Number 20

This wasn't on my original list but I guess needed to happen so I will replace it as #20 because there is no way I am going to catch up on scrapbooking.  As I am getting older I felt I needed to make sure all my parts were healthy.  So in the last month I have had everything checked....I mean everything.  I won't go into detail but it isn't something I plan on doing again soon.  I had blood work done and shots and then all that other stuff.  Today I finished up with a mammogram so if all goes well with that I am healthy.  I was hoping for some weird stuff to happen with my blood work to explain a couple things but all I was told was to cut down on the french fries and eat more fish and nuts.  Probably didn't mean the fish and chips kind.  I was happy because there is a strong presence of diabetes in my family and there was no sign of that either.  So even though it wasn't fun and I hated every minute of it all I did it and can have some peace that I am healthy.  

# 40 Finish My Current Journal

Even though it is #40 it isn't the last one I need to do, but I am getting really close to finishing.  I started this journal January of 2002, so had I finished it on my birthday last year it would be exactly 10 years old.  Honestly I am not a big journal writing person.  I used to be but I don't feel like there is much variation in my daily life so it isn't that interesting to write or read.   When I got this one for Christmas I wanted one without lines so I could be more creative with it.  So I would tape ticket stubs in and the odd drawing or whatever.  It makes it a thousand times more interesting for me to look at and remember than just writing.  Here are some examples of pages.  The first is when I got behind on ticket stubs so I stuck them in and tried to explain what they were and with who.  The second is some of the pictures I did when I dabbled in watercolors.  I got really good at pine trees.  I didn't have anywhere to put them so I just stuck them in the journal.  It is fun to go back and look at these kind of things because it brings back more memories than words. 

#16

This one I have needed to do for 5 years.  My brother Fletcher fell from a constructions site almost 6 years ago.  He is fine and recovered however it was a really hard thing to go through as a family.  It is impossible to describe seeing your baby brother laying there not knowing if he will make it or not.  As a big sister I was supposed to protect him and wasn't able to or even help once it happened.  So #16 is that I wrote up that incident and what my perceptions of it were.  It was hard to write and relive.  It ended up being 6 pages long single spaced.  I will file it away for maybe his kids to read when I am gone.  During Fletcher's accident I came to really know that I love my family.  I came to know our capacity to work together for a common goal and support one another.  I came to know the deep love my parents have for Fletcher and then all of us.  The hardest was to see them go through those events.  In the very beginning when Fletcher fell, I prayed in the back room of my classroom and was let know that he would be alright so during the experience I could focus on caring for my parents as they cared for him.  It is an experience that I base my faith on.  It happens to be Fletcher's birthday today too so even though I didn't plan it, it is a good day to post it.  

#17 Grow a Garden

 Since I have lived in this house 4+ years I have grown tomatoes in a little patch under the kitchen window.  One year I grew peppers that were so hot you couldn't even eat them.  However I have always wanted to grow a garden.  Two years ago I cleared a little patch of land and plant various seeds and nothing grew.  Could be I didn't really water it and I didn't read the directions on the package and put tons of seeds in.  So this summer I was determined to grow something besides tomatoes.  So instead of just throwing seeds into the earth and expected them to grow early in the Spring I planned my garden and read each package of seeds carefully and took notes in a little notebook.  Then tilled the ground and planted.  It worked.  I have squash, onions, radishes, and cucumbers.  The peas didn't really grow or the beets but next year I will try to figure those out.  Not to be cheesy but it really a miracle.  You put a little seed into the ground and cultivate (care for) it and then you have food.  It is amazing.  The first meal I really used stuff was really like a wonder.  We had gone fishing so we ate the fish we caught and the vegetables from the garden.  The only thing we didn't provide for ourselves was the rice.  Included in this years harvest was my lavender.  As with the garden I have planted lavender I bet 4 times, one each year and nothing happens.  Last year I planted two bushes and really cultivated them with water and shade when needed and then year they blossomed.  I clipped the buds and dried them and then removed the flower from the stalk and put the flowers in a little satchel.  From two pants I got 2.5 satchel which I gave to my mom.  So #17 very fulfilling in growing a garden.   

Number 31

This is really random but I have been embarrassed about something I couldn't do for a long time, backing up a vehicle with a trailer hooked onto it.  As a Roberts and a Wyoming raised girl it is an embarrassment.  I have tried numerous times growing up and then a couple times in the last couple of times with my dad's boat but I always jackknife the truck and trailer and then get so dang frustrated and mad that I give up and wouldn't try again.  A couple of years ago....the best backer upper in the Bryce Roberts family....my cousin Shauna gave some good advise.  She said "it sounds really weird and it doesn't make sense as I am saying it but you follow the trailer".  So the other day as I was helping my dad and the opportunity arose for me to try again in a calm circumstance without pressure.  My dad needed the snowmobiles out of the shop and backed in the shed.  So we hooked them up and I drove forward pulling them out of the shop and then I reversed it and started backing up.  I kept saying the mantra in my head "follow the trailer, follow the trailer".  To my astonishment it worked.  Dad was there to guide me into the shed and I backed them in 'good' the first time, but then he needed it 'perfect' so he had equal space all around to walk around the trailer so then he made me pull out, back in, pull out, back in.....like a billions times.  Well if you aren't going very far it is hard to follow the trailer so I lost my confidence but didn't give up like usual.  Eventually he was happy with where they were, which I think was pretty close to where I had them the first time.  We unhooked the trailer and manually moved it over a couple of inches to where it was satisfactory for Dad.  So I did it.  I think the next time I will be able to successfully back up a trailer without jackknifing it.  Kinda a stupid goal to put but it is something that I have struggled with my whole life and was able to accomplish.  Now I can be proud to be a Roberts because I have the skill.  My dad said that my aunts, his sisters, always had to back up the trailer because their 'city' husbands never could.  Just another thing to put on a resume. Check off Number 31!

#33 Write Letters

Number 33 has been a hard one.  I am emotionally exhausted.  I wanted to write to 3 people who have influenced me in my life.  I have finished the letters and will send them on Monday.  Excluding family members the three names that I came up with were Phyllis 'Cleo' Griffiths.  I have thought about my relationship with her and what category it fits in.  She is equal parts friend, mentor, and second mother.  We talked, cry, and laugh.  She gets me and I get her.  Some of my favorite memories are stream testing with her in Logan, when I helped her sign up (just like 2 years ago) for a library card (hers was from the 60's I swear) and then to show her how to the ATM to get money out after she retired she needed access to cash sometimes.  With the ATM we felt like we were robbing the bank, it was hilarious.  The second letter was Veldon Izatt 'VI' who has known me all my life.  My first memory was he was the bishop when I got baptized.  Then he was one of my high school teachers, but taught me I think 4 classes of various subjects.  He influenced a lot of kids with his friendly teasing manner.  He also is from the community where I grew up Freedom Wyoming and I love to see him when I visit my parents and spar back and forth.  The last was Carroll Wood.  He is a man even though he has a girl's name.  He passed away a couple of years ago so I wrote to his wife in DC.  He was just so kind and fun as I worked in Senator Simpsons office.  He made me feel at home in the office and then invited me several times to be with his family as well.  We were soul mates that transcend age, race, or religion.  So through tears of remembering and expressing how these three have influenced me, #33 might have been the hardest of all these to finish.  Check Check!

#32 Have a Liv day!

I try to do stuff with my nieces and nephews in groups but then individually as well.  My niece Liv and I haven't ever done something with just the two of us, so I thought it would be fun to have a Liv day.  Liv is 4 and was all for it.  Liv doesn't talk much in big settings like when all the Roberts' are together.  She is one of the younger ones and sometime the noise and chaos can overpower the best of us.  She is a giggler though.  She loves to hug and sit on your lap and let you comb her hair.  She loves to be involved with what is going on.  She is a sweet girl. 

I picked her up at her house during a February snow storm.  I was planning on driving back to Salt Lake and us walking through the Gateway and going to Build-A-Bear, but Liv is a girlie girl and when I gave her the option of Build-A-Bear or getting her nails painted, she choose the nails.  It was better because it was close by and we didn't have to drive in the storm.  So we went in and she choose two different pinks for every other finger and I choose dark purple.  The guy painted hers first and then painted a flower on.  He asked her which finger and she said her pointer finger but he tried to persuade her to do the fourth finger and she knew what she wanted with the pointer, so it was the pointer.  Then we put our hands under the light to dry.  Check....fingernails painted. 

 Then she chose to go to lunch at McDonalds.  I am not sure why kids love McDonalds so much, but it was her choice so we went.  She ordered chicken nuggets and we ate in the playland.  I had just injured my knee the week before so it was actually nice to put my foot up while she played.  She didn't talk to any of the kids but her and another little girl kinda followed each other around.  She would scream my name when she was in the playland for me to see her.  When we left we got ice cream and headed to our next adventure.  After lunch we went to Barnes and Noble to find a book.  She choose a My Little Pony story with little plastic ponies.  Then we went to buy the boys a treat so they wouldn't feel left out.  I left her choose the treats and we went through each brother and she pointed something out.  She was pointing right in front of her and just in a row so I asked her if that is what they liked or she was just pointing at stuff and she said it was what they liked.  I doubted but when we got back to her house each brother chose out of the bag the one she had chosen for them.  She knows her brothers.  

What I learned about Liv in our day together that she is a girlie girl through and through (I kinda knew that already).  She is a confident girl.  Even though she is shy and doesn't say much she does know what she wants and is willing to speak up for it when she needs to.  She is smart and kind and beautiful and I am glad we had the day together and hope for many more.