-Monday, 13/7 
This was my first day at work experience. I met with the team a week prior, which ultimately made me feel more comfortable and less stress-ridden about starting within a new environment. I entered the building and immediately started admiring the beautiful art displayed around the YO building. Chelsea guided me down to Galkangu, where without plan. I bumped into my friend's mum, and we caught up for a while.  
After that, I collected my pass which allowed me to enter the gates. While at Galkangu, Chelsea introduced me to many other lovely people. We borrowed a laptop that I’ll be using this following week. While heading out, we bumped into Katie, and Lily and they told us a funny and bizarre story about how another member's shoes had been left behind at an event and found under some pizza boxes.   
Once we made it back to YO Bendigo, Chelsea gave me a site induction where she gave me a tour and showed me where everything was if I or anyone else was to run into trouble. Chelsea then emailed me the Work Experience Plan. This gave me an overview of what my week will look like, who will be responsible for me, and a list of activities of many different varieties. 
I chose to begin by emailing my resume to Leon, where he could help me improve it to job ready standards, but of course, this took me a bit longer than I had planned. I had a bit of a struggle becoming used to three running screens, but Chelsea helped me understand how to use one selected screen at a time. 
For lunch the girls offered to get me a spud bowl, which was very sweet of them. Once they had made it back, they encouraged me to sit around the table with the rest of the crew. Chelsea and Katie were teasing each other, and it certainly made me let out a few giggles.  
For my second task I wrote an Ambedo Magazine about the importance of creative writing, what it means to me, and why I feel that writing is a part of me. 

-Tuesday, 14/7 
I entered the door with complete thrill to see everyone that morning. I couldn't wait to tell them about the Echidna I saw whilst on my way to YO. While telling Chelsea and Leon about my discovery, Leon shared some pretty cute footage of Echidnas himself and they were adorable.  
I had then started finalizing my Ambedo Magazine. Once I felt satisfied with my design, Chelsea, Lily and I all left to go get some hot gravy and chips from a local HSP place. 
After we finished our food Chelsea asked if I would like to design some appreciation certificates for the paparazzi that worked at the Winter Ball. I had a lot of fun getting an idea of the different templates and styles for the certificates, and both me and Chelsea were quite pleased with the results.  
Tyler, a member of the YO events group, then introduced me to the YO events group. I met with many kind faces and spent the last of my time talking to Tyler while waiting for my mum to pick me up. 

-Wednesday, 15/7 
We had all gone for morning tea up at Galkangu. I had some cucumber, strawberries, pineapple, honey dew and a chocolate chip cookie. The food was wonderful, and fresh. 
Afterwards Chelsea and I took a detour back to have a look around Galkangu. Once we made it back to YO, I began looking for youth events and grants happening in Bendigo. With little to no luck, Chelsea found a new task for me to do. I went through photos from the Winter Ball and got to decide which photos I thought appeared the nicest. Haylee, who works with Headspace, and Emma who works with Bendigo Community Health, came in for a meeting. They asked me for some input on what they should consider introducing in their new newsletter. 
After Haylee, and Emma left from the meeting, I went over to Old Green Bean Cafe and thought I’ll be getting myself a nice cheese, tomato, and ham toasty. Only to be met with devastation, my card declined a matter of eight times, (Don’t put your card through the washing machine guys.) so my only option was to sprint back to YO, grab cash, and sincerely apologise to the waitress. After a break I returned to photo scavenging. Not long after Leon spent some time with me, going over my resume, and looking at some areas for improvements. I gave Leon an overview of what I had accomplished, and what I was working towards. 

-Thursday, 16/7 
We began our morning heading down to a few flower shops. We were looking for some nice flowers to celebrate Emily’s last day (with all of us) although they just didn’t have what we were looking for. So, Katie, Chelsea and I headed to Coles where we brought a vase of flowers, and her favorite Monster energy drink. Once we made our return to YO, we made plans to get lunch at Grill’d for Emily’s last meal with the whole team. Chelsea stayed back at YO to set up Emily’s surprise. Emily was appreciative of her gifts and almost teared up over Chelsea’s handwritten card.  
I then continued to write about my week of work experience, until Chelsea and I met up with the Child Safety Officer at Old Green Bean Cafe. We spoke about what other safety processes we could put in place to make YO a safer and comfortable environment for all. Chelsea and Katie then helped me look for music for a TikTok going on the YO Bendigo TikTok page. This was very engaging for me, although I think for future reference, we leave the music up to Katie. 

-Friday, 17/7 
I began today with a meeting with Chelsea, Emily and Ella about what went well at Winter Ball, what to improve, and what we could add. Not long after I tagged along with Chelsea and Emily to see Emily's Field Officer, Rochelle. Emily and Rochelle went over a few things to make sure Emily’s three-month placement during her traineeship was going well. We returned to the office and met with goodie bags! They contained different YO merch, and I got to experience it all for free. Only a few minutes after wrapping that all up, the Pride Festival Committee came in for a meeting about future collaboration opportunities. The meeting went a little overtime, but overall, it went alright. After we finished the meeting, we rushed to get some chips and gravy as a group and enjoyed it all together. I helped the team pack up some Winter Ball decorations and we jammed to music together. 

This was great work experience for me. The team was wonderful and certainly know how to have a fun time whilst keeping their priorities in place. I was quite worried about how I’d go with work experience, but the YO team really showed me that there is absolutely no reason to not enjoy yourself. Thank you, YO, although I was only here for a week, I know I’ll miss the time I had with the team.