chelsea

Alaska

Five Gold Rings

29 December 2015

The Fifth Day of Christmas

The five golden rings represented the Pentateuch, the five books of Moses, which gives the history of humanity and God’s response of grace. What we learn from the five books of Moses is God’s dealings with his children. It starts with the creation of the world and of Adam and Eve (yay, I love them), how they fall, but then we are taught we are given a redeemer, the song of God. And then it goes through the early prophets, and the Exodus of the children of Israel, and stuff after that. :) I need to become acquainted with the old testament. When I was studying it in Jerusalem, my love and appreciation for the Old Testament grew a lot a lot! But since then, I haven’t taken much time to study it. In scripture study, I learn a lot with the help of the institute manuals, but I don’t see myself as a very good scripture studier right now, which means I can only get better! :)

As Christmas break often goes, I stayed at home today and enjoyed hanging out with my smelf. (Chris says smelf instead of self, so I do too sometimes. It’s a funny thing we do hee haw). I finished making cookies this morning and enjoyed a bunch of them. They’re tasty and not too unhealthy with their organic whole wheat and oats and organic sugar (which is still unhealthy) and coconut oil and applesauce. And then loads of chocolate cheeps, or chocolate chips as we sometimes call them.

The best thing I did today was make appointments to go visiting teaching! I’m so proud of myself. :) I always have the desire to visit (or somehow connect with) my assigned sisters each month, but more often than not, I don’t accomplish that. Things are changing now! Hooray. I think visiting teaching is super fantastic. It is wonderful to visit people, especially when they want and need it. I have one older lady that I visit teach that loves and appreciates visits muchly.

We had some yummy broccoli cheese pasta for din din tonight, and watched Star Wars episode 6, and I konked out with a half hour left. And then I napped for two hours while he played Xbox. Not sure how I slept through all that. I remember feeling the cats walk on me, and I really love that. I love being walked on by cats, really. Their gentle little paws cruising across you. When I walk up, Edel had jumped on the couch and was cuddling with me. It was so cute! We love our animals, even though they’re extra worse and mess and wear and tear. They’re good companions.

Here’s my cat bum magnets from Chris! <3

For a couple hours, I talked with my childhood bff, Carlita Carla, on the tell. We snap chatted each other while we talked and it was funny. She taught me a new snapchat skill which I’m pretty proud of. I never knew how to move the emojis around like this before! Successful day.

(this airport one is Carla’s) The bus cracked me up.

Also! One of my favorite Christmassy/Winter musics is George Winston’s December album. It’s such good piano music and I’m listening to it now, and Chris and I listened to it a lot last winter when we played rummikub. I like playing games yay yay goodnight cheers.

Alaska

Four Calling Birds

28 December 2015

The Fourth Day of Christmas

The four calling birds are the four gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. The word gospel means good news. Chris got an xbox 1 headset today! He bought it for himself today and uses it for talking with his little bro while they play Star Wars Battlefront together. I claimed it as his gift of the 4th day of Christmas though. :)

So, my Monday… I woke up and did a half hour of yoga and that is excellent! I love when I do yoga and hope to do it more! It’s still raining around here, so everything is very icy and kind of slushy. I took Edelweiss on a great walk, and enjoyed my time in nature. She sho did too! When I came home, Chris had finished working out, showered, and was ready to head to the office.

I spent some time in front of the heater this morning, as per usual, some time on the computer looking stuff up, some time eating last night’s delightful stirfry, and some time eating a bunch of lindt chocolate. Then I felt like a ding dong face for having eaten too much chocolate, so I read a bunch of stuff about how sugar is bad for our bodies and minds. I want to eat much less sugar and I’d like to improve my relationship with food and become more involved with its growing. Soon enough. I guess I could start with an herb garden! I’ve never grown much before, but I’d love if Chris and I had a huge greenhouse. The governments grants high tunnel greenhouses to people with a few requirements, like using them . So I want that. And I want chickens and our own eggs. I LOVE BABY CHICKS. And I want babies.

This afternoon I sent out a Christmas box to my sister in law Angie, did some grocery shopping, and some stuff to prepare for the New Year’s Eve party at church. Sometimes I put off doing errands, but I was pretty on top of it today. I like that! Oh! And I went to the bookstore and got a super journal and the best pen ever for my new passion planner. It’s a six color gel pen, how perfect. I got the q&a journal, which I’ve been wanting for five years or so. And it’s a five years journal, which is such a great idea. And I got my next cute journal and a present for Chris. I LOVE journals.

I’m tired. It’s 3:30 in the morning. Not sure why I’m up hehe.

This evening some of us church friends got together and had a feast at the Wolfe’s home. It was wonderful to be in everyone’s company and to eat the tasty halibut casserole.

Chris and I each got home about 8, and then he played hours of xbox while I explored spotify and rekindled my relationship with music. I haven’t listened to much music the past couple years, but now that I have a spotify account, that’ll change! Chris got me a spotify subscription for Christmas. I’m going to go get in bed with him now and squeeze him tight.

Oh, I made cookies tonight and a jar with ingredients to send to my home girl, Carla. She’ll just have to add butter/coconut oil, vanilla, and an egg! Easy peasy! I wrote some missionary letters tonight too, which is always so so so good. One of my bffs is in the Philippines on her mission for another year. Chris and I want and plan to be at the airport when she gets home in a year.

Alaska

Three French Hens

27 December 2015

The Third Day of Christmas

The three French hens stand for faith, hope, and charity.

I felt pretty useful at church today! I had ward council this morning, and we got out late, and so Chris had to find his own way to church. He planned on getting a ride from some friends, but it didn’t work out, so he had to walk 10 or so minutes to my mom’s house and pick up her car. He said he actually ice skated over there, because we had some snow, but now it’s just rain! So everything has turned into ice. The roads were bad and some people didn’t make it to church. I lead the music today, which I’ve never done in a sacrament meeting, but I’m glad I know how! It was cool being up there and seeing everyone. And then when it was time for the closing prayer, the assigned person wasn’t there and bishop looked behind and asked me to do it. I was glad to. The prayers can and should be a very important part of our church services.

During Sunday School, I sat with my sista Holly. I love being at church with her and I’m glad she’s a faithful church goer, especially now. We were totally twinning today, with long skirts, and dark blue, chunky (funny word), wintry sweaters. She had her scriptures on her lap, so I put mine on my lap to look she like her. Then she opened her cover, so I opened mine. And we both had the same bird sticker in the same place inside! So funny! It was the same type of bird sticker, just different color and facing the other direction. It was placed in the same place, the middle of the top inside cover. I felt great, strong connection that Holly is my sister. I’ve pretty much always looked up to her and I love her lots. How special to have sisters. We both grew in the same womb and we’re blessed we’re here in Homer for each other.

The third hour of church is Young Women time. I prepared my lesson late last night and I wasn’t feeling 200% on it, so I was glad when we decided to got to Relief Society instead! We only had 1.5 yw there today so it was great to go to Relief Society today. I love it in there. And I played piano for the opening and closing songs! We started out with Joy to the World, one of my favorite songs to play, and we ended with How Gentle Gods Commands. I enjoy playing piano and was happy to share my musical talents at church today. Not a lot of people know I play piano. I want to play more and I can, because I have a great full size keyboard here at home. I want an old, wooden, upright piano, but I don’t feel I’m very deserving of one until I play what I have now.

Chris played lots of xbox today. I fell asleep in front of the heater for a while. Then I cleaned up Christmas aftermath, all the stuff we haven’t put away the last week. I want less stuff. I’ve listened to the Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up a few times, and I really want to simplify all of our possessions. Extra stuff takes so much extra energy.

For Chris’s Three French Hens gift today I wrote him a load of love notes and hid them all over the house. I hope he’ll be finding them for weeks. And I put away his pizza he left out. :) Also, I want to have babies.

Alaska

Two Turtle Doves

26 December 2015

The 2nd Day of Christmas

The two turtle doves symbolize the Old and New Testament, which bear witness of Christ.

As Chris’s second gift of the 12 days of Christmas, I said we could get rid of this fantastic, mustard yellow chair in our garage. We’ve had it for almost a year, and I love it. But it’s gross and is just taking up space. Christopher doesn’t like it and never wanted it in the first place, and I had big dreams for it to put in my creation room, once I gave it an extremely deep cleaning. :) But alas, I’ve never cleaned it and it would take a lot to clean, so this week we’ll take it to the salvage area at the dump. Tsk tsk but that’s okay.

Also! I learned some other great stuff about turtle doves. Not only are they in Home Alone 2, but they show up in Palestine in about April. And Mary gave two turtle doves as her temple offering after giving birth to Jesus. She didn’t give two lambs because she didn’t have much money, so turtle doves or pigeons were acceptable.

AND we went sledding today and it was SNOW much fun playing in the awesome snow. Where our house is, there’s just a little bit of snow and ice. But head up the hill and BAM (hit by a bus)! It’s winter wonderland! It was so fun and uplifting to be all together and play and eat and laugh. And Chris went to Star Wars for the 4th time today. I almost went, and decided I should stay home and work on my young women lesson for tomorrow. Here it is 2:30 am and I still haven’t done much with it. Oops. I did learn a load about the 12 days of Christmas though! And I had a really great conversation with Chris’s sister. And I listened to Enya.

Alaska

A Partridge in a Pear Tree

25 December 2015

….. To help prevent after Christmas blues and to keep the spirit of CHRISTmas alive in me, and thanks to my inspiring friend, Alyssa, I’m doing a 12 days of Christmas for Christopher. I’ve read a lot a lot online about the origin of the song and the symbols of each day. Really interesting.

The 12 Days of Christmas starts with Christmas day and ends on the eve of Epiphany, the day commemorated as the Magi/wise men arriving. Something I read said “you can’t celebrate the birth of Christ in just one day!” Which is one of the reasons for 12 days of celebrations. For me, the whole December is pretty Christmassy. Oh I love love Christmastime.

Something eles I read said how some religions weren’t allowed to celebrate their beliefs, so this song helped remind them of things that bring us closer to Christ, and blessings we’ve received. All of the birds or performers or 12 things have interesting secular backgrounds too.

The 1st Day of Christmas

The partridge in a pear tree is Jesus Christ. Christ is symbolically presented as a mother partridge which feigns injury to decoy predators from her helpless nestlings and nest.

For Chris’s gift today, I wrote him a love letter.

Alaska

Merry Christmas and Cats!

25 December 2015

Oh how I love Christmas time. I love the lights, the musics, the giving, the snow, the service, the visits, the nativities, some of the goodies, the feast, and the together time. I LOVE the season of Christmas. Of course there is a great love for Christmas day too. It’s such an exciting time with presents to open and presents to give. And then the rest of the day, to visit people, to play with your new toys, to hang out. I love this joyful time of year. For me, Christmastime has always been joyful, though it isn’t always that way for everyone, and I hope everyone can find peace and joy in Christ, despite their very difficult circumstances.

Christopher and I stayed up till 2 am on Christmas Eve finishing wrapping our presents for each other, which meant we wouldn’t be waking up and 5 am and running to the living room to see what Santa brought, like we do when we’re kids. We woke up about 9, got ready, and took Edelweiss for her walk. There was snow on the ground and it was starting to rain. Edel ran back and forth through the crunchy snow while Chris launched her ball for her. While we walked, I read Luke 2, the Christmas story. How wonderful that we have those records of the savior’s birth. I also have this record of when I went to Bethlehem seven years ago. What magic.

We came home from our walk and sat by the tree with all our gifts from Santa and loved ones, mostly from each other. Chris did great at thinking of what I likened what’s important to me in gift giving this year. I think we both did a good job at giving some fun and meaningful gifts.

I spent a long time painting a sign/picture for Chris’s office, and he liked that a lot. And for me, he got some great photos from our sealing printed on wood. They look excellent. We don’t have any pictures printed from our sealing a year ago, so those will be so nice to display on the walls of our home, because it was a pretty significant and special day for us. During our present opening, we all had lots of pictures and messages going back and forth in the family text. This picture of Brady was the highlight of that for me.

IMG_5756-1

After present opening and me eating a bunch of chocolate chip cinnamon rolls I made (it’s tradition!), we went to my sister Holly’s house and ate Christmas Eve dinner leftovers and opened a few presents with them. Holly gave me a cute, little, thoughtful, owl vase, and Natalie give us some stick people ornaments she made of me, Chris, and a baby. No, we’re not pregnant, but I’m excited to be!

Oh! Before we went to Holly’s, we went to Gloria Corey’s house and visited with her. She’s recently widowed and is such a sweet and tiny Alaskan woman. We came back home in the afternoon and played with our new toys. :) Chris/Santa got himself an xbox, so he can play Star Wars Battlefront with his little brother and nephew, and for other reasons, like he likes it. I tried playing but an xbox controller is hard to use! Bring back the old school Nintendo controllers, world!

In the evening, our friend Richard and his daughter Emily came over and hung out for the rest of the night. We ate more Christmas Eve dinner leftovers and fudge and such, and played some games. I love playing games. What a wonderful way to spend time with people, along with eating, o’ course. We watched some good youtube videos too. It’s always nice to have a tribe to pass time with!

OH! And I got a bunch of cat stuff, my favorite being a shirt with a printed cat popping out of a fake pocket, soon to be a real pocket. And we’re taking care of like, 8 cats right now. We’ve got our current two, and we’re cat sitting one here with us. And we’re taking care of the neighbors three cats for a few days, just feeding and petting them. And my mom is gone and she has my sister’s two cats at her house. They just need food and love and their litter box cleaned. Anyway, cats cats cats.

Alaska

Two years

23 December 2015

December 21st marked two years of marriage for us!

This picture is funny to me, and it’s taken just in the spot where we were married two years before.

We are happy together. ❤️

We almost didn’t go out to eat on our anniversary, but decided we should do something a bit more special. But I just love being home with Chris and doing simple things together.

On our drive home from dinner, I made up a compliment/comment game for us to play, where you back and forth throwing out compliments.

I started with: “I like your beard.”

Chris: “I like your butt.”

Hahaha that cracked me up. Then we shared a bunch of random comments like “I like when you stick your chin out and look at me (like in picture below)” and “I like when you wear your boat shoes, sort of. I like when you skate around in them in the driveway,” and things like that. I love my boy and I’m grateful we chose each other. ?

Alaska

Christmas break has begun!

18 December 2015

Since we got home from our Utah, Nevada, California three week long trip, I’ve pretty much been subbing day after day. This is good. But I’ve missed being able to get up and do what I want! Instead of sleepily getting out of bed and getting ready for school. Well, today is the first day of Christmas break! I’m celebrating by laying in bed. :) Now I need to celebrate by getting up and taking edelweiss and the cats for a walk, by listening to Christmas music, by making Christmas presents, and cleaning our house.

Happy aloha Friday!

Also, a shout out to Piper for helping take the ornaments down. ;)

Also! I just saw this funny article and illustrations. True love. Approaching two years of marriage and this article is very relatable! Especially, “this shirt doesn’t fit you anymore. Can it be my pajamas?” Haha. I love Chris.

Alaska

The best elementary Christmas concert

8 December 2015

In a world that’s becoming more and more secular, I’m so grateful there are still things like kids’ Christmas concerts. Most of the songs and performances were light and super fun, but there were a few CHRISTmas-y moments that were really special to me.

First of all, I got lazy and almost didn’t go to the concert, because I wanted to stay home and decorate the tree and put some more lights up. Like I didn’t have all day to do that.

Cutting down our tree was funny. We found it on Sunday night and it’s a beauty. We don’t have a saw or an axe, but luckily Chris has a nice serrated blade on his leatherman. Once we discovered that blade, ten minutes in to sawing the tree with a dull blade, cutting down the tree went pretty quickly. Edel was happy to join us and Piper, the spaz kitty, was happy to be there as well.

This year we have a tree stand! That makes the Christmas tree thing much better. :) you may notice a little pile of lights that I still need to wrap around. Earlier when I was putting light on the tree, the tree started to fall over, and Chris and to fix the tree stand. He said something about how Christmas can be kind of annoying or frustrating. He had just untangled a chunk of lights too. Now there’s some random Christmas decor strewn about the living room they I don’t feel like cleaning up. Maybe tomorrow. :)

Back to the Christmassy moments of the day… In the concert there was a 5th or 6th grade Down’s syndrome boy being guided by a fellow classmate around the stage. The helper boy seemed so so kind. It was pretty sweet and reminded me of the goodness of the savior. Alyssa, you would’ve loved that moment and the performance too, and especially at the end of the song when a couple of the special needs kids were so happy with everyone clapping. Big smiles all around.

Another great moment from the concert was accompanied by the song “Where are you Christmas?”, which Faith Hill rocks at. There’s a deaf girl at the school, and she and a bunch of her classmates signed that song! It was awesome. The interpreter lead the students in the song and most of the performers were really into it, and I bet it made the deaf girl feel so included in a world where she’s so different. I thought it was great and it helped me focus on the words of the song too. We can find Christmas with lots of love!

The other highlight of the concert was watching little Natalie dance around in her paper leprechaun hat, banging exercise balls with sticks, and listening to the foot stomping, Celtic version of her Christmas song.

Alaska

Martin Schoeller

8 December 2015

I DID YOGA THIS MORNING and it was a wonderful way to start the day, getting my body and mind in tune. Last year I made a yoga resolution and I’m glad to report that 2015 had lots of yoga thoughts and even some yoga action! I started 2015 of strong doing 30 Days of Yoga (with Adriene) and I was so consistent. Toward the end of January I missed days here and there, and it ended up taking me about two months to finish my 30 days of videos. Since then, I do yoga every so often and think about it every day haha. It makes me feel good inside and out, so hopefully I can get over the lazy sloth bones I have and do yoga more frequently.

Christopher had a meeting at 7:30 this morning, and that’s what got us out of bed. Sometimes I make it hard to get out of bed and I’d prefer jumping out of bed and dancing around and giving thanks to God. Progress is a process though, and I like the quote I got in my email the other from LDS daily messages: “We do not have to be perfect, but we need to be good and getting better” -Kim B. Clark (Eyes to See and Ears to Hear).

We got ready for the day, I sang Christmas songs in the shower, actually it was just one line that I kept repeating: The mighty God, the everlasting God, the Prince of Peace! I often get one line stuck in my head and sing it over and over. My Holly girl sister stopped by and that’s always great. I love having people in our home. And I spent most of the day carpet cleaning yesterday so now our house smells less like animals hopefully. Speaking of animals, Edelweiss is licking my foot right now, and she wants me to throw her ball for her… Now she’s on our old orange chair chewing on the kitty.

After our walk with Edel this morning, I took Chris to his office and we saw a homeless looking man on the way. I’ve seen him around town before and I want to know more about him, and help him if he needs. There’s people all around us that need help, and I like helping people. When I came home I found myself browsing instagram in front of the heater, with Edel by my side.

I came across Martin Schoeller’s instagram account and read all of the conversations he had posted. He seems dedicated to helping homeless people in LA. The account shows photos of PEOPLE and parts of conversations he has with them. He asks people how they became homeless and how they get by. It was really interesting to read and helped me become more compassionate. Many of the people had had some level of drug involvement which contributed to their current situation. Some people had good attitudes, some didn’t, or maybe those people were just having a good or bad day – we all have ups and downs. It was interesting reading about people’s families too. Homelessness is something that I want to understand more about, and I wish people didn’t have to suffer so much. I bet it makes Heavenly Father sorrowful when he sees so many of his children suffering, sometimes from their own decisions, sometimes from others, and sometimes for other reasons. But I know Heavenly Father loves us all and wants every person to have joy. And I know he can use us to help others.

Alaska

Mockingjay

7 December 2015

spoiler alert :) if you don’t know what happens at the end of the Hunger Games series, you might not want to read this yet. Just know that I had a good time at the movies and I’m happy.

11:30 pm. Christopher and I just got home from the movies! Our little Homer Family Theater is so cozy and since tonight was monday, it was only $6 each! What a deal. We didn’t go to the movies too often when I was little, but I do remember watching Aladdin in that theater! Except then, it had big murals on the inside walls, and lots of spit wads on the ceiling. But now it has like some sort of sound board panels or something. I miss the murals. I think there’s less spit wads now though, so that’s always good.

I haven’t read the Hunger Games series, but I did watch all the movies with Chris. I think I watched the first one with him when we were dating, and we probably fell asleep on the futon in his living room, and after the movie was over I probably tried to get up and go home, without wanting to, but wanting to at the same time. :) I love that I can have sleepovers with Chris every night now! I don’t ever have to get in the cold car and drive home because I already am home. How happy.

The third hunger games movie I watched here on our couch, cuddling with Chris. I remember when it was over I just wanted the next movie to be out so I could know the rest of the story! Actually I would’ve just preferred if they made the third book into only one movie instead of two. Harry Potter is the only story that can split into multiple movies. I wish there were five movies per Harry Potter book. :) Actually, I don’t know if I wish that. But I am happy they have Harry Potter on audible now so I can listen to the books again! I love listening to them. Jim Dale does a perfect job with the audiobook.

Back to Mocking Jay part II (here’s the spoiler), I really liked the ending. It was happy and sunshiney. The whole war and battle was not my favorite part, but it was pretty crazy when Katniss shot President Coin. I suspected it, but I didn’t know if that’s what she was going to do or not. So that was a good surprise and I liked how it turned out and Panem was better off without Coin (and Snow) as leader. And then Katniss went home, and there was her sister’s cat. :( That was sad but good, and cats are great. So sad her sister died though, and I liked how true her emotion seemed.

Then I loved when she and Peeta met back up at home, and he had primrose flowers. How perfect and sweet. And I like the name Primrose. And then they were just bffs again! And lovers too. After the whole story and all the battles and war and lack of peace, Peeta and Katniss had perfect moments of peace. And I thought that that’s what it was all for. For people to love each other, especially Husband and Wife, and then for them to have babies and teach them how to find peace and joy. The ending was great.

I loved what Katniss told her baby, that she sort of plays a game in her head about thinking of every good thing people have done. These days it’s easier to lose hope in humanity, but it’s important to remember that there’s still hope and there is still so much goodness in the world.

The image from the movie was most piercing to me was when Katniss got in bed with Peeta and they cuddled and fell asleep together. So that’s what Imma go do right now with my honey husband. I’m so grateful to have Christopher boy as my companion and that he loves me so much. Life is great with him. <3

Alaska

See you in three weeks, Alaska

26 November 2015

I left my Alaskan home in Monday, and got on a few airplanes until I made it to Salt Lake City. How amazing they we can get on an airplane and be almost anywhere we need within a number of hours.

Our friend is taking good care of our animals and home and we are ever so grateful. It’s not an easy job and it’s so so helpful to us. Thank you Emily! When I left, I was a bit sad to leave the animals, and my family members too, but we’ll be home in a few weeks, just in time for the local nutcracker!

My plane ride was great. I slept, listened to good música, and read a super great general conference talk for 1996.

Alaska

“I’m eleven too!”

11 November 2015

I miss Brazil. Well what I miss are the Brazilians, the people who gave me so much unconditional love, people who don’t have much but who are willing to give it all, people who make the best rice and beans seasoned with garlic and onion and some meaty thing probably, people who are humble, beautiful, and who have taught me to be more Christlike. I hope they all know how much I love and appreciate each of them and all they have given me.

There’s one Brazilian lady, Isabela, who would tell us the English she knew. She had a tape and workbook or something that went like this: “I’m eleven….” and then “I’m eleven too!” And I love hearing her say that. I miss her. For some reason that plays on repeat in my mind “I’m eleven too!” And sometimes I even say it out loud.

Speaking of more elevens, today is eleven eleven, Veterans Day! At school (3rd-6th) they did good things to commemorate and remember Veterans Day and I learned when Veterans Day first began! I forgot now, maybe 1919 with Roosevelt? Not sure though haha, I need to study up on my history!

Chris told me how he has national pride on this day, proud for the values that were fought for, and for those who served and gave their lives, proud of that old America, the land of the free and the home of the brave.

11-11 is also especially special because you get to make wishes all day long! I used to be big into wish making, but I’ve forgotten about it the past few years. I guess my wishes all came true! :) At one point I’d wish eveytime I through a banana peel, since I ate so many bananas. I shall start wishing more and throwing good thoughts out there, because there’s still plenty of good wishes I can make.

Natalie and I made pie and yum!
There are many suffering in the world, so much suffering that I don’t even know about. I know we can make it through our pains though, and with God, we are capable of so much. I’m grateful for the freedoms we have here in America, and especially in Alaska, and I hope we don’t lose them! Either way, we’ve always got the freedom to choose. Oh! Also, when we obey, we’re free! I think I was listening to a talk from general conference that said that, how obedience to God is freedom! So let freedom ring, my friends. :)

Alaska

Christmas lights

4 November 2015

Yesterday’s Christmas light magic:

And today’s… Nice. They got knocked down. :(

Alaska

Giving Thanks and catch up

1 November 2015

November. I love November. It’s a time to gather, a time to give thanks, and a time to prepare for Christmas! I wore a Christmas/winter sweater to church today and listened to some Christmas music tonight. It was delightful. I wore some nice blue tights too to keep my legs warm in the cooler weather.

Right now I’m in bed alone, wishing Chris was here to keep me warm. But I at least have our dog and a couple cats. They sure are nice to cuddle with. ❤️ I dropped Chris off at the airport tonight to go to an aviation conference in Texas. We’ll be apart for two weeks, until I meet him in Utah. We’ll spend Thanksgiving time in Utah, Vegas, and California, then we’ll be HOME for a good while.

It’s always hard to find someone to take care of our animals while we’re gone, but with good effort and the Lord’s help, it always works out. Still working on finding someone to stay here for the few weeks we’ll be out. I’m sleepy. Edel girl just jumped up on the bed to perfectly spoon with me! That’s nice. If only the cats will cuddle with me too. We shall see haha.

The animals, especially our German shepherd, Edelweiss, are plenty of work and make our house lots dirtier and so there’s always something to clean, but I love them anyway.

I miss Chris. He’s such a good cuddler and I love it and his love. Here’s a sad airport picture. Funny that we’re not both looking at the lens at the same time, because Chris always gets on me about looking at the camera lens and not at my reflection in the screen hehe.

Here’s some catch up of the Last two weeks since being home from Brazil.

Not pictured: changing the cat litter (ugh), washing the walls and carpet from a dirty puppy that’s gets hair and dirt all over. Also not pictured: the unhealthy eating of unhealthy foods I’ve been doing lately (oops, time for changes), me not going visiting teaching, staying in bed late like a bum sloth, my skin growing more pale day by day, my cat getting fatter, our fluffy cat missing, and other minor and less minor struggles that we go through, but life is also full of these wonderful moments that are pictured.

At Katy’s 7th birthday party with loads of temporary tattoos and with my sister who is a great mom.

Natalie and I adventure walking from the beach to home. Cats included! And check out those delicious fall leaves!

Walks with Chris are lovely. He always walks our dog Edel and half the time I don’t join, but if Piper is outside, she always goes haha. She’s such a spaz sometimes. Like right now as she’s attacking my rabbit fur! Turd.

My mom, sister, and nieces and I hang out a lot and I love it so much. Here we are with a pile of Brazil stuff I needed to go through.
Kiana’s Homer missionary farewell. She is such a gem and she and her brother create great music together! She’s off to the missionary training center and then to Italy for 18 months!

Watching a sunrise at 9:20 am, from my favorite perch of dead trees and stumps in the swamp.

Kindergarten teacher by day, sloth by night! ;) Sometimes I teach kindergarten, or anything else needed. I love subbing.

I went to pick Natalie up from school with Edel. I took her a cookie too. It was so great to walk home together and she loved it.
I had a special afternoon with Katy too. She was wearing all black because she and Natalie got in a fight and Katy said Natalie didn’t like black, so she wore it, hahaha. Here she is making an egg!

Natalie and I played at her school playground and it was awesome. Super fun. I don’t want to forget how to play! On this day Natalie was wearing all black. Katy picked it out for her and it turns out Natalie doesn’t really mind black.
Lots of good things in this picture. I remember reading that the number one need of a dog is exercise. We do what we can to exercise edelweiss and keep her happy. She’s a lot of work, but she’s a really good dog and I love having her here with me when Chris is gone. And when he’s home too.

Fresh salmon from din din!
Seminary one morning. News flash, they changed some of the scripture masteries! Who did that?! It totally threw me off.

We made homemade corn tortillas! They were delish and we had a yumm Mexican feast and rented movies or watched BBC stuff on Netflix. I love making food together and need to make it happen more often.
I got a yummy salad when we went to our friend Richard’s birthday dinner put a bajikkion craisens in my salad. So I made a smile with it. I only like about five craisins per salad. How do you spell craisens or craisins?

Super awesome clouds one morning.

Beach walk to help Chris take a little break from being at work all day. He’s been working so much, too much, but it’s temporary. Natalie reading! She had a hard time reading in school her first couple years, but loves it now!!
These moccasins…. Fixing them for Natalie’s Halloween costume.

Katy dodging a picture because she got upset since she couldn’t do what she wanted on my phone.
A drive by picture of beluga slough. Wow! Going to meet our good friends for dinner. Such beauty! We saw a bunch of whales in the bay too on our drive out to the end of the spit. It was awesome. And then I ate a yummy salad and tasty mac n cheese for dinner. :)

I voted! For our bishop to be a city councilman.

The best and pinkest morning sky I’ve ever seen. This is one of the only reasons I’m thankful for daylight savings. Otheriwse, daylight savings is silly silly. But today I was able to get out of bed and have loads of time before church. It was great! Our life is good and we are grateful. :)

Brazil

Mini PME

4 October 2015

Three years ago I bought some mini Pregar Meu Evangelhos (preach my gospel in Portuguese) and today I finally gave one away! I had tried sending them in the mail a couple years ago, but the box ending up coming back to me six months later haha. So I’ve been holding on to them to bring to Brazil. At the time they didn’t sell the mini ones here or something. And on my mission I really wanted a mini one, so I figured others would want that too!

It was special to give Meddison one today. She’s a recent convert from when I first came here to Brazil. She and a couple of her siblings were baptized shortly before I arrived in the area. Her mom went to church all the time too, but couldn’t get baptized because she wasn’t married to her “husband” and thus not living the law of chastity. Chris and I stopped by their house and visited them before general conference today. It’s really incredible to be able to see everyone again. For the most part I’ve just felt joy, but sometimes I feel sadness when people are no longer following God’s path and plan of happiness.

Meddison is pretty strong in the church though, and it makes me happy! She said her PMG book was really worn down and was grateful for a new little one. She’s 17 and is thinking about serving a mission, but she isn’t sure. She still has plenty of time to think about it if she feels that’s what she needs and wants to do. I know that a mission brings so so so much good though. That’s what missions do. They spread light all over the world and make the light brighter inside each missionay. I am so happy to be back in my mission areas right now. It brings me so much joy!

Lower 48

Consulate General of Brazil

23 September 2015

I’m glad the Brazilian tourist visa stuff is out of my hands now. Ever since we bought our plane tickets to Brazil just over a month ago, the visa stuff has stressed me out a lot. I was so worried we wouldn’t get to go to Brazil and that all out travel plans and monies and dreams are wasted. But alas, everything will work out.

If you’re ever trying to get a tourist visa (vitur) to Brazil feel free to contact me! It was a hassle and the website was very unclear. The ladies working at the office were very kind though, and it was good speaking Portuguese with them! I did feel a little embarrassed of my Portuguese though because my accent is not what it once was. I need to get over that before we go to Brazil on Monday! I’m so excited.

We’re are waiting on our visas now and will be able to pick them up in a couple days, hopefully by Thursday so we don’t have to change our flights to Orlando to visit Chris’s brother’s family. “Everything will be alright.”

Btw, husband and I went to the consulate in person, but that’s not necessary. You can do it by mail I believe, or also pay for a visa service agency. The website isn’t as intimidating as it seems, but it is unclear. Anyway, all is well!

Alaska

Magical Miracle

22 September 2015

My dear brother, Jake, is currently living in Bethel, Alaska working as a dentist at the native hospital. We don’t get to see each other too too much, probably a couple times a year, and we all wish he lived closer.

We texted the other day and he said he just got out of Denali, and I wondered if he might be in Anchorage when Chris and I flew out. But I forgot and never asked.

To get to Anchorage from Homer, it’s a four hour drive. It is an option to fly from Homer to Anchorage, but it’s not inexpensive so Chris and I drive when it makes sense. Christopher and I left home when we planned and were doing pretty good on time. There was some construction on the drive up and lots of fireweed fluff fluff! The yellow leaves were so beautiful too. Fall… It’s lovely.

Anyway, when we finally made it to the airport we were cutting it so close on time. Nobody likes that. Chris insisted everything would be okay, and that’s always nice to hear. Security took much longer than normal to get through, and normally it’s a pretty quick process. But I was standing there staring off and I hear, “Chelsea” and then I looked up and there was my brother! We got to hang out for about a half hour and it was so good. Rejuvenating. I love family and I’m really proud of Jake.