Life in 2010

So 3 years ago I had just barely graduated high school and I had my whole life planned. I was going to get my degree in Childhood education, work with babies my whole life, meet a great guy, marry him, and be a stay at home mom. I thought since I had it all planned out that it would be smooth sailing...funny right? haha Well I quickly learned that life does not work out how you want it to.
I never thought I would be the junior in college with no real major, working at flying j, and being 21 and living at home. Despite the detour I seem to be taking, life is good.

Here are the top 10 things that I love right now (not necessarily in order)

1. My sister and I only have to look at each other to know what the other is thinking.

2.I have a great group of friends who make me laugh a lot!

3. I can go to work and laugh the whole night (depending on who is working).

4. That by working at Flying J I have come out of my shell a little bit. I used to be a super quiet girl, well not so much anymore. I am a different girl than I was 6 months ago when I started. :)

5. Although living at home isnt something I really want right now, I love seeing my dad and mom every night. They are amazing people!

6. I love that dad has learned how to text. It makes me smile when I see a message from dad that says, "bring me home a diet coke" or sometimes just the word "cookie".

7. I love that I work with my Aunt Sherry. She is one hilarious lady.

8. I love my brother and what an example he is to me. He is one strong person!

9. I love my car...superficial? yes but it is my first real car and I love it a lot! Especially when it drives me away from McCammon and into Pocatello where my friends are.

10. I love that it is the simple things in life that make me the happiest. I can say that I am happier now than I was 3 years ago when I thought I had my life planned out. Now I really have no set plan and am just taking time to smell the roses.

Life is totally not what I expected, but for now I wouldn't trade it for the world. I am pretty content. Except on nights when I am stuck in McCammon but hey we cant have it all! Free rent is pretty awesome and the bills are getting paid off a lot faster. I just found out that I am a match to give my brother a kidney. As long as I am mentally/emotionally stable and have 2 kidneys I will be giving him a kidney. It might take at long as 6 months from now to actually do the surgery, but at least we know I am a match. Then I can look into moving out on my own again. After that life might be perfect.

The aha Moments of Life

So as you can see from my earlier posts, life has certainly thrown me some curve balls this past years. Well I just got done re-reading an amazing book called, The Secret Journal of Brett Colton by Kay Lynn Mangum. It is all about this girl who gets a special gift from her brother who died 14 years earlier. He wrote a journal just for her. This book is really amazing and put a lot of things into perspective for me. Even though life lately has been hard, I wouldn't change it for a minute! I have learned and grown from these experiences. I am so grateful for the family I was born into! I have been so blessed. My dad has an ability to know exactly what to say to make me feel better. My mom is the constant in my life that helps me to keep pushing through. I know that she and my dad will always be there for me and love my unconditionally. My siblings are also amazing examples of finding strength through difficult times.

I am most thankful for the truth of the gospel and for my Savior, Jesus Christ. Without this knowledge I would be lost. Nothing would make sense anymore. Thankfully I do have the knowledge that Jesus Christ died for me and that he is always there for me. I am so grateful to have been born into the gospel and for the joy and peace it gives to me. I am also grateful that although my faith was tested I came out the victor! I am excited for whatever the future may bring. I love the quote by Sister Hinckley, Come what may and love it! I am going to try and remember that and live by it. I may not love exactly the circumstances of the past year, but what I do love it the blessings that have came from it!

Lifes up's and down's

Well life has certainly been very crazy lately. Mandy has spent 42 days in the hospital for a very serious fungal infrection in her heart. We are just waiting for the surgery date now to replace both of her valves again.

Through i all I had a very difficult time. I lean on my sister a lot and suddenly I felt like I was on the verge of losing her. I also felt so alone and I had so many decisions to make that affected both of our lives. decided to moveus back home. (Luckily I have an amazing family that basically took care of it for me once the decision was made. ) Sadly through it all I kind of forgot what really matters and WHO is always there for me. I didn't read my scriptures or pray for more than my sisters health. EventuallyI had a break down in front of my parents. My parents are amazing and my dad has the skill of calming me down.

He told me I needed to kind of be selfish and pray for ME as well as the other things. He also told me that I needed to read my scriptures daily. He can tell when im not studying my scriptures cuz im not happy when i dont. I went home after that talk and did what he told me. I read in Alma chapter 34 and by the end of it I was in tears cuz of the feeling of peace and total love and acceptance I felt. Its a amazing chapter for sure :). I fell down to my knees and thanked my Heavenly Father for his love. I realized I can never be alone when I have my Savior and live the commandments and ask for his strength and help through my weak spots.

I am truly blessed especially with everything going on. I feel 100 times more comfortable and better living at home than i did in town. I feel accepted at the singles branch and love the peaceful feeling at church. Lately when I talk to people they always say "When it rains is pours." while that is true I like to add another sentence to that, "when it rains it pours, BUT the bleessings are being poured upon us like a hurricane!" I just have to remember that sometimes.

2009 thus far

Well 2009 has been one crazy year so far and its only 5 months in! Every month so far someone in my family has been in the hospital. Mandy has spent nearly more time in the hospital than out of it. Mandy has these spider veins behind her heart that looked like blood clots. If they had kept her in Pocatello and on the meds for blood clots she would have died. Luckily they shipped her to SLC and caught the mistake. Then they found out she had to have open heart surgery to replace two valves in her heart. That took up January and March hospitalizations. In February my brother went into complete renal failure. If he had waited even a half hour longer to go into the hospital he would have died. Now he is on dialysis and doing pretty good. His kidneys are so shrunk up that they cant even get a reading off of them. Now it is the sit and wait game, waiting for him to get a new kidney. Eventually and probably soon i will be tested to see if I am a match and I hope I am.

April was a crazy crazy month in and of itself. All three of us kids were in the hospital on the same day. Mandy developed an allergic reaction to some meds she was on and had to go to SLC to have her surgeon and cardiologist check it out. My brother was in the hospital that same day to get a port put in for his dialysis. At the same time my gall bladder decided it needed to come out. I got sick on a Sunday morning and I got really sick. I threw up everything that I ate or drank and on Monday went into the doctor. They said that I had a huge gall stone that couldn't pass and my gall bladder needed to come out. Well the surgeon couldn't get me in til the next week but I was still so sick. By Thursday after still not being able to keep things down and having more attacks my parents came home from SLC where mandy was in the hospital and took me to the ER. They admitted me and kept me on IV fluids overnight til they could take the darn thing out the next day. Everything went well and I feel SO much better.

Well my school work really suffered through all this and sadly my teachers weren't very understanding. One just kept telling me to drop the course so needless to say this isn't my proudest semester at ISU. I am probably just going to take online courses for next semester. I also have to get the breaks replaced on my car and all that jazz. Thank goodness for work. I really love my job. The two year olds completely make my day :).

I really hope the rest of 2009 turns out to be better for me and my family. I have struggled with everything that has been happening. I keep thinking that we have been through enough when something else hits us again. Although I sometimes ask Why these things happen I have a deep understanding that the Lord is still on our side and loves me and my family. His hand has been in every situation, guiding us and the doctors into doing what is best.

What really matters?

So lately I have been thinking a lot about what really matters in life. In my life there tends to be some drama. I HATE drama but nevertheless it tends to always be right around the cornor. Lately I have just been plain old sick of it. When its come around lately I have been up set and mad but then I basically just said "who cares" "What really matters here". I go to work everyday with the most adorable two year olds. They are what matter....they are the most precious things in my life. At two years old they are learning SO much and are still so innocent. They love and trust you almost immediatly, which is something I am trying to learn from them. They make my whole day turn around. All it takes is one hug or one "Miss Tara!" to turn my whole day around. I love to hear the little boy giggle when he sees me come in. I LOVE my job and can basically talk about my kids all day.

Then I also have lately looked at my friendships. I have lost a few close friends since high school. And now again I say "so what?" I have new friends and may I say better! Most of all my sister has become my best friend. This friend I will not lose. We are an enternal family and so I will be with her for eternity. (hopefully we each have our own husbands and kids hehe). There is just so much drama in this world that if we took a step back and asked "so what?" or "what really matters in this life" could be solved with much less contentions. For me asking these two questions has saved my friendship with a couple of people.

reflecting

So I just did a blog on myspace going over 2008 and it made me reflect on this past year. 2008 was dramaful to say the least (read the changes blog). Lost a couple of friends, dated someone and broke up, and roommate drama. But I realized that I have done a lot of growing this year as well. I wouldn't take that back for anything. I feel like I really got out of that high school mode of thinking and became an adult. I look at things differently, I feel more mature, more responsible. Also a lot of good things have happened this year.

I have made some amazing friends (im sure you know who you are) and gotten some great advice. I also have had the help of my Savior. He is always there for me. Jesus Christ and my Heavenly Father are my constant in a very crazy world. I love this gospel and the love that I feel from my Heavenly Father and his Son Jesus Christ. There is nothing better than feeling their love in a moment of despair. It changes everything. They give me far more than I can return! I want to try and there are a lot of ways I can improve. This new year and semester is going to be different. I am going to put my Heavenly Father first and school second. I am going to cut back on computer time and focus on whats really important. Its not a new years resolution this is a promise to myself and to them.

School is almost over!!!

So here I am sitting in Biology writing a blog. Yep this is the theme of my semester. Procrastination. I have skipped more classes this semester than I have ever in my life combined. I just had a hard time finding the motivation to attend..especially biology. I put off every single paper every single speech and every single test and quiz. Trust me though I paid for this. I have managed to pull everything off and still have decent grades. But I lost sleep and my stress levels were very high. This past week I had a speech to give and a paper to write. I knew about them in advance and still didn't do them any earlier than the night before. Lets just say I had a little breakdown, freaked out, and didn't get to bed until 3:30 and had to be up by 5:45. I pulled it off and managed to do fairly well but its not the best thing.

Next semester my classes are going to be harder and I am trying to pick up even more credits. I now have a goal not to put papers off or homework off til the last minute. I will get my stuff done early so I can benefit better. I have come to realize that if I put things off it just takes me longer and my best work is totally not there. I am a fairly good student and want to really show my potential. I am paying for this and can't afford to retake a class and its certainly not who I am. I am now looking at receiving my first C since middle school. I have always gotten straight A's with an occasional B+ in math. So people help me with my goal. Dont let me procrastinate!