Maybe I'm Amazed From Joyful Noise With Lyrics Featuring Jeremy Jordan

Recently saw this movie "Joyful Noise".  One of the best movies I've seen in a long time.  I always love this kind of a musical.  Awesome one of a kind song!  Listen and enjoy!

"Still enjoying good music"!

Organization and Mom

So, Mom is staying with me for a couple of months this summer.  She has recently moved back to Utah and two of my sisters and I are sharing her.  It's been fun having her here.  I feel badly leaving her at home every day while I go to work but when I come home I am usually pleasantly surprised by my clean, tidy, well put together home.  My laundry is done, my house is clean and if I leave instructions on dinner, that is done too.  I think she is trying to spoil me so that I wont want her to leave.  My sister Regina said she did the same for her when she was at her house and now she is suffering  having to do her own dishes again!  Ha Ha!  Anyway, it has been a great blessing having her here.

Since we moved into our new house,  I have not been able to get a whole lot done since it seems I am usually playing catch up on the cleaning each weekend and that's about all I have time for.  However, since Mom has been here, I have been able to get some of the organizing done in my home that I have desperately been wanting to do.  Some people like to spend their time decorating their home.  My passion is organization!  I love it!  I can get pretty carried away if you give me too much time and a little bit of money.  But i sure have been enjoying it!  With Mom taking care of the basics during the week, I get to come home and just organize til my little hear it content!  Unfortunately we have a lot of areas that need help in this department so I'll be busy for a while.  Luckily, I have 2 months before my house falls apart again without Mom here.  Mom will leave for Theresa's in August and then she will be back in December so I will have a 4 month lapse of time where I will not be able to be so attentive to my organizing obsession!  So, for now I will just enjoy.

But today we took a break and went out to Thanksgiving Pointe and attended the Rose Festival.  It was a beautiful summer day and Mom and I just enjoyed the out doors and the beautiful scenery.  We had our girl time together walking around the garden and having lunch together.  When I heard they were having a "Rose Festival", I just knew I had to take my "Rose"!

49 ....... and almost 50!

Happy Birthday to me!  Today I am 49 years old or young!  I mean really if you think about it 49 is a very special age.  I'd like to live til I'm 100 so I guess it's almost half my life!  So, I guess I can finally transition into adulthood once and for all because I KNOW there's no turning back now!

I like being this age.  I like it because it turned out to be better than I thought it would be when I was younger and thinking what it would be like to be this old.  I dont feel a whole lot different than I did 20 years ago.  I've learned a lot about myself and about life.  I've been through a few experiences now and I've had my share of ups and downs.  But I still feel like I have so much further to go!  It's almost as if I am starting my second phase of life.  The part where you are now actually the person that you really want to be.  The part where you get to really show your true colors.  The part where you better take a hold of your life and do all the things that you always said you would do someday.  So, here's to being 49!
Ready or not here I come!

Guess What?

Guess what?  I'm not 16, or 17, or 18 anymore!  Yah, I know it was a shock to me too!  I sometimes feel like I am still that young girl I was so many years ago.  I know it is somewhat pathetic...okay, okay, very pathetic!  But, seriously, I think it has finally sunk in!  The fact that I need to do things differnetly in my life at THIS age, is finally becoming a reality! And guess what?  It feels pretty good.  I am motivated and determined to do some things differently than I have been in order to live a more full and enjoyable life at the ripe old age of 48...soon to be 49!  Whew!  That was close huh?  50 is right around the corner now.....literally...just one more year.  So, my plan is that when I am 50 I will wake up the morning of and say to myself...."yes!  I did it!  I finally started acting my age"!

Making sense of my happily ever after.....

Do you ever sit and wonder if you had made this choice different or that choice different what your life would have been like today?  I think I have done this quite a lot since my 40's came around.  Probabaly because of different trials I have had in the last several years.  Wondering if I had done this or that differently would I be having these trials? 

Then this past weekend I attended a women's conference and performance where I heard the gospel taught by word and song.  It was a performance by a group called Mercy River. It was during this performance that was so uplifting that I heard something said that hit me so hard.  I guess when you are ready to hear something that you really need to hear is when you really get it as if it was the first time you heard it.  One of the girls said she had heard a speaker once say that it was important to teach young women that when we get married to the right person in the right place by the right authority, it is not gonna be all "Happily Ever After.  We will continue to have trials in our lives". He then said, "The gospel of Jesus Christ is not insurance against pain, it is resource in the event of pain".  Wow!  So, this quote really got me thinking a lot!
In fact I started thinking to myself..."Duh.  What did you think?  That because you started off your married life on the right foot, that you were not gonna have any more trials in your life"?  I then realized how silly I sounded.  In fact I then realized that trials are trials because they are difficult for us.  My particular trials may not seem difficult or hard to another person, that's what makes them "my trials"....because they are difficult for me.  And we all know that none of us will escape this life without them.  That is the reason we are here. 

Now, we may have traded a certain set of trials for another depending on the particular choices we made and continue to make in this life but, they will still seem hard and difficult, because they are meant to be, how else will we learn to depend and lean on our Savior?  Our need for his atonement and our dependance on him is what we are here to learn.  So, now my "Happily Ever After" makes perfect sense!

Still growing up

I remember going to a fireside years ago while in my young single adult life and hearing a speaker say that the one thing we do best as human beings is "change".  That has always stayed with me and I have pondered that statement many times.  Lately I have felt myself changing again, inside.  Frankly sometimes I feel silly when I finally get something new, something that it seems everyone else got a long time ago.  It seems that even after 48 soon to be 49 years of life there is still much I have to learn in my life.  So, today I am grateful for the chance to ever be learning new things.  Things about myself, about life and about what is important.  After all I guess I am still growing up. 

It's all worth it

Okay, so it seems that all I do is work, work, work!  When you spend 36-40 hours a week at a job, then you go home and clean your house, cook, do laundry and tend to the needs of your family, well, it doesn't give you much time left for anything else.  So, today I am feeling sorry for  myself that I dont get to do more of the things that I would really like to do.  Like blogging for instance.  I miss keeping up on all the many happenings in my life. 

I realize that I need to pick and choose what is best for me and prioritize my time.  But, sometimes I wish I could have more hours in a day.  Today I'm at work early and I am tired.  We had a good-bye party at our home for Adam (Michael's best friend) last night.  It was a lot of fun.  We had friends, family, games and good food to eat of course.  Adam has been with us for about 8 months now. He is now heading up to Idaho to attend BYU.  He is really excited and we are excited for him.  We will miss his fun dispositon in our home.  I love when all of the boys are home together. It gives me great satisfaction:)  But now Adam is leaving and Michael will soon follow as he heads to Alaska for the summer. 

Even though we continue to struggle with Mike trying to find employment.  Somehow we still feel blessed and lucky.  I am so blessed and so lucky to be able go to a job everyday that I love, where I feel so at home and so appreciated!  The kids seem to be doing well without me around 24/7.  They are old enough now and keeping busy doing good things for the most part.  I do continue to do some prodding and pleading for some of the regular everyday stuff but I guess that is to be expected right? 

Sophia is visitng right now.  She is such a natural part of our family.  The boys love her to death!  She is like the sister they never had, so they are happy to place her in that spot and defend her to the very end in all that she is a does!  She is a sweet addition to our family.  She will always be considered one of us.  We love her like our own.  It doesn't matter how much time we spend away from her, when she is with us, it is like she never left.  We love her dearly and would do anything for her. 

So, such is my life. And most importantly and through it all, is the love of the Lord we all share.  That ,I can say without question.  Yes, the truths of the Gospel of Jesus Christ that we share is what keeps us all going.  That burning inside that tells us that in spite of all of this craziness it is still all worth it.