Christmas

I guess it means you've had a good Christmas if you only took one picture the entire time.
This is Nathan, wearing all of the gifts Grandpa Jim gave the family. We especially love the ESPN pants.

Christmas was a wonderful break for us. I was lucky in the fact that I only had to work Monday - Thursday and had a full 3-day break for Christmas. Our break was filled with many games of 55 Alive and Forbidden Island, movies, sports games and lots of story-telling and laughter. It was our "first" Christmas together, but it honestly didn't feel like anything new to me. It felt familiar. 

We were sad not to be in NY, but I was grateful that we weren't one of the ones stranded by all the storms. I had to drive in the ones we got in Utah. Not my most favorite commutes, but I am grateful not to have been in one of the hundreds of accidents that occurred during those couple of days. 

As everyone is sending out their newsletters and beautiful Christmas pictures to friends and family, I feel like I should try to do one too. But I think I will skip the mailing part. It was enough to send out our Christmas thank you's today. (I am horrible at remembering to put things in the mailbox!) So maybe our blogletter will be my next post. 

Today was the first day of school for BYU. I'm graduated, but even I am not looking forward to this semester -- except the fact that by the time it is over, it will be warm and sunny!!

If you are anything like me and grew up loving any and all opportunities to immerse yourself in a world where you become the character of the book you are reading, you should read this book. Other than the fact that it is a "self-help/life lessons" book with really good advice, it is a fascinating look into the lives of the women who wrote their own lives into the heroines of their books. Every chapter made me realize how much I inhaled the books I read and how I learned from the stories in them.

Seriously read it. It's short, so you don't really have a good excuse not to. :)

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It's our 1/2 birthday!

"We" are 6 months old!

The way it is supposed to be.

I'm a world class worrier. One of the best, in fact. 

Last week-ish (maybe a bit more) I was sitting on the floor of a building at BYU. It was light when I got there, dark when I left. And I had that weird feeling in my stomach. The nervous, uneasy feeling not unlike how I used to feel before an exam. I tried to ignore it but of course, I let it get to me. 


Kind of like last night, where I had really strange dreams and woke myself up and tried to ignore it as I hoped sleep would come back over me. 


That type of ignoring doesn't work so well. Mostly it was all about how I was just going to up and quit my job. Without having one lined up, and only having a few interviews and after sending out hundreds (okay, maybe only one hundred) resumes. And I let that worry kind of consume me. I thought about it A LOT. 


Thursday was my last day. Friday I spent sleeping in and looking for stuff for our Halloween costumes, and partying -- Ignoring the fact that I was unemployed. Or at least trying to.


Sunday came and during primary and RS, I thought a lot about how we didn't know what we were going to do for money. As I was thinking about this, the thought came to me that everything was going to be okay because we paid/pay our tithing. I have never had any hesitation about paying tithing. I try to recognize the fact that everything I have in my life is a blessing from the Lord, and I am more than willing to give back to him. PLUS, when I give back to him, he just gives me more and more. Who wouldn't want that?? And I have had that thought come to me a few times before, usually when I was worrying about something - go figure... So I paid our tithing on Sunday.


 And I very very very strongly, strongly, STRONGLY believe I was blessed with a job on Monday. I am so so grateful for my testimony. I am grateful for prayer. I am grateful for the need to turn to the Savior. I am grateful for the experiences I had growing up that led me to develop and strengthen my testimony. It even talks about this in my patriarchal blessing. 


I think a testimony and worry have an inverse relationship. The stronger my testimony (the more faith I have, the more I trust the Lord, the more I put His will before mine), the less I worry. There is such an innate sense of peace when you know that even though you have no idea what is going to happen, the Lord does, and everything is going to work out the way it is supposed to.

Halloween

My family is hilarious.

This picture came up on my newsfeed today and I started dying with laughter when I saw it.

Oh man. So sad I missed out on being part of this....

The kids in primary are so stinkin' cute! Every other Sunday I am in primary and I can't help but laugh almost the whole time. They say the most nonsensical things. And as much as we try to simplify things for them, somehow a few things are just over their head.

My favorites are the two boys, Hayden and Jack (ages 3 and 4). They pretty much are hilarious. We asked Hayden what one blessing is that we get from going to the temple. And he just held up his hand and said "5. 5 temples. And I was Woody for Halloween." haha

I'm not quite sure where he was going with that but it makes me laugh every time.

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Lazy day.

BYU football has a bye week =  lazy day for us.
I think I got a good 10 hours of sleep today.
And then we've kinda just hung out. The weather isn't so fun so my idea of golfing got rained out.
We've watched a couple movies, I took a catnap, and the Real game was disappointing.
AND we are having grilled cheese and tomato soup for dinner. (Well, I am. David thinks pizza and tomato soup will be a good combination. ??) I think it's the best rainy day food. SO yummy!

I am grateful for sleeping in(!), slow days, and laughter. Being married to your best friend makes for some great days.

Who you gonna call?

Today is pre-Halloween.

I think whenever a holiday is on a Sunday, Utah decides to boycott this by celebrating all weekend long. (4th of July, Halloween....)

We are going to the ward party as ghostbusters! I found a jumpsuit at DI for $6. And then add some old boxes spray painted black, tubing and flashlights from walmart and we have packs! I think it would be nice to hold on to these for a couple years because they are so easy to throw together. AND they don't require face-paint. That stuff only makes me want to touch my face even more.

I am grateful for holidays, yummy food, good friends and fun basketball games. 

One month until Thanksgiving

I am so, so very grateful for a loving, forgiving husband who loves me no matter how much I frustrate/disappoint/infuriate/annoy him  make things difficult. 

 I am grateful he is crazy and adventurous enough to go jump out of a plane with me.

 I love that he is so goofy (You know you are, babe.)

Day 1: I'm grateful for someone who loves me for me and grateful that I get eternity with him.

Tuesdays could be better. (part two)

Oct. 19.

Work went okay (after many not-so-fun days, I finally had a good one). I got tons of stuff done (then promptly ran out of things to do and was bored). Plus, the thought of going to the REAL game kept me stoked for the end of the day. We've been planning this for awhile, didn't go to the game on Saturday because of it, and even invited Stephen, who kindly said he would get our dinner for us.

Fast forward to the end of the work day. I take David the second half of my (free) sandwich from lunch, then go home to research how to make my computer stop overheating, watch a little Bones and fold some laundry.
Our basement doesn't really let my phone get service. For some reason, HIS works, but mine doesn't. There have already been issues with me NOT getting phone calls because my phone is just plain weird. So, I figured I would put it in the spot that usually lets calls to me come through.

And normally, I check my phone like 20 times during the 2 hours I'm waiting for David to be done TAing. I should have checked it last night. But I didn't. I assumed he would maybe get out a little early, but lately the class has been going almost the whole time. At 6:20, I get stuff together that we would need for the game, especially a JACKET for me. I grab my phone and am about to walk out the door to go pick David up so we can leave for Rio Tinto. My phone rings as soon as I walk out the door. I answer it and hear "I've called you 29 times." He's just around the corner from home and we were supposed to pick Stephen up 20 minutes ago from Costco with our dinner! We get in the car and on the way to Costco, I get on my facebook app and see that the game is SOLD OUT.  They always post stuff like "Hurry and get your tickets, because they're going fast" but we have gone to games where they say this and there will be a ton of seats. So we kind of ignored this earlier. I call the ticket office to verify - "yeah, we only have about 50 standing room only tickets left. $25 each, no vouchers". 
Sad day. We've been looking forward to this game for weeks. And now there are no more home games left.

We picked up Stephen and went home to watch the Yankees (lose, unfortunately). The Rangers have definitely outplayed them this series. And then we semi-watched Real crush Cruz Azul 3-1 on the computer. With our back up players. That's a nice feeling.....


I am definitely going to miss going to the games. We got so lucky with the student "season pass" deal. And I definitely did not plan on missing 29 phone calls AND the Real game.

BUT THEN, I got a call from an RM. Fresh off the mission. So nice to hear his voice.
I'm glad my brother's home.
So all in all, not what I expected. But good.