Hope

The past few hours have been emotionally draining for me, so I decided I need to write.  There are some thoughts and feelings I just need to express in a public way.

First of all I LOVE this country.  There has not been a time in my life when I have felt so passionately about the United States of America, the freedoms we have as citizens of it, and the many opportunities and hopes granted to us because of it.  There has not been a time in my life when I have felt a greater sense of urgency for us to act as responsible citizens.  I can only hope that others will have the same deep rooted emotions that will stir them to act on behalf of our country and it's people, as President Obama asked us all to do last night.

It is because of my deep love and passion for our country, for our constitution, and the strength and hope exemplified by our founding fathers that today I have cried over the state of our country and it's future.
 I can only hope that more Americans will feel that fire inside of them for our well-being and freedoms as a whole and not try to take and take leaving our country in shambles.  In the words of John F. Kennedy, "Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for our country."  I don't think words have ever rang more true and could be more appropriate than at a time like this.

 I am struggling with the feeling of hope at this moment.  I had so much last night, and now it seems to be dwindling.  But I stumbled across these words of hope and I am trying to take them to heart:

"Men may fail in this country, earthquakes may come, seas may heave beyond their bounds, there may be great drought, disaster, and hardship, but this nation, founded on principles laid down by men whom God raised up, will never fail. This is the cradle of humanity, where life on this earth began in the Garden of Eden. This is the place of the new Jerusalem. This is the place that the Lord said is favored above all other nations in all the world. This is the place where the Savior will come to His temple. This is the favored land in all the world. Yes, I repeat, men may fail, but this nation won’t fail. I have faith in America; you and I must have faith in America, if we understand the teachings of the gospel of Jesus Christ. We are living in a day when we must pay heed to these challenges. I plead with you not to preach pessimism. Preach that this is the greatest country in all the world. This is the favored land. This is the land of our forefathers. It is the nation that will stand despite whatever trials or crises it may yet have to pass through". -Harold B. Lee.

I am grateful to be a part of this country, I am grateful that I care enough about this country and love this country enough to be heartbroken when the choices made do not seem to reflect what is best for the people.
But I will still have hope.  Last night in his address to the country, President Obama stated that he will sit down with Mitt Romney, and others, and work with them to make this country a better place.  I hope he was speaking the truth.  I have hope that Obama has learned from past mistakes and can work with others to make this country strong.  I have hope that we as a people can do the right thing and be responsible citizens and uphold the values and principles we believe.  That we can be responsible with our economy and our health, and our service to others.

And above all, I hope and sincerely pray with all my heart that this country will stop dividing itself and tearing itself apart.  That it will stop with the ugly, hateful things said by both Republicans and Democrats.  The ignorance and childish things said by both sides are a disgrace to the parties themselves and the country as a whole.  To be an American is a privilege I will still continue to be grateful, though I know the heaviness in my heart will not go away overnight. 

Accomplishments

It seems with toddlers for every positive there is a negative.  I think this is also the case with their accomplishments. For example, today I learned Thomas is very good at drawing and recognizing the letter "C", but he also drew on the carpet and lost the cap to the marker. 

Trying to look on the bright-side though :)  I think I will start going over the letter "T" with him.  Maybe we can do a new letter each week and soon he will be able to write his name.  That would be really cool.  I honestly don't know where children are supposed to be with things like that and I've also kind of just let things be and not push him, but if he's interested and already learning letters on his own I think it's time I start getting involved in that and helping him!

I also decided to completely stop with disposable diapers.  They are getting so expensive and I am getting so frustrated.  I don't care if Thomas potty trains or not but I refuse to buy anymore diapers.  I will clean dirty underwear and cloth diapers until it clicks for him.  I'm just done with the diapers!!

Oh yeah...

I'm supposed to be doing this blog thing, huh?  Well, I've once again failed to complete the blog challenge! At least I made it further this time.  Anyway, it served it's purpose.  It did get me back into this blog thing and now I have things that I Actually want to write about instead of just following whatever the challenge of the day is.

As you most likely know yesterday was...

 

The 4th of  July!! Aka Independence Day :)

Jack and I decided to have an impromptu get together and it was a really good time! Despite the nearby wildfire, the weather was beautiful and perfect for grilling hot dogs and playing in the pool.

Thomas and his cousins

Chilling with the neighbors

After playing in the hot sun Thomas decided little Eden had the right idea sitting in the shade

When things started to settle down, Thomas and Brooke went out front to throw "Pop-Its" or fireworks as Thomas called them.

It was so much fun for Thomas to have a new experience like that! Jack and I decided that night, we should go buy some sparklers and let Thomas have some more 4th of July celebration fun.

 But when some neighborhood fireworks started going off, Thomas was not happy!

He cried a bit until Dad came through with some milk and snacks, but he was still not a very happy camper.  Jack and I tried to light some sparklers to show him they were fun, but he wasn't buying it.

I told Thomas to blow it out if he didn't like it haha and he tried to

Even though it wasn't a huge success Jack and I still had fun with the sparklers and we saved some to try again with him another night when the sky isn't "blowing up".

When the neighbors finished their show and the noise settled down, we were able to sit together out at the park and Thomas watched the fireworks without further distress. 

Happy 4th of July! I hope everyone stayed safe and had a good time :)

Day 6- An animal you'd love to keep as a pet

 

Panthers rock.  Assuming it wouldn't tear me to shreds I think it would be pretty sweet to have a pet panther.  I've always liked them, maybe because of the Jungle Book, I don't know.  More realistically though, if I were to go buy a pet for our family right now and I could pick any one I wanted (panthers aside) I would choose: 

A chocolate lab.  D'aaawwww he is so cute. And you can't have just one picture of a puppy because they are just so adorable so let's take a moment to just enjoy their sweetness.

And last but not least, the  cutest of all!!!


Kinda looks like the baby panther, no?

In other news, today was rushed and crazy.  I was supposed to work tonight and i completely forgot so I no showed my shift and that pretty much sucks, a lot. 

Day 5: A picture of yourself from two years ago

2010 wow.  I can't believe two years ago Thomas was still that grown up.  I still feel like two years ago was before I got pregnant but that's just not the case.  It's weird how your perception of time changes with life events.  I kind of define my life into six different blocks now.  There's childhood, high school, pre-married life, newlyweds, pregnancy, and Thomas. 

I chose this picture because it's from the last time we were in Alaska.  And I felt it was appropriate since we will be back in Alaska in a few weeks! We're going to be visiting Jack's family that is up there and have a 50th anniversary celebration for his parents so it will be really nice. 

I'm also really looking forward to having a vacation for awhile.  Things have been REALLY busy lately, and busy is good most of the time I do like to keep busy, but I wish I wasn't quite as busy so I could take time to hang-out with people in the neighborhood, take Thomas to the water park, etc, 


Hopefully things slow down a bit in the next week or so.  :)  Anyway it's time for me to head to bed.  I was so close to getting this posted by midnight but I kept getting interrupted so I will just backdate it ha.

Day 4 Your favorite photograph of your best friend

Well, I don't really have a best friend, and the closest I have to one is probably Jack, and the picture of him that is my favorite is not on this computer :(

I guess here's a picture I like a lot of him   I don't know why, it just makes me feel happy inside and gives me an "I love us" kind of feeling.

That is all.

day 3

Day 3: My favorite store

This is a really hard one, I'm not sure I have a favorite store. It really depends on what I'm buying. I would maybe say Target because it has a little bit of all the categories.
Other than that I like Forever 21 for most clothes and accessories. Norstrom Rack is really good too ... Hmmm ... Home depot and Lowes are awesome, I've been spending more time in those two stores than any other lately.

That's pretty much all I can think of and I'm kinda tired so yay lame post. At least I didn't have to post a picture.
Sent on the Sprint® Now Network from my BlackBerry®

Day 2 Blog Challenge: A photo of something you ate today

Cheeseburger with avocado and tomatoes, yum!  Went to church today and I got a hutch online for my craft room, I've been setting that up this afternoon trying to get this room more organized.  I really like it, it's pretty and I'm excited to have some practical storage space in this room.  I will definitely post pictures when I've got it all done.

Some of you may have noticed I finally updated the tickers on the left sidebar of my blog, and the countdown to Thomas' "bobot party" somewhere over there <----.  Well, the other day we were at Wal-mart and we saw a bunch of party supplies on sale for pretty cheap.  So we decided to ask Thomas about his birthday party, which isn't until October, and see if any of the stuff interested him.  I had already had some ideas in mind ranging from a Transformers theme to Blues' Clues (which he goes through phases of really loving and not loving so much).  So Thomas has this toy transformer with a "laser beam" that shoots out of it's arm and he is obsessed with this toy.  He calls it his "bobot", or robot.  So when he saw all the Transformers stuff he was adamant that he was to have a "bobot party".  So we have officially decided on a theme, we bought all the stuff and tucked it away in the garage (he now tries to sneak into the garage so he can look at the bobots).  And his Aunt Karen promised him a robot as a present if he pooped in the toilet, so he has now also started sitting on the toilet and shouting, "I wanna prize! I want a bobot prize!"  He has yet to poop, but at least he is motivated, bless his heart.

So that's the story behind the robots, luckily we got it at Walmart so if he changes his mind returns will be easy but I think he has pretty much decided.

Also, we are going to be dog sitting for a few days this week and Thomas is SOOO excited! He just can not wait to have a dog at the house that he can pet.  It's fun to see how excited kids get over things like this, but I have to admit, I'm a little bit excited myself.  :)

Day 1 Blog Challenge

Remember the blog challenge I was going to do awhile back?  Well I am finally going to do it!

So here we go!  Day 1: A photo of yourself and a description of how your day was



Today was pretty good!  In case you haven't heard, there was some crazy airport stuff going on in the tri-state area this weekend.  Thunderstorms paired with a fire at the FAA Tech Center in Atlantic Cityhad pretty much the entire east coast on a ground stop, meaning no flights in and no flights out.  It was nuts.  However, one nice thing about this little fact is that it resulted in Overtime at work.  Which means I got to get paid time and a half to help out with the high call volume.  We haven't had overtime in a really long time, what with such a mild winter and all so it was really nice to be earning some extra money!  I worked until about 2 am and then decided my brain was too foggy to function properly and I should get some sleep.

When I finally woke up at a luxurious 10:30 am Jack and Thomas had made pancakes so we had a nice breakfast and then headed down to our old house to finish up some work.  Well, Jack did.  On the way he dropped me off at Taylor Andrews to use my mother's day gift- a pedicure and deep conditioning hair treatment, yay!  I've never had a pedicure before, not that I remember anyway, and it was really nice to hang out at the salon and get my hair done without worrying about Thomas getting impatient or bored.  And it resulted in my lovely curly blown out hair you see pictured



When we finished up down there we went to a couch place and bought ourselves a sectional for the basement! YAY! This is a big deal. Our basement is bare and the only seating was an over-sized chair I got for free online that is super ugly and can really only fit one comfortably.  We are going to be picking up the sectional next week and then moving the PS3 down there to watch shows in the glorious freezing cold that is our basement.  Plus it comes with a storage ottoman, bonus! We've never really had an ottoman before, just coffee tables we put our feet on haha so it will be fun.  I am very excited for this.

After we bought our couch I donned some shell necklaces, and Jack and I headed over to our ward party which had a Hawaiin luau theme.  It was a busy day! One where I definitely should have taken more pictures (sorry for the wordy post and lack of pictures) but it was a lot of fun!! And Thomas even won a prize at the party, a plastic pineapple filled with jelly beans.  This is epic for him as he has been obsessed with "prizes" lately and feels he is entitled to ALL the prizes.

Anyway that is all I have for now <3  See you tomorrow! Where you will apparently get to see a picture of something I will eat ooh goodie.

Something Scary, Something Hard

Before I get into my blog post for the day, I should probably address the obvious- I did not complete the Blog Challenge.  I didn't even begin it really... I thought about it, and I tried, but I was discouraged by all the pictures you had to take.  I didn't want to share so many pictures haha

Anyway! Moving on... I thought today's blog post title was fitting for two reasons.  First, because today I have been thinking about change and changing is indeed something scary and something hard to do.  Albeit, very worthwhile, still scary and still hard :)  Second, because I felt like I should share my own very personal experience with change and it is not an easy thing to share something personal and dear to your heart to the world when there is a good chance that 90% of the people seeing it will mock you or take it lightly.  Nobody likes seeing things they hold close to them taken lightly.  So I'm just going to ask if you're reading this, and you read what I wrote, and you don't agree with it or think I'm off my rocker, please just keep it to yourself :) Or kindly just make fun of me to someone I don't know so I won't hear about it.  Thanks in advance.

Those of you reading this who have no idea what I'm talking about, I promise not to keep you in the dark.  Today I posted something on my Facebook profile, it was a long something, and I will share it here:

"Today I was reminded of the change a person can make in their life for the better. It seems like a lifetime ago I was that rebellious teenager many of you may still think of me as, but the truth is I am no longer that person. And the reason why is because I was brought to the realization that where I was in my life was not going to bring me to the things I really wanted in life.
Was it easy to change? No, not always, but I was able to leave the person of my past behind and meet a man who saw me and loved me for the person I wanted to be, the person I was trying to be. Now, almost five years later I have grown in ways I never would have thought possible. I have reached goals that even when working toward being better, I never thought would be attainable. Am I perfect? Definitely not. But I am a better person than I once was. I am a happier person than I once was, and I am grateful for the knowledge that change is always possible, and you should never give up on trying to be better.

If you are at a point in your life where you are wanting a change for the better, don't give up. There is always a way to bring yourself out of a bad situation, there is always opportunity to make decisions to bring you closer to what really matters. The best way to do that is through the Lord. Some of you may not be religious, but I can not deny that I know God is real, and I know He is aware of each and every one of us. Share your desire to change with someone who can help you, don't do it alone. But most importantly, share it with God. He can and He will help to change your heart, and bring you closer to what really matters in life.

'...for the Lord seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart.' 1 Samuel 16:7 Old Testament (King James Version)

'12 And according to his faith there was a mighty change wrought in his heart. Behold I say unto you that this is all true.
13 And behold, he preached the word unto your fathers, and a mighty change was also wrought in their hearts, and they humbled themselves and put their trust in the true and living God. And behold, they were faithful until the end; therefore they were saved.' Alma 5:12-13 The Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ

If you would like to learn more about my personal experiences and my faith you can view my profile on mormon.org here http://mormon.org/me/2TQW-eng/

To learn more about my church go to lds.org and feel free to message me if you have any questions. I am not a perfect Mormon (nobody is) but I am willing to share my experiences and beliefs with any who would like to know."

I have never been very openly religious on my Facebook account, not that I can remember anyway, but I just really felt this was an important message to share.  Today in church we talked about change and the teacher asked if any of us had ever really truly experienced a great change in our lives and how it made us feel.  While I didn't share my experience at the time, I couldn't help but reflect on it and think of it.  And I just thought if I could help encourage someone to have the courage to change their lives for the better, to be able to stand up as an example of someone who did and was able to, than I should.

So that's why I did it.  And it is always a little nerve-wracking for me to share things like that, I don't know why, but I don't regret it.  I know what I know, and I believe the ability to change is what makes the human race so beautiful.  We can be more than we are in this moment, we can be more than we are even when we are at our best, and part of life is almost like a great big opportunity to jump up and say, look how far I can go! Look at what I can be!

I am excited and hopeful to take advantage of that opportunity. I hope I can continue to try and make right the things in my life that need to be improved, I am sograteful for loving friends and family who help me and encourage me along the way.  I think a support system is very important, and I would like to offer myself as a support to anyone who needs one, no matter how far away we may be.  

I amgoing to challenge myself this week to pick one thing in my life I would like to change and focus on that, and try to be better.  I would encourage you to do the same.  Those of you who read the Book of Mormon or have a copy, or would like to pull it up on lds.org, read the book of Enos each day as you try to make this change, (it's only a page and a half long), I have been told that it is a very powerful message that can help us change, and as we read we may notice things to inspire us or encourage us.  I am willing to give it a try! 

I hope everyone had a great Easter and you all have a great week!

Blog Challenge

So much for the blog challenge! That was a total fail! I didn't realize there would be so much picture taking involved, I don't know why but it always seems like so much more work to make a blog post with pictures...
Speaking of which, I am going to have to make one soon so I can put up pictures of the house now that we are moved!!

It has been a whirlwind of a month but I will try to post later and keep everyone posted.  I have been putting off house pictures because I want to get everything decorated and prettied up but I guess it will be nice to have something to compare to for when I do finally get everything the way I want... which at this rate will be in like 50 years!

Things are just insanely busy but I am trying tokeep up with everything and despite the added stress I am really feeling happier than ever and just so glad to be here where we are.  I truly feel so blessed, I know Jack and I have been greatly blessed and we are so grateful to everyone who has helped this goal come to be.

Better Late Than Never

Right?  I need to get blogging again.  So I decided I would kick things off with a 30 day blog challenge.  I found a good one here:

on Mystationarylife.com

So I will be officially starting tomorrow- first day of February! Wish me luck :)  Feel free to join me.

At the store

We're at the grocery store, I have my purse in the cart and we get to the checkout lane.  Thomas takes off running and I go after him leaving Jack to pay for the groceries.

Cashier: "Can I tease you a little? Are you thick-skinned?"
Jack: (not really sure what he's referring to) "yeah, sure"
Cashier: "Alright.  Nice purse,"
Jack: *shrugs* "It's not so bad, mine comes with a pretty lady."

Awww.  Yes, my husband is a sweetheart.  And he will carry my purse.