My Mornings

The first thing I see when I wake up is this:
That's the pillow next to me. It's empty. Sometimes it makes me sad. But then, I look out my window and I see this:
And then I think about eternity, and heavenly promises, and then I can't be sad anymore.
(Promise the temple is bigger and brighter than that when I look out my window - guess it's time for a new camera.)

Coming soon: the update on the 10-10-10 Cruise - be excited!

Thank You

Dear Sisterhood,

I just have to say thank you to you all. You have shown so much love to Justin and me as we have struggled though our loss. The flowers you sent to the hospital were beautiful and brightened my spirits. Although my heart was aching, I could still feel love. Your messages were uplifting and gave me strength and encouragement. I am so lucky to have friends like you!

Much love,
Crystal

Ok sisterhood, I have told a couple of you that I would put a couple of pictures up from the wedding. I won't try to tell a story along with it, because I''m not a great story teller like Alicia, but the wedding was great.

Just us kissing...
Traditional pose...
Everyone who was able to make it to the temple. Crystal and Justin are in there, I promise...

Soon, I will post some pictures of Vail, CO. It is beautiful!

A Celestial Romance

Like every good little girl should do, on my way home from work last week I decided to make a stop at the temple for a session. When I walked into the Celestial room, I decided to sit on one of the couches. I usually don't, so that all the married/engaged couples can use them, but there weren't too many people, and the couches are my favorite, so I went for it. Bad idea. I'm innocently sitting there, doing my thing, when all of a sudden this man-person comes and sits next to me claiming, "Hey, I think we know each other!"

My initial reaction (inside my head of course): "Oh blast!" (I couldn't say "swear word" in the temple.) "This guy knows me and I have NO idea how I know him!" Oh panic. Granted, he did look familiar, and I noticed him once in the session, but just figured he was someone from my home stake and didn't think much else of it. So basically I'm frantically trying to remember who he is without having too much of an awkward pause in there. Lucky for me he stuck out his hand and said, "Hi, I'm Carl!"

And then it all comes back to me. One time, THREE YEARS ago, Carl got my number at a dance and we went out. Once. Obviously I made a huge impact on him, because I'm pretty sure he doesn't remember that we've been out because all he said was, "Didn't you go to one of the Holladay wards?" Which means he thinks he knows me from his ward in Salt Lake.

Carl proceeds to chat it up with me, asking where I live, and work, etc (typical 1st-date questions). While sitting on a couch. In the Celestial room. Of the temple. (Remember how the couples on the couches are usually looking longingly into each others eyes while thinking about love and eternity and posterity? They're usually NOT having a first-date.) So I'm feeling a bit awkward talking to someone I hardly know on the Love Couch in the temple, and eventually told him I had to get going. Which then prompted the "Celestial Ask-Out."

"Well, would it be ok if I called you sometime?"

Are you laughing right now? Cause you should be. I was laughing (in my innards). I tell him "Sure" but he assures me he will forget my number if I try to tell it to him, so would it be ok if we met up in the lobby after we change? Wow - he REALLY wants my number. Either this guy's got a lot of guts, or I must have looked REAL hot in my get-up. :) (Please bless I don't get struck by lightning for that comment.) We exit the room together and 2 different temple workers were beaming at us. If they only knew. I couldn't stop chuckling to myself in the dressing room. Sigh.

I made it out to the lobby before him. The thought DID occur to me that maybe I should just leave - this whole "Celestial Ask-Out" was almost too much, but before I could make a decision, there he was, in all his temple glory. Again, we walked past several grinning temple workers on the way out. Pretty sure they all thought we were married or something. Woof.

Boy got my number. And we're supposedly going out this weekend to "explore" Bountiful. Please bless he doesn't ask me to explore the temple with him too. At least not on date #1, thank you.

I thought I had seen it all with Queer Clear, but apparently not. I wonder what's next?

Don't Judge Me . . .

. . . if I still own this shirt. Don't worry, it's going in the DI bag. Not because the trip was a DI trip, but because it's real old. Hooray for moving which forces me to get rid of old stuff. (Wait a sec, I've moved at least 4 times since we got this shirt . . . oh boy.)

ps - the reason I didn't show my face is I look awful. ALMOST as bad as I did in the following picture. Taken at 4 ish in the morning after Elisabeth and I successfully moved Jaime, Elisabeth and I from 103 to 303. Elisabeth is obviously much better at looking cute after a huge move than I. You go girl. (And sorry I look like a boy. Is that a mullet? Woof.)

Random Thoughts

I was watching Sleepless in Seattle not too long ago (does it mean anything if you watch that movie in Seattle and fall asleep in the middle of it?) :)

Anyway, remember how Dr. Fieldstone is talking to Sam (Tom Hanks) on the radio show about how his wife had died and she asks him what he's going to do now? His answer is perfect. And it describes my last almost 2.5 ish years:

"Well, I'm gonna get out of bed every morning... breathe in and out all day long. Then, after a while I won't have to remind myself to get out of bed every morning and breathe in and out... and, then after a while, I won't have to think about how I had it great and perfect for a while."

It's all about going through the motions. Which, if any of you have read Mockingjay, what Katniss says at the end about going through the motions is SO true. Not that I've ever had to kill people in the Hunger Games, I'm just sayin' . . .

So, for anyone out there who also doesn't have a perfect life, and maybe has some bad days (if you haven't read Crystal's latest post, you should go there now - love it!), here's to "going through the motions until they start to mean something." Tomorrow, I'm going to wake up at 5:44, make mush for my dad and I for breakfast, commute to work, take away a few kids' cell phones, drive home, make dinner, can salsa with my sister, try to get my nephew to say my name, and then go to bed. (With a few things in between all that. Like I'm sure I'll go to the bathroom somewhere in there. And brush my teeth.)

Anyway, there's my random thought for the day. That is all.

1 Down . . . 179 to Go

It's official. Summer is over. I took a final bite of a delicious oreo cheesecake last night, declared it the last bite of summer, and then went to bed so I could have energy for the FDOS (First Day Of School). Not that any of you want to know what the first day of high school is like these days, but let's just say that the sign on my classroom read, "Welcome to Awkwardness," the game I played involved students moving a cookie from their forehead to their mouth - sans hands (oh, SOOOO funny), and I danced in front of the entire school with orange claw marks taped across my shirt. Pretty sure I don't remember any of my high school teachers doing anything of the sort on the first day. I must be the epitome of awkward.

Since you're all dying to know, here's a bit of an update of my life since . . . April (I've never posted about my trip to New York City. Back when Elisabeth was pregnant. Remember how Luke is 3 months old now? I'm so lame.)

New York

Probably no one reading this post could say they've had a relaxing trip to New York City, but I successfully managed to spend 4ish days in the Big Apple and returned feeling refreshed and ready for life. Tiff and I overlapped our stay by one night (we live one state apart but have to travel to NY to see each other, go figure). Shopping, eating, reading (hooray for Fablehaven 5 and the Guernsey Literary Potato book (or whatever it's called)), eating and as pictured above, we may have accidentally watched something around 9ish episodes of Pushing Daisies (while eating, of course, no, I'm not the pregnant one in the picture - Elisabeth looked adorable!). Tyler really liked watching it with us. A lot.

Jaime's Wedding

This is Jaime. And Kevin. And Mama Mabray. Moments before this picture was snapped I said, "Smile big, this one's for the blog!" Little did we know it would take so long to get up here. Such a fun wedding! I loved it ALL . . . especially the awkward Asian security guard who was worried about the possible alcohol consumption. Good times. Oh, and the ice cream bar with Blue Bell ice cream was amazing. As was the day spent by the pool. Thanks for getting married and giving me a reason to leave school a day early!

San Francisco

This is me. And Jenn. And friend Jill, in Turlock, awaiting our authentic burritos from the guy in the RV on the side of the road. Turlock=best.fruit.ever. San Francisco=lots of creepy homeless people. But I did fall in love with the cable cars (SO fun) and if any of you find yourselves in downtown San Francisco may I HIGHLY recommend taking a tour of Alcatraz. Super cool. Oh, and make sure you say hello to Jenn and Jon while you're there - they are the best hosts ever!

Palmyra & Vermont

Bet you didn't know Nephites have mullets! Here's living proof. So classic. Spent 5ish days in Palmyra/Vermont visiting church history sites and performing firesides with the Jenny Phillips choir I'm in. Seriously amazing trip - we even got to see the Hill Cumorah Pageant (puts the Manti pageant to an awkward and embarrassing shame).

Seattle

Took a last-minute, week-long trip to visit my sister and her fam in Seattle. Ever been there? I HIGHLY recommend this super-cool fountain thing. It even blows out fog. The cutest nephews in the world loved it almost as much as I did.

Franklin, Idaho

My neighbor was nice enough to let the fam take a badly needed vaca to his cabin in Idaho. It was just what I needed, and I even had the chance to play around with the camera to get some cool shots of the kids slip-n-sliding down the coolest hill ever. What are men compared to rocks and mountains?

Colons

My sister had her colon removed a couple of weeks ago, which means I became the insta-mom of 3 boys/the best hospital buddy ever. (Those of you raising boys, bless you. Boys are gross.) Fuss Pot, pictured above, is a Mama's boy, which means he likes to whine when his mom isn't around. Pretty sure I earned my ticket to the Celestial Kingdom when I took care of him while he had the stomach flu. No one should have to clean up someone else's kids diarrhea or vomit. I did both. Fuss Pot was nice enough to give me his disease. One week before school started. Let's just say getting the stomach flu is a quick-fix way to lose a few pounds. Remind me of that during the Holidays please.

So, as you can see it's been quite the eventful summer. Upcoming: Tiff's wedding in Boise on Friday, and my 10-10-10 cruise in October - you're all invited!

OH - here's an update for those of you who made it to the end of this post. I had my date with Queer Clear/Purple People Eater. Oh.my.goodness. Remember how he was wearing a dark purple shirt? Pretty sure I wouldn't have noticed except that the first thing he said when we met was, "Hope the purple shirt doesn't make too much of a statement for a first date!" I think he was being sarcastic, but it definitely left me speechless for a couple seconds. Good times!