Wednesday, December 19, 2012

Random Acts of Kindness

I got on the Elliptical at the gym and watched as the news unfolded: A school shooting, 26 dead, Connecticut, Elementary School, Kindergarteners. As the news story continued to unfold through out the day I found myself attached to it. As a teacher I know what a school community is. I've been through the drills of what each class does if there is a threat in the school. I could see clearly what those classes would have been doing first thing in the morning. The atmosphere of the school ready for Christmas break. While the news story unfolded I watched as it all came crashing down. I've spent days thinking about what I would have done in the situation. Where could I have hid kids? What would I have in my classroom that I could use to stop someone? And 1 thing that is true of every teacher out there, no one would get near my students while I was physically capable of standing in their way.
Now almost a week later the world continues to spin as it always must do after a tragedy. It's easy to get angry or just forget. Instead, my awesome sisters proposed an idea to put some good back in the world that is filled with evil. Each of us is doing 28 Random Acts of Kindness. Little things to brighten people's day. Simple acts to remind people and ourselves that there is good in the world. Not only is there good but the history of the world has been written and good will prevail. That knowledge, knowing that those little kids and teachers were welcomed into the open arms of a loving Savior and that their families can find comfort through Him is what we need to win.
28 little things, not hard, time consuming, or expensive and each time I do one I think to myself, "Satan is a punk". Join us, spread some happiness, fight back, heal.

Facebook group: 28 Random Acts of Kindness
http://www.facebook.com/groups/238709522926570/239216312875891/?notif_t=group_activity

Sunday, December 16, 2012

Pants

Apparently, today is wear pants to church day. The Internet has been a buzz about this for several weeks. I've read the varying opinions and seen the Facebook comments. I know this is a sensitive subject for a lot of people. At the surface it seems a little silly making a big deal about pants. But I guess if we dig deeper its a problem that several women in the church confront. People I love and in my own family have struggled with women's role, sexism in the church, etc. I know my thoughts about this aren't profound or unique but I feel like I should throw in my 2 cents.
I want to start with saying that I was raised by the most amazing woman. As an adult now I give her a hard time about being crazy and we don't agree on everything but growing up she was a super hero. Now she's something better just my hero. I promise this has to do with women in the church. I grew up with a mom who could have been anything. She is a genius literally, not an exaggeration. Given everything she could have been I watched as she CHOSE to be a mom. If the smartest person I know chose and found joy in being a mom somewhere in my growing up brain that was a big deal. My mother is also a spiritual giant. She knows every book of scripture better than just about anyone. Not only does she know it but she loves it. So it is with her example that I grew up. She wasn't a passive part of our gospel centered home. I watched as she and my dad were truly partners. So with her example to try and live up to I have been blessed to love and understand the gospel including women's part in it.
Moving on, in high school I read a book called Defining Beauty. It was a book about the history and evolution of the beauty industry. In the introduction the author explains that 10 years before the book was published she started her research on a quest to expose the deeming and degrading nature of the beauty industry. 10 years later her view of feminism and women had changed. She realized that women's power comes for their femininity and by being different than men. When a woman try's to be a guy she looses her strength. This is stuck with me. Women and men are different, even outside of the church they are different. I choose to embrace the difference and being a girl. I know I'm a girlie girl, I love heels and dressing up. But I don't think that makes me less than a guy, less intelligent or weak.
I know that lots of women in the church feel as if their "different role" is actually a lesser role. I remember a great seminary teacher ( the best I had) once explained it like this Christ came to earth and did 3 major things: Organizing his church, the atonement and ressurrection to conquer spiritual and physical death, and ministering/caring for those in need. If we look at women's and men's roles. Each role of the Savior is given to each specific gender based on their uniqueness. Men are ordained to oversee the organization of the church and its ordinances. Women bring children into the world and nurture  them play a crucial role in the Plan of Salvation. In some small way women have a part to play in the atonement. And all of us are called to be disciples of Christ and minister to those in need. And one thing I have always loved is that as He hung on the cross Christ thinks of his mother and ensures that she is taken care of and the 1st person He appears to after being resurrected in Mary Magdolen. I believe Christ and Heavenly Father have a place for women in their hearts and church.
the gospel is perfect, LDS culture is not. In our current ward there are people in jeans, ACUs, tattoos up and down their arms, and no one blinks. Sometimes LDS culture gets in the way.
Lastly, I know that each of us has to come to understand our role in this life. Not just a male or female but as children of God. It's personal and different for each of us. I wish that we could all focus a bit more on the the central purpose of the Gospel. Christ came and dies for us so that we cw live together with our father in Heaven as families forever. Our role is to ultimately make that happen for ourselves, our families, and those around us. With everything horrible in the world going on perhaps the best way to find peace with who we are is put aside ourselves and get to work.
I not trying to offend anyone. I know this whole pants wearing lds feminist movement is a sensitive subject. But hopefully, we can all be understanding of each individuals personal struggles and be there and be Christ like.

Friday, December 14, 2012

Waiting...

You know, I spend a lot of my life waiting. There's the day to day waiting in lines, for Brian to come home, for the dishwasher to be done, etc. but then there's also the waiting for life: waiting on adoption stuff, waiting for Spring to apply for teaching jobs, waiting to see if Brian deploys, waiting waiting. It's hard to not get caught up in waiting for life. I have to be careful or else I miss life right now. I guess I've always been like this, couldn't wait for high school, then college, growing up. But right now life is really good, so I'm trying to not get stuck waiting for the future and pay attention to today. Speaking of today we are gearing up for Christmas and the decorations are up. I love getting to buy presents for people but I'm terrible at waiting to give them out. So I'm doing the 12 days of Christmas for Brian so each day I get to give him a little something each day. Here are the pics of our little Christmas decorations.

Our tree is starless...I can't find a non hideous one.

I'm still working on the sign to hang above our little centerpiece. Brian being more artsy than me got this to look nice




Monday, November 26, 2012

DCA

Diet Cokers Anonymous

I am a diet coke addict. I have been for several years. I've tried to quit multiple times. The longest I've ever gone was 14 days. 14 very long days. I know there are others like me out there. This is for all the Diet Cokers in the world.

You may be a Diet Coke Addict if...
10) By 7:30 in the morning you already have one
9) You can taste the difference between fountain, bottle, and canned
8) You know the places that serve the best Diet Coke in your area (Thanks McDonalds)
7) When asked what you want to eat your response is Diet Coke
6) You have taken Diet Coke to funerals, weddings ( including your own), church functions, etc
5) The back of your car, your desk, and house is littered with empty and partially drank Diet Coke containers
4) You have forgotten what all other sodas taste like
3) When you meet a fellow Diet Coke drinker it is like running into a long lost friend, you are "kindred spirits"
2) Needing a Diet Coke on Sunday  is considered an ox in the myer situation.
1) You are drinking a Diet Coke right now

Now onto other happenings, if you want to try something absolutely delicious make Nutella Banana Bread. I got the recipe from this awesome website called Chef in Training. Here is the link
http://www.chef-in-training.com/2011/10/nutella-banana-bread/
It will change your life. 
Brian and I had a nice quiet Thanksgiving. It ended up just being the 2 of us but we had a lot of fun.   
He was supposed to work on Friday but they told him he didn't need to come in but had to be on call. So we wo
on our fire pit. Our backyard is mostly dirt and leaves. After lots of raking we took bricks from the front yard
and made a fire pit. It is awesome we had a fire on Saturday night and roasted marshmallows. It really 
makes you feel like your far away from everything right in our own backyard. We had a good lunch. Date
at Chilis on Saturday and a sleepover Friday and Saturday night. This means we take the mattress off 
of our bed and put it in the living room. We have a TV in our room but there is something sort of fun 
about sleeping in the living room. 

Sunday we put up our Christmas decorations, I'm still working on some of them so I'll put up some pictures 
when I'm done. 
Overall it was a great weekend! 

Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Murder, mystery, hobby

3 things to blog about today: Murder, Mystery, and Hobby

Murder:
Our scene opens on a 24 year old female, home alone, in the shower. She is washing her long hair when suddenly there is a loud thud. Our heroine jumps, startled. She holds her breathe waiting for what she knows must be coming, the robber murderer responsible for the loud thud. A million things race through her mind, she doesn't have much to defend herself with. She isn't wearing any clothes that's gonna be embarrassing when the police find her, at least she's already shaved her legs. After what seems like forever there is no robber murderer coming and the house is quiet. She turns around in the shower  to find that the "robber murderer" is really the hanging shower caddy. It's slipped down  the shower head and landed with a bang.

Mystery
We return to our 24 year old heroine, standing where ever girl hates to be...the scale. She looks down at the number and curses. THAT can not be the right number. Tragedy strikes again that afternoon at the Dr's office when the scale again reads THAT number. THAT number is bigger than any before it. THAT number she vowed would only be acceptable if pregnant. Which is not the case, again our heroine is NOT pregnant. So how did that number appear? She had worked hard for a year at the gym and was feeling good. Then she moved to Georgia and gained some of the weight back during the month of getting settled. But she was back at the gym. Her and her hubby were eating healthier than ever. She was drinking diet coke once a week. She wasn't eating ice cream, candy, processed foods, etc. So how was she continuing to gain weight? How could ones weight change increase by 15 lbs in 1 month? How does one gain back a years worth of fought of weight plus an extra 5lbs and still wear the same size pants?  To add to our mystery, she isn't the only victim. Her hubby has gained 25 lbs in 2 months. Works out 2x a day. And hasn't lost a single pound or inch. What, what could be doing it? A lack of elevation? No cafe rios? The weather? It remains an unsolved mystery...

Hobby:
We close today with a final glimpse of our lovely female as she starts to cook dinner. Something we would have rarely seen a year ago. Now we see it 4-5 days a week. She seems to love it. Trying new recipes. Having success. Getting excited. This could be the beginning of an exciting new chapter.

That concludes today's saga. Tune in next week for move adventures!


Tuesday, October 2, 2012

2 in1 week.

I don't usually blog this often but since yesterday was so horrible, I'd figure I'd update. Yesterday when Brian got home from work, he and Jon ( aka Hunt who lives with us) went put to look at the Bronco. Brian went to show Jon how we had battery power but the car wouldn't start...well the Bronco started. After I and Brian tried multiple times through out the day to start it, it started right up like nothing was wrong. The boys think with so much humidity and a bit of a colder morning caused the problem. I think, divine intervention . Either way we'll replace the battery connectors for 10 dollars rather than the starter for 200. After having to have his bum swabbed yesterday, the Dr. called back and tomorrow Brian has to go to a gastroentology exam. Hopefully we can figure what is causing his weight gain, exhaustion, bloody poops, and as he puts it feeling like he isn't digesting anything, he says it just sits there. Who knows but at least they are doing something. I got to go to work today, so Tuesday is looking up.

Monday, October 1, 2012

Mondays...

If Sunday is supposed to be the Lord' Day, then Monday is Satan's Day. I hate Mondays! I try not to, when I was teaching I tried to have a good attitude about a fresh start and blah blah, but I always hate them. Today has reminded me why I HATE Mondays. Here's the play-by-play and it's only 3:00 pm. (Warning, this gets pretty long)

5:30 AM: Brian leaves for work, Brian comes back into our room to tell me the Bronco won't start (yes the same Bronco whose starter I replaced 2 months ago). He asks if I want to take him to work or if he should just take the car. Being 5:30 in the morning my brain thinks..I don't have any pants on, I can't take you to work without pants, so you'll have to take the car. Leaving me carless for the day.
6:30 AM: My phone rings for a sub job, being carless I don't take it.
8:30 AM: My phone rings for the SAME job (school starts at 8:30). I accidently accept the job and have to call the high school and tell them I can't actually come to sub.
9:00 AM: Sister Nelson texts me to remind me we are practicing the music for the fireside at 10:00.
10:00 AM: Walk to the church, and practice with Sister Nelson. During said practice I had to refrain from loosing my temper about 12 times, and resist the urge to throw the music at Sister Nelson and walking out. See, I don't have a piano, I have a keyboard, and playing on the keyboard is different than playing on the piano in the chapel. Also, 2 weeks ago I was handed a stack of 14 songs and told to learn them, but assured that whenever I wanted to get into the church to practice I could. Well I asked 3 times last week to get into the church and they couldn't let me in. So needless to say I am STILL learning these songs. Today she FINALLY told me which one I actually have to play vs the organist. Which helps, but then she decides that she is going to play piano teacher and play the keyboard with me while I play the piano and count out load, tell me to use less petal, faster, slower, etc etc. I had played the song 2 times before this morning. I finally just played the right hand and bit my tongue.
11:00: Brian calls me while practicing and asks me why the registration for the Eclipse is not in the car. I tell him I left it in there and I have no idea where it is. I go home to find the registration.
11:30: Find the registration, Brian comes home for lunch. He had a Dr's appointment today, because he doesn't make weight. He can pass his PT test but has gained 20 lbs back in a month, while working out 2x a day, and eating healthy. He is exhuasted all the time, the list of whats wrong goes on and on. Thyroid come to anyone elses mind? The Dr. informs him that there is nothing wrong with him, but he will take some blood just in case. Then he goes to report to Alpha battery where he was assigned 3 weeks ago. Well Bravo battery also had him on their list for the last 3 weeks. So he now has to inprocess into a different battery. The 1st sergent is pissed at him because he hasn't been there for 3 weeks (not his fault, he went where they told him). And informed him that rather than deploying in Feburary with everyone else who came from his AIT and after actually going to training the 1st sergent is pushing to send him in November. Without having trained with the rest of the unit, or on the weapon he would be using.
1:00: Brian takes the car back to work, here I sit carless. With a pregnant woman who moans and goans about every 30 seconds. Has been into the hospital/Dr. 4 times in 2 weeks because she "hurts". I have never been pregnant, but she has a little thing moving around in her and  its gonna hurt a lot more before its all done.
I think I'll go watch Vampire Diaries.

Friday, September 14, 2012

Settled in

We've settled into our cute little house in Georgia. Life here is staring to take shape. We are making some good friends and getting to know the area. I have to play the piano for a fireside in October, except it's not a play the opening and closing song, it's a program with special musical numbers. Of course I agreed before knowing this...but too late now. We spent labor day weekend at Jacksonville beach. It was weird that in an hour we were in Florida at the beach. Florida seems like a fat away vacation destination, not a day trip. I love it!
Hinesville is a lot like Cedar City, scarily so. It has a Wal Mart and lots of fast food.  You can get from one end of town to the other in 10 min. We're 45 min from a city with a Target.
We play deployment game, which means everyday Brian comes home from work with a different month of deployment. It goes from yes to no to maybe. So we wait and see ( Army's motto)! I finally decided I was going to put pictures up and unpack like we'll be here forever.
And we have discovered the reality that adoption is expensive. We've decided to start the process of adoption, we had always talked about going through the state to adopt because it's less expensive, and a lot of good kids wait in foster care for years to be adopted. Then we moved to Georgia. While its still less expensive here, it quickly gets complicated. In order for a child to be adopted through the state of Georgia they have to have been in foster care for 24 months or be special needs. Most of the kids are 8 or older, or severely handicapped. Both situations we have decided are not right for us right now. Maybe later in life but not right now. So lots of money is needed. We are looking into grants to help cover the costs. It may take awhile but the agency we found works with military families, will place children in another state so if we move we aren't starting completely over and is less expensive then most.

Thursday, August 30, 2012

Greetings from Georgia!

Well, we are here! After 4 days of driving, and lots of Diet Coke. We are here and not homeless. The boxes are almost all empty and we are only missing a handful of stuff. Somehow we lost all of our silverware, and some misc kitchen stuff. The odd thing is both Brian and I remember packing them and what the box looked like but it's gone. So odd...but moving on. Our house set up. Brian is STILL in in-processing. Which is actually nice cause it means most days he's home by 3:00. I am all set up to sub but have to wait until I can go to the training on the 12th. Both Molly and Rex made it here. Molly has adopted the love sac as her new dog bed, spoiled dog. :-) we are adjusting to life in the south. It's been awhile since I lived somewhere where the cashiers like to comment on what you buy, the weather, really anything. It's humid and has rained every day since we got here. My hair is not happy. After almost 10 years in the land of blonde haired, blue eyed, tiny girls. I feel very white and very small. I swear the girls are taller here. The water is nasty I swear the use bleach to treat it. This also means finding good diet coke is hard, McDonalds does not have dollar drinks. BUT the gas station down the street has 59 cent drinks and it's good diet coke! Hardwood laminate gets dirty and dusty way to fast. I dust mop 2x a day and swifter wet jet every other day. However, the laminate is excellent for sliding down the hall in my socks and begs to be danced on constantly. Church is close by, our ward is full of people our age with lots of little kids. Overall, we are having a good time. It's a 4 day weekend so we may go to the beach or into Savannah. Do some exploring. Someone needs to eat a Costa Vida salad for me, and jamba juice and a Rumbi rice bowl!

Friday, July 6, 2012

Life in General

Lets see a quick recap of life:
June: 
  • Brian's 30 year old knee decides running sand dunes in FL is not acceptable- He gets reclassed to a new job no more diver :-( It was very depressing couple of days. 13B-Big Cannon Crew Member here we come
  • Finish school, move a whole lot of stuff into our storage unit. 
  • Parents leave for Samoa: Day 1 of them being gone does not go well
  • Brian goes to Fort Sill Oklahoma for training 5 weeks 3 days. We are very lucky he got to start his new training so quickly. He now should get 10 days off after graduation on Aug 10th. Wahoo! 

July: 
  • I attempt to keep the house clean while my parents are away. I vacuum, I do dishes, and then do it again. 
  • I go to Provo to get my brother who missed the bus the night before and crashed with some kids he met a few weeks ago at orientation. 
  • We celebrate the 4th of July! My favorite holiday. We manage to uphold all family traditions such as BBQ, 1776, and even fireworks. We may have done fireworks at 11:30 at night and had my mother been here she would have had heart attack. BUT no one died or got burned and we had a bucket of water. I also went to the Real Salt Lake Game with Alli, the game was frustrating but we got a pretty good fireworks show afterwards. 
  • We have a sibling outing and get ice cream. Then we go home and decide to finish 1776 except we didn't start it until 11:00. None of us saw the whole movie. 
  • 7:30 this morning Molly wakes me up insisting to go out. While stumbling back downstairs to go back to bed, I am stopped by Provo bound brother who has missed the bus and needs to go to his 9:00 o'clock class. Sigh, I take him. 
I'm deciding the whole domestic, housekeeper, soccer mom is not a good idea. I don't cook (I burned frozen pizza last night), the cleaning is not happening, and I hate driving.

Thursday, May 17, 2012

Birthday Fun

There was fun to be had! Before I start with the actual day of birthday fun, we need to back up to earlier in the week. About Monday my mom started asking me what we were doing for my birthday, then my friend Lindsay started asking me what fun things we were doing. Well, I was not in the mood for birthday fun. It was one of those weeks where I had a lot to do and no motivation to do it. Wednesday hit and I was bummed that Brian was gone and would be missing my birthday. I am not sure why it made me so grumpy, usually we just go to dinner or something its not like its a huge grand event but I was grumpy. I convinced my mom that we should do a combined Mother's Day, her birthday and my birthday on Sunday. Lindsay continued to ask me what we were going to do and I kept telling her I didn't know.  I was mostly planning on sitting around the house doing nothing on Friday. Thursday night I relented and made my mom a list of things I wanted for my birthday (strawberries, ice cream, diet coke, clothes, and a camelbac). Well, being the awesome friend she is Lindsay refused to give up. On Friday I got a text asking what we were doing, she even invited me along to her hubby's birthday dinner with the whole family that night (his birthday was on Wednesday). I was feeling less grumpy on Friday and decided I was going to buy myself a birthday outfit, I enlisted Lindsay's help. We went to lunch and to the mall. It was a good thing she was there cause the birthday outfit turned out much better with her help. I also got my parents and brothers to do Burger Friday at Red Robin..yum cause its my favorite. Fast Forward to Sunday: A yummy meal with real mashed potatoes and peas, family, presents, a strawberry flavored, flower shaped cake, and presents. It turned out to be a great birthday, and in a week I get to see Brian and get Chuck Season 5 as one last present :-)
                                                                My birthday outfit.
                                                             My camelbac...yes I know I have a weird creepy face in this picture. My mom who is taking the picture made an inappropriate comment that caught me off guard. :-)

Sunday, May 6, 2012

Update

My sister reminded me that I need to be updating the world on my life. Keep in mind that half of the people who may even read this live in the same house as me and another fourth I see regularly. However, that will be changing in a few months so I am going to try and get back in the habit of blogging. A quick recap of what is going on in our life:
1: Brian passed phase 1 of dive training. Out of 15 who started in his class he is one of 3. It took lots of prayers to get him through the 3 week training with both of his ears injured, but he made it :-)
2: Now he sits around until June 10th when he will go to Florida for Phase 2.
3: I got a 2nd job. I will work nights through June and then whenever during July and Aug. It's at a new Mexican restaurant on State Street called Los Cucos. We'll see if I am capable of waiting tables.
4: Went to Houston for a week to watch Uncle Tom and Aunt Anna's kids. It was great weather and a good week.
5: At the end of Aug. I will move to Florida to be with Brian. We will be there until December. He has been told to plan on Hawaii as our FDS. Anyone is welcome to visit in either Florida or Hawaii :-)

Now family and friends there has been much discuss as to what my next step should be in terms of education. Options that we have discussed
1: Masters in Education
2: Masters in Social Work
3: Work at McDonalds
4: Continue to teach once I get to Hawaii
Suggestions? Input? Ideas?
My true dream is to be Supreme Dictator of the World, since apparently I'm bossy.  But they don't offer degrees in that. So I need a plan B

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Pictures...

I absolutely love pictures. I grew up in a family that took a lot of pictures and we have photo albums for each year, some years have 2 albums. I tend to think that most "stuff" I don't really need. I'm not a collector or a keeper of anything. I take a picture and keep that. My poor husband I would put pictures up everywhere. So for all of my love of pictures, I am a horrible picture taker. I never remember to take pictures of anything. I'm usually pretty good about holiday traditions like carving pumpkins and dying Easter eggs. But I want pictures for every adventure and fun thing in life. Brian usually takes pictures of the two of us at sporting events, (cause we went to a lot last year). I've noticed even more so how bad I am at taking pictures since Brian has been at BCT. I always want to send him pictures but I don't ever have any to send him. I went to Cedar City last week and kept saying I am going to take pictures while I'm down there and didn't take a single one. Sigh. I think part of it is I always just take pictures on my phone, but since I'm not carrying a camera around with me, I don't remember to take pictures. I guess I could go find our super old digital camera in the storage unit. I hope I don't get Alzheimers in my old age cause I would only get to remember carving pumpkins, dying eggs, and Real Soccer games.

Friday, January 20, 2012

Growing up...

Remember when you were little and all you wanted to be was big? It all seemed so exciting and wonderful. I don't want to go back to being little but I do sometimes wish I would have been little a while longer while I had the chance. What do we do as grown ups that make our lives so glamorous to little ones? Do they really not see all the crap that we deal with? Do we really shelter them from the "real world" that much? Don't they see the car break down, the house become a mess, us lose our tempers, have a bad hair day, fight with loved ones, get sick and still have to work? Or maybe it's not that they don't see it but they have the better perspective. Really, I remember "bill paying day" it happened once a month and we were supposed to leave Mom alone. But maybe through 10 year old eyes 1 day in 30 doesn't make life suck. It didn't take away my burning desire to grow up. I remember my parents arguing (not very often) but I also saw them dance in the kitchen, go out on dates, hold hands, and kiss. Through the eyes of a 10 year old arguments didn't define a day or a month or a life. Grown ups were like superheros, rock stars.
SOOOOO maybe should put on our 10 year old eyes the next time we have a life sucks and then you die day. Maybe we should remember how badly we wanted this and love all the perks. Maybe we should cut ourselves some 10 year old slack and not get hung up on the little stuff. And maybe we should fight for 10 year olds to stay 10 as long as possible to help us all keep some perspective.

Wednesday, January 4, 2012

An Early Morning...

I've decided that no day should start with a 4:45 wake up call. But that is in fact how my day started! Brian reported to MEPS this morning to ship to Basic Training. Yesterday, I got to take the day off of work and we just hung out. They put all the new recruits in a hotel last night and then they bus them to MEPS and then the airport. I got a room at the hotel, and when we got there the front desk said they would just assign Brian to my room rather than another room and a roommate. It was nice, except that Brian didn't sleep last night and at 4:15, I started waking up every 5 min paranoid that we would sleep through the wake up call or that it wouldn't happen. So we are now both very tired but it was worth it to get to hang out last night. 10 weeks, 70 days, 1680 hours. I put the official count down on my phone :-). We are excited to have started this next adventure. I'll keep the blogging world posted.