A few firsts

I love this picture of Brandon and the girls. You can tell who's hairline they have.

The girls are 3 months old and we have had a lot of "firsts" in the past couple days. Here are some of them. (Most of the pictures don't go with the stories)

Our First Dryer Heating Element Burn Out. I guess all the extra laundry was too much for our dryer. Luckily Brandon knew what he was doing and was able to replace the heating element the same day we figured out it was broken.

Our First Illness. The girls have had coughs that resemble croup. I called the Dr's office about it, but since the girls were still alert and eating okay they told me not to worry about bringing them in. It's been sad to hear their little coughs, but we are just about through it. Lydia lost her "voice" and so for once I could tell their crying apart.

Brandon is working swing shift again so this is how we end up most mornings. All of us hanging out in bed. I love this picture because it shows why we call Charlotte "Bright Eyes."

We went to all three meeting of church. We've just been going to sacrament meeting with the girls and once a month I teach Relief Society. But with Brandon's new schedule we were able to try all three meetings. It went well. And I discovered that I can use a baby as an excuse to get up and walk around when I get bored.

Our first walk to the grocery store. In Logan we lived across the street from Smith's MarketPlace so we always walked over to do our grocery shopping. We found it helps us save money if we know we have to carry home everything we buy. When we moved to Bountiful we ended up only a few blocks away from another Smith Marketplace (We joke that we always have to live near one. Even at the hospital we were about two blocks from the avenues Smiths) We put the girls in their front carriers and headed off to the store. It was really fun. You should have seen the looks we got from people as they noticed we each had a baby under our coats.

Here are the girls in some of my favorite outfits.
The girls met their Aunt Lindsey and Cousin Rocklond for the first time. Lindsey was able to fly up from Houston unexpectedly. We were able to get together on the spur of the moment.
All three cousins had fun hanging out and getting to know each other. Rocklond was very helpful with the girls and tried to comfort them when they cried.
The girls seemed to like meeting their oldest cousin.

7th Grade - Orchestra Memories

I totally believe the theory that smell and memory are connected. The roof of my Jr High was being water proofed with tar during my first week of school. To this day if I smell tar I automatically start feeling nervous. I start remembering how I felt on the first day of Seventh Grade.

Kids from my elementary school were divided up among 3 Jr Highs. There were only about 9 students from my elementary that would go to my Jr High. Luckily my two best friends, Ashley A and Becky P were among those nine. The three of us walked to to Jr High on that first day and entered a completely new world.

I'd been to the Jr High for a Orchestra concert the year before and for back to school night a few days before so I sort of knew my way around. During that first week I went to my classes and learned how things like the cafeteria worked.

Out of all of my classes I have the strongest memories about orchestra. Orchestra was the only class that I had with 9^th graders. Those 9^th grade girls seemed so grow up to me. Kim, Pam, Krista, Liz, and Heather they all seemed to know exactly how to act. They were involved in such interesting things; cheer leading, student government, dance company, and institute. To this day I still think about those girls with awe.

At first I felt completely out of place in Orchestra. Everyone else seemed so talented. I was sure they could all tell that I had no talent at all. But gradually as I practiced and participated in class I began to feel like I was talented too.

I was able to participate in the small chamber orchestra group in the Christmas Assembly. All the performing groups of the school were part of the assembly. There was a loose plot that linked all the performances together. Two students played Hyacinth and Richard Bucket from Keeping Up Appearances. The Buckets were on a vacation and the performances by the orchestra, dance company, cheerleaders, choir, and other groups were all part of the vacation entertainment. Their tour guide was Malory H who was elected Student Body President in High school. After high school she was killed in a tragic car accident. I remember her as a 9^th grader stealing every scene with her stage presence.

At the end of the school year in May the orchestra went to the annual district festival. We had worked hard to learn our songs. We played “Arlington Sketches” and the Feather Theme from Forrest Gump. It starts out with a very strong rhythm played by the cellos and basses. We had seven cellos and one bass – me. It was probably the hardest song I had ever played up until that point, and I learned it perfectly. I remember standing on the stage performing my part exactly like I had practised it so many times. It was one of the greatest thrills of my life.

After we were done playing we went back to our seats. Dr. Frome, the man in charge of the music program for the district came over and told us how wonderful we were. He then asked, “and where is your bass player?” I raised my hand and he told me that I played fantastically. Later when I told my dad what happened he reminded me that Dr Frome was his high school orchestra teacher when he played the string bass, and that I had met Dr Frome when he conducted an orchestra where my Grandma played the violin.

When the festival was over we collected the two envelopes that had the tapes of our performance and the judges scores. We opened the envelopes on the bus. The first judge gave us a “1” which is basically a perfect score. We all freaked out and were bouncing off the walls. Our teacher, Ms Davis said that it was highly unlikely we would get two 1's. She opened up the next envelope and said, “We're going to have one heck of a party.” We screamed again and she told us that we had two 1's.

When we got back to the school we listened to the tapes of us playing. The judges made comments about out performances. One judge singled me out in particular and said that I played very well and that I added a lot of color to the orchestra. I was in a daze the rest of the day.

A few weeks after festival the chamber orchestra played a song called the Delta King at the end of the year awards assembly. I had a pretty long solo part in this song. I had a hard time playing it, but the night of the concert I played it perfectly.

I would continue playing the string bass until halfway through my Sr year of high school. I have a lot of really good memories of orchestra over the years, but 7th grade is probably my favorite. It was nice to know that even though I didn't know how to do everything I was good at one thing.

Inspiration: Hidden, untapped potential

This is from the April 2006 Conference talk by Joseph B Worthlin. A sister in our branch read this as part of her talk a couple weeks ago. I loved the story and I thought I would share it with all of you. Click here for the full talk.

Harry de Leyer was late to the auction on that snowy day in 1956, and all of the good horses had already been sold. The few that remained were old and spent and had been bought by a company that would salvage them.

Harry, the riding master at a girls’ school in New York, was about to leave when one of these horses—an uncared-for, gray gelding with ugly-looking wounds on its legs—caught his eye. The animal still bore the marks that had been made by a heavy work harness, evidence to the hard life he had led. But something about him captured Harry’s attention, so he offered $80 for him.

It was snowing when Harry’s children saw the horse for the first time, and because of the coat of snow on the horse’s back, the children named him “Snowman.”

Harry took good care of the horse, which turned out to be a gentle and reliable friend—a horse the girls liked to ride because he was steady and didn’t startle like some of the others. In fact, Snowman made such rapid improvement that a neighbor purchased him for twice what Harry had originally paid.

But Snowman kept disappearing from the neighbor’s pasture—sometimes ending up in adjoining potato fields, other times back at Harry’s. It appeared that the horse must have jumped over the fences between the properties, but that seemed impossible—Harry had never seen Snowman jump over anything much higher than a fallen log.

But eventually, the neighbor’s patience came to an end, and he insisted Harry take back the horse.

For years, Harry’s great dream had been to produce a champion jumping horse. He’d had moderate success in the past, but in order to compete at the highest levels, he knew he would have to buy a pedigreed horse that had been specifically bred to jump. And that kind of pedigree would cost far more than he could afford.

Snowman was already getting old—he was eight when Harry had purchased him—and he had been badly treated. But, apparently, Snowman wanted to jump, so Harry decided to see what the horse could do.

What Harry saw made him think that maybe his horse had a chance to compete.

In 1958, Harry entered Snowman in his first competition. Snowman stood among the beautifully bred, champion horses, looking very much out of place. Other horse breeders called Snowman a “flea-bitten gray.”

But a wonderful, unbelievable thing happened that day.

Snowman won!

Harry continued to enter Snowman in other competitions, and Snowman continued to win.

Audiences cheered every time Snowman won an event. He became a symbol of how extraordinary an ordinary horse could be. He appeared on television. Stories and books were written about him.

As Snowman continued to win, one buyer offered $100,000 for the old plow horse, but Harry would not sell. In 1958 and 1959, Snowman was named “Horse of the Year.” Eventually, the gray gelding—who had once been marked for sale to a low bidder—was inducted into the show jumping Hall of Fame.¹

For many, Snowman was much more than a horse. He became an example of the hidden, untapped potential that lies within each of us.

Bridal Fair

When I grow up I want to be a wedding planner. I love pretty things and I love to plan so it is a natural combination. As part of my preparation I like to go to bridal fairs. On Saturday my parents baby sat the girls so I could go to the bridal fair at the Joseph Smith Memorial Building. I invited two friends along and we all went and had a great time.

I only took pictures of center pieces, but everything was amazing.

This was probably the 10th bridal fair I've gone to. It's about the 7th I've been to since getting married.
Over the years I've gone with my roommates, my sister in law, my sister, my friend Amy (who was a true friend and went with me even though she later told me that she hated bridal fairs) and Brandon.
This was the first time I'd been to this particular fair. It was much better than anything I'd seen in Logan.

Going to the fair brought back memories of planning my sister Emily's wedding. Click here to see the post.

Outfits

I spent most of this last week with a horrible cold. So I don't have a lot of cute pictures for the week. Still there were a couple interesting things that happened.

The girls are big enough to wear the outfits that were intended to be their "going home from the hospital" clothes. Charlotte's says "Introducing Me" and Lydia's says "It's fun to be me."

The girls also wore some other onesies. This is a big deal because usually I just keep them in sleepers all day. Up until now the girls didn't really fit any of their pants so it's been easier to keep them in sleepers. Now if they could only keep socks on their feet :)

I also discovered a way to play with the girls. They don't really interact with me yet so I was really excited to find something that they would react to (besides being fed.)

And that was basically our week!

1997 Family Vacation

1997 was the Sesquicentennial anniversary of the pioneers arriving in the Salt Lake Valley. Throughout the state there were celebrations and commemorations. My family decided that the we should spend our annual family vacation in Salt Lake as our own way to honor the pioneers. We went to places such as the Bingham Copper Mine and Ensign Peak. We spent a whole day in down town Salt Lake. On that day we toured the Beehive house, road a trolley, and went to Temple Square.

The highlight of the week was going to the Lagoon Amusement Park. We went during the “bounce back” promotion period so we were able to go to Lagoon one day and then come back the next day for a reduced price. We stayed overnight at the Lagoon campground so that we could be at the park right when it opened.

The first day of our Lagoon trip was spent entirely in Pioneer Village. I guess the logic behind this was to make sure we were remembering the point of this vacation was to honor the pioneers. We looked at the recreated buildings and shops. This took probably an hour. It quickly became apparent that Pioneer Village was not going to hold our attention for a whole day. My parents decided that the new water ride, Rattle Snake Rapids, was close enough to Pioneer Village that we could ride it.

We got in line for Rattle Snake Rapids. Somehow we ended up in two groups with quite a gap between us. I was with my Dad and some other siblings as we watched my Mom and Hillary, my 4 year old sister, go by as they road on the water ride. Hillary was pressed up against my mom and she had a look of terror on her face. It was the first intense ride she had ever gone on. (Years later her first roller coaster would be Magic Mountian's Goliath) Soon it was my group's turn to go on the ride. We boarded the boat and were launched on a river ride that got all of us soaking wet. It was so fun. Over the next two days we would ride Rattle Snake Rapids 7 times- once for each member of the family.

My parents also decided that the Log flume and the train ride around the zoo were part of Pioneer Village. We spent the remainder of the day riding Rattle Snake Rapids, the Log Flume, and the train. We also watched a performance of a play about the old west. At the end of the day we went to our campsite and ate dinner. I remember falling asleep to the sound of people screaming as they rode the Colossus roller coaster.

The next day we woke up when one of the zoo's lions roared. We ate breakfast and packed up camp. Then it was time to go back into the park. This day we were allowed to go to any part of the park we wanted. We must have split up into groups but I can't remember. I do remember riding the Colossus for the first time. I was so scared. I kept thinking I would fall out at the loop part of the track. My dad explained centrifugal force and I was brave enough to try it out. The Colossus became my new favorite roller coaster. We also went on my old favorite from when I was seven– the white roller coaster.

At one point all 4 of my siblings and I got on the little kid ride, Puff the Magic Dragon. My parents remarked to each other that this was probably the only time they would see all 5 of us on that ride together. I was 12, Lindsey was 10, Emily was 8, Billy was 6, and Hillary was 4. None of us knew it but this was also the only time all of us would go to Lagoon together. I'm glad we were able to experience the park and make such fun memories.

Inspiration: A woman's work

A few days ago I watched the Simpsons episode where Bart and Lisa take aptitude tests that tell them what their future careers should be. Lisa is told that she is best suited to be a homemaker. She exclaims, "A homemaker! I might as well be dead!" I'll admit I laughed long and hard at that statement because I've felt that way at times. I mean how can I feel like I am impacting the world when I don't even know what is going on in the world.

However, I also know that I am important and that the things I do for my family will have lasting impact. Here is a quote that reminds me how important I am. This is from the novel Caddie Woodlawn about a young girl growing up during the Civil war. Her father gives her this advise towards the end of the book.

"It's a strange thing but somehow we expect more of girls than of boys. It is the sisters and wives and mothers who keep the world sweet and beautiful. What a rough world it would be if there were only men and boys in it, doing things in their rough way! A woman's task is to teach them gentleness and courtesy and love and kindness. And it is a big task, too-- harder than cutting trees or building mills or damming rivers. It takes nerve and courage and patience, but good women have those things. They have them just as much as the men who build bridges and carve roads through the wilderness. A woman's work is something fine and noble to grow up to, and it is just as important as a man's. But no man could ever do it so well.

I don't want you to be the silly, affected person with fine clothes and manners whom folks sometimes call a lady. No that is not what I want for you, my little girl. I want you to be a woman with a wise and understanding heart, healthy in body and honest in mind. Do you think you would like to be growing up into that woman now?"

Caddie Woodlawn Page 216

So even though I still have some self esteem issues do to the fact that my title has changed from Internal Auditor/Billing Manager to Homemaker - I know that what I do as a mother will last much longer than what I did as an auditor.

Here is a link to a review of Caddie Woodlawn.