Cute Kids!

A few months ago I was walking around the greenbelt with a friend and he received a text from a girl that contained a picture of her niece. Neither of us knew the girl very well and he made me laugh out loud when he said "I love it when a girl shows you pictures of their niece or nephew, it's like they are saying look my sister makes cute babies maybe you and I could too." HA HA There are lots of reasons why I think I will make an awesome mom. The fact that I have cute siblings has nothing to do with it though. The credit for that goes straight to their parents. So enjoy these pictures for just what they are. Cute pictures of cute kids. Kids it will literally break my heart to leave in the morning.



I love that his hair is sticking out like cRaZY on both sides of his head!


Simon having a little sample of something Santa left him in his stocking!

I ♥ Primary!

Okay really the best story of the day happened before primary. I had my two year old sister Madison during sacrament and I was surprised at how good she was being. I turned around and Madison was resting her head on the head of a 4 year old little boy behind us who was leaning forward in the pew. I was sitting there enjoying how cute they were all cuddled up together when he leaned in and kissed Madison right on the lips. Madison jumps up, turns to me, and says “Reese! I feel like singing my la la song now!” HA HA HA Madison it is too early in life for boys to be making you want to sing your la la song.

In primary I sat down between two of my Valiant girls (I was subbing). One turned to me said “oh no look who is sitting together!” and pointed to my 9 year old brother and two of his best friends. I asked what the problem could be and she said that with the three of them together something was likely to explode. I questioned her “like they’ll get loud?” She told me to wait and see. Seriously like seconds later a pen comes flying up from the middle of the three of them and parts of it go flying everywhere. Also during the course of sharing time an adorable boy stood up and used his leg as an air guitar and a few boys used their artistic skills to face paint each other. While an outsider may have looked in and thought things to be a bit chaotic I have not felt the spirit stronger in weeks. I struggled in primary a lot. I was super hyperactive and talkative, I know imagine that! But people spent so much time telling me to be quiet and sit down that I never really got to enjoy primary. I wish I had been allowed to enjoy primary like I did today.

Travel Update

No great stories yet. I was looking forward to some panda express in the Denver Airport but hat did NOT happen. Our plane landed at 9:46 and our connection departed at 10:07. We went from gate 97 (the very last one) to gate 17 (the third to the last on the other side of the airport). Typically they will hold the flight for you but they hadn't checked us all the way through in Idaho Falls so we still had to check in. Yikes! I asked when I first got off the plane if they could like call or something and let them know and the lady was like "No! You have to check in at your gate." So we hauled trashed across the airport, they had closed the gate and everything and I run up to the podium and like throw my ID at the lady and she says "Omaha?" and I said "Yes Please!" Then I told her Katy was still coming, (cause she was trapped on the moving sidewalk HA HA HA) and she looked up at Katy and asked me if she was over 12? HA HA! Anyway we made it and are now sitting in the airport waiting for Dad to get here. Then Chinese food, the Temple, and some serious shopping.

Please stay tuned...

I am all packed and ready to go. I must admit I feel safer flying home rather than driving with the way the weather currently is in Wyoming. I am way sad though that I will not get to go on a road trip! Road trips are the very very best.

I hope everyone else that is traveling makes it home safe and sound and that the journey there be filled with adventure. Stay tuned... I promise some GOOD GOOD stories!

Good Idea bad idea...

Good Idea... Getting into the hot tub after a good workout at the gym.
Bad Idea... Being too lazy to change out of your swimming suit top and just putting a coat on and leaving. (especially when it is December in Idaho)

A few of my favorites....






I don't even know why, but this one was always my favorite.

David and Goliath

One of my favorite movies of all time is Win a Date With Tad Hamilton... Watch it!

There are a few quotes from the movie that I use almost on a daily basis. I will focus on one here and one in the next post. I love it when Rosalee's dad tells Pete that sometimes Goliath beats the "crud" out of David. It's true. Sometimes we do everything right and bad stuff still happens. And we sit around wondering "But Heavenly Father I thought you were suppose to take care of me?"

So why is it that we feel like this sometimes? Why do we have those days when we just feel abandoned? I have been thinking about this lately and I have a few thoughts...

At what times in my life have I felt like this? I can think of two "kinds" of times when I have. The first when I feel that he has taken something away from me. Like when one of my best friends passed away in college, or when we lost mom, or when the guy you are dating turns out to be a huge jerk, or even when I gave up my dream of being a chef. What I had to realize was that he isn't taking these things from me to punish me but rather to bless me. This can be easy to see in cases such as realizing the guy you are dating isn't what you thought he was. I mean it is obviously a blessing to learn that before it involves divorce and children and things right? It is harder to realizes the blessing of things like losing mom. What are the blessings there? Well for one Madison grace, and for two Simon Carter, and three a friendship with my "wicked" stepmother. There are other blessings too. I have learned to value all relationships and I think I am a better friend, sister, daughter because of it. I have gained strength, I have learned how to grieve and been able to touch many people, and will touch more through my work at Hospice.

The second is when life has taken an unexpected detour. Something I hadn't planned on or prepared for and I am left wondering how to juggle it with everything else. It always seems to happen when you are already kinda feeling like you are at your breaking point. But there is a blessing here too in that in every single one of those times I have learned to just give all of my troubles back to him. I just say look this is too much for me, it's your turn. Then he takes over and life is good again, better than expected and the other blessing is we now have a better relationship.

Does he ever really leave us? No. Does he allow bad things to happen to us? yes. How often are those problems of my own making? Frequently. But I am getting better at learning from them, moving on, and making sure they don't happen a second time.

In the spirit of my lack of Christmas spirit this year I thought I would post this. HA HA I think it is so funny!





No worries my friend I will find the spirit of Christmas somewhere. Maybe it is because I haven't watched The Grinch, Or Home Alone, or Prancer. Oh oh or Nora's Christmas Gift. HA HA Or because they have been playing Christmas music at work sense October. Anyway I am on a mission.

I totally win!

I blogged awhile ago about a particularly bad day I had at work. Number 5 in the list talks about a small office situation I had. I have an office assigned to me by corporate. It is suppose to be my cubical/office. Unfortunately our Sales Manager got kicked out of his office because he is suppose to be out on the floor. Apparently he thinks that means he is suppose to move into my office. Anyway he got really mad at me that day because I left my sweater on the back of the chair and it was making it a froo froo office. Hmmmmm. Then a few days ago I left a stack of papers on my desk for an hour or so. Mind you these were very important papers, anyway when I came back to my desk he had torn one of them in half for scratch paper and thrown the rest of them into the shredder box. These are just a couple of examples of the kind of stuff I deal with daily.

Anyway today I was telling the HR manager my story. Not as an I'm so frustrated and I'm talking to HR kind of story, but like here is a funny story kind of thing. Apparently he decided to do something about it. So this afternoon they found me a new office. They gave me the district managers office. He only uses it once every few months and it is the biggest, nicest, and most private office in the store. I know I shouldn't feel this way but... I totally win!

Going for a walk

I took Mosely for her afternoon walk today and amid our usual dialogue of "Mosely we do not eat other people's poo" I heard this conversation between a little boy and girl on the playground:

Boy (Teddy): "But we aren't suppose to."
Girl: "Listen Teddy you can't be good forever."
B: "Yes I can."
G: "No you can't. You have to have fun too."
B: "But I want to do good things."
G: "Teddy you aren't cool at all."

Teddy man stand your ground. Girls are very very dangerous and you will find that later in life you will begin find her much more persuasive. Don't cave Teddy don't cave. You don't have to throw snowballs to be cool.

What would Jesus do?

This question has been plaquing the mind of man for centuries. In the first presidency Christmas devotional yesterday they talked about where and what Christ would be doing if he were here with us today. My mind then jumped to a question me and my friend Doug discussed one thursday at insitute when we should have been paying attention. We wanted to know this...

If Jesus came to my ward potluck what would He bring? A main dish? A casserole? Some green Jello? Would He add shredded carrots? just a thought.

Then last night I also started to think what would Jesus do if someone's fly were down? Would He tell them? Would He pretend He didn't notice? What if someone had a huge bat in the cave? Would He say something? What if they had a huge bat in the cave and their fly were down? Again these are just thoughts.

What shampoo do think He might use? What car might He drive?