Another Time Out that started with a big "Crash"

I attended yet another "Time Out for Women".  I love to go.  I would really like to go to Women's Conference at BYU, but I am a little far at the moment so instead, when it is available, I have been so blessed to attend "Time Out for Women".  This time it was in Nashville, TN.  Nashville is about 75 miles north of us, so not too far to go.  My friend Marie and I were suppose to go in Atlanta together back in October, but I needed to attend the funeral of my sweet little niece and so I missed going with Marie.  When the opprotunity came to go to Nashville this year, we both got the OK from the husbands and headed off.  Marie had asked another friend to come along as well and the three of us had a great time. 

Most of you know that Jeremy goes out of town a lot.  Because of this, he accumulates a lot of hotel points.  So we were blessed to stay in the Renissance Marriott which was connected to the convention center that Time Out was being held at.  Very convienent.  I parked in the garage, got my bag out of the back seat, shut the hatch down, and "CRASH!!!!"  My back window shattered into a thousand pieces.  Now let me explain something to you.  I have had this SUV for about 2 weeks.  I was not excited to not only hear this loud crash, but to also see my window in thousands of peices on the garage floor.  All three of us were silent for maybe 30 sec, but it seemed more like 5 min.  It sounded like someone shot through my window.  I had no idea what to do.  I called Jeremy, he called Honda, took all my stuff out of the car, and checked into the hotel room.  After we got some dinner, I went back to the car and reparked it in a stall backed up to a wall so hopefully nobody would know I had no back window. 

Now it is a little hard to see that there really is no window, but it is very much opened.  Here is some of the glass inside the car, the rest was on the floor.  Well, hopefully Honda will take full responsibility and fix it.  I think it most definately was a defect on their part.  I will take it in tomorrow and I hope they give me a car to drive, 'cause Jeremy is in Jacksonville and I will be carless during Spring Break. 

Funny Story:  A few weeks ago one evening, I had come down with a bad case of flu.  Achy body, cold chills, it was aweful.  I had been crying, wishing for my mother like a little four year old at which time Jeremy had given me a blessing.  Well I guess all my crying worried Hunter.  The next morning I was all better.  Hunter had said this to me:  "Mommy, I thought you were going to die last night and so I prayed that you would get better and not die and Heavenly Father answered my prayer"  Sweet right?  Well today I was telling Hunter that hopefully I will get a car so we can do some stuff this week so I said, "Pray for a car."  Hunter said, "Like when I prayed that you wouldn't die?"  Kids have so much faith.  We can truly learn from them. 

Well after all the boom and crash, we acturally had a pretty good weekend.  I hardly thought of my car, except when it was brought up from time to time.  Here are some hilights of the weekend.



This is Marie Kilpatrick, Karen Bagley, and me getting ready for the evening talks and performances.  Now I had never really met Karen before, but I enjoyed being around her.  I found her very fun to be around and I hope we can continue to keep in contact.  I had seen her every week and didn't even know what a great person she was.  We are both in the nursery in our wards and as I am leaving, she is coming in.  Small world, right?  

This is Merrilee Boyack with Marie.  She just loves her and I thought these were the cutest pictures.  She looks like a person in heaven meeting someone who has been a great influence. 

This is Mary Ellen Edmunds.  It was fun to hear her.  She is someone I remember my mom talking about all the time. 

This is Mariama Kallon.  I heard her speak at Time Out in Plano, TX.  I wanted to get a picture with her then, but didn't get a chance.  She has an amaizing story and a huge amount of faith and hope.  She grew up in Africa in a place called Sierra Leone, while they were in a war.  Her parents were killed, and she watched her sister get her arms and legs chopped off and came very close in losing her own life.  She had no more family, but somehow she found the gospel.  I love to listen to her speak.  If you ever get a chance, look her up.  She has a heartbreaking, but wonderful story to tell.

After the evening talks finished, we felt like some dessert.  We went to the place called Mortons.  Very classy.  I mean the waiter even had a special tool to sweep the crumbs off the table.  He called it his "zambonie". 

The rest of the weekend was just as great.  I loved Hilary Weeks like always, heard some great talks, and took some great thoughts home with me.  Will I do it again?  Most likely.  We even made it home with no window in the back.  Poor Karen had to endure the wind, but she was exhausted and hardly noticed.  Jeremy and I put some plastic on it because we heard it will probobly rain, but hopefully I can get it to Honda before any rain hits.  Of course, I can't see through the back now so if you are driving near me, you might want to move away. 

(OK, so my spell check is not working, so if I have tons of spelling errors, I am so sorry and please remember that I never claimed to be a genius.  I mean, I was a kindergarten teacher.  How many words do I really need to know how to spell?  Let's just call it inventive spelling and leave it at that.)

Christmas Festival

Every year our stake has a big Christmas festival.  This festival is enjoyed by all around Huntsville and other areas near by.  It is enjoyed by members and non-members.  The community looks forward to it every year.  Prior to the festival, they collect nativity sets from all who will let the stake borrow them.  There are hundreds and they are all unique.  Some are from other cultures, some are very childlike, and some are very elegant.  They have very big ones and very small ones.  They even have a set that is distributed throughout the sets where the children can look for each piece like a scavenger hunt.  They display these through out the cultural hall along with Christmas quilts that many have sewn and Christmas trees decorated.  They even have a live nativity where you go from room to room watching as the story plays out.  They transform the rooms and hallway and it really looks as much as you can in a church, like being there.  It is very quiet going through this live nativity and very reverent.  The whole church is decorated with decorated fireplaces throughout and foyers decorated very home like.  They have a choir that sings at different times (which you should acquire tickets earlier because it is reserved seating).  They also take a family picture, if you would like.  This is ours.  Not too bad.  It was a very nice night.  The choir sounded beautiful and amazing with many added orchestra instruments involved as well.  What a great way to start the Christmas festivities.

Memorial Day

Our ward had a picnic at this lake on Memorial Day. They have it there every year. We went last year and the kids had a great time. This year, I did not want to go. Mostly because of the whole lake thing. I was not in the mood to deal with the lake and the kids and I definitely did not want to go swimming. Jeremy on the other hand wanted to go, which is actually really odd, because usually he is not so much up on the social thing and I usually am. Jeremy just remembers how much fun the kids had last year and wanted that to happen for them this year. I told Jeremy that he was in charge of the kids down at the lake and I would stay up at the picnic area and relax and chat. He was good with that. Well, I chatted for awhile, then I found myself down at the lake watching the kids. They had a great time. It was a good day after all. We had good conversations, ate well, and the kids had tons of fun in the water. I guess my husband can be wise about things at times.

72 hour kits / Emergency Essentials Enrichment

So, our last enrichment was on the 16th of May. We had an all day Super Saturday food storage/emergency essentials day. Now, this wasn't a day where you went from class to class learning about how to do your food storage. It was more about Hands on learning. We had several activities to do. One was making a no-rise 90 min. bread. They actually grounded the wheat, and mixed the ingredients, baked, and took their loaf home with them. We also dehydrated fruit leather using apple sauce and jello mix. Some were able to bring their bulk items and they used the canner and the Mylar sealer. We had an activity where they made fudge from pinto beans.( I know, it sounds really gross, but actually it is quite yummy. It must be good if I like it because I am so picky with stuff like that.) We had a class where they made can rotators out of card board boxes. It is a pretty clever contraption. Finally we put together 72 hour kits. This was my activity I prepared. It was very time consuming. The picture above is all the food and items I had stacked in my living room, ready to take to the church. I had no idea when I took that activity to do that there would be so many kits sign-up for. Most, liked the idea, cause then they could do it at enrichment and it was done. It was quite the chore to get all the stuff. Wal-mart customers thought I was crazy with the 159 tuna packages and 159 cups of soup mix. I got quite the looks from many who saw my cart packed mile high. Even at Sam's club, where people buy bulk all the time, gave me the looks. Cashiers would ask, what is all this for. We would explain about 72 hour kits and the church. All thought what a great idea and felt motivated to make their own kit. See, we even did a little missionary work with the preparations. Here are the items I included in each kit: 6 bottles water, 3 oatmeal packets, 3 hot chocolate packets, 3 granola bars, 3 cans of fruit, 3 tuna packets, 3 Ritz crackers packets, 3 cup-of-soups, 3 juice pouches, 1 jar of peanut butter, raisins and crasins, 1 roll of lifesavers, 1 package of gum, 1 poncho, 1 thermal blanket, no battery flashlight, 2 light sticks, 1 sm. first-aid kit, lighter, hand sanitizer and hand sanitizer wipes, plastic utensils, 1 roll of toilet paper, wet wipes, and a whistle. We put it all in an orange 5 gallon bucket w/ lid from Home Depot. We also had a table of food people brought from recipes from a particular food storage recipe book that my enrichment leader had. People could sign-up to order the book if they wanted. The food was good. I was pleasantly surprised. Well, that was our day. It was a good day, but I was glad it was over.

Gladys Knight "Saints Unified Voices"

Tonight, down in Birmingham, we had the opportunity to attend a fireside put on by Gladys Knight. It is called "Saints Unified Voices". It was excellent. We invited our neighbor and her 13 year old son. They both loved it. What amazing performances. I have never seen a choir perform like that in person. Some people couldn't help, but get up and move and clap to the music. Me, myself, had the urge to stand up and yell, "Hallelujah!" But I resisted. Gladys Knight puts on this fireside throughout the country and we were blessed to see it. She gave some of her experiences about coming to know of the gospel and also her husband gave his experiences as well. A couple of others spoke and to my sup rise one of the speakers was one of my seminary teachers from high school. WOW! Mostly, it was some great music with a wonderful spirit. What amazing people, she and her husband are. They both bore wonderful testimonies. It was very very uplifting. Some of the soloist were so fantastic. American Idol has nothing on them. The stories they told were great, the testimonies they bore were wonderful, and the music was unbelievable. If this performance ever has the opportunity to come where you are, please take the chance and invite someone and go. You will love it and so will who ever you invite. It was just wonderful.

We all can create

So, my friend in Virginia had this video clip on her blog. It was a talk that was done by Dieter F. Uchtdorf. They made it into this nice inspiring video clip. I would like to thank her for putting it on her blog. What a great message and what wonderful inspiring words that they were. This was one of my favorite talks given by Elder Uchtodorf from our last Women's Conference. It really does make me think and feel about creation. We all have the ability to create. I myself always feel pride in things that I can create. For example, I love to play the piano. (Though, I am not always good at the piano, but I still love to play) I got this new piece of music to play. A song that I just love. When I started, I thought no way, I am never going to learn it, but I persisted and now I think, how could I have thought that. Now, I didn't create the song, but I created the process in which I learned the song. Other things I like to create might be, a letter to a friend or family member, blogs, a craft for super Saturday (though usually I steal those ideas), lessons for church, a new way in teaching something to help my children learn, friendships, jokes I might share with my husband, time with my children, and even a new skill every once in a great while. We all have the ability to create something. What can you create? If you don't think you can, sit down, and think. I bet you have creations every minute of the day. (you might have to pause my playlist music, so you can hear the clip)

Birthday Dinner

Well, It is over. We just had our Relief Society Birthday Dinner. As most of you know, I am the RS Enrichment Counselor in the presidency. It is at these times that I am the most busiest and am grateful that we only have the four enrichments a year now.(I would be very stressed if it was every month like in the days past, I feel for those who had to do it that way) Now my old friends in Virginia told me that last year for their dinner, they had a few people decorate one cake for each table in a theme ( a grandmother, a mother, a wife, a daughter, a sister, a friend). These were the centerpieces on the table and the dessert for after dinner. I thought what a cute and great idea. I am a big copy cat. Boy do I have everyone fooled, they all think I know what I am doing. So that is what we did. We then had a program called Women of Destiny (which I did in Virginia when I was Enrichment Counselor there) This was about seven songs from the CD in conjunction with a slide show that I put together with pictures of the various sisters in the ward. There were talks/scriptures in between the musical numbers. The last one was on Emma. As in Virginia, it turned out well. I thought I would add pictures of the various cakes below. They turned out well. We have some great sisters in the ward. Everyone involved did such a good job.

a grandmother......

a mother.......

a wife........

a daughter..........

a sister.......

a friend.........

Silent Night

We just had our final Enrichment Night for the year. It turned out so well. I had created a Power point presentation about the life of the Savior. It started with his birth and ended with his Resurrection. The presentation included various pictures of the Savior, scriptures from Luke, music, and a video clip of the end of the Savior's life. Books were made up that followed the presentation and the sisters were suppose to write down thoughts that they might of had during the presentation. The idea of the night is that everyone is suppose to be silent. When I was the Enrichment Counselor in Virgina, we did something similar to this, but I made the presentation a little different this time. I had to create from scratch, but I think I liked it better. It turned out quite nice. My Enrichment Leader is great. She planned all the decorating and helped so much to put the final touches of the night together. We were so surprised how many sisters came. It really was a great night. So many expressed their gratitude after. I thought I would post a couple of pictures of the decorations. We went crazy with the Christmas lights, but it was fun. After the program we had apple pie and ice cream. It was a great night to start the Christmas Season. How grateful I am to know my Savior.

Time Out

I had the great opportunity to go to Nashville this last weekend and attend Time Out for Women. It was fantastic. I normally do not like to put pictures of me on the blog so this is a first and a last. They had some great speakers and some great musical performances. We heard from speakers like Emily Watts, Chris Stewart, Camille Olson, Jason Wright (which was so nice to see again), Chieko Okazaki, and Carolyn Rasmus. They all did such a good job and I left feeling great, refreshed, and learned a few new things. We were able to sit right behind all of the speakers and performers in the front rows. They were all so nice and wonderful. Great to talk to. This is me and Hilary Weeks. She has such a wonderful voice. All her music was way beautiful. I was so dumb though. Here I told her the only song I can play on the piano and sing at the same time was "He Hears Me". I did tell her I only do that when nobody is home to hear me. I also didn't realize how funny she is. She was very insightful and very funny.

Here is Kenneth Cope and me. He is another LDS singer that I have always liked. Of course he was just as nice and seemed very happy to speak with everybody. He sang some new songs that I have never heard. They were wonderful songs.

Hilary Weeks is singing. I know the picture isn't very good. My camera was having a problem.

Chieko Okazaki is speaking here. She was great. She had so many technical difficulties and she was such a good sport about it all. She is very funny as well. I enjoyed her talk and all of the others as well.

I really did enjoy the weekend. It has been a long time since I have done anything like that and well needed. I was able to meet so many others from all over the South. We all laughed, shared and enjoyed each other company. I am already to go to another one. There is a lot I will take of what they said and put it into my own life.

Achievement Girl's Day Hike

Today we had an Achievement Day Activity. The girls got to go on a hike. The leaders asked if a parent could come a long with their child. I have to say that at first I was not enthused to go. It wasn't so much cause I didn't want to go on hike. I actually like to hike, but as some of you know I have a huge fear of snakes. I know. It sounds silly, but the slithering critters are around here and have been known to cross paths with the non-suspecting hiker here in the woods. You are thinking, come on, get a grip, get over it, what's the big deal. Whatever. The weather has gotten a bit cooler so I was banking on that. Now this hike was suppose to be a simple mile hike. By the time we were through, it was probably a 2.5 to 3 mile hike. We must have chose the wrong trail. It was up, down, through the rocks, jumped over a few ridges. We definitely got our exercise, but the girls seemed to have a lot of fun. Though they were pretty tired at the end. I asked them if they wanted to go again. NO WAY was the response. The weather was pretty perfect. Temperature was nice and cool. Definitely a great fall day. I took this picture of Megan on one of our breaks. It really was very pretty.

After the hike, the girls played on a little playground set that was set right before the trails started. Here is Megan, chatting away with one of her friends. It really was a fun day. I think tomorrow though, I might be a little sore. And guess what? I didn't see one snake. I am glad I went and enjoyed a great day with my oldest daughter.

Women;s Broadcast

I just came back from the Women's Broadcast. I really enjoyed it. I will have to be honest and say that I really didn't want to go tonight. You know, sometime I get like that. ALOT. Well I am so glad that I went. It was really a good broadcast. I got some good insight. I think I especially liked when Sister Thompson brought out that Relief Society is the Lord's organization for Women and that it is our Heritage. I never thought of it like that. To me that is like saying it is our birthright. Another statement I liked was from Elder Uchtdorf that Creation is something that did not exist before. Start small when trying to create something new. He said that we each have the desire to create that wasn't there before. Anyway, I thought I would just tell you a few things that gave me some insight. For those that went tonight, tell me somethings that you liked from the broadcast.

Primary Program

I know that I just made a post about our Mini HULK, but I wanted to let you know how the kids did in their primary program. I told you before that Megan was asked to play the piano while the primary kids sang the song"Home". She practiced and practiced and practiced. This morning, (the day of the program) she was an emotional wreck. She teared all morning and was tearing up at church. She said that her tummy felt funny. I told her that she had practiced so hard I knew that it would be great. When it was her turn, she got up and looked very brave. She did a wonderful job. I didn't hear one mistake. Hunter was his stubborn self through most of his practices. Wouldn't say a word. I made a deal with him that he liked. Today, he got up there, said his part real well, and sat down. I new he could do it. Emilee was the luckiest. She was the last person to say her part. I told her that usually the last things said is the thing people remember the most. She was fantastic. I took a picture of the kids when we got home today and I thought I would post if for you. Just know this, I am so lucky to have such great kids.