Dresser, final (more or less)

Hey mom, here are the pictures you asked for. The lighting is not the best, but you'll get a chance to see it in person soon enough. I think it turned out okay. It will work well with the blue paint and the fabric for the curtains.

A passing

Nate's grandpa passed away last Friday. It was a bit of a surprise (at least, it was to me). I was out of town for training all week, got home late Thursday night, and then Friday afternoon Nate told me that during the week his grandpa had gone to the hospital (congestive heart failure) and been sent home with hospice and morphine. We didn't know how long grandpa had left to live...

And we got the call late that night.

Amy wrote about this on her blog. She said it just the way I would have, so I decided to quote from her:

"We had the funeral Tuesday. It was a happy death, because he [grandpa] was 97 years old, and basically has been ill for years. He fell every other week, always breaking something, so we were all relieved and happy for him when we found out he died because we know he's now with his sweet wife... I'm glad they are together now and that he doesn't have to live in his awful sick body anymore."

What I remember...

A year ago today, on an evening much like this one, I received a phone call. It was Amy. She and Mike had given notice at their apartment; they were moving out and needed a place to live. Amy and I talked at length about their options -- they basically had three, one of which was staying with us. During the previous two months we had discussed the possibility several times, but by the end of the phone call the possibility was reality. We had 18 days to get ready -- to clear out and clean up the basement, and to fix the downstairs bathroom.

Until that phone call, the basement was just a storage space. We kept all of our tools on the fireplace hearth, stored spare lumber in the middle of the room, and filled the shelves with miscellaneous boxes. The bathroom was the cats' room, and none of the plumbing fixtures worked. Our free afternoons and evenings over the next 18 days were devoted to cleaning, fixing, and remodeling. It was a tiring process.

But most of that is actually a blur. I have only vague memories of laying new linoleum in the bathroom, replacing the toilet, putting in closet rods, moving and reorganizing the tools, and so forth. Mostly I remember that first evening -- that phone call. How Amy cried, and I cried too.

When I got off the phone and went downstairs to examine the crap piled in our basement, I felt useless. Giving family members a home in our brown-shag-carpeted basement room seemed more like an insult than an aid. It did nothing to ameliorate the real problems; it did not provide them with employment and it certainly did not cure cancer. It was just a room -- a place to take temporary shelter while the storm raged on.

Don't get me wrong: shelter is important. We were glad to help. And in the end, the bigger problems were solved. But at the time, on that day one year ago, our simple offer seemed so very insignificant.

I also remember -- N8 and his folks will laugh when I remind them -- that I really wanted to build Shoji for the basement, so that the room could be tastefully divided into separate living and sleeping quarters. Not surprisingly, the task was impossible given the timeline and other items on the to-do list. I thought I could take just 3 of the 18 days and get it done; much persuasion from my family convinced me to give up. (Thank goodness!)

Nate wanted to add a mini-kitchen to the basement. In retrospect? Not a bad idea. But again, we didn't have the time. We also definitely didn't have the room or the finances for a second kitchen! And really, what would have done with all that now that it's just the two of us again? Ha.

These days the basement is back to being a storage space, but more thoughtfully so. There are several pieces of extra furniture downstairs (in part because we're soon to remodel one of the upstairs bedrooms, so things have been temporarily moved). The basement is also a great room for some of our bigger projects, including my occasional (large) craft project.

But every once in awhile I just stop and stare at the room, picturing what it looked like a year ago, and 9 months ago, and 6 months ago. Wow.

Awesome news!

There are several things I miss about living in Portland. One of those things is Trader Joe's, which has the best-tasting soy milk of all the many, many soy milks I've sampled. They also have yummy chocolate-covered almonds and a host of other good-for-me-and-for-the-earth (hippy) foods.

So this article announcing plans for a Trader Joe's in Salem just made my day:
www.statesmanjournal.com/article/20101001/NEWS/10010345/1001

I'm a little impatient for the new store, which won't open until "sometime" in 2011, but I'm very excited that they've decided to locate on my end of town, near other places I visit (such as church, the bank, and our usual grocery store). I look forward to being part of the crowd during the store's opening weeks, and a regular customer thereafter.

Awesome!!!

Hachi and my "boys"

Part 1: Hachi

Just finished watching the movie "Hachi" which is basically a story about a very loyal dog. I spent the second half of the movie crying. Stupid cute dog movie... how dare it make me bawl my guts out!

There's really not much to the movie; watching its trailer tells the whole story ("spoiler" alert): Man adopts stray dog, dog is loyal, man dies, dog continues to be loyal until dog dies. Doesn't exactly sound like the type of movie worth crying for, right? But mom, I'm certain that you would've cried the whole time, too.

Part 2: My "Boys"
Nate and I were hanging out in the office today (by which I mean our home office), watching the LDS church's semi-annual General Conference broadcast on the computer. As he usually does, Nate fell asleep during the two-hour afternoon session of the conference. Meanwhile, Jack (the cat) came in looking for snuggles, and found the sleeping man. The result is this:

...my two favorite boys, sharing an afternoon siesta. Cute.

New/old dresser: A work in progress

Below are pictures of a dresser I just got from my brother Bill. My mom purchased it about 30 years ago for 30 bucks. I'm in the midst of refurbing it. As you can see, I got through the sanding and priming steps. I think I'd like to finish it by doing an antique paint style, but I need to do a little more research on antiquing. (Is that a word?)

For now, it's past my bedtime, so I will just share a couple of pictures and call it a night. I'll post more pictures when I have them...

I'm a geek, geek, geek, geek, geek....

.... and darn proud of it!

http://oregonemployment.blogspot.com/2010/09/working-in-science-and-math-it-pays-to.html

There are no less than a billion pictures that support my claim that geekdom is awesome.



Added note (...since I failed to mention this elsewhere): My brothers and I are not the only geeks in the family. We come from a long history of geeks. And I'm quite proud of that history. GO JACKSONS!

The full article is at: www.qualityinfo.org/olmisj/ArticleReader?itemid=00007234
Or, for a limited time, from the main page of http://www.qualityinfo.org/

The latest and greatest...

I'm behind on blogging. Aack. Here's an update... briefly:

• Today: Met with the youth group this morning to plan their activities for the next 6 months, then drove them to Portland and dropped them off at a conference called "Especially for Youth." They get to hear some awesome speakers, meet other kids from around the state, and go to a dance. I'm grateful for the opportunity I have to serve as a leader for the youth group right now. It's the highlight of my week. I love my girls.

• Last week(end): I celebrated a birthday. I'm really starting to rack up the years. My parents in law took me out to breakfast at my favorite place on the coast (on the 4th), then my mom came down with my dad (on the 6th) and she went for a long bike ride with me. She also got me the most beautiful little side table for my living room:


We went to Freddy's to get some tomatoes for lunch and I spotted the side table. I wasn't sure how it would look in the living room, but I liked it so I didn't really care if it matched or not. But now that it's in the room... I'm impressed with how nicely it all goes together:


Of course, it wasn't hard to beat the old side table, which most definitely did not match our newer furniture:


• Also for my birthday: One of my thoughtful co-workers taught me something new about what it means to have "friends." You see, "friends" are the people who buy you grandiose balloons, like this one:


...knowing full well that you commute to work on your bike, and that you'll be traveling home with "the bird" flapping behind you. In other words, picture me riding across town on this:


It's a good thing I adore the spotlight and can laugh at myself. Which I did. The whole way home. Bonus points? I made many children point, laugh, and shout with glee. "Look at the bird!" and "I love your bird!" That part almost makes me want to attach a balloon to my bike every time I ride.

Almost.

• Also last week: Nathan got his "boot" off. He's still gimpy. His damaged leg looks like a little chicken leg. But he's healing. Someday I might even get another piggy-back ride out of him.... I'm really looking forward to that day.

• Mid-August: I went to D.C. (again) for work. It was a wonderful trip. I would not mind it if my work asked me to go yet again in the near (or distant) future. I learned a lot, met some great people from around the country, and had just a little time to sight-see in our nation's capitol. I love, love, love Washington D.C.

• Late July: The young women in the youth group had their second annual hike in the Mt. Jeffereson Wilderness area. I can't begin to tell you how good the experience was for me. While we were up there I spent some time doing a bit of soul-searching. The content is too personal for this public blog.... suffice it to say that I came back a different person.

Panniers are here! Thanks Mom!!!

It's been quite a long week, so I am going to keep this brief...

My awesome mother ordered an early birthday for me a couple weeks ago: bike panniers! They are beautiful. They come in pairs, but my things for work fit nicely into one bag, so I will use them one at a time.

The bags are waterproof and they latch onto the back rack on my bike. There are a couple of pockets built into the inside of the bag, which is one of my favorite features!

(Many thanks to Steve from my office, who loaned me a very nice pannier while mine were on order.)

Now I just need to get a seat cover that matches the rest of the red/black theme going on. If I were a more talented seamstress, I would whip something up. But since that's not one of my talents, I've just been avoiding the problem... :o)

Front deck

We've been working on the front deck lately. It was a project I thought we would finish last fall, but an unexpected turn of events delayed our plans considerably. Nevertheless, we're back on task and the work progresses.

Here's a glance at what the front deck use to look like. As you can somewhat see, there was a wrought iron railing on the deck. If you look closely, you might be able to tell that the whole deck is slanting forward:

The picture below is from October. It shows the deck stripped down and leveled. The deck remained in this state from October through June. (Nine months. Ugh.):

Here's the deck again, with the new railing and lattice work. It has also been stained. We haven't redone the stairs yet, nor put in the railings for the stairs. Notice also the beautiful red tree:

Here's the deck from the front door. You can see a couple of solar-powered lanterns on a couple of the posts. These are the lanterns we've decided to go with, but we need to purchase another set of them for the rest of the posts:

I love the stain on the deck. I think it's beautiful. But the important thing is that the deck is level and it's safe!

Planter's Boxes

Despite his temporary disability, my handy man make some planter's boxes a couple weekends ago. My parents in-law are building a new house and had a bit of leftover wood, which they generously gave to us so we could build the boxes.

Here are the boxes in the backyard, all set up:

The first box (below) is full of tomato plants. They also came from my parents in law. They were all "volunteer" plants -- i.e. they just showed up in the garden, unplanned. My in-laws do a lot of gardening every year and they plant a lot of tomatoes, so it's not uncommon to see some volunteers. This year they had a couple dozen tomato volunteers all around the yard. I took 16 of them home for my boxes; about 12 survived the move. I have no idea which kinds of tomatoes they are! Could be Roma's or cherries or early girls or golden or... you get the idea. Hopefully there's a variety:


The next box has several lettuce varieties (in the front) and some squash (in the back). The squash were all volunteers in our compost pile, so I don't know which kind they are, either:


(Sorry this third picture is at a weird angle.) The third box has another tomato, plus a basil and a cantaloupe. I got the tomato because we don't know which varieties are in the volunteers, and I wanted at least one early girl. I've never grown cantaloupe before, so it's a new experiment:


In the last box, I planted six squash seeds -- three yellow, and three zucchini:


The coolest part (so far)? I took those five pictures last Sunday. When I came out to water on Monday night, three of the squash seeds had suddenly sprouted into plants!

I am really enjoying gardening. The boxes make it much easier.

Damaged Goods

N8 and I had our very first ultrasound last week! It was on Nathan's leg. His right leg, with particular focus on his Achilles tendon.

But let me back up...

Over a month ago, on a fateful Thursday night, The Bear decided to play a 9pm pick-up game of volleyball at the church building. I'm an old lady who goes to bed early, so I wished him a good time and got ready for bed. He hopped in his zippy little car and was off to the game.

Since I wasn't there, the following details are based on several eye-witness accounts of The Event: It was a busy night at the church building. There was a volleyball net and a volleyball, and a throng of people gathered on the court. The ball was served. Points were scored.

N8's team lost 3 games in a row, and was lining up to lose a fourth. All of a sudden, the volleyball sailed over the net, headed toward N8. He stepped back to volley the serve back across the net, and... WHAM! According to the victim, "It felt like someone kicked me in the back of the leg."

The ball fell to the floor. N8 started rubbing his leg and glaring at his teammates, wondering who delivered the blow. No confessions were made. (Future details would reveal that N8 had not, in fact, been kicked by someone.) The Bear continued rubbing, and when the pain wouldn't subside, he hobbled off the court. In the end, a friend had to drive him home.

I learned of the injury the next morning, when I woke Nathan up to take me to work and he informed me that he was unable to drive. Over the course of the next week, the signs of the injury became evident. His leg swelled from knee to toe, blood pooled visibly in his ankle, and there was bruising.

It was nasty.

Gentle nagging from his mom sent N8 to the doctor's office a week after the injury. The doctor diagnosed a tear in his calf muscle and sent him to the physical therapist. But the therapist disagreed, believing the Achilles tendon was damaged. She suggested an MRI. Bickering ensued between the doctors, the nagging (/hysterical) calls from mom increased exponentially, and N8 finally got an appointment with an Orthopedic specialist.

At the Ortho appointment last week, the PA and the surgeon also disagreed about the source of the injury. One said Achilles, one said the muscle. They scheduled an ultrasound of his leg. They also insisted on crutches and a boot for The Bear. (Insert small victory for the B-wife, who had been nagging about the need for crutches since week 1.)

Last Friday we went in for the ultrasound. Wednesday we sat down with the Ortho surgeon again. Results indicate a partial tear of the Achilles. Since it's not a full tear (called a rupture) N8 won't need surgery. But he will spent three more weeks with all these aides:

Then he will move to just this:

His boot has three risers in the heel which keep the weight off of the injured area. Over the course of six weeks, we will gradually remove the three wedges, and then the boot itself. After that, N8 will start a couple months (or more?) of physical therapy.

Thus it will be early September before N8 is out of the boot, and he will finish PT sometime around the holidays.

Endnotes:

1) The folks at Hope Orthopedics are awesome. Efficient, funny, very knowledgeable... Couldn't ask for a better Ortho team for my Bear.

2) I'm not worried about the injury. N8 is strong, healthy, and indomitable...

3) But I am worried about N8 getting back to work. His job will start again the end of August, when he will still be strapped into the boot and (technically) unable to drive. I can't drive him to work because (a) I don't even drive myself to work, and (b) his office is in Independence. So... ?!?!?!

4) N8 had a lot of goals for this summer, all of which are dashed to pieces. He's bummed. I'm bummed. Some goals were pure fun, like going hiking, and a camping trip with his best friend(s). Some of them were productive goals -- namely yard work and house work. A big goal for the summer was to remodel one of the bedrooms and turn it into a nursery. (The room needs new windows, insulation in the walls, and new drywall... In all, it's a complete overhaul. We have the funds to buy supplies, but not enough to hire someone else to do the work, hence frustration with Bear's brokenness.)

5) It's hard taking care of an injured boy and so many the household responsbilities.

Help me decide: Which tree?!

N8 and I purchased two trees today. One of them will go in the front yard, the other will go in the back yard. I'm having a hard time deciding which tree I want to put out front. The two trees in the pictures below are the same tree, but in different colors. They are different sizes now, but they will grow up to the same dimensions.

Here's what I'm hoping for: Will you take a look at the pictures and let me know which tree you like better? I'm just looking for votes one way or the other. Thanks!

News from the Trip, Part 3: The Melting Pot

One of the things I'm really enjoying about Washington D.C. is the diversity. Walking down the street, or sitting in a restaurant, or riding on the Metro (subway), or anything else, you pass people from all over the world. They are speaking all kinds of languages.

To some of you, that might sound kind-of annoying. I promise it's not. It's beautiful. It takes me back to the foundation of our great nation, when people came here from all over the world, shared their culture and their language and their experiences, and built this amazing country together. And now, today, we're still melting; there are still migrants coming from all over the world to build a life here.

As I mentioned a couple of posts ago, we went to Arlington Cemetery on Monday. (I need to do a whole separate post on Arlington, I know!) One of the things I noticed was all the different languages... even though it was a cemetery! There were tourists from many different countries who were visiting our nation's most prominent military cemetery. I passed a group of Asian youths admiring the Iwo Jima monument; a Hispanic family watching the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknowns; a Moroccan man enjoying the view from Arlington House; a French couple taking pictures at Kennedy's grave; and more.

You literally cannot walk down the street without hearing several different languages.

The workers at the hotel come from many different places. There are a lot of Indian people (not Native American Indian, but India Indians). In fact, of the dozen or so restaurants near the hotel, 3 of them are Indian food. The Hispanic people here come from a lot of different places -- not just Mexico.... so even the diversity is more diverse than at home :o)

So, my point is just this: As white people speaking English, we're part of the minority here, and I LOVE IT. It's educational and humbling. And it's beautiful.

News from the Trip, Part 2: Time Changes

We flew in to D.C. via Detroit. Apparently Detroit is 3 hours ahead (I thought they were just 2 hours ahead), so when we arrived at 3am Pacific Time, it was 6am local time. And the sun was getting ready to rise. It was very weird to have a sunrise at that hour. We'd watched the sun go down around 8pm when we were at home, then 7 hours later it was back up!

My sense of time was already pretty screwed up from flying in the middle of the night. That, combined with the "early" sunrise, helped the shift into the new time zone fairly quickly.

But yesterday (Monday) afternoon, I stared thinking about time "back home." For instance, when we hopped on the subway at 5:30pm, I was thinking, "Back home, it's 2:30pm. My co-workers are still at their desks, perhaps thinking about an afternoon cup of coffee; it's nearly Tea Time for Graham. Everyone still have a couple hours of work to do."

And when we got a phone call last night at 11pm, I thought, "Well, it's only 8pm back home. That's not too late to call your buddy." Of course, it would have been nice if that "buddy" here in DC had turned off the cell phone before he went to bed :o)

When I woke up this morning I considered making a phone call, but then I realized, "It's 4am back home; the person I want to call isn't awake yet! And neither is anyone else I know!"

I guess what I'm trying to get at is this: I went through a couple changes in time zone on the way out here, but I didn't really feel it, so it's weird to me that I'm actually in a different time zone! I'm surprised every time I think about what you all are doing back in Oregon.

News from the Trip, Part 1

Earlier this afternoon I told myself that I was going to get back to the hotel and blog about the trip thus far, in FULL detail. Seriously, the plan was to sit down for an hour or two and write, and upload pictures, and get all the great info out there for the world
(okay, and for my own records),
but by the time we got on the subway for the last trip home, I was very tired and getting motion sick, so instead I crashed on the bed for about an hour.

Now that I'm up, have eaten dinner, and am in my jammies, I don't really feel like writing anymore. Mostly I just want to watch Brothers & Sisters
(side note: Mom, I think you might like Brothers & Sisters; we should chat about this later)
and get a full night's rest.

Except here I am, and I've started blogging. So I will try to give a brief overview of the trip thus far...

The plane rides were fine. No trouble with timing or picking up the connecting flight, so all my silly worrying was just exactly that... silly :o) The first leg of the flight was a little annoying. I ended up next to a large, older man who stank of B.O. and felt that he deserved the elbow rests and the space (MY space) on the outside of the elbow rests. I was basically touching him the whole flight. Eeeew.

Plus there was a screaming baby, four times over. I didn't mind it too much
("That, folks, is why you pack earplugs!")
but the kid did wake me up two of the four times. At one point in the middle of the flight (aka, in the middle of the night), an old lady picked a fight with the father of the screaming kid, while mom was trying desperately to calm the boy. It was a tough situation for all. Everyone survived, but were sleep deprived.

I was exhausted when we reached D.C.; I think I got about 3 hours of sleep between the two flights. We figured out how to catch the subway and hopped over to the hotel. It was 10:30am and check-in wasn't until at 3pm... but our room was ready! So we managed to drop out bags and grab a nap before hitting the subway to Arlington Cemetery.

So... I think I will leave it at that for now. More stories and some pictures tomorrow, I hope!

Kinda finished house front...

The front of the house isn't really done. The deck still needs some love (railing, sanding, staining), and we still have quite a few plans for the yard, BUT the front of the house where we replaced the window is done. Sealed. Painted. Window is trimmed. Attic vent is in place.

So let's all take a deep breath and admire the awesomeness before I launch into the next round of projects :o)

Baby Lucy's present!

Our very good friends Adam and Paige just had their first kid! We're very excited for them. So excited, in fact, that I made a little gift for baby's bedroom:

There are holes at either end of the sign where it can drill it into the wall. These holes get covered up with wooden "buttons" -- as you can see in the picture below (sorry it's a little fuzy):


Now, before you give me too much credit for the awesome craftyness, I must give credit to my sister. She made a similar gift this Christmas for our new nephew.


In case you're curious, here's a little bit about these friends of ours: Adam and Nate grew up going to church together, so they've been friends a long time. They played paintball together in high school, and even lived together for a little while in college. Ironically, I first met Adam long before I ever met Nate, as Adam was my very first Home Teacher when I joined the LDS church.

I became friends with Paige in college. In fact, it was at a church gathering in her apartment one fateful Monday night when I first met Nathan. (This was back when he was a loud mouth, sported massive facial hair, and wore coke-bottle glasses.)

Adam and Paige have a really awesome marriage, founded on their mutual love for all kinds of gaming. Oh, and it probably helps that they are some of the nicest, most upbeat folks you could hope to know.

Congrats you two!!!

I kinda think the Duggars are strange...

...so I enjoyed this MSN article on the parents (http://tv.msn.com/mom-pop-culture/what-the-duggars-are-doing-wrong/story/feature/?GT1=28137).

Can someone explain my cats?

There's fresh water in a clean dish for the cats. I exchange it regularly, I promise. Yet Abby really likes to drink from the faucet in the bathroom. In fact, here's her latest thing: When I wake up (early) in the morning to get ready for work, Abby appears and starts meowing at me, begging me to turn on the faucet so she can get a drink.

Anyway, I think this is too cute not to share... even if the only person who bothers to watch it is my mom:




Jack, who is bigger than his sister and better than her at almost everything, has been trying hard to mimick her skills at the bathroom sink. Alas, he's pathetic and unable:

Ah, babies.

Wondering when I was going to dive into the murky waters of blogging about baby talks? That post has arrived. (You betcha!)

All of you who heard about the recent Facebook "oops" already know this, but N8 and I are sorta talking about maybe trying to have kids someday. It's, like, a huge step forward. As soon as I mentioned it to my sister, she said I need to start taking prenatal vitamins (even though we're only kinda thinking about the possibility of the eventual future addition of a small-sized person, who grows, to our household). At her insistence and with her guidance -- and after accidentally over-exciting my mum -- I've started the obnoxious process of adding yet another something to my daily routine. A daily vitamin.

Really, it's not all bad. I could definitely use a multi-vitamin anyway. It just feels a tad weird to be ingesting a prental vitamin every morning when we're many months away from concievably converging on the concept of attempting conception.

(Have I mentioned that alliteration is one of my favorite literary devices? I'm a....... nerd.)

So now that I've rambled, THERE IS ACTUALLY A POINT TO THIS POST:
gDiapers (www.gdiapers.com)


I was reading Oregon Business Magazine for work today, and there is a lead article on a Portland-based business called gDiapers. The g stands for "green." If you groan at green, I agree. It's abused. But diapers are one of the few items where I think "going green" really, really, really matters. (Hey to the baby-makers, you could actually change the world.)

But it's not the eco-friendly angle that first attracted me. That's just a huge bonus. What's really got me hooked it that gDiapers has come up with a much cleaner, easier way to do cloth or disposable diapers.

For the disposable fans, less garbage piles up.
For the cloth lovers, it's quicker and easier to clean.

PLUS you could quite easily do both cloth and disposable. You don't have to own/pack a whole bunch of different stuff to make it work.

I already feel good about gDiapers, and I'm only maybe-kinda-sorta thinking about the possible possibility of perhaps trying to actualize the concept of kids. I love them so much, you can feel free to send me some inserts -- either kind.

www.gDiapers.com

My Testimony

For those of you who are not LDS, a quick note of explanation: In the LDS church, we often talk about our "testimony." Basically, it's a way to talk about the faith we have in things; having a testimony of something means to know of its truthfulness. For instance, if you believe in Jesus Christ, then you could say you have a testimony of Him. (Make sense?)

One more note of explanation: Once a month at church, on the first Sunday, our full congregational meeting is called a testimony meeting. There's about 45 minutes of open mic time, when people from the congregation can get up and share their testimony (i.e., talk about their faith).

Some background, briefly: As I was sitting in the testimony meeting in February, I realized that the anniversay of my baptism into the LDS church was at the end of the month. It got me to thinking about the last seven years of my life, and next thing I knew, I was scribbling notes about what I've experienced and what I've learned. I spent the rest of the meeting writing... and the rest of the week polishing my thoughts. I didn't know why, but I felt a very strong urge to write it down, and to write it well.

All last month, I wondered if I should share this written testimony at the March testimony meeting. I didn't feel a particular urge to share it, so I thought maybe writing it down was just meant to be an exercise for myself. Besides, people don't usually prepare anything for a testimony meeting, so it might be weird of me to share.

As I sat in the testimony meeting this month (March) and partook of the sacrament (also known as communion in many other churches), I pulled out the sheet of paper I had so carefully worked on. The sudden, terrifying pounding of my heart told me, in no uncertain terms, that I was suppose to get up and share it. Groan. Is there anything more terrifying than public speaking? I didn't want to get up.

And so I sat, wrestling with myself, knowing that after we finished the sacrament (communion), I had to make a decision. Would I get up and follow the very clear prompting of the Holy Spirit, or would I deny the Lord?

The choice was obvious. A few nice words of introduction were forming in my head; I scrambled to write them down on another spare sheet of paper.

Then, with trembling hands, I slowly rose and walked to the pulpit. The testimoy I delivered was something like what follows, although I didn't read it word for word...

And now, my testimony:
Seven years. Wow. It's hard to believe sometimes that it has been seven years since I joined the church -- since a very dear friend took my hand and led me into the waters of baptism; seven years since an Elder in Israel placed his hands on my head and confirmed me a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Seven years. It seems so long ago - almost like a different lifetime. Yet it also seems very short.

Much has happened in seven years...

I finished high school. I went to and graduated from college. I got married and started a "career" and bought a house.

Three of my siblings graduated from college. Two got married. One had a baby. Two went back to school.

My neice moved to Ohio, and moved back. My dad's Parkinson's got much worse. My grandfather died.

In seven years I've lived in three different cities. I've moved six times. I've been in six different wards.I drive the same car I did seven years ago, but I've added about 50,000 miles to it.

Thankfully, my car is not the only thing that has endured the last seven years. My testimony has endured, and grown. I still love my Heavenly Father, and I love my Savior. I have come to understand, perhaps not fully but certainly very deeply, how valuable it is to be a member of the Lord's True Church. Knowing the Gospel -- the Good News of Christ -- is one of the most important gifts in life.

Sometimes it's hard to believe that I deserve the blessings that Heavenly Father gives me -- that the Almighty God; the Father; the Ruler over all Creation, could love little old me, one simple person, among His billions or perhaps trillions of children.

Yet He does love me. The Lord knows me by name, and despite all of my faults and my mistakes, He loves me. Every day He shows me that love through His manifold blessings. Every day of the last seven years He has shown me His love.

I am grateful for that knowledge. I am grateful for my testimony. I know that Christ lives; that He atoned for our sins; that the Church is true; and that the Book of Mormon is true scripture. That knowledge has been the most important thing in my life these last seven years, and I pray that it ever will be,
in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

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I dedicate this post to an old friend of mine. I figured, for once, I should be the one sending a nice message in honor of my bbday. To RNC: Thanks for everything.

Big fat cat and some journals

Cats
My mom requested a picture of the cats, since they've grown a bunch. So here's one of Jack:

He's definitely not a kitten anymore. Not even a kattin. Pretty much, he's just a cat. Don't get me wrong; I still love him! He's great for company. But he's not an adorable little snuggly buddy anymore. He's a fattening lap dominator.

I'd love to produce a picture of Abby for you, but she's been difficult the past few weeks. I think she knows I want her picture and she's not going to let me have it. Whatever, fussy cat.

Journals
Okay, this is actually pretty cool. For Mutual (that's what our weekly Youth Group activities are called) a couple of months ago, the young women made "church journals." They each got a composition notebook and then had a ton of fabric they could use to decorate it.

Well, since I'm addicted to paper, I thought, "What if I decorated mine with paper, instead?"

So I took mine home and did just that:

(It has my contact information on the cover in case I leave it somewhere, but I blotted that out of the picture for obvious reasons.)

Well, there were a couple of extra notebooks. Since we were missing some of the girls that night, I figured I might as well decorate the extras and then everyone could have a cute notebook. So I did:

I'm pretty proud of myself for the crazy awesome craftyness that I created!