What makes you happy?

Yesterday marked 6 months since my wonderful sweet grandma leaving this earth. I am sad. But I know I have much reason to be sad. One of the most elect lady's has left us and returned to our father in heaven. She is happy and I know wants me to be too, even though it is really hard. I know she is right now doing something that brought her much joy in her life. Sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ. I know she is helping others to learn of this wonderful church. She is being very patient and loving while she does this too I know. It is amazing to imagine. I will try to do my best to also share the gospel with others, so that they can feel the joy and peace that I have!

My Grandma was a LOT of fun. She was always telling us stories, or making us laugh. She loved to laugh! She taught me how to make her amazing brownies, and always showed us what she was sewing. A lot of the things she made for us! She was the queen of games and loved a good game of phase 10 or scrabble. She would always sing some pretty funny songs to me and she always encouraged me and was there to talk to me.

I Miss her a LOT. But I know she's busy somewhere on the other side smiling.... and when she smiles YOU smile. I know she would not want me posting about how sad I was here but instead finding something else to be happy about. So here are some things that I am happy about that have been going on in my life or have made me smile.

I am happy about completing our Classical acting play "Two gentleman of Verona". It was so much fun to do but the joy definitely comes in the completing of it! My mom was the director and she did an amazing job. She spent more than 12 plus hours a day for a few weeks on this play!

Evan, My mom and Me


Here is just one of me..... Don't you love that creepy hand in the background... Megan. :)


I was happy that I got to spend Natalie's birthday evening with her. It was on the night of the play. Here she is opening the gifts I got her. I got her a bunch of our "Favorite things" we like to eat or do. And just some random stuff too, but she liked it. Sorry the picture is blurry.

This picture So makes me smile!!


I am really happy because I now have a garden!!! For one of my classes we have to plant a Garden and I finally did it. It is a hanging garden made from shoe organizer. Sounds weird yes, but I think it it pretty cool! I am growing, 3 kinds of flowers, carrots, rosemary, cilantro, green onions, lettuce, and spinach.

I also planted this pretty flower that has an AMAZING fragrance!
And.... A raspberry bush! We havn't planted it yet, but it's outside and it does look better than it does in the picture. (That's a picture from when I first bought it.)

I am happy because on Sunday we are leaving for a little vacation! My dad has work in Arizona and we are staying at a really nice hotel! This is just ONE of the pictures (I found on there website) of the pools where we are staying. They have a lazy river too! I can't wait to go get in that pool....


In my new swimsuit from lands end!
Isn't it cute?!


But I'm smiling even more because some of my favorite people are coming and meeting up with us in Arizona!! Susan, Dave, Josh and Holly! Were excited!

Evan, Susan and Josh on new years eve.

I am happy for this pretty picture of some flowers in my Grandparents backyard after General conference. Conference was awesome!

And I was so happy for the great hike me and Evan went on yesterday. It was so pretty!



And lastly am happy to share a sneak peak with you of some cookies I made today!

Okay and now I am happy because I finally got got up with some stuff I've been doing! I'm not at all caught up with my flicker but at least I am with my blog! :)

Utah... Part 1 (Friday)

Last week we went up to Utah for a few reasons. The main one was that we were taking my brother Aaron up to collage at BYU! We got there on Thursday evening and started doing everything on Friday! He is starting summer semester and is in helaman halls. His hall is called budge halls.


My dad, My mom, and brother Evan with the "budge" sign. (Evan found a piece of wood that looked like a Y and put it after the word budge to make it say Budgie/budge, .... get it another named for a parakeet? Yes I know he spelled it wrong.)
Aaron with his new bed!
Aaron with his closet
Aaron's desk and closet
Here is a bigger view of it all
This is Josh, Aaron's roommate and good friend. We are really good friends with his whole family and have known them for a long time!
They even get a mini refrigerator! :)
Then we ate Pier 49 pizza, which we always eat when we come to Utah because it's so good!
And then I had this amazing idea to go find Aaron's bike among all the other bikes and take this picture to send to him.......
But he spoiled my surprise while finding me on his way out of the dorms!!! He saw me on his bike and thought that was funny. :)

On our way home we saw all this water coming out... and we had to take a picture of it!
Our last stop was at the BYU creamery! It was SO good. The two ice cream scoops I got were toffee & Raspberries and cream cheese. It was so yummy! Have you been there before??? What is your favorite flavor?

A picture a day

Hello Everyone! Sorry I haven't been that great at blogging all the time... But I promise you that I HAVE still been taking pictures. I decided that I wanted to try and take at least 1 picture (or more) a day. So Far it has been pretty good and I've only cheated a couple of times and of course I always take another picture for that day that I missed! At then end of the month (tomorrow!) I'm going to do a big collage of all the pictures I've taken in Feb and then post it on here! But for now Here are a couple of pictures I've taken this month that I think are cool.

It's a rainy day here, and I love how the raindrops catch on the plants!
My parents Japanese dolls
It's really hard to get an "okay" picture of my dog Roxy, and I did like how this picture turned out!
My brother Aaron got Excepted to BYU Provo!!! He is rooming with my friend Natalie's brother. He leaves in June for Summer Semester!
Yummy orange slices!
I earned each of these Jewels by doing work in a class.
Self portrait!

Welcome home Evan!

After about 6 days of staying in the hospital......today Evan came home!! He lately has really been wanting to come home and today was the day they finally let him come home! Here is a picture of Evan and his Bear he named "Randy" they gave him in the hospital. He loves this little bear and it is so sweet. They both have on Eye patches. (It helps his vision). His vision is doing better because tonight he said he didn't see double of us.


There was of course lots of "Welcoming Home" stuff to do. I had a play reversal so before I left I made a sign and The Bakers & our friends the Hulse's brought signs and balloons and hung them up.

With more signs and Balloons. Evan is loving being home. He keeps saying how happy he is to be at home and not be hooked up to an IV and have to take medicine at 11:00 at night and so on. We are glad to have him home!

Welcome home Evan!!!

Update

Sorry I haven't blogged...life's been a little crazy. Want to see what I mean by like crazy? Here you go!

Last week Evan started out as sick just a bad cough and fever. He was a lot better on Wednesday night and we thought he was fine. On thursday he got back from his piano lesson and was not feeling good. So I'll start my week on Friday.

Friday- Not to much going on for me. I wrote in my journal lots. Evan still isn't doing good. His vision is bad and is seeing doubles of things. Has a fever, his neck and legs hurt. Finally he is doing so bad my parents take him in to urgent care. The find out he has an ear infection and guess what elts? He has Walking Pneumonia! Uh oh. Not good. Later that night late Evan says his stomach hurts. My dad is up with Evan all night while Evan gets sick.


Saturday- This morning Evan was not doing good. He was having a very hard time breathing and his eyes looked funny. My parents take him to the Children's hospital in San Diego. They had to wait 4 hours to see a doctor. (Evan luckily stayed in the car with my mom while they waited I think) I am home alone most of the day. Dad calls every once in a while to give me an update. He tells me about all the tests they have to do. Within the first 1/2 hour they had done tons of tests on him. They did a cat scan on his head and a VERY painful test were they stick something up your nose and scrape to make sure you don't have the flu.

Sis Davies calls too to find out all the news. I spend most of my time cleaning, on the computer, answering the phone, watching Tv (Did any of you happen to watch the Kentucky derby horse race? ha ha. Yep I watched it. Wow, yeah I didn't even get to the part were they even race and I was board and turned it off. But they did have some neat hats I must say.) Dad calls to tell me the news of what they found. He has Spinal Meningitis. Ouch. Well that explains why his spine hurt. Me and Ryan went to my cousin Dallin's Baptism. Went over to their house after dinner. Dad comes home for the night while Mom stays with him. Aaron comes home from Youth conference.


Sunday - Dad goes back to the hospital. I pack some stuff for Evan to do. (Thought he is not up to it.) Aaron stays home from church he is tired and has a sore throat. I stay home too. My back hurts, I should take it easy since I don't want to get sick and people at church would start freaking out since they know my little bro has meningitis and think I might have it too. Mom comes home from the hospital while dad watches him. She sleeps and takes a shower. Evan eats some lunch at the hospital. That is good! Our ward family is so great. Sis Hulse arranges dinner to be brought for us till Tuesday or Wednesday. Later mom leaves to go back to the hospital. Two people brought us dinner tonight! Wow! They were both yummy. Dad is back home and mom will stay the night with him tonight. I emailed my old art teacher and good friend Kara and let her know about Evan. She emailed me back. I would like to share part of the email she wrote to me. Last year I gave her a book of mormon and marked some scriptures for her to read. (She is not LDS)I kind of forgot about it and never knew if she read it. Here's part of the email.

Kara : Thanks for letting me know and it is so weird I have been thinking about you all weekend, John (gaughan) asked me if I ever read the Mormon Bible you gave me (I told him that story a long time ago) and I said that I have read the scriptures that you wanted me to read that reminded you of me many time over the years.

That was SO exiting for me to find out that she had read the verses I had marked for her!


(Still Sunday) Evan is not comfortable hooked to all the stuff. When something comes unplugged it starts beeping and it upsets Evan. He started crying today and told my mom he just wanted to go home. He is not being very responsive to the doctors & nurses. He will respond to my Mom & dad but is kind of in his own little world. When my dad gets back we go for a walk.


Monday- Slept in and missed my art class. It felt good to sleep. :-)
Dad left for a lunch for work. LOTS of people call through out the day. Two people tell me they have him or are putting his on prayer lists at the temple. Everyone is so nice I talk too. At 11:30 I go down to my cousins house for my math class at 12:00. Get home from math. Dad gets home from his lunch to pick up Ryan to go give Evan a blessing. Evan is doing better. He is more of his normal self and not in his "Own little world" anymore. Mom comes home and sleeps and showers. We receive a wonderful dinner tonight. I write this post and chat online with my friend Natalie

Ok... so to summarize for you

1. Evan is in the hospital with Spinal Meningitis and Pneumonia

2. Evan is doing a little better but it not fully recoverd yet.

3. Evan had an MRI tonight and he did ok on it. His vision is really weird so they had to do an MRI.

4. He will hopefully be home by Wendsay. We pray for a quick recovery.

Thank you if you have prayed, fasted, brought us food, or had Evan in your thoughts.

I will keep you updated. It would be appreciated if you could Fast, Pray and please keep Evan in your thoughts. If you have any questions you can comment.

(Evan November 2008)

Ryan is going to the little rock Arkansas mission!

We have been expecting Ryan's mission papers any day now and today was the day!!! I was at school all day and so my mom called my teacher to tell me and my mentor was picking up something for us at the store so then my mentor called my student mentor and she told me that Ryan got his mission papers and to call my mom. So I called her and found out he is was going to the Little rock Arkansas mission! We are all excited! I I never even thought about him getting called to Arkansas but I guess every mission call is a surprise. Congratulations Ryan! He leaves on June 24! (It was also really cool because my friend's sister got her mission call today too! She is going to Russia!)
The soon to be missionary!
Little Rock