Oh the Beautiful Spirit of Christmas

I had a conversation with a lady the other day who is one of Jehovah's Witnesses. She is quite a wonderfully nice, caring, and good woman. Our conversation went the way of talking about the celebration of the Christmas holiday. She said, "You know that Christ was probably not born on that day right? The Bible, when read correctly says that He was born in the Spring." I agreed with her and said that I believed the same thing. She then asked why then did I celebrate Christmas.

The meaning of Christmas, for me, has been created throughout my life through many memories and learning by watching those around me. There is one person that I would say that has taught me the most about the true "Spirit of Christmas", my grandma, Erma Andersen. I can almost still hear her singing in my mind "Oh the beautgiful Spirit of Christmas, It came at the Holy One's birth. When the message of gladness and glory was brought to this slumbering earth.
Beautiful Spirit of Christmas, Beauitful Spirit of Love. Sent by the bounitful Father, sent from His mansions above.
Oh the Beauitful Spirit of Christmas, it broods o'er the spirits of men, and the hearts that were hard and unthankful, grow kindly and tender again.
Beautiful Spirit of Christmas, Beauitful Spirit of Love. Sent by the bounitful Father, sent from His mansions above."

She loved the Savior, and she loved Christmas. She was the best giver I've ever known. I can remember that with every Christmas that came, there was also a focus on serving. I suppose that through her love for Christ, Grandma was able to teach me that Christmas was about making a way for everyone to be happy.

Grandma had a figurine of Santa kneeling at the manger side of the Savior. She loved to give, but not because of all the hype and "commercializing" that everyone complains about. She loved to give because of the love she gave with each present that was unwrapped.

I feel so blessed to have that continued example in my life with my parents and the way they go about Christmas.

How grateful I am to know the true meaning of Christmas, to have been taught to understand the gift of the Son.

Oh Sweet Tender Mercies

The last week has been full of incredible miracles from friends being at the right place right when I needed it, to being led and guided in every way. I just wanted to give an update on my sit. I was offered a job this morning as a Recreation Director at a care facility nursing home type setting. I'm a little nervous about the completely different situation than I have ever put myself in before and doing rec. therapy with a completely different group of peops, but I'm pretty excited. I know that I've been led to this experience and that it'll all turn out great! It will be fun to interact with my new fun friends...I love old people...that's another thing that I don't know the politically correct name for...senior citizens...my elders...old people...? So yep, I start the job on Monday and I'm super amounts of excited about it!!! Life is wonderful and I'm so blessed!

My sweet life today

I hope that I'll be able to fully capture my feelings and thoughts in this here post....my life completely changed from where I thought it was going in a matter of ten minutes yesterday. Since those ten minutes, I've felt feelings I've never felt in such depth and I've learned things I didn't even know I needed to learn or understand. I'm humbled by the goodness of the my Father, to whom I owe everything.
On Monday, my boss pulled each of us rec. therapists in one at a time to tell us that they'd have to be eliminating one of the positions and he was wondering if there was anyone who was planning on moving on with life soon. Come to find out, no one was. So yesterday, after having being there for about two hours, he asked me to take a walk with him down to the admin building. This I willingly did knowing it was almost certainly my last along that road as an employee.
We made small talk about...random stuff :) really I was thinking about the past six months and how good they had been. I'd learned so much from those kids, felt so much love for them, learned so much from my co-workers...colleagues...whatever the professional name is for the people you work with. There have been many times, walking back to the office from a group along that same pathway, that I just couldn't help but smile and laugh to myself at how much I loved what I did and who I got to do it with. There were other times that I would walk back to the office so frustrated and confused at what else I could do. And now I was walking the road for the last time.
The HR woman explained everything to me, they wish they didn't have to let me go, but they had to. No money meant no choice. I was pretty proud of myself for holding everything I was feeling in there while at her office. I don't remember most of what she said, I was focused more on what I was feeling.
I wasn't even quite sure if I could pinpoint the feeling. Was I angry? No, not angry. Hurt? A little, no, a lot. Not by them letting me go, but because I had to go, that hurt. Sad? Very. Confused? Yes, about what I would do next. I wanted to stay. I almost wanted to tell them, I didn't care if they wouldn't pay, I wanted to stay.
She took my badge, and I walked alone back to the office (my boss had left after the HR lady was done explaining that I would be laid off). I went up the stairs, and there were the people that I like so much and have been incredible examples to me. Because of them, I am who I am right now. I won't go into detail, but yep, they've helped me so much as I've learned by observing them and talking with them.
I'll fast-forward (sorta) through the rest of yesterday. I cried a lot some. Spent time with friends. And spent a lot of time thinking. I felt so beautifully the Lord's love and assurance, I still do. People ask how I'm doing...it's kind of a hard question for me to answer. I'm doing okay, I feel hope, peace, love, and I'm gaining understanding. So with that in mind, I'm wonderful! It hurts, but I'm wonderful.
I had the opportunity this morning to attend the temple with a wonderful friend. I was taught a principle there that has helped me to gain confidence in all that is taking place and hope for the future. It is something taught in the book of Abraham and I'll call it the "be prepared" principle.
It is actually taught throughout the scriptures in about...well I didn't count...but a lot of places. I'll start in Abraham though.
Abraham uses phrases like "prepare the earth", "order the (fill in the blank)", "organized the lights", and "Let us prepare the waters". In Alma 18:39 it talks about the plan that the Lord has "prepared from the foundation of the world". Alma 13 uses that phrase multiple times to describe the Lord's planning. The earth had to be prepared step by step in order to be ready for the children of God to inhabit it. Prepared and organized in every detail and way.
The pre-earth life was preparation for this earth life, and this earth life is preparation for eternity (Alma 34:33). The Law of Moses was preparation for the coming of Christ (Mosiah 13:30-31; 2 Nephi 11:4). The baptismal covenant is a preparatory covenant to the covenants made in the temple (Elder Bednar, April 2009).
The Lord tells us that "[He] prepared all things..." (D&C 104:17). If it is a preparation process, that must mean that there is something coming next.
In Ether it talks about the Jaredites and their journey across the sea. The Lord gives them specific instructions and then says "And behold, I prepare you against these things; for ye cannot cross this great deep save I prepare you against the waves of the sea, and the winds which have gone forth, and the floods which shall come" (Ether 2:25). I would have to say that the Lord has truly prepared me throughout my life to experience what I have to this point. Surely this is preparing me further.
I'm not quite sure what tomorrow will bring. I'm excited to find out. All the same, I know the promise the Lord makes in 1 Nephi 17:13, the "[He] will prepare the way before [me], if it so be that [I] shall keep [His] commandments...and [I] shall know that it is by [Him] that [I] am led." I know preparations have been made and I'll see the way laid out as I choose to be an "agent" (D&C 104:17).

Killing some time...

Well it has been past my six week earring mark, which technically means that I can take out these studs I've had in my ears and spice up my ears' lives, for some reason I have yet to do so. Maybe I will in the next week...I'll add that to the happy list of fun things to do in this next week.
I finished my internship a week ago today. That was a happy happy happy day. Now that walking thing I did in April is officailly official. I finished writing my last paper that morning, thanks to a good friend that helped me edit it so it sounded somewhat educated. Kind of crazy that I wouldn't have to write any more papers if I didn't want to...
Monday I started my officailly grown-up life at a full-time job as a recreation therapist. A happy happy thing in my life is that the place where I have been doing my internship hired me...have I said that before? If not, well I'm saying it now, I got hired, oh happy day! And so this past week I've been being an employee and stuff. It's been fun!
To celebrate this event of getting a full-time job, I'm taking a week off! Pretty awesome yeah? So right now I'm sitting at the airport, waiting to board the plane to happy Arizona to see my family!!! I'm soooooooooooooooooo excited! Then I'm going to go play with my wonderful friends Carie and Amy in San Francisco for a few days. Can life get any better? I don't think so...
I moved out of beloved Regency apartments where I have been living for the last year and eight months (the longest I've lived anywhere besides with my family) and moved in with Carie's parents for about a week and a half. It has been a wonderful blessing. They are pretty neat.
When we come back we're going to be moving into our new place which will be an adventure I'm excited to have.
Yep so my life continues to be sweet. Can't believe how beautifully everything lays itself out. Nothing short of a miracle from a loving Father. :)

A little somethin' new

So...for many months now I have been tossing the idea around to pierce my ears. After much debate I finally did it...so now I have pierced ears. The deed is done. And that's about it. Kind of weird to just post a picture of my ear...but nothing else was turning out postable.

Mid-summer update

So, because I can't decide between all the things that I should/wanted to get done this morning, updating my blog became the thing to do in the moment. Much has happened since May 3, but then again, not too much either. I found myself twice down in Moab. That's kind of a funny way to say that, I wasn't lost, I knew I was going there, so I should just say that I went twice to Moab in the last couple weeks. We took the kids from my internship. It was an amazing trip both times and I loved every second of having the opportunity to get to know them better and being one with nature like I like to do. There is nothing like smelling like sunscreen, river water, bug spray, and sweat. The views were amazing, cameras don't really do it justice at all.

They were such wonderful trips in every way possible. I have love every second getting to know these kids and working with them. I wish that I could write and post pictures of them and our fun adventures together...but since I can't I'll just say that I love them and working with them and the fun we have together.

Everything else in life is going grandly. With the spring term ending I lost a few roommates and gained a few more. I can't believe I just have two months left here in the Reg. Besides the internship I end up just playing a lot and hanging out....yep, it's a pretty wonderful life.

This isn't much of a post because I pretty much lost the zeal for writing it the minute I started writing...but things are good and wonderful and happy!

almost graduation!

So this here is a picture of Brandice and I...we were in the same freshman ward, and we served in the same mission, and then how precious-we were able to sit next to each other graduation. Last weekend I "graduated". It was only a "graduation" because I won't technically be done until August when I'm done with my internship that I'm doing this summer. Another monumental moment in my life took place this past week was that I quit my job at the MTC. It was pretty much the saddest moment in all of forever...so that might be a little dramatic. I woke up Saturday morning last with a feeling that I needed to do it. It was quite an experience being that I had no idea where funding for my life was going to come from, but it all happened quite rapidly. The decision was made Saturday, confirmed Sunday, executed Monday, and Tuesday was my last day. Bam, el fin. Though it was quite a drastic change, I'm feeling really good about the gained beautiful summer time time that I have. Hm...other news in my life would consist of...five new roommates, that are wonderful although it was quite an adjustment to my past roommates whom I miss with all my whole heart. (I guess that is what the term "all" refers to, a "whole"). And that's the life of Mel today...

Another day, another trip, more new unexpected friends

I go on adventures every day. Some days my adventures are a little bit different than other days. Friday's adventure was such an experience. I decided the other week to travel home and surprise my brothers and sisters with my graceful presence. The plan was to arrive home right before the kids got home from school. I enlisted Erma my cousin, a gal in the ward named Heather whom I love, and another gal named Nicole whom I didn't know until that morning but now I have a huge place in my heart for her. The last two both served their missions in Mesa. So at approximately 6:16 and 24 seconds am MST on Friday morning we left on our merry way. We had a beautiful drive making great time all day, timing was working out great and I was very much looking forward to our surprise. As we approached Flagstaff I was a little nervous because of our last experience coming in Flagstaff but we reached our regular gas fill-up stop without sign of trouble. We got onto the road again and had been about a minute when the battery light came on (we just bought a new battery a week ago) then the car over-heated and the power steering went out. Luckily we were able to get off the interstate pretty quickly and pulled of into a Conoco station. I sure realized that I would be a lot buffer in the arms if we didn't have such a thing as power steering. Heather had to help me pull the wheel a couple times. I feel like I have truly come to know cars a lot better lately, at least I've come to know mine, inside and out. I called my dad and told him we were having trouble and I'd keep him posted, looked under the hood at everything. It all looked mostly normal to me except that the belt looked kind of loose and there was fluid of some sort pouring out of some hose...I called Carie's dad...who has been more than generous with helping me through my pathetic knowledge of cars, and as I started to talk to him, some man stuck his head under our hood and said "well this is your problem" and pulled the hose right out...well almost right out, it was still connected. Carie's dad said that that sounded like it was the problem and to get that worked out...so our friend Alvin told us to go to Jiffy Lube...well we inched our way there and met some more friends...who's names I don't know...oh wait, one really nice guy who called people for us, his name was Larson Spencer... who told us that that wasn't the real problem, we had a broken idler...whatever that is....and that is why the belt came off. Hm, so we call a tow truck and have an appointment at Randy's garage. So then we sat in the car for an hour waiting for the tow truck man to come. An hour passes, and then some, and we finally see him coming, we were rather excited. Our tow truck man, we decided to call him Frank, said that we could ride in our car on top of the tow truck!!! It was super fun, kind of like riding on a ride at Disneyland...or six flags. He tilted the bed of his truck, hooked some hooks onto the bottom of our car, and then it pulled us up on top of the bed. It was rather exciting. We got to Randy's and found out that Frank's name was really John...but people around there called him Juan, so we did too. I'm sure we brought light and happiness in Juan's, Randy's, and Curt's (who was the guy who actually fixed the car and offered the borken part to us as a memory of our adventure...we declined offering it to him as a souvenir...he declined too...so it got thrown away) lives yesterday. Sure enough they found this thing that was supposed to hold the belt on totally broken and no longer holding the belt on, they replaced it, and just over three hours after breaking down we were back on our way car fixed and all. I don't know that I'll ever drive through Flagstaff without getting scared that my car will break down now. So...yep, there you have it. Great fun with my new friends. While they were fixing our car we took ourselves a little walk up and down the street in Flagstaff, it was a grand walk...and that was good too...thus ended another adventure fourteen hours after it started. Oh my happy life...we're super blessed that it broke down when it did and that we could meet Alvin, Larson, John, Randy, and Curt...timing and everything was perfect... :)

ah life :)

This, again, has been quite a month. It's time to update the few readers of this here blog on the happenings in the sweet life of Mel. Last I wrote I was thinking that it was time to head east....so to help readers understand my thought processi through this whole decision experience:
Choice A: Stay in Provo, do my internship at Heritage Schools working with amazing kids and doing what I really want to do and what will help me a lot in the future with what I want to accomplish in the way of helping youth get out of their issues and live productive happy lives.
Choice B: Sun Valley Adaptive Sports. Not only is this in Idaho, but it is where I spent seven happy months. I LOVE it there. What attracted me to this opportunity besides the location was that I would have the opportunity to get a little different experience than I have in the past with therapeutic recreation. I would have the opportunity to work with mentally and physically disabled wonderful individuals. I actually really, really, really, really enjoy talking and working with disabilities, so this was an exciting thought of an adventure.
Choice C: Children's village, New York. When I interviewed with these people I realized that I didn't really want this one very much. It sounded incredibly fun and exciting, but my role wouldn't have been so much a recreation therapist as it would have been a play pal...which I love doing, but for my internship I really wanted to get a little more clinically involved and see what that is like.
So, by virtue of the interview alone, choice C was vetoed and got rid of itself. Choice B and A both offered me a position... Choice B was a no go, even though it was to be amazing...and so here I be. So for all those that shuddered at the thought of losing my presence from this happy valley, shudder no more. Now just to decide what to do in August....I think I'm feeling I'll be here....
Now that I have that decision out of the way, it relieved some stressfulness that I was feeling...I think it did anyway. School has been crazy busy. I think it is time to introduce the world to my friend, Sniffy the virtual rat. I spent an evening with Sniffy the other day. He was trouble if there ever was any. This was last week in the midst of decisions, and waiting for phone calls, four tests, a quiz or two, a late night of reading the wrong week's class material, and oh so much other stuff. And then I had Sniffy. He is a program for my learning behaviors class and we have been classically conditioning him to...oh boy, I don't even remember what we've been classically conditioning him to do, but this last week we switched to operant conditioning. My task was to condition my friend Sniffy to press the bar (that you can see right over him) above the hopper (where the food lands) in his little cage so that he could get a food pellet. You'd think that he would quickly oblidge since he was getting a good deal out of it, 'twas not the case. The manual that we have is supposed to teach us how to train Sniffy, it usually gives great directions. This busy night it was not so. I actually had to do two experiments with him. The first trained him that the hopper delivered food. I had that one out of the way in no time. I'm a great food-comes-from-hopper-trainer for Sniffy. The next task was to train him that every time he went up on his hind legs, the hopper delivered food, then that proximity to the hopper brought a higher possibility of food, then pressing the bar. I had a really hard time getting to that last one. It took an hour and a half, he kept untraining himself because he wouldn't go up on his hind legs next to the hopper, so he wouldn't get a pellet, so he quit going up on his hind legs. I was really grumpy at the virtual rat. However, after much suffering and frustratedness, he did what I wanted him to, and all was well. I can't imagine what others around me thought as I sat in the library with a rat on my screen just pressing my space bar for an hour and a half...hopefully no one noticed.
So that's my life...decisions, Sniffy, and...nope that's pretty much it. It's a pretty happy life.

Maybe time for somewhere new...

I've had quite a mind pondering month. It's hard to believe that it is February. My lack of seriousness for the goal of August 20th as a wedding date never really materialized itself as manifested in my not doing anything to move toward that goal...it was fun to talk about though :). I sit hear right now listening to my Brazilian roommates ramble on and on with their Brazilian friend. I understand what they are talking about everytime they say an English word that they don't have a Brazilian word for...but mostly they could be making fun of me and I would have no idea...except for the fact that I think we're friends, I've been playing with them a lot latey, so I don't think they would make fun of me like that...
Anyway, back to my pondering. I've been thinking a lot about what I want to do, what I want to be, and where all I want all this to happen. Actually, that's not true, I know what I want...wait, not I don't, but it isn't very much about what I want....
It's internship application time. I found out today about an internship in New York, a "quaint historic town" about twenty miles north of New York City. It sounds just like anything that I've ever wanted to do.
I think that next time it rains, I'm going to spend a little time looking for the pot at the end of the rainbow so that I can do all the things that I think would be amazingly awesome, because as of right now I don't have the money to do it all. That or I need to get into the money making business. Well, by that I mean the actually physical making of money, I already have a job. Which, by the way, I love and is a huge reason why I wish I could continue to prolong my moving on with life.
Or I could move to Jamaica, surely I could find somewhere there to do an internship.
Or I could stay here in Provo. Bonuses being things such as, being closer to people that I actually know, and my family, and have a car. ...so my Brazilian friends just invited me to join the Brazilian facebook....I like them. Back to the internship thing...And I would...well maybe if I went somewhere else I would get offered a job and I would live in Timbuktu for the rest of my life and fall of the western United States planet.
So I don't know, we'll see. Maybe it would be good for me to go far away...
This entry might not have made any sort of sense whatsoever, mostly because it doesn't include all of the thoughts inbetween the words... :) I can translate if you want

just two random things

Well, it has been a little bit since I've written anything, and a lot of things have happened, but since I don't have to time to include every exciting second of my life, which is basically every one of them, I'll stick with a two experiences that have occurred in the last couple days that make me laugh and bring joy to my life.
The first is that I have a new friend. Her name is Rita. I met Rita over the phone at the Referral Center at the MTC. She had called last month to receive a Joy to the World DVD and I was making calls to give an example to the Elders I am working with right now. Rita's information popped up on the screen, she being my twentieth try to catch someone at home, and so I was taken off-guard when she answered. Upon investigation, also known as simply asking her, I learned that she hadn't received her video and she was sad about it, really had wanted to receive it. It took me about a second to realize that Rita was not from the United States of America because she had a thick, heavy, Italian accent. It reminded me of my Aunt Doris, I told Rita so. Rita said she didn't want to have the missionaries bring her the DVD because she was a Catholic and was always going to be a Catholic, and she was a 63 year old woman and nothing in the world could change her from being a Catholic, she had a niece, in Chicago, or Michigan, or something that has the letters c, h, and i in it, that was Catholic, then Jehovah's Witness, then Mormon, then Catholic and when she was Jehovah's Witness, she quit wanting to work for Rita because Rita was earning too much money and money is not a righteous thing to go after and Rita thought that was weird because we need money to leave, it wasn't like she was worshipping the money that the Lord was blessing her to have, but she was Catholic and was always going to be Catholic. (She really did make all of that, and probably more, all one sentence). So I realized that Rita wasn't going to just say yes to having the missionaries come see her, I decided to take a different approach. She acted like she knew a lot about the church, so I asked her how she did, then she started to tell me again about her niece in that other place back east, but she knew all about it she said and she didn't understand how come religions couldn't just get along we all believe in the same thing essentially. Well I felt like she wasn't quite ready for my answer about that either, I knew I had to find a common ground with her, so I asked her about prayer. Bingo. She prayed, and boy did I hear many great stories. Actually I can say that she is pretty much amazing, she had some miraculous stories, and I felt the Spirit strong as she told me some of them. There was, however, the whole Mother Mary thing, so I decided to try for the Bible, this was my favorite part I think. Rita started to tell me about how her...daughter-in-law I think...gave her an Italian Bible since she didn't read English very well. She was given the Bible five years ago, but hasn't ever opened it. She explained to me that she felt bad, but that she had told the Lord that the day she opens that Bible, she will never close it again. So I invited Rita to open the Bible this week. We're going to chat again next week. I'm excited to talk to my new friend Rita. Oh her Italian accent makes me so happy, I wish there were a way to type in an Italian accent.
The second thing that is kind of new is that I decided that I could and should and why not get married on the 20th of August of this year. The fun part is telling people. I decided just this past Sunday. It is a lot just an act of faith, deciding on a goal and then moving forward with it. There are many parts to this goal that I'm working on. I'm going to ask boys on dates now a little more than I used to....that's not hard to do when you never do it :). And I'm going to employ a little bit of flirting maybe...I don't know, I haven't really thought about how I'm going to accomplish the goal, I just set it. I should probably work on the ligistics of the execution. I told my parents on Sunday night when I was talking with them. They laughed at me. I'm not quite sure how to take that response. My mom said that I should probably meet someone in order to get married to the in seven months...I didn't realize that that was all the time in between now and August 20th. I told my Bishop tonight...he laughed too. I'm not quite sure how to take that one either...so yes, it was random, I'm not even sure how it came up, but I feel okay about it...so we'll see :)
Hm, that's all I think for now.

Zipadeedodah-day

The snow is falling outside and I get to be inside! That's a wonderful relationship. Sunday night I celebrated at one a.m. that it was the last time that I am obligated to stay up that late because of work. No mas! Oh happy day. I began the semester off right by sleeping-in yesterday. No classes Monday mornings I think just might be a very happy thing. So I did that, enjoyed a very relaxing morning around the apartment. I went to my class at one about. It was wonderful to be in school again. I'm excited this semester to be taking a bunch of psychology classes and to be philosophical and stuff. I've loved my classes and the way that the professors approach the topics so far.
I can't believe how much the snow has fallen over the last day, tonight, as I walked home from campus, I completely slipped and so now my bum is wet, speaking of which, I should probably change. It was pretty much embarrassing, but I am pretty smooth on my get-up procedure. Gratefully, the two guys that I had been walking next to just seconds prior had passed me up and I didn't need to have them watch me fall. That was a blessing. The last time I was around this much snow was in Sun Valley Idaho. I pretty much slipped every other day, maybe that is why I am smooth on getting up, I've had a little practice. It is a lot easier to get up in pants than it was in a skirt though. When I was there we had about this much snow on the ground, and we made snow angels in our skirts...don't worry it wasn't during proselyting time.
Hm, this is all a bunch of randomness, mostly just because I am procrastinating looking at all the things that I'm supposed to be doing...so I probably should be getting to that right about right now...