Food 4 Thought Friday

GET YOUR APPETITE ON and PLAY ALONG! Just copy and paste the questions to your blog and PLEASE leave a comment that you played along so others can go and check out your answers. These are so much fun to go back and read later!

*SPECIAL REQUEST:  Please add the link of this post on your Food 4 Thought Friday post so others can find it .  And please be sure and check out the answers of those who left a comment and spread the love!  


Welcome to Beacon of Hope's:

Food 4 Thought Friday!

A little feast without the calories!!

Feel free to play along for some yummy fun! I will post a new one each Thursday night. JOIN IN!!!

Food 4 Thought Friday ~ This week's questions:
♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ 
Breakfast ~ Post a few photos from your phone that most sums up your week and explain why.
Lunch ~ What are your weekend plans?
Dinner ~ What is something you have needed extra help with this week.
Midnight Snack ~ Name a song (or two) that you currently love.
Recipe of the Week ~ (instead of your recipe for life what is it just for the week?)  

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥
MY ANSWERS

Breakfast ~ Post a few photos from your phone that most sums up your week and explain why.

Okay HORRIBLE picture, but this one really sums it up!  It needs NO explanation.  It has been ONE WET WEEK!  It has rained constantly!  I LOVE IT!

I have also felt like my week has been like this!  Trying to paddle my way through the rough and fast current so I don't go under! Just trying to stay above water!  I have also felt like jumping out of the boat a time or two! LOL

And I've felt totally stuck in the mud as if I just can't get ahead and no matter what I'm not feeling like I am really progressing with all I have to do!

But....THIS one sums it up the best!  Feeling TOTALLY frazzled!!!  hah

Lunch ~ What are your weekend plans? Today I have a list of a million things to get done.  Then McKay is having his senior and mission pictures taken FINALLY (after five plus reschedules!).  Then he will be doing his "day date" for his last high school dance.  SO sad. We then have to go to Logan to a wedding reception for one of Taylor's friends.  She is a girl that him and all his friends shared the gospel with and she got baptized in high school and is now getting married in the temple. So awesome!  On Saturday, I was going to run a race but I am feeling like I have too much to do.  I am hoping to take McKay mission shopping and get a lot done, but he has his very last high school dance Purple and White and so I will be here to take photos of that.  Then we are hopefully going to the Mandarin in Bountiful with our friends (we've been planning this for months too but couldn't get four couple's schedules to work out until now!).  I really don't have time, but sometimes those kind of things are just as important as getting everything done.  I will also spend the day getting his graduation announcements done!  Yes, they are still not done!  Can't do them when you don't have the pictures yet!  GROAN!  And Sunday I will attend church and somehow try and become a little less frazzled!  Yeah right!


Dinner ~ What is something you have needed extra help with this week. Where do I start?  haha  It has been ONE of those weeks!  Mainly I have SO much to do that the pressure is starting to really pile up on me and so my anxiety level has really been high.  Trying to get a missionary ready for RUSSIA in less than two months has not been easy as well as trying to do all the graduation stuff on top of that too. Two months is just not long enough while they are also still in school full time.  I have spent at least twice as much time trying to find the right things for him to take than I did for my other sons.  Mainly because of how cold it is over there.  I have really needed to take the time to sincerely pray and when I do I feel so much more peace.  I make sure to not just pray, but to also listen and to write down what I hear and that is when I feel comforted and the peace I need.  Prayer has helped me survive. I am finally feeling some peace with the whole Russia thing too. 


Midnight Snack ~ Name a song (or two) that you currently love. I have no idea why, but I really LOVE Taylor Swift's song STYLE.  I could listen to it over and over!  And I did just that when running my final 8 miles of the marathon. I kept hitting repeat on my iPod and listened to it over and over and over.  No idea why, but I love so many of her songs.  I also love Blank Space.  If I am in the car, I will just belt it out as I drive. 

Recipe of the Week ~ (instead of your recipe for life what is it just for the week?) Breathe...just breathe!

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

 

*Monday Memos*

*MONDAY MEMOS*

            

 (If pictures are too small, just click to enlarge) 

dear mission prep, this is still ongoing!  There is still SO much to do, but it is coming slowly.  One thing that is stressing me out is the fact that I haven't really taught McKay how to cook.  Not sure why because I did my other boys.  Taylor didn't really know how either but not from my lack of trying to teach him.  He just preferred I did it for him. ☺ He did learn quite a bit on his mission.  Bryce is pretty good and Skyler is an amazing cook. I guess being the baby means you miss out on a lot of those things that happened before your mama mellowed out (or got tired!) about those kind of things. But...it's never too late!  McKay actually said he was going to cook dinner on Sunday but we didn't have ingredients for what he needed and so on Monday I told him I was going to teach him how to make homemade mashed potatoes and gravy to go with our chicken.  He did a great job and they turned out rather yummy!  I do worry he is going to starve because he really has very little experience in cooking.  If I could turn back time...  I posted on Facebook a week or so ago that I thought mission calls should be given when they are five so we moms have time to prepare them for where they are going to be serving. I guess we should be doing that anyway!

Mashing potatoes the Russian way (without smiling!) 

dear first run walk after the marathon... I tried to run on Tuesday, but my muscles were still really tight and sore.  I didn't push it and pretty much walked most of the time.  I knew if i pushed it, then I would pay for it and it would set me back and so I really took it easy.  I did find a penny in a very odd place and I saw my cute puppy friend Missy.  I also found a rattlesnake!  Check out the photo on the far right.  

 

Now that's my kind of rattlesnake.  Well, NO rattlesnake is my kind, but IF I had to pick one, that would be the kind.

dear missionary shopping, I went to Ogden and tried to get a few more things checked off my list, but wasn't very successful.  This is coming way too fast and I just pray that it will somehow all come together!  I am getting nervous because the days keep passing so fast and the list isn't shrinking, but getting longer!  

dear photo shoot for McKay, we had to cancel once AGAIN!  This must be three or four times now due to the weather or wisdom teeth or scheduling.  This time it was because McKay's face was super swollen after school on Wednesday and he was in a lot of pain from his wisdom tooth.  He took a pain pill (his first since the surgery last Friday) and it didn't even touch it. I called the oral surgeon and he said to get him in first thing in the morning the next day.  I told the surgeon I was afraid he had a dry socket.  When he examined him (OUCH!  He about jumped out of the chair!) he said that it wasn't a dry socket but he was pretty sure it was an infection.  He put him on antibiotics and said that it could be a piece of food lodged in the opening and then since he is so healthy, it healed so fast right over the top of it. If that is the case, then he needs to have more surgery to remove it.  He said to take a couple of the antibiotics first to see if that helps.  He also said he normally would have put him on antibiotics but the surgery was an easy one and he thought he would be fine and have no problems. He said in retrospect he just should have anyway.  I thought so too.

 On our way home.  He was still in a lot of pain.  But he wanted to go right back to school.  So I got him a shake and then he headed back.  He was doing much better when he got home from school, but the swelling was still not down and so we cancelled his pictures again.  After a couple of days the swelling started to go down and he had no more pain and so we are hoping that is the end of it.  I was getting frustrated with not being able to get his pictures done. It has been one thing after another totally out of our control. McKay in all his wisdom told me it was just Satan trying to discourage us.  I realized he was right and decided to just go with the flow and all will be well.

dear busy week, most of the week wasn't photo worthy, but I spent a lot of time working on speakers for the women's forum, picking up mission stuff (suit etc.) for McKay, cutting hair, shopping online for hard to find things for McKay's mission (scripture case, Under Armour, sweaters, etc.), buying and planting flowers for pots for my backyard, cooking, delivering gifts to friends, getting my windshield repaired, making food for a funeral, and dessert for a party I was so excited to go to for my friend Davaleen but I had to bag it because I was just so overwhelmed with getting things done for the mission, attending our Relief Society activity, which I thought was going to be totally different than it was or I wouldn't have gone. I thought the class was on the new electric pressure cooker, but it was on the regular kind.  And I also had to go to another long class on Dutch Oven cooking that I really didn't need to go to, but the one I wanted was after it, which ended up not being what I wanted anyway. I felt like I wasted a good two hours that I didn't have, but it was good to get away from it all for a bit and to just visit as well.

dear city league champs!  This was posted in the local newspaper.  Great job guys!

This was also on the USU website.

This was on Instagram....I wonder who posted that? ☺

dear mr. cat, now that is the life.  I can't even imagine having no worries other than worrying if it is raining or not and then if it is, to just go take a long nap and wait for it to stop. 

Just looking at you in such a relaxed state, helps relax me.

dear bryce, you are still in Hawaii.  You ended up staying a bit longer because you hadn't purchased your plane ticket home and so you could be flexible. Chris came home, but you stayed with Sky for another four or five days.  I AM JEALOUS!  Your tickets were a killer deal too!  I should have gone with!

 Some pictures you posted

dear taylor, I'm excited you got called to help with the activities in your summer single's ward.  It will be fun. I have decided that you are either holding food, eating food, or talking about what food there is to eat...probably about 90% of the time.

 
You went camping on Thursday night after it rained ALL day.  I made you and your friends Hobo dinners before you left.  Well, you and CJ also helped me.  It was fun having him over here.  He is such a cute kid and I love talking to him. He is just an all around awesome kid.  I also made some for us, and they were so yummy! I need to make them more often because we all really enjoyed them even if we cooked ours in the oven.

You got home from camping in the morning and then you got ready to go to the cabin with Weston.  I tried to get a good picture of you both as you were leaving but you were both being pooh heads and so I finally said, "Okay then just pull a face."  That worked.  You let me take it if you were pulling faces.  Hah... Weston NEVER lets me take his picture. So now I know, just tell him to pull a face and he will let me. ☺

dear girl's night out, Karen invited me to run the Cache Valley Color Vibe run with her and her girls.  She decided to stay in Logan the night before and to go to dinner before that.  Aubrey invited three of her friends (who were all darling!) and we met at Maddox and had a very delicious dinner.  Karen and I shared a turkey steak because we can never eat the entire thing and we couldn't doggy bag it because we weren't going home after.  We also decided to order a caramel bread pudding to try it out, but it wasn't anywhere near as good as Roosters or the Union Grills. 

We then headed to Walmart to try and find some outfits for our race.

We had a blast shopping and then headed to Logan and hit Walmart there and Smiths and finally found some great outfits!  We knew it would be raining and so we got some ponchos and jackets as well.
We had an amazing hotel room.  Karen has a time share thing at the Marriott and so we stayed there.  It was N I C E !  The girls went swimming while we discussed life and caught up.

The next morning even though it was POURING out, we got ready and ate breakfast (they had Johnny O donuts!) and headed to America West and got our race packets. 

WE WERE EXCITED!  Even in the rain!  It was really coming down!  I must have some kind of Karma thing going because nearly ALL of  my races this year have been in the rain!  This is the third or fourth!  I LOVE running in the rain!  Just not so much when it's a really long race, like a marathon.  But this one was only a 5K and so I was actually happy it was raining!  That was until I saw that the entire course was on a dirt road which meant M U D ! And lots of it! 

What a gorgeous scene!

We got a MUD RUN thrown in for no extra charge compliments of Mother Nature!

It was so muddy that the only time we could run was here in the muddy flood because it was the only spot with asphalt underneath!

GREEN!!!

PINK!!!
 
The best of all...PURPLE!!!  Cover me in that stuff please!

GO PURPLE POWER! 

I love looking at how colorful and just pretty these pictures are.  Look at how gorgeous!

THIS ↓ not so much....

A kids dream come true!  It was really quite fun to say the least!  We were laughing the entire time!

The party at the finish line!  MORE COLOR!

Now this is a cool shot!

Lots of pink.....too much for me!  WHY couldn't it be purple? ☺

We were TRYING to get a jumping picture...this is the best we got!  HAH!

One of my faves!

We were definitely COLOR VIBED!

What a blast!  A COLOR blast!

We will definitely do THIS one again!  Maybe next time it won't be raining.  But then what would the fun be without the rain AND mud! 

LOVE!

I can NOT believe I didn't take any photos of us getting in MY car after.  Talk about a mess!  We were covered in mud and colored chalk and soaking wet!  I had some plastic sheets to put on my seats but my color got a little color vibed too!  When we got back to the hotel we immediately washed all our shoes and clothes AND hats!  WHAT. A. MESS!  The pictures would have been awesome! Hopefully I'll remember next time! You should have seen the shower after!  Ours was BLUE! 

dear cabin, even though I was not planning on going to the cabin because we had McKay's pictures scheduled that afternoon, the rain changed all that.  Karen and the girls pleaded with me to go up with them and said how fun it would be and told me to just come.  I came home from the mud run -oops- I mean color run and asked McKay if he wanted to go to the cabin since we had to cancel his pictures.  He did!  I was really torn because I felt like I needed to stay home and take McKay shopping and get his stuff bought for his mission, but I also felt like this would be time well spent and we could do the shopping next week even if I have to pull him out of school for a day.  Oh the stress of some decisions!  But, I really felt strongly we needed to go to the cabin.  Hopefully all will fall into place with the other.  I tried to get Dave to, but he had a huge meeting with our area authority that he couldn't get out of on Sunday.  I told him that it was our last chance to go to the cabin before McKay leaves, but he just couldn't do it at the last minute.  We felt bad, but I knew an opportunity when it comes and so we took it.  Taylor was already up there with Weston and Karen and the girls were on their way.  So off we went!  What a gorgeous drive.  Especially in the rain! 

Check out this rainbow we saw just as we were getting close to Alpine. WOW!

The cabin is always fun to get away to for a time.  It was even more fun this time because for some reason when everyone is on top of each other, you feel closer!  haha

We had a large group for such a small place, but we managed to sleep everyone comfortably!

Dave's parents also came.  They manage to sleep comfortably anywhere!  hehe  Isn't that the sweetest thing you've ever seen? 

The cabin is always the best place for cousin time! 
Even better when your girl cousins bring up their cute friends...(if you are a boy named Taylor or McKay that is!)

Taylor and McKay enjoyed getting to know Aubrey's friends. 

What a good looking group of kids!
These were taken after church.  We always go to church in Etna when we are there.

The cousins.  These guys are best friends.

My studs!  They have a glow about them in this picture.

Happily Dave surprised us by showing up on Sunday afternoon!  We found him some food and it was nice he made it up and Barry also drove up Sunday afternoon.  We had 13 total at that point.  It's a long drive to go up for just one night (3.5 hours) but glad they made it!

On Monday morning, Dave and I drove up to check out the Snake river and the Grey's river.  They were really full this year!  We saw these deer on the way up.

We took advantage of our beautiful surroundings and got some photos.

Then we watched this guy surf the snake!  He was amazing. I can see my Bryce doing this someday!

We headed back and Dave really wanted to take the boys rafting down the Snake.  I wasn't really thinking it was a good idea because Lunch Counter was SO full and it looked like suicide to me.  He really wanted to. They talked the girls into it but after I told them how high it was this year, they changed their minds.  I really didn't think it was a good idea, but he took the boys anyway.

Taylor really tried to talk the girls into it (he was really working his charm!) and Hadley did want to go but Callie didn't and so they all didn't.  I could tell Taylor and Hadley both felt bad. Those two kind of had a little flirting thing going on.  It was cute.  She came down and watched them launch the boat.

Then we headed to Lunch Counter to watch them go through it.

NOTICE the surfer still in the waves as they are coming through!  Good thing they took the path on the side instead of straight through.

They made it look like a piece of cake.  The girls were wishing they had gone now.  Me too!  I love rafting the Snake!  I just thought it would be super cold (it had been raining most of the day) and more dangerous than usual.  Guess I was wrong on both counts!  Dang!  Oh well, there's always the family reunion in July to do it again!

We got back to the cabin and packed up and headed out fast!  The boys were supposed to leave as soon as we got home to go sky diving in Moab!  We booked it home and got caught in several torrential rain storms and a couple of hail storms too!  When we were by Devil's Creek I thought I was going to go off the road. I have NEVER driven in a rain storm quite like that in my life! It was coming down SO hard and SO fast and I could barely see out of my window.  Dave was following me and he said he couldn't see and so just followed the yellow line.  He had no idea if anyone was in front of him or in back.  There were several cars off the side of the road that and a couple of wrecks.  IT WAS CRAZY!  My wipers were on full speed and it wasn't fast enough!  It was also SO loud!  But also fun!  I had the radio cranked up too and I just enjoyed myself.  I was white knuckling it a few times though, but we arrived home safe and sound. 

When we got home Bryce was home from Hawaii but not feeling too well and very jet lagged.  They were getting ready to head out the door for a five hour drive to Moab.  They didn't have a place to stay that night (they were just winging it) and Taylor had to be back by 4:00 for a test the next day and so they were going to have McKay drive so he could study.  Um.....no!  Not on Memorial Day and not through the deadliest road in Utah (Spanish Fork Canyon). We did NOT feel good about it at all.  If they had not floated the Snake and we had got home at 1:00 like planned, then it would have been different.  But it was now 5:00 and we just didn't think it was smart OR safe.  We talked them into postponing it. They were bummed but Dave and I both felt that was the best and smartest decision.  What a relief!

dear much needed quotes this week:

Been putting this to the test this week! ↑

Hahahaha!

dear heavenly messages this week, this one came on Wednesday and WOW!  It could not have been more timely or more perfect for what I needed to hear that day!

Today we believe God wants us to know that ...

if you're feeling in a slump, allow the winds of change to blow through your life.

Life is a learning process, and changes can be wonderful opportunities for growth. Don't be afraid of change! Embrace it and grow!

Oh so much change is coming my way and I'm not being very open to embracing it at all!  Guess I better start trying harder!

These others were post worthy too:

Today, Jodi, we believe God wants you to know that ...

it's okay to ask for help. You are not here to do it all alone. That would be crazy! Do you know how to grow rice, spin yard or make electricity? No one does it all alone. That's why people have each other. Relying on and supporting each other is what makes the world go round. Don't be shy about asking for help.

Today, Jodi, we believe God wants you to know that ...your unspoken prayers will be answered. Yes, God knows you, God hears you, God loves you, God is there for you. You are blessed.