July 26, 2009 Update

Missionaries Family and Friends

I need to break my habit of missing letters. It seems to be happening more lately. I promise that I will think about doing better in the future. I had been excited for an event about a week ago. I had to go in and get my cholesterol checked. Over the past 3 months I had changed my diet significantly, exercised regularly, and drank fish oil almost every day. I had worked hard at changing my lifestyle in an attempt to lower my cholesterol. After Dad's heart attack I was even more curious to see where I stood. Devin and I went to the doctor to see the results and to my dismay my cholesterol had gotten minimally better. I now am required to take a cholesterol pill and need to go back in 3 months. Some of you may remember what this means. I had to do 2 things in order to get a motorcycle. I had to loose 30lbs and get my cholesterol under control without medication. In a few minutes at the doctor office my hopes and dreams of the wind in my face were dashed into more pieces than a plate dropped on a tile floor. I was dejected and sad about the prospects of getting a motorcycle. Devin decided that because I was working soooooooooo hard Devin amended the agreement and I just have to have my cholesterol under control. I am happy and look forward to getting to work on 2 wheels and not needing to peddle my way there.

This week was lots of fun. It all started Wednesday. I woke up at 4 in the morning. Partly because I was half way dreaming about entering test results in a database and partly because later that day we were going to have company over to play. My sister-in-law Tawnya was coming into town, from Galveston, for a family reunion with her 3 daughters Faye(4), Daisy(3), Lizzy(17 Months) and we got to have them stay with us that night. I was very excited and Devin and I wanted to have a party with the girls while they were here. We blew up lots of balloons and made cake. The girls had a good time running around and playing with us. The older girls would chase me around the house hitting me with the balloons and I pretended that they hit me with a ton of bricks. Lizzy would follow behind and be very cautious not to get hurt by the rough housing going on and make “pay attention to me” sounds. It was very cute. I loved to pick up Lizzy. She is a squishy little girl and is fun to hold. I was happy to go to work late the next day and play with the girls for the morning. One of my favorite things to watch was which plates the girls picked to eat their food on. We have several kids plates: Dora the Explorer, Spider-Man, Disney Princess, and Cars. I was very sure that Faye would pick princess and she did. Since Lizzy was small I was sure that she did not care what she ate off of but looked excited that the plate had a picture on it. Daisy was the wild card I could see her go with any of them except Spider-Man. Daisy saw one and was happy to pick the Lightning McQueen. Daisy kept telling me about the movie and that they had that movie. We really enjoyed having the girls over to play with us, and wish we got to see them more. Tawnya is alright as well and we're happy she came along with her girls.

Friday was another day that was exciting for us. We woke up at 4:00 a.m. and headed to Las Vegas. The reason for our trip to the city of sin was that a close family friend was returning home from a mission. Justin had been serving in Uruguay and we were excited to see him and find out what had happened over the past few years with him. We got into town and waited to hear from him since he also got home that same day. Melissa, Devin's sister, had dated Justin before his mission and was super excited to see the man of her dreams all day. We were instructed not to mention Justin all day so that they she could make it through the day easier. Every time she walked into the room I wanted to say something like “You showed up JUSTIN the nick of time to grab a plate and do dishes”. I was told that those comments would be inappropriate and I restrained myself until the next morning after Melissa had come off of her emotional roller coaster. Saturday Justin's family threw a welcome home party and we went and had a good time seeing friends in the area. Justin seems to have had a good time on his mission and was happy to have served. Both his family and Melissa are ecstatic to have Justin back. We are happy to have seen Justin and look forward to seeing you all soon as well.