Happy Goings On

Many people have taken it upon themselves to be more thankful this month and to think about what they are thankful for since Thanksgiving is coming up. I have seen people post gratitude in their blogs, on facebook, and give challenges to other to be more thankful. I love this! I think we should do this more often. Gratitude is the best! So, THANK you, to all of you who have expressed gratitude in the last little while. It has been inspiring. I am thinking about doing a post each month, a bullet point type post to list some things I'm really grateful for that month. I think I write more about being thankful this month though, because it is the month of Thanks!

I have also realized that I haven't really written an update in a while, I've just been posting Harry Potter videos and pictures, so it's definately time for a bullet point post. It's going to be a happy/thankful bullet point list.

These are things I am happy and thankful about as of late:

• It is fall!!! I have always really liked fall, but summer usually wins me over as my favorite season. I actually used to list summer AND winter (gasp!) as my favorite seasons! But, this year fall wins the gold. I have been thoroughly enjoying the beautiful leaves and cooler weather. It is perfect! I officially declare fall as my new favorite season.
• I have been loving the leaves so much that I've been taking some pictures of them (especially the brilliant red ones, my personal favorite) and have re-discovered my liking for taking beautiful pictures. I will have to post some of them someday, but my computer isn't very happy lately, so I'm trying to keep from loading things onto it.
• Speaking of pictures....I SOLD a picture I took! It was one I took last weekend of the beautiful sunset that Friday night. It was only for $20.00, but it was totally unexpected. A guy from work had seen it on facebook and he asked if he could buy it from me and use it. He takes pictures of temples and puts them in front of really gorgeous backgrounds and uses them for gifts and stuff. I was very flattered, I never thought I'd sell a picture I took!
• Jayson and I have officially purchased tickets to Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1. We won't be going to the midnight showing though. I am sad about this because I love the enthusiastic crowd and the fun that goes with them, but I am also not sad because I'm really not a big fan of staying up that late any more. I have no idea how I used to do that so often back in my single days! Anyway, we were going to go even though we don't like to stay up so late, but Jayson has been driving for work a lot lately and there's a 90% chance he'll be driving the day the movie comes out, so we figured 4 hours of sleep max+ drivng for eight hours= bad life choice. So, we are seeing it on the 19th after work, and we are stoked!
• Yesterday I bought a pineapple. I love fresh pineapple, maybe more than any other food(except pizza, obviously).
• Speaking of delicious food, today I made a peanut butter pie! It's ingredients include sugar, peanut butter, cream cheese, fudge, and whipped topping....so it's bound to be delicious! We haven't tried it yet though...but I'm super excited.
• Weekends. Oh how we live for and love the weekends. I truly forgot how perfectly wonderful weekends can be. When I was in school weekends were sort of non existant, especially what we think of as "Saturdays". I think I did more homework saturdays than during the week, so weekends really lost their thrill for me. Now that it is back and the business of summer is over I am in heaven on the weekends. Sometimes we do something fun, sometimes we go somewhere, and sometimes we clean, and sometimes we relax. I LOVE weekends.
• On Thursday I was invited to speak at a Young Women's leadership meeting for the stake near the Jordan River temple. One of the ladies in the stake young women's presidency is good friends with Jayson's mom and his mom told her about me. She wanted to inspire the other leaders and help them know what they can do for the girls they teach. My young women leaders were HUGE influences in my life, so she wanted me to share some stories about how they made such a big difference. I was listed in the program as a "guest speaker". HA! I never really thought I'd be asked to be a guest speaker. I am really grateful for the opportunity though and I hope it was inspiring for those women.
• Teaching Primary. I think those kids teach me more than I teach them. There are just things that little children can teach us that we could never learn from adults. Since I didn't go to primary much as a child I've really enjoyed seeing what it's like and learning the basics again.
• Teaching the Young Men. Jayson has thoroughly enjoyed being a Priest advisor. It has been challenging for him to get 16-18 year olds to pay attention to lessons, but he has loved teaching them and getting to know them. I don't know if he sees it, but I can tell he's making a huge difference in their lives and being a great role model.
• Family. Pretty much everyone in my family is born in the fall or the winter, plus the holidays are coming up! That means TONS of time with family for us. WE LOVE IT. I don't think we could adequately express to you how much we love spending time with our family. Why? Because everyone in our family rocks, of course.
• Friends. I have been especially fond of my friends as of late. I don't know what I'd ever do without them. I know every says it, but I seriously have the best friends in the world.
• People. I just love people. I love getting to know people, talking to people, watching people...you get the picture. I think that the most enriching part of life are the people in it. We've been thinking a lot about the people in our ward lately (if you wonder why..please refer to the last bullet point) and how much we just adore them. We are seriously in a magnificent ward and we're going to miss our neighbors somethin' fierce.
• Babies. There are babies all around our life lately, and more on the way! Jayson's cousing just had a baby and he has two cousins that are pregnant, PLUS our sister in law, Alona (Jayson's brother's wife) is expecting! Yay for a new neice or nephew...we love those!
• And...drum roll please....We have started house hunting!! Yup! That's right, for those of you who don't already know, we are buying a house! We went looking for the first time on Friday. Crazy, huh?! It's seriously so surreal. If you would have told me two years ago when Jayson and I got married that we'd be looking for a house at this point I would have given you a funny look and laughed at how ridiculous you sounded. But, here we are! We have been incredibly blessed.