Almost doesn’t count…

Today is July 1st. This means that we have lived through a full six months of the year 2010. This got me thinking about what my new years resolutions were, and I decided to check my progress and share my status with you. You can read my New Years post HERE where I clearly outline my goals.

Resolution 1.)  to be a better missionary. i will invite (and pray the invitation is accepted) a minimum of 10 people to attend church with me. I was able to get two visitors last year, and although neither have been baptized yet I know that they have at least been introduced and that they know where to go if they have questions or concerns of any kind.

My first New Years Resolution this year was to be a better missionary. I feel as thought I got off on the right track by having the missionaries who are currently living in my ward over for dinner once and inviting my Mother over to join us. My mom has accompanied me to several church events where she seemed to have enjoyed herself, and I thought that maybe having her over for dinner would be a good start. We ate the dinner I had prepared, watched a church movie with the guys and then read a from our scriptures outloud. I am pretty sure the topic of that evenings discussions was The Restoration of the gospel because, still to this day, it is one of my favorite things to discuss. My mom was given a Book of Mormon to read aloud from and then accepted the offer to keep it. I am not sure if she has read any of it since, but I know that she has been introduced and she knows where to go if she has any questions. I invited the missionaries over once again the following month, and my mother agreed to join us, but I fell ill and had to cancel our plans so that I could go to the hospital that evening. I haven’t signed up to have them over since, but I think its about time. They have such a strong spirit about them, and you can’t help but have a great time when they are spending time with you in your home. As far as inviting anyone else to church, I have drooped invites into conversations and emails throughout the year, but as not to seem overly pushy, haven’t followed up as much as I probably should have.

Resolution 2.)  to better live the words of wisdom. I already follow the words of wisdom, but I want to be even healthier. I want to take care of this body that I have been given. I only get one and truth be told I have already put mine through hell and back in the seemingly short time i have been on this earth.

I am somewhat pleased with my progress on this resolution thus far. Of course I do follow the words of wisdom, I have since investigating the church and don’t ever intend on not following them, but, I still have a few unhealthy habits that I am sure I intended on giving up when I made this resolution. A decrease in fountain drinks would be a good start, as it seems to be my current obsession.

Resolution 3.) to be a better wife and mother. I will give all of myself to my family. I will make sure they know i love them and that I am here for them. I will teach Sam the right ways of living and try to get less frustrated with him as he grows and learns and naturally makes mistakes.  I will raise my daughter as best as I can and remember my unconditional love for her at all times – even during the 3am feeding on my 97th consecutive sleepless night following her birth.

Ah, yes. Its strange to re-visit these. I wrote them while I was expecting little Miss Charlie to arrive, and was almost clueless as to how her birth would effect me. I would like to say that I am, again, pleased with my progress on this resolution. I have been getting less frustrated with Sam as he grows, learns, and makes mistakes. He is actually very mature for his age, I think, and we have developed a great method of communication.  As far as Charlie goes, I make a conscious effort to enjoy her every moment of baby-hood. She has almost doubled in size since her birth and I know she’s just going to continue to get bigger. I still consider her a newborn, at only 7 weeks old, but she can sit unassisted for over an hour in her little chair and she can roll-over and scoot too. She still has her baby smell, but it is quickly fading and just the thought of it being entirely gone makes me want to cry. I try to focus only her while she nurses, although I do often multi-task, and just enjoy her. Sam grew up way to fast for me, and I am trying to slow down and enjoy it more this time around. She may very well be my last baby (although i hope not!) and I don’t to miss a thing. I also have taken much better care of my house and my other in-home responsibilities this year, than in years past. My focus is my family and everything I do – or choose not to do, for that matter – is for them… even if they might not understand it at times.

Resolution 4.)  blog more often. I want to use this blog as the tool i originally intended it to be. I want to learn more from ya’ll and i want to write about the ways that the LORD is working in my life.

I have pretty much failed thus far at obtaining this goal. I think about blogging ALL the time, but just never get around to it. You do have my promise that I will continue to make an effort when it comes to keeping this site updated. I do want to hear from you guys more often and I want to speak to you too.

Resolution 5.) read The Book of Mormon from start to finish. The ladies group at my church is doing a challenge together so that we can all read a little bit each day and complete the book on or before the end of the year.

Fail. Big fat FAIL. I haven’t even finished 2 Nephi, to be completely honestly with you, but I AM reading and I WILL finish. I am waiting before trying to accomplish other church-related things until I am done reading my scriptures from cover to cover. I am extremely motivated to do this, believe it or not, I just need a few hours of uninterrupted silence and I could probably read it all at once.

Almost doesn’t count, and because it doesn’t count I will continue to strive to reach these goals that I outlined 6 months ago. I’m so very glad I decided to revisit them, it was a good reminder.

Also, I’d love to hear from you… so de-lurk, my blogger friends, and say hi!

(PS what time does Magnolia ward start? I want to visit ya’ll, but I never remember what time your meetings begin. Sorry!)

Happy Memorial Day!

My favorite (sniper!) vet is over today cooking outside with my husband. I went to the gun range (alone!) for an hour & i live in the land of the free with my husband and children. I have a lot to be thankful for! Enjoy your day & be safe, ya’ll!

Happy Mother’s Day!

Happy Mother’s Day to all the great and wonderful Mommies out there – you have the toughest, most demanding, most blessed job ever! Its hard for me to believe that in just 3 days I’ll be welcoming the newest little addition to our family, Charlie Grace, into the world. Wow!

Here’s me and baby Sammy on my first Mother’s Day back in 2007:

Sam the Man

My baby turned three on Sunday, can you believe it?! We had his monster truck themed party on Saturday, and on Sunday he received his “baby” blessing at church followed by some pretty awesome family time.

Happy Birthday Dude!

HE LIVES!

Happy Easter, ya’ll! Here is a short video where our modern-day apostles and our living prophet testify that Jesus Christ is the Savior and that he lives today.

Watch & enjoy!

Happy Valentines Day!

Valentines Day is somewhat of a “major” holiday in my house.  My now husband, Casey, asked me to be his girlfriend (actually, he asked me to be his “old lady”) on February 7th back in 2006 and told me he loved me for the first time just a week later on February 14th. He also told me he wanted to marry me, but he felt like he needed a better job and a nice ring before he could ask my dad to give me away. He officially proposed a few months later (traditionally after gaining  my father’s permission, of course) and we were married less than 2 weeks after our engagment was official. We moved fast, but we are still just as dorky and in love as we were that first Valentines Day we celebrated together. Its so funny how opposites attract, we have so little in common but are so completely nuts over each other that it just works out.

Here’s a photo of us taken when we first started dating, shortly before we were engaged. We both look ALOT different now. We have lost a combined 300 pounds between the two of us and he no longer has his nose pierced, but I do. Man, I love this guy.

My advice? Marry your best friend. That is the most important trait in a spouse, or at least i think so. Someone you love so much that you just simply can’t live without them. So what if he is too loud or goofy at times and you squeeze the toothpaste tube from the middle or talk too much?! Is that going to matter when your 84? No.

Also, you should treat every day like Valentine’s Day. Make sure your spouse KNOWS without a doubt that you are truly happy to have them in your life and that you thank God daily for blessing you with them.

Here is a very short video for your viewing pleasure. Enjoy!

Kelchmas Festivus

Ok, so if you haven’t already read my general Christmas post  you can find it HERE.

If you haven’t read it yet here is the short version – i used to hate Christmas, but now i don’t. The End.

Since that blog was somewhat general in nature i thought i would take a moment to elaborate on my family’s (as in my husband, children, and I) traditions.

We call it Kelchmas Festivus. Kelchmas comes from our last name, and Festivus comes from… well, Festivus. We dedicate the Sunday before Chirstmas to spending time with only each other (my husband has to work on Christmas Eve, and Christmas Day is spent outside of our home.) looking at lights, watching christmas movies, listening to christmas music and opening presents to each other.

This year Sam and I went to church and were gone most of the morning. Right now we go for 3 hours each Sunday starting at 11Am. This will change in January when we’ll go earlier. We came home and Sam willingly napped knowing that he couldn’t open presents untill afterwards. I had wrapped all his gifts individually in green santa paper and allowed him to open them one at a time and allowed him to go at his own pace. (last year all of his gifts went into a large bag with tissue paper since we wasn’t old enough to unwrap). I didn’t make him stop for pictures, but I did film the whole thing (my dad would have disowned me if i had dared not to!) He wasn’t given the bike he wanted, because even though *i* woke up early to get it on black Friday, it was from Santa and was not to be opened until Christmas Day. He was given several different Thomas the Train books and other small goodies like a wrapped box of animal crackers, a cup of manderine oranges, a car magnet set to put on my dishwasher with his other toy magnets, playdoh and playdoh accessories, etc. All in all he had a blast and it was soooooo much fun watching him get excited over his gifts. After he was done opening he handed each of us our gifts and watch us open them. Casey got me a WII and a WII fit, and even though i HATE video games (except the origanal NES Mario Bros and arcade games like Pac Man) I really did want the WII Fit. Casey and Sam have played with it, but i haven’t yet. I just haven’t had the time to, but after the New Year Starts I plan on working it into my daily schedule (along with some other things I should already be doing, but am not.). He also got me something i have wanted for YEARS… a cast iron dutch oven. Now, if you are a female and you are rolling your eyes because its not diamonds or something stop right there. I am the type of wife that LOVES those types of gifts. In fact one year i made such a big deal about wanting a handmade apron that I had found on etsy for my birthday that i litterally was given 8 aprons by 8 differant people. LOL. I kept them all and use them all, too! So anyways, I really wanted a dutch oven. I didn’t specify what kind, i just let him choose it himself. I was so excited when I opened it that I couldn’t even think about anything else expect for what I was going to cook in it first. He also got me a gift card for some much needed maternity clothes.

Sam handed casey his gifts too. I got him a manly-bath-kit thing from Old Spice, some other things that I won’t elaborate on here and… a Ruger LCP 380 pistol! Now, i realize that this seems like an unessacery way for me to spend my money while i am unemployed, but it is just the opposite. See my husband is a machinist by day, and since i am not working he is also a pizza driver by night. He delivers in a nice area of town, but still anything can happen. We have both worked for pizza places before and we have both known people, our own friends and family, who have been robbed while working. It doesn’t matter what part of town you are in, its still somewhat dangerous. Anyways the company he works for as a very strict “No Holstered Weapons” policy (even though he has a license to carry!!!) so in order to carry a pistol it has to be in his pocket (hello, dangerous.) His Glock was to big to conceal in his pocket so he has had to carry my Springfeild .40 for the past few months… and its still too big and heavy to carry in your shorts pocket. So long story short, the Ruger is TINY but packs a nice enough punch if needed for self defense. Of course we hope it will never come to that, but better safe than sorry. I wanted to buy it for his birthday, but i couldn’t… I saved a few weeks longer and made a few more sacerifices and got it just a few days before christmas (and almost didn’t because everyone was sold out!). It was awesome to see the look of surprise he had on his face when he opened it. All he had gotten from me so far was some Old Spice Deodorant and body wash and some camo colored carmel popcorn. He looked happy as he opened each of his gifts, but i know how much he wanted (and really needed) a smaller pistol. He is a hard worker and he really deserved it.

I am still SHOCKED at how many gifts we had this year. I know we went over budget, we always do, but we did not go into any debt for any of it. No credit cards were opened and the house payment was still made. So even though we went over, i’m not upset. My goal is to still be debt free one day – and we are with the expection of our house and cars, so I am forever grateful that we were able to do it all without credit cards again this year.

Christmas

I am sure that I enjoyed, and even looked forward too, Christmas as a child. As I got older, however, I hated it. I couldn’t wait for it to be over with. I hated the decorations – especially my parents tree and how they decorated it with blinking multicolor lights that SANG and the lights flashed to the beat. It annoyed me to no end, but I had to deal with it for about 6 weeks while the tree was up in our small home. I think I began disliking Christmas after my grandfather passed away, who was followed by my aunt who was also a big part of our holiday traditions. My grandfather always lit my candle at the midnight candlelight service on Christmas eve and always had less annoying decorations at his home. Christmas eve was spent with my mothers family, and I think that was always my favorite part.

As soon as I moved out of my parents home, shortly after I finished high school, I decided I would not decorate my apartment. It was my apartment, I thought, so it was my choice. Jesse, my live in boyfriend at the time, wanted it decorated. Apparently Christmas was his favorite time of the year. I gave in a put up a tree, one that I had gotten for free, and that was it. No garland. No orniments, and defiantly no singing lights.

By the time the next Christmas rolled around I was temporarily living at my parents home again for a the few weeks between the time my lease on my apartment was up and the construction on my new home was complete. I was 19 at this time and still didn’t want to participate, but did… and not without complaining and making everyone else miserable though.

The next Christmas was my first Christmas in my new house. I was 20 years old, newly single and I had a new roommate named Holly, my now sister-in-law. We agreed together we were not going to celebrate Christmas in our house that year. Instead we were celebrating Festivus! Oh, no blinking lights! No carols! Best of all, no tree! Instead we had a Festivus Pole. It was a tall steel pole embedded into a brick of concrete and placed it in the living room. It was our festivus pole, donated by a friend that worked in retail, and we were glad to have it! We did all the Festivus traditions that year together. The feat of strength, where I beat my now-husband at wrestling (although he won’t ever admit it!). The airing of grievances, and much more. We still celebrated christmas with our families, but at our house with our visitors it was “Festivus for the rest of us!” we so proudly declared.

By the time the next christmas rolled around I was 21, married and pregnant. I didn’t want a tree, but like before, I was talked into getting one. This time I was firm in not getting a Christmas tree, but wanting to compromise with my new spouse I went out to a local hardware store and bought an outdoor yard decorative tree. It was white and had no needles. It lit up too, but didn’t blink. It served double duty that year as a festivus pole AND a Christmas tree for my Christmas-loving husband. That was all the decorating I did that year, but I enjoyed the holidays with my husband and our families. It was the first time I allowed myself to not feel misrable and to make others miserable too. My favorite part was my husband’s step-father’s stocking gifts. He carefully (and somewhat randomly) choosing odd things to shove into a stocking each year for each of us. They can include anything from a rolls of quarters to duck tape to jars of gourmet salsa. Each year it’s a little different, but that was my first time having a BLAST opening gifts. They even let us rip the paper open, and leave it on the floor while moving on the the next present – something that my parents would NEVER have allowed back then. We slowly opened gifts at their house, trying very carefully not to rip any of the paper. We then had to fold it up (or throw it away if it was deemed not reusable) then smile and pose for a still picture (all while being filmed by at least one video recorder, sometimes two or three). The randomness of my in-laws celebration was refreshing for me and that ignighted a tiny spark of Christmas spirit in me that has growed a little bit each year.

Now, my parents have become more relaxed at christmas time, but still have their set ways of doing things. This is why we can’t ever have a big mixed family Christmas all day at one location. Each family has such different traditions I think its better to just keep the Christmas celebrations separate. (Although, we have had two years in a row of joint thanksgiving celebrations. Last year I hosted in my home, and this year my in-laws hosted.)

Before I jump into this topic I want to be clear when I say that everything mentioned in this blog, unless otherwise specified with noted references, is my own opinion. It is not the opinion of my friends, family or my church.

Before I was baptized a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints I considered myself to be agnostic (a separate post of agnostics vs atheists coming soon!). I believed in a god or creator of some kind, but didn’t really know where I belonged… this affected me a lot around Christmas time. I was tough growing up I should be celebrating the birth of Christ, but why? I mean, I believed then, and still do, that he was not born in December…. The day Christmas is celebrated on also happens to the be day that The Winter Solstice is celebrated on in pagan traditions. Now, I could get into a lot of details on why Christmas is celebrated in December on the same day as a pagan holiday is celebrated but it really just boils down to converts and convenience (am I wrong? Please feel free to correct me… I’m here to learn!). My dad church didn’t celebrate Christmas, because of its pagan roots, but my mother’s church did. How could two christian church be so different? One spoke in tongues while filled with the spirt. The other literally read from a script in services with the entire congregation calmly, in unison and in monotone. As my husband one told me, towards the beginning of my journey, “a church divided is no church at all”. You could even say “a home divided is no home at all”. Either way, it fits what I was experiencing. I was broken and torn on the subject of Christmas.

This year is the first year I have been completely excited for Christmas. I went to my church’s parties. I gathered with friends and family, I even baked homemade cookies with my toddler (and got a speeding ticket trying to deliver them to the men at my husband’s machine shop on time!). I had a Christmas tree up, and a few decorations around my home. I bought presents and actually wrapped them for the first time in my life (I usually i just toss them into bags). I mailed out 175 christmas cards (although there weren’t homemade like in years past, I just didn’t have the time) and I was happy to do it all… I must say that it was my best Christmas ever. My son left a cookie out for santa and a carrot out for roudolf (yes, we are choosing to let him believe in them at this age) He got the bike he had been asking about for months, and he got tons of other goodies . He unwrapped Christmas presents by himself this year, and helped pass them all out too. He also knew we were celebrating Jesus’s birthday and he also participated in events at our church.

Growing older, Getting baptized, Having a family of my own – all of these contribute to the changes I have made in my life, but I have to say that having an excited toddler and great friends and family and being a member of an awesome church makes it a little easier to get into the spirit of the holidays.

I hope you all had a great holiday too, feel free to leave comments… I love hearing from ya’ll!

Black Friday

Sam, my two year old son, asked for two things this year for christmas.

1) a Thomas the Train bike

2) a tractor

After hearing his list I explained that he should only ask for one gift, that way there would  be enough toys for all the other children to have too. He thoughtfully considered his options and settled on the bike being his first choice, and books as a back up.

So my husband did some research on the upcoming holiday sales and found that Toys-R-Us was going to have 12″ Thomas the Train bikes (with training wheels!) on sale for 50% off at 5AM on the day after thanksgiving. At first I wasn’t going to participate in the insane shopping day – I had once before, about 10 years ago when my mom had cancer. I remember waiting in line for  about 8 hours to get a Furby doll for my sister and a tickle me elmo too. My mom had other things in our cart too, including a barbie for my cousin Tiffany. While waiting to check out another lady snatched some of my mom’s items, including the barbie, from the cart. I was always amazed at the selfishness and greediness the shoppers displayed that day. My mom was sick, frail and BALD – obviously a cancer patient – and people were trying to fight her for the sale items in her cart. My mom and I vowed to never shop on black friday again, and untill this year I hadn’t.

Since I am unemployed this year I decided to give the sale a try… it was 50% off… enough to buy an additional gift for someone else. (Yes, I know Christmas is not about gifts. I will blog about the history of Christmas and its pagan roots in a separate posts one day this coming week, i promise!)

So, I set the alarm on my cell phone for 1:30AM and decided to go and try for the bike. I set rules in advance and promised myself not to get disappointed if i was unable to get it, and not to let my feelings get hurt by any rude shoppers I might have met that day. I also decided to leave immedatly if the crowd looked unruley or violent in anyway.

My alarm rang & I hit snooze… alot. I ended up not leaving my house untill about 2:30AM, about the time I had planned on arriving at the closest mall to my home, and arived at Toys-R-US at 3AM. The sale on the bike didn’t start until 5AM so I was prepared to wait in a line outside, but because the store had another sale going on from 12 to 1Am that still had about 100 people trying to check out the doors were opened and I was allowed in the store. I walked around for about an hour trying to locate the bike, and finally did… THE LAST ONE! The manager politly helped me load the bike, unassembled, into my cart and made me promise not to check out untill 5AM. I agreed and headed off to the book isle (the only part of the store that was not crowded… what is wrong with that picture?!) and browed through the Thomas the Train books and choose 4 of them for Sam also. Two had buttons on the side that made noise, and 2 did not. The quiter books will be given to sam for him to take to church, while the books that make noise will be for the car or house. I got in line at 5am, checked out at 5:02 and was home at 5:33Am.

No one was rude, no one pushed me or tried to steal the items in my cart. The employees were helpful and polite. I didn’t have to wait outside.

The best part was getting Sam the Thomas the Train bike AND 4 books while still staying UNDER budget.

Now, my husband wasn’t so lucky. He had to wait outside for hours and didn’t get what he wanted… Luckly my sister and brother-in-law were at another store close by and grabbed an extra one of what he wanted so he just had to drive over, wait in line, and check out. He was cold, but saved about 50% off on his purchase too. Although the people at his store were a little crazy.

what was your black friday experiance? did you shop, or did you stay home?

Also, I have an ultra-sound tomorrow morning where I think I might be able to find out the sex of the baby. Casey wont be able to go with me this time so I am going to ask the doctor to write the sex on a paper and seal it inside of an envelope (if its not to early to tell) and open it tomorrow night. IF we find out the sex i’ll be sure to post an update here for you all to see! I have a million orders to fill tomorrow and I might not be able to blog untill Tuesday, but I promise to try and let ya’ll know as soon as I can.

Goodnight!

Happy Halloween!

Ok, so growing up we didn’t celebrate “Halloween” in my house, but we were allowed to participate in the season’s activities in our area. My dad is Pentecostal, and from what I understand they choose not to participate in Halloween because of its pagan roots. My mother is Lutheran and her church always celebrated “Reformation” on October 31^st in honor of Martin Luther nailing the 95 Thesis to the door of the Catholic Church and thus beginning the protestant movement ( I think I said that right!). I also went to a private Christian school for a few years when I was really young and they had a “Fall Festival” each year we would attend, or sometimes we would just go to the “Reformation Fest” at my mom’s church. I don’t remember doing the traditional “trick-or-treat” in my neighborhood, but I don’t think it wasn’t because we weren’t allowed, but more so because we were so busy doing other things at the local churches. I know that I was never allowed to dress as anything evil, and I do remember my parents checking my candy for needle holes in the wrappers and discarding anything that was homemade. (Is this still a concern these days?) As a teenager I always choose to go out and be with my friends. I remember dressing as a rock star one year and ordering pizza with some girls from my neighborhood. I think that was the last time I dressed up.

Since Sam was born we would buy him a cute costume and pose him for all kinds of pictures and usually take him to the Reformation Festival at my mom’s local Lutheran church where they had food and inflatable jump stations.

This year is going to be different, and I am really excited. Sam is dressing up as Thomas the Train – the first costume he has picked out on his own – and we are going to go to my church’s “Trunk or Treat” activity. My sister, her boyfriend, and their new baby are in town and have decided to come along with us. My husband has to work, but is scheduled off early so we’ll try to stop by his parents house (his step-dad does a good job of decorating the front yard and scaring passer-bys) as well as my parents house to see my mom who is scheduled to come home from the hospital today.

Sam is laying down right now, and with a little luck he’ll get a nap in before all of the activities begin. I really want to take him to buy a pumpkin (not to carve, but to cook the seeds) later…. We’ll see.

BE SAFE TONIGHT!