My little girl is growing up. These are some old pictures of Amber and I just wanted to share them. When she was in middle school, she signed up for the High School Lip Sync contest. I was terrified! That was really something I would never had done, and didn't want my little girl up on stage in front of a bunch of teenagers and parents. I didn't want her laughed at or made fun of or to experience any embarrassment at all! I tried to talk her out of it but she was determined to go through with this.

This is her performing her song. She was a natural at it and really seemed to be at home on the stage. Proving that our children are not us. She did a Hillary Duff song and the audience loved it. She won 2nd place! I was so excited for her.

Last weekend we had an Especially for Youth in Omaha. John Bytheway was speaking and we were all excited. Annette, my wonderful friend and second councilor, suggested that we get there early so we could have our youth in the front. This was a 4 stake event. And I'm glad we did. We got the 4th row from the front. Ben and Amber were able to come, Amber was a little late because of a Jazz Band competition, where they won first place, so pleased with her, but we had a seat saved for her up with our group. I was a little concerned about Ben, his idea a good time is not sitting in a church meeting in a shirt and tie on a Saturday. But when is was over he was smiling and said "I really liked that guy, he was funny!" Which is exactly what I wanted to here. I hope he got the spiritual message as well. After the speaker they had dinner, then the under 14 year olds had to go and then they had a dance. Amber really enjoys the dances. She said on the way home that she loves the church dances because it's a time when she can just let go and go crazy and not worry about what people are thinking about her, because everyone is going crazy. But just watching her dancing with the boys made me think of her upcoming birthday, when she turns 16! She's going to be starting a whole new chapter in her life. Scary time for a parent.
I'm so thankful for the Gospel. It's such a help when your having to raise kids. I kept thinking at the dance as I watched all those special "Mormon" kids dancing and having a great time, that the Church is a wonderful thing. You wish every child and teenager in the world could have that wonderful spirit of Christ in there lives to help them along and keep them on the right path. There was such a wonderful spirit in that church that night. One of our girls from our Branch, Kelsey, brought a non-member friend who is interested in the church because he noticed how different she was, he saw that special light in her eyes that a strong testimony of the gospel gives you. He wanted to know what that was all about. I hope he listened and that his spirit was touched.

Sunday was also great, we had our Branch President speak first and tell us that the process for us to have a new addition to our building has been set in motion. So the summer of 2011, our church will finally be getting that extra room we so desperately needed! So excited.

Doing good with the running thing. I wasn't able to get my long run in on Friday due to wind a few technical difficulties, and fighting children. I hope I'm ready for this marathon, time is short!

It's the little things

I must say that I have been in that winter depression the last month or so, and was lifted out of it a bit by one little thing I found in the chicken coop! My first egg since November! This tells me that spring isn't to far away.
Last night for our Young Women activity we planted little flower pots full of dirt and grass seed. We wanted our own little patch of spring. I can't believe how wonderful the smell of dirt can be. Nice moist good soil in the hands and the scent of it in the air was such a powerful thing. Brought me out a little bit more. After going through one of the hardest winters in Iowa, we are all ready for it to be over!

I've been doing some spring cleaning in the house, can't believe how dirty some things can get, put out some of my spring flower decorations, and I'm feeling pretty good. Okay can't blog any more. I have a date with the black top!!!

Busy crazy week

Whew! It's Friday. The start of Bret's call weekend which means pretty slow and nothing going on weekend. Thank goodness. I've been going like crazy these last couple of weeks trying to get the Young Women's New Beginnings Program all set up, (thanks so much to Annette and Allyson, my trusty counselors for all there help!) and then getting ready for my women's club meeting that I was hosting last night. Really doing a lot of deep cleaning, scrubbing of walls and floors and counters and cupboards, dusting anything and everything and vacuuming all the dirt up. I was wishing I could open all the windows for some nice fresh spring air, but that wasn't happening. So a couple of nice candles and some febreeze will add a nice fresh scent to a very clean house. The New Beginnings program didn't go as smoothly as I'd wanted it. I wasn't as prepared as I'd have liked to be for the program part of it. And we had some girls that I'd really hoped would come not come, and didn't have as many parents there as I'd had hoped. But we did have some fun and I think the girls got the message. I forgot the high-lite of the night, some necklaces that I'd ordered for the girls. So that was a bummer, but I'll get them to them on Sunday. Not the same though. The meeting last night was great. I love meeting with these women, they are a great inspiration to me, as well as good friends.

Amber had a busy night last night, she didn't get home until after 9, with the Soup and Song, supper, and Pep band for the girls basketball game, then play practice after that. She's a busy girl. Ben and Sam both had piano lessons. Ben is really doing so much better, he wasn't really liking it but now he's learning some cool songs, and is enjoying it a lot more. Had to get all the valentines stuff for Sam and Keaton's school parties, bought and put together for today, and run and get a few things from the store. Yeah really exciting.

I'm just glad this week is over.

Today we had no snow days or late starts, (like we did on Wednesday) and Keaton went to Preschool! I was so excited because I decided it was warm enough, 25 degrees, and it wasn't windy, so I went out to run! I did my 4 mile run on the hi-way even! The roads were clear and the shoulders had been plowed so I was able to go! My favorite is to run, run, run outside!!!!! I tell you though, running 4 miles outside is much harder than running inside on a treadmill! Lots of hill outside! Love it! After my run, I ran a few errands, then I had an hour before I needed to pick up Keaton, so I grabbed my Lord of the Rings book, Return of the King and headed to one of my favorite spots in Harlan, Hanson Brother's. I had a green pepper and bacon omelet and a carrot and blueberry specialty juice, that is freshly made, and I sat at a little table all by myself and ate and read my book. It was so nice.

I can't believe how much better I feel when I can get OUTSIDE and run. I so wish I could do that everyday. I hope it's not to windy tomorrow.

Sorry, I meant to do this yesterday, I've been busy planning the New Beginnings program for tomorrow night, and i also am having my women's club meeting here at my house on Thursday so I've cleaning like mad. My house is a bit messy from not cleaning it very well for a month. What can I say, I'm in that winter depression and haven't felt like doing anything.

I did run my 3 miles on Monday. I really need some new shoes. Nothing really exciting to add to this, still winter, still snowing, and blowing and still very cold. Roads are still a mess, the only time I go out side is to shovel my front steps, because the wind keeps blowing the snow and it drifts my steps up to the house closed. I have a pretty good trench dug out up to my house. The walls are 4 feet high. I can't stand this any more. Someone come and take me away!

Sam's Baptism

We had a wonderful day yesterday. My little Sam was baptized. It was very nice. Kevin and Jennie and their family came from Des Moines, and Sheri and Derek and their family came from Omaha, and we had some good friends there. Ryan Deakins conducted from the Branch Presidency. His wife Annette, played our prelude music. Amber led the music, Derek played the piano. Sheri gave a wonderful talk on baptism, and was talking about how being baptized washes away your sins, and in the middle of it Sam raised his hand and Sheri said "yes?" And he said "It's like magic water." Everyone got a little laugh, and it was so CUTE?

After Bret baptized Sam ,Bret comes out and asked me if I have a towel. I didn't. How was I supposed to know to bring towels! No one told me that! So Uncle Kevin comes to the rescue. He happens to have a hand towel that he just so happened to have accidentally slip into his suitcase from a hotel. So....yeah. Anyway problem solved. After Sam came back out to sit with me in his new suit, which he looked so nice in, Bret gave a wonderful talk on the Holy Ghost, tears were shed, and then he was confirmed a member of the Church and given the Holy Ghost. Then Lisa, a member of the primary presidency, welcomed him into the church, very nice. And little cousin Bryce gave the closing prayer. He did a great job. It was just a really nice sweet baptism. I loved it. After we went to Apple bees for dinner, it was packed! It was 5:00! What were all these people doing eating that early. But we had a great time, a little hectic but good food and fun. I forgot to mention that before we had the baptism we went to the KIA dealership to pick up a car for Amber to drive. It's a 2003 KIA Optima. She's beyond excited. Problem is she wont get her license until July. She has to take drivers-ed first. It's required here in Iowa. So a safe drive home in the falling snow and Kevin and Jennie stayed the night and we all had fun watching the Mario-cart wii tournament. Keaton and Ben were kicking butt. Beating Uncle Kevin and Bret! It was great.

Okay. As some of you know I'm going to be running a marathon with my wonderful sister Sandi in Seattle at the end of June. It will be my second one and I'm very excited about it. Especially since I did everything wrong in my training the first time and had problems with injuries. I know what I'm doing this time......I think.

I've let myself get out of shape over the last couple of months due to the amount of snow and cold and ice and rain and more snow we've been having. I have a really hard time with the treadmill and I've just been lazy. But Starting Monday I'm starting my training. I have 19 weeks until the big day and I have a lot of work to do. Especially since my sister is way ahead of me. She's up to doing 16 miles already. So if you don't mind I need to be accountable for my training so I'll be posting my progress on this blog. Also with the other things that are going on as well, cause how boring would that be if I only told you how many miles I ran that day. So Monday I need to run 3 miles. I know that doesn't sound like much, but you have to start somewhere. I have been running a couple of miles a few times a week for a few weeks now, so I feel I'm ready to up the miles a bit.

So bottom line if I don't run the miles I'm supposed to, I want to hear about it!
On to SEATTLE!