I sync'd my phone before taking it to the Apple store - and btw - I am NOT SAVVY with all of this:/ NONE of my apps transferred either. I am SO FRUSTRATED. Please help.
You "synced" it to what? iTunes?
Did you make an iCloud backup? Did you make a backup in iTunes?
Did you restore that backup? Or the backup from iTunes?
Note that you can easily redownload your apps from the App Store as long as you are signed in with the same Apple ID as your other phone. And that's typically preferable anyway.