I remember at 16

16 November 2011, 5:56 pm by Giggles
Categories: Family, Gospel, Relationships, Remembers

The summer I turned 16 we went to the east coast – Baltimore and the harbor, New Jersey, Washington D.C., Philadelphia, Hershey 😀 , Gettysburg. I got to stand in the Atlantic Ocean. We sang the songs from 1776 on a tour of Independence Hall and walked the fields of Gettysburg.

We spent morning till night for a week doing everything possible in D.C. and still needing a few more weeks to see everything we wanted to see. We stayed at a bed and breakfast row house and we’d eat breakfast in the morning and maybe we’d remember to eat something for lunch, but not always. And then we’d come home at ten or eleven at night and think we should probably get something for dinner. I tried the same tactic at Disneyland with Brett last year and he wasn’t too thrilled with the idea.

In March of my 16th year I took a trip that would affect my life in so many ways even still today. With the young women from my ward we drove the three hours (it’s really a four hour trip but everyone says three) to the Mormon colonies in Mexico.

I saw the beautiful valley of Colonia Juárez and didn’t realize at the time how often I would be back there. I went back on my 21st birthday to attend the new temple that was built on the hill above the high school. I went back after my mission and did my student teaching. I went back a few years later to chaperone and witness my best friend’s wedding in that temple. That is a very special valley for me.

We explored the area and learned about the history there. But the main purpose of our trip was to get together with the young women from one of the wards there and throw a party for a group of disabled children. We played with them at a park and broke a piñata and ate cake. I spent the day with a little boy wearing a red sweat suit and one of the young women from Mexico. In the group photo that’s her with the left arrow and me with the right arrow.

Less than a year later BYU randomly put her and me together in the same Heritage apartment as roommates. We didn’t make the connection until around Christmas though. It was her wedding I went to in that valley. And she was at mine in a whole different valley.

10 Shared thoughts

I remember at 14 and 15

15 November 2011, 5:33 pm by Giggles
Categories: Gospel, Remembers

I remember going on the fourth year hike at Young Women’s camp when I was 14. It was a two day hike, carry everything on your back hike. It rained at one point during the first day. But the hike was gorgeous and a lot of fun. And it really felt like an accomplishment when we finished. One of the men who was on the hike with us to help us out usually went out with boy scouts. He said it was a completely different experience hiking with us because we stopped to help each other and when we stopped for the night we all immediately set up our tents without anyone telling us to. Apparently boy scouts wait until the last possible moment when they’re dead tired and it’s pitch black to set up their tents.

I remember being a youth camp leader at 15. We went up a day early and got to go on an extra long horse back ride (normal was about an hour or so, this was all afternoon). I’m prone to nose bleeds (have been my whole life) and got one while we were out. It wasn’t bad. They pulled out some toilet paper, we stuffed it up my nostril, and I kept going. The guy in charge of the horses said I looked like a poster person for horseback riding. I walked bow-legged for the rest of the day.

That year the stake also let the young women submit designs for the camp shirt. The theme was “Put a Song in Your Heart.” I have no idea how many designs actually got submitted or if mine was the only one, but they picked mine. It’s real cool to have your design on a shirt like that.

3 Shared thoughts

I remember joy

14 November 2011, 1:00 pm by Giggles
Categories: Family, Happy Things, Relationships, Remembers

We pause in our schedule because today is special.

I remember feeling like all my dreams had come true in one moment, including all those I’d never dared to dream. I remember being surrounded by love. I remember complete calm, pure excitement, radiant peace. I remember joy.

And I remember all those things because I still feel them, two years later.

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I remember at 13

13 November 2011, 6:48 pm by Giggles
Categories: Family, Remembers

I remember the summer I turned 13 that all three of us went to Hummingbird Music Camp and left our parents at home. When we left them the family had one dog, Rusty. My sister had got him for her birthday the year before. He was a toy poodle (which really confused me when we were looking for one because I thought she wanted a real dog and they were saying we were getting a toy). Hummingbird Music Camp is where I learned all the silly camp songs I know.

At the end of the week our parents came to pick us up. I was in the band shell getting ready to perform when I first saw them and people kept passing between them and me. But I was real confused. Because if people were on one side of my parents then our dog was on the ground on a leash. If people were on the other side suddenly our dog was in my mom’s purse. That was one quick doggy.

When we finally met up with our parents it turned out that while they’d been home alone they’d gone out and got another dog. So I’d really been seeing two dogs. They’d been waiting till we met the dog to name him but Dad had been calling him Fred in the mean time. We decided that was a great name for him. Fred was the runt of his litter and used to being pushed out from the food by his siblings. So when he could get food, he did. And as soon as we sat down for lunch he took the hamburger patty right out of my brother’s hamburger.

I’d gotten two parakeets for Christmas the year before (having read every book on them in the library to prove I knew how to take care of them). When we moved to El Paso that fall their cage was in a huge box in the van with no way for them to see out the windows. Yet every time we went under an overpass they both ducked.

Our first winter in El Paso it snowed enough that we were able to make an entire snow family in our back yard – all five people, both dogs, and both birds. We thought it was funny walking around the neighborhood and seeing everyone’s attempts at a snowman. It was obvious that most people had little to no experience with the task.

2 Shared thoughts

I remember at 12

12 November 2011, 8:17 pm by Giggles
Categories: Education, Exercise, Family, Musings, Remembers

I remember trying out for every single sport my first year of junior high (which would include all of basketball and volleyball, but at 12 it was a lot) and getting cut from everything. But I wasn’t cut from track. In fact, I was good at track. I ran the 800, the 1600, and anchor for the 1600 medley relay. The track at our school was dirt and that actually gave us an advantage when we ran on real tracks. The coach would have us run the 800 against the 800 relay team for practice. It was fun to wear the same uniform as the team and go on the bus to away meets. It was New Mexico, so most of the meets, even though the track wasn’t dirt (our home meets were at the high school), everything around it was. And it can get real windy.

My mom’s going to make a comment either about the wind or about how the fact that she drove the mountain roads to come to my meet in Los Alamos shows how much she loves me, or both. Those Los Alamos girls had super skinny legs.

That year in band another student and I went back and forth challenging each other for first chair flute. The band director put a time limit on how frequently we could do it. And finally in the second half of the year said enough was enough and that the winner of this last challenge would be first chair for the rest of the year. I won it.

We read The Hobbit that year and I really don’t see the appeal, but for my project related to the book we made a Gollum.

I made a model adobe house for social studies. It was supposed to be in groups, but the other two members wanted to meet at the library to basically make a box with sugar cubes, and that’s just not my style. So my mom and I used plaster of Paris on a cardboard box to imitate adobe and then used miniature furniture, rugs, and trees to decorate it. It looked awesome. And my other two group members got the A too. I still remember that when I’m making group assignments.

We also had to do a family tree for that class. And I never do anything normal. So I made a mixed media (fabric, pipe-cleaners, and matting board) peacock with each layer of feathers another generation. I even had photos of everyone on the peacock.

We went to Disneyland the first time that year. The first and last ride of our trip was the submarine. My sister was so tired one night as we were leaving that she fell asleep and my dad had to throw her over his shoulder and carry her out like a sack of potatoes. I went to the ocean for the first time on that trip.

I got contacts that year. I didn’t get glasses till high school though. I got them shortly before our trip to the Wool Festival in New Mexico. The wool and yarn and sheep were a lot of fun. But I realized that from that moment on I was going to need to wear sunglasses when I was outside or my eyes weren’t going to be too happy.

And I remember a girl who hated me. She spent that school year spreading rumors about me and trying to make my life miserable. However by the end of the year she had no friends and my life was still pretty good. So when I faced almost the exact same situation two years ago, I actually felt sorry for the person this time around because I knew how it would end for them and it wouldn’t be what they were thinking.

1 Shared thought

I remember at 11

11 November 2011, 9:53 am by Giggles
Categories: Education, Remembers

I remember my sixth grade year was probably my favorite year in elementary school. I had an amazing teacher (that I hadn’t really liked when I had her for math two years previously). I decided I wanted to be an author and really enjoyed a lot of the writing projects we did. The art projects were always interesting and several still hang from my parents’ Christmas tree. I fell in love with history that year as we studied world history. They did a Medieval fair that year. I dressed as a jester and learned how to juggle (kind of, but not really) and memorized a poem/riddle (that’s more of a riddle if you are hearing it and not reading it).

Twelve pairs hanging high.
Twelve knights riding by.
Each knight took a pear,
And yet left a dozen there.

I was still doing math with my mom. We did a math magic show that year where all of our tricks involved math. I was a breakfast table for Halloween. And two boys had a jalapeño eating contest at the Valentine’s Day party. One boy was clearly more prepared for the impromptu contest than the other. The school took the fifth graders skiing a few Fridays. That’s the only time I’ve been skiing. I could do the bunny hills real well. I danced with Michael Rains at the 6th grade Sock Hop. I was awesome at dodge ball.

We did the 25 days of Christmas for two families, starting with 25 pounds of flour. We had to get creative at dropping things off because they started expecting us. One family found out who we were, but they never said anything. Instead they had the missionaries stop by our house Christmas night and said that Santa had made a mistake and left them some knitted slippers that were meant for us. I remember Mom taking us out of school at lunch sometimes to drop things off just to mix up when we were there and bundling up in my parents old skiing goggles, scarves, and hats to try to disguise who we were.

2 Shared thoughts

I remember at 10

10 November 2011, 8:20 pm by Giggles
Categories: Education, Exercise, Remembers

I remember not particularly enjoying my fifth grade teacher when I was ten. Mr. Smith taught me a lot about how to not be a teacher. I still use him as an example when I’m teaching future teachers now. He was from Canada and taught us Canadian history instead of American history, which was a twist. He also brought his RV camper to school and parked it outside our portable and used electricity or something from it to separate the hydrogen and oxygen in water (I can’t remember why it required his camper, but apparently it did).

He had us run a lot. According to my journal we ran every Tuesday and Thursday for P.E. At that time I imagined myself a future Olympic athlete winning a gold medal. And because running is a summer Olympic sport, I always won on my birthday. I imagined the announcer and the crowd. But even then I knew I didn’t want to dedicate my life to the training that would require. My feet grew from either a 3 to a 5 or a 3 to an 8 that year, and my toes weren’t poking out of the end of my shoes. I know there’s a 3 and a 5 in there somewhere. We found that out when we went to buy me new running shoes.

My other teacher was my mom. That year, because I was “two years ahead” in math I would’ve had to go to the junior high for math. Instead my mom taught myself and two other boys math. We did some space math, using knowledge of space and the space shuttle to formulate math problems. Negative numbers finally made sense for me that year.

The summer after fifth grade was the first time I went to Shuttle Camp. That was a blast.

Marbles were really popular at the school that year. We did a not-bake-sale to raise money by selling draw-string bags to put marbles in.

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