Happy Anniversary!

My first date with Spencer almost wasn't.  He was the 4th date I had that week, which is evidence of the theory of Feast or Famine.  The first 3 dates were not that great.  Except for the one that was REALLY awful, I don't really even remember who my dates were with or what we did.  But it was enough for me to swear off dating.  I was ready to call Spencer and tell him that I was unable to get together with him.

Fortunately, I lived with and was raised by Ms. Dependable; therefore, I did not feel that I could cancel with Spencer, when he had been planning for over a week.

Spencer and I have been together exclusively since that first date.  It has been 23 years ago, yesterday, that we had that date.

When we were dating we often put our noses and foreheads together to talk.  Yesterday he left the stand just before Sacrament Meeting began.  He knelt on the bench in front of me, leaned over, and put his nose and forehead on mine and said, "It is an anniversary today." 

My heart went pitter-patter.

Miracles!

Subject: The dockster just called




…tissue was clean – all is well



No evasion into the nodes…

I Just Wanna Be Home

1.  Spencer
2.  Our children
3.  A razor
4.  My pillow
5.  Spencer doesn't snore.  Also, if he gets up before the sun, he doesn't talk to me.
6.  My drugs (My head is spinning, because I forgot one of my prescriptions.  Now that I haven't taken it since Tuesday morning, I'm kinda miserable.).
7.  I'm stuck between flights for 2 1/2 hours in Phoenix, AZ.  There is no question that Phoenix is a lovely place.  And while PHX may be "The Friendliest Airport in America," it's still just a dumb airport.  Why don't they have movie theatres in airports?
8.  My gloves.  It's 75 degrees outside, but I am stuck IN the airport, and my hands are freezing!
9.  Three days is a long time to be away from home, the routine, and FAMILY.

I brought a book to read.  I was in Phoenix for a couple of hours on Tuesday, too, so I finished my book.  So I went into the airport bookstore and chose a book.  That's scary--What if I hate it?  What if it's boring?  What if it's crass?  I chose a book by an author I had read before.  The book iss not bad, but I don't love it. 

CAN I BE HOME YET?!

It Never Goes According to Plan..And That Is Good!

You know that I have started an online MBA program.  I finished my first course, which is a required course for all students of that university.  Basically it is a "How-To" course:  How to enroll is each class, how to find books and other sources online, how to contact people when you need help, how to submit assignments.  It was fairly straight-forward.

After completing that class I had to get enrolled.  It's not difficult, but it is the first step in getting my online access to about 400,000 things.

I thought that perhaps I would be able to spend some time doing school work during these days away from work and home.  But, alas, it has not worked out that way.  I'm still waiting for all those access things to be done.

That's a bit of a disappointment.

HOWEVER...

I have had the chance to do some visiting and some cleaning and some driving and some Christmas-gift designing and some TV-watching and some more visiting.  And I found the frozen yogurt shop, which is very important.

This has been a little vacation with a big slice of peace of mind.  Tomorrow I will get on an airplane and head back to "Life As We Know It."  The school plan will kick in; the Christmas shopping and gift-assembling will need to be done; the emails will have to be answered; the RS lesson will have to be taught.  For now I'm basking in the fact that life did not go the way it was planned.

This Was Us for a Long Time

Update on the Girl's Mom

Yesterday the girl's mother had surgery--a single mastectomy of the left breast.  The girl's mom chose that route to simply get the cancer out of her body.  The doctors tested her lymph nodes, and the preliminary results look very good.  The mass they found in the breast was quite large (golf-ball size in diameter, but the girl doesn't know how thick), and it contained about 25 "peppercorns" of black cancer.

The girl's mom is feeling quite good.  Her appetite last night was good, as was her sleep.  Unless something goes wrong with the drainage, etc., her mom will be home from the hospital within a few short hours.

The girl's dad said that her mom cried a lot when she was in recovery.  But the girl and her mom know that this surgery makes her no less a woman--especially when it comes to how the girl's dad feels--than she has always been.  The girl and all of her family are very grateful for your thoughts and your prayers and your kind words.  The family is also grateful for good medicine, good doctors, and good caregivers.  And also that this surgery was "textbook" and went so smoothly.

The girl also needs to tell you that she is very in love with her wonderful husband who made it possible and supported her in her choice to travel to see her mom for a few days.

The girl is incredibly blessed.

Christmas Laughs

A Stressful Week

Monday:  Sterling Singers Christmas Concerts at Libby Gardner hall (UofU).  I left work at 3:00 to make it on Trax (with Briana and Bestest-Friend Brittany) to the U.  We sang till our chops were busted.  I took a call from my dad between rehearsal and our first concert.  He was informing me that Mom was having a single mastectomy on Tuesday the next week.  I cried, and many of the SS-es came to make sure I was OK and give me a hug.  Some of them were people I didn't even know!  Kind people are a blessing. 

We got home at 10:30 p.m.  It was a very long, cold walk from the Trax station to the Conference Center, where our car was parked.  Bri and I have decided that we have already seen enough of the Christmas lights on TSQ.  Our family disagrees.

Tuesday:

Woot, woot!  I drove home, picked up Ash and Landon, and we headed to Murray High School for Eagle Gate College's graduation.  Both Spencer and Briana graduated with highest honors, thus the gold ropes.  I'm so proud of both of them!  Afterward we took other pictures and did some visiting, then went to dinner.  We got home around 10:00 p.m.

Wednesday:  My first day of school at WGU, but the computer was having issues.  I was so frustrated!  I didn't get much done, but I made a showing.  Between shopping trips for...

Thursday:  The ward Christmas party, which was my last activity because the Quorum of the Twelve love me just enough to change the Handbook and eliminate this position altogether.  I left work early so I could get set up at the Church.  Briana and Landon helped me set up tables and chairs.  Many HUGE thanks to Stacy, Brenda, and Jen, who decorated multiple tables each.  Some of the YW in our ward also did tables; Ashtyn and Briana decorated the stage.  Did I take pictures?  No, of course not.  You'll have to take my word for it--it was cute!  We had dinner and played a game involving white elephant gifts and Christmas music.  Then we cleaned up and came home.  I was home by 8:30, so I went to school for a little while.  More computer issues, but not as many as the night before.

I also booked a flight to Sacramento for next week's surgery.

Friday:  Spencer had massages, so I came home and went to school for a long time.  And FINALLY got a lot done.  We went to bed after 11:00.

Saturday:  Did a bit of early shopping with my sweetheart, then headed to Magna for this:

This Beverly Hillbillies/Woolus Atkinson load, headed to the dump, is what is left of the carpet in my brother and sister-in-law's house, along with some couches they are dumping.

Then I came home and went to school while Spencer and Briana went to help lay flooring.  You'll have to check out Becky's blog for those pictures.  Spence is pretty sore today.  It's taking a long time to heal from that ladder fall.

This is what Ashtyn did with her day:

Ashtyn's projects are always expensive. We purchased:  Meringue powder, powdered sugar, candy canes, hard Christmas candies, SweetTarts, gumdrops, Dots, Neccos, Smarties, pretzels, sugar cones, LifeSavers, Skittles, licorice pull-aparts, Gobstoppers, another cake-decorating tip, and probably more. But it turned out darling, and she had fun doing it.  Her house is even made of real gingerbread!  Because of the expenses she incurs, we always tell Ashtyn she's fired, because we can't afford her.  But who could really fire Ashtyn (who had a stressful week of her own)?

Taylor--who sleeps here, but we never see him because of WJHS Madrigals performances--called to see if he could bring the Mads over last night.  There were about 15 kids here, in addition to our 4 and Logan.  Colton POH-lujek said I'm the best mom ever, and some of the kids said I could be MadriMom.  I think that was because of all the candy lying around the house, but I decided to just say, "Thank you."  This group even sang a couple of songs for us.  We love it when our children bring their friends over!  (I bet the Fishes downstairs don't love it quite as much.)  Spencer and I went to bed at 11:00.  I don't know what time the house quieted for the night.

Work was also crazy-busy (just the way I like it) this week; and also my headlights died just as I was leaving for work one day, so I was very late that morning.  I had to wait for the sun to come up before I could drive anywhere.  Why do stupid things like that always happen in the winter?

I am looking forward to a day of worship today, before beginning another hectic week.