My turn at 2008 in retrospect

Wow... saw my friend do this and thought it was a good idea... Count Your Blessings kind of thing...

First of all, before I even begin, you must be warned that this will be sappy and dramatic... just like me... While I do like to think people come to this page to see updates of my family, I also consider this a journal of sorts... and I am VERY long-winded. Consider yourself warned.

Second, this has truly been one of the hardest years I've ever experienced... mostly due to my own decision to wallow in my sorrow/trials/pain instead of remembering my blessings... I've spent many wasted hours distracted, crying, venting, and being just plain angry at the hand life has dealt me instead of truly rejoicing in what the Lord has been trying to teach me. That, unfortunately, has been the theme for me this year and I need to profusely thank my dear friends and family for sticking with me as I am learning to "get over myself..." as well as my Heavenly Father and Savior for waiting oh so patiently. Acknowleding this fact is acknowledging to myself and all who read this that I am closing that chapter and moving on to the happy adventures of 2009.

Despite that sad introduction, 2008 really did hold some marvelous things which I hope to list here (leaving out most of the garbage):

"Superman" interned at the Utah Legislature (for FREE) while working full-time for Sprint and writing 10 different papers as well as pages and pages of journal entries for said internship, all the while still Elder's Quorum President and full-time Logan manager (what a commute)! To add to the stack of stress and after much fasting and prayer, deep introspection and many late nights/early mornings, we decide to run for the State Legislature all while Superman is trying to finish the last semester at Weber State. He really and truly does graduate (YAY!!!!!) while running a primary election campaign. "Rhiaman" also finished out his last year of preschool, and graduated within weeks of Dad. He can't wait for Kindergarten to begin!!! Princess Sunshine is beginning to realize her best friend is about to have life experiences that she won't be able to tag along for. "Beautiful Baby" is happy and content in every situation and is definitely a blessing and calming influence amid all the stress and motion.

Yours truly and Superman spend out ninth anniversary at Campaign School in Salt Lake City after Superman didn't sleep one wink the night before trying to finish up some project I can't remember right now. We do have an awesome dinner that evening at a restaurant I can't remember the name of and spend quality time reminicing about all the good times from the last nine years together.

Despite being an exhausting three months of intense door-to-door campaigning with three kids in tow, endless campaign strategy meetings, and hours and hours of typing letters & invitations, April, May and June finds Yours Truly and the kids actually spending more time with busy hubby than we have for years/months. My kids lived with their Grandma for the last two weeks of June during crunch time for primary election. (Thank you Grandma and Grandpa). We win the primary election! Superman just didn't win... WE ALL DID!!! YAY US!!!!

Mixed in with the sweet is the bitter as Ryan's family experiences family tragedy whose backlash will be felt for years among the old and young. In the space of three days, we mourn, we celebrate and then leave for a well-deserved vacation in Island Park with my siblings and mom where "Beautiful Baby" celebrates her first birthday and the kids see Yellowstone for the first time! Go Old Faithful (with my crazy brothers... good times...they always know how to make me laugh) and Dragon's Mouth! One week later we venture to Mantua for Superman's family vacation where we experience an eye-opening almost-loss of Superman and Rhiaman as the four-wheeler they are riding flips over on top of them... Can we say road rash?! Thankfully we don't even have to venture to the hospital... though we probably should have. Fireworks, emergency trip to Walmart for a usable air mattress and home to be in 4th of July parades for Uncle K.

"Beautiful Baby" gets teeth, "Rhiaman" starts losing his. "Princess Sunshine" really learns to use her lungs as her screaming when upset escalates to an all-time ear-piercing decibel. We take the month of July off from just about everything, even helping in-laws with home renovations, as we recuperate. We all take turns getting strep throat and spend the 24th in bed! Summer brings more piano students and more transcription. We have a fun outside/backyard recital with ensuing water fight! Ryan's dear cousin Josh and his beautiful wife (another new friend) get married and Josh is ordained an Elder and takes out his temple endowments. We sincerely look forward to future sealing in 2009.

The kids learn to swim and Rhiaman excels at city league baseball. Princess Sunshine can't wait for her turn. She spends a lot of time her with new best friend, McKinley, whose mommy has incidentally become one of Mommy's best friends, home decorators and fashion consultants!

Fall time: Rhiaman begins KINDERGARTEN and can't wait to be a big kid. Begins to read and reads everything in site. Corrects Mommy when she skips sentences of long bedtime stories. Princess Sunshine officially begins preschool and life without big brother. Makes friends easily, loves to learn and is so happy to be an independent thinker and mover! Is truly a Princess!

Fall campaigning finds Yours Truly less than anxious to do anything campaign-oriented but ends up making friends-for-life with campaign opponent and his wife (it doesn't hurt that they also live in our ward and their daughter is a dear friend of mine and piano student)! Superman gets promotion to closer store and actually spends less time driving to and from all his responsibilities! I am released as choir director and called as the "Family, Home and Personal Enrichment" Leader... I trust that the Lord knows what He is doing!

I not only begin Twilight series but immerse myself in it. I am a friend of fantasy anyways and find a genre that speaks to me at this point in my life. I obsess over Twilight with another new dear friend, my sister Becky... We spend hours online searching for movie clips, book reviews, interviews, and the countdown to the movie emailing each other about our latest finds as well as spending hours reading FanFiction. I go the midnight movie premiere with her and love that I am also an independent thinker and mover! Beginnings of celebrating me... not just being what I do... (or don't do)...

Superman wins general election and the mailbox heist and time-with-family heist begins. So many pieces of mail for Representative "Superman" that it piles up on the kitchen table until we can get a system in place... Good luck finding anything there! So much time away with meetings, people and causes. Limited money in the State of Utah bank account due to the state of the economy equals "fun" future Leg sessions without money in upcoming 2009.

December brings new Leg. orientation (wow, eye-opening... I stand in awe of Superman), family tragedy and baggage with my family, but plans for a happy Memphis wedding with Superman's family that provide a much-needed distraction. Life stress reaches an all-time high, tears are shed, egos are severely bruised, and priorities are necessarily reshuffled. Superman leaves for wedding in Memphis with siblings and parents (nothing like dropping $700 for a plane ticket right before Christmas, thus reason why Superman went alone) and I paint a living wall room red, rearrange the basement, cut eight inches off my newly "blonde" hair, and begin the much-needed process of "digging-out" physically and emotionally (thank you Marilyn, Heather, Andrea and Denise, and of course, Superman)!

Christmas comes and goes in a flash while we revel in the magic of these fleeting Christmases with our young family. I also got to spend much-needed time with my siblings...and realize just how much more I need them in my life! Good times!

The renovation of Superman's parents house finds us spending many hours helping putting their home "back together" before wedding party arrives and scrambling to put an Open House together at the same time. Thank goodness for a friendly plumber willing to make house calls on New Year's Eve! We get things "functional" just in time to ring in the New Year sleeping on a chair in my in-laws house. A significant thought crosses my mind as I reflect on that position... not home in my comfortable bed and probably not appreciating it, but exhausted serving someone else resting in an easy-chair, completely happy that I've spent precious time doing something good for someone who needed me... just like my dear friends have done for me this year!

I had an interesting but enlightening conversation about hope this past year... knowing that is what I needed most. Hope is a state of mind... Hope is a choice. Despite all the garbage, we choose to hope, not in ignorant bliss, but in informed and knowing eyes-wide-open joy, acknowleding with every breath all that the Lord has truly given us.

Hope shows it's face around here again and upward and outward is where we are headed in 2009...