distractions

It's SO easy for me to get distracted while doing my homework assignments. Like right now, for example. I'm sitting in the computer lab at school working on a project that's due tomorrow. The only problem is that I have to search for images online that I like and then work on them in Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop. In my searching, of course I find cool pictures that I like. I also find things that just interest me but have no relevance to my project.

But I just had to take a minute and share this one:

A baby hippopotamus that survived the tsunami waves on the Kenyan coast has formed a strong bond with a giant male century-old tortoise, in an animal facility in the port city of Mombassa, officials said.
The hippopotamus, nicknamed Owen and weighing about 300 kilograms (650 pounds), was swept down Sabaki River into the Indian Ocean, then forced back to shore when tsunami waves struck the Kenyan coast on December 26, 2004 before wildlife rangers rescued him.

"It is incredible. A-less-than-a-year-old hippo has adopted a male tortoise, about a century old, and the tortoise seems to be very happy with being a 'mother'," ecologist Paula Kahumbu, who is in charge of Lafarge Park, told AFP.

"After it was swept and lost its mother, the hippo was traumatized. It had to look for something to be a surrogate mother. Fortunately, it landed on the tortoise and established a strong bond. They swim, eat and sleep together," the ecologist added. "The hippo follows the tortoise exactly the way it follows its mother. If somebody approaches the tortoise, the hippo becomes aggressive, as if protecting its biological mother," Kahumbu added.

"The hippo is a young baby, he was left at a very tender age and by nature, hippos are social animals that like to stay with their mothers for four years," he explained.

This is a real story t hat shows that our differences don't matter much when we need the comfort of another. We could all learn a lesson from these two creatures of God. Look beyond the differences and find a way to walk the path together.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/92011777@N00/228573089/

living and life

I finally moved into the house I'll be in for the next three months. There's two separate addresses, one for the upstairs and one for the downstairs. I live at the downstairs address, even though the mail all comes to the same box. I like it. My room is painted bright turquoise. The bathroom is hardly bigger than one you'd find on an airplane, complete with separate faucets on the sink for hot and cold water, making washing my face at night a challenge (I either get boiling hot water or ice cold water, and it's hard the mix the two). The kitchen is already pretty stocked with dishes the previous renters, which means I'm not unpacking my kitchen stuff until Bob moves into our future apartment and I can just set it all up there.

And I LOVE having a nice old couple as landlords! They're so nice. They let me make up my own contract for living there basically. Since I'm getting married in November, they said, "Well, why don't you just make your contract from Now until then?" I'm so used to companies and set contracts with apartments that I hadn't even thought of that. So now I don't have to stress about the possibility of not selling a contract that I'm stuck in until May or longer. Such a relief, since money will be tight with Bob and me for a while already.

And speaking of money, I started working again! It'll be nice to have a paycheck every other week, even if it's only for $600 or less each month. I can still make it work. I discovered that I really like having a budget. It's nice to see where my money goes. I also really enjoy seeing my savings account building, and seeing money going toward a vacation fund and a snowboarding fund for me to use later. It's a whole lot less stressful than what I used to do (guess at what's left in my account when I want stuff and just hope I have enough money).

School starts on Monday. I'm excited and nervous. I'm taking the freshman courses in my major. Those should be fun. I'm also retaking some classes to try and get my GPA up in case I ever need to transfer schools for any reason (such as not getting accepted into the major again when I have to apply again next august). Communications 101 and College Algebra are the ones I'm most worried about. Beginning Piano should be good, and of course the Creativity classes for Industrial Design should be fun too. 14 credits is about all I can usually handle, so that's all I'm doing. I'm just not good at school, especially when classes I abhor are involved.

Lastly, I got this nasty cold last week. Bob caught it too (and I'm 99% sure he got it from me... go figure...) I didn't have work today, thank goodness. Bob called in sick today. So we've done nothing and it's been so nice. I was a little bummed that I missed out on rock climbing this morning, but there was no way I was going out into the chilly morning to exert energy that I already didn't have. There will likely be other opportunities anyway. So today Bob came over early this morning (as usual) and we ate breakfast. We went back to his house and I ended up falling asleep on his couch and he went in his room and went back to bed. Since then we've just sat around haven't done much.

It's honestly been nice to do nothing since I haven't done that in quite a while. Plus, my body needs the rest. But really, I just hate being sick.

Blog Overdue!

Wow. I need to have written over twenty blogs on all the happenings in my life this summer. And now summer is drawing to a close, and I haven't written a single one since... June? I'd apologize for being a slacker, but that's the reason I haven't written any--because I've been extremely busy. So this will be an extremely LONG blog. Be prepared to come back and read more later if you just can't make it through it all in one sitting. And if you just don't feel like reading it all, I'm not offended.

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Girls Camp back in June was a blast. I love those first year girls and the Youth Leaders so much! I wish the Young Women understood just how amazing they are and just how much they are worth. That's my last year going to YW Camp in TN. :( I'm sad, but my life has to move on forward.

Then EFY happened all summer.

I drove through Arkansas to visit Katie and see her newborn (who probably isn't so newborn any more!) . That was so much fun! I loved catching up with her and just getting to pick up on our friendship where we left off ten years ago.

I made my way to Louisiana (and just for the record, there is no Interstate or highway with a speed limit more than 50 miles an hour from Little Rock to Baton Rouge; it was a LONG drive). I played with my niece and nephew, ate crawfish with Cam, and enjoyed that heavy Louisiana humidity that I haven't missed all these years.

Then I woke up early and drove eight hours to San Antonio, my favorite part of Texas. It was a fun drive, partially because I couldn't wait to visit people and also because I was excited to work at EFY. I arrived and had the new counselor orientation, ate food, met people, and then went and stayed with the Marshes that night. I went to church at the Parkwood ward the next morning, and it was so fun to see so many people I'd missed for eight months. I stuck around for one of the singles wards as well. It was fun to see people recognize me but not know how they knew me. Lots of people would say, "Hi, how are you..?" trying to figure it out. Sometimes I'd be nice and tell them right away, but then again, it was really fun to just go along and see if they could figure it out themselves. But there were several people who remembered me right off. I was surprised to see so many people who came right up to me and said, "Sister Wheeler!! What are you doing here?!" And what was an even sweeter experience was to have a couple of investigators I'd taught approach me and tell me all about their baptisms.

The following wee was EFY, and it was a blast. Those kids are SO much fun, and I loved to be able to see the spiritual growth in each of them during the week. At the beginning of the week, they hardly knew each other, and by the end they were best friends. And what was even better, they all wanted to share the gospel with their friends! One of my girls had been stuck between our church and the catholic church, and by Thursday she'd already been making plans to get baptized as a member of our church by the end of the summer. I loved seeing the Spirit touch these kids in such a way that they knew the principles and doctrines we taught are right and true.

The following week I visited my mission. I'd spent the 4th of July at the Marshes again (and if Sister Marsh had it her way,I'd just move into their house there and live with them for my entire life). The Sunday after I went to New Braunfels Ward and Memorial Ward. It was so fun to see so many people that I love there! I couldn't believe how many remembered me after a year and a half of me not being there. I was especially flattered when the bishops recognized me and wanted to catch up on everything. It feels good to know I made some kind of impact. I stayed with the Petersons some during that week. I went up to Austin and surprised Sister Denison, my one and only trainee of the mission, with breakfast one morning. That was hilarious. She didn't know how to react. "What are you doing here?!" was what I was greeted with. We caught up for a few short minutes, then I let her get back to studying. I picked Bob up from the airport and we visited several other people, especially one of my favorite (I know I shouldn't choose favorites) converts, Nathan. I'm so proud of that kid and I love him to death. We went to the Shoal Creek Ward the following Sunday, where Bishop Taylor asked me to be a speaker in Sacrament Meeting that day. Some things never change.

Unfortunately, I never got to attend the Brushy Creek Ward while I was down there. It's hard when I'm strapped for time and there's only so many Sundays during vacation there.

Next week Bob and I both worked EFY, where we had some wonderful experiences again. Bob's boys would yell fun things to me across campus when they saw me with my girls, so I had my girls do the same for Bob. I think a few of Bob's boys even developed crushes on me. My girls were so good and we all became such good friends, especially since we had such testimony building and spiritually enlightening moments together.

At the end of the week, on Saturday morning, Bob and I drove to Baton Rouge, where I introduced him to the absolutely delectable and delicious food of crawfish. It was so good, and I think now Bob can understand how I feel when I talk about it.

Sunday we drove and drove, out of Louisiana, into Mississippi, and as we got into Tennessee we stopped in Memphis to attend church and take the Sacrament. The only Sacrament Meeting that was going on at the time we were there happened to be the Spanish Branch. That was great. (And P. S., the Sacrament bread Hispanics and Latinos use is often home made, and absolute heaven to put in your mouth.) I had fun translating for Bob.

We made it all the way to my parents house, had dinner, unloaded some of our stuff, and drove on to Bowling Green, Kentucky for yet another session of EFY. This session was by far the best of the three I did. Well, I love each session for different reasons. This one was a little closer to my heart because of a wonderful opportunity I had, which I didn't recognize at first.

Bob and I had wanted to be co-counselors, but it didn't happen. I was pretty bummed about it, and he was too. At check-in on Monday morning, and I overheard some counselors talking about a girl who was attending that didn't speak English. I asked about it and they said they were trying to find a group for this girl from Costa Rica in the hopes that at least the male counselor could speak Spanish. I grinned and said, "I speak Spanish fluently."

As it turns out, I was the only female counselor who spoke Spanish decently. Some switching went on with the girls in my group, and I ended up only having nine instead of ten girls. I was fine with that. The fewer there are, the more personally I can get to know them. Belany, my little Spanish-speaking princess, didn't have a roommate. I didn't either, so she got to move into my room and be my roommate for the week. I think she needed that too. It was so neat to translate for her when she didn't understand what was going on, and then I could talk to her as we were getting ready for bed at night, and I don't know if she would have been able to get to know anyone quite so well with the language barrier. Seth, my co-counselor spoke Spanish too, so he got to help with that as well.

Now Bob had a similar experience, where he was put in a group with a boy who needed him to be his counselor. This kid was introverted and unhappy to be at EFY. He didn't think he had a testimony of the gospel at all, and was only there because his parents made him go. He hid behind the same purple beanie and black and purple striped hoodie everyday.

At the end of the week, we had a meeting with all the counselors, and one of the male counselors mentioned how he'd seen this kid at previous EFYs, been his counselor, and nothing had helped or changed him in any way previously. This counselor was so excited to see that this boy, by the end of the week, was smiling, had made friends with everyone in his group, and even spoke about serving a mission and teach the gospel to others. And it's true! I saw the change in this kid myself! This kid needed Bob to be his counselor, to offer his listening ear, experiences, and testimony.

Miracles happened all week long there. I could go on and on about the youth in my company: one kid who refused to get out of his chair on Tuesday at the dance to dancing at almost every song on Friday night. Or the boy in my group who developed a desire to finally repent for some things that had been weighing him down for years. Or the girl who thought she had no testimony or desire to be at EFY who, by Thursday, wanted to share it with others and keep it strong in her life. Seriously, one beautiful miracle and change after another happened that week.

And then Saturday morning rolled around and we all had to say our heartfelt goodbyes. Bob and I drove back to my parents house and napped all day.

Sunday I went to church with my parents for the last time as a member of their ward. It's bittersweet to leave so many people I love, knowing that I need to move on. Then Sunday evening the missionaries stopped by. After they left Bob and I went for a walk in the woods.
I didn't really think anything of it because it's so normal for us to do stuff like that. We walked along the path through the trees, stopping to notice the beautiful setting sun as it was shone through the trees. We stopped again at the edge of the bluff above the river and talked for a little while about how we were feeling about our relationship and such. We walked a little further to where the trail used to branch off toward Nin's house, but it's all overgrown since her grandkids have all grownup and there's nobody left to run and play in the woods there. I wanted to find a some place to sit so we could just enjoy the gorgeous evening and talk some more until darkness started to fall. We found a large old stump to sit on, and Bob told me about some answers to prayers he'd recently received concerning us. He talked about some fears and hopes among his feelings for me.

It was all really serious, so then Bob finally said, "You know what I like about our relationship?"
"What?" I asked.
"I like than we can play and be silly sometimes. So right now, since I've been so serious, I can do this," and he pulled out this big box--bigger than something a ring belongs in, like a watch box or something. I didn't know what to expect, especially knowing Bob. He proceeded to open it, and in this really goofy voice says, "Janae, will you marry me?" He opens the box and inside is a bicycle bell. He pulls it out and puts it on my left ring finger as a joke, and rings it.
I thought, 'Haha, Bob. A ring...' I laughed, and then I felt a little let down thinking, 'Dang. That's it?'

He let that sink in for a few seconds. And then I noticed the expression on his face change from that ridiculous grin of his to a very sincere smile.
He looked at me and said, "Seriously."
He pulled out another smaller box from his back pocket. I stopped breathing for a few seconds as I realized what was happening.
He slowly knelt down on his right knee, and as he opened the beautiful dark wooden-finished box, he said, "Will you be my wife for this life and for eternity? Through all the hard times, and beautiful times, and the joyful times?" Tears were welling up in his eyes. He was serious this time. I looked down at the ring. It was beautiful. It was exactly what I hoped for, but it didn't really matter what it looked like at all. I would have loved it no matter what he picked out. I realized I was smiling. Then I started to cry as I picked up the box and ring and looked at it. I couldn't talk for a moment, and then I realized Bob was still there on his knee waiting. I finally found my voice enough to respond, and said, "Yes, I will."

Bob pulled the ring gently out of its place in the box, slid it onto my finger, and one of the best embraces I've ever had followed. As I looked around I noticed all the fireflies in the woods giving us a stunning show of lights, and the sky through the trees was every gorgeous shade of orange.

We walked home, smiling and wiping tears of joy from our eyes and faces. We stopped to watch the sunset for several minutes, debating how to tell my parents that we had just become engaged. we finally walked through the side door and into the kitchen. Dad was on the back deck reading a book and Mom was in the living room watching the Food Network on TV. I noticed that she'd made apple donuts, so I asked from the kitchen if they were for us. My mom said yes, so I strategically picked one up with my left hand and as I walked into the living room I took a bite, making my left ring finger very apparent. Mom immediately saw it and said, "Oh, what's that?" in a nonchalantly sarcastic way. I laughed. Bob followed me out there and we rehearsed the whole thing to my mother, after which, she went and had my dad come inside and we told the story one more time. I called each of my brothers (by the way, Bob got permission from all three of my brothers and then my parents to marry me) to tell them the news as well.


The longest drive ever from Tennessee to Utah followed a few days later. Dad and Bob put a trailer hitch on the Camry (Yeah, did you know that was possible?) and there we were: four adults packed inside the Camry, with a cooler in the backseat, the trunk loaded with luggage, and towing a trailer full of my things.

We noticed the engine running hotter than normal, and in the middle of Missouri needle on the gauge shot up all the way into the hot side. We pulled off the interstate and let it cool for a while. Dad fiddled around under the hood, and as soon as the needle was in a better place on the gauge we took off as quickly and carefully as we could for the next exit off the interstate. And then luck hit. We pulled into a gas station, the right behind it there happened to be an auto repair shop. As we waited for our new water pump to be put in, we went to a diner attached to the gas station to escape the heat. We walked in and a waitress asked us if we wanted a booth or a table. We all looked at each other for a moment, and finally just explained that our car had just broken down and we all just really wanted some water. Then my dad had the brilliant idea getting some hot cobbler with ice cream. We all decided to get some after that. It was a nice little place with a good atmosphere, and the four of us wound up laughing and smiling instead of feeling upset and irritated.

In an hour the car was fixed and ready to go. We made it into Nebraska in the wee hours of the morning and stopped at a hotel. Everything was full, except for one particular room at a more pricey hotel. Dad, Mom, and me slept on the king sized be and Bob slept on the floor. We woke up and left by mid-morning the next day. I drove out of Nebraska, and Bob drove us through an absolutely ridiculous hail storm in the middle of Wyoming. but we finally made it to Provo.

I applied and got accepted into my major the following week.
Dad bought me a car one morning and we got it registered and licensed that afternoon, and then I got it insured over the phone (Thank you, Gieco!) and then they emailed me all the information, I printed it out, and was driving it that evening.
Bob and I found a nice place to live in November, and he's moving in there in September.
I found the wedding dress I want.
Bob and I scheduled the sealing room in the San Diego Temple without a problem.
I got my job back from before my mission (my first day back was today!).

Aside from Bob getting his laptop stolen right out of his house night before last, things are really working out so far. I'm excited for school to start. I'm even more excited to get married in November.

Really, life is SO good.

Another allergy to another delicious food...

I became allergic to bananas when I was 14, and then also to pineapple when I was 20. Both are fruits I really love to eat because they're SO delicious. I'm kind of eating bananas again, though I don't eat large portions of them and it's usually cooked in something like banana bread or banana brownies.

So tonight I ate dinner as usual, nothing to concern me about what food we were eating. I went to take care of some cats for this lady that's out of town for the weekend, and on the way I noticed a bump on my left ring finger that started itching. I thought it was a mosquito bite at first, which wouldn't be any surprise to me. Then I also noticed one on my foot and the back of my neck too.

I make my way home and as I'm going about doing things, I start noticing that I'm just itching all over. I reach over to scratch my shoulder and the skin felt kind of odd underneath my shirt. I went into the bathroom pulled my collar over so I could see my shoulder. Here's what it looked like:

Then I pulled my shirt up in the back to see this:

I've never had hives before, ever in my life, but I knew that's what they were immediately. I ran downstairs and my mom ground up some oatmeal for me and found me some nice itch-relief lotions. I took a 20 minute oatmeal bath and then stood there staring at all the little bumps and welts in the mirror, doing all I could not to scratch them. The back of my neck is just on fire and it feel like it's spreading up to the rest of my scalp. I have a nice welt just under my left eyebrow and several on my hands and feet and legs. The bulk of it is on my chest and back though. It's so irritating!! I just wanna scratch everything!

Luckily, according to the American Medical Book, they should disappear in a few hours. I sure hope they do.

And I've been trying to figure out what caused it:
Not the cats I'm taking care of, I itched before that.

So what else? It must be the food I ate for dinner. But everything I ate was perfectly normal and stuff I eat pretty often. Then I realized, I must have developed another allergy. Not the the salad, not to pork and beans but to watermelon. WATERMELON!! Why??!?!!?

Sooner or later I'm just gonna have to start carrying around a bottle of Benedryl just so I can eat at all.

Watermelon. Seriously??

Will pray for work.

My summer has been really busy, which is slightly overwhelming and stressful at times. But the past week has been so much fun! I acquired a temporary job at the Busy Beads & Moore, which I wasn't planning on. One of the employees broke her foot a while back and needed surgery on it. She's supposed to stay off it for 6-8 weeks. They're also getting a new website going and they've got free tech support for a month. So another of the employees is on the computer working on the website all day and can't go work with customers in the store while she's in the midst of that. So Sylvia called me and asked if I'd like to work for a few weeks until Young Women's Camp and EFY. It's easier than training a brand new employee and having the others work overtime, plus I LOVE working there.

Back in January, we had a Relief Society sleepover and the theme had something to do with feet or footsteps, so everything involved feet in some way. It was a lot of fun. Before the sock puppet show, one of the ladies, Ryan, was trying to recruit someone to paint a back-drop for it. Nobody was jumping at the opportunity, so I said I'd do it. When Ryan saw how well I'd painted it, she got so excited and asked me to paint her daughter's room, immediately offering to pay me. I've never painted murals or anything of the sort before, so I warned her of that, but I agreed to do it. Well, I finally have found to the time to do it! So after work each day this week, I've gone over to Ryan's house and painted in her daughter's room. I love it! I could seriously make a living out of doing stuff like this!















Ryan also wants me to paint some palm trees in her son's room. She told a friend about it, and now she might want me to paint something similar in her house too. Anybody else want some murals done?

And, all my EFY paperwork is getting sent off tomorrow. It'll all be official finally and I'll be working three sessions of EFY!

This all goes to show that prayers really do get answered in the way that's best for each of us in our personal situations. When I came home from the mission, I was prayignt hat I'd get a job so I could keep busy and make some money before school in August. I had zero luck there for a while. But I was okay with that because it allowed me to travel a lot and have tons of freedom I otherwise wouldn't have had. I was still worried about the money issue and was still searching for a job. I'm sad that Heather had to break her foot for me to have a job, but the Lord sure did answer my prayers there! I've been getting desperate. And I seem to have this skill for painting that I never knew was so developed, and now I can use that to earn some extra cash for school too. If I had gotten a job at any of the places I'd applied earlier, waiting tables or managing a book store, I think I would have hated going to work every day. What a tender mercy it is for me to be able to go and make jewelry each morning, then go and paint each afternoon. I'm so grateful for my talents and abilities, as well as the opportunities the Lord has granted me to use them for both others' and my own benefit.