Feeling Old!

So I hate adulthood...I got my first paycheck on a full salary, which I thought would be wonderful. Then I realized that with a doubled salary comes doubled taxes. Curse you Feds! But I have a job and I love what I do, so I wouldn't trade it for anything.

Next, today as I was walking into the building I heard some new girls in my ward talking about how they feel abandoned by their friends, their missionaries have all gotten their calls or entered the MTC. I then realized that it has been, depending on the friends 2-3 years sinc my missionary friends left me. Wow.

Third, my youngest sister is a senior in college. When did that happen? Next thing I know I'll be a grandma telling 'back in my day' stories.

For my Dad...

So with my dad going on business trips to DC often he has lots of time alone, which means more phone calls to me at odd hours of the day. Lucky for me (and for him) we get to talk about lots of things and have set a record high for the duration of a phone call...we aren't big phone talkers. In most of the conversations he tells me about this song he hears that reminds him of me, and I thought it was my time to tell him a song that reminds me of him. The past week has not been incredibly hard, I am living the greatest summer of my life (see previous blog post). But I have just had a lot on my mind and haven't been able to sleep well. Usually when I can't sleep I put on some music and I'm out like a light. This week the artist of chioce to lull me to sleep has been Josh Groban. Its not strictly classical music, but soft enough to help me sleep. I was thinking about family things, my parents, my job, etc. I was just about to fall asleep when this song came on, and I wasn't feeling particularly emotional but I started to tear up. I started thinking about all the things my dad has done for me, his love and sacrifice for me and my siblings. My dad is an incredible person, intelligent, honest,and such a great example to me. He has been the perfect example of faith and trust, I have been able to look to him countless times for advice during troubled times. I am so grateful he has taught me correct principles, but allowed me to make my own decisions. He is sure to express that he may have been disappointed in decisions I made, but never disappointed in me. He loves me and is proud of me and I hope he knows the accomplishments I have made would not have been made without him. He has helped me to improve, to become the person I am meant to be and not to settle for less than I desvere. I know that when I need him he will be there to help me through. He is my support, my strength, my father, and my friend. He tells me all the time the guy who gets me will have quite the interview to survive, and will be incredibly lucky. I am sure I haven't told him this, but just as adiment as he makes that remark I emphatic reply is 'If I find a man half as amazing as him I will consider myself a lucky girl.'


I love you Dad, and I hope you know how much I truly appreciate you for all you do for us.

Happy Father's Day!

PS. Here is the song...not the greatest quality but one of my favorite live versions.

Spiritus Weekend

So I am going to try to be better about posting this summer, and with all the time I have on my hands there really shouldn’t be a reason why I don't update it regularly. My week has been blissful. I wake up every day around 9, maybe pushing 10, leisurely eat breakfast, catch a little EPSN, and recaps of the previous nights' Padres game(even if I watched the whole game, is that bad), then its off to the pool. We go to one of the apartment complexes in the area with a pool, the same one I broke my finger at last year. Then the roomies and I catch a movie and dinner. Until Thursday this plan had been working out perfectly. Then the blasted weather decided to throw a wrench in it. It has been raining for the past 3 days. Friday wasn’t as bad, I had the World Cup to fill my time. I wish the games on Friday had been a little more exciting, at least one that didn’t end in a draw, but apparently that was too much to ask. Monday Brooke had a tonsillectomy and her aunt came to take her down to Cedar for a few days. Becca and I drove down yesterday to bring her back to Provo. As we drove down we passed the sign at the edge of Cedar that welcomes you to Festival City USA. Becca and I had some great commentary on how lively the city looked, all lit up and 'spiritus'. I realize that is not a word, but only makes the sarcasm of our conversation that much better. We stayed in Cedar overnight and watched the England vs. USA soccer match with her cousins. It was yet another draw, but I am happy we didn't start the group round down 3 points. I came home to a Back to the Future marathon and a Padres game that ended with a 3 run homer in the 8th to make the score 7-1. Even a boring Sunday can't ruin this weekend.

Finally...

Finally #1: I have things worth writing about!

Finally #2: I finally switched my background back to the beach theme. Good news considering it had been a St. Patty's Day theme since March. Yes, it is May 25th, get over it!

Finally #3: I graduated! April 22nd was Commencement and the 23rd was our College Convocation. It was 5 years of hard work, stress, blood, sweat and tears. I spent a few semesters making up for the blunders of a freshman and sophmore slump, but finishing it off with a 4.0 in my final semesters made it all too nice. Who'd thunk it, but I am a college grad and made it 2 weeks ahead of Paul! AWESOME!!

Finally #4: I made it through the first year of teaching. What a roller coaster. I am so glad that I have made it thorough the year, it was questionable at some moments whether or not I would make it or not. I had so much support from my team, my facilitator and other faculty. I will miss the people of Larsen Elementary more than words can describe. My students have taught me more about myself than what I taught them. We have had our fair share or problems, stealing from my desk, lies, tattling and bullyinhg; but we have had some great successes too! I will never forget my first year; the kids, life lessons, and professional development will benefit the kids I teach until my job is done. I love what I do and I love working with kids.

Finally #5: For those of you who don't know I have a job next year. I was hired to teach 2nd grade at Mapleton Elementary and I consider myself lucky. I applied for one job in Nebo that had 94 applicants, and at that point I should have decided to take my resume back! I know that with the economy and the need for jobs so high I am incredibly lucky to be employed. I am so excited to get to know a new school, new students, and new faculty. And great news I get to stay in the same grade, I can use what I have done this past year and the fear of oh, sixth grade won't add to the nerves!


And as a side note to Shaunna and others who read my blog to keep themselves updated on my life. I will be better I promise, especially now that I wont see you everyday to fill you in on the happenings!

Unrequited

I am trying to transfer all my notes from my blackberry onto my blog so I don't lose it all before I get a new phone. So here's the last one of the day...maybe.

Why is it that the one thing we want is often the one thing we can't have. And we know we can't have it but we are willing to put ourselves through the blender of life, sacrificing happiness, enjoyment and time for even a glimpse of it. Even if just for a smile, a touch, acknowledgment, we will deal with the rejection, the sadness, and despair that comes when what we want, or in this case who we want, doesn't want us back.

Invictus

I saw Invictus last weekend and really liked it. I wish they had shown more rugby and it had moved a little quicker but I still enjoyed it. I have always found the story of Nelson Mandela to be very interesting. After being wrongfully imprisoned he still supported reconciliation and negotiation, and took the lead in moving toward a democracy with those of the race that forced him into 27 years in a cell. I know it is just a movie, and the lines are not necessarily fact, but Morgan Freeman, who played Nelson Mandela told Francois Pienaar, played by Matt Damon, "If I can not change when circumstances demand it, how can I expect it of others?" It is a message that many advocates of non-violence, Martin Luther King Jr., Mahatma Gandhi, and others have shared. Change starts with the individual and you can't expect the world to change if you can't. The world needs more men and women like this, who are willing to make a change for the good, and rather than talk about what changes can be made, go out and do it.

*Just a thought.

2-in-1!

2 posts in 1 day..very unusual for me, but I couldn't help it. I was talking with a friend on Sunday about one of the greatest television shows of all time. Arrested Development! I love it so much the theme song is even my cell phone ring. I was shocked, appalled, saddened, mortified, and 100 other various adjectives to describe my disbelief. He had never seen or heard of Arrested Development. Since that day I have vowed to share its message of sarcasm, quirky, and absurdist satire. I gladly shared the three seasons I own on dvd. So fingers crossed he gets as much pleasure from Michael Bluth and his family as I do.

Today's Festivities

So I love my mother dearly, and am so glad she has joined the 21st century by way of texting. I am proud to say she owes her success to me, seeing as I taught her the art of a text and this is what I recieved this morning at 5:09 am (we're still working on the time issue, though she is 2 hours ahead).

Mom 5:09 am: In morons in the news( K addition: a morning segment on a family fav radio station) they told a story of a stabbing that took place at the Cinemark 22 in Lancaster, CA ( where I graduated H.S.) Someone was using their cellphone during the movie when a man leaned over and asked if it could be put away. The boyfriend, in his anger, jumped the man and stabbed him with a meat thermometer!

Kelsey(at a respectable) 7:13 am: Lancaster is a classy place. They use meat thermometers as shanks to show their refined nature. Who the heck carries around a meat thermometer. Do they consider that packing?

Mom 9:50 am: Didn't you always carry one for emergency?

Kelsey 10:37 am: Its never been my emergency weapon of choice. I prefer a turkey baster! (Though in conversation via facebook, my sister informed me of my true preference, a fork)

Mom 11:17 am: solid choice.

Kelsey 11:40 am: thank you! (this may or may not have actually been sent)

Now that I have given a little insight into one of my hometowns if I happen to overreact to a inquiry such as putting away my phone, and I happen to mutilate your arm with a fork and do something with my trusty turkey baster I can not be held responsible!

You have been warned

Additions..

I need to add to my favorite quotes from students.


1. "You smell like chocolate chip cookies!" - Grady
2. "Why aren't you married yet?" -Landon
"She's not even old enough to get married yet!" - Rebecca
"Yes, she is, and I have the perfect guy for her! Louis!" - Grady

P.S. Louis is Grady's 14 year old brother!

More to come, I am positive!

Ramblings of a crazy woman...

Why is it that when we make a mistake, whether it is something minor, like a small child (or a teenager) taking a piece of candy from one of the bins at a grocery store to the even bigger mistakes we just keep on doing it? Yes it is easier to fall back in to old habits and routines rather than put froth a conscious effort to try and better yourself. Whether you believe in a god, or just being a decent human beign with a moral code it shows a great deal about a man or woman's character. Courage is not walking into a situation blindly and hoping it all turns out well, and that in the moment you may make the right decision. Courage is protecting yourself, you dignity by making a decision ahead of time, by knowing what decision you will make before you encounter that situation. Courage is when that situation presents itself you stick to your guns, whether or not the choice you will make will be the popular one. Growing up my mother had a quote posted on our pantry doors that read, "What is right is not always popular, and what is popular is not always right." I wish that I had appreciated the efforts my mom and dad went through to make sure they were teaching me correct principles, and show that appreciation more readily. I wish that as siblings we had shown our appreciation for their concerns for us, our safety, and our salvation rather than right off the efforts as the crazed wishes of our parents. I know my parents want the best for each and every one of my siblings, and I hope that to the day I die I make them proud of me. I know that the sacrifices they have made to help me succeed, to put me through school have not been easy. I hope they know how pleased I am to say they are my parents, how grateful I am for their examples.

I am sure my children, one day, will say I am a crazed parent, a product of the generation I grew up in...but I hope they know I had 2 wonderful examples of how a parent cares and loves their children, and it is them that I do it for. If that reasoning is not enough... I'll blame it on their grandparents!

The Real Meaning of a well known Chirstmas Song

The Origin of the Twelve Days of Christmas

You're all familiar with the Christmas song, "The Twelve Days of Christmas" I think. To most it's a delightful nonsense rhyme set to music. But it had a quite serious purpose when it was written.

It is a good deal more than just a repetitious melody with pretty phrases and a list of strange gifts.

Catholics in England during the period 1558 to 1829, when Parliament finally emancipated Catholics in England, were prohibited from ANY practice of their faith by law - private OR public. It was a crime to BE a Catholic.

"The Twelve Days of Christmas" was written in England as one of the "catechism songs" to help young Catholics learn the tenets of their faith - a memory aid, when to be caught with anything in *writing* indicating adherence to the Catholic faith could not only get you imprisoned, it could get you hanged, or shortened by a head - or hanged, drawn and quartered, a rather peculiar and ghastly punishment I'm not aware was ever practiced anywhere else. Hanging, drawing and quartering involved hanging a person by the neck until they had almost, but not quite, suffocated to death; then the party was taken down from the gallows, and disembowelled while still alive; and while the entrails were still lying on the street, where the executioners stomped all over them, the victim was tied to four large farm horses, and literally torn into five parts - one to each limb and the remaining torso.

The songs gifts are hidden meanings to the teachings of the faith. The "true love" mentioned in the song doesn't refer to an earthly suitor, it refers to God Himself. The "me" who receives the presents refers to every baptized person. The partridge in a pear tree is Jesus Christ, the Son of God. In the song, Christ is symbolically presented as a mother partridge which feigns injury to decoy predators from her helpless nestlings, much in memory of the expression of Christ's sadness over the fate of Jerusalem: "Jerusalem! Jerusalem! How often would I have sheltered thee under my wings, as a hen does her chicks, but thou wouldst not have it so..."

The other symbols mean the following:

2 Turtle Doves = The Old and New Testaments
3 French Hens = Faith, Hope and Charity, the Theological Virtues
4 Calling Birds = the Four Gospels and/or the Four Evangelists
5 Golden Rings = The first Five Books of the Old Testament, the "Pentateuch", which gives the history of man's fall from grace.
6 Geese A-laying = the six days of creation
7 Swans A-swimming = the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, the seven sacraments
8 Maids A-milking = the eight beatitudes
9 Ladies Dancing = the nine Fruits of the Holy Spirit
10 Lords A-leaping = the ten commandments
11 Pipers Piping = the eleven faithful apostles
12 Drummers Drumming = the twelve points of doctrine in the Apostle's Creed