Hello.

Alright I need to pay some serious attention to my poor little blog.  I document everything in our lives with photographs and they are just taking up space on my hard drive for no one to see.  It might take me a while since I'm behind for a lot of this year so far and I'll start with some of our more recent happenings.  So, here we go...

Splash Of Color 5k (Color For Tessa)

Tara asked me to run in a 5k with her for a friend of her's from high school who has Hodkin's Lymphoma for the third time.  Neither one of us did anything to really train for the run and knew we would probably end up paying for that and signed up.  I love running once I get going but I haven't done it since it started getting cold last year.
The weather had been so nice lately, up in the high 70s and even 80s.  So wouldn't you know it, it got cold a few days ago.  It was freezing this morning.  The race was supposed to start at 9am and they wanted us to be there in between 7:30 and 8:30 to get checked in.  When Tara and I got there at about 7:40, there was only about 5 other cars in the parking lot and they were just getting the volunteers trained on what they were supposed to be doing.  And it was freezing, I think only about 28 degrees.  We got checked in, got our bags and walked back to the car to warm up.  We made sure our husbands were coming and then went to find out where the race would start.  We met up with a few of Tara's friends who were going to run with us and then Josh, Cody, my Mom and Chelsie got there to support us.

Me, Tara, Sarah and Sadie

Josh had some fun being the photographer for the day.

Snow-capped Wellsvilles.

We ran through a lot of mud but had so much fun!  

Let the colors fly!

The girls with the girl of the day, Tessa.  It was so fun to run for a cause and to help someone during a difficult time in the their life!  And so fun to be a part of it with my best friend!

Conference Weekend = Fabulousness!!

So early yesterday morning, Josh got up to go play basketball with Cody.  About 10 minutes after he left, I get a text from Tara asking if I had any plans for the day...let me check, nope.  So she texted back that Nie Nie was doing a book signing at Deseret Book in the new City Creek Mall, wanna go?  Um, YES!!  So we decided to leave about 2pm to get down to SLC.  Atty didn't want to stay home with his dad and watch Sports Center and asked if he could come, so he followed us girls around all day and didn't complain!  This boy is going to make some girl very happy one day!
So we got down to SLC and knew we wanted to hit up Smart Cookie at some time during this trip, so we went there first for the fabulous sugar cookies. Oh, these things are divine!
I don't know why but for some reason whenever I get down towards Sandy, I just have this inner feeling of "I"m HOME!"  I loved living down there so much so maybe that's why I feel that way, I don't know.
We headed back toward downtown to the new mall.  Let me tell you, that place is fabulous!  It was wicked crowded and we hit it right after the last session of conference got out so it was packed.

We walked through to find the Deseret Book so we knew where we needed to go for the book signing and then went window shopping.  Tara and I both wanted to go to Tiffany & Co. so we went there first.  We walked around the store and they do have some beautiful jewelry, but I would have to win the lottery before I would ever blow money on something like that!  We got outside in front of the store and since Tara and I are both obsessed with our cameras, we went to take a picture of the store front.  I had my camera up to my eye, when a mall security guy came over and told us we couldn't take pictures of the store fronts, uh ok
 So then we headed back down to H&M, that place was packed and had some of the most hideous clothing.  They also had some cute things, but I never knew sequins were back in such a way except for on dancing costumes and even then we hated wearing them, they itch.  Tara did find a cute shirt and some leggings and I was looking at the bags since I want to make my own camera bag but didn't find anything I HAD to have.
Then we headed back down to Deseret Book at about 5:30pm  The signing didn't start until 6pm and there was already a little line forming.  So we got our books and stood in line.

There was a couple in front of us in there mid 40s maybe 50s.  I thought it was the wife who wanted to meet Stephanie and thought it was so nice of her husband to come stand in line with her for this.  But as we got up to her table, the man became very emotional and started telling Stephanie about his daughter who must have passed away and told Stephanie how she has inspired him to keep going.  She asked how old his daughter would be and he said 16 and she got a little teary eyed, too.  It was great.  Then I got up there and I feel stupid instantly.  I don't know what to say or what to do, just like I did with Ree Drummond.  So we just started talking about how much we love her and she was so sweet and so beautiful!  Her daughters were there, too and came to sit behind her for a minute.  I asked them how they were and Stephanie said they were so bored.  I bet they were, sitting in Deseret Book while their mom signs books!  After she signed my book, I scooted over so Tara could get her book signed too and she asked if we were sisters or friends.  I told her we were best friends and we also work together.  Everyday at lunch we get on her blog and show all the girls we work with how cute she is and how amazing she is.  We got our picture with her and it was fabulous!

She truly is amazing.  In May of 2010 she did a video for Mormon Messages, it brought me to tears and I had to share it, here's the link again.  Watch it.  She has come so far from where she was 2 years ago and is due to have her 5th baby tomorrow.  Which is something she wanted so badly and was so excited to be given the go ahead from her doctors to try for a baby, plus they will have extra skin to work with for her future reconstruction surgeries!  She truly has been an inspiration to me for the past 4 years.

We were starving and didn't want to eat at the mall so we left and went to the Old Spaghetti Factory.  The food was good like always and we all got cream sodas so we got a souvenir glass.  As we were leaving the mall and walking across the street to get to the parking garage, there was the most amazing view of the temple, at least from the street.  I love this temple.  It's always been the one I've loved the most and the one I've always wanted to get sealed in, can't wait!
I love conference weekend.  Anytime we get to sleep in on a Sunday when we usually have 9am church is fabulous!  But I also love hearing our Prophet and Apostles speak.  There is always something there for me to feast on, always.  And today proved no different.
We went over to Cody and Tara's for breakfast and the first session of conference this morning.  The talks were really good.  I loved Elder Uchtdorf's talk.  I definitely need to work on my judgement of people and being envious.  I have been really judgmental lately and I know I shouldn't be and all it does is make my heart hardened and makes me not feel good.  I've been judgemental of others, especially those who are parents thinking that we would be better parents.  And those who are pregnant, thinking why should they get to have a baby when I am a better person and am in a better relationship and would be able to love and care for a baby more.  Terrible, huh?  I know.  And then being envious of those who do have children and are good parents and seeing the fun and the joy of having children is.  As we were leaving their house this afternoon, Josh asked me if I really listened to that talk and I said yes and I know.  He said the part he loved the most was when he talked about not gossiping even if it's true.  Oh man, my own damnation.  Josh always knows how to pull me back down.  Even if I get mad at him for a minute.  But I get mad because I know he's right.  And I will work on it, it's not going to be easy but I will.
We came home and rested for a bit then went back over to their house for steaks tonight, man they spoil us!  Two meals in one day!  It was so good though!  We sat and talked for a good hour or so after we finished eating and laughed and laughed.  Josh and his stories get us all going!  Josh started a grease fire while cooking french fries and Cody gets so amused by that story.
Thanks you guys for such a fun weekend.  It was fabulous!  We love you and I'm so grateful we have you in our lives.

The Hunger Games

I read this book while I was sick one day in January.  I loved it and couldn't put it down!  I was so excited for the movie to come out and couldn't wait to see it.

We had been talking about it for a while at work and Dr. Goble bought tickets for all of us to go.  We decided to give it a week for the crowd to die down a little bit and went Friday.
It was awesome.  I loved it.  The books are always better and there are always things they don't get to explain in so much detail in the movies as they do in the books but this movie was very close to the book.
Josh and Cody even liked it and Josh wants to read the next two books.  It was such a great movie and the first book was great, now I need to finish Catching Fire!

The Sun Was Shining

The was shining and that just invigorates my soul.  I wake up feeling so good and it was even better that it was on a Saturday when I wouldn't be stuck in work not able to enjoy it.  My crocuses were open and smiling up at the sun, too.  I love photographing these happy little flowers.  It's like they are just stretching themselves up.

My sweet girl enjoyed the sun as well.

Then the pretty little daffodils were up enjoying the sunshine, too.  And this one had a visitor.

Such a beautiful Saturday morning that warms my cold soul.

Stream of Consciousness

Brace yourself if you continue reading, you've been warned.  And please excuse the scattered mess that is my brain...
Well, I think it's official.  I am depressed or I have depression or whatever.  I don't like saying that about myself.  I've never let myself get that way and I definitely don't want to throw drugs at it to see if it will make it better or totally take all my emotions away.  I haven't caught up my blog since Christmas really and think everyday to myself, "okay, finish the Christmas posts tonight."  I have birthdays in January and February and everything else we did to catch up on.  I come home take care of my furbabies and then curl up on the couch and watch How I Met Your Mother (most nights) or some other show and sleep until Josh goes to work around 10.  I may get on my computer for a minute to check up on Facebook, which I hate, and shut it down and sleep.  This is totally not like me.  I love to blog and to document our lives.  My computer memory is full of pictures since I love to photograph our life but I don't do anything with them, they just sit there.
I've gotten to the point where I don't enjoy anything anymore.  I'm so angry and bitter.  I hate everyone who has joy in their lives, isn't that horrible?  And the sad thing is, it's not anything to do with them, it's me.  I just want to stay in the house with my husband and our animals and the rest of the world can pass us by.  Maybe it's seasonal and I'll feel better when the sun begins to shine again and it gets warm.  But I don't think that's fully it, it will help but not resolve the problem.
I know that only I can fix my attitude and fix my life but I don't have the energy.
Honestly, for real, I have been struggling for the past 6 months or so.  I don't know how to articulate my feelings into words that will make sense to everyone else.  I think the only person who understands is Josh since he goes through this with me.  I don't know what I'd do if I didn't have that awesome man in my life.  He is my rock in the middle of the ocean of life.  I feel like I'm just bobbing out there in the middle of nowhere.  Don't know where to go, don't know what to do.
I think I need to write for my own therapy all the feelings I am having, so bear with me if you continue to read my pity party.
There are so many people that I know that are pregnant and that's hard for me, selfish huh?  The thing about infertility that I've found is that eventually you lose.  Eventually all of your friends are gone.  You don't have anything in common with them anymore as they all move on and have children then want to hang out with other parents so their children can play together which is totally natural.  But who wants the childless couple tagging along and who wants to be that childless couple tagging along?  Then it's just the two of you wishing for a different life.  We don't want to hear "be glad you don't have to deal with this or that", that hurts.
I don't know where to go in our life.  I know we want children.  I don't know why it's so hard for us or if that is even something we will get in this life.  And don't tell me it will happen.  I hate hearing that even if it comes from the most sincere heart.  No one knows if it will happen for us but God.  I have put my faith in Him and pray every night that we will be able to become parents, and if not, that we will know why and be comforted.  I think we would be good parents.  I know we would love our little miracle so much and would take the sleepless nights for our best night's sleep any day.
I sometimes feel like I am being punished for something I did and if my grandma Pat read this she would lecture me on how that's not how it works.  She would tell me He doesn't punish us.  And I know she is right.  I need to put my faith in Him and to continue to pray.  But how long do I have to pray before He gets sick of hearing me ask for the same thing over and over again and I just become annoying to Him?  Please excuse me, this is a total stream of consciousness.
I'll never understand how it happens so easily for, it seems, everyone else.  It's such a small window of timing that the miracle of life is conceived in and it still is so easy for some people.  Eight years we've been trying.  Not that every month we've counted days and did ovulation tests and head stands in the corner but we've never prevented pregnancy either.  I take my breaks when I'm about to emotionally crack but 8 years and 2 miscarriages later and nothing to show for it but a bitter heart.
This time of year is always a little difficult for me and it's something that I keep to myself.  Feb 7, 2007 was the estimated due date of our first pregnancy.  We would have a 5 year old.
I'm very blessed to work where I do and to have doctors who care about me and want us to have our family and want to help us achieve our dream.  I keep thinking I'm ready to start really trying again but then I get scared of the let down that I know is coming.  I don't know how to prepare myself for it.  It gets to be some pretty dark days.  I have that glimmer of hope back again though that we can do this.  We've done it twice before.  But I don't like that glimmer being there because it just opens the door for letdown and disappointment.
We also are working on getting sealed in the temple and will be able to set dates soon.  Then we can get adoption stuff going through LDS family services.  That's always been something we've both wanted to do.  And to think that that might be the only way we will become parents scares me as well.  I look at a lot of adoption blogs and see all the wonderful couples out there who are looking for their baby and wonder why would someone pick Josh and I when there are so many other couples better than us are on paper? It scares me to depend on someone else to pick us to be their baby's parents and to put that in someone else's control.  It's not a guarantee either.
A friend of mine called me in late August/ early September asking if we were still interested in adoption.  I told her yes and she told me a story of a 19 year old girl who works for her and just found out she is pregnant.  She knew she wanted to place it for adoption being 19 and not being able to support and take care of a baby.  My friend told her about us and my friend thought this would work out perfectly.  There was never a definite decision as to whether or not she wanted us to be the parents but it was a possibility and she wanted to go through LDSFS for her cost.  We were so excited at the possibility that it could finally be happening.  I never got my hopes up though.  It was in the back of my mind for a while and then we just quit talking about it.  My friend told me a while ago that the girl decided to keep her baby, which is wonderful and fine for us.  I'm glad I didn't get my hopes us and think this was it just for me.  But it's just the example of what adoption situations are out there.  I've read many stories of failed adoptions and even adoptions where the adoptive couple have paid a lot of the money for the adoption and don't see a dime of it back and don't get to come home with a baby.  Or stories of being in the hospital, holding their brand new baby and not getting to walk out the hospital door with the baby because a parent had changed their mind.  It scares me.  It puts me in a vulnerable, almost desperate place and I don't like it.
I sometimes wish the want would go away.  I sometimes wish I wouldn't want children so much and that the hole in my heart would heal and the ache in my arms would go away.  They never do.  On Christmas day we were driving up to my parents' house and I told Josh I was going to stop grieving a life I've never had and start being thankful and enjoying the life I do have.  He asked me if that was from a movie or if I read it somewhere, rude!  No, I said, that was all me.  I haven't done too well with that.  I'm still mourning that life and don't know how to hang that dream up.
For Christmas, Josh got me a frame that has a quote from Jeffrey R. Holland that says "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."  I love it.  And if we don't have children in this world, we will in the eternities.  But I still don't understand how that works either, Josh and I had this discussion tonight on the way home from my parents' house celebrating my dad's 55 birthday.  It does give me some comfort though.  And I don't want to call it this but it's almost like our last hope.
We always talk about if we don't have kids then we are going to play and travel.  I need to get through school to do that and that is one of those things that scares me as well.  I have a fear of not getting into nursing school and then getting in and not being able to pass.  That's one of the things that has kept me away from it for the past 12 years.  But I'll never know if I don't try.  It's just one more failure I don't want to face.  And then I don't know what I would do with the rest of my life.
I am so grateful for the children that are in my life that I get to love as if they were my own.  Noah, Elizabeth and DJ.  Their little hands are woven around my heart.  I love those three as if they were my own and I'm so thankful for Shannon who doesn't care that her kids love me the way they do.  When DJ was younger she didn't care that people thought he was mine, he was attached to my hip.
Our nephews Branson and Gavin.  The situation is a little different but I love those little guys so much and I'm so glad I get to be a part of their little lives and they love Josh and I.
And our other nephews and niece, Tycen, Lucy, Raedyn and Landyn.  We don't get to see them as often as we would like.  But we love them so much and wish we could see them more.
Josh and I love being back in church and the rejuvenation those 3 hours give us every week but it's also hard.  Relief Society and Priesthood talk a lot about being mothers and fathers which is great but hard for those who aren't.  It's hard in a church that is so family driven and we are expected to have children soon after getting married.  Then people start to wonder why you don't have children yet and it must be because we don't want them.  Only our bishop and home teacher know a piece of our real story.  It's not something I like getting into.  When our home teacher came over for his visit in January and the lesson was on Living The Abundant Life, he asked me why our prophet would have written that message.  I told him because it was written for me and then told him a little bit of our background.  He is seriously one of the sweetest and most sincere members of our ward we've met so far and his response and prayer at the end of our visit were very nice.
I have a very supportive family and friends who try to do what they can and what they feel to make me feel better, to give me hope and I'm very blessed to have that.
I'm so thankful to have Josh to walk through this trial with.  He is wonderful.  I tell him from time to time that I would totally understand and wouldn't blame him if he wanted to leave and find someone else who can give him the family he wants.  He tells me I've lost my mind and to shut up.  I love him.
Anyway, I'm rambling a lot but just needed to get this out to help myself and not hold it in any longer.

Friday Afternoon

The weather was gorgeous Friday aftenoon and I texted Josh (who called me earlier in the morning to tell me how blessed he was to have me and that I am the best wife) to see if he wanted to go for a walk with the camera when I got off work.  Well the walk turned into a drive since the sun was shining but it was still a little chilly out.  So we went for a drive up Balcksmith Fork canyon.  I hadn't been up that canyon since I was a teenager so it was nice for a different view.  As we were driving around the twists and curves, we got to an opening in the river and noticed a truck pulled over on the opposite side of the road.  I looked to my right and there was a beautiful, majestic bald eagle.  Josh pushed on the brakes and I immediately took my lens cap off.  He was so beautiful and happily sat there to let us soak him up for a few minutes.

It was awesome!

Once we flew off we headed further up the winding roads up the canyon.  It was beautiful up there.  We got up to the end of the road which is Hardware Ranch.  I remember going up there as a teenager and riding the sleigh out to the elk and watched them eat in the snow.  This year there hasn't been much snow and when it does snow it melts in a few days.  It looked really muddy out in the field and they were on the last ride of the day so we turned around and came down the canyon.

I love getting in the car with Josh and just driving, especially when we have nowhere in mind.  I love the adventure and sitting with him with no distractions for a little while to just be with him and talk to him.  He truly is my favorite.