Christmas Tree Murder

Christmas time for a young family is exciting; traditions can be changed, created, and molded into what they want the Christmas experience to be. My husband and I decided that to create more family unity and memories that we would go into the mountains and find our own Christmas Tree every year.

Our first year doing this, I was so excited for the start of a new tradition. However, that excitement soon turned into guilt.

In my anticipation I posted on Facebook "Going into the wilderness today to cut down a Christmas tree". Almost immediately someone responded "A tree has to die for your Christmas?" All my breath went out of me. I was shocked, stunned, hurt, and confused.

I didn't see the post until I got home. Murdered tree and all. This particular person that posted this remark had the reputation for posting remarks that got under peoples skin. Especially mine. However this post made me really ponder about the meaning of the Christmas tree, and if she was right; did I murder a tree?

After some research and deep reflection, I concluded that tree represented the sacrifice the Savoir made for the world. The tree lived, that it may be sacrificed for a beautiful purpose; none more important than to bring us closer to our Lord and Savior.

Two days ago my husband knelt on the snowy ground and placed the blade at the trunk of the chosen tree. Tears filled my eyes as a quietly whispered "thank you for your sacrifice".

Eli, 18 months

I remember when Eli was a newborn. I was exhausted. Period. I remember when I made it a week. It was a huge accomplishment for me. I was exclusively pumping and it was soooooooo exhausting. Six weeks was my biggest accomplishment because that was my goal to feed Eli breast milk. Formula was a lifesaver (thank you formula science people). Eli never slept for longer than 3 hours until he was probably 4 months old. By then I threw in the towel and just let him sleep with us.

Now he's 18 months! Where has the time gone? He now sleeps in his own bed all night, every night. He is the cutest kid EVER. I think that because I'm getting more sleep I'm enjoying this stage a lot! I dread every moment that passes because I know that I'll never get it back again. I'm trying to savor the moment as much as possible. (side-note: And can I just stay that I LOVE being a stay at home mom!!! I am so grateful that Logan has a job that can support us.) I get compliments about Eli being the best looking toddler. I'm biased but evidently some people tend to think he's adorable too.

Some things about Eli: 

1. His head circumference used to be in the 95th percentile (reason for my C-Section), now it's gone down to the 86th. Progress people, progress.
2. This boy is obsessed with cars. He even makes car noises when he drives his matchbox cars all over the couches, my leg, the walls, wherever. 
3. He loves to dance
4. He loves Baby Einstein and Teletubies 
5. His first word was Dog, pronounced "da!" He's been saying that since he was a year old and really hasn't expanded his vocabulary much. 
6. He can sign: please, milk, hungry, wave bye bye, blow kisses, make the "I don't know" hand expression, high five, and fist pound.
7. Every time daddy comes home he sprints to me and "hides" and laughs so hard. He gets so excited to play with daddy.
8. He loves to play outside. He's a master at going down slides in all directions.
9. The thing he loves the most is watching me cook. He will push me away from the counter until I pick him up. I've become quite good at cooking with one hand. 
10. He's so happy.
11. He plays great with other kids. 
12. His curly hair and dimples can make anyone melt. 
13. Every morning when I get him out of bed he hands me his binkie, then jumps up and down. Once he's done jumping then I can get him out of bed. 
14. He loves shoes, and loves to reorganize them (anything really, (he gets that from his daddy)
15. When he hears the train going by town he makes a Vmmmm Vmmmm noise until he can't hear it anymore. I'm still trying to teach him Chooo Chooo. But maybe he's right, maybe it does sound more like vmmmmm.

There are 100 more things I could say. And I'm sure when I read this later on I'll think "oh, I should have recorded that!"

oh well.

Lets take a journey of the last 18 months and see how this little angel has grown:

He's just so fun. I love him!

Life is Empty and Pointless

The other day I was on FamilySearch.org. I like to browse around my family tree and read stories of my ancestors. I realized that there is almost nothing on my ancestors who lived in the last 100 years. This made me incredibly sad. Who are these great grandparents of mine? What struggles did they have to bare? Are they even remembered? I don't know who they are, and their memory dies with those who fail to share them.

This is my mom's side of the family (I do know their stories, only because of my moms efforts to share them)

This started a downward spiral of hopelessness. These people were probably amazing hard workers, and for what? All there efforts are forgotten just 3 generations after them.

I then watched "Fault in Our Stars". It's a sad story about teenagers with cancer. A huge point that the main character makes is that we all die. We live our lives and none of us will be remembered.

Two "lessons" of pointless earthly habitation in one day. You can imagine that I wasn't really motivated to go change the world the rest of the day. Instead, I sat on my neighbors kitchen floor and cried. Later that night my husband came home and I told him about my gloomy day.

Yesterday in church someone asked the question of what the gospel meant to me. My response was frank. It's the only reason I'm living. Without it I would have killed myself a long time ago. The gospel gives me hope and purpose.

After church my husband walked up to me and asked me if I could read and walk at the same time. I said jokingly that I might get "car sick" (I always tell him that I can't read in the car). So as we walked home from church I read a snip-it out of the lesson he gave in church that day. It was the specific answer to my question. What is the purpose to this life?

"We are here for a great purpose. That purpose is not to live 100 years, or less, and plant our fields, reap our crops, gather fruit, live in houses, and surround ourselves with the necessities of mortal life. That is not the purpose of life. These things are necessary to our existence here, and that is the reason why we should be industrious...

The object of our being here is to do the will of the Father as it is done in heaven, to work righteousness in the earth, to subdue wickedness and put it under our feet, to conquer sin and the adversary of our souls, to rise above the imperfections and weaknesses of poor fallen humanity, by the inspiration of the Lord and his power made manifest, and thus become the saints and servants of the Lord in the earth." - President Joseph Fielding Smith

I am so grateful for a good husband who thinks about his wife and tenderly looks for answers to her souls questions.

Grand Canyon, Rim to Rim

When I was 18 I worked at Jacob Lake Inn. It is a little lodge next to the north rim of the grand canyon. I also worked there the following year. It is one of the highlights of my life. I have so many good experiences and memories from my time when I worked there.

One of those highlights was when they provided us the opportunity to hike the grand canyon rim to rim. Both times I hiked it, I barely made it. It is a grueling 25 mile hike (including Ribbon Falls). When I was 20 I also hiked the grand canyon with my geology class. My friend and I made the goal to hike the grand canyon every year. That didn't happen every year, or even any year. Life got in the way.

This year (now I'm 29) I told my husband that we are going no matter what! So I invited anyone who wanted to join and started making the plans. I never realized how complicated it could get. I changed the arrangements at least 3 or 4 times. Making reservations, cancelling them, so on and so forth. Finally I arranged for a guy to rent a 15 passenger van and take us to the south rim.

My brother Garrett and his girlfriend Natasha arrived at 2:30am Saturday morning. Once they got to Jacob Lake, AZ we all drove to the north rim, dropped off our individual cars, then piled in the 15 passenger van. We saw 87 deer on that road!!!! (scary driving) Our hired help drove us to the south rim while the 9 of us tried getting some shut eye.

I am still amazed that nobody flaked out at the last moment! Those things always seem to happen when organizing a big trip with so many involved. 

We started our hike around 7:30am. (in the past we've always commenced around 4:00am, which I recommend). A few had never seen the grand canyon before, so it was wonderful seeing it as the sun was rising.

From Left: Garrett, Natasha, Logan, Dayna (me), Chelsea, Riley, Alecia, Cozeth, Doug

 Cozeth blew out her back a few days before the hike, but she was determined to go for it anyways. I was the least in shape out of the group so I was in the back. We played "accordian" until Phantom Ranch (the very bottom, by the river). After that we all split up. Doug stayed behind with Cozeth and I and the rest of the group went on to Ribbon Falls and made it out of the canyon around 7:00pm.

Natasha and Alecia were beasts. They made it out way before anyone else. They waited for 45 minutes for Chelsea and Riley, then Garrett and Logan followed. They packed in the cars and went to Jacob Lake, showered and ate dinner.

I hurt my knee on the way down, and I had a bad sinus infection to boot. So I was especially slow. About 1/2 through we met this guy who was obviously injured. He walked with a straight leg. I offered him one of my trekking poles and from then on we were hiking buddies. Cozeth and Doug went ahead, and me and gimp went at our slow pace.

 Baron (the injured guy) and I made it out around 11:30pm. Apparently Cozeth and Doug made it out an hour before us and got to practice their survival winter skills for that hour. I had the keys and it was below freezing on the north rim. They wore their socks around their hands and cuddled. By the time we made it out they were shivering pretty bad. I felt bad.

This is my new friend Baron. He's holding Cozeth's toaster (she takes it with her everywhere for humor, it's even been to Iceland)

 One the way back I had Doug drive because I was practically dead. I kept falling asleep mid sentence. Once we got to the hotel (hallelujah!) I took off my shoes and found a blister that I had no idea that I had. It was pretty awesome.

Hiking a canyon is very different then hiking a mountain. On a mountain you can just turn around and go back down if you get tired. In a canyon you HAVE to make it all the way out or you're stuck in the canyon (unless you want to pay $2,000 for a helicopter flight out). It's amazing how you can keep going if it's your only option. I don't know how I made it up that grueling 8,000ft climb, but I did, one foot in front of the other. It didn't matter how small my steps were, as long as I kept moving forward. We each have our story of survival, I'm sure every ones experience was different. Hiking offers a parable in each ones life and strengthen us to keep on going, no matter the difficulties.

To all those who Hate the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge

There are 3 main reasons that I have heard why people do not like the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge:

1. There is too much attention and money being raised for a disease that hardly effects the population. We need to focus our attention and money on diseases that effect more of us.

There have been many diseases that we have, or almost have, eradicated that didn't effect many people. However they were TERRIBLE deaths. Painful, humiliating, horrifying. Take Tetanus for example. We've all gotten our shots for it, but do you know what it is? The muscles tense up and never release again. The person gets "frozen". It's aweful. It's also called "lock jaw" because that's one of the last muscles to freeze up before the lungs and heart go out. Take a look at this picture, it awful. 

ALS is just the opposite. Instead of muscles contracting, they stop working. But it's still one of the worst ways to go. Researchers have NO CLUE how to fix it. These people need some hope.  Other sicknesses are at least somewhat treatable.

2. I'm Pro-Life and don't support anything that uses Stem Cell research.

Stem Cell Research involves embryos that are needed to extract stem cells to research them. What are stem cells? They are amazing cells that have the ability to turn into anything. They will revolutionize the medical field. With that said, if you won't support ALS because this, then you can't support anything. Almost ALL diseases are using stem cell research right now. 

"...research involving human pluripotent stem cells...promises new treatments and possible cures for many debilitating diseases and injuries, including Parkinson's disease, diabetes, heart disease, multiple sclerosis, burns and spinal cord injuries."

And just so you know, a lot of the embryos that are used are the failed embryos of In Vitro Fertilization. They Fertilize mommy's eggs with daddy's sperm in the petri dish. They take the best likely to survive in the womb the rest they used to just throw away. Now they can be used to better the understanding of how the body works. i.e. Australia reports having 70,000 unused embryos from IVF.

Here is a link to different religions and their stance on Stem Cell Research:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stem_cell_controversy#Church_views

3. It's dumb

Whether you think the entire idea has gone too far, or if you think it's a waist of water; you have to admit one thing -It was a success. Do you know how this whole movement started? Watch this:  http://youtu.be/YOUj2v3Ly8w (it is amazing). Pete Frates didn't imagine it would take off like this. It just did. Think about what we, as a society, have to learn from this. Other fundraisers for other ailments will be more successful because they now know some new techniques on how to get the American people to act. It is a success for everyone. 

 

What Dreams Will Do to You

We all have Dreams. Big and small ones. This is not that kind of dream. But it still led me to do something.


One night last week I had a dream that I cut my hair way short and I was a blonde. I awoke wanting to have short hair and be blonde. So it's off. The end.

Thanks to Vicky Berg (my mom in law) for the spontaneous hair cut.

17 Miles of Bliss

My friend Cozeth and I love nature and athletic things. She is my outdoorsie friend. You don't find many girls like that, so we appreciate each other. My Nephew, Tanner (who is living with us this summer), came with us on this adventure. We went on a "shorter" day hike that turned into a very long day hike. I thought that we were just going to be doing about 8 miles and packed accordingly.  Thankfully we came prepared with a water filter and rain coats... but unfortunately not enough food. Our energy levels were wavering the last half of the hike. 

We started out hiking near the trail head to go to table rock/mountain. We hiked on the Teton Valley trail, up Devils Stairs. That was where we intended to stop and turn around, however curiosity pushed us even further. Once so far we decided that because we have gone so far, instead of going back the way we came we should just do a loop. Enjoy me scenery right? Ha ha. It would have been a perfect backpacking trip, too bad it wasn't. I'm still glad we did do the loop though. Even though it was exhausting it was worth it very much so. Here is a map I put together. Maybe this will give you an idea on how much ground we covered in one day.

Now for the Photo Dump. I didn't want to pack my big DSLR so these are just phone pictures. Ohhh my was it gorgeous! My nephew Tanner kept telling me how hhe's never seen so many flowers in his life. The "prairies" should be renamed "natures garden". It was fantastic.

This was on our way back. It rained good. It was kind of a nice cool down.

The dogs were whimpering, Apparently they didn't like the rain.

This area was at the furthest point of our hike. It is called The Alaskan Basin (note: not in alaska). I want to backpack here one day.

My nephew Tanner and I (and Chloe and Titus, my dogs)

My friend Cozeth, She's awesome

I had to post one embarrassing picture of myself :)