Sunday, February 28, 2010

Dance in the rain and forget about the storm.

I'm pretty sure I've never been this busy in my life, other than my mission. Here is a typical schedule for me. Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays I babysit for Brother and Sister Adam's. They have 4 kids. I go in the morning from 6-8:30. Home for a shower, school from 10:30-2:45, Work at Lasting Engraving, then work at Ink Solutions until 9, homework, talk to my Trevor, and bed. Tuesday and Thursdays I go to the gym in the morning from 7-8 then a quick shower and work at ink solutions then Lasting Engraving. Seriously, I get so worn out, but I love being busy. Oh, and I'm sick again now to top it all off. Sore throat, runny nose, man voice...you know the usual. It's literally a sick cycle. I work myself up and take on more than I can handle and stress myself out then get sick and I never get better. So, like my title says, I'm trying to dance in the rain and forget about my storm. Life is good none the less.

Somewhat switching gears, I just wanted to write about something I learned in church today. Our sacrament meeting was fantastic. Backing up a bit, all day I'd been thinking about fire and the symbolism of it. In sacrament meeting, Justin spoke about that same thing, fire. He pointed out that a fire takes a lot of work to build. Then after you build it, that's not all you have to keep continually putting wood in the fire to make it grow. Fire keeps us warm and brings light into our lives. The part I was thinking about today is that the refiners fire burns away impurities. That's like our testimony and the trials in our lives. We will always have trials, but we have our testimony to fuel our fire that keeps us going. It keeps us warm, but can also cause us pain when we are being refined and having our impurities burned off. So the things that are hard are also a blessing. That reminds me of that scripture in Ether 12:27. My weak things can be made strong. But do I really believe that? Do I work for that? Do I want to make my weak things become strong? It's easy to do that with some things that I struggle with, but what about my "pet sins" do I really want those to be a strength? Am I putting wood in the fire so I can keep getting refined? Even though it's painful am I trying to become better? These are just some questions that have been on my mind. I don't really have answers, but just like Nephi says, I know not the meaning of all thing, but I know that God loves His children. I know that God loves me and he's waiting for me to progress.

Even though, I'm busy and overwhelmed I'm dancing in the storm.

Saturday, February 13, 2010

Checking in..

Nothing says Happy Valentines day like a reporting of my goals thus far. Let's see...So far I've lost 6 pounds. I've done so good at walking to campus. I only can go to the gym Tuesday and Thursday mornings but the rest of the days I walk to and from school. I've done good at eating smaller portions and less sugar, so I'm down 6 pounds. According to my scale at least, Trevor's said a whole other number yesterday....that's NOT OK with me. I haven't really learned much new on the makeup tricks yet though. I have learned some cool facial exercises. I look and feel silly doing them, so I only do them in the shower.


As for the Spiritual part this saddens me. I've done good on everything else, but I think there has been a few (less than 10) days that I haven't read my scriptures. And I totally forgot about my goal for specifically studying a gospel topic, so I didn't do that either. I still want to study the Law of Consecration, but I just haven't done that yet. I will repent and do better. I have written in my journal once a week. That's the one I thought I'd have the hardest time with! I'm working on finding someone to go to church with me. I was thinking of Diego to come again, but he hasn't talked to me in a while, so I don't know how that is going to work out. Someone else will be provided I know it.



Mentally, I'm still working on graduation, it's still a way off. I will take the CIL test after spring break and before finals, so not yet. So far I've got all A's in my classes, but we've got a few mid terms coming up, so we shall see and I haven't read any other books yet, but I will start one soon.



Socially I'm doin' awesome. My friend for January is Aramantha VanDeuser. Crazy cool name huh? She's great. She is in 2 of my 3 classes and she's wonderful. She doesn't really have a hometown, she moved a lot as a child but when ya really ask her, she'll say that she's from Vegas. She has one brother and one sister that is her roommate. She is thinking about minoring in Sociology with a major in Physical education? I'm not sure. When I had my dumb cold a while ago, she was so sweet and took notes. I really like her a lot. She's gorgeous too! I'm still working on the debt thing, I think I'm a little behind schedule, but I also bought a car so now I have another payment, so the debt goal might be altered a little. I don't have health insurance yet, but I did finally get a hold of the lady that's been helping me. I'm working on all of these so I'd say I'm doing pretty good. I've done fantastic at writing Morgan every week. Sometimes I mail the letter on Friday, so he has gotten 2 in one week before but I still have mailed him a letter every week. As for having a solid relationship, cross that off! Yes, it's with Trevor, but things are so good. He is so sweet and has really stepped it up a bunch. We have had some wonderful talks and really gotten to know each other. I like him a lot. He spoiled me like CRAZY for Valentines day. It was so much fun, Valentines day gets it's own special post to come later. Just know that I feel that this is a solid relationship. I'm not sure where it's going to lead to, but he has really been wonderful and so much fun to date!

So, that's me lately. I'm happy as ever! Life is good!

Thursday, February 4, 2010

A breath of goodness...

This past week or so I've felt like a missionary again. I'm constantly busy! It's been so good and somehow I've managed to get just about everything done. And when I say done what I really mean is being caught up from being sick. I had the worst cold for 2 weeks! It started with a sore throat, then went to everything after that and back to a sore throat. Yuck! For a while I sounded like a man, then I sounded like I was going through puberty. Not fun! But, I'm feeling much better now and have got caught up in my classes and I love that feeling.
Yesterday in my theory class I decided I wanted to get to know me a little bit better. I decided to make a list of things about me. I've narrowed it down to only 54 things, but some of those things that I can remember.
1. I hate Swedish fish
2. I love the sound of rain on my umbrella
3. I love evenly cut cheese
4. I love organizing things
5. I love straws.

So, that's what I came up with about me. I was going to write more but honestly, I'm pooped and I have to babysit tomorrow. Love it!