publicly creepering

If you have a facebook account you are familiar with the endless page suggestions, applications, and invites to this and that. I usually just ignore them and periodically I will go through and ignore/reject them. But just the other day I received and invite that caught my attention. This was the invite of all invites. The chance for all stalkers to publicly announce their stalker-ness. The link was supposed to enable a person to view private profiles. Now I'm not going to lie, sometimes I find private profiles irritating..but never enough to hack into them. I mean really, they are private for a reason. My own page is private cause I don't want creepers having access to my stuff. I can't imagine people actually joining this group or app or whatever it is. You are publicly announcing to the world that you are a creeper. If you are going to be a creeper...keep it to yourself. :)

Something to aspire to...

"I have never seen a woman in my life, who would endure every species of fatigue and hardship, from month to month, and from year to year, with that unflinching courage, zeal, and patience, which she has ever done..she has been tossed upon the ocean of uncertainty- she has breasted the storms of persecution, and buffeted the rage of men and devils, which would have borne down almost any other woman" -Lucy Mack Smith (said of daughter in Law Emma Smith)

EMMA SMITH

Just the other day my mom was watching a show on KBYU (I think) and I was only half listening when my attention was drawn away from my computer. A woman was retelling a story about Emma Smith. She wanted a blessing from her husband Joseph Smith before he was taken to Carthage jail. There was not time so Joseph told her to write the things she most desired and he would sign it on his return. I have included the blessing below because I think it is beautiful. She was a very intelligent and wise woman and one of my hero's. I know she gets a lot of flack for her actions after Joseph's death but in my book, Emma is still someone to be admired. These are her words:

"first of all that I would crave as the richest of Heaven's blessings would be wisdom from my Heavenly Father bestowed daily, so that whatever I might do or say, I could not look back at the close of the day with regret, nor neglect the performance of any act that would bring a blessing. I desire the Spirit of God to know and understand myself, that I desire a fruitful, active mind, that I may be able to comprehend the designs of God, when revealed through his servants without doubting. I desire a spirit of discernment, which is one of the promised blessings of the Holy Ghost. I particularly desire wisdom to bring up the children that are, or may be committed to my charge, in such a manner that they will be useful ornaments in the Kingdom of God, and in a coming day arise up and call me blessed. "

"I desire Prudence that I may not through ambition abuse my body and cause it to become prematurely old and care-worn, but that I may wear a cheerful countenance, live to perform all the work that I covenanted to perform in the spirit-world and be a blessing to all who in any wise need aught at my hands."

"I desire with all my heart to honor and respect my husband as my head, ever to live in his confidence and by acting in unison with him retain the place which God has given me by his side, and I ask my Heavenly Father that through humility, I may be enabled to overcome that curse which was pronounced upon the daughters of Eve. I desire to see that I may rejoice with them in the blessings which God has in store for all who are willing to be obedient to his requirements. Finally, I desire that whatever may be my lot through life I may be enabled to acknowledge the hand of God in all things"

I echo many of her desires. Not all of them apply to me in my life right now, but I think and hope that someday they will.

so maybe i'm a cynic sometimes....

Now that I'm not relief society president I suddenly have a ton of time on Sunday. NO morning meetings. that being said I had about 2 hours to kill this morning so naturally I turned on WE wedding Sunday because I love all things weddings. They have this show called "my big fat fabulous wedding" and I decided to try it out. The first episode I turned on was a couple who were about 15 years apart. They spent $775,000 on their wedding. Right after the ceremony the groom says, "this is all for you" and the bride says, not thank you, not I love you...but "I'm worth it". Right there and then I decided they will be lucky if they are still married in a year. She was such a spoiled princess he will spend his marriage giving and she will spend it taking. Call me a cynic but I think its a fat waste of money!!

Not just for kids

I am a kid at heart. And maybe not so much at heart..maybe it comes out of my heart a little too often. I love to have fun. I love to laugh and play and enjoy every day! That being said, it only makes sense that I would be a fan of playgrounds and slides. All kinds of slides. However, there are times when the playing must stop and some serious reflection must take place. The last few days I have been reflecting on my life. Where it was and where it is and where I want it to be. As I look back, I realize that even serious things can be related to fun, for example. A typical park slide. I realized, even just a few months ago I was working really hard to climb those steps to get to the peak and enjoy the view. Its amazing being at the top...no one can reach you and your view is amazing. You can see things you couldn't see from the lower elevation. But at some point in the recent past I must have sat down to take a rest or something, and in sitting I inadvertently allowed myself to slide down the slide. I don't even think I realized what was happening. But here I am again, at the bottom of the steps, looking up to my goal and realizing that it takes a lot more work and a lot more time to get to the top than it does to slide down to the bottom. That is the easy part, no effort and it happens quickly. Now I'm not saying I have done anything horribly bad...I just am not seeing things as clearly as I once was and I know the reason for it. I can see which areas of my life are lacking attention and its time to start my upward climb...once again. But this time...I'm going to try and stay at the top.

Before I kick the bucket...

So today I was thinking about my bucket list. For one thing it needs to be longer but for now I will share what i've got:

Shoot a bow and arrow/cross bow
Learn to play the violin
Become and expert marksman
Spend the 4th of July in DC
Fly in a hot air balloon
visit the Ben & Jerry's factory
learn to ski
tour europe
four wheeling in moab
have a lead in Les Miserables (Eponine or Fantine)
orchestra seats to Wicked
take the church history tour
law school
work at Disneyland
go on a cruise
learn to water ski
Eat a lobster tail from Carlos bakery in Jersey
snorkle in Maui
visit pearl harbor


i'm sure there are more things i'd love to do before I kick the bucket...if you have any suggestions let me know and I will evaluate them and see if they are worthy to be added to my list :)