Temple

On August 6th, which was a Saturday, my Mom and I drove to New Jersey to pick up Brian's daughter Riley. She is a doll, to say the least. We then drove to Philly to pick up Brian and Dallin from the airport. Riley lives in NJ with her mom and Brian came to spend a week with her at our house in Delaware. On Wednesday the 10th, me, Mom, and Dallin left at 4am to pick up my friends Jeanie and Larry. It was a grand reunion and we used up our day exploring the historic parts of Philidelphia. I wanted to kick myself when my first thought when we got into Independance Hall was, "Hey, Nicholas Cage was here for National Treasure", instead of, "Wow, George Washington, Benjamin Franklin,..." I don't even like Nicholas Cage! He is ugly and a terrible actor. Anyway, we saw it all. Congress Hall, Liberty Bell, cemetery with some of our founding fathers, and the US Mint. The next day, my Mother and I left our house at 7:30 to make our way to D.C. We drove around the many hills on the Beltway and finally saw the Emerald City, I mean... D.C. Temple sticking way up above the trees. :) It is a very large temple. I think they said one of the largest built. They said even bigger than SLC? I don't know about that... but it was big! We stopped at the distribution center first, on account of it was my first time, and we had 15 minutes to spare by the time we got in for my scheduled 10:30. That's right people, I'm worthy!!! Haha! Not that I gave anyone a reason to think otherwise, but I now know what goes on inside the temple! When people say you don't talk about what goes on inside the temple, they mean you don't talk about what goes on inside the temple! I had so many questions running through my head, but as soon as it was time for me to ask them, I didn't know what I wanted to ask. I think a good diagnosis would be that I was "struck dumb". Well, more-so than normal. :) The best thing though, was that no matter how confused I felt, or how surprised I thought I was, the most overshadowing emotion I felt at that time was peace. Above everything else that I was thinking, I knew that what I had just witnessed was completely true. Even after I went home, I still felt it! It was like, I had my wisdom teeth out again and my dentist gave me an extra prescription for Happy pills. I guess Heavenly Father thought, "Gees, she is thinking way too much about this. She know she can come back whenever she wants and take it all in again, right? *sigh* I'm just going to dump some more 'FeelGood' on her head." That was a good feeling to have the rest of the week with good friends and family surrounding me. I felt so loved and content. The day after the temple, was... a Friday, and we spent the whole day at the beach. Our timing was perfect because the dolphins decided to come out when we got there. There were crabs in the sand where we were swimming and they would go after our toes. I swear I got pinched by a clam or something, because I had a sliver shaped blood blister on my big toe. That night, we walked over to the Hoffman's house and had s'mores around a campfire. The next day, it decided to rain. It was also transfer day, so that meant the main roads would be bumper to bumper with people leaving town from their week long vacation, and people entering town for their week on the beach. So, we pretty much chilled at home til it was time to drive to Philly to drop people off at the airport. It poured clear there. I got to drive the truck with Jeanie and Larry and we just jammed out to "He Is We" and "Hey Monday" all the way there. I felt bad that most of their stay was spent in a car and that we didn't get to see all the places we wanted to, but I'm glad that I have friends that came to support me instead of trying to get all they could out of their plane ticket. Overall, it was a good week.

The Call

Tired of hearing "Oh, my gosh" yet? :)

Dear Sister Gordon,

You are hereby called to serve as a missionary of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. You are assigned to labor in the Brazil Rio de Janeiro Mission. It is anticipated that you will serve for a period of 18 months.

You should report to the Brazil Missionary Training Center on Wednesday, January 11, 2012. You will prepare to preach the gospel in the Portuguese language.

I have a couple months for it to sink in. I need to get me a Rosetta Stone or something....

Office Max

I was at work the other day, and my shift was from 8-4. I am the cashier/front counter person that collects the dimes for copies.... yeah... lame. But today, my first customer was a blond lady who came in with her Starbucks, ready to go. She gave me her flashdrive, picked out the paper she wanted it printed on, and I pushed print. I went to pick up the paper and as I was walking back to give it to her, I saw a cute picture of her holding a baby girl, and the title underneath was "The Day I Died". I guessed from how it was set up that it was the front and back cover for a book. She noticed me looking at her paper and she explained what it was all about. I was very impressed and remembered her name so I could look her up on youtube. This video is of her on some Christian talk show. Skip ahead to 24:30, watch as long as you want, it tells her whole story clear to the end.

The host guy talks a lot, but that tells her whole story. Holy Shmoley, right? Amazing story... I might like Office Max if I had cool people come in all the time like that. But alas, I'm leaving for Delaware to put in my mission papers... :)

Friday the 13th...

So, Dallin is gone to Chicago for the summer. :( I'm going to miss my crazy brother. But, on a glass is half full note, he left his roadster bike here for me to use to get to work! If you haven't read my previous post about my skateboard, read it now. I'll wait for you....

Ok. So, it takes me 30 minutes on my skateboard. On this bike??? 10 minutes!

-UdallFamilyChoirSingingHallelujahChorus-

Best Birthday of my life!

This morning I worked at both places, meaning OfficeMax from 8-4, then Nike from 5:15 to 10. So, I had to hurry and ride my bike home before my friend Derek gave me a ride to Scottsdale. I was going south on Rural and I was about to cross Southern. The white "walk" man and just turned into the red flashing hand, so I had plenty of time to get across. I'm going normal cruising speed on a bike, and I make my way into the cross walk. Then, some SUV does a little stop and look for oncoming traffic, and starts to merge. With my bike.

Thats right. I got hit by a car. I noticed she was going to accelerate, so I tried to slam my breaks, which squealed, and tried to swerve out of the way, but she nailed the back end and knocked me over. I almost was forced into oncoming traffic, but I managed to stay in the crosswalk. So, I get up, stand there looking at where I am for 5 seconds, then pick my bike up and walk it back to the sidewalk I just came from. She rolls down her window and asks me if I'm ok, and thats when I start shaking and the adrenaline kicks in. And the hysteria. I look myself over and realize I'm not hurt at all and say with a big smile and a laugh, "Yeah, I'm fine!" She says are you sure, I say yeah I'm good, and.... She drives AWAY! The car behind her stops and asks if I'm alright because I'm just standing there on the sidewalk with my hand over my heart and my other hand on my forehead. Again, I'm good. They say to me, "That was a close call!" And I laugh and say "YEAH IT WAS!" with maybe a little bit too much force.

So, the moral of this story boys and girls, is that I've had Dallin's very nice roadster bike for a grand total of 1 and a half days. And now the back tire is wonky. I'm never riding a bike on Friday the 13th again.

Oh, Baby!

Just some dang cute pictures of this sweet little boy. He was super happy and cuddly last time I got to visit. Or I'm just funny-looking. :)

Skateboarding to OfficeMax

In case you didn't know already, I got another job at OfficeMax in the Printing section. Now, this is not my idea of an ideal part time job. It is the most boring job I've ever had. Ranging from selling 10 cent copies to laminating 20 papers. Awesome. But, its 2 miles away and I don't have to depend on anyone to get there. I just get my skateboard and I'm off. However. It's an obstacle course on that sidewalk. There are cracks and rocks and crazy twigs. Sprinklers go off all the time. And there are these trees. There is a whole mile that has trees that hang over the sidewalk. They have seeds that fall off all the time. They look like olives. But inside them, are pits or seeds or whatever that are the size of large pebbles. Or small rocks. Whichever is bigger. I skate over them holding my breath. Imagine, if you will, the part on Finding Nemo, where Bruce the giant shark is meandering his way through the mine field that will blow up at any second. I am Bruce in this analogy, winding my way through the mine fields of olive-looking seeds all over the sidewalk. I have flown plenty of times because my wheels hit the seeds and stops the board, but I keep moving. So. The reason for this post. If anyone has a bike that I can use, I will fix it up and make it all nice-like and put it to good use. It will save me about 10 minutes getting to work, and I won't have any battle scars from trekking through the mine fields. I will forever be in your debt. Or, I can buy you Yogurtland and we'll call it even. :)