Christmas time

the music has been playing for just about forever, and the stores have had out christmas stuff for months now, and finally, we have decorated the house. it must indeed be Christmas time.

uninspired

i get to spend the day doing wash. hurrah.

an attempt

sean has been wanting some pictures of prettry sunsets, and last night there was one that was really pretty. you cant really tell it from these pictures, but it was beautiful.

Walking in a winter wonderland

my utah house got its first snow storm of the year. it was very exciting.

Registration

i handt expected to be registering for any classes till about 2009. i guess that i was wrong. i registered for an online religion class. now, if only i didnt have to stay in salt lake, and then i could go back up to school...

Where i want to be

Wanted: an "Its a Wonderful Life" Experience

(just a forewarning, i've never actually seen "its a wonderful life" that movie was banned at our house, so i actually have yet to see it.)

i have people asking me all the time "why are you still living at home? you should move out." answer is, yes, i probably should, for my own sake and for any sorts of future prospects. i'd be happier, and i'd be free to do what i liked, and when i wanted to do it. i could go out on four hour walks at eight at night, and no one would worry, cause that's who i am. i like to justify myself though. i cliam that i stay at home because its cheaper, and mostly for rachel. i want my rachel to have a better childhood than i remember having. in ways, i think i help her to have one. she knows and can recognize that she is loved, and is told it, at least once a day. she gets to do things that i dont remember ever being alowed to do. but at the same time, there are days that i think that no matter what i do, she's going to end up with the same type of childhood that i did, so why stay, why should i stick around? my becky lee has offered me a room in her house, so why dont i take it up? what i wish i could have, and not just for rachel, but for other reasons as well, i want an "its a wonderful life" experience. from what i understand, the guy is about to commit suicide, and an angel comes and shows him what life would be like without him in it. i want to be able to have that same type of experience. i want to be able to see "oh, this is one possiblity of what things would be like if i had never come to be" i want to see how rachel would be and how her childhood would be. i want to be able to see how other's lives or experiences would have been different. can i please have that? just once?

day of reading

I was feeling depressed today, so i did nothing but read

Day with my not family

i spent all of saturday with my beckys' and my lisa. we also stopped my emily's house. we havent seen each other in about a year and a half.

temple trip!

Thanksgiving!

Dad won thanksgiving dinner from Smith's so we actually brought most of the dinner. it was way yummy though.

for more thanksgiving fun...

an escepade

we went on an escepade to JoAnn's for material for dante pj's. some other things found, and or very very common there too

Egg Beaters

Reading Material

Mountians

i went on a bike ride today, and took pictures of the utah mountians for one of the missionaries that i write to.

Roomates!

huzzah! my roomates came down to visit before they went down to provo. rachael spent a lot of the time reading a story to the rest of us. great thing about the picture, is that she doesnt know it was taken. she doesnt like to have her picture taken, so it was fun to sneak it in. :)

library day

saturdays are library days at our house. we take about an hour every saturday, and run to the lirary, looking for books, picking up holds, and other such library related things. we have a box full of books sitting in our living room that we go through each week.

an empty bed

we sent rachel off to california last night. it was odd to get up for work and see an empty bed this morning

work

i spent about six hours at work today rearranging womens socks and underwear. wasnt it great that i got to come home, and do all the wash, dealing with all the same things? i also am now a proud new owner of a letherman! haha! i'll never be without a knife at work, (stupid recieving always has them all) or even out in the woods! :)

second one today.

wow, this will be the second picture i post today! and isnt it a feast? this was lunch, eaten while waiting to pick up rachel from school. a shake and fries. so nutritious. at least i was reading something good for me, even if i wasnt eating it.

what i do while i talk on the phone

in case anyone asks, i've never been big on talking on the phone (about the only exception was when i had a boyfriend, and he would call on the weekends). what most people dont realize is that while i'm on the phone, i usually am also doing at least one other thing, besides talking to that person, sometimes two or three. here's what i was doing today when a friend called.

the chuffers!

warning: the following is a rant

so, i've said once that i really dont like rachel's newest set of step-family memebers. but even though i dont like them, i can usually see their point of view. but they were being bloody chuffers! rachel is leaving this week to go to california with them for thanksgiving. first off, i dont think that they should have her over thanksgiving, but that wasnt up to me. they had been going to come get her all bright and early on friday morning. we had agreed on that. about a month ago! so, last night, we called them to find out how many days she was going to be gone, andwhat all they were doing, so that we could pack the appropriate, and enough, cloths for her to wear. we were pretty much busy all day on thursday, and that was why they couldnt come get her on thursday. rachel had SEP's (equvelant of parent teacher conferences, but the student and the parents plan things instead of just saying what a good child they are), and school, and we have a thingy at the library (its a mother-daughter book club type thing-a-ma-bob) plus, i have work all morning, so there isnt any way to get started on her wash so that she _has_ enough cloths to go with until after 2. that was fine, they said, we'll just come pick her up on friday, bright and early. that was fine, everything was great, and life went on. till last night. they called us back (we had to leave a message) to get the details about the trip. "oh, and we're picking her up on thursday night." what! we agreed on friday, so pick her up on friday. we had to explaine to them three or four times that it would be physically impossible for us to be able to meet such a request. did they listen? absolutely not. they hung up, under the pretense of "discussing it amongst themselves" but, they didnt "discussing it amongst themselves" they called up rachel's daddy and complained to him about it. next thing we know, we get a call from rachel's daddy, and he's asking us "whats wrong with picking her up on thursday night" we have to explaine it to him three or four times too! eventually, mom and dad get too upset, and rachel has to talk to him for a bit while they go "discuss" (more like argue) about it. i end up having to get on the phone and try to explaine it to rachel's daddy. the stupid bloody chuffers! they didnt need to call rachel's daddy up! he's trying to recover from Post Traumatic Stress! this is the _last_ thing he needs. rachel's daddy tries to calmly explaine to me why they can no longer come and pick rachel up on friday. rachel's grandpa hawkes apparantly suffers from severe back pain, and is not able to be in the car for long ammounts of time. woah here! and they were planning to DRIVE to california?! sorry, thats long amounts of time. i've been told about a 14 hour drive. an extra 15 minutes wouldnt hurt him in the least. secondly, even if we went with that plea, there's still the fact that we cant do it! so, what if we were to drop her off at their house, bright and early? they wont do it. hmmmm..... why not? we never did get an answer for that one. they seem to be too bloody....askl;dfj;lasdf! chuffers! dad could drop her off there as early as 5:00. its on his way to work, and when you drive an hour for work, leaving a half-hour early, its not much of a deal. they would never tell us why they wouldnt do it. they didnt want to have a clean rachel with clean cloths. no, they have to go and be stupid bloody chuffers and come pick her up, without having a shower, and with filthy cloths, after the library thing on thursday. i honestly hope that she's as onery for them when she's really really tired (she wont be getting to bed at their house till about 10) as she is for us.

i'll end this by saying sorry i seem to rant so much. i'll try and stop.

School Projects

i spent the day helping rachel build a diorama for school. its about the weather cycle. it has all the different types of clouds (cirrus, cumulus, and nimbocumulus), snow, rain, and hale, evaporation, condensation, a snow capped mountian, a lake, and even snow runoff!




for reference, rachel decided she wanted to take a picture of her diorama so it was falling. :) she enjoys it, and made sure i put it on here so you all could see it.

Leaves

"mom! i'm home! and guess what!? you know that pile of leaves you left outside? i jumped in it! it was so fun!" she said, as she came running into the room.
"i'm glad you enjoyed it. do you want to go out and play in them more? i'll even come with?"
"yeah!"
i turned off my computer, and we went outside. it was a beautiful day. not to hot, not to cold. just warm enough that we could be comfortable with short sleeves, and no jacket or sweater. suddenly, my mind began to race. why was i doing this? she had homework, i needed to start dinner. more importantly, we were both getting over bad colds, and it was sure to get cold out here. why hadnt we worn jackets?
"common mom! lets go!" she said, practicly dragging me out of the house.
she started to rake up the leaves, and we jumped in them. she did it again. we fought with the leaves, having "confetti" wars. we chased each other, and tried to get leaves all over each other. we burried each other.
suddenly, nothing else mattered. it was just me and her. and the leaves. we played for hours. never tiring, not noticing that the sun was going down. all that mattered was us. me and her. we were actually doing something, and it wasnt me telling her that she needed to do this, or go do that, or eat your dinner, there wont be any food 'til breakfast. all that mattered was that we were having fun...together.
eventually, after many times of pretending to be a bear, hibernating in the leaves, and being leaf monsters jumping out to attack each other, and chasing each other around the yard for hours, the leaves were in the garden, and there was nothing else to do, but to go inside, and to remember. it was rare the days like this, and i hoped that she would remember this, above everything else.

stolen idea

first off, thanks to sean for his idea for this post. its a fun idea, and after thinking on it for a long while, i think i may be able to do this too. its a "photo scavenger hunt" and on this hunt, find five predetermined habits, and take a picture of it, or more like, representing it. and off we go.

Habit in Action

i have a whole bunch of projects that i'm working on, one of which is preparing for a mission, and developing missionary like habits, like reading the Scriptures, and Preach My Gospel and the like.

Good Habit

i've been trying to spend a bit each day playing piano. it helps with a few things, and to keep my mind on track.

Bad Habit

i spend way too much time on the computer, when i could be doing other things, like reading my Scriptures and Preach My Gospel, and actually starting on riding my bike.

Habit to aspire to

i'd like to become a bit more domestic like. making bread, sewing things and other such, so that if i ever get married, i'll be able to at least be able to be somewhat like what i see a mother and wife being

Habit forming

this one was hard to choose, cause i have a lot of habits in forming currently. i chose this one, cause its probably been in forming for the longest. i'm trying to go on a bike ride for a half hour every day. ever since leaving school and hour to four hour long walks, i've become a whole lot more lazy, and can feel it in my muscles. besides that, some cardio with all the strength training i get every day at work, it would be well worth it.

just for fun

just for fun, i finished the project started at the Relief Society Super Saturday that was last saturday, and took another picture that looked cool, but has absolutely nothing to do with anything

a day of accomplisment

i got so much done today! i was so proud of myself. i finished my shirt

i voted

and i cleaned the bathroom, after having the job for the last month or so

(before)

(after)

i even finally printed out my deferment, now that registration is next week. i feel so accomplished. :)

sunday pictures

Rachel drew these pictures yesterday. i thought they were cute. :)