Decorating the "tree" (finally)...

I put up our "tree" at the beginning of December with the intent of decorating it a day or two later.  True to form, it's two weeks later and we just now got around to it.  But, it's decorated, and awesome!  I'm getting pretty good at coming up with creative Christmas trees, that the animals can't get to.

We also got our stockings out, and I got super excited when I realized we could hang them by the fireplace!  

I love Christmas!!!  I also love Pandora.  I have perfected my Christmas music station and it's so much better than 99.9 or the other radio stations (although I am liking 91.5 for some slow jazz Christmas music every night...).  I haven't taken the time to slow down and enjoy the Christmas season and I'm sad that it's only a few days away.  

Last week, my Relief Society did a special Christmas program for our December activity.  I think it was the best church activity I have ever been to.  It's sort of difficult to explain.  The way that it works is that everyone participating sits on chairs with blind folds on and their hands in their laps.  The program is a walk through the life of Christ, and they do it through music and speaking, as well as touching items, smelling things, and tasting things.  Some examples, when they talked about the birth of the Savior they had people walk around with their babies and had you feel their feet to represent baby Jesus.  One of the miracles that they went through was when Christ calmed the storm while they were at sea.  There was someone narrating the story, and there were people with fans and spray bottles, spraying and blowing on us, as well as lights flashing and thunder sounds (remember, we were blind folded while all this was going on).  It was so cool to experience all of these things (it was an hour and a half program) in such a different way.  Not being able to see allowed me to really feel like I was there.  I hope that someday everyone can have the opportunity to have an experience like this.  

Well, I am off to make some hot chocolate (Can this rain and cool weather please stay FOREVER?!) and then go to bed.  Good night!

Update and Conference!

      General Conference, as usual, was amazing!  I'm so excited for everyone affected by the changes to the missionary ages!  It's so cool that they have the option to go earlier if they feel ready!  I loved the talks, and so many of them stood out to me.  I don't think you can have favorites, but Elder Holland's talks are always among my favorites and this time was no different.  His understanding of the scriptures astounds me and I hope that someday I will be able to read the scriptures and see the stories in them the way that he does.  There were several other talks that hit home for different reasons, and just in general, I was left feeling uplifted and motivated to do better.  I can't wait for Thursday when they put the transcripts up so I can re-read my favorites and get some good quotes from them.
   
     So, as far as re-motivation goes, I was in need of it this week.  My last post I was very motivated to make a lot of changes, through the Personal Progress Program (say that 5 times fast...).  That hasn't changed, but I also haven't done great at it.

     Number 1 was Faith and establishing a routine of praying morning and night.  I did so good at this! ...for 3 days. And then it got a little bit sketchy.  I'm doing better though and am learning what works and what doesn't work for me.  I am finding that the days that I say my prayers I have a better day and am able to feel the spirit more often.  It has just been little changes, but I can feel the difference it's making already in my life and I am loving it!

    As for the rest, I've done bits and pieces, but really there's nothing to report.  I'm working on setting aside a time to work on these goals everyday, so hopefully that will help.  On a different note, Greg and I have started going to the gym in our apartment complex on any afternoon that we have off (usually it ends up being 3-4 days a week).  After years of searching, I have finally found a good workout partner! Imagine that, he was living with me all along.  I always have a hard time getting motivated to go and he is doing that for me.  I'm already feeling better and looking forward to getting healthy!

    And lastly, in other news, Greg passed his FAA Exams! Well, the first two...  He has two more to take tomorrow, so keep him in your prayers and watch for an update.  If he passes them both, he'll have his airframe certificate!!!  (For those of you who that means nothing to, he has two certificates that he'll need to graduate, airframe and powerplant, and this is the first of the two.  He'll test for powerplant near the end of spring semester.)  We are over halfway there... WOOHOO!!!


   

Personal Progress

Recently I have been working on getting the person that I want to be and the person that I am a little bit closer to being one person.  I have tried and failed at a lot of the goals I've set and it's becoming increasingly frustrating for me.  I can see what I want, it just seems like every time I take a step in the right direction I'm actually stepping onto a moving sidewalk that's going in the opposite direction.  I've had the thought a few different times over the past year that I should redo my Young Women's Personal Progress, and I've even gotten as far as looking up a book on the church website, but I never went to get the book and so I never started.  Earlier today while I was on the phone, I thought about it and since I was already killing time on the computer I decided to look it up.  I went to the link and was very surprised to find that it's all online now!  I, being the computer geek that I am, was instantly motivated to start on it.  I've decided that in order to keep myself accountable, I'll be writing about it on here.  That way there is at least the possibility that someone else knows about it.

The first paragraph on the Personal Progress homepage is this:

You are a beloved daughter of Heavenly Father, prepared to come to the earth at this particular time for a sacred and glorious purpose. You have a noble responsibility to use your strength and influence for good. Your loving Heavenly Father has blessed you with talents and abilities that will help you fulfill your divine mission. As you learn to accept and act upon the Young Women values in your life, you will form personal habits of prayer, scripture study, obedience to the commandments, and service to others. These daily personal habits will strengthen your faith in and testimony of Jesus Christ. They will also allow you to recognize and develop your unique gifts.

Basically that is exactly what I am trying to do anyway!  I'm going to start with a few goals and go from there.

First goal:

Faith 1 - Learn about faith from the scriptures and living prophets.

• Read Hebrews 11; Alma 32:17-43; Ether 12:6-22; and Joseph Smith--History 1:11-20.
• Read two general conference talks on faith.  
• Establish a habit of prayer in your life, beginning by saying your morning and evening prayers every day for three weeks.

Individual Worth 1 - You are a daughter of Heavenly Father, who knows you and loves you.

• Read Psalm 8:4-6; Jeremiah 1:5; John 13:34; Doctrine and Covenants 18:10; Abraham 3:22-23; and Joseph Smith--History 1:1-20.
• Record how these scriptures teach you that Heavenly Father knows you, loves you, and is mindful of you.

Good Works 1 - Learn why service is a fundamental principle of the gospel.

• Read Matthew 5:13-16; 25:34-40; Galatians 6:9-10; James 1:22-27; Mosiah 2:17; 4:26; and 3 Nephi 13:1-4
• For two weeks record the quiet acts of service that your family members and others perform.  
• Acknowledge their service in some meaningful way.

Integrity 1 - Integrity is the willingness and desire to live by our beliefs and standards. Learn about what integrity means for you personally.

• Read Moroni 10:30-33 and think about what it means to "deny yourselves of all ungodliness."
• Read the pamphlet For the Strength of Youth and reflect on how the Lord's standards differ from the world's standards.
• Record appropriate standards for behavior, dress, conversation, literature, movies, internet, music, and other media.
• Write your plan to stay worthy to attend the temple.  After keeping this plan for at least a month record your feelings in your journal, and continue to keep to your commitment.

So here goes nothing... Week #1 here I come.

Lemon Poppy Seed Cake

For the past few months I have been avoiding using our oven at all costs.  We had an old oven in our apartment that got almost as hot on the outside as it did on the inside.  Last month, after I got burned from touching the OUTSIDE of the oven, Greg decided to call maintenance.  They said they would come look at it and 3 days later they knocked on the door with a brand-new oven!  They set it all up, we turned it on, and... the house stayed the same temperature!  Amazing what working appliances can do.  So, now that I can cook at a comfortable temperature, I have been baking everything.  Today I was craving lemon (I know, weird!), so while I was at Wal-Mart I picked up a lemon poppy seed muffin mix and a cake pan and went home to make my very first lemon poppy seed cake!  It was delicious!  And double success, Greg thought so too!  In fact I probably won't be making it again anytime soon, because I've eaten way too much of it already.

My yummy cake!

Ingredients:

1 Box Lemon Poppyseed Muffin Mix OR Lemon Cake Mix

1 cup water

4 eggs

1 lemon pudding mix

1/3 cup oil

butter or margarine

cinnamon sugar

(This recipe is for a denser cake, more like a pound cake.  If you don't want it to be dense, just follow the directions on the box for the batter and then continue with the rest of my instructions)

Coat the inside of the cake pan with butter.  Make sure it's really well covered.  Pour some cinnamon sugar into the bottom of the cake pan (it doesn't really matter how much, you'll just put the excess back), then move the pan around until the whole inside is coated with cinnamon sugar.  Pour in the batter.  Bake according to the directions on the box (I think my box said 40-45 minutes.  I did it for 40 and it was perfect!)

Dump out while still hot and enjoy!!!  

If you want a glaze as well (I'm not gonna lie, the glaze was delish) just get a carton of your favorite frosting and spread it on while it's still hot.  I tried cream cheese frosting on the first one and lemon on the second one and they were both amazing!

Happy Birthday Aubree!

Well, it has officially been over a year since I posted anything here.  I've been meaning to get back into it and have even half-written a few blog posts, but have never finished them.  When better to get back into it then on one of my favorite people's birthday?!

Today, my beautiful baby sister turns 14!  I've been sitting here for 15 minutes trying to figure out what to say about her, not because I don't have anything to say, but because I have too much to say.  I've been trying to think of one story to tell that would sum up what I want to say about her, but the way that she has impacted my life didn't happen in one story, so one story won't suffice.  I think that Aubree was born into our family at the time she was for a reason.  For me, Aubree has always been the age where she could help me the most, when I needed her to be that age.  She has always been able to come in my room when I don't want anything to do with anyone else.  She makes me laugh when I don't think I can.  She always has a hug for me and gives the best hugs.  When I'm having a bad day, all I have to do is go over to see my family.  Without fail, Aubree will jump up or stop what she is doing and give me a big hug and genuinely be so excited to see me.  I can think of at least a million times when she has been exactly what I needed to make my day just a little bit better (or a lot better).  Now that she is older, she is teaching me lessons on how to be a better, happier person, just by being who she is.  I have gone from thinking of her as just my little sister, to considering her one of my closest friends and even though I'm sad to see her grow up, I'm looking forward to the amazing woman she is becoming!

So, Happy Birthday to my amazing, fabulous, beautiful sister!  I love you lots!!!

Cards, shirts, and other news

Well, it's been a little while since I've posted anything.  I have written a couple posts, but not finished them and so I never posted them.  Oh well...

So the first news is, we got a puppy!  He's a black lab (which wasn't our intention, but we just fell in love h him) and he's mostly blind.  We didn't know that when we got him, but we love him anyway.  He's clumsy, adorable, and obnoxious. Here's a super cute video that my sister took of him yesterday over at her house. And below are some pictures:

This was the night we got him.  He loves to cuddle up next to us.

This is a pretty recent one.   He's getting so big!!!

Speaking of yesterday at her house, I went over there to make cards to send to Greg's grandmothers, and they turned out so cute! Let's see if I can get them into the post...

This was the first one I did.  I used puffy paint to make some of it stand out a bit more. I loved it!

Then I made this one.  It might be my favorite... The colors (which the picture doesn't do justice to) were perfect.  There's another flower on the inside that's yellow with a pink middle, to liven it up a little.

This one looks a million times better when it's not a picture, the colorful paint just doesn't show up against the paper in a picture.  And the paper is sparkly and textured which makes it even more awesome...

My next card project is to make them for my grandmas...

In other news, the last Harry Potter movie came out last week.  It was so good, definitely the best movie so far, but I'm so sad that it's over =(  I've had either a Harry Potter book or movie to look forward for as long as I can remember!  It's so strange that there's not another one coming.  Me, Greg, Jereme, Aubree, and Colin went to the midnight showing and I decided that we needed shirts.  So we went to Michael's, got $2 t-shirts, and went to walmart and got fabric paints and we got to work.  Or more, I got to work.  Everyone designed their own, but I painted them all and they turned out AWESOME!!!  Here's a glimpse and I promise more (and better) will come soon:

This is the back of mine.  I chose the quote from the second movie by Ron, "Follow the spiders?  Why couldn't it be follow the butterflies?"  

This is the back of Aubree's.  She chose the quote about Hermoine, "When in doubt, go to the library!"  

I put the deathly hallows symbol on all of the shirts somewhere, Aubree's is on the sleeve.  I can't wait to get the other pictures up!

This post is all out of order, but in June we had the opportunity to go to Colorado for Greg's older brother's wedding.  We had a lot of fun and it was so good to see his family!  We don't have a camera so we don't have many pictures from the trip unfortunately.  However, the last day that I was there we went on a drive up Pike's Peak, the top is at 14,000 ft I think, it was really high, whatever it was.  The view was gorgeous and we just had to have a picture, even though it could never do it justice, especially since we took the picture on my phone.  But here we go anyway:

And I am looking just gorgeous so don't look to closely...

Also, Greg got his Associate's degree at the end of last semester, which is just awesome!  He starts an aviation mechanic program next month and he can't wait.  It's an 18-month program so we are anxiously looking forward to him being finished with that.  Then we're moving on to wherever his bachelor's program takes us.

Well, I think that's all for now.  I'm really trying to keep this better updated, and I'll probably be stealing another of Kayla's ideas (with a little flair of my own, of course), so watch for it soon...

Sadie

     
     On Saturday night our sweet, perfect puppy passed away.  She had an infection in her uterus and her uterus ruptured sometime in the past few days, probably Friday night.  The doctors did everything they could but the infection was already through her whole body, so we had her put down.  Sadie was my family's dog, but I have always considered her my dog, and this was really hard on me.  I've been trying to remember all the good things, so I decided to write about it on here.  Feel free to read it or not, it's mostly for me anyway and I think it may end up being pretty long.
     We got Sadie when we were still living in California, from our realtor, actually.  Our parents told us they were going out to run errands, I think, and then my dad came in and told all of us to go into the family room because they had a surprise.  My mom came in through the backyard holding the sweetest, cutest, little black lab puppy. To say I was thrilled would be a complete understatement.  I loved that dog, and it didn't take long before my dad started calling her my baby (and I certainly treated her like she was my baby).  
     When we first got her, my parents decided to kennel train her.  We put her in the kennel in the family room when we went to bed, and even though it was on the other side of the house I could hear her sad little cries.  At first I just tried to go out there and comfort her, but it was so sad that she ended up sleeping in my room a lot, which was definitely against the rules. Eventually my parents put an end to this, and she started sleeping outside. Every night when I went to bed I would go out and tuck her into her kennel in the backyard.

     
     My parents have this big, professional looking, vacuum, called a Rainbow.  The hose attachment is really good for suctioning onto people, and we used to do this to each other whenever the Rainbow was out.  So one day, we had the vacuum out to do our chores and one of us (I'm not sure who) had the brilliant idea to stick it onto Sadie.  She freaked out!  But instead of running and hiding, she attacked the vacuum hose.  It was hilarious!  The vacuum was pretty high powered, so if it wasn't attached to anything it would flip around on it's own a little.  Sadie faced that vacuum hose like it was the enemy... every time we had the vacuum out.  
     
    I'm sure everyone has heard us refer to Sadie as "the perfect dog."  The thing is, she really was the perfect dog.  First of all, Sadie hardly ever barks.  In fact, she barked so seldomly, that I actually remember the first time she barked.  We were all in the backyard doing yard work and my dad put her in the dog run on the side of the house.  She sat at the gate and whined and cried, wanting to be out with us, but my dad wouldn't give in.  Finally, in sheer desperation I'm sure, she let out her first bark.  It was the most pitiful bark I've ever heard.  It was high pitched and squeaky, and so stinking cute!  Unfortunately, I don't think it made my dad give in.  After that, I started trying to find ways to make her bark, in an attempt to teach her to "speak".  This never really worked out though, because she just wasn't a barker.  

As she got older we found that we could tease her with something she wanted (usually a ball) and get her all worked up and she would bark.  We all thought it was funny, just because she almost never barked.  Sadie was a very happy, friendly dog.  She always wanted to go see other dogs and especially people.  She loved little kids, and it was so funny to watch her with them, because she would follow them around (although that might have been because she discovered that they were easy to steal food from...).  Sadie also pretty much trained herself.  I mean, we taught her what to do, but I'm pretty sure she spoke English, because she just picked right up on it.  She always seemed to know what we were saying too, and I swear she knew how to spell.  


At some point Sadie got completely addicted to tennis balls.  She LOVED them.  She always had one either in her mouth or sitting next to her, and if it wasn't in those places you could say, "Sadie, where's your ball?"  and she would get up and get it.  Anytime we said the word ball her tail would start wagging and her ears would perk up, so we started spelling it so she wouldn't get her hopes up if we weren't going to play with her.  The problem was, she picked up on it.  We would spell ball, and she would perk her ears up and start wagging her tall.  She got this way with a few different words, ball, play, walk, and park.  When we would take her to do something, we would always say those words over and over and she would get so excited that she wouldn't know what to do with herself.   At some point, Sadie just turned part-human.  She was very much a part of the family, and liked nothing more than when all of us were together.  Last night, we went to see her in the hospital before they took her for surgery.  All of us were there (except Greg, because he had to work) and even though you could tell just by looking at her that she was very sick, she was so happy to see us all.  She was laying on her side when we came in, but she kept moving around to look at us all, and trying to stand up to get off the table.  We were joking that she probably felt like that was exactly how things were supposed to be; laying on a table, wrapped in a nice comfy blanket, surrounded by her family, with all attention on her.  Man, I am going to miss her.  Okay, new train of thought, this one is making me sad again...

     Sadie had two other loves in her life, besides her ball and all of us ; they were cheese, and water.  Cheese was her very favorite food.  In fact, part of the reason we knew something was very wrong with her was because she wouldn't eat cheese when we tried to give it to her.  Every time someone would walk toward the refrigerator she would stop what she was doing and sit up and watch us.  If we opened the fridge, her tail would start wagging slowly.  When we opened up the cheese drawer she would be there next to you instantly.  She'd look up at you with those cute eyes, wagging her tail, her ears all perked up.  It was just about the cutest thing ever, and also extremely hard to resist.  I think she usually got some, too =)  Last, was water.  Sadie LOVED to swim.  It's funny, because it took a while to get her to that point.  At first we forced her in the pool. 
We would push her in, carry her in, and even sometimes put her on a boogie board and pull her around the pool, trying to get her used to the water.  I don't remember when it finally happened, but at some point she decided she loved it.  Her favorite game was fetch (because it involved a ball) and her favorite place to play it was in the pool, (or pond, or stream, or lake...).  When we would get home from the park, or anywhere that she did anything other than lay on her bed, she would come home and jump in the pool, even when the pool was freezing!  Then she would come stand at the back door because she (being the perfect dog) knew she wasn't supposed to come in when she was wet.  For a while, one of us would have to go open the door and invite her back inside, but eventually she got to the point that she would just wait at the door, usually with her head inside the doggy door flap, until she felt like she was dry enough.  Then she'd come in and get on her bed. 
     Another funny story about Sadie (I just remembered because I saw this picture).  Sadie really liked going on walks, but she wasn't very good at walking on a leash, partially because we didn't use one very often.  She was so good about not running away that she didn't really need one, but there's a law about using them.  So one night, my mom went on a nice long walk, without Sadie.  The next morning my mom came downstairs to this:
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Sadie doesn't chew on shoes (like I said before, perfect), but if she doesn't get to go on the walk with you, she gets the shoe you went walking in and sleeps with it.  She did this to my shoes a few times too.  Talk about making me feel guilty for not taking her!  
     I said earlier that I always thought of Sadie as my dog.  There are lots of reasons for this, but I think the main one is that she has always been around when I needed someone, but felt like I didn't want anyone to help me.  When we got Sadie I was going through some tough things, and it was so nice to have her around because she loved me, no matter what stupid thing I had done, and no matter how I felt about myself.  There were many nights that I would sit outside with her after a bad day, and it was like she knew.  She would come sit or lay down by me, or on a couple especially bad days, she just climbed right onto my lap.  Early last year when I was living at home again, and having a pretty rough time, she slept in my room every night.  At first she just slept on the rug on the floor like she was supposed too, but one night she sat up and laid her head next to me on my bed, just looking at me.  I smiled at her, because it was really cute, and started scratching her head.  Then she just jumped right up next to me.  From then on, she slept in my bed with me most nights.  I can't tell you how much of a comfort it was to me.  Dogs are great that way, they are more perceptive than they get credit for I think.  Sadie always seemed to know what would help me feel better.  It sounds so silly, saying all of this about a dog, but she was more than that to me, and to my family.  Sadie really was a member of our family.  We are all so sad that she is gone now.  I had looked forward to her being around when I had kids, and I still can't believe that she won't be.  But she was very sick and in a lot of pain and I know we did everything we could for her.  So, to my Sadie puppy: I love you, I miss you, and I wish you were here.