Oops

The most recent 3 blogs (all published tonight) published in a weird order. I meant for the older stuff to be at the bottom. Read all the way down to the Sleepover one! :)

Happy Birthday to Me :)

Like our anniversary post, this is almost 3 months late. Oops.

I started my day off by going to work at 8 in the morning. My sweet bosses got me a card and came out and made everyone sing to me. :) When I came home, I couldn't wait to open presents. I got The Proposal and an iPod (from Doug and my parents)! Doug knows me better than I do... I had thought that when I got an iPod I would want a pink one, but he explained as I opened a RED one that the pink ones were nasty and he got me this awesome red one instead. It's so nice! He had engraved on the back: Now we can rock out together. Xoxoxo He's so sweet! We went to my favorite restaurant for dinner.

My angel visiting teacher brought me a present so sweet it almost made me cry! I had raved about some cookies she brought me about a month before. For my birthday, she brought me a plate of hot cookies, a bag of dough that she had frozen so I could have them whenever, a scoop, the recipe, and the chocolate that goes in. Thanks so much Terry!

My mother in law bought me the vinyl saying for the frame that I bought ages ago with it in mind. It's a 24x36 frame that now reads: "Real love stories never has endings." We're going to hang on the wall next to our stairs when we get the motivation to get the ladder in here, haha. She also gave me money that I'm going to use to buy paint for the kitchen! Sweeet! Thanks!

My sister in laws went together and got me a gift card to the most wonderful decorating store! I quickly used it to buy awesome decorations, of course! :)

My parents came down the next weekend and we went to my favorite restaurant again with them. I got free fried ice cream. :) It was a wonderful birthday!

Thanks everyone! Love you all!

Our Anniversary (Posted almost 3 months late...)

So....this is almost three months late. But I figured it would be good to get it on here anyways.

It's been a year already! It's gone by so fast and I love him so much! For our anniversary, we started off by sleeping in! It's a rare day that we can sleep in together, so it was wonderful. We went to go to Avatar 3D but it was sold out. (I should have listened to Doug! It had been out so long that I really didn't think it would still sell out...oopps!!) We changed our plans and bought tickets for the later showing and went to dinner early. My mom was so sweet and had given us money to go to an expensive restaurant. Thanks mom! After dinner, we went and picked up a new wedding cake layer that I surprised Doug with from the same lady that made our cake. We went to the movie and LOVED it! It was both of our first 3D movie and it was an awesome movie too! It was so nice to spend the whole day together.

Pretty cute in 3D glassees, huh? :)

Sleepover!

A while back we had our nieces over to our house for a sleepover! We had such a good time! We had pizza for dinner (yum!) and made the world's best brownies together for dessert. I LOVED having the girls helping with the brownies, it was heaven! Needless to say, they were very enthusiastic helpers!

I love these girls so much!!

Calling All Prayers!

This is my cousin's daughter, Michelle.

She is an angel. A miracle. The moment she was born she had to start fighting for her life. After forever in the hospital, she was finally been able to come home. She has been growing and learning SO much since then! Unfortunately, she is back in the hospital very, very sick. I know you don't know her, but she desperately needs your prayers right now. So please, please, PLEASE pray for sweet Michelle with all your heart.

The Refiner's Fire

Doug and I were in SLC and had the amazing opportunity to watch gold be refined up close. I am banging my head against the wall that I didn't think to take the camera in... But I was completely overwhelmed by why this certain symbolism is used in the scriptures.

First, the gold goes into a very thick metal cup and gets put into a metal tub where the fire is. This fire was so powerful by itself that it was astounding to look at...and the people said the fire they have didn't get hot enough by itself, so they took what looked like a welding torch to it to get the fire even hotter every once in a while. I asked them how hot it had to be to refine the gold, and the answer was somewhere around 1800 degrees. Every so often he would drop in some powder that makes all the impurities cling to it and come together . After quite awhile of melting the gold, the refiner got the cup out and cooled it in buckets of water. He dropped the gold out onto the floor, and all the impurities were all together in a black shape on the bottom. He hit it and they all dropped right off.

Pretty simple right? I can't even explain to you what a powerful representation to me of why the refiner's fire is used as a symbol. You're going through a trial and it's really bad, and then when you think it can't get any worse, the fire gets hotter. It circulates between bad and worse, all the while you are (hopefully) learning what you need to and your imperfections are sinking down. When you bring the Savior into it, the imperfections or bad things can fall right off, just like in the gold.

It's odd to me how much this experience taught me..I definitely don't think it was a coincidence that we had this opportunity. I mean, I'm the type of person that gets emotional at gorgeous art and beautiful songs, not watching raging fires.. Not that I got teary eyed emotional at the experience, but I don't think I've ever felt so powerfully taught about a symbol and that I knew and understood why Heavenly Father chose that symbol to use for us. I remember that feeling of absolute understanding and I know that I was supposed to learn what I did.

Going private

I have thought about it and have decided to make our little blog private. There are lots of things I want to post and don't feel comfortable doing so in view of the general public. So, send me an email with the email address you use to login to: mmaarrcciieeATgmailDOTcom. :)

If there's a chance I won't recognize who you are by your email address, just write your name in the subject of the email. I look forward to posting about things, places, and people I love that I wouldn't otherwise do without having the blog being private. :D