Recent Bragging Rights

It's the 2nd Annual Attempt at a Garden Event! Okay, so I put in the garden a couple of weeks ago, but I've been too busy to post some pics. The plants are growing well, and there is even a baby strawberry growing.







In other news, we did an enrichment activity where we learned cake decorating, and I will just tell you that I was pretty proud of my cake. I don't mean to sound proud, but it looked the best out of all the cakes there. Granted, I frosted it a little thinly, but other than that it looks pretty okay. When I brought it home and presented it to Alexander, he made me take a picture of it before he let me cut him a piece, so here is a picture of my recent accomplishment. :)





Also, I do have to brag about the mother's day gift my siblings and I made for our mom. We should have won an award for how awesome it was. We made my mom a CD of us singing primary mother's day songs, telling our favorite memories, and telling her why we love her so much. Alexander worked really hard on formating and making it technically perfect, I made the CD cover, and Jen was the director of what tracks should go where. We finally finished it just in time for family dinner on Sunday and presented it to her as we began to eat. She put it in the CD player and instantly began crying. Not only that, but my dad was also crying. Us kids sat there in silence, taking in their every reaction. The CD runs 15 minutes, which I think is just about perfect for this project. All my mom could say was that it was the best day of her life. Here is the pic I put on the front of the CD cover.

This is a Blessing, Right?

IF ONE MORE PERSON IN THIS WARD ASKS ME TO DO ONE MORE THING I JUST MIGHT LOSE IT!!! That is if I haven't already lost it, which I may have already done. So it all starts with my real calling as Enrichment Leader. Yesterday I spent at least 4 hours working on enrichment stuff. This morning I arrived at church early so I could put the relief society calender (that I had spent at least 1 1/2 hrs on) in with the sacrament meeting program. That was done, great! I was feeling better already. I then had a run in with the 1st counselor of the Primary.

I was asked to sub for the chorister for the next couple of weeks. So instead of enjoying Sunday School, I went in to scope out Primary. After watching a train wreck of Junior Primary singing time and deciding that I hated the way these women ran Primary, I returned to Sunday School only to worry the entire time that I was being set up for a new calling as Primary chorister. After the meeting I calmly walked down to Relief Society where I was bombarded with a hundred enrichment things, and an "oh dear, will you lead the music?" While leading the opening hymn I was struck by how funny it was that more and more people are turning to me for things they need. I also felt blessed that I was able to help. It made me feel better. It was a set-up.

After the meeting and after speaking with 5 more women, I finally stepped into the hallway to see a sister who looked a little distraught. I asked her if I could bring the treat to book club and she looked relieved. I felt I had done enough, but she kept talking. Apparently she serves with her husband as the youth activity coordinator (her husband is Stake YM Pres) and they are in charge of the pioneer youth trek. This morning we found out that our ward is being moved to a new stake and that 4 other family wards are as well. This couple will still be doing trek, but now they have 4 new wards to work with, none of which had been planning for a trek. So now the trek has been enlarged by 4x the youth and not enough help as Ma's and Pa's. This sister asked me if my husband and I would like to be called as a Ma and Pa, I told her I would love it, but my husband can't walk for more than 30 minutes. She was obviously disappointed until she had a new idea. She will call her assistant to be a Ma and call me as her assistant. Ta Da! Trek is on June 4 and if I am called it won't be for another week. I would be organizing and working with registrations (hmm, this sounds like a job I once had...) and keeping this woman sane. Sounds exciting.

It's a good thing I'm so wonderful or else I might be overwhelmed. ;)

I think I might just die.

Late Night Confessions

I am perfectly evil....and I think I'm okay with it. For some really selfish, absolutely sinful reason, I love to make other people think I am amazing. Okay, so it's sounds really bad when I say it (or write it) out loud, but inside my head it doesn't seem so bad.

I got a new calling on Sunday, Enrichment Leader. This was the calling I had right before I got married, and I always felt guilty that I didn't have the time to do more with it. I have now learned a valuable lesson: DO NOT FEEL GUILTY FOR NOT MAGNIFYING YOUR CALLING OR ELSE YOU WILL BE CALLED TO IT AGAIN. Yup, so I get a second chance to be better, or something like that.

The problem with this calling is that as I said before, I have to trick everyone around into thinking I'm amazing. Some of my close friends, and my husband of course, know that I am in no way amazing, but my ward is easily fooled. This means that in the year I have lived here I have already set a precedence of 1) gourmet desserts; 2) a vast knowledge of history/politics/world events; 3) being able to make people laugh etc. The problems with people thinking these things are 1) 95% of the time I hate dessert and only make it for the Relief Society; 2) I learned everything I know from my brilliant husband and I just occasionally dip into his wealth of knowledge so people think I'm smart too; 3) I really am not funny and I talk too much.

Tonight was my first enrichment activity and I had to look like I was cool, so I made two desserts, a chocolate trifle and cream puffs and then I proceeded to try and make the people around me laugh while giving a presentation on how to do different kinds of makeup (I am NOT an expert on makeup). Needless to say, by the end of the night I was plum tuckered out.

Now the armature psychologist inside of me needs to pose some questions: Why must I try to be everything to everyone? Do I have a previously undetected self-esteem problem? Do I really have to try and be better than everyone else? The side of me that claims to have no problems won't answer any of the psychologist's questions which only makes my inner psychologist wonder if I am schizophrenic, but that's for another day. For now I don't know what my deal is, but if someone wants to give their opinion I will gladly invite you in for a few laughs and offer you dessert (the trifle is divine by the way).

The Chat Queen

Since quitting my job, I have accidentally dropped out of society. I didn't realize how much I crave talking to other women until I stopped going to work and chatting with Al for 6 hours a day, 5 days a week. I liked it best how Marjorie Hinckley put it, "Women need other women". It's true though, we love our husbands but sometimes just need to talk to someone that can keep up with us and our rapidly changing thoughts. Only another woman can truly appreciate and participate in that kind of a conversation.

So today, I randomly decided to attend the book club for our relief society (you know, one of those enrichment groups). I picked up the book at the library at 3:30 today and read enough of it to be able to participate a little. At 7:00 I showed up at a door I had never been to before and tried to feel like I belonged. The funny thing is, I did belong. In fact, I became a little too comfortable and the other 6 women in attendance became privy to my views on: 1)women in Afghanistan 2)the Holocaust 3)the current presidential race 4)German in-laws and anything else that spurted from my lips. I couldn't make the waterfall of words stop! I just kept talking and talking, like I was the expert everyone wanted to listen to!

And then, as we were all leaving, I began talking to the woman who had hosted the book club and whom I have a great amount of respect for (she has always been super nice to me). Gradually we walked away from the open door and sat on the couch and talked for 2 more hours! She just let me keep talking about everything and I had so much fun!

Thinking about it afterwards, I cannot help but feel a bit embarrassed for having talked so much. I frequently find myself in this situation, thinking that I drove the person I was talking to nuts and that they will now try to keep their distance from me.

More and more I am finding evidence of what my mother fondly calls my "adult ADHD". Doing everything with a slightly unnerving amount of energy and overwhelming those who are near enough to be affected or are accidentally caught up in my tornado of words, like those of you reading this blog. Poor people, If I were you, I would run very quickly in the opposite direction so you don't get sucked up. ;)