How Firm a Foundation

Right now I was just laying down in bed to fall asleep because i'm SOOOOOO tired, but two things happened and i think they were supposed to happen in this order so I'd connect the two thoughts. First, I was checking my RSS feeds and clicked on my "latest headlines" from BBC news to just get the latest on the California fires. I just heard the details of what was happening tonight from my friend Julie Bradshaw and wanted to catch up myself. I can't believe that sometimes I go through life not knowing anything of what is happening in the world around me, and I was humbled and concerned for all of those effected by Natures happenings this week. My thoughts and prayers will especially be with family and friends affected (i'm to tired to remember if it's effected or affected).

So Second, I said my goodnight prayers and then i picked up the ensign to get a little spiritual thought in, and I started reading an article called "My Burden is Light". The words to the hymn "How Firm a Foundation" are quoted, and it reminded me that when our faith is founded on the Lord, we can stand firm amidst anything...

Fear not, I am with thee; oh, be not dismayed,
For I am thy God and will still give thee aid.
I'll strengthen thee, help thee, and cause thee to stand,...
Upheld by my righteous, omnipotent hand

...

When through fiery trials thy pathway shall lie,
My grace, all sufficient, shall be thy supply.
The flame shall not hurt thee I only design...
Thy dross to consume and thy gold to refine.

The would that on Jesus hath leaned for repose
I will not, I cannot, desert to his foes
That soul, though all hell should endeavor to shake,...
I'll never, no never, no never forsake!
(Hymn 85)

Chocolate

About 45 seconds ago, I opened a Extra Special Dark Chocolate Lindt Truffle. I'd been holding it wrapped up in the tin paper in my hand for a few minutes, getting it just a little bit warm so the middle part of the truffle was liquified. Then, a quick unwrap and a pop in the mouth, and Ahhhh, it was delicious!!! I wish each of you were here to partake of my hefty bag of chocolates (don't worry I have some milk chocolate and even a white chocolate one for you, Mom!) (Sorry Dad, I don't have any sugar and fat free ones....can you splurge just for a day?)

Eating my Truffle reminded me of one of Seth's quazi-roommates, Sasha. Sasha was a quazi-roommate because he wasn't really paying rent...he was just staying on the couch for a few weeks. Sasha is from russia, and was dating our friend Natalia at the time (they're now married and have a little baby). Anyway, after Sashas extended stay and entertaining light stick dancing and "home improvement help" (he always told us we needed to fix a table, and that all we needed was "Too SKRoooz. Juz TOO SKRooz." (two screws)) he left a big box of truffles for us as a thank you gift. Before he left, he showed us the perfect way to eat a truffle (as described above....hold in your hand for a few minutes, just until liquified). While we tried many variations in order to speed up the time (i just can't wait that long with a wrapped up chocolate in my hand) this is the tried and true "Russian way". :)

Come to DC and Visit me and I'll share my stash!!!

Off to School

With all of the back to school pictures, I've been kind of sad that I don't have any kids to send off to school, so I thought I'd send myself off again!
I think this was my first day of second grade? Mom, correct me if I'm wrong.
I still have this bag!

Lil' Janeys everywhere!

Recently, there has been an upswing in the name "Jane" particularly as a Middle name. I of course, am NOTHING but COMPLETELY ELATED about this trend, as it gives me the chance to be super attentive as an "Auntie" to my Janeys. I wanted to share my cute lil' Janeys on a blog post for everyone. Aren't they just the cutest little babies/infants??

Above is a picture of me as a child. Mostly just as a buffer before you see the cute lil' Janeys

Here is the first of the Janey's, Hallie Jane Jeppesen. She is quite the doll. I think my favorite Hallie memory is one day when Angie and I were talking (and trying to feed Hallie Cheese while we ate our chocolate) I told Angie that something was "Duuuuumb!" and then Angie repeated me and said "Yeah, Duuuuumb." Next thing we knew it Hallie got this big smile on her face and said "Duuuumb!" (OOPS!) I quickly taught her "Cool" so she would say that instead....sorry Angie!

Next came Lydia Jane! Sadly, I haven't been able to meet Lydia yet, as she lives in Mexico....errr....Arizona. (Just kidding, Jen!) Eliott and Jen, the lucky parents of this adorable babe, named their oldest son Seth, and Seth Johnson has been the proud "Uncle" ever since. Just in jest, I told Eliott one day that he should name his baby Jane, just so I could join in with Seth in his gloating. HaHa, little did I know Jen already loved the name Jane and they were thinking about it. I like to think that my previous blog post on this subject influenced their decision, but really I know that they just put up with my silliness and named their daughter Lydia Jane anyway despite my ramblings ;) Still, I love lil' Lydia, and I can't wait to meet her and spoil her :)


Yay, next came Sydney Jane! My dear friends Devony and Aaron had their wishes come true with this sweet baby girl who was born September 9th. Devony called me last week to tell me that they had decided that Sydney's middle name was Jane, and I was so excited! Devony and Aaron even said I can be the Fairy Godmother (see pictures to come...) so I'm very excited for my next trip to Denver so I can see this cute lil' thing!

Yay for the Janeys! May their lives be filled with less drama than mine, great family and friends as I've had, and the best of adventures :)

Book Review: We Were Not Alone

My roommate Laura recently lent me this book to read, and I took a break from the "Twilight" series so that I could sneak this one in (and believe it or not, it's worth it!) :)
I've always loved stories about WWII, and have always been fascinated by the changes that war brings about in people's lives. So fascinated, in fact, that as a child I used to play "holocaust" and try to imagine what it was like to be alive during WWII. Mary, you can now share your stories of finding me in the crib in the closet... (it's true, how embarrassing!! Was anyone just slightly worried about me playing concentration camp?? Phew, good thing that phase didn't last long, I promise I'm not crazy or permanently scarred from this experience.)
ANYWAY, We were not alone is a story of an LDS Family who survived the war in Berlin. It is a great book about the war because it's focused on an entirely different aspect--no one goes to a concentration camp, they don't hide Jews, and they're not involved in the underground effort--rather, it's just a story of spiritual guidance, family togetherness, and survival. I quite liked the lack of drama in it :)

I don't want to be the spoiler for the rest of the book, so if you're going to read it, don't read on.....

I just wanted to share my favorite part of the book, because it really did kind of change my life...

Karola is the writer of the story, so the book is in her perspective (the youngest child of 5 in the family). Karola, her parents, and her three sisters are living in West Berlin after the war, and food is scarce. Karola has to take a train once a week in the morning to East Germany and walk for three hours to buy food from a greenhouse in a small town. The road that she walks along is dangerous, and the Russian guard station is particularly scary. She is protected many times from being raped or killed, and she truly feels that God has tested her faith through the experience. After one particularly precarious situation, her family realizes she cannot go to this particular place anymore. Karola's mother refuses to eat her full portion of food and gives it to her family to live on--but by doing so she is in effect starving to death. She is very weak and pale, and is eventually on her deathbed. The situation is dire, and there's not much more the family can do.

One morning Karola goes to get food and her Mother starts praying and asking God for help. A peaceful feeling came over her, and she somehow knew that food was on the way. A half hour later an American Major came to the door carrying several boxes of food. He said that he walked past a store that morning and felt as if someone pushed him inside. He bought groceries and then asked the Lord what he was supposed to do with it. He had remembered seeing Karola and her sisters at church, and had no idea who they were, but somehow found out from the mission home and brought the food to the house. He told the family they need not worry about food anymore.

When Karola's mom told her this, Karola said "He's answered our prayers, Mother. He's answered them again." Mother said "Why, yes, Karola. The Lord always answers our prayers." Karola then said, "But why did he wait so long? I don't understand."

"Sometimes he waits so that we will know how much we want what we ask for. Sometimes he waits because the time is not yet right, sometimes to test our faith, sometimes he waits for reasons only known to him, and sometimes the answer is 'no.'"

"Karola, I know that he answers prayers in his own way, according to our faith."

I love this story. A family, for several years, labors to find food and to merely survive in midst of trial after trial. They remain faithful, and God blesses them miraculously. It truly changed the way I think. I really do believe that God answers our prayers according to our faith, and that he knows the right timing for things.

Anyway, the American Major ends up bringing them food every week for several months and even brings the Mother medicine so that she can heal and get better. :)

(I'm so bad at blog endings....) Um it changed my life the end. :)

Rinse, Repeat

I think I might be inspired by Carol's #5 on her "Top Ten Things only Women Understand" but tonight I was washing my hair (and i wasn't "washing my hair" as a great excuse to not go out on a date, hee hee, I was ACTUALLY washing my hair). Anyway...i was washing my hair and I realized that i've been keeping my greatest secret to happiness from all of you, so I thought I'd share it!

As a precourser...I'm the type of person that reads instructions to everything...EVERYTHING. When I got my new macbook, I started reading the instruction manual (seth thought i was crazy!) before I turned it on, and i followed the instructions to a tee. I remember growing up when we got a new tv, dad was trying to figure something out with it, and i was in the background reading the instruction manual so i could tell him if he was doing it right (i am annoying, i know). I just really like instructions.

So anyway, I've always been one to read everything on a bottle in the shower, too. So when a shampoo bottle says "Wet Hair. Pour a quarter sized amount into palm. Lather. Rinse. Repeat." or "Apply to wet hair, gently massage lather through hair, rinse thoroughly. Repeat if desired." or (my personal favorite) "Dispense into palm and rub hands together. Apply shampoo to wet hair, massaging scalp with fingertips in a rotating motion. Work lather through to ends. Rinse thoroughly and repeat if desired." I always used to laugh when it said "REPEAT." In my mind I'd think "WHO HAS TIME FOR SUCH A THING??" or "I bet the shampoo companies make a killing off all the instruction followers out there in the world!!"

Well, one time i was at my hair dresser's and I said "I have a question. Why do shampoo bottles always tell us to 'rinse, repeat?' are they really just trying to get us to waste more shampoo?" Meredith laughed and said "Well, actually if you wash your hair twice, the first time the shampoo takes off all of the outer gunk from the product in your hair, and the second time it actually washes your hair to make it squeaky clean." Ah-HA! Soooo...I tried it out.

IT WAS AMAZING! (Okay, another confession as a precourser to this (man this is a long post, i didn't mean to go on so....) I don't wash my hair every day...it gets too dry and is just far to damaged if i do....I have to work to get any form of good hair that doesn't resemble a cat that just had a fight in an electrical storm, and if i washed every day i would just spend far too much time than i have in my life for such things...) So because I only wash my hair every other or every three days I've found this to be just the ticket to shiny manageable clean and non-icky hair!!! I do still have unreasonable hair days, but not NEARLY so often, and my hair stays clean feeling-and-looking about twice as long!

So next time you're in the shower....just remember...


"Rinse, Repeat!"


p.s. Also, a short commercial for the best haircare products in the world, Pureology. I have the blue, the purple, the green and the yellow, and I love them all. Worth the price, they last forever!!!

Drumroll....

As I mentioned, Mom and Dad came into town two weeks ago, and while they were here, we decided to FINALLY take care of the dead Mitubishi in the driveway, and I decided that it was time for me to buy my first car. We woke up early on Labor day Monday, and made our way over to the Toyota dealer! We started by looking at used corollas, but within minutes we realized that the labor day sale actually made the new corollas only about 1,000 more than the used ones, so my eyes quickly shifted to the 2008 edition!
We got in the car, and I was in love. It smells new. It looks new. It had 7 miles on it. It's navy (can't go wrong with such a classic color). I've been talking about a navy corolla for at least a year, and every time I see one I'm happy.
So we started driving it, and off we were, with Mom and Dad in the back and Oliver (the salesman) shotgun. We went over to the house to see if lil' cloud would start. We jumped her, and she started running. After about 20 minutes, I tried to back her out of the driveway and made the mistake of turning on the lights and putting her in reverse at the same time, and it was just too much for her, and she went kaput. We gave it one last shot, and she feebly made it back to the dealer (barely). It was a sad departure, but I think that the lil' Mitsubishi recognized the need for change and gave us the opportunity to let her go. :) (hee hee).
A few hours later and a few tough conversations with Oliver I had signed all the papers and we were set to go. The next day I went back and picked her up.
It's so empowering to have a car again. I can drive wherever I want, whenever I want! I also feel so comfortable in being able to offer rides to people and help people out. It's....lovely.
Okay, I'm not saying all of this to toot my own horn (haha) or anything, I really just have been waiting for so long for some of these things, and I wanted to share the good news. In case anyone was wondering, money really doesn't buy happiness. :)

Video iPod

So the deal was that you could get a Macbook and receive an iPod Nano for free. OR you could pay $50 and get an iPod Video, so naturally I chose to spend just a little bit and get exactly what I wanted! White iPod video. Ahhhh :)
Isn't it cute? It comes with me wherever I go (in my newest accessory...see next post) :)

MY MacBook!

I am very proud to introduce you to MY Macbook. After leaving CUA, I realized that I'd need to give up my laptop, as it is a part of the juggernaut, MLP. I quickly put my mind into "I need a new computer" mode and slept on the decision. It finally came down to a Dell Inspiron (pink...) or a Macbook. I called Dell and spoke with them, figuring it would be cheaper, and as I brought in my specifications, the wait time got longer and longer and the price got higher and higher. I got off the phone with an eager sales associate telling me she would "Call me back in just a few hours!" to give me an even better deal. I thought about it for almost ten minutes before I made the executive decision to just buy a macbook. With some encouragement from Seth, I went to the mall to get my hair cut and colored, to buy a new work outfit, and to buy a macbook with associated products (see next post).

So three hours later I was pretty much a new woman! New hair, new clothes, new macbook, free printer, and $50 iPod. The total bill for everything at the mall was less than the total quoted price for the Dell, AND i got it all in one day!

Needless to say, my quality of life has improved with this purchase. It takes me a full 10 minutes less per day to navigate myself through the web (my old computer was very slow...) and as soon as I get my pictures on the macbook, everything will be up to date, and I will officially be a MacWoMan!

Courage

I love the air force memorial. It might be my new favorite. Two weeks ago mom and dad came to DC to see me, and this was one of the pictures I took. After they left, I downloaded my pictures, and was just so glad about the way this one turned out. I like the quote at the bottom “Courage is doing what you are afraid to do.” This rightly describes my life at this time, as I’m currently doing a lot of things that I’m afraid about, and that worry me, but I also am trying to have courage and find peace in those things, too.

Heather used to read this scripture with such vim, so whenever I read it I get a smile on my face, and it makes me happy. It makes me want to hold my fist in the air with a little “Les Mes” determination in my eyes. D&C 128: 22 “Brethren, shall we not go on in so great a cause? Go forward and not backward. Courage, brethren; and on, on to the victory! Let your hearts rejoice, and be exceedingly glad.”

Honestly, I feel hopeful about the future. Mom sent me the famous President Hinckley Quote that I just keep repeating in my head over and over. It is comforting. “Things will work out. Keep trying. Be believing. Be happy. Don’t get discouraged. Things will work out!”