Jennie Jen Jen

One of my best friends, Jennie Commons, ran her first marathon today in under 2 hours (I think she did under 9 minute miles, which is awesome!!!).

So PROUD of her!!

I don' know how she did it... training all winter semester at BYU-I (which is really cold if you didn't already know), plus getting a 4.0 for the semester with beastie classes like anatomy and that stuff required for nursing, and still being a wonderful friend and wife to her husband.

Dang girl! How do you do it?!

To me, she's an example of how amazing you can be if you have goals and work towards them.

Love you Jennie Babe!!

Biking in the Rain :)

So much on my mind right now :)

So I moved out of Provo and I'm back with my family. Love them so much! Last night my little brother and I decided we wanted to make cookies, but we were out of chocolate chips, so I convinced him to grab some bikes and then we'd head over to the local Wal-Mart to find some of our missing ingredient. As we headed off on our journey, I realized that the wet roads from the rain were not conducive to keeping my clothing dry and clean.

Oh, well! So we got to Wal-Mart, and I had this stripe of wet and dirt going from my mid-back to the crotch of my shorts. Haha I looked like some skunk wanna be! We wandered our way through the store trying to find the chocolate chips, and when we did, they were out of normal ones! AHHH!! So we got minis instead. FOR CUTE :)

Anywho, as we were on our way out, we ran into a friend of my older brother's (he was also a friend of mine and was in one of my classes in high school) who just got back from his mission in TX the night before. Good to see him and see that he's doing well.

So we then checked out and headed on our way home. AND IT STARTED TO POUR! This is a strange phenomenon in UT...it never pours, it rains slightly. But this time it was pouring, and we both got D-R-E-N-C-H-E-D. So much fun though!! We got home and we were dripping, so we took a quick warm shower and then went to make our cookies.

Definitely one of life's greatest pleasures! :D Wouldn't trade that experience for anything!

Oh, and then after cookies...we decided to have a music party. Benj pulled out music from Owl City and we tried to figure it out for a while (him on the piano and me on my guitar), but it was new to both of us so we decided to go with something a little more known. He pulled out 100 Years and we jammed to that until Michael came home and distracted us.

Love times like this :D

Today was snowy on my way to work. Weird. We had a department meeting, which are usually boring since pretty much nothing they say applies to me as I am a student employee and not faculty. This time though, there was a quote on the agenda that kept me quite mentally entertained during the meeting. It's from a BYU-Idaho devotional given on May 29, 2007 by Kenneth L. Southwick:

"What is the great measure of my discipleship?... I would like to suggest the following: the great measure of our discipleship is how we view others... Do we see others as a spirit son or daughter of God, as a person, as a human being, as a soul of infinite worth? Or do we see them as something less?... Now what do I mean when I say, "We see others as something less than what they are?" I will give you five examples and... for each of these I am going to hold up an object. I do that on purpose because when we see others as less than who they really are we see them as objects.

The first object is a check list - one that you can put on your refrigerator with magnets or that sits on the corner of your desk. Sometimes, instead of seeing another as a person to be served, we see them as a task to be accomplished.

The next object is a bunch of grapes. Sometimes we see others not as an individual, but only as a member of some group.

The third object is a can of mosquito spray. Sometimes we see others not as a person but as a pest or a nuisance, an annoyance to be dealt with, postponed, simply endured, or avoided altogether.

The next one is a TV remote... Sometimes... we view others as an interruption.

The last object is a mirror. Sometimes we see others as a mirror. When we do this... we are more interested in the other person's opinion of us than we are the other person.

This list... presents us with an opportunity to learn, to change, to grow, and to become more like the Savior."

WOW!! Talk about a smack on the head!! I feel horrible now that I realize how terrible I have been to some people I have met or known. I am so sorry! If I've ever treated you as an object, please, please, please forgive me. Now I see that it's not so much how we treat others that matters, but how we view them, for we will treat them as we view them. I need to be better at this, and I know I won't be perfect right away. It will take some work, but I'm willing to try, I need to try, I must try.

I need to be better at seeing those around me as people with a divine inheritance, rather than objects to be maneuvered or removed. Again, I'm sorry if I ever treated you like an object (and chances are, I did on multiple occasions).

Well, I'm ready to go head up to Alaska in about a week and a half. I'm gonna take what I've learned and do my best to apply it there so I can come back a better person. :) So excited to see the wonderful area of Juneau! Already got some great advice from people who have been there or know someone currently living there who I could contact! :)

Picture Sayings I found.....

I think we all need a little humor in our lives....so I'm going to take a moment and review a moment in my life; hope it makes you laugh:

So the other day I went in to work and my boss gave me a list of people I needed to call to inform them about a glitch in our system when they registered for a conference. Excited for something to do, I took the list and immediately picked up the phone to start calling. To get out off campus, I have to dial 9 first. If I'm calling long distance, I then have to dial 1 before the area code and number. I did so, but my finger stayed a little too long on 1 and it ended up going twice. Now, I'm not sure if you've ever tried that before, but immediately after you dial 911, no matter what you do after, it rings right to the emergency line and there's no going back. So, knowing that they would just call back to see if everything was alright anyways, I just hung up. Moments passed and no call came in. I started to get hopeful, maybe they never even received the call :) ... Ah, too soon, the boss over the whole department came into the office and asked if anyone dialed 911. OOPS! I swear my face got as red as a tomato as I sheepishly muttered that I had on accident. He asked if everything was ok, I responded yes, and he left to go tell the emergency operator who had called him.

Oh man! I felt so dumb right then. In front of the department head! Oh my, oh my! :S

It's My Life

"It's my life

It's now or never.

I ain't gonna live forever.

I just wanna live while I'm alive."

This is my life, and I get to choose what I make of it.

I get to choose who I become.

I get to choose what I learn.

And I get to choose to be happy every single day I'm alive.

This is my life, and it's beautiful!

It's not the situation, circumstance, or people around me that make me happy.

It's me, my spirit, and the Spirit inside me that are the light of joy.

Happiness is a decision I get to make each day.

:D

"This is your life,

Are you who you want to be?"

Wonderful Things I've Learned Today

1. Nobody is perfect, but the good of a person is a better indication of who he/she is than the mistakes and sins.

2. Judge not, for ye know not.

3. I see who you want to be, I know who you are, let me help you become the former.

4. "Can you play baseball?" "Yes!...But I don't know how yet." - We CAN do anything, we just may not know HOW...yet.

5. I believe people honestly want to change and to be better. I must do what I can to help them learn how and be very careful not to hinder their process by judging them.

6. Life is beautiful and the Gospel of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is truth.

God

I've been thinking quite a bit this week about God; who He is, what His characteristics are, etc.

I tried to imagine Him in my head and see how I perceive Him.

It was quite an interesting thing to look at.

Then I looked at how my perception of Him influences how I make decisions in life (especially the major ones).

That was also incredibly insightful.

If you haven't thought of it yet, I highly encourage you to honesty ask yourself how you see God. Likely you've never actually seen Him, but what kind of person do you think He is?

Divorce... :(

I found out yesterday that another one of my friends is getting divorced. That's two who were married and divorced in two years because their husbands were unfaithful.

It's depressing.

To them and to me.

There's gotta be guys out there with high standards who are strong enough to avoid and resist temptation right?

Come on guys, you can do it. Don't give in!

NT - Paul, Peter, Mark and Rome

Cool connection between the four I learned this week...

Paul was in Rome under house arrest for two years. Mark stood by his side as a scribe while many others who were with him apostatized). Then, after Paul is executed, Mark becomes a scribe for Peter who is also in Rome (although he may have come after Paul's execution).

Formula For Beauty

For attractive lips:

speak words of kindness.

For lovely eyes:

seek out the good in people.

For a slim figure:

share your food with the hungry.

For beautiful hair:

let a child run his or her fingers through it once a day.

For poise:

walk with the knowledge you'll never walk alone.

People, even more than things, have to be

restored,

renewed,

revived,

reclaimed,

and redeemed;

Never throw out anybody.

Remember, if you ever need a helping hand,

you'll find one at the end of your arm.

As you grow older, you will discover that you have two hands,

one for helping yourself, the other for helping others.

The beauty of a woman is not in the clothes she wears,

the figure that she carries,

or the way she combs her hair.

The beauty of a woman must be seen from in her eyes,

because that is the doorway to her heart,

the place where love resides.

The beauty of a woman is not in a facial mole,

but true beauty in a woman is reflected in her soul.

It is the caring that she lovingly gives,

the passion that she shows,

and the beauty of a woman with passing years only grows!