Slivers and Silver Linings

Mark and me won a free photo shoot from one of my long time, high school best-friends, who is now a professional Photographer.  Amy, at Amyeliseallen Photography ( http://amyeliseallenphotography.com/ ) does such good work, and we've loved all the pictures she has done for us in the past, so I was more than thrilled when we won the give away! plus, we skipped a 2 year family photo, and this year has been really good to us, the only one missing in the pictures is Lincoln, but maybe we can get him in the Christmas card for this year!  As usual, I love, love, love the pictures! We went up Hobble Creek Canyon in Springville and took advantage of the beautiful fall colors. It was so fun, we pretty much laughed the whole time.  These pictures are extra meaningful to me, because I was 6 weeks pregnant in them. These are some of my favorites from the photo shoot!  Isn't my husband so cute?! Amy also t...

3 years of marriage is just around the corner. March, 2016 will be here and gone before we know it. Seems like time just comes and goes as it pleases, and regardless of how slow or fast it feels, it's always consistent. It seems that these 3 years have flew by. So much has happened for us in just 3 short years, and we've been incredibly blessed to spend them together.  So here's a recap, and my thoughts on a few of the things that have happened. First, I want to start with something that happened a long time ago, but I feel I have finally made peace with it, and I think both Mark and me are in a really good place in regards to our marriage and sealing in the temple. I don't regret being sealed, since I think we may have had some guilt if we hadn't gone through. Of course, there was a lot of guilt afterwards too when we completely didn't understand, or feel that the temple was right for us. Eventually we made our piece with the temple, and have since...

26.2 a poem recapping how I felt about my Marathon I can’t explain why I did it A strong pull Something to prove But not to anyone Other than myself June seems so long ago and 4 months wasn't long enough time to train in. 17 miles should never be your longest run, before a race of this size, but it was on that raining, dark day that i ran 17 that I knew more than ever that God does exist, because me and him had a long talk, as I've done on so many of my long distance runs. And while I trained I loved those long runs Where I felt connected To nature To my body, god  And my cleared mind Where I remember that I used to love running A lot more than I do now After a certain point The race is paid for And there’s no backing out And I am at the starting line, with my best friend to run the hardest race, I've ever done. The first half goes by fast Wayyyy to fast But it’s too late And by mile 17 I need to walk Something ...

Drugs Stole your life Took your soul To young.  You lost all that was All that you loved you lost everyone And anyone who new Were scared  you couldn’t be trusted So they turned you away You ended Cold, alone your favorite friend Running through your veins Which is how they found you In your truck  bed In the back alley In a bar,  a ditch,  a park You weren’t dreaming although the hunger was gone For once  Your life stolen In your wake, destruction, heartache A Deteriorated family Your deceit left everyone victims But you couldn’t stop Because you needed it Used to be a good friend Husband, wife, child, parent Until Drugs And they stole from you Your dignity, health, honesty, morals And life. Suicide I am alone Like you are alone Except there is a monster In the back of my brain Whispering lies That I believe And they won’t go away But I want them to stop Be...

Time                                                                      13 years ago Divorce divided my family But I lived I am happy. Almost as many years have passed Since your parents divorced too It wasn’t your fault It never will be. you'll see that you will live and be happy too Abandoned You walked onto the strip dressed as a  stripper And sold drugs. When you got caught,  the judge slapped you on the wrist and on the face. But it didn’t stop you And you ended up in jail anyway And you did cry, for the drugs had left you fooled you as you had fooled so many people But...

If you are on a journey to become healthy, then one thing you need to know is Breakfast is what champions are made of!, well  In my book at least. To me breakfast is hands down one of the most important meals of the day. I L-O-V-E breakfast foods. Mark is also a big breakfast eater! He wakes up at least thirty minutes earlier than he has to just to make a nice big breakfast for both of us. Even if i'm sleeping in that day, he will leave me food on the stove. It's incredibly sweet. I feel so spoiled. Here is a simple breakfast, that will fill you up, and give you energy. Scrambled Eggs, Sausage and Veggies 2-3 eggs 1 tsp. Coconut Oil/butter Dash of salt/pepper/ garlic salt ( to taste) 1 small sweet potato sliced thinly, and halved 1 small potato sliced thinly, and halved 1/4 C. Onion chopped 1 handful of arugula ( or however much you think is good) A small portion of turkey sausage ( add as much as you'd like) Half a bell pepper chopped ...

One of my life goals is to conquer the art of making food that's healthy, and really tasty. Eating healthy is such a big part of being healthy. In fact, diet is eighty percent of weight loss. That's something to think about. Since I've been married, I’ve had to learn how to make healthy dinners that aren't super expensive. Meal planning has been a big help, right along side Costco, which I endorse for all married couples! I mean, please make a list before going, because you can end up spending a couple hundred dollars in a blink of an eye, but it’s one of my favorite grocery shopping trips we make. Back to my story, so something I love about Mark, is that he enjoys cooking, and he is really, really good at it. He makes good food, because he loves to eat good food, When we first got married though, this was a somewhat of a hurdle for us, there was a big learning curve on how to cook healthy meals that we both enjoyed. Lucky for me, Mark is a big veggie eater, befo...