Happiness & Truths

So last conference I didn't get the chance to listen because i was having fantastic, and much overdo, girls weekend with friends from College. That doesn't excuse me from not watching or reading, that I know, but this year has been a major growth one for me, and since not watching conference, I have been craving it! Well yesterday was the General Relief Society Broadcast, and once again, was unable to watch it (last night) due to my father in law's 50th birthday party - Happy Birthday again Jeff!! But this time I did TiVo it and was able to watch it this morning. Not as much fun watching that at home as in the church, but it was still uplifting!

The General RS presidency spoke, and they did great jobs!! I enjoyed Sister Allred's talk about Temples - I always love to hear about the Temples, they are amazing and fantastic!! If you haven't had a chance to go, get there!! Even if it's just to the grounds! And I really Enjoyed Sister Thompson's talk on Service. She speaks very well. But the highlight of it was Elder Uchtdorf, who is awesome!

Elder Uchtdorf, for those of you who aren't members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, is the second counselor in the First Presidency of the Church. He addressed the trials that we face as women, and did not, in the least negate or tell us that they weren't important. In fact, it was the opposite. He told us that every struggle, no matter how insignificant it may seem, is big to that individual, and he understands, and feels for each one.

Admittedly, I am HORRIBLE with short term memory, and won't do his talk justice. But the thing that stood out the very most to me, was instead of waiting and wondering where the answers were to our prayers, he told us to think of the last time we were an answer to someone else's prayers. I thought that was awesome. I have had people come into my life who were answers to my prayers.

While I was going through my hardest times, my bishop counseled me to pay attention to the spirit and do whatever thought came into my mind. I found that the spirit directed me a lot! And it was in all areas of my life. So, I am going to do my best, to continue to listen to that spirit, and hopefully strive to be an answer to someone (or several) prayers. I believe that if we try to do that, our own prayers would be answered, and we would have more peace in our lives.

I encourage all of you to watch or read, especially Uchtdorfs talk from the General RS broadcast. And especially to watch General Conference next weekend. I don't care what faith you are or aren't, there are fantastic words of wisdom taught in those 4 sessions and in this scary world we live in today, a little peace and encouragement is always nice.

I love you all!

Stuff and Stuff

Hee hee hee. I like my titles! Anyway, how bout a bit of updates . . . eh? :-)

Last Wednesday Makayla came home from school happy and ready to play. I went to change her clothes and all down the right side of her body were . . . spots!! Chicken pox!! ("the pox, the pox, how delightful the pox!! - name that movie!!) Well it wasn't delightful, but it also wasn't itchy, and she had no fever. So I called the Dr. They said they won't see kids with the chicken pox, so I had to watch them for 24-48 hours, if it was the pox then they would scab over, if not, bring her in and we'll see . . . yeah right, but I'll get to that story in a sec. Anyway, so she had to stay home from school on Thursday and Friday - no scabbing, no itching, no fever. She was BORED out of her mind!! In fact on Thursday afternoon she asked if she could go play, i told her no and she said, "oh this is BORING! Let's hope this doesn't happen again!" I laughed; Mak is funny! Anyway, Friday, same story second chapter.

Well Saturday rolls around, and I am set to go with Danielle to find a wedding dress (which we found and it's GORGEOUS!! Daniel is going to die!! Anyway, so Nate decides to take her to the doctor. Apparently our original Dr. has moved to California, and has been replaced by an older lady who apparently can't see!! She took a look at them and said, "well it's not chicken pox (duh!) and it's not an allergic reaction (never thought it was) it must be a bug bit!!!" Are you freaking kidding me!?!?! 37 bug bits and she didn't feel a thing and the spots had little white heads?!? She didn't even test them!! Well, it turned out to be Rosiola. It only lasts three days, and honestly, by Saturday afternoon, they started fading. By Monday they were practically all gone!! I'm done with dumb doctors and RIDICULOUS insurance premiums that we have to pay huge deductibles for!! I'm all about moving to Canada!! Veltman, make room for us! :-)

Makayla is continuing to do well in school. She is enjoying it and making lots of friends (and even has a little crush!) She won't tell me about it, but she tells Cindee about it and Cindee tells me. Friday, we had the Fall Festival. That was crazy and fun. Makayla got to do the Cake walk, get her face painted, get a heart balloon made, and have fun with friends from class as well as Thomas and Chase. I meant to take pictures, but during the cake walk, she was dancing around the circle and I thought i was going to die laughing!! It was soo funny! I did video it, but no pictures. Sorry.

As for Nate, work is just busy, crazy and dumb. That's my opinion. Although he was able to come home early and pick Makayla up from school, which she loved! He is now a veil worker at the temple which is nice. Other than that, he still tries to sneak in xbox time, but i told him no more shoot em up games around Makayla. So that's put a major damper on his time.

Me, I'm still working and being busy. I still LOVE my job! MetroMamma is the best job I think I have ever had. I've had struggles and frustrations, but overall, it's amazing!! Perfect I get to take Mak to school head to work, leave work and pick Mak up from school. So in her mind, I am a stay at home mom! It's fantastic!

Well, I think I might have blabbed on long enough. I'll write more often so they aren't as long anymore. Okay? Bye for now!

It's True!

I got my new computer on monday and it is AWESOME! There are a couple of issues that I have with it that we are trying to wor out, but other than that, I LOVE IT! It's been a hard couple weeks without the computer (we took our home computer down to the office for Snappy Thoughts), and it's really pathetic how addicted we've become to computers. When I finally got my computer back, I had 237 emails (I use this for my work email too).

So the last couple weeks there's been a lot happening. As I stated last time, Makayla had a birthday on the 7th! Her party was on Labor Day, which was perfect! It was a great party and she got everything Polly Pocket that she could possibly imagine! Please note the box of the Polly Pocket Mall that is bigger than Mak! And that's just one!

On her actual birthday, Nick and Elise had their cute little Logan blessed and all the Grandparents and some aunts and cousins came to it too!! It was a fun day full of family, balloons, good food and of course cupcakes!!

I can't help how much I love this little girl!

I had a birthday too. I am now . . . 29! Forever!! No, actually, I hated my 29th year, i'm really 31! Woah! I'm getting old! I like it though. I like my hair, i've put on a few pounds (much needed pounds) and i LOVE my job! MetroMamma is an amazing company and I'm sooo grateful to be a part of it! I am also a bridal attendant at the temple, teach Valiant 9 & 10 at church, and I get to sing with Gladys Knight! What more could I really ask for?! I am having fun with my life!

So much has gone on, and yet at this moment, my brain is saying, "i'm tired, stop typing and lay down." so I'm going to obey my body! Didn't get as much sleep as I wanted to last night, so gonna try to make up for it now!

Hope everyone is doing well!!

First Time

Okay,  so this is Nathan.  This is the first time I am attempting the Blog thing.  I have spent the last 2 hours setting up Shannon's new Computer.  I am extremely jealous!!!!!  It happens to be the coolest laptop I have had the privilege to use.  Now the Computer is being reposed.  Shannon wants to play with her new toy, so I will say adios.  Until next time!

 

Nathan

Mak's Bday, the short story!

So, I'm still out a computer and it's making me crazy!!

Makayla's bday party was on Monday (labor day) and was lots of fun!! There were 15ish kids and that many adult as well. My house isn't that big, so we decided to get a bouncy castle!!! Let me tell you all, that was the most BRILLIANT idea I think i have ever had!! Go me!! I'll put up a few pictures, and like I said, i'm still trying to learn more about this whole blog thing, and as soon as I can figure it out, I'll do a slide show of everything. But for now, here are a couple pictures.

The girls all gathered round as Makayla opened her presents. Let me tell you how hard it is to get kids to back up. They all apparently think that they need to be sitting on top of the person opening the presents!! It was funny!

This is Abbey, my friend Aimee's youngest. She looks a lot like her mom!! Parker, Ellee and Abbey (3 of Brent's and Aimee's 4 kids) all came. That was fun as I don't get to see them as much as I'd like to. They live on the other side of town.

I'll write a lot more when I get my computer up, but for now, i am going to go and clean . . . or something. Gotta do something with my day ;-)

Birthday Fun

Yesterday I got to have my FAVORITE meal!! For our birthday's, my mom makes our favorite meal; she's a FANTASTIC cook!! My Favorite is Chili Con Queso! Yummy Yummy!! I only ever get it on my birthday because my brothers don't like it, and since there are three of them and one of me, I fully take advantage of the fact that I only get it once a year . . . on my birthday.

The best part about it though is that my whole family gets together. I realized yesterday that I haven't seen my older brother Jason for probably 3 weeks, and my sister-in-law Stephanie, for almost 2 months! Ugh! I miss them, and they just live down the street!!

Well, dinner was about perfect (not enough in my opinion!) and my cake was great! Cherry Chip cake with Cherry Icing, yum! We just hang out and have a good time. Today is a new try because I'm goign to put pictures in here from last night. Nothing too exciting, and Jason and Steph left before I got any pictures, but here's us being bums!

This is my youngest brother Daniel and his adorable fiance (YAY) Danielle. Yes I did do that right! Dan and Danielle will be getting married on January 16th here in Vegas. We really love Danielle and can't wait until she is officially a member of the crazy Swint clan! She's a lot of fun and has been the best thing to happen to Daniel since his mission!!

This is my sister-in-law Garrettson and two of her three boys. Thomas is the cute one with the Popsicle (he's 8) and Hayden is my super cute, super chunky little baby face on Garrettsons Lap! He was born on May 14th. This is David's family. Can you believe that little baby chunky monkey came from that beautiful skinny thing!! I love Garrettson and the boys, and luckily, they live just one street over from me!! It's so fun. Thomas and Makayla walk to school together (with G & I of course). It's fun.

This pics bigger cuz there are more people in it to explain. From Left to right: Jordan Ballard, practically a member of the Family. Our families are about as close as two families can be. Gpa Mike, Gma Barb and Aunt Allison all love to spoil Makayla rotten! It's awesome!! :-D (those would all be Jordan's Family, and my second Family) Next is Chase, he is a mini me of my brother David and also his 2 year old boy. The kid is just about as cute as a little kid can be!! He is so much fun and full of energy all the time (unfortunately, he fell and cut his eye open last night, it was sooooo no bueno!! ) Then there's Mak, whose birthday is on Sunday Sept 7. She's gonna be 5! Oh, my baby is growing up!! That's my dad who is holding Mak. He's actually quite amazing, and I'm going to have to do a seperate blog all about the AWESOME things that are going on for him right now! YAY! Then there's my mommy. Isn't she beautiful!! She hates pictures, but I love her and I want to show her off. She' probably going to beat me to death for putting this picture up . . . bbbuuuuut, she'll get over it! Love you mom!!

And finally there is Roxy. She is my mom and dad's beautiful little dog. We got Roxy when we first moved here back in February of 00. She was just a tiny little puppy and sooooo fun!! She used to run laps around the house and up and down the stairs. It was so fun to watch her and hear her run around upstairs. Well, Roxy is now too old for her body, and it's falling apart. She has a buldging disk in her back which is causing her to loose feeling in her feet and she will fall over or her feet will fall out from under her. This has all deteriorated REALLY fast. She is probably being put down today. I'm really very sad about it. Although I'm not the biggest fan of dogs, Roxy is an exception and I don't want her to be put to sleep, but after begin with her all day yesterday, I would much rather she be put to sleep than continue to be in pain constantly like she is. :-(


Well, This is incredibly long I know, but it's fun to tell about my family and stuff! Hope you all have a fantastic Labor Day. We are going to be celebrating Mak's bday today! YAY!