(188) Tag!

So, my friend Evelyn, has an awesome blog: Hanging By a Silver Lining. It is a lot of fun to read, mostly because she is cool and honest and friendly. I wish we lived closer together so we could hang out.

I have this little secret (not so much now) desire to get more involved in the blogging world someday, although I have pretty much resigned myself to waiting until I don't have to spend my evenings working. Still, I can't tell you how thrilled I was when Evelyn tagged me! Seriously, I'm super thrilled!

So, the idea is to answer the 8 questions posed by her and then to tag 8 people and ask my own questions.

Here it goes:

1. Did you swear you'd never do something when you became a parent and now find yourself doing? Fess up.
Honestly, I waited a long time to get married and have kids. I spent a lot of that time watching my sisters have kids and enter the "joys" of motherhood. By watching them, I guess I learned, at least a little, that parenting is unpredictable and sometimes a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants kind of thing. I never did promise myself I wouldn't do something that I find myself doing now. I knew I would have movies-all-day days; I knew I would have cookies-for-breakfast days; I knew I would have giving-in-to-the-crying nights; I knew I would have cry-it-out nights; and I guess I knew that I would learn along the way that one technique that worked on the first wouldn't work on the second. And, I knew all of that was ok. All of this I learned from my sisters. Isn't that cool?! I never realized that until now.


2. If you could only eat three foods for the rest of your life, what would they be?
Hmm...Here is what comes to mind. Sandwiches made of ritz crackers and crunchy peanut butter with a side of BBQ chips. I'm counting that as just one because, really, you can't have one without the other. Pumpkin cookies, with chocolate chips. And, um, pineapple. Yeah, that sounds good and balanced to me. =)

3. Retell your worst dating experience.
Oh, good grief! I have so many bad dating experiences! I dated from age 16 to age 29. That is a lot of years to gain a lot of experiences. I went on a lot of first dates, a lot of blind dates, and a whole lot of weird dates. Probably one of the best of the worst that really stands out was with a guy I have named "James Bond dude." Long story short, he started out the date making it clear that he didn't like the side of town I lived in, the high school I attended, or the music I liked to listen to. Every attempt I made at finding something in common was shot down. He was an avid fan of James Bond and spent his evenings watching and memorizing every detail of every James Bond movie ever made including the names of all the girls. He did this while living in his parents home. He had a degree but was not interested in doing anything with it but working at a call center (as a manager at least) and watching free cable. He also informed me that he thought he would be a good spy, telling me how he was in a habit of positioning himself so that he could watch doors (in case he needed to make a quick escape), memorizing room layouts, watching people for their giveaways and secrets. He had "lightening quick reflexes" and usually "noticed things that normal people wouldn't see." They boy seriously thought he was James Bond. And, he had no interest in getting to know me. It was an awful night, but a really funny story!


4. What was the most recent thing that made you cry?
Lily fell backwards head over heels down 4 of my very steep, very hard wooden stairs today; two full rotations and a landing on her stomach. It scared the life out of me and I sat and cried while I held her for about half an hour. (She is fine, by the way. She cried for maybe a minute, snuggled with me for another 2 minutes, and then tried to get away from for the rest of the time).

That's my happy thing today, by the way. Not the fall, but the fact that we have the money to put up a good sturdy gate and I have a husband who not only offered me a lot of comfort and relief from the intense mommy guilt but is also able to put in the new gate.


5. Favorite childhood memory. Go!
I had a really, really, really good childhood. I got along, for the most part, with all of my siblings. We laughed a lot. We played a lot. Our family was and still is so very close. I have so many good memories. What comes to mind, initially, though is spending pretty much every summer from about age 11 on at Yellowstone. We would go to Roosevelt Lodge, get an economy cabin and pack ourselves in. At night we would sit on the porch at the Lodge or play card games. When it got dark, we would go back to our cabin and snuggle in for the night. In the morning, Dad would light a fire in the wood stove and it would get so hot in there that we had to escape into the cool air. That way we would have an early start to our day driving around seeing the sights, eating lunch whereever we could find a place with tables, and stopping a lot to take pictures and explore. Oh, so many good, good memories.

6. What piece of advice have you received that you will NEVER forget? Good or bad.
This advice was not given to me. It was given to my friend Nicolle and her husband at their sealing. The officiator told them to remember the words, "Seek and ye shall find." He applied it to their marriage saying that if you seek the bad in each other you will find it, but if you seek the good, you will find that. Whatever you look for, you find.

That has stuck with me and I have applied it to so many aspects of my life.

7. You're driving, approaching an intersection and the light is yellow. What do you do? Would your answer change if your kids weren't in the back seats? Would your answer change if your mother-in-law was in the passenger seat?
First of all, if it is not feasible for me to stop safely, I will go through without worrying.

If it changes to yellow while my car is underneath it, that is good luck and I will kiss my hand and hit the roof of my car.

If I have plenty of time to stop, I will. I always have even before I have kids because my mom read an article in the Readers' Digest once about how dangerous it can be to run a yellow light, shared it with me, and scared me. I'm a very cautious driver anyway, but that article (that I didn't even read) made me even more cautious with yellow lights.

My answer doesn't change with my kids in the car or my mother-in-law. I'm still a cautious driver who has been known to stop at a yellow light.

8. What do you do to keep your eye on the prize when it all just gets to be too much?
I write in my journals, I blog about what makes me happy (especially when it is a little harder to find), I read my past journals and, most importantly, I read my scriptures, I pray, and I read my patriarchal blessing.

It also helps me a lot to talk with my husband, my mom, my sisters, my dad, my brother, my friends, etc. I really like to talk with people who know me and who remind me how much I love life and what is important.


Alrighty then. Here are the 8 people I am tagging, in no particular order.
1. Rita, my most loyal commenter. I love hearing from her every day!
2. Luanne, my sister-in-law and my other loyal commenter. I love you too!
3. Jeigh. My sister. I'm trying to wake up her blogginess a little.
4. Erin. My other sister. She has an awesome blog.
5. Rochelle. Another sister-in-law. She lives in Australia. I wish it was closer.
6. Nicolle. An old friend. She moved to Utah after I moved away from Idaho. I hope she stays long enough for us to live close again.
7. Megan. A new friend who is inspiring and friendly and fun. I need to get to know her better!
8. Lori. She is my cousin's wife, so I guess that would make her my cousin-in-law? I haven't seen her in years, but I have gotten to know her awesome family through blogs. She makes me want to have a family reunion!

By the way, if you didn't get tagged and you still want to play, consider yourself tagged. Go ahead and copy and paste my questions, answer them in your own blog and pass it on. Just be sure to leave me a comment so that I can see your answers!

Ok. Here are my questions:
1. What specifically has made you feel happy today?
2. Are you a morning person or a night owl?
3. If you had/have free time, what would you/do you spend that time doing?
4. What is your favorite breakfast?
5. You are alone in the house. No one is watching. You are listening to your favorite music. What kind of music is it? Are you singing along? Are you dancing? Remember, no one is watching. =)
6. What have you never tried but really want to?
7. Do you have a favorite holiday? If so, what is it and why?
8. What is the most recent thing that someone has done for you that made a difference in your day?

Have fun! I can't wait to read your answers!