Monday, November 28, 2016

*Monday Memos*

*MONDAY MEMOS*

   
 (If pictures are too small, just click to enlarge) 
Weekly recap of my rather crazy, insane, but fun and rewarding life!

dear running, I was excited to get out and start running again this week after surviving the Turkey Trot!  However, as I started to run I knew I was going to end up walking because my hamstrings were so dang sore from the race!  OUCH! It had been raining all night, but it had cleared up while I was out.  I just walked four miles and called it good.

dear tea party,
I took off to go to our annual Gratitude Tea Party which was at Carla's this year and about half way there I realized I forgot my treats!  I don't think I was meant to take them because I had them all set out on a plate and when I got home from my run they were gone. Dave had taken them to his Dad because he thought I had made them for him.  Oops!  So I salvaged what I could from what I hadn't put on the plate he took and I had enough to take, but then forgot them! I also forgot my teacup and so luckily I had left early enough so I had time to hit Costco to grab some "scones" aka "crumpets" and grab a teacup at Ross for $1.99. 
The party was fun!  Sadly, we only had five show up.  Sometimes, I just don't get why more don't come because we do really fun things.  Oh well, we had a good time.  Dawn had made us a binder with some photos of fun things we have done on the front and inside some quotes on gratitude and places to put our own thoughts and things inside.

Carla had everything set up so nice and it was really fun having an adult tea party.  We just needed to speak with an English accent and then it would have been complete!  lol 
We shared what we were grateful for and some got really emotional.  Then Dawn had us do what she called an "angel walk" that she learned at her Limitless conference.  We each took turns telling each other things we thought that was great about each other one at a time.  It was a bit uncomfortable for everyone at first, but it got easier.  The things I remember whispered to me were: *You are young at heart . *You are a great example to everyone around you. *You are a fighter.  *You are fun, vivacious and a true friend.
We are supposed to learn to own those things and not feel like we have to be humble and disregard them.  I wish we had more time to do some other things Dawn had learned It was really fun but too short because everyone had to run off to their other things.

dear errands, whenever I am in O town, I try to cram in everything I need to do for the week while there. Even though I am only 30 minutes away, I rarely will just make a quick run in to do one thing and so I save them up for when I am already in. Small town problems.  ;) Some days I have a long list like today.  I had to find some fixtures for the boy's bathroom and I knew that would take time (never found what I needed after searching several places) and I had some Christmas gifts I needed to grab.  Dave loves In and Out Burger but we rarely eat there and so I grabbed some to take home since I knew we were going to the play tonight and wouldn't have much time for dinner.

dear little mermaid, we went to see The Little Mermaid at the high school again.  These were the tickets I had originally bought. Our seats were back much farther but in some ways they were better.  I could have gone every night and loved it.  It was so professionally done! Almost like Broadway!
 This is King Triton.  He is in my SS class.  I wish you could see his costume close up. It's unreal how much work went into it and how expensive that scale fabric must be!
 
 Since it was closing night, they let them come out in their costumes.  WOW!  They were amazing up close!  Flounder reminded me so much of Tyson because he was little and so dang cute!
I'm here with my friend Michele and  the Sea Witch Ursula and her eels.  They were amazing!


dear tuesday run, I only got in about three miles today but I wasn't as sore as I was yesterday and so that made me happy.  It was overcast which I love.  I found a penny!

dear garage, when I got home I pulled in the driveway and noticed the garage cabinets again. They have been bugging me for months and I asked Dave to clean them but he still hasn't and so before I even went inside, I got to work on them.  I ended up cleaning all of them and the walls and the sink area.  I organized some totes that were out there and cleaned up a bunch of stuff.  I was out there for a couple hours. But it looks much better.  It still needs a million more hours to get it to look good, but that's Dave's job.  I have enough to worry about inside!  The problem is it doesn't drive him nuts like it does me.  

dear harvest soup, there was a lot of the garden harvest out in the garage that I knew needed to be taken care of or it would rot, so I brought in all the tomatoes and red potatoes and made Autumn soup.  I threw in things I usually don't  like zucchini and green beans.  It turned out really yummy.  It was rainy outside and so it was the perfect day for soup.  I sent some to Dave's mom and dad.  Wish I would have taken a photo because it was a very pretty and colorful soup.

dear tyson's festival of tree's tree,  
From 2006

This tree has been weighing heavily on my mind lately.  It has been stashed in a corner in a room in the basement since we did it 10 years ago.  The clinic bought it so they could display at the clinic each Christmas but they thought it would mean more to us if they gave it to us instead so we could put it up in our home each year.  It was a very kind and touching gift.  That gesture meant so much to our family.  The problem was when they tried to get it to our home, the center of the tree broke.  When Festival of Trees delivers the trees to the owner, they have a professional crew do it, but when the clinic transported it to us after they displayed it during Christmas that year, it was just a couple of people and it was too big of a job and it broke.  I felt so bad, but I thought it would be an easy fix.  Not so.  After much deliberation, Dave said it could not be fixed and we needed to remove all the decors from it and get a new tree and put them all back on it.  At the time, I could NOT even comprehend doing that.  Tyson had only been gone a year at this point, and one thing many people don't realize is that grief is physically exhausting.  I just didn't have it in me.  Physically OR emotionally. First of all, it took about 10 people eight hours to decorate it!  I just couldn't in my head even fathom doing that again only ALONE this time.  Second of all, it was still too emotional for me to be able to just start over by myself.   It was such an intensive labor of love and time and cost to do it and so I haven't been able to do anything about it until now.  But, I was ready now!  I wanted it taken care of.  So Dave and I headed in the basement and we started to painstakingly  remove all of the decors.  It was tough because the Festival had a rule that every single decor had to be wired on the tree.  That is why it took 10 people eight hours (or more) to decorate it.  It had a LOT of decors meticulously wired on!
It was such a beautiful tree!  It was fun and whimsical, yet beautiful.  I spent many many hours finding and hand making the perfect decors for it and to see them all again was very heart warming. 
We had so many people help us with it and it was therapeutic to think back and remember how many people contributed to it.  Loraine made a gorgeous tree skirt.  Janzen made a surf board to go around it.  The Young Women in our ward made small surf board ornaments for it.  I had SO many friends help decorate it and be a part of it as well.  It was one amazing tree!  Back then I had planned on doing one every year, but it cost too much money to be able to just donate one each year.
The notes on the back of the surf boards the YW made
Tree skirt
I put all of the decors in a large tote.  My plan is to get another tree in the future and decorate it again with the existing decors and either keep it or donate it once again to the Festival of Trees.  I'm just not sure yet.  It would be a wonderful thing to do a tree for our family so we could remember Tyson that way, but it is so much work and unless I could leave it decorated each year and just store it somewhere, I don't think I would be able to.  It will take some thought to know what to do.
On the back of the tree skirt
 Such fond memories

dear taylor stitches, while we were working on Tyson's tree, Taylor called Dave and told him he was on his way to get stitches in his head from getting elbowed at a basketball game.  His friend TJ was driving him down.  Dave left and I kept working on the tree. I had it done before he got home.  It took much less time to remove the ornaments than it did to put them on!  Taylor headed back up to Logan right after Dave finished his stitches and so all I got to see were the pictures of his head.  OUCH!  Dave said it was deep and needed stitches inside AND out (over 15)Of course, as a head wound it bled pretty bad.  Looks like it would have knocked him out, but he said it didn't. He told me he wasn't in a ton of pain and was okay. That kid is tough!

This was taken a couple days later.  It's getting better every day! ↓

 
dear thanksgiving eveI headed out on a run first thing this morning.  It was a nice day and I got in four miles around the high school. I found some good coinsSince school was out today, I could scour the parking lot.  lol  I came home and ate the lunch Dave brought home from the clinic (Maddox!).  As I was eating Taylor came in the door. He is home for the weekend.  His poor eye though!  It looks so sore!  Poor kid!  I showered and then ran and did my VT and grabbed some things at the store and it started to snow and sleet while I was out!  When I got home Taylor had gone to work in Ogden.  He is selling solar and they had a booth to set up appointments.  I got some stuff done around the house that needed to be done.  Dave worked late.  Since Dr. Matthews retired last month, he has been swamped.  And the new doc they hired is also going to be leaving soon.  Dave had meetingsBrrr...... Winter is here! 

dear thanksgiving, it was cold this a.m. and so I waited until after 9 to go running.  I didn't feel like running the hood and so I drove down to the high school track but there was a turkey bowl going on and so I text Robin to see if she had left yet.  She hadn't and so we met up and got in almost 5 miles.  I went to her house and checked out her cabinet she painted red.  Last week I ran into her and she said, "I painted my chest!  You have to come and see!"  I laughed so hard.  This is the first time we have run together since before the marathon!  And of course I forgot to get a photo!
 
I hurried home and made fudge for today.  I guess I just missed CJ who spent the night at our house.  I got ready to make rolls but when my Mom called I found out Allison was.  Hmm....  I believe I told my mom at least three times I was going to.  Oh well, it saved me a bunch of time.  We took candied yams, green bean casserole, a raspberry jello salad, and almond fudge.  We were eating later than usual (3:30) but luckily we got there around 2:00 to help her get things ready because there was a confusion on the time. Some were told 1:00 and others 2:00 and two of us were told 3:30.
The food was a feast as usual.  Jerry and his fam, Britt and her fam, Trevor and his fam, Chantel and her boyfriend, and my parents were all there.  Bryce was unable to make it. I feel very bad about that, but his park opens tomorrow and he had some last minute things come up. Since he is pretty much solely in charge this year, he had to take care of it.  But we missed him!  We missed Sky as well who spent it in California and of course McKay who spent it in Russia, but I doubt celebrated it.  
Feasting!

We haven't seen this girl for a while!
Jerry and Winston hanging out in the closet entertaining each other!
 Winston was the star of the show and he had me and Jerry laughing most of the day.  A couple weeks ago when his mom told him he was going to Mammy's for Thanksgiving, he asked, "Is Jooooooooodi going to be there?  Is Jerry?  Are they going to have a whipping cream fight again?"  I can't believe he remembers that from two years ago because he is barely five now!  What a cutie. I made sure we had the whipped cream war and got him and Jerry, but he was on Jerry's side and kept saying, "Jodi started it!"  Hilarious!  Oh, he is the cutest thing!  His new baby sister Kailani is also adorable!  We had a lot of laughs. 
Winston unhappy about the whipped cream on him even though he couldn't wait for the war!  Hah
More whipped cream shenanigans!

They have matching bald spots!
Dave and Taylor kind of went and hibernated most of the day watching football, missing out on the shenanigans.  I love my family.  We have so much fun together.  I did feel bad for my parents. I think they are getting too old to have it at their house. My poor Dad was stirring the gravy while sitting on a chair because his back hurt.  He sliced the turkey while sitting as well and so I kicked both of them out of the kitchen when it was time to do the dishes and all the girls did them.  Of course, my mom couldn't stay out and she popped back in and had to help.  That's my Mom for ya!  She is a character though and as usual had everyone laughing and loving her.
I neeeeeeed one of these!
Dave had to get home to release a missionary and so we left before I wanted to.  I came home and looked through the Black Friday ads but there wasn't a lot I need or want however, Taylor wants to go and so we are going to go because it's fun to spend time with him.  Hopefully I will be able to find some things to check off on my Christmas list!  It's coming so fast!

dear black friday, Taylor and I headed to Shopko about 7:15 am.  There was hardly anyone there!  So different from years past.  Now everyone goes on Thanksgiving day and I REFUSE!  Thanksgiving is family time and I feel bad how many people now have to leave their families and go work at the stores so we can leave our families and go shop at the stores.  There is just something so wrong about it.  I am so happy to see so many stores starting to say no more.  I hope it catches on and goes back to Friday only.  On the flip side, it sure does make it nicer for me because I don't have to fight the crowds anymore and I usually end up getting what I want.  Taylor was meeting his old teammates for some basketball and so I took him to Mickey D's and then dropped him home.  I then headed out to Riverdale because my phone decided to commit suicide again. Well, actually it was all me this time.  I put it in my back pocket and sat down on my tub sideboard on the tile and a jewel I had on my pocket cracked right through it!  Ugh!  I was sick!  I can NOT believe I did that!  And the crazy thing is I had just bought my shatterproof glass screen cover the day before but just hadn't taken the time to put it on!  UGH!  All of the money I saved by shopping the sales today was exchanged for an $80 phone bill for a new screen!  I tried to get into my phone repairman but his office was closed and so I luckily found a black Friday special at Ique and they were able to get me right in!  Whew!  Hard to live without that thing!  While it was getting fixed, I went to use it for so many things!  They fixed it while I shopped at Gordmans.  I felt like I was back to the good old days (not) and had to stand in a very long line to check out.  But it went fast so it wasn't too bad.  I also went to Home Depot and got some cool things for the guys.  Before I took my phone in, I stopped in downtown Ogden at a Rec Outlet store but they were out of what I was hoping to get.  I honestly would have only gone to Shopko today (possibly Walmart) if my phone hadn't needed an ER visit.  I am totally okay if I don't even make it out on Black Friday anymore.  Online shopping is the way to go if you ask me.  It is nice to save money on things you are going to buy anyway.  However, I saw this thought and I have to agree:

"As the old saying goes, a bargain is something you don’t need at a price you can’t resist. And nobody knows this better than Black Friday shoppers who come home and realize that, amidst the crazed kerfuffle, they’ve made a purchase that will be about as useful as the forgotten spinach salad on Thanksgiving."
~Liesl Nielsen, KSL

Saw this GIANT coin today!  I was so tempted!  But... read above thought.

dear saturday, I headed out fairly early and actually ran six miles this morning.  Pretty sad when six miles is your long run!  Hah, but I was grateful I could go that far!  That is the farthest I've ran in EIGHT WEEKS!  I hope I'm back but I could still feel the piriformas.  I will keep doing my strength exercises and force myself to take Advil and hopefully I can kick this thing once and for all!
Frost on the cattails!
Look who I found on my run! He was worn out from all that Black Friday shopping.
I went to Honeyville Grain and Hallmark to use some Black Friday coupons that hadn't expired yet.  I came home and Taylor had gone to work for his landscape job. I practiced the harp and did some cleaning and then got some roll dough mixed up and then went and picked up the Sister Missionaries. 

dear sister missionaries, I got asked to go with the Sister Missionaries again today.  I am always happy to do that if I have the time.  I am just hoping the Lord will bless me with some extra time now because I was really hoping to go get our tree during that time.  This next week is crazy busy and Christmas is now in full swing and I am starting to panic already!  I worry most about my poem and the calendars and of course getting things ready for company this year.  I am really not sure how I will do it all!  Praying for some heavenly help! 

The sisters weren't quite ready when I arrived and so I went and got some gas and then went back.  The only place we went today was to visit a lady who owns a craft store whom they had visited previously.  Sister Beckwith goes home on Monday!  I am so sad to see her go!  She is seriously one of, if not thee best sister missionary I have ever met.  She is so cute and her laugh just lights up the room with the spirit.  There is something very special about her and people open up to her.  She has a gift that was needed for this area.  I truly will miss her.  We talked and did a little shopping while in there and thankfully it wasn't busy and so we got a lot of time to just talk.  No religion was even brought up except at the end when Sister Beckwith shared how faith helps us through hard times.  This lady knew Officer Ellsworth the policeman who died this week and was pretty distraught over it.  I was so impressed with how they truly just wanted to friendship her and not push her.  I learn so much from going with them.  I enjoyed it very much.  

dear dinner with taylor, Dave and I took Taylor out to dinner before he headed back to school.  He choose Ricardo's but they were closed and so we went to El Toro.  I had my usual Mole' Enchiladas.  I ate more than I have in a long time because I was famished!  I will pay for that later!  When we got home, Dave's dad dropped by for a short visit.  He is such a great man. I love him so much and I have been blessed with such great in laws.  After he left, I hurried and made the rolls so Taylor could take some with him.  They turned out yummy but I was too full to even eat any.  You should never make homemade rolls when you are too full to enjoy them!  Other than, that way, you don't eat them so maybe that's the secret!  Hah
His cut is looking better.

dear sunday, twas a busy day and we got our first "real" snowstorm.  We went to Linda's for Trevor's birthday party.  We had fun talking about how exactly two years ago at his party, I had said that if Dave was put in as SP, I wouldn't sustain him. I was really only joking, but it was funny.  I had to eat those words!  We talked about the events of that weekend and Dave was telling them that Elder Ballard really liked me and called me a spunky little thing and I said, "I have no idea why he said that" and everyone immediately started to laugh and say sarcastically, "Oh we have no idea at all!".  Okay, I am spunky.  My Grandma Mae was spunky too so pretty sure I get it from her.  lol  


dear mr. cat, you spent a lot of time on my bed this week HIBERNATING!  Can't say I blame you though.  It's cold!  Our Indian Summer has turned into a Banshee Winter almost overnight!
Here ↓ I am with my cat named Lightning Mow. This popped up on my FB memories.  I had him for 17 years!  I loved that cat!  He was very affectionate and loved to be held and loved.

dear family pioneer recipe, my mom makes this steamed pudding EVERY year for Thanksgiving because her mother Mae made it EVERY year because her mother Violet made it EVERY year and her mother probably made it EVERY year too.  Guess who doesn't make it EVERY year?  Guess who has NEVER made it?  Yep.  Yours truly.  What a tradition breaker I am!  And yes, in case you didn't already know, my great grandma was named Violet!  Violet Grieve Sharp.  I wonder if there is some heavenly influence with my obsession with the color violet and her?  Hmm..... Would not be surprised!
 I am posting it here so it will always stay in the family even though I have never liked it.  In fact, I used to tell my mom to NOT make it because I thought it was so nasty.  But now that my taste buds have matured, I actually really like it except for the raisins!  They should be replaced with chocolate chips for sure!

*Interesting side note:  The recipe directly below it by Joyce Jensen is my brother's wife Allison's great grandmother.  So... my brother's great grandma and his wife's great grandma have a recipe on the same page!  How cool is that!?  However, I am not sure I would try hers since it has three raw eggs in it!


dear boys, I actually have some pix of all of them this week!  Taylor and his roomies cut down a real tree for Christmas and decorated their apartment with lights.  They are very festive.  These are the last pix I have of him before his new scar!
 (I stole them off of Snapchat)

 I don't have any pix actually of Bryce, but I do have some of his Christmas Light park he posted.  He is getting it ready to open this week! ↓
 He sent me this one!  ↓ LOVE IT!

 I stole this one off of FB of Sky and Sarah. I haven't met her yet, but she seems like a very nice person.

dear mckay,
 Brrrrr.........  At least he knows how to shovel snow!
 The American's fed them a Thanksgiving feast!  They had to get the turkey shipped in from Japan!
Mmmmmmm.....
Samurai Wine cooler

dear random, I found this sign in the basement!  This is what I used for the television broadcast for the spa blogging contest when we were all begging for votes and our signs had to show WHY we deserved their vote.  It is missing a few parts.  I finally threw it away.  But it was a fun memory!

The turks are back, just in time for Thanksgiving!  Actually, I am surprised so many of them are still alive considering what month it is!!
PURPLE Christmas tree!  Someone posted this and tagged me in it on FB. 
My bro sent me this!  It's in Layton somewhere.
Love this.  Thanks Facebook.

I don't love this one ↓....  Makes me sad.  It's Bro. Ellsworth's home.  The officer who died in the line of duty.


dear quotes,

"We are just a car crash, a diagnosis, an unexpected phone call, a new found love, or a broken heart away from becoming a completely different person. How beautifully fragile are we that so many things can take but a moment to alter who we are for forever."  ~Samuel Decor Thompson

  "Perfection is just a form of self abuse."

"Nobody will protect you from your suffering. You can't cry it away or eat it away or starve it away or walk it away or punch it away or even therapy it away. It's just there, and you have to survive it. You have to endure it. You have to live through it and love it and move on and be better for it and run as far as you can in the direction of your best and happiest dreams across the bridge that was built by your own desire to heal." -Cheryl Strayed

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