turkey (i think) came up to me. I had noticed her when I was standing in line to get my test corrected while her boyfriend was standing in the line to get the test. She said, "you just took the test?" I responded in the affirmative and then she said "could I see the test?" I probably should have said "oh, what for" to gauge her intentions instead I yelled NO WAY. As you can see I had gone bonkers by then. I had sat in line all morning (it was about 1pm ) to have somebody ask if they could see the test...which by the way had the answers marked on it. 

Oh but it doesn't end there Muh haha hahah.. Seth finishes up his test and comes to me and says we need to do a few things for our car registration. I inhaled slowly through my nose. okay, I can do this. We just need to get a quick smog inspection, which I had thought we might have to do anyway. I called Mary, an angel of a sister, and asked if she could watch walter for another hour. If I would have had to take Walter with me on this awesome adventure, I would have cried. 

We finished the smog inspection and headed back to the DMV. By this point we had paid money just to have an application for the car registration and then we just paid money to be tested and get a certificate. So we head back and pull our car to the exterior car check (dont worry we had to wait in line there too). We finished that and Seth was so kind to send me off to mary's to grab something to eat and the plan was to pick him up and be done for the day. BUT WAIT, it gets better. Seth  texts me and says "im in line AGAIN"....twenty min later he texts and says "almost to the front of the line, do you want to come pick me up?" Then twenty more min later he calls around two thirty and says that we still did not have all of the information. that was at about 2 thirty, the DMV closes at 5pm. Seth said that we needed to hurry and find a place that is a certified brake and light check place. 

As we were looking for said place, Seth told me the story of what happened in the DMV. He finally got the front of the express line they put him in because he said he had already waited in line all morning. The lady at the front said, "oh, this is not getting processed today, you do not have all of the required paper work." and Seth is just astonished! after all of our work, someone at the DMV had forgotten to mention that we needed one additional piece of paperwork. Had it been mentioned earlier we could have quickly got it done when we were out getting the smog test. But here it was 2:30 and the lady at the counter was sure that we could not get it done before closing time.

At this point Seth was so frustrated! I would have cried if i was there. He said "look, I cannot comeback another time and get this done. I start work next week and will never have a weekday to come in. I have to get this done because I am the only one on the title. My wife cannot come in because she was recently in the ER and cannot get this done and sit in line again with our 17 month old baby boy." The lady seemed to listen to our concerns and gave us an address to get the work done and then to hurry back and come straight to her without waiting in line. 

So here we were driving around looking for this place she had referred...yup didn't find it. so we stopped at two or three other places and one place referred us to the last place we ended up going. So I called ahead and asked in the kindest voice I could if they could help us out. The owner said if you can get here in five minutes we will try but there is no way it will be done before five. Well they started the work at 3:55. Seth and I sat anxiously in their customer waiting area...which were two chairs in the parking lot.

 Seth was so frustrated and hungry and probably frustrated even more because he was hungry. I told him to go across the street and get something to eat. 20 minutes went by and he came back and ate a sandwich as we talked and tried to laugh about our predicament. "it would be a miracle if we could get all of this done today" we both thought. Well at 4:40 the car was pulled back into the parking lot so Seth ran into the office and filled out the last of the paperwork, get our certificate and pay for the inspection. Boy did it seem to take forever to get that done. By the time we got in the car we had about fifteen minutes to get to the DMV. We made it there with five minutes to spare, seth jumped out of the car and ran inside. I sat outside in the car anxiously for ten minutes before seth texted me saying he was just waiting to be helped right after the guy she was currently helping. The DMV had closed their doors, but this meant that seth could get it all done, assuming we really did have all the necessary paperwork. Ten more minutes passed and he walked to the car with a huge grin. We had done it! It took from 10 am to a little past 5 pm to get everything done but we did it! 

I would never wish a DMV visit on anyone. We were so blessed to get things done in the nick of time. On the car trip back to mary's to get Walter, Seth said that as the lady was putting the final paperwork through she was reflecting on our earlier visit where she had told seth that he was missing paperwork. She said that sometimes she notices that stuff but that she doesn't say or do anything about it, and then later the customer would get a letter that says they would need to provide that additional information. BUT, when she saw that we were missing the last certificate she somehow knew she had to say something. Now you could judge her and say, "hello! you should ALWAYS tell the people when they are missing something." I would agree with you, but no one is perfect so I am just so grateful that she did. I am sure that our heavenly father watched out for us not once but several times that day.  

 

The Sainsbury family month-by-month for the year 2012

Starting off the year: Seth is in the BYU MACC program and is excited to graduate in April 2013. Julie passed her series 7 and 63 and was a licensed broker for Fidelity from June 2011 to April 2012. In February we were blessed to have Walter Seth Sainsbury join the family, weighing 8lbs 11oz.! Julie is now a stay-at-home mommy, happy to be with Walter as he grows and learns, and boy has he been growing! He has been in the 90th percentile since the day he was born. 

In the first ten months he has been with us we have traveled and experienced a lot! 

     -At two months we went to St. George and went hiking in Zions National Park. 

 

     -In April was Walters baby blessing, he was blessed in the same outfit that Seth was as a baby.     

     -May we moved to the Sainsbury farm and got to hang out with the family for a couple of weeks before moving to NY.

     -June we went to Southern Utah to hike through Little Wild Horse Canyon. The second week of June we moved to NYC for a summer internship with Deloitte. We stayed with the Chenn family for the first half of the month and then helped them pack for their move to Utah. At the end of the month we found a studio apt at the Monterey just south of Harlem. Walter and Julie went sight seeing almost every day and were joined by Seth on many grand adventures (to list a few);the Bronx Zoo, famous museums, boat tours of Manhattan, Waffles and Dinges, playing chess in the park, a Broadway play and Sunday game nights with friends. 

     -July we traveled to Pennsylvania by bus to attend a wedding reception of Julie's best friend. We love NY and will miss going and doing all the amazing things we experienced.

     -August we returned to Utah; our first week back we headed to Woodland, Ut for a Sainsbury family reunion!   We also got to hang out with the Chenns in UTAH weird! And I had a good friend come visit Walter. I'm convinced he will be as big as her pretty soon.

     -September we went on Walter's first camping trip up Payson canyon and then we did the Nebo loop just for fun on our way back. 

     -October we went to Spanish Fork for Seth's work party (Vivint) such a fun carnival, derby destruction, and firework show. This same month Seth flew to California for an interview with Disney and in November he would accept the offer for a two year rotation program in Burbank, California beginning July 2013. 

     -Mid-November Vivint flew Seth out to Canada to do some auditing in their offices in Calgary. This fall semester Seth played on two intramural teams one for soccer and one for flag football we loved going to them and cheering even when there was a foot of snow on the field. Thanksgiving break we carpooled with the Sainsbury's to go to Broomfield, Colorado for an Anderson holiday weekend and celebrated our third anniversary. 

     -December 1st we started the Christmas season out right, by traveling to Vernon with the Sainsbury's to pick out a live Christmas tree for the farm house. Mid-December Seth has finished his finals and got his tonsils out. We finished the year by spending Christmas with the Call clan, Seth went to Texas for auditing work with Vivint, and then we rang in the New Year with the Sainsbury clan.

2012 has been an amazing adventure and it has taught us one major lesson: you never know what or where your next adventure will be but you should try your hardest to enjoy the good things NOW, so you never have to think "if only" in the future...

 

2013 will be full of even more changes

but we are excited to move around and experience the good things in life, 

month-by-month, 

wherever it may lead us.

The Miracles of Modern day Medicine

Our family has been pretty blessed. We began this year with the miracle of medicine for Julie, the middle of the year with a miracle of medicine for Walter, and end this year with the miracle of medicine for Seth.

The beginning of the  year I was blessed to take medicine to ease the pain of child birth. A month or two after child birth I was having a few complications and was able to get medicine to help me get back to 100%.

Half way through the year Walter became very sick, with a terrible cough and fever. Unfortunately we were in New York so we did not have the luxury of taking him to the doctor (which is what every mother wants to do with anything that happens to a newborn). However, we did have the luxury of our choice of six different stores carrying medicine on our block. So I went to the store bought some medicine and wa-la Walter was able to have some comfort during his first sickness of his whole life.  He got better shortly thereafter.

And here we are at the end of the year, Seth had a tonsillectomy on Friday and we are again reminded how medicine is a modern day miracle!  Seth was able to be unconscious through his whole surgery. He was able to come out of having his throat sliced and talk to me an hour later!!! He was able to come home and hang out on the couch with relative comfort. Can you imagine what life would be like without medicine?

Seth and I have come to believe that one should NEVER use medicine unless it is completely necessary and under careful moderation. We have taken special precautions to ensure that our family is careful we would strongly suggest that ALL families set up precautions for their situation.  
 
I am writing this post because I am made aware of the blessings and miracles in my life. And I believe medicine is definitely one of them (well and having a doctor in the family :) thanks matt) The last couple of days have been hard but I cannot even imagine how hard they would be without medicine. I am really struggling with keeping Walter on his schedule because, all of the sudden I have another mouth to feed and constantly tend. This morning was probably the worst in pain Seth has been in. He could not even swallow without gagging. We finally decided to increase the amount of medicine to see if it would help. Within about 30 min. the medicine fully kicked in and he was able to swallow without throwing up, he was able to eat a whole bowl of mashed food, and now he is sleeping soundly on the couch (and to think I take all of those things for granted). 

Twinners.....triplets?

So one beautiful Sunday afternoon I thought it would be cute if Seth and Walter wore the same outfit. I asked Seth to put on his blue shirt so they could be twinners. Seth regrettably informed me that it was in the dirty laundry. ah shucks, i thought, well at least he can wear it after we do the wash. So we headed to the Call house for Sunday dinner. When we walked in my sisters quickly laughed at how cute it was that Walter and MY DAD were wearing the same outfit. HA. So after the laundry was done we took this picture to mark this serendipitous moment.

we tried to put something in each of their shirt pockets so you could see how their shirts were almost exactly the same.

Nap Time= Quiet Mommy Time

Oh I love nap time. Don't get me wrong, Walter is a good baby; yet, I do like having a few hours in the day to spend getting things done or doing things that I know I should be getting done.

So in my one hour of quiet time this afternoon I would like to catch up on a few things we have done.

Summer Internship in New York:

  I was sad to leave all of the things to do and places to go, the hustle and bustle of so many lives living in such a small proximity was exciting for me. Needless to say if I was ever bored there was a plethora of people watching that could be done by Walter and myself. If you know Walter then you know that he has a sober stare that glosses over his face when he is in his people watching phase. We did a lot of things in New York that were a first for me and the fact that there are still a ton of things that could still be a first for me is what makes New York so fun. If you haven't heard Seth has been offered a full time position in New York!

We came back from New York at the beginning of August:

From there we had little time to sleep before we had Sainsbury family pictures taken. Here are just a few pictures of that photogenic day for Walter.

This first picture is great. While looking through our family pictures I noticed that it didnt really matter what Seth and I looked like because you cannot take your eyes off of that cute baby face!

 Here is the WHOLE Sainsbury clan. Such a cute family, if I may say so.

 gma and gpa sainsbury with their grandkids

 And lastly a picture of just the Sainsbury siblings. Seth is the most attractive and that is why he is in the middle. :) okay fine it is really done from oldest to youngest. such a good picture everyone is looking at the photographer...oh wait there are no kids in this picture :)

 After family photos we headed to the Sainsbury Reunion 2012 in Woodland Utah:

This was such an amazing experience! I had so much fun and was so relaxed it was great to not have to come straight back from New York and worry about moving again. This house was huge and had so many fun things to do: there was a pool, hot tub, pool table, awesome themed bedrooms (we had an awesome bathroom IN our bedroom), amazing showers, huge dining room table (like from beauty and the beast), a razor, three garages (maybe more?), big flat screen tvs everywhere, a nice deck, a fire pit that was electric (WOW) a theatre room, plenty of space to play ghost in the graveyard or green ghost as the sainsbury's call it...im not quite sure why. We were there during the olympics so of course we watched some of that too.  We also had fun going to the Natural History Museum in Salt Lake that was SO cool if Walter was a little older and not crying the whole time it would have been just a little bit more fun. we also went up to heber girls camp for part of the Moody/Anderson reunion. We took the razor and a four wheeler up in the canyon and did some crazy speeds....okay well some people did crazy speeds I was okay hanging out at the camp site. Well if you cannot tell from this description how awesome it was then you don't know awesome! I don't know if I just did not take any pictures or if they are some where else (which makes me so sad).

Third week of August to present:

We finally moved and settled into our Provo apartment. It is kind of lonely here because I don't know anyone but that was the point in moving somewhere new. It has been kind of hard because we have not been going to our actual ward for a while.

We had a farewell to go to, stake conference, the brigham city temple dedication, and then we went to our ward this last sunday, sort of. We both thought that Church started at 9 so we strolled over to the church at 8:55 noticing how eerily quite everything was, once we got inside I notice that everyone was already there (again weird).

We were looking from the doors so that we could find a seat without disturbing anyone. While looking I was trying to figure out what part of church services we were walking into...everyone was quite like the prayer was about to start but the silence went on for a long time. then someone got up and bore their testimony....so apparently church started at 8:30 and it was fast sunday (we seriously need to get with the program).

Other than that awkward experience here are a few other things we have done:

Moved into new apartment and started feeding Walter more varieties of baby food. This is a picture of seth feeding Walter. wierd huh? well it is because we dont have a high chair :) do what you gotta do.

 Seth started school...this is Seth doing homework with Walter.

We went to Two Buck Tuesday at Thanksgiving Gardens with the Englands and Rachel, it was so pretty. I need to find those pictures! 

We have gone to several recruiting events and other formal dinners. Seth is still in the Presidents leadership committee. He is also doing intramural flag football and soccer with his cousins.
 

We went swimming with the Chenns at their new place

 We were eventually kicked out because of lightning haha

 We watched some football games

 We hung out at home!

 We had a visitor! Yes, Jennifer and Walter are almost the same size haha jk

 We went camping??

 We were up at Payson lakes it was super fun and a little chilly notice walters winter coat (I may or may not have been a little over the top with how cold he was)

 We had some visitors up at our campsite who provided a delicious STEAK meal. How many people can say that when they go camping.

 Here we are in the morning- yes walter woke up every other hour- but we still managed to have a good time in our two man tent that was wall to wall full of our airbeds . Fact- you can try to make it as easy as possible on yourself when you are camping.

 After packing all of our stuff up we went to one of the Payson Lakes so serene!

 We then decided to go on the Nebo Loop, which is something Seth has been wanting to take me on since before we were married. Three years later we finally did it! I loved the beautiful colors of fall. I would definitely recommend this scenic byway to everyone. This picture is just a small portion of what the whole time was like.

 I tried to make caramel dipped apples....with homemade caramel. they were supposed to turn out like this...

 but turned out like this....

 We went to Kiddie Kandids and took his seven month pictures. This is in the waiting area because they do not let you take pictures in their studio.

 We have gone to the library for reading time. And we do reading time before bed too!

 Last but not least we go to gma Calls house every Monday to visit/do laundry/help out/ hang out with Grace aka be beat up by grace. I was trying to upload a video of the last time Grace was "playing" with Walter but it isn't loading right now so...until next time.

Seth and I have had a wonderful time keeping busy and going out and doing things! I have realized now that I don't have a job or school to take up all of my time that I need to get out and do things for my sanity and for Walter's education. I am excited for all the things that we will get to do this coming month. October is going to be busy and very halloweeny. I am so excited to spend this time of year...or any time of year with my family and with the Call's and Sainsbury's.

And Walter is now awake so the posting time is over, until next nap time!

Standing alone

So recently I have been going through some of the mormon messages videos. I do not know if I have ever watched more than two in my whole life. Well I decided that I wanted to see what they were like and have found myself sitting in front of the computer watching one after the other. They are so inspiring and uplifting!  I absolutely love this story that the Prophet shares. When I first clicked on it, I thought that it would be about cursing in the Navy because I have heard and loved that story.
This is not the same story but it was still such a great message. I was crying half way through because I realized how sometimes I have felt alone but I never really am.
These messages are a wonderful way to get the word out to those around us. Even if they are already members, it is so important to understand that we are God's children and we have worth even when the world would have us believe otherwise. I am grateful that the Church has put these messages together because they bring life to the stories that we can read on lds.org. If you have yet to watch some of the newer videos I would highly suggest that you watch them they are amazing teaching and personal study tools! I love this Gospel and am so grateful for a Church that inspires me to be the best person i can be and reminding me that there is so much more to life!

unfortunate story continued

"Saweet!".....We need to make sure we are the first ones on to make sure that we get a seat. So we rush onto the train and I hurry to sit down. This all happened within five seconds. Second number one: I am motioning to sit down. Second two: As I am sitting down I realize that there is a guy lying on the seat and that kind of creeped me out. Second three: I immediately stand back up and move to a seat directly across. Second four: I almost gag, "what is that horrific smell!?" in fact, yes I actually said to Seth, "blah what is that smell?" The stench seemed like layers and layers of B.O. and trash and alcohol. Second five: I am starting to realize that the smell is emanating from the man.

Whoa that was a lot of stuff to go through in five seconds!

So I notice everyone else who was getting on after us go through that same five second realization but they have enough time to turn around and get into a different compartment....Since we were the lucky first ones on, we were also the very unlucky ones who would be last to get off. Unfortunately, we weren't that lucky. The doors started closing before we could get out and so I move our little family to the opposite side of the compartment, next to the air conditioner, and I hope it blows good smelling air towards me. At this point, second fifteen, I hear Theresa's warning rattle through my brain..."if a train is empty there is probably a good reason why. Try to avoid those." And NOW I know why. I was kicking myself for not remembering her advice until it was too late.

During this memory recall I watch the man out of the corner of my eye just to make sure that he is not dead, or hurt and that is why he is laying motionless on the bench. (Now if you have been to New York before you know not to lock eyes with homeless people because they can react in a ton of ways; they can curse at you, be really adamant about how you don't need your money but they do,....and other more scary things I've heard stories about). This sounds heartless; but, when you are traveling with a little baby the situation is a lot more scary. You cannot anticipate what they will do and you are twice as slow as regular people because you have more things to carry.

Back to watching the man....He was breathing and did not seem to be hurt in any way. So I felt that it was definitely okay to leave this compartment. I start looking through the windows of the other trains and realize they are so packed there is no way our family would fit in there. So we sit in the strangling stench for two more stops. And at every stop I notice some unfortunate soul go through the same five second realization.

 What does one do in this situation? do you get out and walk the rest of the way home? twenty blocks? Do you call 311 and say there is a smelly man on my train?  Obviously there was not a lot we could do. We finally reach our stop and notice the man get up and stretch...oh but our story doesn't end here. He gets off at our stop. This is a terrifying thing because we use the elevator to go up three flights of stairs. And if you have been in an elevator in the subway before you can smell a very similar smell to that of the man (although I don't want to think about why) so we rush to the elevator and start pushing the button a million times (because that really does make the elevator come faster HA) We get in and notice that the man did not follow us but started rummaging through the trash, whew.

Moral of the story: advice can be as good as gold, but I guess you wouldn't know its value until you didn't use it.