First week of school

As some of you may know, and many of you may not know, I have started going to school again. I have decided I'd like to get my bachelors degree, and with Jon's benefits, I can go without paying for tuition. I was a little nervous about what it would be like, since it's been five years since I graduated with my AAS degree. It's been a pretty good week. I don't think it will be too difficult, but I haven't started my Psych Stats class yet either. As Jon put it, I have my "secret weapon" to get me through the class. I don't know that I would be all that anxious to take the class if I didn't have Jon to help me through. It's been even longer than five years since I took my last math class. Well, wish me luck!

My flowers

Pretty roses

The flaux I thought would die.

Aren't they beautfiul?

After I trimmed the rose bush.

Before I trimmed it.

Can you believe how long that is?

Now that we have our own house, its been fun planting plants and flowers around the house. I planted 3 rose bushes and they have been doing so well. We also transplanted some flaux from our friends and I was sure they wouldn't make it. They were pulling through before we went to Utah, but what a surprise when we got back, to see them in full bloom, covered with purple flowers. I had to take pictures to show my green thumb. Thanks to Shannon for keeping my plants and flowers watered while we were gone, otherwise they probably would have died. Maybe next year I'll try planting a vegetable garden. One of my rose bushes had a new growth that just kept on growing and by the time we got home, it was a little too long. I cut it after I took the picture, but I had to show how well it was growing. Miracle Grow is great stuff. Thanks for the suggestion Dad!

YW Campout

The YW near the waterfall.

Jon standing on the "hiking" path.

Not much of a hike.

Another view of the "hiking" path.

The four young women we "hiked" with.

Friday night, Jon and I got the opportunity to campout with some of the young women in our ward. The girls needed to do some certification and for an overnighter two priesthood holders are needed, so Jon was asked to go and I got to come along. Unfortunately a lot of the girls weren't able to be there, but we had fun with the few that were. We had a yummy dinner, roasted marshmallows for S'mores and played games. I wasn't quite sure what camping in Minnesota would be like, I'm used to camping in the mountains where its quite a bit cooler than in the valley. It was very pleasant at night, but it was a little cold the next morning. After breakfast we drove to the water fall and then we went on a 3 mile "hike". In comparison to the hike we went on in Utah, you can see the pictures on a previous post, this was a nice prairie walk. It was a good walk though. The older I get the more I find things that I don't like about camping. Don't get me wrong, I still enjoy it, but the bugs are the number one thing I hate about camping, and there are lots of bugs in Minnesota. All in all we had a good time.

Our prayers are with you

Nathan Belcher

Madalyn Fletcher

While we were in Utah, we received some sad news. First, my cousin Trishelle's little girl was diagnosed with brain cancer just a few days after we got to Utah. We found out the night we got to Utah, that Madalyn was going in for surgery the next day at Primary Childrens hospital. The surgery went well and the surgeon was very hopeful that the tumor was non cancerous. Unfortunately, the report wasn't so positive, she has a rare form of brain cancer. The doctors were hopeful that she would go home after a week to two weeks. It has now been three weeks and Madalyn is still in the hospital. We continue praying each day that she will improve and get better, so she can start chemotherapy treatments. We love you Trish and Terrell and pray that Madalyn will be healed.

I also found out that my good friend Julie, lost her husband to cancer. Nathan was diagnosed in February with stage 4 melanoma cancer and has been fighting it ever since. We were hoping to see Nathan and Julie while we were in Utah, but it just wasn't possible. He passed away on Wed. August 6th. I was saddened by the fact, that I wasn't aware that he had passed away, until after the funeral had occured. I wanted to be there to give Julie my love and support and to tell her how much I care about her. She has two little boys McKay is 2 and Aidan is 5 months old. I pray for her each day that she will have the strength to make it through this difficult time and also, so she can be a strength and support to her sweet boys. I didn't know Nathan well, but the few times I was privileged to meet him, he was so kind. Julie I love you and think about you every day. Our prayers are with you.


I just don't understand why things like this have to happen. I can say that my testimony has been strengthened through knowing that our lives are in the Lord's hands. He truly has a plan for each and every one of us. We may not always understand or agree with His plan, but He truly knows whats best for each of us. I have learned that through not being able to have kids. I don't know why it was Nathan's time to leave this earth, but I know it was the Lord's will. I also know that if it's His will, Madalyn can be healed and one day we can have a baby. In comparison, our trial of not having kids seems minute. I am so grateful for the gospel in my life. It gives me the hope I need to continue on in life and to get through the tough times. I do know that our Savior atoned for each and everyone of us and that He suffered for our pains and afflictions then and He suffers with us now. Trish and Julie, I know the Savior is aware of you and the pain and suffering you are feeling at this time. He feels your pain and suffers with you. I know if we look to our Savior, He will heal our wounds. He loves us and wants us to be happy, but sometimes we have to suffer before we can truly have joy.

Family & Friends

Camille, Macy and Kate
Jon with Macy and Kate. Kate had to sit on Jon's lap.
Mom at her birthday celebration.
Nicole and Scott

When we go to Utah, we stay at my parent's house, so we usually get a lot more time with my family. When we went to Logan, we also got to spend some time with my cousin Camille and her two girls, Macy and Kate. They were so cute, especially Kate. It took her a little while to warm up to us, but once she did, she was Jon's little friend. She even had to sit by him during dinner. It was so fun to see them. They used to live in Las Vegas so we rarely got to see one another. As I said, we spent a lot of time with my family. We had family pictures taken, much to everyone's shagrin. We spent a day at Lagoon, we celebrated mom's birthday, which isn't until the 28th, we watched a lot of the olympics, and we spent a lot of time hanging out and visiting. It was so fun for me to spend so much time with my family. I miss them so much when we are away. I hope someday we will be able to move closer. We did a lot of our visiting others and traveling the first week or so we were in Utah, because Nick, Nicole and Scott were still in school taking night classes. I think Nick and Scott were very grateful Jon was around, because he was able to help each of them study for their Math final. We got to see some of our good friends while we were in Utah also. Our friends, Scott and Melissa were in Utah visiting their family, so we spent an afternoon visiting them and playing games. We also got to see the McMillan's, friends of our who moved from Mankato back to Utah. We miss them a lot and wish they were still here in Mankato. We had a great trip. We were busy most of the time running here and there visiting family and friends and it was worth it. We love you all and enjoyed seeing you!

The hike

Jon & Heather

What a beautiful waterfall!

It was worth all the hard work getting there.

Jon's sister Heather invited us to go on a hike up Bell Canyon. She told us it was a mediocre hike. Boy was she wrong! I guess if you are as in as good a shape as she is, it's not too bad. We aren't in the greatest shape and we certainly aren't used to hiking anymore. We don't have mountains in Mankato. We do easier things like walking on trails or biking on trails, we have small hills, but that's it. Needless to say, we weren't the best hikers. We made it to the beautiful waterfall, but that was after many, many stops along the way. The hike had quite an incline, but it was well worth it. Once we finished, we were starving and sweating. We went to Cafe Rio for lunch and then we went swimming at the pool at my sister's condo. Thanks Nicole for letting us cool off in the pool.

Grandparents

Grandma & Grandpa Stuart with Nick, Nicole and me.
Grandma Reed at Nicole's wedding last year.

Adriana, Me and Dawn are with her.

Abuelita at Nicole's wedding last year.
Grandma Tolman all dressed up for a skit. I'm sure she'd love this picture!

One of the greatest things we got to do, was visit all of our grandparents. Not all of them are in Utah, and they don't all live in the same town either, so we got to travel a little to see each of them. Between Jon and I, we have five sets of grandparents. Jon's grandma Tolman is the only one of his grandparents still living. All three of my grandmothers are alive, but Grandpa Stuart is the only grandpa I have still living. Since we don't get to see them very often, we thought we would make the effort to see each of them this trip. We had such a great time visiting them. We first drove to Pocatello to spend a day with Grandma Tolman, then the following week we drove to Logan to see Grandma Reed and Abuelita (my mom's mom). The day after we got back from Logan, Grandma and Grandpa Stuart came over for dinner and spent the evening with us. We love you all very much! It was so fun to see you.

Harper family

Ashley tuckered out from chasing dragonflies.
Kenzie pretending to play the Wii.

Dustin, my little buddy!
Junior trying to read the paper.
Aidan looking so innocent.
Austin cute as can be.
The two trouble makers, Braden and Asa.

We spent a full weekend with Jon's family. It was a lot of fun, and we got to bounce from house to house spending the night at two of his brother's homes and his sister Jenn's house. We, I say we, but mostly the boys had a great time playing the Wii that Amber requested we bring. We ate, played games until way too late and enjoyed being together. Thanks everyone for letting us stay with you. We had a fun time seeing everyone, especially all of the kids. We love seeing our nieces and nephews, because we don't get the chance to see them very often. They sure love playing with their uncle Jon, especially when he has fun video games to play.

Girls craft day

Look at all the fun!
All of the girls, minus Amber who is taking the picture.
The finished products. My tin pail and the cute card Amy made.

My sweet sister-in-law Amber organized a craft day just for the girls. All of the guys got to spend the day with the kids. We had such a great time, knitting, scrapbooking, making cards, decorating pails and of course eating. We had wonderful food and great company. I think some would have liked to accomplish more than they did, but we still had a great time. I decorated a tin pail and I got to take home a cute card that Jon's cousin Amy made for me. I also spent some of the time teaching my sister-in-law Heather how to knit. How is your hat coming along? Thanks Amber for organizing such a fun afternoon. We'll have to do it again another time when we are in Utah. Seeing all of the cute scrapbooks that my sisters-in-law have done, really got me wanting to start scrapbooking too, so I bought an album and I'm going to start with our wedding pictures. We'll see how it turns out.

Family Dinner

Tio Israel and Aunt Sherri
Madi and Ethan, what a cute little guy!
Me holding Addison. Don't I look happy?
Taylee and Leah, having the time of their lives.
Can you tell they are sisters?

The first Sunday we were in Utah, my parents invited some of my aunts, uncles and cousins over for Sunday dinner, so we could have the chance to see all of them. When you have a lot of family who all live close to one another, it makes it tricky to see everyone. We did plenty of running around anyway, but it is nice when a lot of us can get together, it lessens the amount of traveling and running around we have to do. I got to see my cousin Natalie's little girl for the first time. Her babies name is Addison, and she is such a cutie. Madi and Ethan came too, and Ethan is such a cute little guy, and I mean little; he doesn't weigh very much, but he is sure smart for his age. Aunt Jer and Janelle came too, along with the Pitts and it was wonderful to see them. We got to spend a little more time with Aunt Sherri, Tio Israel and with my cousin Jonathan and his wife Jana and their two girls, Taylee and Leah. We had such a fun time with them. My brother Nick and brother-in-law Scott built push carts and they thought it would be fun to take the girls for a ride around the yard. It was quite entertaining, and the girls had a blast. What a wonderful way to spend the first day in Utah.

We're back!

We arrived safely from our fun filled trip to Utah. We had such a great time with our families and friends. We did lots of fun things, which made it so I didn't have much time to update my blog, so please forgive me for all of the new posts at once. I need to get caught up.

New lawn mower

Jon wanted to mow our lawn one last time before we left for Utah, and when he went to start the lawn mower, it wouldn't start. We went to Lowe's that night to buy a new mower. We found a beautiful new red lawn mower. We realized when we tried to get it home, that we need a bigger car. I was squished in the back seat with the tiny fridge we bought while the lawn mower box was in the front seat where I should have been. It was quite the trip home. Luckily we don't live too far from Lowe's. Jon really liked mowing with his new mower. I really like it too, because as you can see it has a bag, so we won't have all the lawn clippings left on the lawn to dry. I just think it makes a much cleaner cut and the lawn looks much better when he's done.