Tis the season

The wedding season that is. In the last month I have been to 4 receptions,4 sealings and an endowment session. It's been crazy busy!!

It started at the beginning of May with Jarom and Jerika's reception. Love those two!
Then two weeks later my cousin Emma got married. It was SO fun to see my aunt Suzanne twice in two months! That day was jam packed with the wedding and reception back to back. Sadly both of those receptions were during my diet so I couldn't eat anything.

 Dad thinks he is so GQ.

 It may have started raining on us and of course we covered ourselves instead of the bride.

This last picture is one of my favorites. Aunt Suzanne was complaining that her feet hurt, so Julie graciously offered to trade her shoes. Too bad they were just a little bit too small.

The next weekend I was off to Brigham City for Dustyn and Kim to receive their own endowments. I hadn't ever been to that temple. It was beautiful!!!

Then it was on to the wedding marathon weekend. Friday was both Dustyn's wedding and my friend Pam from the mission. Since Pam's was in Utah I'd only have to take a half day at work to be able to attend hers instead of a full day to go to Dustyn's. Pam had told me months and months ago so I could make sure I was actually in town. The day I found out the two weddings were on the same day was a very sad day.
Pam's sealing was beautiful. Probably my favorite sealing I've been to. It was all in Spanish so that was awesome, but the overall Spirit that was there was almost overwhelming. I actually cried!

I left from Pam's wedding at the temple and headed for Idaho. I actually made it in time to go to Dustyn and Kim's reception in Burley. After, I headed to Twin to stay with my friend Camille for the night. I needed to run in the morning and knew where I was almost the entire time, having been to Twin many times in my life. I ran past the Twin temple,

which was beautiful and took my temple's to 3 in as many days (Provo on Thursday night, Timp on Friday and then Twin even though I didn't go in). At about mile 6 my phone died and then I was in trouble. Once I got back to Camille's neighborhood I was completely lost. I was lost for about 25 minutes and it was really scary!! I finally went to a yard sale and a nice lady went and got me a phone charger so I could look up the address. I was about 3 blocks away. Ugh!!
I had to hurry and get ready so I could go pick up my brother so we could drive to Boise for another sealing. Kevin's best friend from childhood, Jared, was getting married. His sister Dana, who is one of my best friends, was going going to be there as well. No way was I going to miss this when I was so close! We had a nice drive there and the sealing was very nice (as they all are). It was fun to catch up with Dana and afterwards Kevin and I went with Dana and her husband John for ice cream.

  This took my temples for the week to four! Two in Idaho and two in Utah.

 Kevin was really helpful keeping me awake on the way there.

Then we were headed back to Jerome for Dustyn and Kim's second reception. We made it home with just enough time for me to change my clothes and drive over to the reception.

Whitni is such a silly girl, but she just loves me and I love her!! It was a great weekend, but so much driving! I'm so happy for everyone who has gotten married these last few months and hope they will be very happy.

I finished the trip up with a nice visit with my grandma and then I stopped to visit my grandpa and his wife LaRee on the way home. I was so tired last night and pretty much crashed as soon as I got home. Thankfully there aren't any weddings or any travels in my near future.

Made it

I did the 30 day Wholefood challenge! I didn't notice any changes except for a massive decrease in energy when I run, but that did get a little better toward the end. I weighed myself this morning and I lost 2 pounds.
I do feel like I could be healthier in my eating habits and I'll probably stick with a lot of whole30, but I'm definitely not going to be so strict with it. If I go to an activity and they have cookies and I want one, I'm going to eat it. :)
I probably won't have as much dairy as before or wheat, but I'm putting those legumes and rice and such back in. I might have pasta every now and again.
Sugar I'll definitely try to keep on a low. I had a cookie this morning and it was tasty, but not a satisfying as I was hoping for. It will still be nice to have the option.
As I've gone through this challenge I have learned a few things that I think will be beneficial. Being aware of what I'm putting in my body. With this I have to think about what I'm eating. Can I eat this? It also got me thinking a lot about the Word of Wisdom and how everything has it's purpose and benefits, it's just our consumption of them. Moderation in all things.

We'll see how I do this next month and if I need to make some more changes. In the meantime I'm looking forward so my pizza tonight. Hopefully it doesn't make me sick. :)

We've got this

Ever had one of those days where you know the world won't end, but it kind of feels like it will and you almost hope that it does? And you can't even have a cookie to try and drown it all out? That was my Monday.

And then you have those moments within that day where you can hear God whisper, "take a deep breath, we've got this". It still takes the entire day, a good cry, a conference talk and a good nights sleep to actually believe it and feel better, but He never lies.

We've got this.

Whole30 Day 12

I'm on day 12. Today is not a good day. I'm very frustrated that since I started this I don't have ANY energy to run. My day to day energy levels seem to be fine, but when I go out to run there is nothing in the tank. Today it's really getting to me and making me mad. REALLY mad. I have a half marathon in a month and I have gone from 10 minute miles before I started this to 12 minute miles. Not encouraging. AND I'm suppose to be upping my mileage, but I barely have the energy to run a 5K. I think it's a combination of other things in life stressing me out, the new way of eating, and PMS that have me really hating this today, but that doesn't change the fact that I want to cry and go eat some carbs that will actually give me some GO when I run.

On a brighter note: I made my own lara bars and they turned out yummy and they were super easy. You can find the recipe here.  I haven't done the math yet to determine if it's actually cheaper to make my own, but at least I know that if it is, it's worth the time to make them on my own.
I also made my own coconut flakes. I'll attempt coconut milk and coconut flour next.
Look at me, being all domestic and adventurous.

Little moments

I went home this weekend for Mother's Day. I wasn't planning on it since we have all kinds of weddings and family things coming up requiring lots of travel and assuring I'll see my family, but when my dad called and asked me to come, I couldn't say no. I got a couple passengers from the BYU ride board and headed home.
The weekend was nice, mom was surprised, but one of my favorite moments of the whole weekend was when I made my dad read me a story. I was just sitting in the office doing nothing. He came in and was bothering me, because that's what he does best, so I handed him a book and told him to read it to me. He told me there weren't enough pictures, so I grabbed "The magic pumpkin" and handed it to him.
He stood there and read it to me and it was just a lovely little moment.

Look Up

This gem of a video is going around facebook right now. I love that it came out at about the same time as Elder Ballard's CES devotional which you can watch here.

How much of life are we missing out on because we are hooked into our electronic devices? What people are crying out for our love, attention and help? What beautiful moments are we missing because we're watching the latest clip of ___________ (fill in the blank) on youtube?

I hope I can take a good inventory of my life and how I spend my time and make the necessary changes to actually be present in my own life. To see the beauty and blessings surrounding me and the wonderful people all around me just waiting for me to love them.

Last day of freedom

I'm super ticked this got deleted. Here goes round 2. If this one gets deleted, I'm taking it as a sign that I shouldn't do this.

My friend Kari has convinced me to give the whole30 challenge a try. Basically I cut out all food. But seriously here is what I can't eat.

• Do not consume added sugar, real or artificial.
• Do not eat grains. This includes pseudo grains like quinoa. 
• Do not eat legumes. What the heck!? I thought those were good for you.
• Do not eat dairy. With the exception of something I've never even heard of. Ghee anyone?
• Do not eat white potatoes. Really?! I'm from IDAHO!! smh
• Do not consume alcohol in any form. Finally an easy one.  
• Do not consume carrageenan. I don't know what that is, but spell check is telling me it's misspelled the replacement word for it is carnage. I think I'll avoid that one. No MSG or sulfites.
• No Paleo-fying baked goods, dessert and junk food. 

Basically the next 30 days will be filled with vegetables, fruits, meats, a lot of label reading and creativity. I've done no sweets for a month. No meat for a month. We'll see how I do with this ^^ awesome monstrosity. At least this time I'm not doing it by myself.

Tonight Kari and I are menu planning and grocery shopping and having our last non whole30 friendly meal. Hot dogs on the grill and Rita's for dessert.

I'll blog about it here and blow up instagram with obnoxious hashtags about my weird sauce food. At least facebook will be safe.

Just don't offer me a snickers. I don't think I have that much self control.