The Christmas Spirit

This is the mormon message from the Church website! It is so good so click on the link and watch it!
The Christmas Spirit

The Good and Bad of Thanksgiving.

The overall weekend was fun. But I have to vent. I basically got sat at the kid table because guess what? I am not married! Yes, but guess what? I am almost 30! I don't know what 30 year old would enjoy sitting with two seventeen year olds and a nine year old. There were three people at the "grown up" table younger than me but they have said "I do". I mean no offense to anyone who might be reading this blog but it was the low point of my Thanksgiving. I have been becoming more aware of the way single people get treated sometimes. I don't think that the people who do it realize how ridiculous it is. It is almost like it is just tradition that gets passed down. Here's an example: Every time my brother and I both go stay at my sister's house he thinks that him and his wife get the bed. I would understand if that just left the couch but there is an air mattress and another bedroom. So why do I always have to sleep on the air mattress? You guessed it, because I am single. Honestly, I am getting kind of tired of being treated like there is something wrong with me. I'm single, not contagious. So I don't have another person that comes along with me. What's the big deal? Yes, I want to get married but I am not crying myself to sleep. I am making the most of my single life and I am really enjoying myself.

The Good part of Thanksgiving out weighed the bad. For those of you that don't know Thanksgiving in Orderville is awesome! (Well if you like volleyball and basketball) We have an alumni tournament. You are eligible it you graduated from Valley High or married someone who did. Guys play basketball, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Girls play volleyball Friday and Saturday morning. My team won consolation. I actually like the basketball part better. I was the scorekeeper when I was in high school and I do it for the alumni tournament. I guess I am the alumni scorekeeper. :) I did the book for all but two of the games this year. I love every minute of it! My brother kept the score clock a lot of the games and it was fun to spend the time with him. They even do a top ten and an MVP. It is a big deal! The whole tournament is for a good cause. They give scholarships to the high school seniors.

So the weekend as a whole was a lot of fun even though I vented at first.

Time Out for Women

This last weekend my Mom, Sister and I went to Time Out for Women in St George. It is kind of a big women's conference put on by Deseret Book. It was so amazing! My Sister and I had been before in Vegas a few years ago. If anybody ever has the chance to attend I highly recommend it. It started Friday night at 6:30 and went until 9:30. Then Saturday it started back up at 9 am and went until 3:45 pm. They travel around the country and they always have a theme for the year. This years was "Sweet Assurance, the certainty that comes when you know life's truths." They had people like Hilary Weeks, Kenneth Cope, and Mary Ellen Edmonds among others. Hilary Weeks is hilarious! If you ever get a chance to see her I recommend that too. She was so funny plus her music is so neat. She is definitely the type that has you laughing one minute and crying the next. It was such a good, spiritual experience. It recharges you batteries and makes you feel good about life. I know they have already announced next years tour so if you are interested check it out. It is well worth the money and time. You can get info on Deseret Book's website.
This is my sister, Me, Hilary Weeks and my Mom.

You're from Cedar City

I was recently reminded of a funny client story. She was a twelve year old which I have a hard time with as it is. I tell my Mom that when I have daughters that age I am sending them to her to keep until they are old enough to live on their own. Anyway, I took this girl to the shampoo bowl and she says "Please try not to wash off my makeup, I didn't bring any with me to reapply." Um, I didn't really plan on washing her face, just her hair. And, does a twelve year old really need makeup on anyway? While I was cutting her hair I was asking her if she had always lived in Cedar City. She told me that she had moved from Phoenix. I said something about how that must have been a big change. She said "Oh it was, I really miss all the shopping and the malls." Well then I asked her how old she was when she moved to Cedar. She says "Um, four." Realizing how stupid she sounded having just told me how much she missed the shopping, she quickly added "but I still remember going shopping with my Mom all the time." Sorry sweetie but you are from Cedar City, not Phoenix.

It's Strange How Life Happens

Today I attended church in Orderville because my cousin who recently returned from his mission was speaking. Our families were really close. We grew up right next door to each other. I often say we were like one big family that lived in two houses. I have always thought of him as my little brother. I have been thinking a lot lately about the fact that he is now a return missionary. This is really going to give away my age but he was a third grader when I was a senior! The reason I remember that is because I was an Elementary aid for his class that year. I now have been thinking of girls that I could set him up with. Well he is coming to town tomorrow (Monday) and I had the great idea of making him come to my singles ward family home evening. He seems excited. Well this is where I decided it gets strange. He was in third grade when I was a senior and now he is hanging out with me in a singles ward. What?

I LOVE FALL!!

I have been thinking a lot lately about how much I love fall! I love the smells, the temperature, and the colors. I love being able to wear my hooded sweatshirts, I have a lot of them.

I remember playing in the leaves at my grandma's house when I was little. I really don't remember them being so scratchy back then.

This isn't the greatest picture I realize but I love the colors up on the "C" mountain. I wish my camera would have taken it better.

My Dad loved pinenuts and every time I smell them roasting it reminds me of him and the fall. I love them too! He always just bought them. A couple years ago was the first time that I had gone out and gathered them myself. My step dad took my Mom and I. He took us again this last Thursday. I have to say that it is a lot of fun! I love being out in the crisp fall air. It is kind of a tedious little job picking the pinenuts off the ground, and not to mention how sore my legs are after crouching or kneeling for so long. But in the end it is worth it because the pinenuts are delicious and I didn't have to pay for them. We found a lot, as you can tell. What a wonderful time of year!

Mr. Perfect

I know you were all hoping I was announcing something but I am not. I just have yet another funny story from my nine year old nephew.
I was at my sister's house several weeks ago and I said something jokingly about how her and I never had guy issues with each other. Of course we didn't, we are eight years apart. My brother-in-law spoke up and said, "Yes you have, you are jealous because you are still looking for Mr. Perfect and she has already found him." Well I half teasingly said "If you are Mr. Perfect then I will stay single." That is when the nine year old said "I was going to say Dad, you are not really Aunt Lisa's type. You are pretty country and she is more, well city." I thought it was so funny! Number 1 I had no idea that the nine year old would even know about "type". I'm not sure I am exactly "city" but other than that he is right!

Playing with Ellie

In case you didn't know, I am a pretty proud Aunt. I saw a thing on the Today show the other day about a lady who poses and takes pictures of sleeping babies. She says it works best if the babies are under 2 months. Ellie fits that description so I decided to try it last Sunday while she was "peacefully" sleeping. Jeff and Erica were nice enough to just let me play. Jeff did say something about "What are you doing to my baby? Um, I think you should e-mail me some of those pictures." Anyway I decided to post of few because I thought they turned out cute.

INTRUDER!!!

Last Thursday night my roommates and I were all sitting in our living room just chatting. I just have to tell you that it is very odd that we were all there together. It is very rare for us all to be home and especially all be in the same room at the same time. Well our front door opens and in walks THIS.......










We were all nervously laughing. I can't speak for the others but I was thinking "It has to be someone we know, right?" But there was definitely that doubt that MAYBE IT WASN'T! It jumped around at us for a few minutes. I really didn't know who it would be. Laura kept saying "Jason, I know that it is you!" Sure enough it was our funny friend Jason. He is the one person that I would suspect but he just recently got married so I really wasn't thinking it would be him. His birthday was the day before and his wife had surprised him in it. So I guess he decided while they still had the costume they should make some use of it. He could not have planned it better though. I can't believe he caught us all home in the living room together like that. It was pretty funny, after we got over the shock!

Ellie Roselle

After 8 1/2 years my family was finally able to produce another girl! She is only the 3rd one out of 10 nieces and nephews! So as you can tell I am a pretty proud aunt! You don't have to think she is cute, she is a newborn but I think she will be cute eventually. Don't tell my brother I said that! Her middle name is after my sister-in-laws 97 year old great Grandma. They were planning on giving her that middle name the whole time and then by coincidence she was born on Roselle's birthday which I thought was very neat.

She was born last night (aug 26) at 8pm and this is her at 10pm. Pretty alert for a new one. She was only 5lbs 15 oz and 19 inches long. She is a tiny little thing.

My only other two nieces are 15 and 8 and live in Alaska so you can imagine how exciting it is for me to finally have another girl to spoil. I told her last night that I was her favorite aunt and already started working on her to say my name! :)

LAKE POWELL

I went to Lake Powell on Monday with my Uncle Jim and Aunt Jann's family. We had so much fun! I was trying to think of the last time I was there and I can't remember a time since I graduated from high school (Which was longer than I would like to admit).

Just being there and playing in the water like this was enough for me to realize how much I had missed this and wonder why I have gone so long without going there. I think I would have been content to play all day just off the shore and then lay out and get tan but we had two boats and that is when the fun began!

I love this picture just because that is a typical pose for my Uncle Jim to be in.

Carson is getting the boat ready for us to go out.

This is Owen, Cassidy (their cousin on their Mom's side) and Marv. They were making me laugh so hard when they were riding the tubes. They were being funny and crazy! They were taking turns jumping from one tube to the other.

This was hilarious! Owen's was about to flip out of his tube and so he hurried and jumped on to the other one. The rode all three together until they could catch the other one and then Owen jumped back on to it.

This video is pretty funny! I had a hard time holding it very still since we were on a boat.

I got burned! It was my own fault. I only put sunscreen on my face once. I wanted to come back from the lake with a good tan. It is already starting to darken up. It has been a little sensitive but I am excited about the color I now have. I know that is bad and you are supposed to always wear sunscreen but I haven't really even been tan yet this summer and I really wanted to be.

New Car

I bought a new car yesterday! (Well the bank bought a new car yesterday.) I know what some of you are thinking, "Isn't that just like her old car?" The answer is yes it is very similar. My car had given me a few problems and the last straw was that the air conditioning broke several weeks ago. For those of you that don't know me well enough, being hot makes me ornery! So I decided to trade it in for one that still has a warranty on it. But I loved my car, it was so cute and has some really nice features. So I got one that is a lot like it. This one is a Mercury Milan. My old one was a Ford Fusion. (same thing) This ones color is Satellite Sliver which is kinda cool. It looks different depending on the angle. It seems so have a light green tint to it. It has everything mine did except the sunroof which I can live without. One of the things this one has that my other one didn't is the leather seats are heated!!! I'm so excited, but I won't be using that feature anytime soon. It is a year newer (07) and only has 14800 miles on it. My payments aren't that much more and my warranty is much longer. I am excited!

SAN FRANCISCO

I recently returned from San Francisco. I had never been there before and it was a lot of fun. I went with my cousin Troy's wife and her sister Megan.

We went down to Pier 39 and Fisherman's wharf. This is one of the first things we saw and we thought it was hilarious!

There was some beautiful views there. I didn't buy any of the fruit but I wanted too! We did eat French Crepes though and they were yummy! We also had clam chouder in sourdough bread bowls! They were excellent!

I really liked this shot because it showed the fun activity around and the street car in the background.

We made the trip out to Alcatraz. I didn't realize it is a National Park. It was interesting to see. There was actually a audio guided tour of the jail cell. That was good because then it told some of the fact and stories of the place.

Of Course we went for a Trolley ride! It was almost like a rollercoaster ride because of the rolling hills that they go up and down.

Oh, Ghirardelli Square! This was on the agenda but when we ended up there was kind of an accident. We were actually just going for a Trolley ride and this was the last stop. We had wonderful ice cream and bought some delicious chocolate!

This is Lombard street. It was kind of fun to see. There are people that live along it which I think would be really annoying since most of the people driving down it are just tourists. I kept thinking we were going to see an accident in the intersection above it because of all the people that didn't really know what they were doing or where they were going.

And finally we got to see 'Wicked'! It was really good! I read the book which I wouldn't really recommend but at the same time I was glad I had. There were a lot of differences but I felt like I knew better what was going on because of reading it.

I've got some time!

Here is a follow up on a previous story. If you haven't already, read "I guess I better hurry" before you read this one.

I asked my nephew the other day just how much time I had to get married before I was kicked out of the family. I was curious. He told me that I had fourteen thousand months. That made me feel better because I was afraid the divorce from my family might be happening sooner than that. So I told him that I could probably find someone to marry in that amount of time. Then he changed his mind and told me I had fourteen thousand years. He then said "You should be able to find someone to marry by then." Then he kind of mumbled " You should be married by now!"

Best Memorial Day Ever!

I didn't really have plans for Memorial Day weekend. I told someone I just might spend the entire day in bed reading and/or watching movies. You know a nice relaxing day. Well Sunday I came down with some of the worst allergies I've had in a really long time. I left church after sacrament and went directly to bed. I didn't really get up until Monday afternoon. I even tried to read and my eyes would not stay open. So my wish of staying in bed came true, it just wasn't quite as I had imagined. The nice thing about over the counter allergy medicines is they take about three days to kick in. I wish I would have known about the allergies last Thursday! Tuesday evening I finally started to feel like I was coming down off of my drug induced coma. Sorry clients I had on Tuesday!! All is good now. I feel much better!

Couch Burning

So one of my friends called me the other night and said "How would you like to see what a couch looks like when it is on fire?" I said "I would love too!" I'm not going to lie though it was not my first time. I attended a bonfire once when there was three couches burned! I might have a little bit of redneck in me! I guess that is up for debate, especially after this post combined with the last one.

We Rock!

Today my friends Kyle, Kristi and I went to the Rock Crawls. They have them out to 3 peaks not far from my house. I had never been before and it was actually kind of fun. Not only was the actual event entertaining but so was observing the interesting people that attend! Here are some of the best pictures we got as well as a video that is kind of cool!

Family

So I have been trying to think of something new to post but I guess my life hasn't been that exciting lately. So I decided that I could put a picture of my cute family. My two older brothers live in Alaska so we don't get to see them very often. This picture is from last summer when they were both down. It was the first time my whole family had been together in about 6 1/2 years! It was so fun for us all to be able to get together. It ended up being really good timing to because my Grandpa Goulding (the one in the hat) ended up dying about two weeks after they had been here.

Favorite story from being a hairstylist

I decided that since I have hair in the title I should tell at least one story about work. This story was very memorable because it left me speechless. You know there is a joke that hairstylist are kind of like bartenders because people tell you their problems. It's true! So I had done this lady's hair quite a few times but it had been awhile since I had seen her. I was asking her what she had been up to. She told me that she was getting a divorce. I told her that I was really sorry to hear that. She said "Yea, he caught me cheating on him." I really had no idea what to say to her. She said it so casually like it was the weather or something. I've never been at such a loss for words.

I guess I better hurry!

So I recently celebrated my birthday (we won't talk about how old I am). My sister and her family were in town the night before so we had a birthday dinner. Right after we said the prayer on the food my eight year old nephew looked at me and said "So why aren't you married?" He was very serious. I told him that I guessed I scared all the boys away. It didn't end there. When my Mom went to the cake I asked if she had gotten something written on it. Once again the eight year old piped up with "Yes, it says 'If you don't get married soon you are no longer part of this family!'" So anyway, I guess I better hurry!

Snowshoeing

One of the fun things that my friends and I did this winter was go snowshoeing. We went up by Cedar Breaks. I had never been before and I am not going to lie, it was hard. We got our exercise but we also got some great pictures!