Sometimes you need to throw away the list!

Today I had planned on getting a lot accomplished. You know the usual.

Clean the house. Do laundry. The usual Saturday list.

Sometimes the best days are days when we abandon the list and go with the flow.

Today was a day where I went with the flow.

Today was a great day.

Kinsey hasn't been sleeping well and she hasn't felt well and hasn't eaten much because of being sick. She asked if I would take her to Rice King in Provo. Rice King has vegan food and she really likes it. In my mind my list of things I wanted to get done flashed and I almost said no we need to get this and that done.

But instead I said yes.

I am so glad I did. We had a great lunch and we had such a good talk. We both got fortunes that matched us both so well and we both kept them. Kinsey's said "put all your unhappiness aside and be happy". Mine said "stop worrying and take a chance".


After lunch we went to the Provo Farmers Market. It was so fun. It reminded me a little of New York street fairs. There was produce and food and jewlery and great music and lots of interesting things.

We really had a great time we bought some corn. (Kinsey's favorite) and some jewlery (cheap and unique). We also listened to some music. There was a fun band playing and as we walked further on there was this guy singing with his guitar. It was really mellow music. The kind that is sad but beautiful. It was a guy by the name of Colby Stead. We listened for awhile and loved it and decided we needed to buy a CD. We bought the CD and listened to it while we drove around and ran some errands. We both chose the song No as our favorite song.

While running errands we saw this old guy on a bike who had a grocery sack full of bread. We couldn't figure out what he was doing but after a while realized he was feeding the birds. It was so interesting to observe this. It struck Kinsey and I. He was doing a good deed that many driving around accomplishing their list might not see.

Kinsey and I had such a good talk about noticing things in life and how important small things or small acts are.

It was a great day! Kinsey thank you for taking me out of the norm of the day and giving me an adventure. It was such an interesting good day. I love you Kinsey for opening my eyes to things I might not other wise see. For being kind hearted and for seeing the best in others that I might other wise over look or view in a different way.

Change in Plans

(This photo is one Aaron took when he climbed Mt. Whitney. It's Beautiful and sets the reflective mood.)

I read a post today on Thepioneerwoman.com it was a post about are you where you thought you would be 5 -10 or 20 years ago. I read thru some of the answers and they were inspiring and made me think. I decided to do my own "Are you where you thought you would be post".

My answer to the question is yes and no. My guess is that would be most people's answer.

After all could we imagine how wonderful life is? How great it is to hold a newborn that you and your husband created. To look in their eye's and see the love looking back at you. The feeling that you are everything to this child and that they are depending on you for all their needs. That they are counting on you to teach them and love them no matter what. (Sometimes when teenagers the no matter what is a hard one to keep. Yet we do.)
Children teach us more than we do them sometimes. At least for me mine have.

When growing up I wanted to be a wife a mother. I wanted to have the perfect picket fence mormon home. I wanted to be a stay at home mom who kept a lovely home and cooked fabulous meals and did everything just right. You know "old fashioned". I guess honestly I wanted to have and be all the things I didn't have or at least was taken from me when I was young.

Marriage: I married young. Too young (19) I tell my girls all the time... wait live life a little more. But they have their own journey's to follow. Who knows what will be.

I was lucky so lucky. I married a wonderful man. Who I love more than anything. After almost 23 years of marriage I love him more each day and I am so proud of the man he is. He inspires me to be better. He is the best example and has the kindest giving heart.

Children: I thought I would have 5 or 6. It wasn't possible but I am so blessed to have been able to have the three I have. Others aren't as lucky and I am so grateful that I could have children.

Mother: I wanted to be the perfect mother. I wanted my children to say and feel that I was the best mother ever. I am not perfect. I have tried to be perfect and it is not possible. In fact trying to be perfect sets you up to fail. Teach your children. Example is the best teacher. The teaching part of being a parent is the hardest part to look back on. You could always do more. That is true and what we beat ourselves up about... I'm guessing for the rest of our lives. Do your best and try a little harder each day. Make it that simple.

My advice to all who reads this is Love your children unconditionally. Don't be like satan. Yep I said satan. Free agency is something we fought for in heaven and something as parents we fight against. Being a parent is the best and hardest thing I ever thought I would do. The answers I have found is love and acceptance.

Career: I didn't want a career (remember I'm old fashioned). I have had to work since I was well...I started babysitting at 9 and haven't stopped working since then. I still in my mind think I am going to have the chance to be a stay at home mom. My baby is 15 so nah I don't think so.
But our children have had the best of both their parents. We didn't have babysitters. Grandma some but we worked it out between Neil and I. We made the best of the situation and our children have had both of us in their lives.

Picket fence home: I spent a year planning and building a home. It was a wonderful home. I planned the yard and planted every plant. I loved having Christmas in this home. It snowed a lot there and there were deer everywhere. I loved the kids sitting at the top of the stairs waiting to get the ok to come down to open Christmas. There are many memories here. Happy times.
We sold this home over two years ago. I was devastated. I mourned it like a death. I was so sad and disappointed and I sure did feel sorry for myself. Why wasn't things working out better for us financially and on and on.

BUT... I have come thru the other side of it. I have grown and realized many things. It was just a house. Brick and stucco and paint and wood. It didn't make us a family. It was just a place to live. I can honestly say that a home is what you make it. It is what you do together as a family. It is the love you have for one another. It is sacrifice and encouragement and helping one another.

I no longer need the perfect picket fence home. Home is where ever we are as a family.

The one thing when we think of where we are going to be in 5- 10 or 20 years... we of course don't see are our trials. When we plan as children what our life will be like we plan only good things.

Trials come to all of us. Some are consequences, some are allowed by our Father in Heaven and some are inflicted upon us by others. Trials find each of us. There is no escape. What matters is what we do during our trials. I think our true character comes out when we are in the midst of our trials. There have been times I have been proud of myself during trials and other times I am ashamed.

Here is one of the posts off thepioneerwoman.com that I liked and have to say says how I feel sometimes. "I am grumpy when I should have patience, I yell when I should forgive, I run when I should have courage…I am not who I need to be, but thank God I am not where I used to be".

This post has gotten long and I am afraid I have gone on and on. Thanks for listening.

Oh the other things about life real quick.

No I don't look like I thought or hoped. I would be 75lbs over (how did that happen?)
Nope I don't take as many vacations as I would have hoped. I haven't been out of the U.S. oh unless Tijuana counts.

I am blessed. So blessed. That's part of the reason I blog. My blog is my acknowledgement of all my blessings. Living proof to myself what a wonderful life I have.

No life isn't exactly what I thought or maybe even hoped sometimes that it would be.

In many ways it is better than I could have imagined and thru the living and thru the trials of this life I have come to see with different eyes than I once saw thru.

Your turn leave a comment or post on your blog "are you where you thought you would be 5-10 or 20 years ago".  

A Blue Day!

No today it's not raining outside. In fact the temperature is over a 100.

It's not a cloudy day. But for me it is a blue day.

Do you have those days? Not for any particular reason. Maybe lots of small reasons.

I started blogging back in March. I had thought about doing it for a few months before that.

It had been many really long months where I was at a low point. Maybe the lowest point of my life. I felt like I was in a hole and I couldn't find my way out.

I looked at life as something I was enduring. Something that seemed to always happen to me. I didn't look at the good things in my life enough. I was focusing on the things that were not going well the trials, the burdens of life.

Don't get me wrong I have many many good things about my life. I always have. I am actually quite lucky and I have a good life.

You see the problem was that I wasn't giving as much attention, as much notice to all the good things. All the many things I have to be grateful for. I was focusing on what wasn't right instead of what was right.

I have learned a lot over the past year or so. I have grown. I guess that's what this life is about. Learning, growing, stretching, trying, failing and trying again.

I am not where I want to be. Will I ever be? Not here, not in this life. But I keep trying and I will succeed and I will fail.

This blog is a stange thing for me. It is out of my comfort zone. Yet it has come to mean a lot to me in a strange way... that's hard to understand.

I was searching on the internet one day for a recipe, just browsing and I came across a blog. I didn't even know what a blog was. It was called Pioneer Woman. The blog is in my list of family/friends and places.

This lady was from the city and now living on a ranch. It fascinated me. I read her stories, I read her recipes and the thought came to me that this lady was making the most of her life. She was taking whatever circumstance she was in and she was making the most of it.

I knew I needed a new perspective. I needed to shift my life from poor me, to lucky me. That is now my journey, my goal.

Lucky Jeannie Warner!I am lucky. I am grateful. I am blessed. I am trying to live, to really live. I am trying new things. I am trying to look at the glass half full.

Do I always succeed. No! Today remember is a blue day. Probably PMS, being too busy or the stress of school starting and needing money for school clothes and registration and on and on. (The money stress never seems to be out of my life.)

This blog I look at often. I don't always post but I look for a few moments and I see the photo's the memories the joys that are my life. I see my trip to New York. The nice surprises my husband does for me. I see evidence that I have a life that is full of many blessings.

I am even taking or should I say allowing others to take photos of me. For years because of weight I would always take the picture. I was not in the picture. WHY? I feel sad about that because where is the evidence that I was there at the event? On the vacation?

I really never know who reads this blog and it doesn't matter. This is for me, to remind me I am blessed. A lot of you tell me you read it and you don't have a blog. Blogging is probably not for every one. It's strange to put your life out there. But for me it has been like therapy. I plan to print the blog each year. (Did you know you can do that? Pictures and all). I don't write a journal and I long ago gave up scrapbooking. (I am too far behind and too busy for now). This will be my journal my scrapbook.

I invite you to start a blog and if you do share it with me. I will add you as a friend.

Thanks for listening. My blue day is turning around.

Just for fun here are some photo's of me that were taken this week.

Wow Jeannie you are getting brave and you are living. (Does this sound like I am talking to myself?) I do that probably too much. But hey sometimes it helps :0)