25

My thoughts....
If I were to have a baby this year, my oldest child would only be 14 when I turn 40! That means I will be really old when my kids are all grown. No, I'm not pregnant, although I have had three different people ask me if I am in the last 2 weeks. Thanks!
I did think by now I would have at least one, maybe two kids. Life really hasn't turned out like I had planned. When I graduated high school I thought I would go to college for a year and then marry someone that I met at college. Turns out, I finished college, then married someone I met at home.
I thought I might be young women's president someday, when I was like 30 and had a daughter who would be in YW in a few years. Turns out I am 25 and YW president with no kids.
I thought I would work at my current job for maybe a year and then find something better. After three years I'm still here and haven't found anything better.
I never thought I would have a brand new home that I really like, the car of my dreams, or a Yorkie, and I would have been okay without all of these things.
The thing is, I am pretty content with how things are right now most of the time. That's a blessing I am very grateful for. We all have things in life that aren't what we planned in our heads while day dreaming through those boring classes. We all have things that we would change if we could. But, isn't being content pretty good? I can think of a lot worse things. Life is hard, and if we can get through it and be okay with God's plans and the way he has made things, I think that's pretty good.

"Some blessings come soon, some come late, and some don't come until heaven; but for those who embrace the gospel of Jesus Christ, they come."
Jeffrey R. Holland

Vegas Vacation

We were able to get away for a few days and go down to Las Vegas. We went with my parents, my sister, brother-in-law, aunt, uncle, and two cousins. It was a pretty good time. Here is a little bit of what we did.

1. ConExpo/ ConAg

This is the largest construction expo in the world and is held every three years in Vegas. I have been to the last four I think, maybe 5. There is so much cool stuff there to see if you are into that sort of thing. The most fun thing to do though is walk around and collect free junk. That's why my mom, my sister and I did. I think Michelle left with about 40 pens.

Does anyone watch America's Best Dance Crew? Well if you ever have, these guys were on it. Their group is called Break Skate. They performed at the expo.

2. Limo Ride

We rode the monorail to the strip one night to find dinner and do some sight seeing. Well, the monorail broke down on us, so we did more walking than we had planned. When we got ready to go back to the hotel it was still broke down. Instead of paying for three taxis we decided to get a limo for the same price. I felt pretty cool and kept saying, "We're in a limo" (inside joke).

3. MGM and Lady Gaga confusion

One morning we went to the MGM to eat at the Rainforest Cafe. We knew that Lady Gaga had a concert there that night and saw her convoy parked in the parking lot on the way there. We were walking in and passed someone who looked kinda like her. I asked my cousin if it was her, but she said it wasn't. When we got in and sat down my other cousin was talking about how she thought it was her. I got on my phone and looked at some pictures and found out how tall she was. This all made me sure it was her. Later we were walking around and saw the same girl. After having a better look we could tell it wasn't her, but they did look similar. My sister Michelle loved sitting by the fish tank. We also went to see the lions again.

4. Le Reve

We got tickets for Le Reve at the Wynn. It was awesome. It is like a Cirque de Soleil, but not, and it is in water. The people in it were very talented. I did not understand the plot, but seeing what those people could do was amazing. We couldn't take pictures of the show, but this is Michelle and Wes before the show started. 5. The Wynn We walked around the Wynn after Le Reve and I felt like we were the Clampets. This is a picture of a waterfall that is outside by a little restraunt. Someday I want to get all fancied up and eat there.

6. The wax museum

We finally were able to see Lady Gaga. Too bad she was just made of wax. Sorry for the horrible picture of me. BAD HAIR DAY! Kit also had fun punching Jeff Gordon in the face. I kept waiting for some of the figures to start moving or slap me for getting to close to them.

7. Heston's got a girlfriend

Heston came down for a day and brought his girlfriend. This was my first time meeting her. Turns out she is real nice and would marry him tomorrow if he would get off his duff and ask her. I think after all those conference talks last week it won't be too long.

8. Please stop breast feeding your 3 year old.

We went to Circus Circus where we were able to see a 36 month old being breast fed. Yeah, I thought this lady just had a large boob, until everyone pointed out the kids feet and legs sticking out of the bottom of her shirt.

We left Sunday morning. Overall it was a fun trip, but four days is way too many to spend in Vegas, especially when all of the college kids come in for Spring Break while you're there. Turns out we missed a ton of celebs who were in town. Here's the list: Fergie and Josh Duhamel (see previous post), Britney Spears (did see her at the wax museum though), Lady Gaga (also at wax museum), Vince Neil, Flo-Rida, and who knows who else.

20 + 1

A photo of something that makes me happy

Miss Koda

Instead of kids, we have Koda. She makes me smile almost everday.

Funny story: I have this little candy dish that I put on our coffee table. I kept finding hershey's kiss wrappers everywhere. I assumed it was Kit because I always find wrappers laying around from him. So one day I come home and there are like ten on the floor in front of the coffee table. I knew that Kit couldn't have done it, so I started looking around and found Koda's little muddy paw prints all over my coffee table. She's been crawling up there and eating the kisses. Her little heart beat so hard all night, but she didn't get sick.

TwenTy

The meaning behind my blog name.....

Well....

All because two people fell in love

NiNeTeEn

Another picture of me....

Okay, this is kind of a lame picture, but I don't have any pictures of me by myself unless I take them and you probably don't want to see those.

8-teen

Something I crave a lot is

Mt. Dew is my vice. And I love brownies of any kind, but two bites are an old love. These two things together seem to make life look better when I'm feeling down.

Seventeen- Photo of the fam...

This is the most recent family photo we have. There are few additions since then. Traci married Cole, who had two kids, Jayden and Brooke, together they have Presley, Baily married Del, and Heather and Bret added little Laken. I pretty much have the best family in the world. Love them soo, soo much.

16... your celebrity crush

This one was actually kinda hard for me. I find a lot of actors attractive, but one major crush... I dunno.

So I picked 3!

Ladies, let me introduce you to......

Kristopher Polaha

Josh Duhamel

And James Marsden.




ENJOY!

Day 15 - Something I won't leave the house without

Well.... my phone

and chapstick

Day 14...

Days 9 to 13 seemed kind of boring to me and let's be honest, I'm too lazy to take pictures, so you get day 14.... A show I am currently addicted to. There's lots to choose from, but this one makes me late for work, keeps me up late at night, gets put before cleaning my house and doing my laundry, and I talk to most people I run into about it. It's funny because when this show was actually on, I wasn't in to it. Now it fills up my DVR. Thanks to this show I had a very hard time not calling a certain PA at the night clinic a DUMBA$$ when I took my little brother in and I've been thinking about creative ways to get ones foot or other object in someone else's a$$ (does doing $ signs instead of s's make me any better of a person? probably not). I hope that someone guessed this show by the last sentence.

Hanging out,

down the street.

The same old thing

we did last week.

Not a thing to do,

But TALK to you.

We're all alright!

We're all alright!

If you don't already, I suggest you start watching this show. You never know when a good line from Red will come in handy.

This post has nothing to do with the 30 day challenge

Do any of you remember this show about a robot girl who is adopted by a human family and could clean the entire house in about 2 seconds?

What about this one, with Ben Savage's older brother Fred?

I was thinking about tv shows I used to watch as a tiny tot in the 80's and these are some of my favorites.

Who's the Boss, with the oh so funny and charming manny (male nanny).

Mr. Belvedere, the babysitter of three bratty kids who is is secretly writing a novel about the community.

Kirk Cameron was such a hottie in Growing Pains, I especially loved the episodes with Leonardo DiCaprio.



Another one about a babysitter, Charles in Charge (of our days and our nights).

Who didn't love ALF...

And Golden Girls?

And probably my most watched show.... Full House.

These are just the non-cartoon shows I watched. I must have been in front of the tv all the time.

So what shows did you watch as a kid?

Day 8 - A Song To Match Your Mood

At 7:52 AM - Forget You by Cee-lo Green

Day 7 - Your Dream Wedding

Of course I'm going to talk about my wedding because I thought it was pretty perfect. I worried about the weather because we were having an outside reception, but there were blue skies and it did not reach 100 degrees.... just 98. I was a little sad that there wasn't a chocolate fountain, but I didn't get to eat any of the food anyway, so it didn't matter.

The couple...

The decorations...

The cutest niece ever!

Kit's truck...haha

The food that I didn't get to eat...

My beautiful cake. It turned out perfect!!!

My beautiful sisters and me
I think this little romance was rekindled at our reception (Kandice and Cody)


Oh... and did I mention that Chant, my brother-in-law, had this awesome mullet???

It was a great day!

Day 6 – A photo of an animal you’d love to keep as a pet.

Someday I have to have a West Highland Terrier. Everytime I see one on a Milk Bone box or the Caesars commercials I tell Kit how cute they are and how much I love them. I think Koda would get along great with one, too.

Day 5 – A photo of yourself two years ago.

This is us in Hawaii about two years ago. We never take pictures and when we do, we are both in them.

Day 4 – Your favorite photograph of your best friend.

So this one was kinda hard because I don't really hang out with friends anymore, but my best friend friend is Kandice. This picture was taken on our last day of college. Yay! There were more favorites, but I thought I wouldn't embarrass either one of us.

Now that I am old and married, I mostly just hang out with the fam. I have a few faves of Baily. This one is just a funny face that makes me laugh.

This one is when we had to share a room and bed for a while and she was pretending to be a banana. We had good times

Here's the rest of the sisters. I think they all look really pretty in this picture.

LOVE ALL THESE GIRLS!!!

Day 3.... The perfect first date

Eating somewhere yummy, like Tucanos, and then going to a Jazz game...... Oh wait, that's what I'm doing tonight! Pretty much perfect, I'd say.

I actually hate first dates, so I'm glad I'm past that point in my life.

Day 2... My Job

I work for the Division of Child and Family Services as a caseworker in the out-of-home unit. I have my social service worker license (all that means is that I make more money than I did before I had it). My main responsibilities are to make sure my kids are safe, have food and clothing, and are going to school. I work with their bio families to try to prepare them for the kids to come home. I make sure they are attending therapy and receiving all of the support they need to be successful on their own. If it becomes obvious that the parents aren't going to get their crap together I either work with the kid to help them get ready to be on their own or work towards adoption with the foster family, it depends mostly on the age of the child. I spend a lot of time in the car and a lot of time on the phone, which is not one of my favorite thing. I also go to court a few times a month and have had to testify on the stand on a few occasions. That scares me still.

I love that I have Fridays off, but I hate working 10 hour days Monday-Thursday. I love seeing little ones get adopted by great people, but hate seeing parents who don't or can't get their lives in order. I love getting paid to care, but I hate that I think about work all the time. It is a very emotionally draining job, but it can be rewarding.

30 Day Blog Challenge

I'm totally stealing this from someone. I never know what to blog about. The only interesting thing are the audible books I listen to while driving, so this is perfect for me! So here goes day 1: A picture of myself and ten facts:

1. I have been married for over 2 1/2 years.

2. I live in Roosevelt in a great home.

3. I am 24. YIKES!

4. I have no idea what my natural hair color looks like, but think it's probably not as bad as I thought it was when I was 16 and decided to start dying it.

5. I'm the youngest of four girls, or the middle of 7 children. Confusing, I know.

6. I love my little dog, Koda.

7. Mt. Dew and Chocolate are my weaknesses.

8. I'm the Young Women's president in my ward.

9. I have my dream car.

10. I love being with my family more than anything else. It's even better if I can be with my family at Disneyland or somewhere warm.

30 Day Blog Challenge:

Day 01 - A picture of yourself with ten facts
Day 2 – Tell us about your job.
Day 3 – Your idea of the perfect first date.
Day 4 – Your favorite photograph of your best friend.
Day 5 – A photo of yourself two years ago.
Day 6 – A photo of an animal you’d love to keep as a pet.
Day 7 – Your dream wedding.
Day 8 – A song to match your mood.
Day 9 – A photo of the item you last purchased.
Day 10 – A photo of your favorite place to eat.
Day 11 – What’s in your makeup bag?
Day 12 – A photograph of the town you live in.
Day 13 – Your favorite musician and why?
Day 14 – A TV show you’re currently addicted to.
Day 15 – Something you don’t leave the house without.
Day 16 – Your celebrity crush.
Day 17 – A photo of you and your family.
Day 18 – Something you crave a lot.
Day 19 – Another picture of yourself.
Day 20 – The meaning behind your blog name.
Day 21 – A photo of something that makes you happy.
Day 22 – A letter to someone who has hurt you recently.
Day 23 – 15 facts about you.
Day 24 – A photo of something that means a lot to you.
Day 25 – What’s in your purse?
Day 26 – A photo of somewhere you’ve been to.
Day 27 – A picture of you last year and now and how have you changed since then?
Day 28 – Your favorite movie.
Day 29 - Your biggest Pet Peeve
Day 30 – Something you could never get tired of doing.
Day 31 – A photograph of yourself today + three good things that have happened to you today.

New Year's Resolutions... I guess

I don't really make resolutions because I am horrible at following through. As 2010 ended I thought of the things I would like to improve on in 2011. Two things top my list and I feel that both will make me a better person. One is that I would like to work hard on my personal progress. I've read through the book and I know that the projects in there are things that I should be doing anyway. I want and need to grow closer to my Heavenly Father. I want and need to be a better wife/daughter/sister/friend/yw leader. I want and need to have more confidence in myself. All of these things I can have and be if I will follow through and complete it. So... here is the goal... to complete my personal progress by Dec. 31, 2011. Wish me luck!
My second goal is to lose some weight (It bugs me when people say they just want to be more healthy). I am going to use this as one of my personal progress projects. So far I haven't lost any weight, but I have been getting up in the morning before work (at 5 AM, ugh!) to get on the treadmill. Last week I did this 3 mornings. This week so far I have got up both mornings and I'm incorporating the slim fast diet. We'll see how that goes...... I feel much better when I exercise and drink a lot of water. My body just seems to function better.
I'm hoping that by doing these two things I will find other parts of my life going better. Good luck to all of you with your goals in 2011!