New Beginnings

Every year there is a program in the church for the Young Women, it's called New Beginnings.  This is when the girls that have been participating in the program welcome in the new ones into the "teen scene".  Once you turn 12, you move out of Primary and into the Young Women's program.

I don't know of a girl that hasn't wished for this day to come sooner because this means you can do fun things like go to girls camp, firesides, dances and hang out with the older girls, but more than anything, it means you don't have to do the Primary program in church once a year.  It's not that the program is horrible.  It's just that when you get to be about 11, you don't want to get up in church and sing and have speaking parts in front of EVERYONE. 

Of course, the parents love the program because they get to watch their little ones sing, wiggle, pick their noses, wave to everyone, and just have a laugh while trying very hard to be reverent.  These programs are a good mix of that.  I remember crying while watching our little ones up there but secretly hoping they didn't do anything TOO embarrassing.  There are very few things that tug at a mom's heart like that once a year program.  The songs they sing are so tender and sweet.  The sing about Jesus and how they KNOW He loves them.  They sing a song that says, "If the Savior Stood Beside Me...would I do the things I do".  They sing about families and how important they are.  They sing about prayer and how if they will pray, their Heavenly Father will hear and answer them.  It really is quite a program with all sorts of great emotions.  

For the children that are 3-11ish, they are so excited to perform for the parents but that fondness seems to wear off just in time to move on.  I'm sure that that is how it's suppose to work.  Well, Becca is on the verge of moving on and she is thrilled!  She will turn 12 on less then one month and she is READY!  


Our Young Women leader are amazing with lots of great ideas and tons of energy.  The program that they came up with was based loosely on the Sleeping Beauty story and all of the older girls were involved in the skit.  They talked about the 8 values (8 dwarfs), which are:

Faith, Divine Nature, Individual Worth, Knowledge, Choice & Accountability, Good Works, Integrity, & Virtue.  


These are the topics that all of the girls study and work on for the next 8 years until they graduate from high school.   Now, it's not all work, work, work.  Trust me, they have tons of fun while leaning these things too.  By the time they graduate, they will have accomplished the equivalent of earning the Eagle Scout award.  

Two down, one to go!  Now I just need to motivate Jeffrey to finish his Eagle!

These are all of the Young Women in our new ward.  Pretty impressive #'s

Amanda & Becca at New Beginnings 2011

Two of my girls...One in the last year and a half of Y.W. the other just starting.

Rough week for Amanda!

Amanda is a wonderful child.  As long as you keep food in her stomach and make sure she gets enough sleep, she is really pretty low maintenance.  If you don't do those two things...watch out!  She has helped me around the house so much lately, I feel a little guilty about "throwing her under the bus" but I just can't resist.  What can I say, it's payback for all of her less then helpful moments.  HaHa!  


One day, she was heading to run some errands and as she backed out of the garage, she side swiped my car.  The damage wasn't huge but she broke the tail light on her TWENTY YEAR OLD car!  Those are not easy to find and we can't leave it because with all of the moisture we have here, it will rust.

Dave was able to rub the black mark off of my car but that little crease will stay.  I think of it as "character".

Black mark gone...crease is not.

This little ding will stay as well.

A few days later, she was working on making some fabric headbands for the Young Women with a couple of her friends.  See below.  See how cute they are.  But then...they got finished and bored so her two friends started giving piggy back rides.

And they lost their balance, and a teenager who will remain nameless had her butt go through our wall!  See below...

Perfect BUTT size!

Funny thing is, is that this very same thing happened at my childhood home.  My brother and a neighbor were rough housing and our neighbors butt went through our wall.
Dave actually took it rather well.  He has mellowed in his old age.  Don't tell him I said that.
The girls promise that their dads will fix the wall...we'll see how long that takes.

Amanda got a job!  Hallelujah!  Now maybe she can pay for some of her damages around here.  Haha!  Well, she is a referee for the Spanish Fork Rec. Center.  She gets to growl at little kids and glare at their "dumb" coaches!  What could be better.  She gets some exercise which means she should start her Saturdays with a nutritious breakfast, right?  Wrong!  

These are photos of her a couple Saturdays ago just before she had to leave for work.  She was having what she called...wait for it...a Stacy Skillman breakfast!  What is this you ask?
Anything BUT cereal or traditional breakfast foods.  No, it's usually leftovers from the night before or cold pizza but this day, it was chocolate ice cream!!  Thanks Stac!  You taught her well!

She's so snarky!

Breakfast of champions!

This is Jeffrey's reaction.  He wishes he'd thought of it.

Becca just doesn't want to get involved.

Nothing but time on my hands...dang it!

For the two people that might actually be reading this blog...you might be wondering how I've been able to do so many entries lately.  Well I've got lots of time and not much mobility right now.  So don't judge! 

I got my injections yesterday.  You know it's NEVER a good thing when the Doctor comes in, sits down in front of a computer screen, and says, "WOW"!  Nope, that's never a good thing.  
He then said, "you've got quite the problem."  No kidding??  He then showed me "my problem", not that I knew what I was looking at or anything, but he was kind enough to translate for me and showed me just how herniated my little disk is. 
 
After that, I was required to roll from the bed I was in to the new bed so that I would end up on my stomach.  This is NOT a good position for me because it makes my right leg throb and go more numb.  But that is where I had to stay while he messed with my back.  He was very gentle and kind and it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be.
He asked if I was okay (I guess he could see the stress on my face or hear it in my voice) so I told him that I opted out of getting epidurals with all four babies because I was too freaked out about having needles shoved in my back, and now look where I am.

It should take 3-4 days for the stuff to work but until then, I've got time on my hands.

Church Ball

Church ball is legendary!  We've all witnessed or at least heard the tales about how it is the only place where a fight begins and ends with a prayer.  We've heard how grown men go absolutely NUTS and turn into completely different people when they step onto that court.  For some reason, all of a sudden they think they've been drafted to the pros or something.  They think that if they don't win, their million dollar contract with be null and void.  Really?  It's church ball (or rec. center ball) guys!

This is the very reason that Dave doesn't play and hasn't for years.  He is just not that competitive when it comes to games.  He always says, "It's a just stupid game for crying out loud!"  He doesn't like the way grown men think that it's okay to act like idiots for that sake of a game.  This is one of the things I love about him.  He is quite big enough to be able to throw his weight around and do some damage, but he just doesn't have it in him to do it.  To him, character matters, on or off the court.  


So when Jeffrey decided to play church ball with the YM in our stake, I had reservations about it but thought I'd let it play out.  Now, our ward has some great YM and they are pretty cool but athletically speaking, they are not what you'd consider "stand outs".  But what is great, is that they more than make up for it in character and humor.  And our "cheering section" can't be beat!  


So they won their first two games with not much trouble and with humility (it's easy to be cool about it when you win I guess).  Then came the dreaded 3rd game.  This other ward was stacked with priests who towered over our boys, not to mention, they could out hustle, maneuver and jump them.  Our poor guys couldn't catch a break.  They tried everything, for the first 1/4 and then they realized that they just needed to have fun.  With the help of our fan club (parents & siblings...no cute girls in sight, only their sisters) they started to poke fun at their circumstance.    By the time 1/2 time rolled around, the score was 5 - 41!  See photo below.  


After that, it just got ridiculous!  Our fans where yelling things like, "just do a Jimmer"!  They were referring to Jimmer Fredette, the star BYU player that will probably end up going pro after graduation.  Then the best line ever came from our Bishops son who said, "pull his shorts down!"  Sadly, I think that would have been the only way to stop this team.  They should have gone "Harlem Globetrotter" on them!  The end score was something like 7 -65.
It was ugly.  But they sure tried hard.  And the biggest bonus of all...not one of them acted like grown babies who are sore losers!  It makes me proud.

Beginning of game, when they thought they had a chance.

Planning a new strategy

This is right about the time the "pull their shorts down" comment came out.  Haha!

Biggest and best fan club ever!  A lot of good it did.  haha!

What did I tell ya?

Realizing all was lost, but fun was found.

Tweeners + Camera + No parental supervision=

Something made me laugh the other day.  This was a good thing.  I took my mind off of the pain in my backside (see previous post...or don't) and gave me a real giggle.  I was going to take some photos so I grabbed the camera and turn it on only to find some very silly photos that had "mysteriously" popped up.  Apparently, while I was gone for the day a few weeks ago, Becca and some of her new friends decided to put on a show, of sorts.  They must have found some awful makeup, some silly props, and thought it would be fun to do a "fashion show".  The following is a little scary but really sweet and funny.  But note to self, don't leave children alone with a camera and props.

This is Maddie...all dolled up!

"Face Art"

More face art!

Admiring their artwork...In my bathroom. It must be Jeffrey who is snapping the photo.

Kristian looking hungry, or maybe the are doing the "Thriller" look.

Facial hair & Cruise Ships

Dave and I were on a cruise one time and we went to see the comedian at one of the evening shows.  I can't remember his name but he had us all laughing hysterically.  I was laughing so hard that tears were running down my cheeks and I almost couldn't get enough air.  Well, there may have been a few in the crowd that we're laughing so much, which you'll understand very shortly...  

He was totally clean with no foul language, crude comments or anything.  But what was so funny was that he had this piece about how strange it is to see couples (mostly older) come on board the ship and the are dressed the same.  He said, "You know what I'm talking about.  Look around, you'll see pops and grammy wearing matching shirts, hats, pants etc."  He wondered how long it took for that male to just "give up" and let her dress him how she wanted to.  He said that often times they even had the same haircut!  Now you see why there were a few in the crowd that probably weren't amused!  But it's TRUE!  

Now just to be clear here, Dave would rather die by firing squad then the let me dress him in matchy matchy outfits.  And to be even more clear, I would rather swim in a body of water that I can't see my feet in than to do it either.  Anyone who knows me, knows that that is one of my greatest fears (the dark water, not the matching outfit, although it might be a close second)!  I've decided that wearing matching shirts, hats, pants etc. is just part of it.  It's the "giving up" part.  So it turns out that the older we get, the more we look the same...Case in point

Pardon me for being blunt but let me describe what I see happening to all of us.  Men develop a "chest" just as ours shrinking and sagging.  Men start to loose hair on their heads but find it growing out their ears, nose, back and eyebrows.  We find ourselves plucking & shaving in places we've never needed too before.  Or if we have the cash available, we opt for the more high tech laser treatment (can you imagine our grandparents even considering this).  At the same time we're shopping for "hair volume-izing shampoo" to get our head hair to seem fuller.  Some of us find that our feet grow the older we get.  Heaven help me if I EVER wear the same size 14 that Dave wears!  Women loose estrogen but gain testosterone.  For both males and females, our eyesight goes bad, our hearing goes bad, our hair goes gray. Sometimes I wonder if the only thing that separates males and females is that women wear jewelry and make up, on a good day.  

I think that all of this is God's way of leveling the playing field.  For what purpose?  I don't know.  I just know that I am not going down without a fight!  I will pluck, shave, and slather myself in what ever it takes to NOT look like wonderful husband.  And we will not ever dress in the same outfits!  Not ever!  Because that is just giving up!


P.S. MRI results are back.  Doc. says I've got a "fairly sizable" herniated disk and I will be getting two cortisone injections next week.  Hopefully I'll be able to feel my right foot and leg after that.  Just as I was figuring out how to not walk like Quasimodo...

Pain in my back side!

I must be getting old!  Some days I refuse to acknowledge this sad fact but there is no more denying it.  Just before Thanksgiving this year, I was "hit" with a herniated disk in my lower back.  I say HIT because that is what it feels like.  It feels like a sharp, deep pain that goes from my lower back and into my right leg. Unfortunately this is not the first time this has happened.  I seem to be prone to this...lucky me! 

Well it went away just in time for the holidays and I had a great time with everyone until this week.  Then it hit me again.  I try very hard to be careful about how I bend, lean over, and how I move but for what ever reason, when it wants to flare up, it does.  


This time has been different because this time my right foot and half way up my calf has gone numb!  I mean really numb.  It feels like someone shot me with Novocaine.  Nothing I do will make the feeling come back so I decided it was time to go the the next step past Physical Therapy.  

I scheduled a Drs. appointment at which time he told me that I have a herniated disk and a pinched nerve.  So he scheduled an MRI.  Now if you've never had one, let me share with you how they go.  They give you and very fashionable outfit to change into.  I'm sure it's straight from the runways of Paris.   Then they give you a set of earplugs.  This is a good thing because the MRI machine is VERY loud.  Then they have you lay down on your back on a semi hard table (this is very painful for me at this point).  Next, they tell you to hold very still so the "pictures"  will not be blurry. Then they slide you into a giant tube where you stay for about 20 minutes while they take a myriad of photos while you must stay very still.  The tube isn't that bad but if you're claustrophobic, this is not for you!  I remember when Dave had to get one after his stroke.  He never knew he was claustrophobic until that day.  Not to mention he is quite broad through the shoulders so I imagine it was like trying to squish 
"Mr. Incredible" into the small tube.  Now that's a visual image!

I tried to keep my mind busy so that it didn't feel as though I were in a coffin and fortunately I put a piece of gum in my mouth just before going in to keep me "busy".  Although, while I was chewing and chewing, I had an awful thought come to mind.  What if the gum fell to the back of my throat and I started to choke!? You cannot sit up or turn over so I just had to focus on not letting that happen.   As you can tell, since I'm writing this, I survived!


My foot & leg are still numb.  I figure it just matches my brain at this point.  haha!  I don't know what the MRI results are yet.  But one thing I do know it that I have the best family ever.

During this episode I have had to rely heavily on all of them and they have stepped up and done a great job.  Amanda gets up early so that she can take Jeffrey to school and get to her own school without being late (I've only had to call and excuse 1 tardy).  Becca has helped me hobble around and has even helped me put my socks on a few times.  Jeffrey has kept up on the laundry and trash.  Amanda has made meals and done dishes.  She even shaved my legs once because I couldn't stand it anymore.  She only cut me once!  Haha!  I told her that one day, when she's married and big and pregnant, I would shave her legs for her.  She just looked at me like I was crazy!  Dave always calls several times a day to see how I am.  And when he gets home, he dives into helping.  Even Sarah has called to check up me.  I really love my family.  I wish everyone was blessed to have one this great.