One step closer to an update

I've finally downloaded a TON of pictures from my phone and camera so that I can document the last year! Now to actually blog... Soon. I promise. Soon.

Words to live by...

I was taught at an early age that if you have nothing good to say, don't say anything at all.

I've tried to be really positive and find good in all the crap that lies around me, but I'm too tired lately to post any of that positiveness. At present, I don't have much good to say, so I haven't been posting. Hopefully that will change soon. We'll see. Should know more by June 15th. Perhaps I'll write an update then.

Solo

Several weeks ago, after feeling the love from our new ward, I was asked to sing a solo for the Relief Society Birthday. It was going to be a program about Lucy Mac Smith. The song they asked me to sing was titled "Emma", but changed some of the words so they would apply to Lucy. I had never heard the song before, so I rang up my sis and asked her to play it for me to help me get an idea of what it should sound like. The timing was strange and as we tried to go through it on the piano, we finally decided it would be easier to just go online and see if we could find it to listen to. We were in luck. We found the song and listened to the demo clip and I got chills. It was beautiful. Rach downloaded the song for $.99 and made a CD for me to take home and practice.

From the first time I played the CD at home, my kids loved the song, and instead of coming home from school and turning on the TV, they would put that CD in and tell me to sing. After a while, they knew the words and would sing along with me.

The first few days, though, I wasn't able to make it all the way through the song. Why? It talks about all the things that Emma/Lucy went through in the early days of the church. Not only was she the wife of a controversial man (in the eyes of non-believers), she was the wife of the prophet who was beaten and chased and finally killed. She was the mother of many that died. She was chased from her home, but there wasn't any time for her to have self pity. One line in the song says, "Never had a day to call your own, when so many needed your warm heart as a home." She had to be strong for the other women of the church. And then, at the end, after all she endured, losing her husband, her children, and so much more, the song says, "I'm sure your heart breaks when some of the saints say somewhere down the line they've lost their faith. How much can one heart take?"

That last phrase I couldn't make it through without breaking down and crying. How much can one heart take? I thought my heart couldn't take much more in many times in my life, and I've never been through half of what those great women had to endure. They must weep when saints lose their faith. After all they did to establish the church again on the earth, and then to have someone "lose their faith" over seemingly trivial things, such as being offended at something someone said, or not getting a calling they wanted.

I was renewed. I had a revived desire to be stalwart. I wasn't going to be one of the ones that couldn't hack it. I've always thought of myself as a very strong woman. I can handle anything. I can do anything. I WILL do anything I set my mind to, and I can do it alone. But I'm learning that doing it alone is lonely and I just don't have the energy to be that strong. But with family, friends, and a fantastic ward and bishop behind me, I really COULD do anything I set my mind to. And my mind wants to be known as a woman of great faith. Just like Emma and Lucy. I have so far to go. But I'm not discouraged. I'm going to do it.

Incidentally, the performance went great, my mom was able to be there along with my husband and kids, the Spirit was strong, and we all left feeling peace. It was awesome. This is the first time my children have seen me sing in public and they were so excited to see me up there. The other day, out of the blue, my son looked at me and said, "Hey Mom. Remember when you sang the other night? Well that was BEAUTIFUL! You did a great job!" Coming from a 5 year old that I didn't think cared much of what else went on, that meant a lot. He actually remembered and thought it was beautiful. *SIGH OF CONTENTMENT*

Job Hopping

January 12th I began my new career on the telephone. I took a job at PMI - Professional Marketing International. Boy was it an education! First, I truly enjoyed the people I worked with. My team was fantastic, I made some great friends and strengthened existing friendships. I had a 3 hour lunch break every day to do whatever I wanted, we had a movie day every Friday where my team would hit the theaters on our lunch break. They fed us every Tues. and Thurs night because we all worked late until 8:00 or later. There were some great perks.

There were some downsides as well. I had a lot to learn, to start off with.

I had to be BOLD!
I had to be BRAVE!
I couldn't back down from people screaming at me and hanging up on me! I had to "get back in the saddle" after every call, when all I wanted to do was go home.
I made over 300 phone calls daily to the same 50 people (no wonder they were mad at me...)
I worked 6 days a week for longer hours than I had put in at any other job and made less money than I made at any other job.

So why on earth was I working there?!!!

I asked myself that question every day.

I cried myself to sleep most nights and then geared up to go at it again.

I felt as though I was beating my head against a brick wall - for NOTHING!

My prayers consisted of begging and pleading with the Lord to let me know if I should stay and keep trying or quit and move on. And I never felt any answer. So I continued to try.

Because of my long hours and schedule, my husband had to re-arrange his work schedule to take care of the kids. He permanently took off Tues and Thurs since I was at work from 9am until 8pm. It was great that he could be home with the kids on those days, but that meant that he would never be able to go to church. He would have to work every Sunday. The Sunday shift he worked was 11:00, and our Samoan ward met at 11:30. Because of this, I decided to stop driving the 20 minutes each Sunday to get to the Samoan ward, and just walk next door to our home ward. Imagine my smile when I found out that the ward started at 9am so my hubby could actually come to church with us for the first hour and then go to work! Our first Sunday at the home ward was a bit unreal to me. It was fast Sunday and as we sat there, all together for the first time in a long time, a great feeling of peace came over me. The Spirit was so strong. I hadn't felt that strong in years. It even moved my hubby to get up and bear his testimony, which moved others to get up and comment on how they were moved to bear theirs. For lack of better words, it was a beautiful day. It was simple, and calm, and peaceful, and beautiful. I met with the Bishop and introduced our family and just felt as though there was a purpose to life again. A ray of sunlight in my very dark and twisty life.

So, back to the job...

Rewind to Dec. I applied at my brother's company, but they were re-organizing their teams and put off hiring for a bit. By the time they called and offered me a position, I had already taken the job at PMI.

Fast forward to February. My brother told me they were creating a new team to work with the UK, so the hours would be from 2am until 11am. I re-submitted my resume requesting that team so it could allow me to be home with my kids in the day, and for WEEKS didn't hear anything, even after all of my phone calls to follow up. I was frustrated because it was obvious to me that the Lord either hated me, or he wanted me to be unsuccessful at PMI. Because that's what I was doing - being unsuccessful at PMI. I so badly wanted to rock the house and be rookie of the year and make a boat load of money. The potential was there! I just couldn't seem to grasp any of it. It was always just out of my reach.

Then came Monday, March 2. My ever faithful sitter who has watched my kids since they were born, called to let me know that her pregnancy wasn't going so well and is now being put on bed rest. She couldn't watch my kids for all the hours that I was requiring. I freaked out!! What was I going to do! The Lord really was punishing me! I must really be a horrible person!

And then...

The very next day, Tuesday, as I was mulling over my predicament on my lunch break - and actually feeling like all hope was gone, I got the call from SecurityMetrics that they would like to hire me for the 2am shift. They wanted me to start the next week.

Wow.

Hope returned.

It would be more steady money, I would be able to be home with my kids in the day - the only overlap for my hubby's work would only be an hour or two that my sitter could actually do, and I wouldn't be going home crying every day with people screaming at me on the phone.

Sounded like a good option to me!!! I took it.

Went back to work and told my team lead who was AWESOME about it. He even wanted me to keep in touch so that if circumstances changed, I could go back to PMI. It's nice to have that door open just in case. Because it really is a good company and there really is potential to do great things there. Just not for me right now.

Whew. Sigh of relief.

But I still questioned why I had to go through such a difficult time at PMI. What was the purpose in having so much pain and frustration? And then it dawned on me.

PMI taught me to be bold. They taught me to speak with more confidence. They taught me how a successful company works on the phones. I really grew personally in my skills.

It also allowed me to move to the home ward. It allowed me to renew my faith and testimony of the gospel. It gave me a clear marker to see that the Lord's hand really is in everything, and that, although things aren't going the way I want or am comfortable with, he's still there and loves me and is watching out for me. I don't think I would have appreciated the job at SecurityMetrics as much or felt the Spirit so strongly at my home ward if I weren't in such a dark place to start with. I was completely broken. I needed to be to finally realize that I needed to be fixed. My prayers became more honest and earnest.

I finally had to just rely on the Lord to take care of me, and He did.

The Day After Christmas

This holiday season was actually GREAT in so many ways. Not only was there a great family time to be had before Christmas, we had a great time AFTER Christmas with Nanna. She reserved a cool place that I didn't even know existed so we could have a place big enough for us all to hang out at and still cook a great meal. Mom made scones and got turkey and ham and we had so much food and laughter and fun! There was much more we wanted to do as well, but there just wasn't enough time in the day to get it all in. It also happened to be Ari's 3rd birthday so we had a princess cake and presents. The kids played Wii, danced around and sang, the girls chatted the entire time, and the guys went to their corners to nap. It's been so long since we've spent much family time, and VOILA! Family time in abundance for several days! Who knew it could really be so much fun. My sisters and mom are finally all getting closer together. It's nice to have those added friends and shoulders to lean on. This year, Christmas was family. I hope my swiss cheese memory will allow this one to stay on the books! It was worth holding on to.

'Twas the Night Before Christmas (as stolen from my sisters)

Twas the night before Christmas...

And all through my sister Jenni's house,
Every creature was stirring - especially the cows!

I, on Jenni's 4 wheeler, and others on the tubes,
made for laughs and faces that looked like ice cubes.

We chased those cows silly! We laughed and laughed some more.
Elle and Ramon raced the machines with smiles GALORE!

Grumpy and One Love came to play in the snow.
One Love got sprayed, which no doubt stole the show!

There was baseball, cars, dancing and lounging a plenty...

And enough food and fondue pots to feed an army of TWENTY!

To sweeten our mouths there was liquid nitrogen ice cream,
which was fun to watch and did taste like a dream.
What a wonderful night, we all had a ball!
Being with family makes me the happiest of all.

But let's not forget the event of most bliss,
There was a nativity that went something like this...

There was Mary and Joseph and Baby Jesus, of course,

Who just so happened to be a baby horse.Joseph was jealous and wanted to be Mary
So he stole baby Jesus, and made Mary very wary.The wise men and Shepherds came on their Que,
And when they weren't looking Joseph stole their gold too.

At the end of the story the angel got her chance at last,
To smite Joseph for being greedy, this was perfectly cast.

Oh the laughter and joy that we all shared that night,
It came to end before Santa came into sight.
So a Merry Christmas to all and to all a Goodnight!

Another attempt

I have pictures and stories about how wonderful the holidays were, explanations of my work situation, etc, but haven't taken a chance to put them here and am not going to now. Sorry! But wanted to say thank you so much to all my friend and family for the lovely holidays and card and well wishes we've received. It was actually a great holiday season. I start my new job tomorrow (Mon, 12th) and am very excited and nervous. I look forward to a new start in the new year and finding great success. I'll update y'all when I get a chance, and will catch up what I've missed. HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

An attempt at a post

It's been so long since I've posted and there is so much to write and no time right now! But in short, with more info to come later, I got a job! I will be working at PMI and I am VERY excited. Christmas was wonderful, especially since I wasn't worried about getting a job. The kids are old enough to actually enjoy their presents, we spent time with family and friends, and it was just all around a lovely time. More to come!

A Day With the Dinosaurs

Being a stay at home mom (even if only temporarily) has allowed me to do somethings that I've always wanted to do. Like take my son to school, and pick him up again. Take my daughter to visit Babs in the day time (Great Grandma Pete - my son decided at a very young age to call her Babs, and it stuck.) And also to take the kids to the Dinosaur Museum that we've driven past for years. We finally went after Thanksgiving and had a GREAT time! It really is a cool place with a TON of stuff that the kids can do HANDS ON. They had so much fun! Take a look at some of the pictures of our outing. Ever since that day, my daughter randomly looks over at me and says, "Mom... remember how much fun we had at the dinosaurs?!!" I love that!

Pictures of the Thanksgiving Loveliness

Just a few shots of all the food and fun that we had on Thanksgiving!