Lesson Learned

In a conversation with some of my family this past Saturday night I found myself talking about various things and people. I guess I was feeling pretty good about myself or maybe I was trying to make myself feel good about myself, I don't know which. I just know that when I went to bed that night I didn't feel very good about anything as I replayed part of the conversation in my mind. Conference had been wonderful and I blew the feeling I had earlier in the day by having that conversation.

On Sunday I arose looking forward to another day of wonderful General Conference messages. I was not disappointed but uplifted and encouraged to be a better person. I even apologized to my family who had heard me talk and I heard this beautiful message by President Dieter Uchtdorf. in which he spoke of just the things I had felt guilty about and his message "STOP IT." Enough said. Of course there were many messages that were important and had a lot of impact on me but I kept thinking of this one in particular as the day went on. Combine it with a message from President Spencer W. Kimball "DO IT" it is wonderful Just "STOP IT" and "DO IT" now is something that I plan to work on daily starting yesterday! I am so blessed to be able to hear Conference live, to hear living Prophets speak and counsel us. I had been praying to feel the spirit and the messages of conference and to be able to recognize the spirit as it testified to me. I am grateful for this experience and the lesson learned.

This morning on facebook the following post was on several of my friends walls. I guess it his message had a great impact on a lot of people.

I love it! I love his messages!

NCAA 2012

Who ever dreamed that I would be such a sports fan? I love going to the Collegiate games for BYU!

My favorite phrase this year comes from the fight song "Loyal, Strong and True, wear the white and blue." There have been fans who are less than stellar because both football and basketball teams didn't win every game I think both teams were terrific and I am true blue! I am not a fair weather fan.I love BYU because the honor code is what I try to live by daily and so it is easy to follow and love them.

Tonight these guys take on Iona in a play in game for the NCAA tournament, go Cougars. They should have been placed in a higher seed because of the wins but they are in and hoping to advance tonight.
Two of these guys are Seniors and won't be returning next year and I am sad I will miss watching them play, but I am looking forward to the upcoming class and the future looks good.

Post Script BYU came from 25 points behind in the first half to win the game, it was amazing. This picture of Brock is one of my favorites from the game. Round 2 here we come.

New definition

Lauri Smith Stevenson
I have a new definition of exhaustion: four days and nights in Las Vegas at a basketball ltournament and a twenty one year old with a list of to do items on the side. I wouldn't do it any different though, we had a blast!

Wendy Huff Evans, Janine Hiatt Mashburn and Christy Jensen Giles like this.


Shelly McCune Greenwood Sounds like you had a great time. Don't you wish you had the same energy you had when you were 21?

Lauri Smith Stevenson Do I ever.

WCC Championships Vegas 2012

West Coast Conference Chamionships 2012
Rebecca and I attended the MWC Championships last year, it was such a magical year that we thought that it could never be matched. With Jimmer and Jackson gone we knew it would be different. We had talked about how much fun we had so often that Kerry decided he wanted to join us this year. The WCC playoffs are held at the Orleans Arena instead of the Thomas and Mac at UNLV a little more fair in relation to the home team advantage or at least we thought!

As we turned off of the freeway towards the arena I saw the headliner on the marque that said the "Osmonds" were performing there for the same dates as the playoffs. Not Donny and Marie but the brothers. Was I heartsick that I hadn't know they were playing because I might have missed one of the nights when BYU wasn't playing to attend. I didn't think they were doing shows anymore and it would have been great for this older woman to see these even older men!

I had planned on taking a picture but missed it.
These are where our seats were assigned the only ones in the arena that weren't cushioned and directly behind the backboard. Ironically we were assigned right next to Anita, Janine and Keith. That was a fun discovery. it turns out that we never sat in these seats for more than a minute or two because we were able to move into seats abandoned by other teams fans.
This is the new banner that hangs in the arena, smaller than the others and doesn't even give the entire name of the University like the others do. Part of me wonders if they really don't expect BYU to stay in this league very long.

Rebecca had a long list of things that she wanted to do while we were in Vegas besides the games. One of the things she wanted to do was to go to Serendipity 3 to get a Frozen Hot Chocolate. She had heard how great they were. So between the women's game and the men's we went to check it out.

These two thought that it was really good, I just can't get into them. But the food was really good, huge portions.

The WCC had a twitter and facebook challenge to see which fans responded the most when we got there the first day Gonzaga's flag was up the next two BYU's flew high. Reb was quite excited to see it up.

They had great big brackets as you went it to see where each team was seated. The first night BYU played against Portland we sat in our assigned seats prior to the game. We noticed the BYU players come in to watch the game just ahead and sit close to the door. Janine noticed empty seats across the aisle and she and Rebecca headed to see if they could get close. We watched as they came down into the arena. A few minutes later I noticed them going back up and figured they were on the way back to us. Then I got a text from Reb saying to look behind the players and there they were. I could see her grinning from ear to ear clear across the arena. As the game ended we decided to try and get over by them where the Loyola fans had been sitting before the loss. We were able to sit there through the whole game and give the team high fives and congratulate them at the end. Great Fun. She was also able to mark stalking the team off of her list as well!

The next night we decided to try and take seats from the San Francisco Fans as they exited from the loss. We were able to get really great seats for the game. The seats were better than the game. We learned from the first minutes we walked into the arena that Gonzaga is not happy that BYU is in the WCC and I was appalled by the things I heard and saw throughout the tournament. I thought that I had heard and seen bad things last year, Gonzaga fans were right in the same league.
The girls had played earlier in the day and won and would face Gonzaga for the championship on Monday night. Since the championships were played on Monday we were able to rest a little on Sunday. We tried to go to church but discovered that there are no 1:00 meetings in the Vegas area. We got some lunch and then set out to mark off some of the things on her list. We went to the Vegas sign but I didn't get a copy of the picture. From there we went to the Temple grounds it was almost dark.

She wanted to try and climb the tree, not really. She was just a tree hugger.

The grounds were beautiful and you could smell Stock all over, I love it.

A beautiful place with a beautiful view.

Love these guys.

We love the Belagio Fountains and the gardens but for the second year in a row we were there while they were in the process of changing the gardens so I was sad.
We also went to M&M world for the fun of it.
Too bad this one didn't turn out a little better!
This is the remodel.
The seating for the women's game was open so we got there early to get seats to cheer on our Cougar Women. The game was quite close in the first half but our girls opened it up and won easily in the second it was great fun to watch them.
The champions!
Another things on her list was to ride New York New York but she had to ride it along because I am such a pansie and Kerry didn't dare because of the recovery time from his neck surgery. I felt bad for her. But she was happy. Just ahead of her was several Gonzaga fans still being "very gracious" not!
During the break between games we decided that we were going to be St. Mary's fans for the the final game despite the fact that they beat us in both season games. Our experience with the Gonzaga fans was so negative it was the natural thing to do.
The guy was shocked to see us walk up in our BYU Tshirts and bought three St. Mary's shirts. While in the process three guys were behind us talking about the retro shirts and couldn't see one for Gonzaga and said 'look there are two BYU ones they probably can't give them away." I quickly turned around, they obviously hadn't seen our shirts he just said "oh, oh. oh." I just walked between them and said "excuse me." Rebecca siad the guy looked so shocked and couldn't say anything. We went into the arena with our BYU shirts on and just before the game started we all stood up and put our shirts on and it was noticed by surrounding Gonzaga fans.

The response to him walking around with the hat and the shirt was hysterical. Most of the comments were funny. At half time we went over by the St. Mary's fans to try and get seats but couldn't get some together so we went back. Kerry made new friends as he explained the hat and shirt combination. It was an exciting finish and St. Mary's won in overtime. Kerry wanted to go back and talk to the people he had met, he was having a blast. As we walked through the crowd Janine chanted "it's not your house anymore." Since many of the Gonzaga fans had been chanting "it's our house" throughout the tournament. They had lost both in Women's and Men's and it wasn't their house like it had been for so many years. Many of the looks were pretty bad... The people we talked with from all of the other schools said they were not surprised by our welcome and that it was nothing new. It was surprising to hear some of the stories.

While taking pictures we made even more friends with people from St. Mary's they seemed shocked we had rooted for them..

For our women!

For St. Mary's men.

New friends!!!!!

After the game to same we were silly is an understatement!!! We headed to the Belagio once again and we were met by these Johnny Depp guys. In all of the times that we have seen the water show we have never seen a malfunction but we did tonight. While we were walking to Serendipity to finish up the night a guy dressed as Beetle Juice on stilts was standing by and Janine said if he came near her she would elbow him. He heard her and started to chase her. He had her cornered behind a tree. I was laughing so hard I didn't even think to take a picture of it.

We went to Serendipity and had Nachos and more Frozen Hot Chocolate and just laughed and relaxed. It had been a lot of fun despite the loss of the men's team and rudeness we experienced. It is fun to spend time with Janine and Anita as well.

Saying goodbye to Vegas. Good times, see ya next year. Looking forward to it.

Long Distance Valentines!

I am grateful for this man, he is my best friend, eternal companion, and so much much more. He is such a great husband and father, I could never have hoped for more.

We are apart way to much but technology makes it bearable. Noth of our Mother's had spouses who were gone a lot. They didn't have the benefit of cell phones, instant messaging, facebook, or skype. I am not sure how they did it so well, it makes it easier. This trip we have been using skype in the evenings and it is nice to see him and hear him at the sametime. We have even been doing our nightly scripture study this way, pretty cool. While I miss him terribly while he is gone I am so grateful for technology.

Happy Valentines Day to my Sweetheart and Companion, I love you with all my heart.
Sorry your package was a little chessy!

It has been a fun basketball season again at BYU even though not as dynamic as last year! I am a true blue fan so it is fun to go to the games even if they do lose. Part of the fun is taking different family members with us to the games. Today I invited Rachel, Cameron, and Jack to go with me but Cam couldn't. Jack was adorable as always. He still performs for the camera and it so cute. A video of the game is on the bottom of this post.

BYU played Pepperdine and the game went quickly in favor of BYU so it was easy to just sit and play with Jack. It was fun to watch him take in all of the new things.

This picture really doesn't give the scene justice but the sunset coming out of the Marriott Center was just beautiful.

This is as we walked across the bridge and headed toward the new Alumni Building. BYU won the game 86-48. I was a little relfective that this season is in the sunset of the year. Silly I know but it has been a lot of fun to go to the games the last couple of years.

Oregon Coast--BYU vs University of Portland

This is a weekend that Rebecca has been looking forward to for quite awhile, enough so that she had a countdown on her on blog for it. It had two things she loves Oregon, and of course BYU Basketball.

Upon arrival we went and got our rental car and Kerry decided to find the place BYU would be playing so we weren't trying after dark to locate it and to know where to park. After we did that we headed to one of our favorite places to eat in Portland. Happy Garden.

We have never found a place that makes Szechuan Chicken like this place. We literally loved it!

After we checked into the Hotel in Newport we walked along the beach until it started to get dark and then decided to go and find a place where we could watch the sunset with theYaquina bridge in the forefront. It was beautiful to watch the sun go down from the other side of the bay.
Watching Kerry try to get the perfect shot is as much fun as it the view. Rebecca called him paparazzi all weekend long.

After the sunset we headed to Mo's our favorite place in Newport! Then to check out movie times but decided everything was to late for us as tired as we were, at least some of us!

After breakfast on Saturday we headed down to the beach by Otter Rock to check out the tide pools which was hard because the tide was in quite high. There was a lot of damage from winter storms along the cliffs again.

Rebecca couldn't resist making her mark for the Cougars!

This is the most water we have seen flowing down this cliff in a long time.

Paparazzi at it's best!!!!

What a cutie!!!!

Time to head back to Portland after stopping in Lincoln City Mo's for one last meal on the coast.

When we arrived at the game we realized how close the players were to where we walked in. We couldn't resist taking some pictures.

While taking some pictures of Reb right behind the bench she realized Greg Rubel (the voice of the Cougars) was also taking her picture. It appeared on a post of Twitter talking about how many BYU fans were there, at least double maybe even triple that of the Portland team. it was fun to see her in that post and for him to respond back to her.

This guy was hilarious as he came into the game, you would have believed that he was really blind. It is his way of expressing his displeasure for the refs in the WCC. We thought it was just people from BYU who felt that way.

Our seats were on the very top row but because the arena is so small, like a High School gym, they weren't bad. We were also in the middle of the aisle so we had clear vision and could stand up all we wanted. We were happy there were so many BYU people there, it was fun and so was the game.

oops, back to the beach, oh well.

Depoe Bay

Sunday before we flew out we went to Multnomah Falls and walked around and up to the bridge. It was freezing!!!! The wind was blowing in the Gorge so bad you could hardly stand up.

Horsetail Falls

Crown Point the wind wouldn't allow us to stand up at all.

Rebecca also wanted to walk around the Portland temple so we went. I had forgotten how beautiful this building was.

Time for one more trip to Happy Garden and then to the airport to head home. What a fun weekend but wow did it go fast!