Kicken off the 4th!

We started the needed LOOOONNNGGG 4th of July weekend off by going to Hollie and Russ’ family cabin down south. We had tons of fun…even sleeping in the back of the Xterra! Everyone else either slept in the Cabin or out in their tents, but seeing that we were the only ones without little ones, Casey and I toughed it out with the seats down and changing in the car with the windows down!
Right when we got there, Casey of course wanted to jump right on the 4-wheelers and head out, which is exactly what we did – I love sitting on the back with the wind and dirt in my hair and eyes! – There really is no sarcasm in that comment, I have always been known as the one that enjoys to get dirty while camping! Oh, and Casey always thinks it is hilarious to go off these jumps, where I swear one day I will be thrown off the back…until then, I will let him enjoy doing so!

Casey and I.
That night we had each prepared a tin foil dinner, Casey did ours. We had steak and amazingly flavored potatoes - nice work babe, it was delicious!

Casey's dad Kendall.
But before dinner, Casey and Hollie needed to take some of the kiddos that wanted to on a quick ride before we headed back out!

- I hate to tell ya, but I truely think Casey is one of little Kendall's favorite people! I think this picture is adorable!

Hollie and Britta.
As we were waiting for our tin foil dinners to be cooked, Hollie and Kristen and Casey and I took off for another ride - It was beautiful watching the sunset and exploring tight trails...At one point we saw this sheep dog just starring at us, it was so bizzare...little did we know and soon found out, that he was rounding up the straggeling sheep to get them back with the herd! A little later we ran in to where hundreds of hundreds of sheep were resting and the two other sheep dogs - i was quite impressed with these smart dogs and their ability to take control of ALL those sheep! However, we could tell that those old dogs were quite diappointed in us as we drove through their herd and becuase of the loud noise the 4-wheelers were making, were scattering the sheep in all different directions...I felt bad for those hard working dogs, oh well. At one point we were on this really narrow path and had to stop becuase of all the sheep in front of us, as we sat there dozens of sheep starting jump from the bushes in front and behind us - they were paniced that we were going to hurt them, it was kind of sad. I didnt have a camera with me and I wish I had becuase of how funny the situation really was...but as Casey and I were leaving the next morning, we saw this...

Now, this picture really doesnt do it justice...but imagin like 5 times this many sheep and being on a 4 foot wide dirt path with them EVERYWHERE!!! It was hilarious!
Anyway, Casey had fun with the bow and arrows showing off his mad skills and killing us all at darts - its funny those little things you find out that your spouse is good at the longer you are together - I was impressed! He was like25 yards away from a bush and put a Dr. Pepper can in the bush and would just nail it with his arrow!

It was a nice 2 day camping trip filled with good eats, card games, one too many roasted mallows and lots of 4-wheeling!
Thanks Hollie and Russ for the fun getaway!

Tuachan!

July has gone by WAY to fast! It is by far my favorite month for MANY reasons…There is nothing better that sitting on a hand made fourth of July quilt watching fireworks, for not just 1 night, but 3. The barbeques with family and friends, my birthday, laying out by the pool and the unexpected “trip” that gets thought out a couple of months a head of time, but always falls in July!
With that said, I better start updating as I feel as if I will never get caught up!
So, I will start with Tuachan...
I was finally able to experience the annual “Edwards” Tuachan trip down in St. George. This is something that Caseys mom Pam, her sister Peggy and Grandma Zenda started 10 years ago. From those 3 families all the girls get together and leave on Wednesday night and come home on Sunday. I did however, get to bring my little sister Alyssa with me and I was glad she got to come! We spent the weekend shopping, seeing “My Sister’s Keeper” (not a good show to see when you just watched someone go through that by the way!), laying out by the pool and eating!
Grandma has a house down in St. George that we all stay in and then she buys each of a ticket to see both of the Tuachan plays that are showing. The two shows this year were Footloose and Annie! They were so good and totally entertaining! I must admit, I liked Annie better. I was totally impressed with the little girls and their acting! Plus, Annie was one of my favorite shows growing up! Thanks Grandma for the fun weekend!



Hmmm...how is it, that I didnt get any pictures of the WHOLE gang when that was going down? Member when Aunt Peg very casually asked me "is that how you are going?" cause i didnt get all dolled up for the annual Tuachan picture? That was hilarious! Maybe that is why I didnt get one! HAHAHA!

One of my summer favs!

One of my most all time favorite things about summer are SNOW CONES!!! When you see those little "Snow Shacks" start poping up, you know its time for summer to begin!
Casey and I had our first Snow Cone of the summer last night - it was just as delicious as ever! We took a little walk behind our closest snow shack and found the city pool - I didnt even know we had a city pool! It has a slide and all! I know where I will be on my days off. Summer may have offically started weeks ago for most of you...but mine offically started last night!

Oh yeah…Cancun

(Don't mind my choice of pictures, I emailed them to myself at work to post them and didnt get the ones I wanted...but if I dont just post it, Ill probably never do it! And they are super small, so you can click to enlarge them.)
Almost 2 months later – but, we did go to Cancun…
It was absolutely perfect, our week long last minute vacation to Cancun! We found tickets for SUPER cheap and invited Casey’s parents to come along, and we hopped flight 2 ½ weeks later.
The weather was PERFECT, it was in the high 80’s the whole week.
The first thing we did when we got there was go eat. We ate at El Shrimp Bucket – and I was heaven! We ate about 7 different ‘flavors’ of shrimp between the 4 of us, the coconut shrimp was seriously like candy, just melted in your mouth…We ate good!
As this was mine and Casey’s third time to Cancun, we wanted to do some things that we hadn’t done in the past, one of them was to just hang out at the pool and the beach and enjoy these…

Mango smoothies! They just dont taste them same in the states! This is at the little cafe that sits under the pool to our hotel overlooking the ocean. It was so beautiful!
We did a couple of excursions…We did the “Jungle Tour” – that was NOT in a jungle AT ALL! We got on Wave Runners and took about a 30 minute ride on the ocean through some trees to the other side of the island and went snorkeling. I thought it was really fun! The first time we went to Cancun we had done a snorkeling adventure and one of the guys that was with us seriously cut up his feet on the coral, so I was kind of nervous swimming over it, but it was really pretty. Casey and Kendall almost lost Pam and I on the back of the Wave Runners though – The ocean was pretty choppy (obviously) and we hit some deep waves, we survived and made sure to give the boys a hard time about it!
That night we went on the “Cancun Queen”! The Cancun Queen is a dinner cruise that is about 4 hours long. You start out with a dance party on top to the old time style ferry and then have dinner underneath and watch the sunset.

We seiously were the only "white folk" on the boat - let me just tell...Those black girls new had to dance! We really had a blast, and enjoyed playing the limbo and learning new dances, they for sure out did us though! They loved my mother-n-law though...Nice work keeping up with them Pam, you totally impressed me!
Easter was a little different, Pam and Kendall went to Chitzenitza and Casey and I stayed at the beach all day. They had an Easter Egg hunt for the kids, but other than it was pretty low key.
Monday we went to the Isla of Mujeras - translated into "The Island of the Women". Because when the discovered the island there were status of women all over the island. The island itself is only about 8 miles long and a mile wide, completley surrounded by the ocean! I think this was one of my favorite spots for sure! It was beautiful! However, I feared for my life the way over there - it is only like 10 miles out from Cancun, but you have to take a boat there and ours only held about 30 people, so it was pretty small to stand up against those HUGE ocean waves! I seriously thought I was going to die watching the waves come up around the boat and looking behind us not even being able to see past 10 yards becuase of those huge waves. I had to close my eyes - There is something about the dark ocean that frightens me! But, once we made it to the island, it was all worth the treacherous trip.
The Isla of Mujeres is a fishing village and though it is now discovered by tourists it still retains it's charm and tranquil atmosphere. As you stroll the streets in the evening you will see families gathered together in Caribbean styled homes, tucked between stores and restaurants, mending their fishing nets and relaxing.
They told us that they had an Angel Shark at the island that we could swim with - supposedly, if you turn an Angel Shark up side down, there brain hits there skull and they fall asleep, so, if the attack thats all they have to do, and nothing would happen - that was all I needed to hear to do it! I begged and begged Casey to do it with me, and he totally wasnt going to have any of it! All I wanted was a picture of the 2 of us with the shark. He gave in after about a half an hour and we started walking into the water - and something hit me - (this really is disgusting - just in case you choose to read on) I had just started my "girl problems" and thought to myslef "What if he 'smells' me and attacks" - (sick right? Yeah I know...but I had to tell you why I was so deathly scared and hiding behind Casey in this picture...)

Obviusly, Casey thought it was pretty cool and I didnt know what to think about it, my face tells it all, I think its cool that my husband is holding a shark, but I am terrified and totally disgusted with the sharks NASTY feeling tail whacking me in the side. I dont know what I was thinking - Why in my right mind did I think swimming and holding a shark would be "so neat"? It was disgusting, I touched the shark once just for Casey's satisfaction, and just thinking of it now - gives me beauterflies - But, I do love Casey's face in that picture!
Anyway, moving on...Here are a couple more pictures of the island, this place seriously was beautiful!

We rented this golf cart and went and explored the 8 mile long island...

There was a turtle farm that had all sorts of different sized turtles on and in it -

Other than that, we took bus rides around the strip and explored and relaxed by the pool! It was such a nice vacation and really needed on my part! Thanks Pam and Kendall for coming along, it was nice to spend some time with you guys...and for the unexpected "spoilage" we received - we love you guys!

Wanna Play?

Our indoor soccer team only has 3 games left and we have to put in our deposit in 2 weeks!!! So, that means – if you want to play with us, let me know! We have 8 players and we are looking for 5 more. The cost is $43 for the season ($35 for player fees and then every game we have to pay $10 for ref fees). We play on Saturdays. The games are as early as 3:55 and as late as 10:40. We play at Timpanogos Indoor in Lindon. So if you, or your hubby, or both of you want to play…let me know before we fill up!!!
As a side note – I know a lot of boys don’t like to play coed, but the rules are different at Timp Indoor. Boys can touch the ball AS MANY TIMES as they want before passing it off (that is not the case at Murry). There has to be 2 girls on the field at a time and when us girls do score…we get two points instead of 1. Those are really the only 2 rules. And…I promise our girls can play! We actually only have 3 girls right now, but we all played High School and 2 of us played in college. So I don’t think you boys would get frustrated. Anyway, call me if you want to play 801-953-8761 – its TONS of FUN!!!

Cafe Rio!

Last night mine and Casey's conversation on our way home from a soccer game went like this:
Casey: What should we have for dinner?
Me: I was thinking chicken enchiladas.
Casey: We only have 1 chicken breast left.
Me: Oh, then we can have burgers.
Casey: We don't have any buns.
Me: There's Cafe Rio...
We looked at each other and both got a guilty pleasure smile! So in we went! We haven't had Cafe Rio in almost 6 months!!! We shared a chicken burrito and some chips and queso - delicious! One should never be deprived of from Cafe Rio!

Free Meal!!!

You all must admit, there is nothing better than finding a "great deal", right? Well, Im not a huge KFC fan, nor do I think Casey will accompany me with our free coupons - but hey, it is for a GRILLED chicken meal. Anyway, if you want a super cheap meal print out a coupon (4 for each household) and take your family!
(I'm at work and our system wont allow me to link the site so...) go to www.unthinkfc.com and print one out. IT HAS TO BE PRINTED TODAY and is good through like the 17th. Enjoy!

The weekend

Casey and I spent Friday night with some of our good friends the Towner’s – they treated us to Tepanyaki. It was delicious! I had never been there before, it was just like Bonsai. Then we went to Maggie Moos, and I made myself sick! Casey and I haven’t had ice cream in 5 months and even though I only got a small, my stomach was seriously upset! Ill stick with fat free frozen yogurt!
Casey and I stayed up ‘just talking’ on Friday night - we didn’t fall asleep until 1:30am.
We woke up Saturday morning at 7:30 for Casey’s outdoor soccer game up at the U.
It was raining – Oh how I love the rain! I grabbed my umbrella and off we went for 90 minutes of soccer! I sat on our lawn chair and was the only brave wife present. I loved watching mistake after mistake because of the slippery ball and field – the best part? When they would get pushed over or slip in a big mud puddle!

Saturday night we opened our bedroom window and listened to the rain! It reminded me of when I was young, my mom and I would cuddle up in her room, open the blinds and window and just listen to the rain pound against unknown objects. Heavenly!

Little life satisfactions!

I get joy out of the littlest things in life. I don’t talk about them nearly as often as I should – but for the mere fact that I cant get these out of my head…

I want to tell you all what some of those little things were, that I enjoyed this week!
(In no particular order)
1. Sour Patch Kids – My sugar free husband has been patiently listening to me complain about my deprivation of no sugar the last 4 months, on Monday when we to Wal-Mart he let me go to the candy aisle to see if they had any of those miniature packages of Sour Patch Kids that I so much LOVE!!! They didn’t and I was super bummed!
2. My most favorite things about going to the store is after we pick a line to check out at, I grab a magazine and catch up on the latest gossip and trends while my honey unloads the cart and pays…On Monday, I was so caught up in the magazine that I didn’t even notice the miniature package of Sour Patch Kids on the bottom rack in the check out line…Casey grabbed one for me. I promptly opened them on our way out of the store and enjoyed every second sucking the sugar off that sour yet sweet treat (my mouth is totally watering right now) – It took me 3 days to eat that TINY bag! That’s pretty impressive. And as for Casey, he didn’t eat one of them! He seriously can not be tempted!
3. As scared as I was at the fact that Casey got laid off a couple of months ago and hasn’t been able to find a decent paying job since – we have been blessed in SO MANY ways! I think the thing I appreciate the most though is the time we have got to spend with each other, between school and work for the both of us the last 2 ½ years, we never really got to just enjoy one another’s company, unless we were at a family function. Now, I come home and Casey has taken care of 90% of the household chores for the day and has dinner cooking – then, we have ALL night to do whatever we please – and I LOVE IT!!!
4. Casey came with me to my hair appointment yesterday just because he “wanted to be with me”! I warned him that I would be there for a couple of hours, but he insisted. 3 hours later, he told me he would never do that again. HAHA
5. I hate how long my hair appointments take when I color my hair! I seriously have SO MUCH HAIR!!! It is so thick and it probably doesn’t help that it hits in the middle of my back, but I love just sitting in the chair relaxing! Trinity (my hair dresser)(oh, and no he isn’t gay) give the BEST head messages! He even got the knots out of my neck last night! DIVINE!!! I’m totally impressed with my new color too! For those of you who haven’t seen me in a couple of months – in October I dyed my hair a couple shades light of black – which shockingly, I LOVED…but for the new season I wanted to lighten things up! Trinity totally (once again) amazed me by turning my black hair about 8 shades lighter and me actually liking it! I was SO scared that it would look horrible with the contrast but you can barely even tell! Thanks Trinity, you are totally worth EVERY dollar!
6. Another joy of mine is spending time with my little sister Alyssa – we’re going shopping together tomorrow! I love hearing about her new adventures at school and he determination to have her associates by the time she graduates high school! (This is totally a past joy, but I am so glad I was taught the importance of school! KNOWLEDGE IS POWER!) Anyway, I love hearing about her “boy” stories too! Remember those days? Im glad they are WAY over, but to hear her talk about her butterflies in her tummy, make me giddy!
Last but not least, my most favorite joy of the week was going to my parents sacrament meeting on Sunday. My mom and dad were asked to speak on the trials and tribulations that came last year (which included my moms battle with cancer, the loss of my dads father to a stroke, and the loss of my dads little sister to pancreatic cancer, my dads layoff that happened 2 months after moms diagnosis and anything else the felt necessary.) They seriously had the whole chapel in tears – and not to be bias, but it was BY FAR the two BEST talks I have ever heard. I know it is always different hearing a talk given by a family member, and especially on a topic that is so close to your heart, but is WAS SO POWERFUL. They did share (very briefly) their trials so everyone could understand why they were asked to talk on it – but they focused on the positive and taught by the scriptures why we have trials and why it is important that we have those trials! I left with such a deeper respect and love for my parents – a love I didn’t think could actually get any deeper than it already was. How blessed I am to have such amazing parents! Both of whom are converts and both of whom have had many trials that have taught them to be the amazing people that they are – I love that I have NEVER heard them judge a single person - they don’t care about the mistakes a person has made, they have always welcomed anyone into their home and as far as I know, have never made anyone feel uncomfortable for not believing something different than they do. Mom, I know you’ll read this, and as little as that sounds, it has made such an impact on my life!

Boo to Red Mango

Casey came and took me to lunch today...They just put a Red Mango in across the street from my office building that I have been DYING to try! (I am a huge fat free frozen yogurt fan!) Anyway, everyday I tell myself I’m going to try it, but I just never have. Today was the perfect day, it finally being sunny and all (:
I loved the layout of the place and my first words when we walked in were “Fancy!” However, I quickly saw the prices to their plan… $3.00 for a small frozen yogurt?!?!?!?
Now, step in my shoes for moment…I hit up the Maverick at least 3 times a week and pay for a LARGE filled as full as I can possibly get it without the top falling over for $1.92. I understood that Red Mango needed to make a profit, therefore we stayed and indulged. They only have 3 flavors: Original, Pomegranate and Green Tea – Odd choice of flavors if you ask me, but I got Original and Pomegranate swirl. She then asked if I wanted a topping, OF COURSE! They had fresh raspberries!!! But don’t worry – we had to pay another $1.00 for a topping.
$4.00 for a small 1 topping yogurt? It’s a business strictly relaying on their profit from the yogurt – so once again, I understand! Until… the sweet lady behind the counter handed me my $4 yogurt that was filled only a third of my small cup up and barely soared over the rim – WHAT??? Seriously???
Needless to say, Casey and I will not make another stop at Red Mango!
I think Frogurt in Draper is a little more reasonably priced, but they too only received business from this yogurt junkie once – my next try will be Frozen Yogurt Junction – I just got a coupon for a “buy 1 get 1 free”! Now that’s what I'm talking about!
Needless to say, my tiny yogurt was delicious Pomegranate and Raspberry mixed is divine!
***Note, the above picture is not of my yogurt, in fact, mine was about half the size of this.

Growth Chart

A friend of mine is such a SUPER crafty woman and seriously has made everything on display in her home. I was over at her home on Sunday and she showed me these cute growth charts she has made for a boutique she is doing in May. They are adorable and she can make them in any color you want. If you are interested, her number is: 801-391-3526 and her name is Janey.

3 games and a Real game.

*** This post is all about soccer, so if you don’t have any interest in this sport, you probably shouldn’t waste your time. Just so ya know.

Saturday was a completely full day of soccer! I am so grateful that Casey and have I both played soccer and enjoy watching it! Anyway, Casey plays on an outdoor team and his games are every Saturday morning at nine. As you can see, my Saturday morning ritual of Casey making me breakfast and the cuddling up to a movie and not getting out of bed till one, has now been sadly taken away…As much as I did enjoy that for the last nine months, I don’t mind supporting and watching him play a game he loves! I wonder if our kids will play soccer so I can enjoy that with them too, Hmmm?!?
Then Casey took me to Texas Roadhouse for lunch! Ymmm…They have a killer deal that if you eat there before 6 you can get your meal with 2 sides for only $7.99 – So if you don’t know where to go for date night this week…you should hit it up!
3:10 – Our first coed indoor soccer game and Casey’s 2nd game of the day. I LOVE playing coed indoor – especially with the little team we have right now! We actually only have 7 players (which allows us one sub), so we are all trying to get in a little better shape so we don’t get outran. Anyway, I understand that being a girl on a “coed” team means that I will more than likely get pushed around by some guys, maybe get taken to school because I am well aware that boys are typically faster than girls and I am TOTALLY okay with that! However, there was a guy on this team who had absolutely NO class whatsoever, after multiple times of getting hacked in the ankles and getting pushed to the ground by him, he decided I needed even more from him and slammed me into the wall and immediately after, elbowed me in the gut! Jerk! Oh well, I told him I could play that game too, and my team thought it was hilarious – 2nd half he was playing keeper and I scored on him. We won 7 to 4. So ,dear “Jerk”, as much of a white trash man I already thought you were, letting your family and buddies see you getting scored on by not 2 but 3 girls and losing the game for your team, was well worth getting slammed into a wall like a hockey player! I cant wait to meet you again!
As if 2 soccer games in a day weren’t enough, our good friends John and Dan gave us their tickets to the Real game that night! This was the first game we had been to this season and I must admit, they have gotten MUCH better since last season! I actually enjoyed myself and didn’t find Casey and I stating high school players who they should recruit!
Oh, and I must mention that our seats were right behind the South goal and if you have ever been to a Real game you will know that this is the section were smoke, confetti and super loud music is blaring from the entire game. What a crack up! I was thoroughly entertained by the clan of over 80 Hispanics screaming vulgarities in Spanish and watching Casey’s eye widen and me wondering what in the world they were screaming – Casey would tell me and then the over-drunken man in his 50’s dancing to the music in the first row mimicking them (not knowing what he was saying) with a huge smile on his face was classic! Poor guy! We left with 10 minutes left in the game because we had another indoor game at 10:40 – yes it was the 3rd game of the day. However, Real killed New England 6-0! Thanks John and Dan for the free date!
10:40pm – Is obviously WAY to late for anyone to playing a game and if 10:40 itself wasn’t bad enough, being your 3rd game of the day, is never a good thing. We started out with only 4 players while the other team had 6. They scored 2 goals on us in the first 7 minutes and then the rest of out team showed up. We lost, but that’s okay! We’ll get them next time!

Will start with this...

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A gas to kill Soliders?

So besides the one time that I have cheated this year...Casey and I haven't had any sweets, candy, extra sugar intake, soda whatever for almost 4 months! Well the other night while Casey was at school I decided to treat myself to a divine bowl of plain cherrios that I LOVE to douse with Splenda for dinner. When Casey got home he saw the bag of Splenda sitting on the counter and for like the 50th time gave me the "your gonna get Cancer" talk for using Splenda! - Seriously! I have a freakin sweet tooth like nobodies business and Splenda is my fix! Anyway, with my families history and Cancer - my whole mindset is: "If I'm gonna get Caner, I'm gonna get Cancer and its not going to be from Splenda!" So...I came across an article entitled "Sugar: The Great "Food" Deceiver Part 3: Sugar Substitutes and Sweeteners".
I am still not convenced that my very irregular cravings for my plain cherrios and splenda will give me cancer, after reading this article, I WILL NEVER USE SPLENDA AGAIN! Especially to give me my fix! Here is a little snip of the VERY LONG article I read...
Splenda (sucralose) is a chlorinated artificial sweetener which chemically looks more like DDT than sugar. Chlorine is a toxic substance, whether used as a gas to kill soldiers (as what happened in WWI), placed in herbicides and pesticides, put in water or added to sweet chemicals and sold as artificial sweeteners. Of the 110 studies submitted to the FDA for approval in 1998, 2 were done on humans—and the longest one was for 4 days. A review of all literature on this product reveals the following findings regarding Splenda. Splenda:
1) reduces the good bacteria in the intestinal tract by 50%
2) increases the pH in the intestines (which viruses, bacteria and cancer cells like)
3) impairs appetite regulation which leads to weight gain
4) causes a myriad of symptoms that have been reported by sucralose users, affecting skin, lungs, nose, eyes, stomach, heart, joints, and neurological systems.
So what will I be doing to eradicate my sweet tooth craving you ask? I am going to invest in a food processor! Why? Fruit remains the best way to appease the sugar drive. Doesnt a cold crisp sliced apple sound divine with fresh protein filled homemade peanut butter? UMMM!
Last Point: If I absolutly can't resist not having my 'fake' sugar, I learned that Stevia and Xylitol are two sweeteners that do not cause the swings in blood sugar that refined sugar does, because they are not glucose sugar and Splenda is.
Just in case you wanted to know!

Go vote!

The pictures are up! If any of you are interested please go to this link - to vote for the Free Mothers Day Photo Contest! Those of you who submitted pictures...don't forget to tell your family and friends to get on and vote for you! (Please only 1 vote per person)Have them email me at carvphotography.live.com!

Draper Temple Dedication

Casey and I got to go to one of the Draper Temple dedications on Saturday and it was a day that I will never forget!
Our stake got tickets to attend a dedication on Saturday but because both of our parents are in the same stake we got tickets from Casey’s dad (who is a bishop) and were able to go with our parents and my little sister to a Saturday morning session.
It was such a pretty day on Saturday and there was nothing more that I would have rather done than be able to be part of that momentous occasion. I had never been to a Temple dedication before and actually learned quite a bit that day. Before the dedication actually took place, the 1st counselor in the Temple Presidency, the assistant to the matron, Elder Christopherson of the quorum of the 12 , Elder Casto (not sure how to spell his name) from the seventy and Elder Eyring all spoke. It felt like a mini General Conference full of Temple stories and humor! Seriously, both Elder Eyring and President Monson were telling funny stories and cracking jokes – it was hilarious! Elder Eyring has always been my favorite apostle, I know I shouldn’t have favorites, but when it comes to the spirit – no matter what he is talking about, I feel it EVERYTIME! I seriously yearn for his talks come Conference time and to feel of his sweet spirit and love for our Savior radiate through him. He spoke on the perfection of each and every Temple and how he learned HOW important absolute perfection was while he was serving with President Hinckley. After the completion of each Temple he would follow President Hinckley as he would inspect each one, President Hinckley would stop at every door frame, feel around its edges and make sure nothing was poking out, or just not quite perfect. If something was wrong, he didn’t have to say word, the contractors knew by his facial expression that something wasn’t quite right – without even knowing what that might be they would quickly say “We’ll fix that!”
Elder Eyring also spoke on the importance of being a Savior on Mount Zion – that once you find and perform sacred ordinances in the Temple for an ancestor and help teach it to those in this world too, that you will truly feel the blessings and importance of being a Savior on Mount Zion, as always, his talk spoke near to my heart and sparked a new excitement on preparing names with my mom and doing ancestral work to find my own ancestors who are up there ‘just waiting’. To give you an idea, my dad nor any of his family has ever been a member, both my mom and my stepdad are converts – I have a lot of work I can and should be doing!
Once President Monson was done with the dedicatory prayer the choir (who were standing behind the brethren dressed in white listed above)began signing the first verse of The Spirit of God and then everyone who filled the Temple began singing on the 2nd verse with the choir “oooing and ahhhing” in the background, I had felt the spirit throughout the whole service, but nothing like I felt during this moment! The prophet was in the Celestial Room, we were pretty much next door in the Telestial Room – but seriously, there were people sitting everywhere – I believe there were over 2000 people there that session. But when we all started signing it was SO overwhelming! For those of you who haven’t been in the ordinance rooms in the Temple, they aren’t that big, maybe holding like 50-60 people but I swear when we all started in on the 2nd verse EVERYONE throughout the Temple could be heard and it was the most beautiful thing I have ever heard.
I am so thankful to be surrounded by so many Temples and for the rare opportunities I do get to be part of being so close to these holy places. No where else in the world could you be driving down the freeway and see 3 almost 4 Temples. What a blessing!

Reminder!

Thanks so much to everyone who has entered so far in the Mother's Day Photoshoot Contest! It has been fun seeing all of your little ones pictures! Just as a reminder - tomorrow (Friday) is the LAST day to send me your pictures! I will be posting ALL of the pictures on www.carvphotography.blogspot.com on Saturday. So if you want in, send a picture to me at carvphotography@live.com!

Anticipation…

A little of this ~

A little of that ~

And a whole lot of this ~

is coming our way in a couple weeks! We just booked our tickets Friday night as we just couldn’t pass up the amazing prices we found to Cancun! – You should all check it out! Sorry, I was WAY to excited not to share!
(And yes, I am well aware of the "gun wars" that are going on in Mexico, but it is not anywhere close to where we will be. So no worries!)

Free Mother's Day Picture Contest!!!

With Mothers Day less than 2 months away, I thought it would be SUPER fun to give a FREE photography session away to a lucky mom! What needs to happen? Submit a picture of the child you want to receive the free shoot, than I will post all the “contestants” on my carvphotography.blogspot.com site and then the public will vote! The winner will get a one hour shoot and I will give you a CD of at least 10 high quality pictures for you to print at your pleasure.
Pictures will be accepted through March 20th. Voting will be open March 21st through March 25th. And the session will take place the 1st week in April.
Please submit your picture to me at carvphotography@live.com with your name and phone number.
All contestants will receive 20% off their next booking. –Think group pictures of the grandbabies for your mom!
Don’t forget to tell people to get on and VOTE!!!

Believer

"We’ve learned it is the discovery of one’s will that determines whether or not we will succeed in the end”.
- Winston Churchill