Memorial Day Weekend!

T-minus 1 hour and 13 minutes until our Memorial Day road trip to Mesquite begins!

We'll be doing some of this:

And this:

(there is always that person who LOVES to splash others)

And I brought my shoes to do this:

(in case I feel so inclined)

But what I'm most looking forward is doing a lot of this:

Childhood Memory

Maybe the title should be more appropriately titled "teen and young adult memory" but there is something that just sounds so wrong about that....

Starting my freshman year (9th grade), I started to take a liking to the Worldwide Wrestling Federation (WWF or now because of an animal activist group, the WWE). My brother used to always be watching wrestling so I was sometimes forced to sit and watch it if I wanted to watch any TV. Soon I got to know the wrestlers' characters, signature moves and story lines. And my obsession with The Rock was born.

I loved The Rock. My mom gave me The Rock's autobiography for Christmas when I was 16. My walls were plastered with Rock posters. My mom said for every Rock poster I had, I had to have a picture of Jesus. Yeah. That didn't happen. I would watch every Monday Night Raw and Thursday Night Smackdown to hear The Rock's hilarious rants and to watch his awesome matches. When Monday Night Raw came to do a live show from SLC, you bet your bottom dollar I was there! I made a poster in red glitter that said "I want the Rock's Bottom" - you see, The Rock had a signature move called The Rock Bottom. My mom was none too happy with that poster. Two of my best girlfriends took me to see "The Scorpion King"  in theatres on my birthday my senior year. Awww, great friends. While The Rock's career moved forward and he was less and less on the wrestling circuit, my interest faded as well. Until John Cena. But that's another blog for another time :)

This past weekend I was dogsitting for my sister while she was out of town. She has Netflix streaming into her bedroom, so I thought it would be a great idea to fall asleep to a movie. Not ever really dealing with Netflix, I was in awe to see all the movies at my disposal. As I flipped through my options, I came to something that could make me the happiest girl in that moment - a documentary on Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson's career rise through wrestling and acting. Yesssss. And it was two hours. As I watched and listened to some of The Rock's best lines and wrestling career moments, I remembered back to a time when all I had to worry about was my hair, my math homework and who The Rock was wrestling that night. Ahhh, yes. Those were the days. Now it's things like health insurance, car repairs and how to get the homeless men to stop hitting on me on Trax.

If ya smmmmeeeelllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll..... what The Rock..... is cookin'.

My Ma

Ok, so she hates that nickname. But that's what makes it so great!

As today is Mother's Day and I just got home from celebrating with her, I wanted to publicly express my love for her! She doesn't even realize how amazing she is. Her unconditional love and support has been evident throughout my life. I think back to how she took care of her family when we were younger and now how she takes care of her family now that we are older and have families of our own (well, not all of us - ha ha) and how her love shines through for each of us.

Here are just a few of the MANY talents and qualities she has:

• Playing the piano. She taught piano lessons when us kids were younger and each of us took lessons from her. She used to play all the time for ward choirs and special musical numbers.
• She rocks on the sewing machine. Seriously. She made a lot of our clothes when we were younger and now she makes all kind of things for my nieces and nephews and super cute wall hangings and crafts.
• She is very patient (a quality that I fall very short with). I'm sure it wasn't easy raising 6 kids and all the personalities that came with it. My mom has never raised her voice with me.
• She makes sure that I know that I am loved by all the wonderful things she does for me (thanks for the frozen enchiladas last week - YUM!) and how often she tells me

I love you, Mom!



Volunteering rambles

I volunteer for Rocky Mountain Hospice and they have placed me with a "client" (aka patient). In order to receive hospice services, you have to have a life expectancy of six months or less. As a volunteer, I visit with a particular client once a week, every week until they pass away. It's a morbid thought that you'll be with this person until they die. Death isn't something that is easy for me by any means but I've known several people in my life who receive hospice services and I thought I should do something to add to someones life. Everyone has a story to tell and everyone wants to feel love and accepted.
While it took six weeks for my background check to come back clean and a few questionable TB tests, I finally got started seeing my client three weeks ago. We'll call her Mary. She lives in her home with her husband, who is unfortunately gone a lot. She has very limited vision and renal disease. She is a quiet, sweet lady who is very close to my parents age, so it hits a little bit closer to home that way.
When the volunteer coordinator told me about Mary and her condition, I had the strong confirmation that this was the person I was to help. While I know that it would take awhile for my and Mary's friendship to develop, I want to help her so badly. Her doctor suggested I try dignity therapy so that Mary can feel a sense of purpose in her life, to remember the contributions she has made throughout her lifetime. Tonight Mary and I were discussing her life history. I watched her smile as she told me stories of her childhood and of her own children and some of the funny things they would do. She is always so focused on her limitations that it is hard to understand that she is still a valuable person. As I watched her face as she talked about her family now, it made me smile inside. From our previous visits, I can see the immense love she has for her family and it reminds me of the love I have for my family. How some of my favorite times are spent with them. How some of them have turned out to be my best friends.
While I hope that I am and will make a small difference in Mary's life, she is already making a difference in my life. I don't think we fully understand how we can touch someones life. While a lot of people are in our life for a short time, they can have a lasting impression. I've had friends, co-workers and clergy members who maybe were only in my life for a semester, a year or so but the things I have learned from them are endless.

Whose life could you touch today?

No Soda May

I like to challenge myself every once and awhile. But what I find is that my challenges can't be too difficult (let's not forget about No Sugar October.... total bust) or else I struggle and eventually fail.
I can go long periods of time without soda without a second thought. I know the best thing for me to drink is water. A kickboxing instructor was telling us the other day that to find out how many ounces of water you should be drinking, take your body weight multiplied by 0.6 - that's how many ounces. Shoooooot. That's a lot of water!
For the past month and a half, I've been doing a lot worse with my water intake and increasing my soda intake. 90% of the soda is diet but that still has really bad stuff in it. So here is my challenge to myself - All I drink for one month is water (with the exception of my Muscle Milk protein drinks before or after working out). I can do it. Right?
It's only day 7 and it's already been a struggle! All the free soda at work is calling my name. I realize when I eat out, I like to get a drink (Soda, people. Soda). When I was at the Jazz game Saturday night, my date got a big drink and I stuck with my water. But I was dying inside for a DC! I realize how much I would drink soda when I was tired too. No bueno!
I've done a challenge like this before in college and I know I can do it again!