Job and visa updates

Day three of my job with Outaskool is now complete, and I'm so happy to be working with this program and with these kids. Each morning I take the most incredibly scenic 40-minute bus ride through farmland with the morning sun glowing on the snowy Southern Alps just in view, arriving shortly before 9 am at Rangiora's Southbrook School, where all 40 kids are usually already playing basketball and board games with the staff who arrive as early as 7:30.
On Monday I took an early bus with the idea of wandering around Rangiora for a while before work, not realizing just how far the school is from the town center, and had to sheepishly ask the bus driver if he would allow me to ride back part of the return trip so that I wouldn't be late. Fortunately, I discovered the original Rangiora Bakery (I'm a frequent customer at the Christchurch outpost) during the few minutes that I was in town and was able to purchase one of their delicious and outrageously cheap baked goods to hold me over until morning tea.
On Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays we have excursions with the other 3 or 4 Outaskool programs in the Christchurch area, which so far has involved a Market Day (kids bring old toys to exchange) at the St Paul school and a trip to the Air Force Museum, and tomorrow will entail the other programs joining us up in Rangiora for Outaskool's Next Top Model and Outaskool's Got Talent competitions. I expected these field trip days to be my favorites, but I've discovered that taking 40 kids anywhere is an extremely exhausting ordeal and our facilities are so nice that I'd almost rather stay there all week.

Update on the visas: applications still not in yet, as we have to finalize the paperwork with the church, who are sponsoring our stay. I'm at the church now (at 8 pm) to draft the documents so that they can be edited and hopefully signed off on tomorrow. Hopefully I'll be able to get back to the city by 5 pm tomorrow so that we can get a couple of papers regarding our marital status notarized before the courthouse closes.
I had a quivering stomach for most the morning and afternoon today, because when Bryan went to the medical center to pick up our exam paperwork yesterday, they would only release his and needed to speak with me about some of my test results before releasing mine. They'd warned us in advance that this might happen and that it would generally signal a very minor issue, but I still worried that there would be something to give NZ Immigration cause to reject us. It turned out to be, of course, no big deal - slightly high results in my cholesterol readings that shouldn't affect our applications. Whew.

-Rachel